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It clicked its tongue at me and hissed, “Perhaps not far from the truth. We survive on that which you wish to discard. Not so evil?”

Perspective was a bitch that way. What if those nightmares in my life had changed my path somehow? If they were necessary? What if not having them changed who I was. In truth, having them cut away, shortened my life. How much had it taken already that I was barely there at all?

“How about another?”

A wave of darkness hit me like ice water and I blinked open my eyes to a dark room, heart pounding.

The wardrobe creaked open. The memory slid back into place with the vivid detail that should have long been forgotten. Thirteen, Grandma and Grandpa’s old farmhouse. That creepy wardrobe.

The door shut with a snap, making me flinch. I held my breath, gaze locked on the wardrobe, waiting for it to move.

For a long time, nothing happened. My eyes grew heavy. I began to doze.

Then something slithered past the crack in the door, rustling the door with the movement.

I froze. Held my breath. Silently prayed it was just my imagination.

Time ticked away. My eyes drifted closed.

Then it happened again.

I jolted upright and fumbled for the lamp. The light clicked on, flooding the room with warm yellow. Everything looked less scary in the light. Less threatening. I almost laughed at myself.

See? Nothing. Just an old house settling.

An eye peered through the crack in the door, staring back at me.

I couldn’t move. Couldn’t breathe.

I shot out of bed, crossing the room before I could talk myself out of it. My hand closed around the wardrobe door. Any sign of the eye vanished as I stood face-to-face with the door, mentally trying to convince myself it had been my imagination.

But I stood frozen, heart racing in terror, grip on the handle, uncertain what to do. I sucked in air, and forced myself to let go of the handle. I didn’t need to see. What if something really was in there?

As I let go of the door, a hand shot out and gripped my wrist in icy fingers, clamping down hard enough to grind bone. I screamed, a raw, guttural sound that tore out of my throat, as I was yanked forward. My shoulder slammed against the doorframe. The wood bit into my ribs.

It was pulling me in.

I grabbed the edge of the wardrobe with my free hand, nails scrabbling for purchase, and pulled back with everything I had. My feet slid across the floor. The thing in the dark was stronger.

“Let go!” My voice cracked. “Let go of me!” I kicked at the frame, tried to wedge myself against anything solid, but I was already being dragged inside. The dark swallowed my legs, my hips, my chest. Cold pressed against me from all sides, thick as water, thick as death.

This is how I die, I thought. In my grandparents’ house. In a wardrobe. No one will even find me.

Footsteps. Running. Shouts. Hands grabbed me, pulling me back.

The grip vanished.

I collapsed to the floor, gasping, tears streaming down my face. My wrist throbbed where the fingers had been, bruise forming with the imprint of a less than human hand.

Grandpa held me tight. Grandma stood in the doorway; fear etched across her face.

Behind me, the wardrobe sat still and silent. Door closed.

I hit the concrete of the warehouse floor, gasping. My grandparents knew. They’d always known.

Something in the dark wanted me. They burned the wardrobe like that would fix it.

Really solved that problem, didn’t it?