Hikaru Suzuki
Even though you yourself are not exactly child-sized, you attempt to crawl into the gap and find that you somehow feel small enough to fit regardless. As you crawl into the soft pile of toys, you allow for the darkness of the space to surround you until you feel fully and completely hidden.
Then, with one sense deprived, you find yourself listening more closely to the ambiance of the room. What at first sounded like an odd rattle or thudding– or perhaps the shifting of walls or the slamming of a door– comes more into focus:
First, you hear heavy footsteps, heading down the hall just past this door. Then, a pause; a doorknob rattling and hinges squeaking quietly further down the hall. A few moments pass in silence.
That tense quiet is shattered by sudden, loud popping sounds. They ring out in your mind, clear as day. Your blood runs cold. Bang. Bang bang. A scream. A thud. Bang bang bang. There is a brief silence, then, the sound of a camera. Click. Click. Click.
Next, you hear the sound of footsteps approaching the door to this room. Instead of rattling the doorknob, this door is violently kicked in with a concussive thud. You hear heavy footsteps entering the room, and you follow the sound of these footsteps stalking around; opening the closet; approaching the bed and kneeling to look beneath it, and checking beneath the desk.
You find that your hands have moved to cover your mouth, lest the sound of your breath become loud enough to alert the intruder.
The footsteps slowly stalk through the room, stopping just near your hiding place. You can’t move. You pray for your heart to stop– it’s beating far too loud…surely this person will hear it if it doesn’t stop.
After what feels like an eternity, the footsteps exit the room once more. You hear rustling, the dialing of a phone. A gruff, muffled voice. All you can make out are the words: ‘kid’s not home,’ before it’s all too hard to make out.
The footsteps fade, and you are left in this cold, dark, silent space once more. After a few beats, the sequence of sounds begin again, as if on a continuous loop.
