Tap Tap Tapping
Near the kitchen is a door to wooden stairs that lead to the basement. Willi doesn’t like the basement. It’s not finished at all, even though Mother and Father keep saying they have plans to. It smells and it’s always wet and musty for some reason. Plus, the stairs don’t creak at all when she goes down them and that’s just dreadful.
Willi’s not scared, of course. She reads, writes, breathes horror. A basement is nothing. But it’s most definitely unpleasant.
Still, it’s the only place she can think of where Mother and Father may keep brown paint.
Willi creeps down the steps, wishing they would creak or moan or something. At least it would add to the atmosphere.
Once she reaches the bottom of the stairs, she starts looking around everywhere for paint. Well, feeling more than looking. It’s incredibly dark in the basement with absolutely no lightsource around.
Unfortunately, Willi seems to touch everything else—boxes, old books, articles of clothing—but nothing feels like it could be a can of paint.
Sighing, Willi begins to make her way out when she stubs a toe on one of the boxes. She yelps, reaching down and rubbing the sore foot hastily.
Something hisses above her.
Willi looks up, despite still not being able to see anything. She really should have brought a flashlight.
“Hello?” she calls. “Is there one of you things up there?”
Silence, and then quick tapping, as if something is running across the ceiling.
“Can you help me?” Willi tries. “I’m looking for something to change my hand back to normal. It’s green, but it’s supposed to be brown.”
More hissing and lots of heavy tapping as whatever it is backs into a corner. The tapping gets heavier, stronger, almost sounding like rhythmless drums.
“Can you not talk?” Willi tries once more, to the negative effect. Hissing and growling can now be heard, and the tapping is vigorous, louder than the beating of Willi’s own heart. Is there more than one creature up there? Do they move as a group?
“How many of you are up there?” Willi asks, raising her voice to be heard. “Are you some strange versions of bats? I like bats. I have one as a friend. His name is Qui—”
“Little girl!”
Willi turns. At the top of the steps standing in the doorway is Strange Cook.
“Little girl! Little lady!” Strange Cook continues. “Please come up here! You are bothering my best patron!”
Oh, is Willi being a bother? She hadn’t realized. She carefully steps around the junk in the basement and joins Strange Cook at the top of the stairs.
“Will practically ruin the floor with all that tapping!” Strange Cook exclaims as they pull Willi away. “Not to mention cause The Thing That Lives Under The Floor to lose its appetite.”
“Is that it’s…ah…description?” Willi asks. It’s so bothersome not having names.
“Of course!”
“Isn’t there something simpler to call it?”
“As far as I’m aware, no! For me, it’s just The Thing That Lives Under The Floor! I’ve never had a good look of it myself!”
Willi wonders how Strange Cook sees anything under that hat, but keeps it to herself.
“I couldn’t find any paint,” she tells them. “My hand is still green.”
“That’s fine! Green is a lovely color! It makes you look diseased!”
“Looking diseased is an unpleasant thing.”
“Perhaps sometimes, yes! But it keeps things from eating you!”
Willi pauses. “…Are there a lot of things that eat humans here?”
“Oh, honey!” Strange Cook bends low, leaning into her ear with their voice uncannily quiet. “There’s things that eat anything here.”
It’s that time of year where the trees look the prettiest! There are so many different colors~ Although my favorite part is the sidewalks being decorated by their leaves! Could do without the cold though…
Anyway, thanks for reading!