As a young boy I was honing my imagination by continuing various dramas in my head well after the film had ended, the book was closed or the radio switched off. One story I heard on the radio called, ‘The Monkey's Paw’, was one that I'd have been better off not hearing. I sat listening with the grown-ups around me, pulling my feet closer and closer towards me and the storyline developed. I was in a pretty scared state already before the real horror began and, '…the dreadful being knocked at the door'. Help! Fortunately my dad noticed how it was affecting me and hurried me off to bed, sharpish. But, alone.
I was still well tuned in to the story as I made my way up the stairs in double-quick time, and leaped from the door straight into my bed. I switched off the light and tried to sleep. If I didn't move and breathed quietly, I could still hear the radio downstairs, and a variety of increasingly terrifying and tantalising sounds began to do their work on my imagination. Then, from the radio, I heard more frantic knocking on a door, and the agitated murmurs of grown-ups, mingled with the most awful sounds.
How can they bear to listen? Are they not terrified themselves? At least they've got each other to scream with, but what about me?!
The darkness now concentrated my thoughts on where I was…alone, completely alone, in the dark, and with potential horrors all around me. With my hearing now on full alert I was certain that something was stirring in the wardrobe, creeping up the stairs or slithering about under my bed, where, oh horrors! I'd failed to check. It was too much for me! I'd heard enough! Really scared now, I curled myself into a ball and pulled the bedclothes tightly round me. At some point, thankfully, my Sunday-school teacher's beliefs must have kicked in, for I imagined, "bands of angels gathered around me as they sang me gently to my rest." That was enough for me to find some peaceful relief, and I fell, gratefully, into those angels' arms and slept in a tight ball 'til morning.
I'll never forget that, and the fear I felt, all alone. Still, a scare is good for you sometimes, isn't it? Gets the adrenalin pumping, adds a bit of zest to life now and then.
(first published www.denniscrompton.wordpress.com 2013)
No comments:
Post a Comment