"You won't find it though." (Part 2)

Part 1“You won’t find it, though.”That was the sentence I woke up with that morning. I tried to remember the dream that had accompanied it, however, I had always found it hard to remember any of my dreams.I held my face in my hands. Was it stress? An underlying medical condition? What could possibly cause me to lose that much time? And what about the little girl? Was she just a hallucination? And the writing on my chest, who had written it?I couldn’t think about it, not now. Perhaps it was an isolated incident, maybe it wouldn’t happen again.I checked my phone, of course, the time read 6:30. There was a single missed call from a number I didn’t recognize and a voicemail that accompanied it.“Mark. It’s, um, it’s dad. Your mom, she’s, uh, she was a little upset last night. I-I’m not around as often as I’d like and, you know, we’re getting older. Just maybe don’t… call her anymore. You can call me just not during work. I know I told you yesterday, but I do work, Marcus. She’s… it’s over now. Let it be over, Marcus.”The voicemail ended there. It only raised more questions, had I called him as well? What was over? The room seemed to start spinning as I tried to collect my thoughts. What was going on?I decided I’d take another walk outside. The early morning air felt nice against my skin, especially considering I hadn’t noticed how much I had started sweating since all of this happened. The street was quiet except for the occasional car passing by. I looked at my phone. Would my dad be awake at this time? I pressed the number and it rang.“Hello?” a quiet voice answered the phone.“Dad, are you getting ready for work?”“Mark, it’s Sunday, Sunday’s my day off. What do you need? Your mother is sleeping so don’t yell so loud this time.”“Dad, what did we talk about last night?”There was a long pause before he finally said, “Are you on drugs?” He didn’t sound vindictive or angry as he said this, nor did he sound concerned. He just sounded like my mother had. Tired and sad.“What? No, dad please, I need to know what we talked about.”“I’ll tell you, but you have to promise me something.”“Anything,” the desperation was clear in my voice now. “Just tell me, please.”“Just… get some help. You know what happened to your brother. First, there was the… conversation we had yesterday and now you’re forgetting stuff like this, see a doctor, see a psychologist, a psychiatrist, anyone.”This time I was the one who paused. “Yeah. Yeah, I will.” I finally said, quietly.“Look, Mark, I can’t even remember a lot of it. You sounded out of breath and most of the things you said didn’t make sense. It was just a lot of yelling and screaming, and you just started-”“Did I say something about my sister?” I interrupted.“No, well, I mean, yes, but… yes you did mention a sister.”“That’s what I meant, a sister. What did I say?”“You said there-”I was standing in my kitchen, in the place as I had before, and my phone was against my ear again. I looked at the time, it was 8:43 AM now. I hit my dad’s number again and it rang and rang until it finally went to voicemail. What just happened? I rushed outside frantically looking around to retrace my steps. I had just lost almost two hours, what had I just done?“Marcus.” the soft voice of my elderly neighbor interrupted my racing mind.He was an older gentleman, always wearing flannel shirts tucked into an old pair of pants and suspenders. He had a deep and crackling but soothing voice that I had assumed had been the result of years of heavy smoking.“Mr. Moore. I-”“Would you help me with something here?” he pointed towards his open front door.“I’m sorry, I have to-”“It’ll be quick.” his voice was stern, but he followed the sentence with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. I didn’t know why, but I felt as though I didn’t have a choice in the matter. Not saying another word I followed him into his house.Mr. Moore’s house seemed to completely contradict his personality. Outwardly, he was a tall man, looking similar to a lumberjack. His home was lined with faded pastel yellow floral wallpaper and he seemed to have a small collection of framed butterfly displays.I suppose he caught me looking at it because he said, “It was my wife’s. She used to love butterflies.”I nodded, a trickle of sweat running down the back of my neck. “Was there something you needed, Mr. Moore?”“Call me Chester. Come, I just needed help with this old thing.” he waved his hand and walked into his living room. A layer of dust covered every surface as if he hadn’t been there in forever. He grabbed the remote and pressed the power button, it did nothing to start the old TV that sat in front of both of us. “Damn remote is acting up again.”He handed it to me and I tried it, it did nothing. “Mr- I mean Chester, I have no experience with remotes, maybe you should call the company-”“Nonsense, they’re just a bunch of greedy pigs, those tech guys,” he said, walking to his kitchen.I had helped Chester with a few other simple tasks around his front and back yard before, but I’d never been inside. He was a kind and harmless old man, sometimes I thought he just asked me to do him favors because he felt lonely and needed someone to listen to his stories. I never minded, he always told good stories and gave me a few extra bucks for any job he had me do.“So, Marcus.” his voice was strange now. He sounded hesitant. “Do you happen to know where my shovel is?”I paused. This was a strange question, did I take his shovel while I had passed out? Is this why he had me come in here, to confront me? “I-I’m sorry, I don’t.”“Hm,” he said, quietly. “Strange. I could have sworn it was you walking off my front yard yesterday holding my shovel.”A loud thump from the upstairs of his house interrupted our discussion. We both looked up the stairs. It seemed as though it was pitch black up there, not a single light had been turned on. The thump was followed by a series of rapid footsteps.“My wife is awake.” he let out a sigh, avoiding my eyes, “she’s probably looking for me. Feel free to see yourself out.”I didn’t hesitate and instead went straight for the door.“Oh, and Marcus,” he called from the bottom of the stairs. “I need that shovel.”I nodded and hurried out the door.I suddenly felt sick, I could feel the beads of sweat forming on my forehead and the once welcome sun seemed to now beat down hard against my already sweaty face. I walked slowly off his porch and made my way to my own house.I felt a buzzing in my pocket. My phone had been going off. I reached around and held it in my hands. “MOM” flashed across the screen. “Hello?” I said quietly.“Marcus,” she answered. “Your father must’ve already told you…”“Told me what?” I asked, “Mom, what the hell is going on?”She paused for a long while, occasionally stuttering, “I-Marcus, you know how much I love you an-and your… brother.”“What?” I could barely let it out as a whisper. Where was this coming from?“Well, there’s no easy way to say this… Marcus, we think Ben is… dead. Your father hired a private investigator a couple of months back to track him down and instead of finding him they found a body.”I paused a moment. I was never close to my brother, I had always been stuck in the middle of the arguments between him and my mother which caused resentment towards both of them. I didn’t feel sad, as much as I felt confused. Her voice sounded like she was reading lines off a sheet of paper.“Marcus? Are you there?” she asked, her voice going back to normal. Had I imagined it? Was her voice really that strange or was I being paranoid?“Um, yes, sorry, I just- I’m ok.”“Ok. I have to go now. Call your father if you either of us.”“Wait-” I said, but she quickly hung up the phone.My father never expressed any interest in finding Ben, and I know if my mother knew she would be completely against it as well. This was all so strange, had the years softened the both of them up to finally finding their estranged son, or had she been lying? I thought back to the message that was written on my chest. What does Ben know or what did he know?I made my way through my house, should I call a private investigator of my own to find out if he really was dead? He was almost nonexistent in my life being so much older than me. And if I was to try to find out more about him I’d have to visit my parents to look through his stuff, which might already have been thrown out.I was exhausted from the amount of stress the last few days had caused. I sat on my living room couch and suddenly had a memory come back to me.It was pitch black and I was in Mr. Moore’s backyard. I grabbed his shovel, inspected it, and held it in my hands. I remember thinking it was heavier than I thought it would be. The lights flicked on and I quickly hid behind a tree, cursing to myself.“Hello?” his tired voice called out. After there was no response he grumbled to himself and walked back inside, turning off the lights as he went.I breathed a sigh of relief and slowly began to walk through his yard. As I got to the sidewalk in front of his yard, however, I heard a confused whisper from behind me. “Marcus?” he called.I immediately froze and looked at him.The memory blurred after that, I believe I stood and talked to him. All I could remember him saying was, “you won’t find it, though.”I got up from my couch. I’m remembering small things again, but still, none of it makes sense. I looked around my house, searching for the shovel I had stolen. It wasn’t in any obvious place, however, as I looked in my bathroom I saw it lying in the shower. I picked it up, once again inspecting it. It didn’t seem like I had used it, however, what really caught my eye was the obvious bloody handprint on the handle. Had I done that? There was no way, the blood looked to be far too old to be something that just happened last night.It was at that moment I realized something strange about my conversation with Mr. Moore earlier. When I had come into his house and looked at his collection of butterflies, he talked about his wife like she was dead, referring to her in the past tense. Then, when the thumping came from upstairs, he immediately said it was his wife. Who was upstairs? Was it simply a mistake? And what would I not find? A body? I couldn't jump to any conclusions here, maybe the bloody handprint was just part of a Halloween decoration, it had only been a few weeks ago after all.I began to hyperventilate, losing myself in these questions. Who could I trust? Everyone seemed to know more than they were letting on and the fact that I was losing time and forgetting wasn’t helping.Suddenly I felt my phone vibrating in my pocket. An unknown caller, perhaps it was my dad calling back. I immediately answered the phone.“Hello? Dad-”The voice of an unknown man cut me off. I didn’t recognize it, though it sounded slightly familiar. “Marcus.”I paused, trying to place the voice. I didn’t know why, but a tear ran down my cheek. “Yes?”“It’s been… a while. We need to talk.” via /r/nosleep https://ift.tt/2IygAXB