A Horrible Dream (Post Five)

Suddenly the door flew open and Sam came rushing out to scare him "BOO!"  He nearly fell flat on his face in his haste to get out of the way.  Sam's tackle took him the rest of the way down.  She rolled off him on to the floor, nearly suffocating from her laughter.

He put a hand on his chest in the hopes that it would help steady his breathing and propped himself up on his elbows.  "What the hell was that about!?  You nearly scared me to death!"  He glared at Sam as she rolled on the floor stammering about the expression on his face between peals of laughter and gulps of air.  The rest of the group was just now starting to emerge, all of them a little misty-eyed from containing their own laughter.  Jack was the last one out.

"Jack, how could you?  I thought we were a team!  That's like the lowest of the low.  You're nothing more than a dirty turn-coat!"  He wiped some dust off his shirt and glared at Jack who just laughed in return.

"Sorry, man, but I just had to have in on this one.  Besides, maybe I'm only just pretending to be friendly with the ladies."  He grinned and poked at Marla.  She turned and slapped him.  "OW!"  He rubbed at the red hand mark on his shoulder.  Marla huffed at him.

It was Sam's turn to chime in: "Jack, you're not that clever."  She was sitting on the floor now, feet folded under her hips, and fiddling with one of her earrings that came loose in the tussle.  Her jeans were covered in dust and cob-webs, a few of the strands also floating around in her hair.  In fact, everyone was dusty and ruffled.

"I didn't know that there was a crawlspace in here.  Is there anything neat in there?"  He crawled past the group and towards the little door, peering into the dark.

"Nah, just some dust, cobwebs, and more dust.  At least I didn't see anything else in there... It is pretty dark, though."  It was Jack, still rubbing absentmindedly at his shoulder.  He had moved off to the side of the room and was leaning against the wall.  He already looked tired again.  He always seemed to be tired.

"Well, I'm bored and I want to check it out."  He shuffled his way inside, making sure not to bump his head on the rafters.  The drum of the rain was enhanced since there was little more than some plywood and a few layers of shingles between him and the wet outside world.  That combined with the dark made for a disorienting space.  He felt like things were moving around him, their presence masked by the constant pattering.  A quick shudder ran down his spine, his over active imagination flashing images in his mind before he could rein it in and push them away.  The space was low and narrow, not even tall enough for him to get on his knees without hitting his head, but ran the length of the cabin.  At both ends there was a vent to help with circulation, but besides that, there was no other opening except the little door he just went through.

Beth slipped in behind him, never one to miss out on a little bit of exploration.  "So, yeah... It's a crawlspace, alright."  He chuckled a bit while trying to squeeze past her to get a better look at one end.  Something caught his eye.

"Hey, what's that?"  He pointed at it as he moved, despite the fact that there was no way for Beth to see past him.  There was a tiny purple glint winking at him just under one of the vents.  He hadn't noticed it at first, but now that his eyes had adjusted it was definitely there.  The shudder passed through him again but he just brushed it aside.  "Hey, Sam, what is this?  There's something shiny and purple back here."

"I have no clue.  I haven't been in that space in years.  Bring it out here so we can see it."  Sam's shout was muffled through the walls.  There wouldn't be enough room for her to see it if she had followed them in, anyways.

He continued crawling his way towards it, being careful to rest his hands and knees on the ceiling joists.  He didn't want to accidentally put his foot through the ceiling of the cabin: Sam's parents were reluctant enough about letting them come.  He didn't want to give them justification.  As he approached it he could make out a small, dark shape poking out of the insulation, the little purple glint nestled towards one side, almost buried in the fuzzy paper mass.  He reached out, just about to touch it when suddenly Beth screamed.

Recoiling, he pulled back and up, smacking the top of his head squarely into one of the solid wood rafters.  "Ah, fuck!"  He flinched back and covered his head with his hands, feeling to see if he was bleeding.  So far he wasn't.  His vision wobbled for a second or two.  "Shit, shit, shit, shit..."  He was muttering under his breath, trying to collect his senses.

Marla came rushing in, "Beth, are you alright?  What the heck happened?"  He could hear a clamor from outside as Sam and Jack came to huddle around the door.

"I'm fine... I think... I think a spider just ran across my hand.  I felt it.  It was terrible!"  He voice was layered in disgust.

"Pft, come on.  What did you expect?  There are probably thousands of spiders in here."  Marla was never one to be very sympathetic.  "Come on out, I think you've had enough exploring for one night... Hey, what did you find over there?"  She was calling to him now.

"I... I don't know.  Just let me get my head to stop spinning.  I bumped it when Beth screamed.  Fuck it hurts."  He continued rubbing the sore knob slowly rising from the back of his head.  Still squinting through tears, he quickly reached out and grabbed the thing before backing his way to the door.  Whatever it is made out of was cold and rough like stone but he couldn't make out any shapes.  It was unusually heavy for its size.  Once out he hastily thumped it on the floor before sitting back against the wall in the closet, returning to rubbing his throbbing head.

Beth was by his side quickly, pulling his head gently forward to check where he had hit it.  "I'm so, so sorry... I really am."  She was sifting through his hair now, looking for cuts.  "I don't see any blood but you're going to have a really nasty lump up there."  He winced as she probed, despite how careful she was being.  She sat down beside him and hugged him, resting her head on his shoulder.  "I'm sorry."

"I'm fine, I really am."  He gave his sore noggin one more gentle rub for good measure before taking a deep breath and leaning back against the wall.  Beth had always been very protective of her friends, sometimes overreacting over small things.  He would be lying if he said he minded right now.

"Hey you two, come look at this thing.  It's crazy."  Sam sounded confused as she called to them.  She and the other two were huddled around whatever it was that he had pulled out from the crawl space.  Patting Beth on the back, he got up to go see what it was.