#07826

#07826

Vincent DeForest walked out of the retail store where he worked. One of the few places remaining in the dying mall. He decided to walk around and kill some time before his ride came to pick him up, as he always did. The more he walked around the place, the more depressed he got. It was sad, he thought. In six years, the place had gone from booming to dead. Sure, there was a pandemic, and the economy has been awful over the last few years, but he couldn’t get over it and felt there was something more at play causing the decline. He walked down the long, stretched path of the walkway on the 3^rd floor, passing countless empty stores. He thought about going down a floor but figured he would just kill a bit more time by walking the entire 3^rd floor of abandonment on one side. As he approached the dead end, he looked into the former anchor store that had been gone for four years. At one time, the store was a pinnacle part of buying anything in the country, and now it no longer existed. He looked over to his left at an empty corner store and stared hard.

He remembered the place used to be either an old army surplus store or a recruitment center; he couldn’t remember which but knew it was military-related. He could never get over the placement of the store either. Most places you couldn’t see how big or small it was from the outside because it went into the back, but this store seemed so small. Vincent decided to walk around it and over to the third-floor exit doors leading to the parking garage. As he turned the corner, he looked at the back of the corner store and noticed a door that had a light on. Strange, he thought, he always figured the door to the back was inside and never knew there was a door here. Vincent walked up to the door expecting to see the back of the store, but instead, he saw a long illuminated corridor. Puzzled but curious, Vincent tried turning the door handle, and much to his surprise, it opened. He looked around, but of course, no one was there, so he shrugged, opened the door, and went inside. Suddenly, he was in the long stretch of corridor where the tan walls were practically scraping both his shoulders. He heard the low-hummed buzzing of the lights. As he began walking, he realized there was no other door inside the corridor connecting it to the corner store.

He thought for a moment before he began walking down the long stretch of corridor. He could hear his feet making that classic footstep sound they always make in corridors or confined spaces while the light continued to buzz despite there being different lights every 30 feet. He kept walking and stopped, looking straight ahead, seeing a wall, but feeling like it was taking forever to get there. Vincent kept walking and walking until he finally came to a wall, with the only place to go being to his left. Vincent turned, and before his eyes was another long strip of the tan corridor hallway with more lights. Something didn’t feel right to him, and he thought about turning back, but his curiosity got the best of him, and he kept walking down the second long strip of the hallway. When he reached the end of it, the only place for him to go this time was right. Once again, another long strip of tan corridor and buzzing lights welcomed him. At least he knew how to get back if he got lost, he thought, laughing to himself. As he walked further down the corridor, he finally noticed something different: a door. Finally, he thought. He opened the door, and to his surprise, he was back in the mall, or was he? As he looked around, he realized that while it looked like his mall, he didn’t recognize any of the layout of it or the stores.

Vincent looked around and noticed the construction of some of the stores he had never seen, and as he walked further into the mall, he came across stores that he had never heard of that were open. As he walked by a clothing store called Sotherby’s, he looked in and noticed the lights on, but no one was in there. He walked by another store, which was a candy store called Uncle Ted’s Candy Factory. Vincent found the same somewhat unsettling, and he didn’t know why. As he looked in, he saw a colorful store full of what looked like hundreds of different candies all in bins, tubes, and crates in various store placements. Once again, there were no people inside the store. Vincent stepped inside the store and looked around.

“Hello? Is anyone here?”

He called out, half expecting a clown or some creepy guy who called himself Uncle Ted welcoming him into the store, but no one came. He looked around, seeing if there were any cameras, but there weren’t. Vincent went over to the Skittles bin, grabbed the scoop, took out a handful, and put them into his hand. He smiled as he put one in his mouth, but when he bit down, he realized he couldn’t bite into it. He took it out of his mouth and looked down at them and noticed they were marbles in the shape of Skittles.

“What the hell?” he asked out loud as he put them back into the bin.

Vincent looked at the other candy around and went to the Runts, gummy bears, and chocolate, and they too weren’t real, just props.

“What in the world…”

Vincent looked all around and suddenly felt like he shouldn’t be in the store anymore and slowly walked out and back into the mall. As he got to the center, he stopped, and his jaw dropped. Looking around, he recognized this part of the mall; it was the same as the second floor, but two things were vastly different. For one, he didn’t remember ever going down any stairs, yet he was staring at the second-floor layout on the third floor, and second, these stores were on the opposite side from where they should be. Vincent scratched his head in bewilderment, not understanding any of it. He walked down the end of the walkway and came to what used to be an empty sports store. He was on the right side of the mall, yet the store was supposed to be on the left. As he peered into the gate, he noticed the back room door was open, and a light was on. He stared at the door as if waiting for someone or something to peer out from the doorway to look at him, but nothing happened.

He decided to walk around to the left side, and as he did, he came to the other empty stores, but then noticed he had walked by the employees-only door on the other side. Vincent decided to use the door and walked back over and opened it. He was expecting the same long stretch of tan corridor, but instead was met with concrete walls with neon blue lighting beaming down high above him. The lights made a different buzzing sound than the others. The long stretch of tan-walled corridor was one thing, but a long stretch of concrete walls with blue lights above made him feel uneasy. Vincent felt they didn’t pair well with each other but figured since he’s gone this far to keep going and see where it takes him. His footsteps were somehow louder than before as he walked down until he got to a dead end, with the only place to go being another long stretch of corridor to his left. He walked down it and at the end came to another door. It said EXIT. Vincent thought he was going to exit the building, and as he opened the door, expecting the sun to hit him, he found himself somewhere he not only didn’t know but didn’t make sense.

For reasons he couldn’t explain, Vincent was no longer in the mall but now in a library. He was in awe at what stood before him. Shelf after shelf on both sides went all the way down and didn’t look like it had an ending. Vincent took a deep breath and walked into the library and down the shelves. He couldn’t make out the wall patterns because of the size of the shelf and the fact that there were so many that they overpowered anything else that was in there. Vincent walked by shelf after shelf, looking to his left and then his right, and as he got about ten shelves in, he stopped and looked at them.

He looked at the books and noticed they all looked the same. Vincent picked up one of the books off the shelf and looked at the cover, and it read: Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions by Edward A. Abbott. He picked up the next book and the one after that, and they were the same book. He went back to the previous shelf and took more books off it, and they too were Flatland. He went to the first shelf he passed, and as he took out the books, he found that they were all Flatland. He went back to the tenth shelf and kept walking as he looked ahead of him, but also looked over at each shelf and noticed the same spine and size, and as he looked up, he couldn’t believe that there was an endless number of shelves and all over them had the same book. Vincent was now creeped out, and suddenly, for the second time, the first being at the candy store, he felt as though he shouldn’t be here. He kept walking down the long stretch of shelves until finally he saw a bookshelf facing him. When he reached it, he looked to his left and to his right, only to realize he was at a dead end.

Vincent began to panic.

“Where’s the door? This doesn’t make any sense! Where is the damn door?!”

He looked around but just saw the shelves with the thousands of copies of Flatland. Vincent looked at the shelf facing him, and as he was ready to look away, he noticed something different. One of the books was different. Yes, he was sure of it. It had a green spine unlike the regular brown with red trim he’d seen on all of these books. Vincent grabbed the book, and as he removed it, the shelf moved to the left, revealing a hidden passageway. He looked into the entranceway and once again was met by a long corridor. He smiled and shook his head. Before placing the book back in its spot on the shelf, he looked down and read the cover: Nightshade Station by Justin Bienvenue. Vincent put it back on the shelf and walked into the corridor. This time, the room was green like the cover of the book, but a different shade. A shade of green he couldn’t place. He had remembered seeing this much of the shade but didn’t know where. Vincent walked down the long stretch of corridor and had grown accustomed to the strange yet familiar tone of walking down them. The lights were normal and flickered, every single one of them. As Vincent reached the end, he came to another door.

“At least I don’t have to turn this time.”, he said to himself.

As he turned to open the door, he realized where he had seen so much of that shade of green.

“The Room 237 scene in The Shining. The bathroom scene…”, Vincent shook his head before entering his next destination.

Vincent couldn’t believe where he was. He looked it over and was in disbelief.

“How? How could I end up here? I haven’t been here since my mom had an appointment here.”

Vincent found himself in the lobby of a doctor's office; he remembered his mom taking him a few times when he was a teenager. He remembered it was creepy and surreal walking through it back then and would not only likely feel the same now but also make even less sense. Vincent looked over to where he remembered there being a door to another office on the left side, but there was nothing there but a wall. He walked over to his right and began the walk he thought he would never take again. The carpet was still the same as he had remembered. A grayish blue with a sky blue wave and red lines going through it. Vincent suddenly remembered something he had heard about the reason seats on public buses have such intricate and weird-looking designs on them, which is to disguise the filth and dirty marks they have.

He felt as though this carpet was doing the same thing. Vincent walked down the decent-sized lobby area of the doctor's office that he remembered until he got to where the waiting room was supposed to be, only it wasn’t.

“What in the world…”

To Vincent’s amazement, he looked ahead and noticed the same hallway he was currently standing in, only reversed like it was at the mall, with the left side being on the right and the right being on the left. At this point, Vincent was all-in and wanted to see this craziness through until the end, so he walked down into the mirrored lobby he was just in and then found himself in the waiting room, which was just as he remembered. He walked over to the door that leads to the rooms where patients are examined, and when he opened it, instead of seeing the hall to the rooms, he found himself stepping foot into a classroom. The room was small but just enough to fit around twelve old wooden desks that kids sat at in class. The walls were a beige yellow with the paint chipping off at certain spots. Vincent walked into the classroom and closed the door behind him. He walked in between the desks and then looked over at the chalkboard, which had one thing written on it: Hello Class!

Vincent walked in between the desks and over to the door at the right corner of the room. Something possessed him to turn around and look at the chalkboard again. As he does, he notices that Hello Class! Has been replaced by a giant smiley face. He looked at it, shocked and bewildered, before turning his attention to the door and opening it. Now Vincent found himself in the school hallway, which had teal floors, walls, and light red colored lockers all going down in a row on both sides of him. As he walked down the hallway, he felt the space getting smaller and the lockers on both sides of him getting closer until he was at a strange hill of hallway with a small opening with a grate at the top. Vincent crawled up to the top, opened the gate, and made his way in through the space. He crawled through the small tunnel-like space until he came to another opening at the end. He looked down but couldn’t make out anything as it was too dark to see. He does his best to switch around so his feet are now in the space as he drops down and lands onto the floor.

Vincent got up and dusted himself off, and looked around to find himself in an office of some sort. The giant open window was blocked off from the outside by boards so you couldn’t see out or in. He looked around and saw two giant desks on either side of each other, but diagonally. There were papers scattered all around and a bunch of brown metal filing cabinets behind one of the desks with many of the drawers open. He looked down at the dirty carpet and found strange substances spilled on it, with one looking like oil. He walked further into the room and away from the desks, going into another room with no door. It was just another room with a desk and a brown metal filing cabinet. The room next to it was a small bathroom with only a toilet inside of it. Off to the side of that was another open door, and as he stepped in, he found himself in a garage. He concluded that he must be at a car dealership, and that was the office, and this is where they work on the cars. Vincent looked all around the garage for another door until he saw a light from underneath the old rusty pickup truck on the belt.

He shook his head as he walked over, got down on his knees, and went through the lit open space to his next destination. This time, Vincent fell a good ways down, landing hard on the ground.

“Ahh damnit my shoulder!”

He looked at the strange patterned carpet he was now lying on, and then he looked up and saw stools, counter tables, large metal racks with bowling balls on them, and at the far end, he saw alleys.

“A bowling alley?”

He got up and walked down the aisle, and he looked over at the screens in the sections, only to notice it was as if people were there playing because there were names and scores on every screen. He walked and walked, wondering when he would get to a main desk or perhaps even see a person for the first time. Vincent took out his phone to check the time. It was 5:37 pm. He put his phone back into his pocket and kept walking down the long, what seemed to be endless aisle of the bowling alley with row after row of lanes, each with names on them. Vincent stopped and noticed that they were the same three names.

“It’s just like the library with the same book.”

Vincent kept on walking down the aisle. He walked and walked and became frustrated as there was no end in sight, just alley after alley. He checked his phone again. It was now 5:57 pm. He had somehow spent 20 minutes walking aimlessly into endlessness. He remembered the library again and noticed how the one book that stood out from the rest was his way out. So, Vincent looked at the screens and checked the three names, which were Ryan, Zane, and Melissa. He walked down onto the lane and walked down while looking up at the screen to see if any of the names were different. He was starting to lose patience and thought his theory was incorrect until he got to the sixteenth lane and saw three new names of Robert, Joanna, and Lucas. He looked over to the next few lanes next to them and saw that it went back to the other three names. Vincent decided to pick up a bowling ball and bowl on that lane to see if anything would happen.

Vincent wasn’t bad at bowling, but it had been years since he picked up a ball and played. He threw the ball down the lane, and as luck would have it, he got a strike. He smiled and waited for something to happen. At first, nothing seemed any different until he heard the creaking of a door open behind him. He looked up at the aisles he walked down, and it was there on the white walls that he saw the faint open impression of a door. Vincent smiled and walked over to the door, opened it, and stepped inside. He looked inside and was somehow even more confused than he had ever been since walking through the door in the mall. He looked at the room he now stood in. The walls were stripes of blue, yellow, and tan with a grungy brownish orange colored couch and a brown rug. There was a small wooden coffee table in front of it, and just a few feet from that was an old television set with an antenna sitting on top of it.

He walked up to the TV and noticed it had a knob on it.

“Where the hell am I now?”

Vincent walked into the open doorway and now stood in a dining room area. The lights were off, and as he made his way in, he noticed the table had two chairs on the left and right, a chair near him, and one at the end of the table. He noticed the first light in this strange place was on in what looked like a kitchen. As Vincent walked toward the lighted room, he heard something coming from it. As he walked in, he found that it was a kitchen. The floor had blue and yellow tiles with a picnic tablecloth on the kitchen table and an old refrigerator off to the side. He was going to open the fridge until he looked up and found what he had heard from in the other room, running water. The sink was on. He walked over to it and turned it off. He felt uneasy again, like that feeling he got the two other times that he shouldn’t be there. Vincent noticed there was no door in the kitchen, which he found odd, so he decided to go back into the dining room. As he stood in the doorway, he immediately jumped back as he saw a figure sitting at the head of the table to the left of him. Their back is turned. Despite his cry of being scared, the figure didn’t move from the table.

Vincent slowly walks back into the room and calls out to the figure.

“Hello?”

The person doesn’t say anything, and Vincent approaches them slowly.

“Excuse me. Do you know where we are? Do you know what any of this is?”

Again, the person remains still sitting at the dining room table. As Vincent gets to the back of the figure, he sees that he’s wearing a flannel shirt and has short black hair that goes a little down his neck. Vincent takes a deep breath and goes to put his hand on the man’s shoulder. When he does, he expects the man to flinch or jump up out of his seat to scare him, but again he remains motionless. Vincent walks around the chair to see the man’s face, but when he looks at him, he notices the man has no face, just a blank circular emptiness. The man’s arms lay on the table. Vincent steps back and is now freaked out. He sees stairs and decides to go up them. When he gets to the top of the stairs, he sees an open door with a light on. He walks toward it when suddenly a little girl with no face steps in front of him from the left room. Vincent stops and looks at the girl and wonders if she can see him. His wonder is confirmed when she tilts her head as if looking at him in a puzzling way. He walks past her and turns around, keeping her head tilted as if looking at him. Vincent then makes his way into the lighted room and steps inside. There, he sees another figure staring out the window.

Vincent doesn’t even try to talk to the figure as he slowly approaches it. He sees that it’s a woman with long black hair wearing a nightgown. He approaches her and looks at her from the side, and like the man at the table and the little girl, she doesn’t have a face. She immediately turns and looks at him.

“What are you doing in my home?! What are you doing?! WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN HERE?!”

The woman then lunges at him as Vincent screams as he runs out of the room. He ran past the little girl, who tried to grab his leg as he ran past her. The woman is now running out of the room after him. He runs down the stairs as fast as he can until he gets to the bottom and sees that the man with no face is now waiting for him.

“Oh god!”

Vincent looks up and sees the woman and little girl at the top of the steps and the man in front of him at the bottom. He decides to shoulder check the man and runs past him as he goes into the living room where he first appeared. He looks for the door only to notice it's gone.

“What the hell? Where is it? Where did it go?”

Frantically, Vincent looks around the room and feels the wall where the door was, but it’s solid. He looks around and realizes why it's so dark inside, because there are no windows either. He walks back into the dining area and sees the man, woman, and little girl all with no faces standing at the bottom of the stairs like a family. He sees there are no windows or doors in that room either. He runs to the small bathroom on the right side of the dining area, and again no doors or windows. He runs to the kitchen and finds no doors or windows in there either.

“Grab yourself a drink from the fridge and have a seat in here,”. The man with no face says, which appears to come from the dining area.

Vincent, now freaking out and scared out of his mind, decides to do what the man said. He wanted to look in the fridge earlier anyway. He walks over to the fridge and opens the door, and there he sees that it’s empty. He walks back over to the doorway into the dining area and sees the man back at his spot, but now the woman is at the other end of the table, and the little girl is sitting in one of the chairs on his right side with her teddy bear, which also had no eyes, sitting next to her in the other chair.

Vincent looks back at the kitchen table with the picnic tablecloth on it. He glances up from the table to see a calendar on the wall. He looks at the date, and it reads November 1976. Now completely confused, Vincent slowly walks into the room where the faceless family sits in silence at the dining room table. He decides to sit on the right side of the table, on the opposite end of the little girl.

“Where am I? What is this place? Please, I didn’t mean to intrude; I don’t even understand how I came to be here.”, Vincent says.

Everyone at the table remains silent. Vincent decides to ask again.

“Please, I need to know. Where am I? What is this place?”

The woman is the one who speaks.

“You’re in our home. You’re everywhere, and you’re nowhere.”

“I don’t understand. What happened to the doors and windows? What happened to the door I went through?”

“Stop talking.”, the woman says.

“But I just wanna know-

“NO TALKING AT THE DINNER TABLE!!” she screams.

Vincent gets up from the table.

“Where do you think you’re going?” she asks.

“I shouldn’t be here! I just want to get out of here! Please!”

“Well, you found your way here, so that can only mean one thing. You were meant to be here. And now you can be the son we never had.”

“The son we never had.”, the man with no face says.

“The son they never had.”, the little girl with no face says.

“The son we never had.”, the woman says.

They repeat the saying over and over, not stopping as Vincent covers his ears and runs frantically into the living room, and then takes his hands off his ears and bangs on the spot on the wall where the door was. He hears the family repeating the saying over and over as it gets closer. He looks over and sees that they have gotten up and are walking into the living room with him.

“The son we never had. The son we never had. The son we never had.”

“FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PLEASE STOP!!!”

They go silent.

The woman slowly tiptoes toward Vincent before she comes running at him full blast and gets right in his face.

“GOD?! THIS IS A HOUSE OF THE DEVIL, AND YOU’RE THE SON WE NEVER HAD!!”, the woman says, putting her cold hands on him and staring at him with her no face.

The man and the little girl do the same as they come over to him and stare at him. Vincent is now in the corner of the room in a fetal position, crying as the faceless family stares at him and laughs.

THE END

*This story was thought to have been destroyed in a fire back in 2022, but yet here you are reading it.