The Black CD
I think, looking back on it all, I had a very gothic upbringing. By age ten, I had attended two family funerals and no weddings, I felt that I ‘identified’ with the colour black, and I found graveyards to be an excellent place to relax. They remain one of the few places where I’ve actually found enough quiet to be able to read peacefully. It’s a childhood that most people might think of as weird and, truthfully, it was. Yet I wouldn’t change it for the world. I lived with my mother in a humble home on Deacon Road in Kingsvale, England. It was a pleasant and simple life. She’d drop me off at school, head to her place of the work, the local hair salon, and then pick me up at the end of the day. Rinse and repeat. I spent almost every moment that I could with my mother. She was my role model and I wanted to be as confident and as composed as she always seemed to be. I hoped that, by adulthood, I would have inherited those traits. And, after recently reaching that milestone, all I can say is that my respect for the woman has increased exponentially – being ‘grown up’ is anything but relaxing. Anyway, let’s get back on track. I imagine that a few eager readers might have come to question where my father was during my youth. Well, here’s your answer… Remember those funerals I mentioned? Yup. He was the second one (the first being for my great grandmother on my mum’s side of the family tree; she was not a woman that I knew particularly well, I must say). It was one hell of an adjustment, losing him so young, and it hit my mother and I with some serious force. I was only six at the time and I was a little bit confused, to be honest, about what was going on. My great nan had passed the year before and I was getting to grips with that one, sort of, but the loss of a parent is a whole other matter. I couldn’t accept it. If you’re wondering what it was that took my father’s life, I’ve got one word for ya (and I’d recommend that you prepare yourself because it’s an ugly one): cancer. To add a second word to the mix, for those that crave specifics: brain. It didn’t take long to take him, apparently. I can’t quite remember the journey. All I remember is the ending. Thus, my mother and I were left alone. The company my father had worked for kindly paid off the mortgage on the house, out of respect, and my mum also received some money from various places and people in order to support me. She did a great job of that, overall, in my opinion. As previously stated, I believe that I was raised as a little goth kid. If you’re picturing a child that wanted nothing more than to one day wake up in the body of a raven, you’re pretty damn close to the mark. However, I wouldn’t associate myself with misery. I was quite happy with a great many things. I suppose I was more suited to the aesthetic than the lifestyle. Either way, I was never bothered about the way I was raised. In fact, I thought of it as pretty awesome. One of my favourite things about my youth was all the effort my mother would put in to Halloween. She treated it like Christmas. Only, instead of wearing green, red and white, you had to wear black (dark red was also acceptable). She even went out of her way to get gifts for the occasion. I always made her a little card, whereas she went out and purchased genuine presents – pretty good ones, too, usually. One year, she gave me an ebony necklace of a slender snake coiling around a cylindrical ‘T’ to form an ankh. For the uninitiated, an ankh is the Egyptian symbol for life. You have more than likely seen one before, whether you know its name or not. Another year, she came home with a book full of short ghost stories, all written by different authors. She read a couple of the creepy-but-not-scary ones to me before bed. I still have that book today, although I’m not too sure of where I’ve put it. When I was eleven years old, my mother gave me a gift unlike any of her others. It was a CD case and inside of it was a music disc. I looked at the front cover and saw that what I was holding, allegedly, was the twenty ‘scariest’ songs for kids at Halloween. I jumped with joy and ran upstairs immediately to start listening to Track 1. She’d picked it up for me earlier in the week, heading out during her lunch hour, and waited patiently until Saturday afternoon to reveal the present. I was delirious with excitement and I darted with it to the upper floor of the house, moving with all the grace of a headless chicken. My mother called up to me from the bottom of the staircase when I had nearly reached her room to say that she needed to quickly pop out in search of a pumpkin. She yelled that she’d been checking throughout the week and everywhere had been sold out. I asked her if I could come with. The evening was approaching and I didn’t like being alone when it got dark outside. A goth kid that’s afraid of the dark – ironic, I know. Luckily, it was rare that my mother left me in the house by myself and, on the few occasions that she did, she always made sure it was bright outside. In response to my plead to go with her, she told me that she wouldn’t be long and I had music to keep myself occupied. If I was scared, she informed me that her number was on a piece of paper by the house phone and I could call her mobile. Reluctantly, I accepted defeat and sulked into her bedroom, where the CD player was waiting for me. Just before entering the room, I shouted downstairs that I wanted her to be as quick as she possibly could. She promised she would be. When she left, I watched her go through the front window of her room. It was raining gently outside and the soft pitter-patter of the rain made me feel quite sleepy. The clouds in the sky were a dismal grey but nothing was out of the ordinary. The weather’s never great in England. It’s something you get used to, with time. As a matter of fact, I felt rather comfortable with the rain – I just hoped my mother would be true to her word and return quickly. She didn’t. I took the CD from its case and admired it before placing it into the CD player. It was a rich and oily black – like a thin slate of obsidian with a hole at its very centre. Beneath the fluorescent light of the bedroom, I caught a couple of glimpses of a subtle shine to the disc’s reflective surface. It was like seeing a single star shimmering faintly in an otherwise empty midnight sky. I inserted the CD and clicked the play button. Then I listened to Track 1 as I lay down on my mother’s bed. Flat on my back, with my hands on my stomach, I looked like an unwrapped mummy. The song was okay. The issue with it was that I’d heard it before. I’d been expecting every piece of music to be unique. I couldn’t recall exactly where I’d heard Track 1 before, but I knew that it was not new to me. That isn’t to say it was bad in any kind of way. I still enjoyed it. I just hoped to find something original in the playlist and, eventually, I did. I found something I don’t think anyone had ever heard before. When Track 2 started, I gave it my best shot but I couldn’t enjoy it. The lyrics were clearly aimed at children much younger than myself. I wanted something scary, something that would actually give me chills whilst being fun to listen to. I should have been more careful with what I wished for. I listened to a few more songs, skipping through any that didn’t instantly make a good impression, and I settled on Track 12. That one was good. Funky and a bit creepy; I thought it was ace. I even tapped my foot along to the beat as I lay on my mother’s bed. I was getting tired of getting up to skip all of the other songs and it was nice to recline with something good playing in the background. Before I knew it, exhaustion took hold of me and my eyes started to close. Let us momentarily diverge from this tale in order to paint the picture of my mother’s bedroom. It’s an important setting, after all, as you will have no doubt picked up on by now. So, without further ado, imagine the following in your mind: Located at the front of the house, with a large rectangular window overlooking the rest of Deacon Road, her room was a place where everything was designated to a certain and specific location, from which it would likely never be moved. Clutter was scarcely seen and the carpet, a gentle blue in colour, was immaculately clean. The walls were a relaxing cream colour and the wallpaper bore an intricate pattern that was still visible in some places but, for the most part, had been worn away over the years. The bed, queen-sized, was gigantic for a kid like me and incredibly comfortable. A sweet scent of vanilla hung in the air and the rest of the world always seemed quiet in my mother’s room. Treating the window as the front centre of the room, there was a wooden end table (that had been designed to look like several large books stacked atop one another) over in the back left corner. It was on that decorative piece of furniture that the CD player resided. From where I lay, I could see some dust over in that area, but there wasn’t really much of it. Along the left wall of the room, other than the end table, there was a black wardrobe and a set of drawers, also darkly designed. The wood was flawlessly polished and it looked brightly beautiful. My mother didn’t have too many outfits stored in that space, she merely liked the way everything looked with the room and I can’t say that I disagreed with her. Above the midsection of the bed, suspended from the ceiling, was a lightbulb that illuminated the room. It was shielded by a lamp shade, which allowed me to lie below it without being blinded. Its switch was on the right-hand wall, very close to the door used for entering and leaving the bedroom. The right wall itself was mostly barren, with the exception of a large clock in the shape of the moon. It had no numbers on its surface, you just had to make an approximation, which isn’t too much of a problem, unless you need to be really specific. Either way, I could never understand why my mother wanted it. It could glow in the dark, so I guess it had that in its favour. I still thought it was stupid, though. Well then, that’s about all I can think of that’s worth stating. Let’s carry on with what happened when the music stopped and Track 13 started to play… It wasn’t a song. There was no beat, no rhythm, no instruments and no melody of any kind. There was, however, a voice. The bone-chilling vocals of this mysterious narrator poured into the room like a cloud of poison. It was a voice that I have never heard again since that day, nor have I encountered anything capable of closely resembling it. It was as unique and memorable as it was terrifying and baritone. If ever asked to identify that nightmare narrator today, regardless of how much time has passed, I know that I could do it. The sinister sound slithered from the speaker of the CD player and swam down my ear canal, where it managed to bury itself within the darkest part of my brain. It is something I know I shall carry with me to the grave. Until then, no matter how hard I try, it will never leave. Pulled from a state of half-sleep, I jolted upwards and turned to face the source of the noise. There was nothing visually wrong with the equipment and, foolishly, I thought that I might have been overreacting to the intended audio of Track 13. So, naively, I chose to listen to what was being said, hoping that things would change. To say that the narrator had a deep voice would be a spectacular understatement. Their voice was as deep and as dark as the ocean of time. My vocabulary, at the age of twenty-one, is nowhere near proficient enough to accurately describe what I heard that day in any level of detail. I sincerely doubt that a professional poet or practiced wordsmith could do justice to something so monumentally atrocious. I shudder to think of the sheer power possessed by the vocalist as they spoke to me from the CD player. They ensnared me with their words, rooting me to the spot. I was frozen in absolute terror. “AT THE DOOR, I KNOCK THREE TIMES.” Thud. Thud. Thud. Goosebumps rose all over my flesh at the sudden noise downstairs. A ghostly hand delicately descended down the curve of my spine and a couple of horror-birthed tears sprouted in my eyes. That sound had come from inside the house. It wasn’t meant as a warning of intrusion. They wanted me to know they were already right there with me. Despite the tremendous volume of the narrator’s voice, there was something else about them that I found to be petrifying. There was an eerie calm in all that they said that seemed to speak of a cold inevitability – like the subtext to everything they dared to utter was clearly visible before my eyes, reading simply: “However long you hide, wherever you run to, I will come and I will catch you.” All of my muscles started to tense and I thought of just one thing: I had to turn the CD player off. Whatever was playing on Track 13, it wasn’t something I intended to continue subjecting myself to for any longer. “DO YOU HEAR ME IN THE HALL?” The question was rhetorical, of course. I have no doubt of that. They weren’t after any kind of vocal response. It was fear that they were after and, boy, was I giving them one hell of a supply. Wordlessly, I screamed at myself to move as I heard their phantom footsteps from two places simultaneously. All sound that erupted from the speaker could also be heard downstairs. That was, with the exception of the stranger’s voice. That seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere in perfect parallel. It was as inaudible as it was deafening – a paradox that I cannot logically comprehend and doubt I will ever be able to fully explain. That doesn’t change one simple fact. I know what I heard. “I LOVE THE PHOTOS IN THE CORRIDOR, TYLER. I’M COMING UP TO SEE YOU NOW.” My heart stopped pumping blood and instead sent ice shooting through my bloodstream. They knew my name. How did they know my name? All of my skin was suddenly frozen and I found myself struggling to breathe. When very young, I’d suffered from asthma and I remember feeling at that moment that an attack was coming on. My former condition had returned from its slumber to take my life before the intruder could do the job. The air felt tight and deprived of oxygen. There was nothing I wanted more in the world than to satisfy my urge to scream but I couldn’t physically attempt anything close to such a feat. However, I knew that if I didn’t move, without a doubt, it would all be over. I would die. It took a short while to summon the strength (and courage) that I needed but, once I had everything at hand, I rolled over in the bed towards the CD player. Like a dehydrated man in desperate need of water, I reached out for my goal… The distance was much too great. That was when my vision started to blur. From the corners of my eyes, I could see a black mould starting to form and slowly close in on me. With each passing moment, my situation grew worse. Thud! The first step up the staircase sent a thunderous echo throughout the house and the walls tremored. It was like being caught up at ground-zero of the world’s worst earthquake. The shaking never lasted long but it felt much worse when the second step was taken. I realized that they were getting closer and I wasn’t doing anything to stop them. I think a lot of people, when recalling past trauma (just like I am doing as I attempt to construct this tale now) use phrases such as “I should have acted sooner.” Whilst this is definitely true in my case, I do not hate or blame myself for hesitating. I remember all too well what it was like being trapped in that bedroom, with nothing to listen to other than the footfalls of the approaching intruder. By the time they were half way up the stairs, I was out of bed and leaning over the end table. My vision was nothing but a small circle of clarity, surrounded by lightning forks of black blindness. The weather outside had worsened by quite a bit. A storm was on the way. Before the narrator could declare that they had progressed any further, I pressed the square button on the CD player to stop whatever the hell was going on. I collapsed forward, dazed and unable to maintain my balance. I smiled as I hit the ground. I had heard, clear as day, the all-too-important click to signal that the CD had stopped playing. And, to confirm my theory, the footsteps had ceased. I was safe. I drew in a deep breath of beautiful air, finding no difficulty in doing so, and expelled it with glee as I lay sprawled on the carpet of my mother’s bedroom. Then the laughter started. The house rocked unsteadily on its foundation and I was suddenly, once again, gasping for breath. I held my throat with both hands, praying for the sweet taste of oxygen. A terrible roar of corrupted joy filled my ears. It was intoxicating. The narrator was closer and they were going to reach me. I knew it. There wasn’t a thing that I could do. But I still wanted to try. After a few moments, the triumphant laughter stopped and my breathing seemed to settle. It was unsteady and I still felt like I needed more oxygen, but I was able to manage. That was when I decided to make a move. Using the bed as a support, I stumbled clumsily back on to my feet and waddled to the foot of the bed, where I could look at the door. I thought about how my mother had left her phone number downstairs and there was no way of contacting her without encountering whatever was after me. “ONE STEP, TWO STEP, THREE STEP, FOUR. WHO’S THAT KNOCKING AT YOUR DOOR? TWO STEP, THREE STEP, FOUR STEP, FIVE. IS TYLER JONES STILL ALIVE?” I listened as they strolled from the top of the staircase past the back wall of the bedroom and to the door. My body was quivering but I tried to maintain a brave face as best I could. My sight had returned to normal after my brief collapse and I was mentally trying to prepare myself for what was about to come my way. They were so close now. I didn’t know whether it was worth diving out of the window and running for the hills. As I contemplated the idea, there was a guttural rumble of thunder from the sky. The storm was underway. “I’M OUTSIDE THE DOOR. LET ME IN.” Although the voice had been so naturally intense, the line was delivered barely above a whisper. It was like I was being mocked. They’d arrived at the bedroom without issue and were asking that I kindly open the door to confirm what was already a fact: they had won. I didn’t move. All I did was stare at the door. The handle didn’t move. No hand struck the other side. However, I could see something at the bottom through a small gap. Perhaps it was a shadow. Maybe it was something else. As soon as I registered that there was something there, it disappeared. “I’M OUTSIDE THE DOOR. LET ME IN!” It was somewhat louder the second time round but I made no move to obey their command. What haunted me most about their cry was that it was only the volume that seemed to alter. Their tone of speech remained consistently calm – just like a narrator’s voice. “I’M OUTSIDE THE DOOR! LET ME IN!” They shouted so loud that the house itself seemed to shiver; Yet there was no hint of genuine irritation that I could detect. I gripped the bed with both hands, my knuckles clutched so hard that my skin was as white as bone. I was shaking frantically and, had I been younger at the time, I think I would have wet myself. My mind raced with several ideas of what to do – all of which were frankly awful. The only option was to wait. Which I did. For a time, nothing seemed to happen. The intruder was silent. I was not foolish enough to think, even for a second, that they’d left. Just past the door, they were waiting. I knew it. I could picture them clearly. A figure of shadow, so tall that they needed to slouch forward to stop their head from colliding with the ceiling. They were there, hunched over and staring at the door with dispassion. The one feature of their person that I knew I could describe with confidence was their eyes. I knew exactly what they would look like. After all, I’d already seen them, in a way. If I opened the door, my gaze would fall upon two spheres, their colour the empty black of polished obsidian, with small segments of occasional light glistening from their surface. That was when I had the idea to try ejecting the CD. It’s something you would have thought might’ve come to mind sooner. I’d stopped the disc from playing it but I hadn’t locked it back up in its case. I imagine that if I was thinking straight, I might have had the idea earlier. I also think that there was something trying to stop me from conjuring such a plan. There was some kind of external force or parasite corrupting my brain and preventing me from taking action. I’ll never know if I’m right or wrong about that, I suppose. It doesn’t matter, anyway, does it? The only thing of any importance is the fact that I managed to gain that precious second of composure to come up with a strategy. When I came up with my plan (all hail my belated stroke of genius), I darted to the CD player and slammed my hand on its top. If you pressed down on the lid that housed the discs, it would automatically open. I know what you’re thinking: That’s some pretty advanced technology, right there. Damn right! When the top leapt open, I snatched the black CD and thrust it back into its case, doing the whole action in a single, fluid movement. It was done. I hoped. I’d been fooled once. I didn’t want to be tricked again. What I decided on doing was waiting for my mother to return and find me. Before that, for curiosity’s sake, I would place my ear to the door and listen for any signs of life, making sure not to touch the handle. I approached cautiously and a little bit reluctantly, placing one foot in front of the other with an incredible amount of care. Nothing seemed to make any noise (aside from the storm, which continued to rage on). All was perfectly silent inside the house. On any other day, that fact might’ve scared me. Not then. I couldn’t have been happier about the quiet. After confirming that I could hear nothing from outside the bedroom, I took a few steps back towards the window, continuing to face the door – just in case – and I sighed heavily. “Thank f–” “I’M OUTSIDE THE DOOR! LET ME…” It stopped, as did everything else. The universe took a moment’s pause, held in suspense. There was nothing remotely calm about the voice that time. It had screamed like an animal being slaughtered. It was full of hunger, anger and hatred. I stood roughly half a metre away from the door, with a rough idea in mind of what was about to happen. I fought away the urge to start hyperventilating and crawl up into the foetal position. If there was ever a time to be tough, it was at precisely that second. On the mark of what I felt could be my final exhalation, it happened. “IN!” The voice screamed and the door flew open, its hinges shattering like glass. Whatever happened next, I don’t remember it. I’d like to think that I fought and that I did so bravely. I cannot say if I saw the individual responsible for my torment and I don’t intend to lie and claim that I did. All I know is that when my mother returned, I was fast asleep in her bed, clutching her Halloween gift to my chest. The weather outside was depressing but it wasn’t anything close to extreme. Only the soft pitter-patter of rain graced the window. I told my mum about Track 13 and can you guess what she said? If anyone opted for “There was no Track 13,” well done to you! She showed me so herself that the playlist was numbered 1-12 and 14-21. Apparently, Track 13 had been cut out due to the superstition that it was a cursed number. So, one might think, was it Track 14 that I listened to? Nope. Before the voice even began, I’d heard a much more monotone speaker announce that it was Track 13 about to be played. Maybe I heard wrong. It’s possible. Although, I did go back and play Track 14 at a later date, just to check whether or not I was mistaken. It was just a normal (and, admittedly, quite awful) Halloween-themed song. I would have come to doubt everything that happened that day if it wasn’t for the trouble I had getting to sleep. I mean, after what I’d experienced, who wouldn’t have trouble sleeping, right? Every time I closed my eyes of a night, in that minute fraction of time between them being open and shut, I’d see someone standing at the foot of my bed. They were a tall figure and they slouched over my body so that their face peered down directly at my own. Their eyes were the colour of a midnight sky. They came every night for years and, during that time, I could never dream. My mind was drained and empty. I believe that’s what they wanted from me: all of my dreams and nightmares. They were a Dream-Eater, or, at least, that was what I called them. It was that grotesque feeding that inspired me to nickname them Leech. An appropriate name, I felt. The more I thought about it, the better it suited them. What do you think a leech would sound like if it could imitate human speech? Whatever you’re thinking, that’s exactly what I heard when they first whispered to me from the other side of the door. Around a year ago, when I was preparing my stuff for my eventual departure from Deacon Road, I stumbled upon the black CD. It had been locked away in the attic by my mother a few months after the incident and, whilst she had forgotten all about it, I had searched multiple times and never managed to find it. So, what did I do when I found it? Did I burn it, break it or smash it? No. I did something much worse. I sold it. There wasn’t too much to be made from the sale but the guy I gave it to thought he’d be able to sell it to someone simply based on how it looked – not what was on it. That was all fine by me, so long as I was rid of it. I didn’t expect anything to change. I thought that I’d continue to be haunted for the rest of my life but, a few weeks after the initial transaction occurred, Leech disappeared from the foot of my bed. I started to dream again. I don’t know who purchased the black CD and found Track 13. All I can say to them is that I’m sorry – which doesn’t amount to much, does it? Perhaps, over the course of the past year, it has traded hands again. It’s not impossible. For all I know, one day, in the distant future, someone reading this tale of mine might be the unfortunate soul in possession of that accursed artefact. Check your attic, if you’re curious. Don’t worry about finding it; it will find you, if it needs to, so long as you’re close by. And if you do manage to discover it, destroy it. Succeed where I failed and cleanse this planet from its presence. Whatever lurks within the words of the elusive Track 13 is a being of unimaginable patience. If allowed to live, I believe that it will lie dormant in the black CD for all eternity, if need be, just waiting for the right time… waiting for the day that someone decides to listen. Credit: Jacob L Bloomer Copyright Statement: Unless explicitly stated, all stories published on Creepypasta.com are the property of (and under copyright to) their respective authors, and may not be narrated or performed under any circumstance.