Short story: Something Strange on Halloween

I was home alone on Halloween night. My parents said I was too old to go trick-or-treating, so they stuck me with handing out the candy. It was getting dark, and I hadn’t had anybody come to the door for at least fifteen minutes, so I thought it was time to turn off the lights and head upstairs to my room.

Boy, was I wrong! Just as I opened the door to my room, I heard the strangest noise. It sounded like slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”  It repeated three times while I stood half in my room and half in the hall, my hand still on the doorknob.

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”

The first parts sounded like they were made by a damp object, but the last part sounded like it was forced out of a strangled throat.

The doorknob under my hand rattled.  I jumped back in alarm, and let out a short scream of terror.  Then I realized that my own trembling hand had rattled the knob.

I took a deep breath.

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”

I swallowed hard.

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”

I peered around the edge of the door into my dark bedroom.  All I could see were shadows, and the glowy orange pumpkin LED light I had left on my windowsill. 

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”

I eased my hand into the room, sliding it over the few inched of wall to the lightswitch.  The room flooded with white light when I flipped the switch.  I was gratyeful my dad had insisted on those new fluorescent lightbulbs.

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp!”

I looked around the room.  Nothing seemed out of place.  I heard the noise again, and knew it was coming from inside my closet, which was closed.  Well, at least my mom had made me clean it out on Saturday, so there shouldn’t be much in there that could be used as a weapon.

“Why did I have to think that,” I groaned softly.

Summoning up every bit of courage I had gained in my 14 years, I took three steps across my room to my closet door.  My hands were still trembling, but I put one on the knob, and turned.

I edged the door open an inch or two, and the sliver of light that got past my shoulder fell on something squirming on the floor of the closet.

Slap-slap-whoomph-“Erp ick-icj-ick!” Slap-whoomph-slap-slap-squich-“Urdle erk!”

Caught in the light, the something squirmed faster, and made more voice noises.  It sounded frantic.

A monster in my bedroom closet on Halloween sounded frantic?  My fear lessened, or my courage grew, but either way, I stopped trembling.  I opened the door to let the light fill the closet.  Below the row of jeans, tops, jackets, and other assorted clothes, something bluish-green was tangled up in my tennis racket, and was partly stuck inside one of my winter boots.  The strangled throat sounds came from inside the boot.  I picked up the tennis racket, and laid it aside.  The something was about the size and general shape of a basketball, aside from whatever was in the boot, and a pair of long, broad, webbed flipper-feet, that looked like flattened scuba flippers.  Two ridiculously short, cute arms, ending in stubby hands with three or four stubbier fingers stuck out of its sides.  They were way too short to reach each other, or to get at the boot. 

As I watched, intrigued, the flippery feet went slap-slap against the floor, the something heaved its smooth, round body off the floor, and promptly collapsed back with a whoomph, and the boot almost sobbed, “Erp!”

Picking up the tennis racket in my right hand, just in case I needed to hit something with it, I reached down with my left hand, and tugged the boot off the something.  It was on there pretty tightly, bot it came off with a squelch-pop!

Two enormous, round eyes stared up at me above a nose that resembled nothing so much as the trunk of a baby elephant.  The head was just as round as the body, but not quite as large.  A tiny mouth opened below the trunk, as the something blinked up at me.

“Oh!” we both cried at the same moment, I in amazement, and the something in startled dismay.

I held the tennis racket ready, but dropped my rather damp boot.  So much for that pair.  “What are you?” I breathed, not actually expecting a reply.

“Umdoorsh Urthleshoon,” it said, its words sounding rather wet and squishy.  It wiggled itself up onto its flippery feet, and gazed up at me, its eyes seeming remarkably old and serious as it slowly blinked at me.

“Did you say something,” I gasped, stumbling back a couple of steps until the backs of my legs ran into the end of my bed.  I collapsed onto it, dropping the tennis racket, and staring incredulously at the something.  “No way will anyone at school tomorrow believe this!” I thought, weakly.

“Esquoose me,” the something said, tipping its head slightly to one side, and patting itself damply with its trunk.  “I says Umdoorsh Urthleshoon.  Is what I is.  I is Umdoorsh Urthleshoon.  Whas you?”

‘Oh my God!” I thought, but I said, “Um, I’m Becky.  Becky Foster.  Um, it’s, like, nice to meet you….”  My voice trailed off as I realized how completely surreal this night was becoming.

“Sankoo, sankoo, Beggy Fosher,” Umdoorsh Urthleshoon said very seriously.  “Now I cansh goo hoom.”

“Goo hoom?”  I repeated dazedly.  “You mean go home?  You can go home?”

“Yesh, goo hoom,” Umdoorsh Urthleshoon agreed, its trunk waving slowly in front of its mouth.

“Um.”  I swallowed.  Then I had an idea.  “uh, not sure how you can go home, but before you do, can you do me a little favor?”

Umdoorsh Urthleshoon tipped its head to one side, then to the other, blinking at me like a damp, bald, blue owl.

Later that night, my mom poked her head into my room.  “Uh, Beck?” she said.  “What on earth did you spill down the side of your shirt tonight?”

“Sorry, Mom, I called from under the covers.  “I dunno what that damp stuff was.  I guess it got all over me.”

She sighed and closed the door.  I heard her putting mu candy-wired brother and sister to bed, and grinned at the image on my phone’s glowing screen.  No one, and I meant no one, would be able to deny that my baby brother had worn the very best Halloween costume when I entered this pic in the school contest tomorrow.  No one had to know Brian had been a fuzzy lion in a jammie costume, because Umdoorsh Urthleshoon had popped out of my closet to … somewhere … with a squelchy sucking sound, and could never tell anyone what had really happened.