When Things Go Bump in the Night by Sue Ward Drake

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          What do you do when something goes bump in the night? Do you pull the covers over your head or go investigate? In my case, being hard of hearing, I’ve never even noticed. LOL.

          October is the month of Halloween with its gorgeous, multi-colored—but  dying—leaves, the pumpkins grinning through missing teeth from every porch or doorstep, and neighborhood haunted houses. October is also quite possibly the favored month for things to make strange noises late at night. 

          I have never visited a Halloween haunted house. Even though I write romantic suspense, I don’t necessarily want to engage in being scared voluntarily. Of course, as a writer, I don’t mind frightening my characters with their fears of the great unknown.

          I was always a fearful kid and never relished the idea of intentionally scaring myself because my imagination did that so easily. My family lived in a big, turn-of-the-twentieth-century two-storied house with many nooks and crannies, in a small town. The house was one of only four on the block and was surrounded by tall, thick azalea bushes and towering magnolia trees that soaked the yard in darkness as thick as tar. The trees and hedges along the street meant my mom didn’t need to pull the curtains across the vast expanses of oh, so many, many windows in order to ensure the family had privacy.

          But who might be lurking outside or taking a shortcut through those shadows? And were they peering inside? My childhood imagination ran wild, though I should have known our current watchdog would have signaled their proximity.

             I remember once when my older sister and I were home alone one night. She insisted we watch an episode of that old TV series, The Twilight Zone. Mostly, I think, because she didn’t want to watch all alone.

         Maybe every episode on that show was just as spooky, but I never watched another. Anyway, after I finally got my sister to turn off the television, I went to bed. This entailed creeping into the hall, a short space before the bottom of the stairs without a single window, thankfully. I then had to climb the stairs, walk down another narrower hall past my sister’s room (who had lights from the railroad station across the street shining through her windows) to my pitch black bedroom. 

            The upstairs rooms had no wall switches and I had to walk into the center of the room to pull the cord for the overhead light fixture. On an ordinary night I would simply rush inside and pull the cord vigorously. But this night, those five feet of floor were fraught with danger.

               I was certain—absolutely positive!—the swamp creature I’d seen in the show was lurking under the bed or behind the door that opened into a small, dark attic.

               In the TV show the “creature” caught in the twilight zone had gotten lost in the swamp in a rowboat and turned into a sponge, unrecognizable as human. I never stopped to wonder if he would materialize in my bedroom in the rowboat or merely as a shapeless blob. My heart in my throat, I made it under the covers without encountering him or anything else. 

               In retrospect, I can see now the episode had a silly, unbelievable plot. The program was all “atmosphere” and the lure of the unseen. I must have been eight at the time and can still remember all the details. That speaks to the seduction of being scared.

                Isn’t that the draw of a suspenseful story, though? It’s as if we need to practice revving our adrenaline just in case a saber-toothed tiger enters the cave.

Suspense Author Sue Ward Drake

Suspense done well can hold us in thrall for days. Even though The Hunt for Red October included a lot of fairly technical technology, I was held in thrall for the entire many, many pages (800?) by the dangerous unknown character and motives of the Russian submarine captain, and the Navy officer uncertain he was calling the situation correctly.

          Maybe we’re all adrenaline junkies in our own way, whether that’s from taking a trip through a haunted house, watching a suspenseful movie, or reading a thriller.

          I may no longer WATCH scary movies, but I love a suspenseful story like everyone else. I’d love to hear about one of your scary experiences in the comments below.

Read about the thrills and chills facing Jack and Grace and little Katie in my latest romantic suspense, 

FLEEING THE STORM.

Take:

1 ex-undercover cop turned bounty hunter

1 French Quarter pastry chef on the run from kidnappers with…

1 orphaned niece

 Throw them all together during...

1 dangerous Louisiana hurricane. 

Sue Ward Drake
FLEEING THE STORM is now on PRE-ORDER!

www.SueWardDrake.com