Gaps

I was a twenty one year old female, and lived alone in a flat. It was all I could afford at the time, but when I got a job, I could have moved into a house or something. But I just felt a strange attraction to that flat, like it was holding onto me. Either that or I just loved the place too much. There was only two other flats that people lived in, then one vacant one.

Yet no one ever wanted to buy it, or rent it out. I asked the young couple in the flat below me about it, as they’d been there longer than I had. They said it was just the fact that our small town wasn’t all that of a tourist attraction. After that I just accepted their answer and went to my own flat. And no, this isn’t like a cliché scary story where people can hear voices or footsteps in the flat above them. It wasn’t so much hearing, but seeing.

About three months after living there, these weird things started to happen. It wasn’t major. Just little things like the blinds being closed when I was sure that I’d opened them, there only being two eggs left when there were previously four. It was just odd.

Eventually some of my things went missing overnight. My high heels that I hardly ever wore and some cheap makeup that I’d picked up at a cheap store. I didn’t think much of it at the time but a week later it was my hairbrush, one of my expensive dresses, and some money that had been taken. I knew that I hadn’t misplaced them or anything like that. I wasn’t that forgetful. Eventually my mobile and my laptop went missing. That was when I called the police.

They came and investigated my flat, when they’d finished searching they said that they didn’t find anything. They said that they’d look around the area and if they weren’t found, they’d replace my stolen items. Satisfied I thanked them and they were on their way.

That night I’d gotten into bed and I was reading, when I’d heard some music playing. This wouldn’t have struck me odd if it was the couples flat downstairs, but it was in fact in my own flat. I knew that this wasn’t possible as I didn’t have my phone or laptop, and my new television hadn’t been dispatched yet. I sat up and rubbed my head, the music only got louder. I went into my living room to investigate.

As soon as I stepped onto the living room carpet the music stopped, and was replaced with the sound of shuffling. Convinced someone was in my flat I called the police. Within a few minutes they’d arrived and walked in. I found it strange as I knew that I’d locked the door. I knew it.

They found me shivering in my bedroom, and gave me a blanket as they searched the flat. Eventually they found a loose plank in the wall of my bathroom cupboard. Within the space between two walls there was the small, rotting body of a child, along with my makeup, phone, dress, heels, and my laptop. This couldn’t have happened. The music I’d heard, what was that? The child had been dead for a while, so what was the music? How did I hear the shuffling?

The police called in some more officers and they carried the body away. I looked at my items and the police told me that they had to take them as evidence. I told them that I was fine with that. I never knew who that child was, or how they got there without me noticing. A few days later I decided to investigate the gap which the child had been in. All I found was some words on the wall in my red lipstick, it was recently written, as the makeup was still moist. “Will you be my mummy?”