The alarm screamed at the top of its lungs. It was 7:45 and Lize hated Mondays. She lugged herself out of bed and got ready for school. Finally dressed, Lize grabbed her breakfast from her mom and headed out the door towards school. Munching on her breakfast at each step, Lize wondered how the week would go being the week before Winter Break. She walked into class and sat in the front right corner by the door, as usual. Her friends, Max, Brittany, and Tom, gathered and sat around her. They sat through their first class, doing their work and chatting as normal. When the bell rang Lize headed toward her locker for her math book. When she opened the locker door, she received a surprise attack by a stuffed bear holding a card. Regardless her surprise, she caught the bear and put it back onto the shelf from whence it fell. The card it held read, “Enjoy you Christmas.” It was signed Anonymous, but was otherwise blank. Lize picked up her bear to look at it. The tag in its ear read Bale. It was an average teddy bear. Bale had plush, soft, brown fur with a maroon bow at his neck. He wore a red jacket and had a bare bear bottom. Lize turned him over in her hands, but the only thing odd about little Bale was his eyes. The bear had plain white eyes with no pupil. He was a seemingly harmless litte teddy bear. The bell rang, startling Lize. She grabbed her math book and Bale then sprinted towards class. When she got to her seat, she showed her friends the bear. Nobody thought his eyes were odd, or even seemed to notice. They all just laughed and joked that Lize had her own secret admirer. She took Bale home with her, and fell asleep with him tucked in her arms against her chest.
Lize woke again to a screaming alarm clock, but this time with a pounding headache. As she sat up in bed, she noted Bale on the floor face down. She picked him up and dusted him off, seeing a faint outline of eyes now. She placed him on the bed and left for school. Throughout Tuesday, classes slowly lost more and more students. Each class was smaller and no teacher could answer where students were. Even Lize's friend Max had disappeared. She tried multiple times to contact him, but not even his parents could locate him. After school when Lize got home, she returned to her room and found Bale overturned on his face again on the floor. When she picked him up, his eye outlines were even more visable. For the next two days the process worsened. Classes grew smaller and more friends disappeared without a trace. Each day more people disappeared and Bale gained a thicker trace of each eye, and was constantly overturned on the floor. Thursday night, Lize came home to an empty house. When she picked Bale off the floor, he had solidly outlined eyes and a faded center and his little maroon bow had gone missing. She placed Bale next to her television and sat down to watch cartoons.
Suddenly, there was a thud and the television clicked off. Lize's eyes shot open and she called out to see if anyone was in the house. Bale lay once more overturned on the floor. She place Bale in a dresser drawer and went to sleep, tossing and turning in wonderment of where her friends, family, and classmates had gone. Lize woke with a pouding headache again, with still not family to be found. Bale's drawer was open and he, again, was face down on the floor. Looking outside, Lize noticed the streets were barren and a fierce wind torn at the houses. She picked up Bale, and as she turned him over she noticed his eyes were no longer faded, but there in their entirety as if they were living eyes. She looked up and around as she heard ahigh cackling in the air. As she looked back, Bale's eyes began to turn red. The combination of her parents missing, the loud cackle, and Bale's now blood-red eyes, Lize began to shake. She ran to the kitchen and threw Bale in a pot. As she turned around for a match , the cackle sounded again and the stuffed bear stood up in his pot. Lize heard the pot moving and turned around with the pack of matches. She froze as Bale jumped out of the pot and grabbed the matchbook from her hands. The bear lit one match, then set the book on fire and ate it. In a manner of seconds, the little stuffed teddy bear was standing, blinking, breathing, and being consuming by fire that didn't affect him. Lize watched him set ablaze then didn't hesitate to run. She ran out her front door toward her school. As she turned to look back her house went up in flames and Bale came out strutting down the street. A demonic screech and the cackle shot through Lize's ears lke a bad memory. The farther she ran, the more houses that set ablaze. Bale had a blast following her down the street. Lize finally reached her school and burst through the front door, but her efforts were in vain, as it was empty. There was not a soul in sight. She ran through the school yelling and screaming for help, but as she hit the far hallway, the color drained from her face. Bale sat atop a pile of bodies and grinned such a malicious grin that Lize was locked in fear. The flames licking at Bale quickly spread down the pile of bodies, sending a wretched smell through the air, piercing Lize's nose. She felt the heat of the flames lick at the air just around her figure. She slammed her eyes shut and screamed as Bale walked closer.
Lize opened her eyes and stared at the carpet of her bedroom floor. She untangled herself from her sheets and put her hand on her throbbing head to look around her room. Her parents stood at her door with a ghostly look on their face. They slowly regained color as Lize moved around, checking to make sure the bear really didn't exist. She picked up her phone as it was blown up with text messages from her friends, no doubt asking where she was at. Her life seemed fine with no eyeless teddy bear. The screen of her phone read Monday at 7:45 in the morning.

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Tag der Veröffentlichung: 01.10.2011

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