Bam, bam, bam.

Oh. Oh no.

Bam, bam, bam, bam.

No, no, this is SO lame, don’t do this to me.

Bam! Bam!

Stop… No… Please… Not now—

BAM BAM BAM BAM!

“OH MY GOD! STOP DOING THAT!”

My phone hit the door. It cracked before shattering onto the bedroom floor into small white pieces.

Good thing it’s a 2002 flip phone.

Before I can cry about the crappy thing, I pried my eyes open. God, I hated being interrupted during sleep. Tonight I was having a rather pleasant dream—but now there was no chocolate bunny and school still existed.

Well, the noise from downstairs stopped. But that’s not gonna solve anything.

“Dad?” I rubbed my eyes and pulled myself out of bed. Eyes squinting, feet dragging, I stumbled towards the door, brushing the phone pieces away with my foot. This kinda thing was pretty much routine. Sometimes—like at least once a month—there’s this loud banging noise from downstairs dead in the middle of the night.

It wakes me up every single time. Whenever I have the strength to investigate, I either find two things: the garage door ajar like a really cliché scene in a horror movie, or my father.

The couple times I found Dad, he’d just be standing still, silently, in front of the garage door. He wouldn’t be breathing.

I’d ask, “Dad? What are you doing? It’s like…like past three. I…Dad?”

Clapping into his ear does the trick. He’d then jump as if I pulled him out of a trance.

It’s really weird. It was always like Dad’s hiding something from me. He’d then say he was simply sleepwalking, which happens, but…I don’t know. When I find him sleepwalking, he isn’t standing in front of the garage door like that, unless it’s The Noises that I hear every month. And normally, albeit reluctantly, I’d brush it off.

But not tonight. I’m not taking this anymore, man. It’s been going on for about a year now. My dad always refused to talk about it and denied there were any banging noises the night before.

I don’t have problems. I’m not just hearing things.

…At least, I thought I wasn’t.

My fingers wrapped around the gilded doorknob. My mouth tasted awful, and my shoulders were in huge pain. I turned the knob and, inch by inch, opened the door to more darkness.

It was quiet. A bit too quiet.

“Hello? Dad?”

…No answer.

Sighing in bitterness, I stood there in a hunch and stared into the darkness. Hoping a light would turn on to assure me Dad was there so I can yell at him. Nothing was worth enough to interrupt a dream where school was but as fictional as my future in college. (Bonus: in my dream, that mean girl Chione from school that always talked about how much prettier she was than me was obliterated by my awesome archer skills.)

I almost smiled at that one. I hated that girl so much. And the fact that Apollo and our cousin Hermes were both in love with her only made my dislike brew right over the rim.

I paused. Maybe I should call again. Maybe Dad didn’t hear—

Oh…my…god…?

Caught up in my own thoughts, I didn’t realize I wasn’t alone. From the corner of my eye, I spotted something which at first I thought was the painting on the wall, but…no…

A pale, shrewd face with white eyes, its nasty mouth stretched back and kept in place with gruesomely sloppy stitches. Its thousands of teeth were smaller that my pinky toenail, and were arranged in multiple rows like a shark’s. Its gums were bleeding. It had almost no nose. As its entire face was hid in the blackness of the night, I could see its frightening mouth twitch. I couldn’t see the rest of it because I hadn’t turned on any lights—but seeing that face staring at you as your eyes adjust to the dark…I literally almost had a heart attack.

“AGGGGGHHHH!” it shrieked murderously in a screech so inhuman that I froze. It lunged at me.

OH GOD, WHAT THE—

Like a banshee, I screamed in utter fright. I retreated into my room, too out of focus to snap the lights on or grab the pillow as a weapon or something. The thing got a grip on the shoulder of my T-shirt, the gross stuff on its mouth getting on my arm. With a final, ear-splitting cry, I punched it square in the face before the thing could do anything else, the impact between its nonexistent nose and my fist forcing me to stagger back and fall on the floor with a loud thud.

“Oh god! Oh god!” I kept repeating, my entire body shaking in spasms.

“Aaaaaagh—AAAAGH!” it screamed again—but oddly enough, this time…it…

It sounded like a teenage boy’s cracking voice.

What a surprise.

I cursed under my breath after a confused second. “No. Way. Oh my god!” I grimaced at the ketchup all over my knuckles, cursing again. “I could’ve died from a heart attack, idiot!”

Apollo pulled off his stupid mask, clamping his nostrils shut. The mask kept squirting liquids on the floor…Oh, that’s gross. “Agh…Ahhhh—! It HURTS!”

“Ugh! That’s karma for you!” I mumbled, getting back up and switching the lights.

“Still was hilarious,” he uttered, wincing. “Ouch. Oooh…”

“I can’t even…You’re unbelievable,” I scolded him. “Seriously. That legit would’ve put me in an early grave. Just...” I took a moment to breathe steadily. “Did you hear that?”

My twin brother snarled at me, his baby-blue eyes in a glare. “Hear what.”

“Come on. The loud banging noise—”

“Wow, calm down. You’re just casually going insane, probably…God—y-you know, I think you broke my nose.” His hands were over his agitated face. Real blood trickled down his chin. “Yup. Yeah. I…Wow.”

I retrieved tissue for him and he snagged it out of my hand, practically stuffing the tissue a knuckle deep up his nose.

More cursing.

I grunted a sorry. “What else was I gonna do when some ugly monster’s coming at me?”

He closed his eyes and sighed. He held his hand up. “My face feels like a ten-pound dumbbell was dropped on it.”

I handed him the entire box of tissues, and he took it meagerly, shutting his eyes tighter as he endured his well-deserved pain.

“Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow.”

I sighed. “I’m gonna go get a drink.” I stalked down the stairs, switching another light on the way down.

“Don’t we have finals tomorrow or something?” Apollo’s voice was a nasal moan.

“Oh please. I’d rather run with wolves than go to school. Those finals don’t even got nothin’ on me,” I smirked.

“Artemis,” Apollo said in a warning voice, yet his nasal voice didn’t get me feeling as cautious as he probably wanted. “If you fail your finals, you literally ARE running with wolves. This summer. Oh wait—you’d probably like that with your weird—”

“Don’t you have to go write some amateur haikus or something?”

“HEY! I take poetry really seriousl—”

I groaned, stopping in the middle of the staircase. “Please, just go to sleep and stop bothering me!”

“You kids awake?” Dad stood at the bottom of the stairs before the darkness of the rest of the house. “What’s going on? What…Apollo?”

My brother had his mask back on.

“…It’s not a phase, Dad. It’s who I am.” The mask spurted liquid.

“…Okay.”

I tapped a foot. “Dad, I heard it again,” I said to him, leaning against the railing and crossing my arms. “I know I’m not crazy. There were noises.”

He sighed, rubbing over his face with a tired hand. “Look, agh. Artemis, I love you very much, okay? You’re the greatest daughter anyone could ever have. But you are literally going bat-crap”—Apollo snorted—“crazy and I can assure you, there were no noises. There were never noises. Nothing! Maybe you could try using those ear buds, kiddo?”

“Oh come on!” I protested. “I’ve lost sleep over it! I can hear someone kicking or punching or whatever, against a wall! Can’t we install cameras or something? Please?”

“Apollo, go to bed.”

“I swear to god. Someone is making a racket,” I uttered frustratingly, my lips in a tight line. “It’s so irritating and it needs to stop.”

“Didn’t you say you only hear it once a month?” Dad countered. “It’s probably just your brother. I don’t know. Try to ignore it.”

I gritted my teeth. “I would if it didn’t get louder the more I try to ignore it.”

He tightened his lips.

“I know you hear it too. I just know, Dad. Why else would you be there in the middle of the night like some weirdo?”

“It’s sleepwalking, Artemis. You know that,” he reminded me. “I’m taking pills for that now?”

I sighed in agitation. “Dad…”

“Is this about that kid?”

I blinked. “…What kid?”

Dad rolled his eyes. “Oh, you know who. That kid with the weird name—Oreo, was it? Onion?”

I nearly snorted out loud. “Orion—”

“Maybe it’s your lover Onion Boy throwing rocks at your window like some cheap Romeo move,” he droned. “Which, if it is—then remind me where the rifle is?”

My shoulders shook in suppressed laughter. “Dad, please.”

“No, but really.” He yawned. “Whatever you’re hearing, just try to ignore it. Maybe it’s just a raccoon digging through our trash outside. I don’t know.”
“Well, why would the door to the garage be open in the middle of the night? We never leave it open like that. It’s creepy.”

But he still didn’t seem to get it. He sighed, his shoulders sagging and the corners of his eyes wrinkled in exhaustion. He bowed his head and trudged towards his bedroom. “Artemis, we have stuff to do tomorrow, all right? …Good night, kid. We need some sleep.”

I sighed, my arms dropping to my sides limply. In a mutter, I replied, “Fine. Night.”

…Aaaand, that was that. I went back to my bedroom and climbed into bed.

I couldn’t sleep the rest of the night, as I expected. And, like icing on a cake, the banging noises started up again, and this time, they were even louder.

I growled and put a pillow over my head. It didn’t help, of course.

BAM, BAM, BAM!

I laid there, glaring up at the ceiling, as the noises continued. Maybe by some miracle I’ll realize there really are no noises at all.

The many past times I’ve gone and looked around, I found absolutely nothing. The trash at the back was intact, the garage was empty of any living things, there were no footprints in the soft, wet dirt surrounding our house. Once, I’ve sneaked a look out the windows to see if someone was actually throwing rocks at our home, but nothing. I didn’t even know the exact location the noises were coming from.

“That’s it,” I grumbled angrily, storming out of my room and running towards the garage door, my feet nimble even in the dark. This was the last time I’m checking, and if it continued…well, that’s what the twenty-four hour Walmart was for, right? (Haha, kidding.)

I sprinted to the garage door. Like always, it was opened a crack. I held my breath and swung it open, switching on the lights.

The noises stopped.

I exhaled and tried not to get angry.

You know, maybe I was just hearing things. Would it even matter, though? Wouldn’t the sole fact I was losing sleep be enough to show something was wrong?

I grabbed my sneakers and slipped them on, walking down the steps into the garage quietly. Pulling myself together, I searched the place—under the van, over the van, behind the boxes of old books and dusty toys. Come to think of it, I’ve never actually been in the garage much, and never thought to see if the noises were coming from here. Maybe it was because the garage was always so stuffy, and a lot of my childhood treasures were stored here. I tried not to think of my childhood too much.

When I was younger, my father brought home many women. I’ve never met my real mother, and Dad didn’t like telling me about her. She walked out on him shortly after Apollo and I were born, for some reason. That might make me resent her, but honestly, it was probably for the best.

All the women Dad brought home were awful. They weren’t compatible with him at all. While my father was a strong, earnest, smart man, the ladies that followed him through the door were idiots that spoke like they never went past seventh grade. And as you can imagine, none of them liked seeing me and my twin brother. I was the one to talk back to them, and Apollo would hold me back. Dad…he didn’t seem to notice how much I despised those women, or at least was one hundred percent okay with me throwing lamps at them.

I moved a box out of my way and drew down the ladder to the compartment above the garage.

Okay, I’m going to stop here for a moment.

Have you ever been so, so angry in your life, you could just squeeze lemon juice into your own eyes? Have you ever felt that twinge of inevitable deceit, like the universe itself was out to make your life seem like a big April Fool’s joke? Have you ever come across one of the lamest, most upsetting revelations known to mankind?

Seriously, this had to be a joke.

I was far from ready when I opened that compartment, and a woman fell on top of me.

I fell right on my face, and my nose twisted a painful angle.

“Ow, ow, ow! Get off! Get off me!” I screamed into the floor of the garage. “Gah!”

The woman collected herself and pushed off my comparably smaller body, her eyes wide and her hands over her gaping mouth.

“Oh, I’m so sorry!” she cried.

I got up. “Who are you?! What are you doing in my home?!” I almost screamed. “What is going on?!”

She shook her head vigorously, worry evident in her pale eyes. “No, please, shh! I can explain, just don’t shout!”

“You broke m-my nose…!”

“I’m so, so sorry.” The woman just stared at me, too frightened to move.

I breathed through my mouth. This was it, this was it. This was actually karma, wasn’t it?

“Just…Who are you?” I demanded, pinching my nose. “And why, in the world, are you in my garage?”

The woman looked nearly in tears. Her sagging dark eyes avoided my face. “I…I…” She could barely speak. “I don’t have a home. I couldn’t find a place to stay, so your father took me in—”

“DAAAAD!” I screamed ferociously. “DAD!”

And just in time, my father ran in, covering his mouth. “Oh no,” was all he uttered. “O-oh no, she found out.”

“What…” I looked from the woman to Dad, a hand to my nose and another held out in confusion. “…is going on? Dad, who is she? Wait.”

My dad looked incredibly sheepish, bowing his head and placing a hand over his temples.

“Don’t tell me—you were the one making so much noise, weren’t you?”

“I’m sorry.”

Literally, all I could do was stand there dumbfounded, my nose dripping blood. I stared at Dad, and he coughed into his fist.

“You’ve gotta be sh—” I began.

“Okay, okay. Artemis, this nice lady had nowhere to go, all right? I let her stay here. Yes, she’s the one who’s been making noises—”

“So you’ve been lying?! All this time?! You DID hear them!” I was seething.

“I-I know! I know! I’m sorry, okay? But the reason I didn’t say anything is very simple—I just couldn’t do it. And she’s completely fine staying here in the garage, apparently.”

I sat down and stared into space. “I…Dad?”

“Yeah…?”

“I hate you.”

He shrugged, sighing. “Sorry, kid. You just seemed to be bothered by guests so much, I thought I was doing you a favor.”

“You were trying to convince me I was insane!”

He put his hands up in surrender. “And I apologize. I just thought that Via here was going to be moving out sooner, so I didn’t bother to tell you. I do this plenty of times.”

“So you mean our house is like a hobo motel, pretty much?”

“I…” My dad blinked. “Y-Yeah pretty much.”

“Does Apollo know about this?”

“Yes.”

“You’re both great liars, did you know that Dad?”

He sighed.

I grumbled something unladylike. “I need some sleep…Good night.”

“You gonna be okay, kiddo?” my father asked me as I walked back into our house.

“Noooope,” I muttered as I ascended up the stairs and locked myself in my bedroom.

Well, tonight I found out I’ve been unknowingly sharing the same house with homeless people, and that my father and brother are incredible liars and that I should probably fear them.

Oh, and when I finished my finals the next day, I received a chocolate bunny as a treat from the instructor but Chione later stole it from me and walked away with Apollo following her like a lost puppy.

Life is full of so many surprises.