“Nightmare at the Plantation”
By
U.T. Haugen
Down Fort Morgan Road, in lower Alabama, just about a half mile from the fort is a condominium community by the name of the ‘Plantation’, close to the water, as most condos are. Within this condo community is; along with other points of interest, a pizza stand.
It was at least one and a half weeks until Spring Break. She sat there without a customer in sight. There were people walking by, yet, none offered to stop, much less come inside the screened in porch and order a pizza or cold drink. Looking out across the few natural sand dunes left ‘untouched’, an unexpected cold wind caught her off guard and forced a shudder through her cherubic body.
Breezes are common place down on the beach, yet, the thermometer had been reading ninety degrees. Glancing down at her ‘Mickey Mouse’ watch, it read 1:35. The sun went into hiding behind some dark cobalt gray clouds; then was gone. The huge clouds came in closer, threatening for a storm. The way they rolled in was much too fast for an ordinary thunderstorm. The whole sky became this cobalt gray with the darkness spreading as far as she could see.
Picking up the handset to the phone she’d call her manager to tell him of the turn of events and ask if she should keep it open…the phone line was dead.
Maintenance and security was busy collecting people off the beach, from the pool and gathering them, they led them inside their buildings to safety as lightening began striking.
Humungous bolts struck first into the Gulf slowly, conflicting with the pace of the clouds and struck intermittently about three to five minutes apart. The many clouds had become one gargantuous spreading cloud, turning the day into night, not just dark but,the most intense pitch of black imaginable.
Turning on the patio lights did little, if any good, for her own piece of mind. She had smoked her last cigarette hours earlier and was praying somebody, anybody would come to tell her that the manager said to, “Pack it in!” or maybe just have a cigarette or pack of cigarettes she could bum or buy or trade for.
The darkness was unnerving enough without the feeling of isolation, and that isolation weighed on her like a ton of bricks. No one came. Condo dwellers were warned to go to their rooms, unplug or turn off their appliances and stay inside. Maintenance had been sent home and those who chose to stay did, inside the buildings.
Security, however, were searching high and low for anyone they could have missed earlier.
The lightening was striking much closer now, too close; about thirty feet away from the building she was in. Lightening so bright she had to shield her eyes from it as it penetrated the blinding dark with explosions that rocked the ground, rattled the pans on the shelves and quite literally shook the little block building she was in; closer, pounding down like a giant
jackhammer too large to strike fast.
The thunder was crashing. Lightening striking like a deadly electric cobra leaving craters where the dunes had been just before. The darkness was invading her very soul to the point of near hysteria. The one and only thing or though that made her stop, made her stop dead in her tracks before the first step to sprinting could have been the last, the loud splashing.
Splashing as though a child were in the pool but, this was not small bare feet splashing in a pool; but rather really large shoes. She couldn’t see it, but she somehow knew the difference.
Breathing. She could hear heaving breathing. Sounding like it was in her ear. Heavy, rasping, almost wheezing. No matter how hard she strained to see, she could only hear it.
Fear beyond any she had ever known before took her into it’s bosom and began to feed into her mind terrors never before dreamed. The back door flew open with a loud BANG as it slammed against the utility sink. Footsteps. Large ones. The little building was pitch black with the loss of lights and she checked to make sure she had turned the oven off.
The footfalls stopped, she guessed maybe six feet, just the other side of the oven away from her, yet I this very small space she didn’t have much room to maneuver.
A loud crash as something was knocked over and hit the floor. She fought the urge to scream. She didn’t dare move. She didn’t dare to make a sound. The foot steps came closer still, and then stopped. It was breathing on her. She remained still, holding her breath until it touched her. She swallowed ever so slightly the bile that had worked up to her throat. She silently winced, forcing the foul fluid back down.
It’s heavy labored breathing told her it was right there when a bright light flashed, and it had a flashlight shining in it’s own face. It spoke. The fear had ascended to a crescending screech followed by the inevitable soiling of her underwear.
For the first time in her entire life of living a distant real life nightmare, she fainted.
The lights were now on, the dough was loaded up and the store ready to lock up as she awoke sitting upright in the spindly chair staring into the face of her manager, who smiled, while shaking his head and said, ”Gotcha!”
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