Chapter 7 - The Memory of a Grave
The words struck Mark like a physical blow, knocking the breath from his lungs. ""Stop it. Clara, stop it! You’re sick. You have a fever—you're hallucinating.""
""Look at him, Mark!"" Clara sobbed, covering her mouth with both hands. ""Really look at him!""
Mark pulled Toby back, staring down into the boy’s face.
Toby looked like a healthy, beautiful toddler—blonde peach-fuzz hair, soft cheeks, big hazel-blue eyes. But as Mark stared, the edges of the child’s silhouette seemed to waver, like heat rising off a summer highway. The sage green onesie didn't have seams. The boy’s skin had no pores, no scratches, no imperfections. He didn't blink.
""Daddy,"" Toby said softly, his voice echoing slightly, as though spoken inside a cavernous hall. ""Don't let him take me back.""
""Take you back where?"" Mark choked out, his grip tightening around the child. The warmth of the boy felt entirely real. His weight was real. The love Mark felt in his chest was heavier than the world itself. ""You’re my son. You’re right here.""
A low moan vibrated through the walls of the house. The wallpaper along the hallway began to peel downward in long, curling strips, revealing not drywall, but pale, institutional tiles covered in peeling green paint. The smell of rain and damp wood was instantly overwritten by the sharp, suffocating stench of bleach and antiseptic.
The front door swung open slowly on squeaking hinges.
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Standing on the porch, framed by a sterile white corridor that stretched into an infinite void, was not a monster, but a man in a surgeon's coat, his face obscured by a surgical mask and deep shadows.
""Time of death,"" the man’s voice echoed flatly across the decaying living room, ""four-fifteen PM.""
