Just When Everything Was Going So Well
By Luke Mepham

She went into the kitchen hoping to find the grizzly remains of her friends. Nobody else was in the house. The sound of the tap dripping echoed through the house. Her blood stained trainers were squeaking on the hard kitchen tiles. Casey took a deep breath as she saw that the door to the pantry was ajar. ‘Oh shit' she whispered. Building up all of her courage, she reached out to open it further. Would it be James' mangled corpse falling on her? Or would Holly's chewed up face be hanging off the end of the crooked hook? Yes that crooked hook; the one belonging to the disfigured former mechanic. Part of his face was missing and his eye must be hanging out, especially after what Tom did to him before he met his sticky end. The door swings open and there's nothing there. Casey was relieved but took too much time in thinking that it was all over. She failed to see the silhouetted arm of the killer rising up behind her with the meat cleaver. Just when she thought it couldn't get any worse, down came the cleaver straight into her neck.

"That's so predictable" cried Jenny, "I'm bored".
The TV is switched off and the two girls look at each other unimpressed. Jenny and Sophie were the best of friends. They've finished school and have four weeks until they upgrade into college students. They owned their year at school. Two of the most popular, beautiful, cheerleading and academic students of the town had a huge fascination with horror films. They know their rules for surviving one, they know their urban legends, they know their horror movie trivia but tonight they rented the apparent ‘scariest film of the decade' and just wasn't happy with it.
"It started off okay but then sunk when they revealed who the killer was. Why can't they leave it until the end like the old ones?" said Sophie. "Let's face it, we've seen all the horrors, banned, Italian, found footage, slasher, I just think they've run out of ideas."
Jenny gets up and ejects the disc from the player. Her long blonde hair is flowing down to the base of her back as she walks with the disc to her bag to take it back to the rental shop.

The window steams up from the outside. There's somebody looking in unbeknownst to the girls. The street lights go off at eleven and so even if they looked out the window they wouldn't see anybody. The person looking in on them is dressed in a black raincoat and a black rain hat. He watches Jenny join Sophie on the floor, wearing their shorts and baggy t-shirts.

"I think we should find another rental shop"
"Agreed" nodded Jenny.
The whole room lit up a fantastic white for a second. Their eyes widen in excitement. They begin counting together.
"One, Two, Three, Four –"
The clap of thunder follows.
They love thunder and lightning. Anything that's horror, they love. Sophie gets up and looks outside. The rain pelts off the window and runs down. More lightning flashes up the street but for longer this time. It was almost too long because in the time that the street had lit up, Sophie saw him. The man in the raincoat was staring directly at her. His face was inches away but kept apart by the glass.
She jumps back.
"Who's that?" she shrieks.
"Who's what?" answered Jenny.
Sophie begins pointing at the window.
Jenny goes over the window and can't see him.
"Oh my God" she says
"What?"
"I think you've gone and let all of those horror films mess with your head"
"You're kidding" says Sophie "There's a man in a black raincoat out there and he stared directly into my face. I'm not making this up."
"Sophie, we just spent what seemed an eternity on watching a horror movie where the killer is a man in a black raincoat. Grow up."
Jenny has her back to the window and misses out on seeing the man again as there's more lightning. The big wardrobe of a man is standing behind her. You could fit two of her inside to match the size.
Sophie begins to back off.
"Look its fine" Jenny says. "You want some air?"
Jenny then opens the window and lets some rain in.
"Close it!" shrieks Sophie.
Jenny humours her and goes to shut the window.
The man grabs her wrist and sticks his head in. Jenny and Sophie both scream.
"Don't!" shouts the man.
Jenny kicks the man in the face with her barefoot. It didn't hurt him but he backed off and fell over a flower pot.
She grabs the window handle and hears the man say something. She couldn't work it out. It sounded like ‘I'm here to kill you.'
Sophie tries her phone but there's no reception. She throws it down in frustration.
"This is a whole fucking cliché of horror films."
Jenny grabs her by the arm and turns off all the lights then takes her upstairs and into her bedroom.
She looks out the window to see the man still lying on the floor. He looks up at her and she backs away.
"He said he's going to kill us" said Jenny
"Well I'm glad you believe me now" said Sophie sarcastically.

The man gets up whilst looking at the upstairs window.
"Get out now!" he shouted up at them. "Come on!"
"He won't come in, he's calling us out as if it's a fight" said Jenny.

THUD, THUD

He begins throwing clumps of dirt at the window.

CRACK, CRACK

And then stones. Jenny and Sophie scream and hide under the bed. The window cracks after a stone bounces off it.
They hide under the bed, waiting for the noise to stop and the man to go.
"I said GET OUT!" cried the man again. "I'm here to help you!" he begins to grow weaker and breathless.
The man then gives up and begins to walk off.
"I think he's gone, should I check?" asks Jenny.
"No not yet. Wait for the rain to stop" said Sophie.
They listen out for the man, to see if he has anymore dirt or threats to throw at them. Then there was a funny smell in the room with them. They couldn't place it, it was rotten. Could he have gotten in through the back door or the downstairs toilet window or the front door?
It was that when Sophie felt something brush against her sole.
"Don't do that" she whispered
"Do what?" asked Jenny
"Brush your foot against mine"
"I didn't, mine are over here"

Jenny Munday and Sophie Heath, the two horror movie geeks, who know all of their horror movie rules, all of their horror movie trivia, and how to survive if they were in a horror movie forgot one rule:

Under the bed is where the monsters live.

By the time they realized the errors of their ways it was too late. Sophie is sucked into its mouth head first so there were no screams.
Jenny manages to get out from under her bed and to bang on the windows. She shouts and pleads for the man to turn back around.
He's failed in his mission to help them.
A hairy, slimy tentacle then slithers its way to Jenny and wraps itself around her leg.
The man outside looks round to see Jenny. She slowly slides down the window back under the bed to her demise.
He shakes his head and then carries on walking.

Jenny Munday and Sophie Heath, who WERE two horror movie geeks, who KNEW all of their horror movie rules, and KNEW all of their horror movie trivia, but DIDN'T know how to survive if they were in a horror movie.

The End