I’M SCARED OF THE HALLWAY
I’M SCARED OF THE HALLWAY
by Tamika Thompson
My two-year-old runs barefoot through the hall, his soles like thunder as they pound the oak planks.
“Mommy, I’m scared of the hallway.”
He exits the dim space, closes his eyes and dives into the family room, where he tumbles across the carpet, rises, and leaps onto the safety of the couch. He nestles into the rust-colored leather and opens his eyes again.
“Why, baby?” With a building sense of dread, I seek to understand how someone who turns off the lights in every room he enters and cuddles with oversized dinosaur and dragon toys could also find a partially lit hall with family portraits, potted succulents, and vanilla candles the least bit frightening.
“I don’t know, Mommy.”
“Are you scared of the hallway upstairs?”
“No.”
“Are you scared of that hallway?” I point to another darkened passageway, leading to the mud room and then out back.
“No.”
“Then why are you scared of this one?” My thumb gestures over my shoulder to the hall that opens to the foyer, but I don’t turn around.
He shoots up on his knees, leans forward, peeks around my body, staring down the hall, as if afraid to look there now that he’s made it out.
“Cause I get new in there.”
And there it is. The room shrinks. I struggle for breath. It manifested much later for my daughter so it never occurred to me that my son sped through the hall from fear.
I kneel before him, pretending I don’t understand, but remembering the hall his older sister hated when she was his age, recalling the time she told me about the hands reaching for her, how she used to sprint through it, hoping she was fast enough that nothing could grab her, that the hands clawing out from the shadows and pressing against her flesh couldn’t keep her.
“New?” I touch his hand, the same way I touched my daughter’s. “How do you get new in that hallway?”
I turn back to it now, a smile on my face so he can feel calmer about it, but my grin is forced. I sense the space listening to us, waiting for one of us to say the wrong thing, to speak out of turn, to give it an excuse to take us, bind us. I return my gaze to my son, and his eyes are wide, brave, but his grip has tightened around my fingers. One of his unfiled nails digs into my palm.
“I don’t know, Mommy.”
“Do you see someone in there?”
He nods, his eyes welling up. He checks the hall again, then looks down at his lap.
I raise his chin so we’re eye to eye again.
“Who?”
I sit cross-legged next to the couch and he climbs onto my lap, leans in close, his breath smelling of milk. He grabs my cheeks and puts his mouth close to my ear.
“I see me.”
I embrace him and feel his heart thump quickly against my chest.
“In the mirror? Above the table?”
He leans back. Shakes his head. “No.” Covers both ears as if he’s shielding himself from a loud sound, when, in fact, the room is silent except for our whispered conversation.
“Where?”
He removes his left hand from his ear, points to the bench where a chunky, cream-colored knit blanket is draped down the side. I pick him up, feeling the fullness of his thirty-pound body, carry him into the hallway, and walk up to the bench.
He is rightly challenging the assumption we all make—that, as we move through pathways, we remain the same. When we wake up, when we exit an airplane, an elevator, a pool, and even when we navigate a hallway. But with my daughter I learned that our basic understanding of our day-to-day permanence could be deeply flawed. Sometimes we enter a passageway and another version of us comes out.
He buries his face in my neck and squeezes.
The only way my daughter was able to stop getting “new” was to stop being afraid. I need him to be brave as well. Because it’s not only the hallway. He doesn’t know it yet, but if he’s scared, he can get “new” anywhere.
Threading his fingers through my hair, he whimpers.
“I’m scared of the hallway. I’m scared of the hallway. I’m scared of the hallway. I’m scared of the hallway. I’m scared of the hallway.”
He’s not crying, but he’s adamant. His hot breath escapes with every word of his chant and moistens my collarbone. He is warm, feverish. His flesh is clammy against mine.
“See? There’s nothing to be afraid of here.” My voice is weak, as I try to convince myself as well. “Nothing will happen to you if you’re brave.”
He stops chanting. A chill darts along my skin. He is cold now. His skin is ice against mine. A gust of wind rushes between the walls, and I sense the change along my flesh before my mind registers it.
He draws back his head and smiles at me. The grin starts out as a smirk on only the right side of his mouth. Then it spreads across his lips.
“Hi, Mommy.” He kisses my cheek just as he greets me first thing every morning.
He glances at the bench. The blanket flutters up and falls back down, as if jerked by an angry hand. He jumps down from my arms, pounds down the hallway and into the living room, leaving me to glance down at the bench, where his silhouette sits, panic-faced, reaching for me.
Before I can mouth, I love you. I’m sorry. Be brave, his image blinks and vanishes into the shadows forever.
Fiction © Copyright Tamika Thompson
Image by Maaark from Pixabay
