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The Monster Buried Deep Within
Cameron Miller habitually ran his calloused hand through his tousled black hair as he ambled out of the family clinic and towards his Toyota truck. After a thorough examination, the young Dr. Rodriguez had concluded that nothing was wrong with him, physically at least. The only advice Cam received was to sleep some more and take an Aspirin in the morning.
Cam was glad that he wasn't fatally sick or anything, but he had really been hoping there would be a logical explanation for the terrible headaches he had been having and how he just blacks out after. Recently, Cam had also been losing track of time and days just seemed to fly by so quickly. Luckily though, when he blacked out, he didn't get those horrible recurring nightmares he has of his mother being suffocated to death. Though Cam had only been seven and he wasn't actually with her at the time, he had been shown a picture of the crime scene by a nice police officer. It was gruesome, how she had been cruelly suffocated by a plastic bag.
Shaking his head to rid his mind of those awful thoughts out of his head, Cam climbed into his sleek black SUV and thought about the romantic date he was going to take Olivia on tonight. Pulling into the driveway of his condo with a ear-piercing screech of protest from his truck's brakes, Cam hurried into his living room - he could feel another headache coming on. He managed to get himself situated semi-comfortably on his worn out couch before the pain overtook his mind and Cam was forced to fall into the realms of his unconscious. The last rays of afternoon sunshine shone on Cam, giving the whole scene a serene and tranquil vibe.
[]
Cam's arms reached upwards in a lazy stretch as he slowly found his way back to reality. He squinted his turquoise eyes as his retinas struggled to adjust to the sudden burst of morning sun shining through the window blinds. Somehow, Cam had ended up asleep under the duvet in his bedroom though he clearly remembered passing out on the couch. He assumed that his long frame had gotten too uncomfortable on the couch and he had made his way in a sleepy haze to his comfortable bed.
Swinging his legs off the edge of the mattress and easing himself into a sitting position, Cam saw what looked suspiciously like a black leather jacket caught in the door of his closet. Curious because he was certain he didn't own anything made of leather, Cam opened the closet door in one fast motion, half expecting an ex-convict or drunk rockstar to jump out. What he did see though, actually surprised him more. His entire wardrobe seemed to have disappeared over night, having been replaced with a new set of clothes that seemed more fit for a twenty-year-old drummer than a thirty-two-year-old corporate banker.
Frustrated and angry, Cam stormed outside to check the trash can to see if somehow all of his clothes had ended up there. To his bewilderment, the metal bin was devoid of any trash, despite the fact that the garbage trucks didn't come by his neighborhood on weekends. Still trying to make sense of how his wardrobe had just been mysteriously replaced, Cam suddenly remembered about his date with Olivia last night. He rushed back into his condo and groped for his cell phone hidden under the vast amount of paperwork in his briefcase.
Flipping open his phone, he frantically read a text message from Olivia at eleven o'clock last night, which was embroidered with a variety of swear words. He hurriedly called her home number, hoping that he could somehow make it up to his girlfriend of two years.
"Hello?" Olivia finally answered on the fifth ring. Her angelic voice seemed a bit stuffy today, and he really hoped he was not the cause of that.
"Hey Livs, it's Cam. I'm so sorry about last night, I was hoping I could maybe make it up to you sometime this week?" Cam apologized, trying to sound as sincere as he could.
"Sorry? You didn't seem very sorry last night. You dumped me in front of the entire restaurant, douche. I never want to see you again." Olivia abruptly hung up, leaving Cam blubbering in confusion. How could he have dumped her when he hadn't even seen her yesterday?
Suddenly, waves of pain resonated through Cam's mind, and he collapsed onto a nearby armchair. Before the throbbing completely overwhelmed him, Cam managed to thank the heavens that it was a Sunday so he wouldn't risk missing work, though he would most likely miss the restaurant opening of his co-worker that was planned for tonight. Thomas had been talking about the new cafe for weeks now, and it was a shame Cam wouldn't be able to make it. He would have to apologize to Thomas on Monday. It was strange though, for never had the headaches come so frequently and strongly...
[]
Without waiting to hear the automated farewell programmed into the elevator in his office building, Cam stepped onto the thickly carpeted floors and made a beeline for his office. His office was one of the smallest ones on the floor and was tucked into a corner, but it was a huge upgrade from the cubicle he had worked at for the past two years. Just as his polished leather shoe appeared in the doorway of his office, the old grandfather clock next door struck eight o'clock sharp.
"Cutting it close on the time, Cam," a gruff and authoritative voice sounded from next door, reminding Cam who was in charge around here.
"Sure thing, Arthur," Cam nervously replied, knowing that he was already walking on thin ice after he had lost a three-million-dollar deal last week.
Cam set his belongings down and retrieved the papers he needed for work from his leather briefcase. He was glad he had woken merely hours after he had passed out last night, which gave him enough time to grab some dinner at a burger joint down the block and get a good night's sleep for another long day of work. As he looked through various papers left on his desk by his boss' secretary, Cam realized that he needed a signature from someone in Finance in order to finalize a contract.
He collected the papers and walked out into the main area of the floor, greeting some of his co-workers that looked up when he walked by. Thomas, who had sat at the cubicle next to Cam before he was promoted, slid into his chair clumsily, hoping that no one had noticed he was late. Cam changed his course of direction and started towards Thomas' work space, deciding that now was as good a time as any to apologize for missing his restaurant opening.
"Hey, Thomas," Cam greeted him casually, an easygoing grin on his face. He didn't want to intimidate Thomas by acting like his boss, even though he technically was.
"Hey, jerk," Thomas retorted coldly, surprising Cam with his hostile tone.
"Okay... Well, I'm sorry for not being able to make it to your restaurant opening last night. I must've been so tired I passed out on my couch." Cam said awkwardly, feeling out of place as some of the neighboring co-workers looked over at them.
Thomas gave a harsh laugh. "Right. You weren't there. That's totally how you deliberately set my newly renovated restaurant on fire. You're lucky I'm not pressing charges," he said condescendingly before turning away from Cam and purposely ignoring Cam's baffled expression.
Completely forgetting about the contract he was holding in his hands, Cam walked back towards his office, wanting to sit down and think about what Thomas meant. Just as he reached the door though, he felt a surge of pain in his head. Cam hoped with all he had that this black out would be a short one, locked the door to his office, and fainted into his fancy office chair.
[]
Cam slowly regained his consciousness and took in his surroundings with a disoriented expression on his face. Quickly perceiving that he was at work, Cam checked the time. Good, it was only eleven thirty, which means he had only been out for a little over three hours. He couldn't have missed that much in three hours, could he?
Just as Cam sat up straight in his chair, his boss came striding into his office. "Cam, why are you not packing your stuff?"
"What? Why should I?" Cam replied, puzzled at the question that seemed to come out of nowhere.
"Don't try to act smart, boy. You're not going to pretend like this didn't happen. Pack your stuff and move back into your old cubicle." He spoke with finality and left the room just as fast as he had come.
Cam obeyed the orders, though he still had no idea what he had done that was so bad to get him demoted out of the blue. After he had settled in at his old cubicle, he pulled up his online bank account to make sure the deposit of his paycheck he had made last week had gone through correctly. He logged in with the same passcode he had been using since he was a teenager and went directly to the 'Recent Activity' page.
He started from the bottom of the screen and worked his way up. Everything seemed normal; electricity bill, water bill, monthly interest, and the deposit of his recent paycheck. But unexpectedly, that was not at the top of the page, something else happened to his account after he deposited the check. As his eyes skimmed over the words, his brain still wouldn't believe what he was reading. Twenty-thousand dollars was wire transferred from his account two nights ago at midnight to an unknown account.
[]
Cam was startled back to reality after having a terrifying and dark dream in which he was mysteriously pushed off a cliff. He woke up in his dark living room, illuminated only by the light emanating from his laptop, which sat next to him on the couch. Cam was dumbfounded at how he had gotten home, since the last thing he remembered was finding a substantial amount of money missing from his bank account. But that was at noon and at work, while now it seemed to be in the middle of the night and he was at home.
Cam sat up and brought his computer onto his lap so he could see if there were any clues on there as to what he had been through during the second half of the day. The only thing opened on his laptop was a Word document with a short cryptic message that he could not understand:
You can try to run,
You can try to hide,
But you'll never escape,
What lies inside you.
Doubt may dwell in your mind,
But turn on the lights,
And fate will let you see,
What has happened to me.
Deciding to follow the seemingly harmless instructions, Cam stumbled to the wall and felt around until the lights flickered once or twice before turning on. He turned around, prepared to see his pristine and neat living room with perhaps a note or something left by whatever psycho maniac had left the message on his computer.
Instead, Cam saw nothing but bodies. There were bodies on the carpets, on the coffee table, on top of the television; all he could see was a layer of flesh covering every surface in the room. Then, he began to be able to see individual bodies underneath the overall atrocity of the scene. There had to be at least twenty of them, both men and women, of all different ages. The only thing they had in common was that they seemed to have all been killed in the same way - suffocation by a plastic bag. There was a clear plastic bag wrapped around each head, and some of the faces still had eyes grotesquely bugging out. The sight struck a chord deep within Cam's heart. It all looked so familiar, like he had seen it before. But... where could he have seen something like this before? Then Cam realized. It was the exact same method that he had seen in the picture that cop had shown him, though no one else knew of that except for...
Trepidation descended upon Cam's features as he finally understood what had happened.
It couldn't be.
It was impossible.
But it was true.
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