Regional Gothic

A collection of stories and images pertaining to the regional gothic subgenre. Regional Gothic is a subgenre of Gothic Horror literature which is derived from Southern Gothic, but instead of only focusing on Southern United States, focuses on all regions of the world. Common Gothic themes include unrealism, abstract expression, and other themes which serve to unsettle the reader. ❖ ❖ ❖ All regional posts are welcome. Feel free to submit something.

[ghostbandaids]

you send in a college application, and you receive an email. accepted, it tells you, and you print out three copies for luck.

the black horse still lives in the pasture. it is still silent, but you visit it often. green grass from the other side of the fence held in your flat palm, you apologize for how long you were scared.

the abandoned house with the light that turns on each night is sold by a realtor, and they put a trailer-house out front. the new owners make no attempt to reclaim the rotten wood of the old house, and the light outside manages itself—like clockwork. some things never change.

you aren’t scared of the eyes in the dark anymore, and the sleeping mask is buried in a nightstand drawer. your family buys a better water filter. you donate books to the library. you make new maps for the new roads that appear. you’re a better driver, now, anyway. you sing with the voices of the wind in the eaves. the snow comes and melts and returns again.

there are people like you, and their eyes are not empty. there are people like you, and the world is not always so lonely, and the dark is not always dangerous.

you leave next august.

but you know you’ll visit.

[nellydreadful]

Menstruation Gothic

There are no tampons. There are no pads. You bought some yesterday. They are gone.

The DivaCup bag is in your purse. The DivaCup is not. Your purse is full of empty drawstring bags with friendly pink and purple patterns and flowers on them. All of them are empty.

Red patterns swirl and spiral and bloom in the water, all the water. Red in the toilet. Red in the sink. Red in the bathtub. You haven’t even gotten into the bathtub yet. Is it pouring out of the taps? The red spins and spreads. You stare into the centre, mesmerized. You lean forward. Closer.

Everything inside you is moving. You feel things lashing, squirming, sloshing. It is fighting you. It wants to escape. You cannot let it.

Your period is a week early. Your period is a week late. It is on your birthday and your best friend’s birthday and the vacation you planned and the fancy dinner and it knows. It knows. It always knows. How does it know?

“It can’t be that bad,” you are scolded, as your legs crumple under you. “You’re being dramatic,” you are chided, as you vomit onto the earth, bile mingling with the blood soaking the dirt. “Everyone goes through this,” you are told, as your uterus breaks free and crawls forth from under your skirt, pulling itself along the drenched soil with its fallopian tubes like an octopus, dragging you behind it. “It’s not that big a deal,” you hear fading in the distance.

[baking-accident]

fast food gothic

- the employees are feeding fries to a possum on the counter. you didn’t know possums grew that big. - the person who walks up to claim your food order as their own looks almost, but not quite, exactly like you. you wish the employees would stop spelling your name wrong. - the floor is very, very sticky. it sticks to your shoes and underneath the peeling tile is a flat grayness. you drop a chicken nugget in one of the gray spaces and don’t hear it hit the bottom. - you laugh at the “children must take corporeal form to enter the playspace” sign but the attendant seems pretty serious about it. - you can drink more soda out of the cardboard cups than seems spatially possible. after a while it doesn’t taste like soda anymore. - contrary to popular belief, it’s totally safe to eat the meat. it’s just some of the customers have a broader definition of “meat” than you’re accustomed to.

[lesbeet]

i see your regional gothic and i will raise you: outer space gothic

You know it is breathtaking and beautiful, so striking that you are not sure you believe it even though you’ve never known your senses to lie. It is beautiful and yet there is something creeping at the edge of your vision, floating behind you and twinkling like a distant star, always blinking out of existence as soon as you turn your head.

It is the silence that suffocates you more than anything, more than the lack of oxygen, the pressure on your lungs that feels so foreign. It is a silence so crushing, and then there is a whisper. Radio broadcasts from an earthly war long past bounce between the stars, and occasionally you catch a glimpse of one, full of static and desperation–or, you think you do. You can never really tell what’s real, out here.

You are floating somewhere inside Ursa Major, and while each bone is light years from the next, you cannot help but feel like you have indeed been swallowed by some great beast, devoured whole and left to decay in the everlong darkness.

They say we are all made up of stardust; it is supposed to make us feel sacred. Instead you feel compressed, you look at the vastness and feel it pulsing inside of you, the bright stars calling every molecule home. You see planets, bold and looming, you feel yourself being pulled into their orbits against your will.

You have yet to encounter a black hole, but you are bracing yourself. You know that the silence and emptiness you are experiencing now are childsplay, that getting swallowed with the light will burn more than the fire of any star could. You feel the universe expanding, flowing as if from your fingertips, reaching for something, some endless light beyond it all that you cannot see. You know with every part of you that it is there.

[luteces]

Fallout 4 Gothic

You turn to see what Dogmeat found, but he is not there. You can’t remember the last time you saw him. Did he ever leave Sanctuary? Do you even have a dog?

The radio is on a loop. No one notices. It’s about Bobbi No-Nose. It’s always about Bobbi No-Nose.

You walk into a room. A companion blocks the doorway. You wait. They do not move.

You turn on your pip-boy mid-fight. The deathclaw stops above you, unmoving, and watches as you use stimpaks. You’re not sure you should put away your pip-boy.

Your lover says your name. You strain your ear, but all you hear is static.

Settlers surround you. You try to assign them jobs. Their faces are blank. You cannot tell them apart.

“I’ll find my son and avenge my spouse.” The words are hollow. You’ve finished powering up your thirtieth settlement. What did your son look like? Do you even have a son? You are not sure you were ever even married.

[valomile]

night magic: moody, but brilliant skies divided by telephone wires, out of focus street lights, the scent of somebody else’s home drifting from a dark apartment balcony.

[rainyday-deer]

az gothic

The sunsets sure are beautiful, they say. And they are. A celebration of the sun’s disappearance for the day; The sun rises are a sickly yellow-green, and only a warning of what is coming.

There are no clouds. The last time you’ve seen clouds feels like forever ago. You’re starting to wonder if they were even really there. The sky looks white anyway.

The sun is reflected in the sunglasses of strangers. They never come off; You can’t tell if they’re looking at you when they talk to you, or if they have eyes at all.

When did you get that tan? You’ve been inside as long as you can be, hiding from the bone-dry heat. Deep down you know it’s still going to find you. You close the curtains and turn the air conditioner up. Your tan gets darker.

It’s the middle of summer, and the sun has set. You look out your window. A large spider is splayed across the glass. You grimace and look away. When you look back there are more, pressed between the glass and the screen. One of them is something you’ve never seen before. You’re not sure it’s a spider. You close your curtains.

There’s a tarantula in your sink. You don’t know how it got there. “It’s illegal to kill them” you’ve heard someone say. You grapple with what to do for an hour. The tarantula never moves.

There’s a tiny snake in the kitchen. You can swear you’ve seen the same snake in your classroom, many years ago. You sweep it into some tubberware and put it back outside.

There’s a cricket somewhere. Only one. You can never find where it is, but you know it’s in your house. You know it’s watching you; It grows quiet when you move.

The Superstition Mountains have claimed someone else.

You only dare sit outside in the dare with friends. Together, in the light, on the porch, the roof, a trampoline. Anything that doesn’t touch the ground. The coyotes howl, and someone jokingly howls back. They stop when the coyotes sound closer, the next time.

The coyotes are miles away. One laughs, and the sound comes from right outside of your window. You tell yourself it’s in the distance, that sound carries. The laughter continues.

“It’s haunted, you know,” someone tells you. You’re not surprised. “It’s haunted, you know,” and this time it’s your voice. They’re not surprised.

There’s a Circle K on the corner. And the next corner. There’s two, across the street, facing one another. It doesn’t matter which one you go into. They’re the same one, after all.

The dust clings to everything. To the windows. To the cars. To the cacti. To your soul.

You pass by someone’s yard. There is grass, a bright emerald green. It is the only one like it on the street, still wet from the sprinkler. The heat makes it stand out more than it already did. You fight the urge to lay in it, for the umpteenth time. As you force yourself to walk away, you know that one day you will give into your urge. The heat will make you.

Tempe can say otherwise all it wants. It’s part of Phoenix. Mesa is part of Phoenix. Glendale is part of Phoenix. The entire Valley is Phoenix, no matter how loudly it is said otherwise. Only Tucson and Flagstaff are not part of Phoenix– They’re far enough to escape it. You are not.

[artazen]

Southern California Gothic

“It’s good that it’s raining.” People greet eachother with instead of saying hello. “It’s good that it’s raining,” they repeat, “The plants need it.” The plants need the rain and there is never enough. You eye your office ficus worryingly and elect to skip that trip to the watercooler. You are so thirsty.

The weatherman says it is 50 degrees outside, but you do not believe him. It must be colder than that, it just must be. Your friend from out of state is wearing shorts and a tank top while you are wrapped in your warmest coat and still shivering. Your friend will not last long.

You see celebrities, sometimes. Miley Cyrus once took your order at In-N-Out, another time you came home to find Tom Hanks in your living room. You did not ask for an autograph. You did not take a picture.

You ask the Chipotle employee for avocado on your burrito. He says “Sure, but it’s going to cost you.” He does not say what it will cost you, and you do not ask.

There’s a yellow flag on the lifeguard’s watch post. Caution, it tells you, but the waves don’t look rough. You watch a little girl wade into the ocean. You lose track of her a moment later. Where could she have gone?

You hear the sound of the Beach Boys playing faintly in the distance. You could swear that it’s coming from the ocean, but it’s probably just the wind. The Beach Boys are your favorite band, and you wonder who else’s.

You have had yearly passes to Disneyland since you can remember, though you don’t actually remember deciding to get them. If you think about it too much, Let It Go becomes stuck in your head and gets louder and louder until you can’t think at all.

A barista smiles at you and you strain your eyes at how bright her teeth are. “I moved here to be an actress,” the teeth say. You nod and smile as you pay for your vegan soy latte, making sure your lips stay tightly closed.

You turn on the news and find out that your old childhood neighborhood has caught on fire. You chuckle to yourself, suddenly nostalgic and remembering the good old days of your youth. The burns have long since healed. 

[nonbinarythorin]

Band class gothic

-Your band director tells a story in class. Everyone laughs. Its the same story every time. Its still funny. Everyone laughs. You are afraid of what will happen if you do not laugh.

-You get your instrument. Where from? No one knows. They seem to materialize in their old, scuffed up black cases whenever you need them. Is your instrument truly yours, or does it belong to the school? You do not know. No one knows.

-There is a Ken doll hanging from a string attached to the ceiling. He has always been there. The string is a bit longer every time you look. The doll will never touch the floor.

-The school owns 23 clarinets. There are only ever 4 clarinet players. All of the clarinets are being used.

-There is one person who doesn’t have an instrument. He doesn’t play. He sits in the middle of his section. His name is never called during attendance. You never see him anywhere else.

-The ceiling is high. There are panels missing. You can’t see the missing panels, the ceiling is too high. Wires dangle from the holes, though you can’t see them. The ceiling is high.

-The TA walks in. Everyone smiles at him. You do too. You don’t know him. You look at your friends. They don’t know him either. Their smiles are forced. They look scared. Everyone likes the TA.

-You play. You don’t know what you are playing, your fingers move automatically. Your foot is tapping of its own accord. Your band director is conducting. He is holding a baton. He is always holding a baton.

-Your band director tells you to pack up. You look at the clock. It says 11:11. It always says 11:11. Your instrument disappears. You put your music in your backpack, to practice at home. You never practice at home.

[big-tiddy-goth-ghoulfriend]

911 Gothic

Every few months you get a call from an address that doesn’t exist. Your coworkers don’t seem to notice. They dispatch officers anyway. The officers arrive on scene and leave 15 minutes later with no transmissions in between.

“911 what is your emergency?” Your coworkers stare at you confused. The phone wasn’t ringing.

There are no windows.

The phone stops ringing before you can answer it. The line is open. There are notes in the CAD. Units are en route. On scene. Back in service. No one has said a word.

There is always coffee. It is always cold.

You got here at 6. You have taken 34 calls and 19 traffic stops. Hours have passed. It is 6:17.

The red emergency phone in the closet rings sometimes. No one ever answers it.

There is a one-vehicle collision. Caller claims the sun was in his eyes. It is 4 AM. 

No one knows where Station 5 is located.

When you ask management why no one uses line four, they avert their eyes and mumble something about “call volume” before hurrying away.

Medic 21 is always on duty but never takes any calls.

The office radio is always set to the weather. It is always the weather for Holt County, Nebraska.

[thepeanutgalleryarchived]

Isolated Small Towns Gothic

Isolated small towns:

You know everyone, and everyone knows you, yet you’ve never met anyone who lives on your street.

The town is surrounded by forest. Never ending forest. There are times you wonder if there is anything other than forest.

You read on Facebook that bears have come into the town. You never see any bears, and no one mentions why they have come into town.

From the time you start school you are taught how to protect yourself from the bears. No one ever mentions what else lies out there.

You watch and envy the people that come in and leave the town before the year is up, they are lucky.

You walk by empty houses with ‘for sale’ signs everyday, and there always seems to be more and more. No one seems to notice.

You’ve been to the next town over, you’re sure of it. It might just be a dream though.

You watch the clock tick by, watching as the hours go by. You repeat it the next day, and the next. Nothing ever seems to change.

There are so many empty spaces to build houses or stores. They would all work so well, in great locations and in the best parts of town. No one ever builds there. You wonder why.

You wonder if you’ll ever get out.

Is there anything else out there? It must just be an illusion.

[kakaphoe]

Steam Gothic

There’s a game in your library you’ve never noticed before. You have no recollection of buying it, but according to steam you bought it three years and six months ago. When you load it up the screen just goes black and you hear white noise.

There’s a sale, there’s always a sale, but when you click to add games they don’t show up in your cart. You feel you are being mocked.

You try an early access game. You don’t know when it will ever come out of early access. The game has no textures. You try to quit but the game won’t let you.

Every game you load turns into Garry’s Mod. You don’t own Garry’s Mod.

You get a steam Achievement while you’re not even playing anything. When you go to examine it, you see it is called “??????” and the icon is just Gabe’s face upside-down.

Steam tries to download an update for a game you don’t have. You try to make it stop. You restart steam. You now inexplicably own the Secret of the Magic Crystals. You can no longer fall asleep at night.

You try modding Skyrim with the steam workshop. You now have a phobia of magenta. Sometimes when you blink you see elves with no eyes floating before you in the darkness.

You have a dream that you are a game on Steam Greenlight. No one votes for you. You wake to discover you have turned into Digital Homicide. You try to scream but only a stock sound effect comes forth from your pre-bought poorly-rendered lips.

You heard that Games for Windows Live was dead. But you still see it there when you play. Hovering. Waiting to strike. You burn your computer.

[mazarbor]

the last three weeks have been “hellish with lovely moments”

[laurenftagnart]

Florida Familiar 

commissions |buy me a coffee| inprnt store

[makerofrunevests]

Asgardian Gothic

The walls are made of gold. The curtains are also gold, and the doors. You wonder if the men in golden armor are becoming part of the palace, or if they came from it.

There are broken pumpkins and shattered glass on the floor, and melted gold running down the walls. You glare at the person who irritated the older prince.

There are no explosions in the distance. Why?

Chains are rattling. You carry on feasting, throwing glasses so the smashing will cover the noise.

Ravens perch in the bedroom, cawing. They are adding important information to the conversation.

Sometimes two people saw the queen at the same time, in different rooms. It was always good to see her.

The younger prince has died again. It’s the second time, or maybe the third. It doesn’t matter. He’ll be in prison again soon.

The end of the world is coming. No, says the lore-knower. The end of all the worlds is coming. 

[allons-ytobakerstreet]

Seaside Town Gothic

The wind blows through the boats in the port. It makes a low sound, and, if you listen closely, you think you can hear voices.

The seagulls have been gathering more than usual. In car parks and on lamp posts, telephone wires, chimney pots and in the streets. Their voices fill the air with bloodcurdling screams. You make sure not to meet their gaze.

There’s an island about a mile offshore. You’re sure it wasn’t there yesterday, but you’re also sure it’s always been there. Faint memories come to you on the wind of picnics there long ago. You frown at what should be a familiar landscape. By morning, the island is gone.

The arcade is bustling, noisy, penny machines and the smell of hot dogs an attraction for the tourists. Colours and sounds entice them in. You never see anyone come out.

Every street you turn onto has a charity shop. They are staffed by little old ladies with teeth longer than you think teeth should be. Donations Wanted, claim the signs in the window. Donations Wanted, Donations Wanted, Donations Wanted.

A sea mist rolls in, hanging over the coast like a blanket. It moves on the air like streams. Familiar landmarks become obscured and then completely disappear. When it recedes, nothing feels quite the same. You’re sure there wasn’t a pier there before.

The fog horns are bellowing in the shipping lane, the low roar echoing over the water. There is no fog to warn of. You hurry inside and lock the door.

Your train is delayed. A mechanical voice apologises for the delay. A train to a different location arrives. Nobody boards yet when it leaves the platform is empty. Sorry for the delay to this service, blares the voice, louder this time. Your train is never coming.

The sea is grey. It has always been grey. Except for when it turns shades of vivid crimson. Nobody mentions when it turns inky black.

[florenate]

Colorado Gothic

-It was 62 degrees when you fell asleep. You woke up to five feet of snow. There’s no sign of it stopping. 9 news said it would only be a dusting, but everyone knows they’re wrong. It doesn’t stop you from quietly talking about the weather reports at every polite juncture.

-Traffic never stops. Valley highway never moves. They always say that they’re expanding the highways. Construction never ceases. You’ve been stuck in dead stopped traffic for hours. You never find the source of the traffic. You’re starving and tired, traffic doesn’t move. You fall asleep and wake up hours later, and traffic still hasn’t moved. You arrive at your destination 5 minutes before the time you left.

-Everyone has a friend of a friend who was present during the Columbine shooting. Nobody talks about it, everyone knows. School lockdown drills are frequent. They last for hours on end.

-You stare out the windows on the lightrail. The bridges that raise the train high above the ground make you uneasy. It feels as if it’s tipping, but it never falls. No matter how loud you turn your music up, the beeping of the closing doors is always louder. You missed your stop 3 stations ago. It takes an hour to catch another train.

-Everyone knows how to ski. It’s ritual for parents to take their infants skiing as soon as they can walk. They go skiing every weekend. Everyone knows how to ski.

-Foreigners think the smog hanging over the city is pollution. Everyone knows it’s a marijuana haze. The city never has time to recover before the next 4/20. You know the difference between skunk and marijuana instantly. Everyone has a dealer at their disposal.

-Sports Authority has closed down. The name Sports Authority Field still glares at you as you sit in traffic. You wonder what they’ll rename it. No attempt has been made.

-You always know the outcome of last night’s football game, even if you don’t watch football. Everyone watches football. You can’t let them know. You can mention it once, and they’ll laugh, thinking you were joking. Mentioning it again is a fatal mistake. Nobody has gotten over Super Bowl XLVII.

-Everyone knows the man in the robot costume on 16th street. Anyone who has traveled 16th street has interacted with him at least once. You wonder how much he makes. You know to be nice to him. The look in his eye tells you that you wouldn’t want to do otherwise.

-The mountains are constantly in view. You get a sense of anxiety when you can’t see mountains, even if you know you’re in a different state. The mountains control you, they call you. You have to enjoy hiking. Everyone owns a camelbak. The trees close in around you. You wonder how many times you’ve walked in a circle now. You must be close to the summit, you think. The heat kills you before you make it to the top.

-Someone once told you the strange tent formation of DIA’s roof is supposed to emulate mountains. You believed them, but were wary of what else they could be. The blue horse stares you down as you enter. You don’t look it in it’s eye. If you did, you wouldn’t be able to look away. You’ve gotten used to the feeling of being watched.