MALEVOLENCE (PT I)

I - GAMES

E.B-L

(2025)

Author’s Note:

Special thanks to:

• Author, Nathan Hatch – for reading the drafts, and whose discerning eye caught the shadows I missed.

• Author (and friend), Brett McBean – for unintentionally inspiring me to write about the darkness.

• My wife, Farah – for her patience and inspiring me to write about my own darkness.

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I - GAMES

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Josiah was a strange child. He would often glare into corners, to the horizon, or straight into a person’s soul – whatever that looked like. Tonight, he was spending time with his school friend, Ned.

Ned’s mother lived with her friend Bryan in rural Victoria, the Otway Ranges, having moved there after Ned’s father passed away. It was fresh out there, abundant with dense Victorian rain forest. The house was positioned on a clearing at the edge of a drop into the valley, holding two stories above ground and one below. A dated build with old oak and timbers. The roof had multiple A-frames allowing for spacious dwellings. During the day, sunlight would penetrate every opening, exposing cobwebs and dancing with dust particles. An elegant and large country home.

Before his mother hauled Ned, and all her belongings, out into “the sticks”, Bryan lived a solitary existence. He spent most days engulfed in the smoke that emanated from his pipe, running his fingers through his long beard while gazing out from his enormous, almost wall-sized, lounge window overlooking the acreage and down into its swamps.

He purchased the property at a time when he was captivated by dreams. Having already been raised in the area, he was further motivated to entrench himself deeper into the land. Those plans had since fallen away into the unforgiving passages of his own history, leaving him to ponder – and on most days obsess – over his pending demise. While it was a fate shared by all, Bryan was convinced his time was coming much sooner than others. Sooner than he was comfortable with.

He caressed the final moments of sun as it packed up for the day; the hills now smeared with an uneasy dusk. The blood orange skies across his little piece of life fought valiantly against the shadowy forces of night – knowing it would eventually concede.

He let out a quiet moan, chased by the remaining air in his lungs, stood up, and walked to the kitchen to make a cup of tea that would see him into the evening. He also overheard the boys downstairs chattering away about something. Ned’s mother was out for dinner and he was in charge. All in all, he was approachable and friendly, but Bryan would generally leave the boys to their own devices. This evening was no different.

He graced them both only momentarily, peering into the room.

“Are you boys going to sit inside all night? It’s warm, we could take a walk through the brush?”

Ned looked up at him, confused.

“Why would we do that?”

“Okay. Just a thought…” retreating back up the stairs.

“Want to do a Ouija board?” Josiah asked Ned.

“Mum said those things attract bad spirits!” Ned, meekly.

“Fine. What about the game ‘light as a feather’?” his eyes pretending to be alive.

“What’s that?” Ned responded cautiously. He was smart. Gifted. While not outwardly, he harboured an intuition beyond the years of an elderly sage. He also knew there was something about his new friend that was not quite right.

Josiah began to explain as Ned studied his demeanour. Of particular note was his head shaking side to side at the exact time he attempted to assure him it was safe.

“So, come on! Let’s do it!” Josiah exerting his aptitude to manipulate.

“Okay, but just quickly. Not for too long, we should be getting some sleep.”

The boys got into position, Ned lying flat on his back.

“Okay, close your eyes and imagine that you’re lifting off the ground. Imagine it as hard as you can. And Ned, don’t be a weakling.”

“Hold on,” Ned sat back up and took his thick-rimmed glasses off his pale freckled face and placed them on the floor to his right, “Okay, hurry up then.”

Ned noticed his own tenor coming off short. A reaction to Josiah’s dig. Also, he was a little unnerved by Josiah’s capacity to divorce the notion of strength from the physical. It meant that he placed weight on the intellect; an area in which Ned had always soared above his peers. Intelligence was his special strength – his impenetrable armour. Hearing Josiah suggest that imagination and thought were akin to power made him feel seen, yet slightly exposed.

Josiah placed his index and middle fingers under Ned and started muttering and slurring. Words? He couldn’t tell. He could have been making it up, yet there was an honesty about the spatterings that drooled from his lips.

Ned’s instinct screamed through a megaphone from the top of a nearby mountain. The message was urgent, but the delay as it travelled and arrived into his conscious mind caused it to be indistinct. The tiny hairs across his skin raised in a show of prepared defence as the inevitable wave of goose bumps arrived, sweeping down from his head – a sensation not dissimilar to a bucket of cold blood being poured over him. He felt weird. Shaky. His muscles tensed as if completely alienated from any direction from his brain. A mutiny of sorts. He couldn’t resist, peeking through his left eye – Josiah remained next to him, but only his head was in view!

Ned was three feet off the ground!

Josiah’s eyes were coiled up so high, his irises could hardly be seen, shaking spasmodically. His verses still unintelligible – now much louder.

“What!?” Ned screamed and dropped back to the floor, the foundations of the home barely detecting his weight.

Josiah chuckled, watching Ned lovingly as he rubbed his face and reached for his glasses.

“Oh Ned. You really don’t know how lucky we are to have him here with us, do you?”

“Who?”

Josiah delayed his response, assessing Ned’s ability to understand, “Nothing. Don’t worry about it.”

He pushed away and turned to his rug sack, pulling out his Ouija board.

“I thought we weren’t doing that!?” Ned, not asking but pleading.

“Go get some supper, Ned. I’ll do this myself. That way, you won’t get in trouble, okay?”

Ned had the constitution and courage to decline situations he didn’t want to be involved in, but he certainly was not brave enough to tell others what to do. He said nothing, got to his feet and made for upstairs; shaking his head at the insanity of the experience which was probably missed on him. Had he just imagined that?

At bedtime, they spoke like children in the dark for hours. School, friends, girls – the usual. Eventually, one failed to respond to the other and they both fell into sleep.