A Short Scary Story

My damn kid got me again. The wife just recently bought a dummy, or a life sized doll, to help our son learn how to express himself in school better. If you ask me its a bunch of bull but she's the therapist. Anyway, all Nolan does with the doll is use it to scare the living shit out of me. Not a funny kind of scary where you get spooked and then laugh about it. It was more of a dark scary, the kind of stuff that makes you want to break down and sob like a widow at a funeral.

See, this dummy was about the same size as my son, had the same hair color, same build, hell even had the same skin tone too. The more realistic the better but I made an argument that simply talking in the mirror to himself would be the same as using this doll. The wife didn't find the same humor in it as i did. My humor eventually subsided once the accidents started.

Sitting down to my morning coffee I caught a glimpse of my little Nolan running into the bathroom. "Try to not miss the toilet little man!" Time had passed as i sipped at my once hot coffee. An half an hour had passed and he hadn't left the bathroom. So I walked on over to the bathroom. Before I had a chance to knock on the door to ask what was up the sound of a large heavy metallic crash came from inside the bathroom. My body jumped like a scared cat as my shoulders shot into the air and my body hopped from the door. After a second of silence I burst into the bathroom laying my eyes upon the back of my son hanging from a noose. I swear that I had seen his arms and legs kick. So I screamed the loudest I had ever screamed. A blood curdling scream that could be heard a few blocks away. My legs had lost control as I fell to my knees when I reached my son, but as I turned the body around to try and help I noticed that it was just the dummy in Nolan's clothes. The overwhelming anger and happiness I had felt at that moment was enough for me to cry.

Nolan claimed to not know what I meant when I confronted him. He stood his ground claiming to not know what I was talking about. I wanted to spank him like my father did me but the thought of my wife held my hand from coming down. I decided to ground him with the agreement to never use the doll again. I was going to tell the wife to get rid of it.

His mother had nothing to say about it , instead whenever she "listened" to me it was only followed by circled questions. "How does that make you feel? Why do you think he did that? Do you think your punishing him or yourself?", I hated when she treated me like a patient. Even a little worry or emotion from her would be nice but that was never the case with Jesse. As fro the doll she decided to keep it. Her argument was that boys will be boys and that ultimately Nolan will benefit from it. It wasn't him I was worried about but she couldn't see it. She was too close. She didn't have to see her son hang from a noose or fear that it would happen again.

The next day as I prepared Nolan's lunch for school he told me he was going to wait for the bus. Before I could tell him that he couldn't leave before I was ready he was already out the door. So I put down the bread I had in my hand and went to bring him back. That's when I felt my heart skip and my blood run cold as a screeching noise of burning tires on the pavement had reached my ears. I imagined the worst as I felt my eyes beginning to burn.

I ran to the road to see a horrific site, Nolan had been hit by a car. "NOOOOO! NOOOOO! NOOOOO! No...no,no,no,no" I couldn't stop. My body began to tremble and my knees began to shake uncontrollably as my little boy in his favorite red shirt had laid upon the pavement. As I rushed to his side though I realized that it was yet again the same dummy. This was the last straw. The pure fury I felt forced my hands to clench and chest to rise. So I screamed for Nolan to come out of hiding. I ignored the worried driver and rushed back into the house. Out came Nolan from the house, before he could ask what happened I screamed at him to get back inside and wait for me in his room. I quickly grabbed the dummy and I brought it back inside with me.

After dealing with what happened and hearing yet again from Nolan that he had nothing to do with the dummy I drove him to school and spent the rest of my day questioning what happened.I wanted to believe what Nolan had been saying, and that he had nothing to do with the tricks. It was easier to blame him than to seek out other possibilities. I tried to make sense of how Nolan could have accomplished such feats of time. In the end the boy I had pictured in my mind that was capable of such things had been an evil genius.Nolan was no genius, I was worried. So that night before Nolan had went to bed I had to talk to him, I had to know if he truly had done those things.

I sat on the edge of his bed after tucking him in and before I could ask him anything he told me something. Something so simple It made me smile and fill with a warmth only a son could give a father."Dad I cant sleep", I wanted to cuddle the little fella. His face was half tucked under the blanket with the covers pulled up to his nose with puppy dog eyes. "Why cant you sleep Stinky?" He hesitated a little finally letting out a whisper, "There's a monster in my closet and he always watching me". So I stood up from his bed and pointed to his closet. He nodded at me and watched as I tip toed to the closet door. I got a little smile out of him as I pretended to be a ninja but as I placed my hand upon the closet door his face went back under the blanket. I turned back and began to slowly open the closet door.

What was behind that door was the most terrifying thing I had ever seen. Behind that door was no monster but a little boy. My little boy. "Nolan? But?" I looked into Nolan's wide eyes as a slowly building growl had began to reach my ear from behind me. My body froze and my eyes watered. I could only watch as Nolan's eyes followed something moving behind me.