The sound of rushing water and bird song, mingled with the wind whistling through trees, had surrounded him. Trees, he could see trees and a river. The house was gone and he was standing in a forest clearing beside a fast-flowing river. Only, when he looked closer he could still see the hallway of the abandoned house. The inner-voice spoke up again, how could two things be in the same place at once? His head throbbed. It was like trying to focus on two pictures, one with each eye.
A figure stepped from the shadows. The light played in shifting patterns as a man in full Victorian dinner-dress appeared before him. The figure was a least seven feet tall and stooped forward to whisper in John ear.
“It is the Nothing, John. That is what is over that hedge and behind the wall, Old Boy. That is what fills the spaces in the places you cannot see. And nothing will drive you crazy quite as fast, my good fellow. Do you hear it? It is stuck in this world and forever glimpsing over there, to the Otherwhere.” The figure’s speech felt awkward, out of time and laboured.
John’s head throbbed. A small far-away voice tried to tell him something, the same voice that had imbedded itself in his head. He now recognised this as something different from the smart-dressed figure that identified itself as his ‘imaginary friend.’, but its message was drowned out by this new presence. John’s mouth hung open in awe and disbelief. He tried to move, to run, but remained rooted to the spot.
“You are looking for madness; did you not know that?” A smile wriggled through its pretend face as the figure came closer. “Here, let me help you with that, Old Chap.”
The figure stretched out a glove clad hand and everything dulled into a grey soup. Whatever world John was in went black.