The Black Liquid

         I awake to the sound of a drop. Drip. Drip. Drop. It wets my forehead, quickly waking me from my deep sleep only to discover a bed soaked with water from the previous nights' storm. I hurriedly scurry out of bed in search of a bucket, not any bucket, but a large one, for this water was coming quick. After traveling around the house for what seemed like an hour, I located a bucket. It was large, wide, and ready to catch any water from wetting my bed further, but I couldn't help but wonder why the water was suddenly able to penetrate my ceiling, unlike nights in the past.
         I place the bucket beneath the supposed leak and decide to remove my sheets and comforter so I can rid them of the deluge of water that coated them during my sleep. After throwing them in the wash, I walk back to my room to see how much water had collected, but this was different. This water wasn't the typical precipitation that I was so used to seeing. This water was black. Confused, I decided to grab a rain jacket and pull the ladder down from the attic in hopes of identifying this mysterious black liquid and where it was coming from if it hadn't been from the storm. Walking up the ladder, I began to smell a horrific stench, seemingly clouding my vision and exchanging the not-so-pleasant smell of my house to a ripening stench of death and discomfort. Now holding my nose, I climb the ladder at a quicker pace, hoping to identify the smell before it clouds my house while also finding where this water is coming from. Hopefully, it is easily manageable, for this is my only day off of work for the month.
         Finally reaching the attic, I pull the ladder up from the floor and close the hatch door. "This place looks like a mess", I tell myself. Looking around, old furniture covers almost every foot of the attic, topped in a thick layer of dust like icing on a cake, thick and hiding what's underneath. Walking towards the far end of the attic, the smell comes back and vomit churns in my stomach at its sudden return. Drip. Drip. Having forgotten about the black liquid that filled my bed while I slept, I begin to panic at the situation I have found myself in: black liquid and a wretched stench. "Can this get any worse?".
         While creeping towards the far end of the attic, which seems like another twenty or so feet away, I hear a low whine. It sounds almost like a dying cat, but worse. It is a low tone and it shakes me to the core at its demon-toned entrance into my house. Still walking, I pull out my flashlight, forgetting it is two o'clock in the morning and a street light can only shine through the windows so far. Turning it on, I shine it in the direction of the sound, the drip, and the smell. Was it a dying wet cat, or maybe it was simply some rusty pipes that just-so-happened to leak black water and a deathly smell; it wouldn't be the first time I've had plumbing problems. Almost reaching the end of the attic space, I climb over a sofa, move an abandoned wooden chair, and push aside the baby stroller that drops dust like rain as it moves across the creaky floor. After moving the stroller and crossing its previous resting place, I hear and see the bricks shift from the wall in front of me. Looking further, the stench grows and the black liquid can be seen oozing out of the bricks like pus would a wound, thick and disease-like. "Hello?" At this point, I began speaking to no one, afraid that there is someone behind those bricks, but that would be impossible. I haven't been up here in what seems like one or two years. Reaching the bricks, I decided to attempt to move them from the wall, one by one.
         Successfully wiggling the first brick from its place, black liquid shoots at me from the wall and I jump back in fright and disgust. I watch as the black liquid continues to ooze out, now at a quicker pace. Walking towards the wall again, I begin to remove the rest of the bricks. It is easier now, each brick moving from its place with ease as if they weren't meant to be there at all. After removing the bricks from what seems like an upside-down cross pattern, I decided to stick my head through the wall and see what may be causing the black liquid, the terrific stench, and the low, grumbling whine that feels my head as I cross the empty space in the wall that was bricked shut only moments before. Looking through the wall, I see a great expanse below and am reminded of a well. This well was about thirty feet down, leaving me confused, for I was never told that there was a well in my house, especially one that was through my attic wall and led down to the depths of hell, or so it seemed.
         Frightened, I back out from the wall only to hear a subtle whine as I exit the wall. Curious, I decided to place myself towards the edge of the wall once more. Staring blankly at the dark that consumes the ground below, I begin to hear scratching, a noise that resembles someone or something climbing up the well with the use of their fingernails. Before long, I begin to see it, climbing its way up the stone wall like a spider. With pale, long legs and arms, the figure speedily craws up the well with a twisting neck. With no time to respond due to fear, I soon find myself being dragged down the well by its dirty grasp. I can only see yellow fingernails, pale skin, and long spindly arms before I am pulled down beneath the black water, only allowing myself one breath before the plunge. Unable to move or free myself from its grasp, I begin to lose breath and inhale the black water. As it feels my lungs and clouds my body, I begin to understand. This thing has been living in my house this whole time. The wretched smell, the black liquid, the low whine. It was all signs of its overwhelming hunger for food, the necessity to its existence, and I just became its first meal in who knows how long. I scream for help, but no one comes, hearing my voice echo back to me from the surface of the water. Soon after, the figures' jaw launches back, showing rows of sharp, yellow teeth. It charges its bite into my neck and I feel as my body becomes a lifeless corpse, wishing myself to be back in a deep sleep before the troubled, black water coated my pure skin in the middle of the silent, peaceful night.