Long Time, No See

"Hey, Jonathan. Long time no see." It'd been almost a decade since Phillip Wiseman had seen his college roommate, Jonathan Stack. Phillip had been an engineering major, and Jonathan, an art major. These two solitary, lonely boys had drifted together like leaves in a stream. They formed a quiet friendship, and roomed together so easily that, at times, Phillip forgot he had a roommate at all. It seemed natural that they would live together for a second year, or half of a second year, before things changed. Before Jonathan went away.

Much too pale, even for the grey fall weather, Jonathan opened the door the rest of the way. "Hey Phil. Come in, come in." Philip removed his hat before stepping inside the dimly lit entry. "Wow. This is quite a house, Jonathan." "It was left to me," Jonathan says, taking Philip's jacket from him and hanging it on the empty coat rack by the door.

Philip follows him into the parlor of the large, sparsely decorated Victorian home. Jonathan sits down on a loveseat in the center of the room. Phillip brushes the dust off of a large wing chair and sits down on the edge of the seat. "Been here long?" "Oh, a couple of years," says Jonathan. Jonathan is gazing at him, the old feelings, of someone wanting something that he could not give them, begin to come back to Phillip. He clears his throat. "So what have you been up to lately?" "Painting," says Jonathan. Suddenly eager, he leans forward and asks, "Would you like to see my work?" "Sure," the word left Phillip without his thinking about it, the way pleasantries always do.

With surprising energy, Jonathan leads him out of the parlor and past the grand, curving staircase. He opens a small door on the other side of the hallway that opens into a large room filled with canvases covered in dirty, off-white sheets. Jonathan holds the door open and motions for Philip to go in.

It's that smile, Phillip thinks. That smile he remembers from the last time he saw Jonathan that

makes his heart sink. Stop it, he chastises himself. It's been ten years. He's better. He went away, and he got better. Phillip steps past Jonathan into the room. The door shuts behind them and Jonathan walks over to a large covered canvas. "Ready?" That smile. "Ready," says Phillip.

Jonathan pulls off the cloth to reveal a large dark painting of the same Victorian house they are standing in. Phillip steps closer, taken in by the dark details and red-grey sky. The many windows, the woodwork — it's all there. "Jonathan, this is amazing. Really." "Thank you, Phil. I hoped you'd like it," he says, moving away. Phillip leans in closer. He can now see signs of decay on the house in the painting. There are cobwebs in the eaves, shattered windows on the ground floor, and, strangely, large vertical cracks in the house that trace from the ground to the sky.

Out of the corner of his eye, something on the painting moves. He jerks his head over and stares at the home's many windows, looking for something he knows cannot be there.

There! Something moves quickly in one of the upstairs windows. Then he sees it flash in the next window, and, a second later, in the next. It's a person--they're running.

"Jonathan?" he says. "Do you see this?" The figure appears at a window on the other side of the house. This time it goes right up to the window and starts silently banging on glass that won't break. Phillip's eyes widen as he brings his face up to the canvas. The figure looks directly at him. Phillip gasps. It can't be, but it is, down to the pattern of plaid on his shirt. The small, shaking version of Phillip stares back at him and mouths a word. Run.

"Here," Jonathan says, startling Phillip, who jumps around to face him. "You're going to want this." Jonathan is holding the handle of a butcher knife

toward him, smiling. The blade in his bare hand-- drops of blood spatter loudly onto the floor. Phillip swears he can hear them as they hit--a scream pierces the night.