I'm Ryden. This is a blog specifically for posting my short (fictional) horror stories.
NOTE: I am not looking for praise or criticism. I am not trying to improve my skill. I just want to do something I enjoy, which happens to be writing fucked up stories. Enjoy
Wholly Unnatural Beings: The Monsters I’ve Written!
Hi, guys! It’s obviously been a little while since I’ve posted a new story - though not for lack of still CONSTANTLY writing. The past several years have been quite different for me and, as you can imagine, my attentions have been all over the place elsewhere. Through that time, though, I’ve had mountainous opportunities to re-read some of my favorite works I’ve written and analyze the monsters/demons/ghosts I’ve written/created. That has led into introspection on who these beings are and how they’d function in this little universe I’ve built. That’s when I decided I would write little backgrounds and descriptions for my monsters! They even have names now - which is something I have only done for my Sixes.
If you’ve read many of my stories, of course, some of my stories are 100% human motivated horror - meaning there is no paranormal/supernatural element so those stories will be left out of this series. HOWEVER, I am open to the idea of writing criminal profiles for each entirely human evil I’ve ever written about. That’s for another time, though!
I decided to start with three stories - I heard my friends voice again. I almost immediately wished I hadn’t. // Mom’s biggest secret lived in the attic. // My imaginary friend wanted me dead. If you haven’t read these yet and you do not want the stories spoiled for you, PLEASE READ THEM FIRST! Spoilers ahead!
I heard my best friend’s voice again. I almost immediately wished I hadn’t.
- This story is about a young girl who loses her friend to illness at a young age. Her grief is replaced with fear when she finds a monster resembling her friend, Whitney, residing in her abandoned television. This is an example of a type of inhuman entity called a Ziya that preys on grieving children. They are inherently created through massive amounts of human grief - mostly during small to moderate tragedies throughout history. They retain the ability to impersonate dead people but, before the technological age, Ziya were much less successful hunters. In the physical realm, they can only hold a false form outside their own for a minute or two. This meant they would have to lure children into the shadows with only a mere glimpse of their loved one from a distance. Once radio and eventually television was invented, these entities realized their true potential. They could manipulate their presence onto television and radio waves and maintain their false form for anywhere between ten minutes and an hour. This brought them from pouncing on their prey from the shadows to manipulating their prey right where they wanted them. This method proved to heighten the grief and overall emotional state of their prey, which makes them a much more flavorful meal. Once they have their meal close enough and entranced enough in their scheme, they reach out and grab their prey. Using black tar-like saliva, it immobilizes and burns it’s meal before devouring it. The older the Ziya, the better the hunter. Newly created Ziya are generally poor hunters and will often reveal their true nature too early to catch their prey - such is the case in this story. They cannot be killed; destroying their point of original contact only slows them until they find you’re near another tv/radio. Your only hope is to stay away from technology until the entity loses interest, though the young Ziya lose interest easier. It is less common, but there are some Ziya out there existing solely on the internet, though little is known as of now about their behavior or hunting methods. It IS rumored, however, that these entities can hold their forms almost unlimitedly online.
Mom’s biggest secret lived in the attic.
- A father recounts his childhood with his talented but neglectful mother who’d found wealth and fame suddenly after a stroke of bad luck. All is not as it seems, however, as the luck comes at the cost of human lives. This is achieved at the hands of a type of demon called a Lukain, though it does not require a vessel like most demons, as the human life force it consumes give it a corporeal form. These are some of Lucifier’s earlier low-level demons, before the concern of Hell’s population of souls. It creates luck out of greed but embodies gluttony - appearing almost always as a black and hateful man-shaped void with white eyes. It will always be hungry, so the luck will always wear off. Regardless, once they’ve granted you luck, it’s near-impossible to get one of these demons off of your back and if you stop providing for them suddenly, they’ll likely eat you instead. The interesting thing about the Lukain is what they truly seek. While they do pull much of their sustenance from the people sacrificed to them, they secretly truly want to feed on the greed of their human provider. It is the highest delicacy for them. The greed of trading any human life for your own wants is pretty much like a big fancy cake for the Lukain. Being demons, they can only be sent back to hell via exorcism or destruction of the vessel and considering the fact that these beings create their own vessel, you’d be better off trying the latter. If you’ve already fed it a few times, though, you’ll likely find yourself dying shortly afterward - demonic luck bounces back threefold. The bounce-back is additionally worse with each sacrifice so while even the most emotionless evil individual could continue to sacrifice human lives for their own happiness, bad luck would eventually place them in prison or in a coffin.
My imaginary friend wanted me dead.
- An imaginary friend quickly is revealed to be a malevolent spirit and spends a span of several years attempting to end the life of a young boy. This is an example of a spirit who has become twisted by the nature of their life and death. Mean and cruel children that meet a sudden and dramatic fate will often be angry about their lot in life and that contorts them into what is known as a Killchild. They latch onto other happy, healthy children who’s lives they envy and drain them of all their happiness in the simplest of ways - physical and psychological torture. Much of their power is drawn from the attention they receive from the child - whether it be negative or positive. Theoretically, a Killchild could be entirely kind for it’s full existence and still be as powerful if they weren’t so spiritually twisted by their behavior in life to think to try, which is what sets them aside from similar benevolent creatures. Their ultimate goal is to either kill the child or push them to do it themselves. They, while evil, are still lonely children and somehow believe the evil they’re committing will bring their living subject where they are, but forget about them altogether once they’ve killed their subject and eventually move onto a new child. They lose a significant amount of power over their victim when they’re seen by anyone besides the child they’ve latched onto but they’re only really vulnerable when they are killing. After they lose that power, their behavior becomes much more like a regular haunting and once the attention is fully off of them, they fade back into the veil until they happen to find another child they can latch onto. Can also be destroyed like normal spirits (destroying human remains) but only after they’re seen. Interestingly - there are a few souls who have truly aged out of their Killchild out of pure grit and determination. After a certain age, even if they’re never seen by an outside party, mostly any Killchild will lose interest.
I heard my best friend’s voice again. I almost immediately wished I hadn’t.
REDDIT
I remember when my childhood ended, and I suppose that isn’t normal. Many people, I’m sure, just grow into adulthood naturally. For me, though, I felt it end deep down in my core when my best friend, Whitney, died. We did everything together; even alternated having dinner at each other’s houses each night. Living just across the street, it was easy for us to spend all our time together.
Then, at 11 years old, she was just gone forever. Some hidden heart defect that had been with her since birth, it was hard to understand as someone who was just shy of 11 myself. Still, like a severed limb, something fundamental felt as if it had been brutally removed and I went numb. I drew back into myself and didn’t talk to anyone for weeks.
It got worse when I woke up one morning, looked out my bedroom window, and saw a moving truck in front of her house. Apparently, her parents couldn’t take living there without her and the pain split them up. Their house was empty and they were gone in a day, without so much as a tearful goodbye.
Days after that, I couldn’t sleep without having night terrors that I still cannot recall to this day. I’d try my best not to sleep at all. Instead, I’d stare out the window at that empty, brooding house, imagining that Whitney was still there.
On one of the many nights that I woke up, sweating and racking my brain for what exactly had frightened me, something about the light outside looked different. I pulled myself out of bed and walked over to the window. A single, blue light shone from somewhere inside the house; in Whitney’s room.
Honestly, I thought I was still asleep and dreaming, that’s why I decided to forgo waking my parents and instead, quietly snuck out the back door. I didn’t even bother to get into my tennis shoes and coat despite the fact that it was a freezing March night. I barely noticed the biting cold as I ran across the street and behind the house, knowing the sliding glass door in the back had never had a lock.
The emptiness inside the house felt so very wrong to me. I’d basically spent half of my childhood there. It was home, and now it wasn’t. Nothing was left behind except a low sound coming from somewhere upstairs. Before I knew it, I was at the top of those stairs and staring down a hallway with all doors open except one. Light leaked from underneath. Again, somehow believing in my mind that I was dreaming, I didn’t hesitate when walking down the hallway or opening that bedroom door.
What had once been a little girl’s crowded, toy filled bedroom was now near empty, but not completely. There were a few boxes, an old desk, and Whitney’s TV. It was pink, Hello Kitty themed, with a built in VCR and Karaoke machine. She’d gotten it for Christmas and I had been jealous.
It was turned on, tuned into a children’s movie we both loved - Thumbelina. I felt myself smiling as I walked closer to the TV. I stood there for a minute, feeling tired and a bit in a trance as I watched the colorful characters dance across the screen. It only lended to the dream like moment when the screen fuzzed out and the image was replaced by a face - a real face.
Whitney’s face.
“Emily? Is that you?” her voice spilled from the speakers, unmistakable. My heart began to beat a little fast, but feeling that there was no way I couldn’t be dreaming, I responded. “It’s me! Whitney, I miss you!” Her face was close to the screen, basically the only thing visible. “I miss you, too.” There was a pause after she said it. A few moments of silence where I didn’t know what else to say. Or maybe I was afraid I’d wake up and the dream would be over.
From somewhere downstairs, there was a crashing noise. It startled me enough to cause me to turn towards the door, and it was that moment that I knew that I was awake. Nothing moved in the hallway and no other noise came, so I turned back to the TV. It was still fixed on Whitney, but the picture was coming in even more fuzzy. This made no sense. I was awake - I knew my friend was dead - but there she was, on the screen.
"Aren't you..... dead?" I didn't want to say it out loud, but I had to ask. Plus, feeling much more awake in that moment, part of myself reasoned that it COULD be a recording. If I hadn't been fully awake before, maybe I dreamed the previous responses. However, when Whitney smiled almost immediately after the question, I knew it I probably hadn't.
She giggled. "Of course I am, you know that!" With each word, the screen grew a little fuzzier. "Ask me anything if you don't believe me!" her voice echoed, sounding off-key and almost layered. "C'mon.... don't you wanna know what it's like? Being dead?" Again, Whitney laughed, her face still taking up a majority of the tiny screen.
I shook my head, tears involuntarily streaming down my face. So many questions rushed through my mind. Why was she doing this? Why did she want me to know this?
There was a second of silence on both ends. I, frozen in front of the TV and her, staring from somewhere inside. Whitney's smile began to grow larger and larger - each tooth sharpening into points. The voice that came from the speakers now sounded more like seven, and all were deep and filled with blissful rage. "Well, why not?" it bellowed and the screen flickered black.
Everything on my tiny body trembled. It had already been cold that night, but something inhabited the air in that moment that felt sub-arctic. My feet were already cautiously propelling me backwards before my mind even registered them doing so. Still, my eyes didn't leave the TV screen as it rotated between plain black and white. Gurgled sounds came from the speakers. They began to form words around the time my body reached the threshold of the bedroom door.
"IIIIIITTTTT FEEEEEELLLSSS AAAAAAMMMMAAAAZZZZZIIIIINNNNGGGGG!!!!!!" It chanted over and over again, the sheer volume greatly contrasting from Whitney's quiet voice. The floor underneath my bare feet began to shake. The windows rattled. "Oh, don't gooooooo!" The voice called from the TV. The screen finally ceased flickering, illuminated the bedroom with plain white light for a minute before shifting back to a distorted, almost human-like face - nearly resembling Whitney, but not quite. "Don't you want a hug from your besttttt friendddddd!?" It shrieked.
Just then, the face pushed through the screen and into the real world. In three dimensions, it was hideous. The skin of an 11 year old girl stretched over the face of something horrid - something inhuman. Black goop dripped from it's overstretched, grinning maw, onto the carpet. Sharp, angular shoulders emerged as well, then long arms with dirt-covered fingers reached out. Reached down. Braced against the floor.
With every move, it's face became more distorted, it's voices multiplied. "DON'T YOU WANT TO FEEL THIS? IT FEELS SO GOOD!"
I still didn't even notice the steady stream of tears falling down my face. "No! You aren't Whitney! I don't want this!" My eyes couldn't leave the steaming, elongated, horrible form that was pulling itself from the tiny Hello Kitty TV into the real world. Somehow, though, my hand reached for the doorknob. In a flash, I slammed it closed behind me and practically launched myself out into the hallway. Almost instantly, as the door latched, no more light leaked from underneath. The house was now dead silent. Still, I didn't stay to take the chance, running home and locking every door behind me.
The following day, the house was silent. Not a single suggestion that anyone was inside, so once the babysitter let me outside to play, I snuck back in again. The bedroom door was closed, as I left it, and the TV was off. The carpet underneath, once tan, was blackened and burnt. I unplugged it and, despite being a very skinny 11 year old, lugged it across the street and into my dad's work shed. At least, I thought, it would be safe there.
Neither of my parents ever asked questions about it, even when I asked them to please not touch it under any circumstances. There would be nights when, despite knowing nobody had been out there, I'd look out a window to see the shed lit up. Instead of repeating the same mistake, I'd wait until morning and always find the TV plugged in somehow. I'd unplug it again, move it away from the outlet, but it'd always find it's way back there until it inadvertently got sold while I was at summer camp in high school.
Now, to this day, I don't know where it is - though there are times where I think it doesn't matter. There are more than a few nights where I wake up with the TV on. Sometimes, it's a fuzzy screen and others, it's a children's movie I love. Pulling the covers off me, as if it's nothing abnormal at all, I get up out of bed and unplug the TV set, hoping that her familiar face doesn't flicker onto the screen again.
My Grandma lived out in the country. Not the real country, with farms and cornfields. Just far enough away from the city that the houses are a good football field away from one another, with expansive backyards. Mom always said she felt we needed the space to run free, though we both knew it was just an excuse for her to drop us off for months at a time, obligation free. We were rambunctious kids, my sister Amanda and I, without a care in the world and so we spent those summers running all over the place.
Along with our energy, we were blindly friendly to everyone, despite most of the surrounding residents being more than a little annoyed with our presence, running through people's yards. Grandma's right side neighbors, though, were very kind to us. I had always found myself personally interested in their house, being much larger and newer than anything I'd ever even set foot in. I also knew there were children over there, though they rarely came outside to play. It was actually their father, Isaac, who initially invited us through Grandma to meet his children.
My sister and I and chased each other across the large field between the two houses. Isaac waved from his porch and as we grew closer and I noticed the two children behind him. Twins, a little girl and boy, who's names I learned were Eloise and Edward. They started off shy, but soon warmed up to us. Isaac suggested that we play in the yard. Both children looked at their father with a surprised look before booking it excitedly off the porch, yelling for us to follow them.
This started a friendship that, although only lasted only a few weeks, felt years old fairly quick. Both children, who my sister and I called simply The Twins, were quiet but incredibly intelligent. Mature. Knowing. They could both be bratty, having been home-schooled and sheltered most of their lives, but it didn't show often. It didn't take long after that initial play-date for the Twins to start staying over at our grandma's house nearly all the time. However, we'd never been to their house. My sister asked a few times during the early days. Either of them would just shrug it off.
"It's nothing special. We don't have a lot of stuff, and there isn't much to do. It's much more fun at your house anyway."
We'd correct them; it was our grandma's house, not home.
Mom hadn't been back to even visit in weeks. Hadn't even heard from her, at least not until she called my grandma up, near the end of July, and needed bailed out of jail. Grandma argued with her on the phone for a while before hanging up and frantically calling people in her phone-book, looking for ANYONE that could watch us while she tended to her business. Soon, she found herself walking us across the lawn with Amanda and I in tow, knocking on the back screen door, and politely asking Isaac to keep an eye on us. He hesitated but ultimately agreed and let us into the house. "Remove your shoes, please! I'll be in my office. It's by the kitchen, so if you need anything, just holler for me!"
Stepping into the door, I scanned the room and realized that the twins were right; there really wasn't anything in their house. Not even a TV set. Two white couches, a glass coffee table, and a plain grey rug. It all seemed nice but kind of.... bland. The room was far too large to be so empty, too. Isaac called to the kids, who jogged up from around a corner. Their faces lit up when they saw us. "Oh my gosh! Hi!"
Soon they were leading us around and showing us everything. Each room was very clean and mostly empty, aside expensive and bland furniture. The Twins led us to the den and something immediately caught my eye; at the corner of the room, a metal spiral staircase both rose into the upper level of the house and plunged into the depths of the basement. Without thinking about it, I exclaimed "Wow! That sure is pretty!" Eddie stopped and the rest of the group did, too.
"Yeah. It's really nice. My mommy had it put in when we moved here. There's another staircase in the hall but that one was hers. It leads right up into her bedroom and down into...." He trailed off for a moment. "Where her craft-room used to be."
Obviously, even as a naive kid, this all struck me as odd. I'd never seen or heard about their mom and this definitely didn't seem like a crafty-mom house. "Your mom?"
Ellie answered this time. "She left. She didn't like us anymore."
I immediately caught the frown that struck my sister's face and knew I probably wore a similar one. Both of us knew that feeling. We tried our best to pretend we didn't get that feeling, but we did. Kids aren't much to dwell on sour subjects, though, because the twins immediately moved on from it and so did we.
"Anyway, we aren't allowed to use it. Too dangerous, daddy says. Plus, we don't really wanna go down into that basement, either." Before I could ask why, the twins were already walking towards the swirling staircase and gesturing for us to follow. My sister stayed behind but I followed and looked down into the hole in the floor.
The basement was a stark contrast to the bareness of the rest of the house. Even from what little I could see, the entire place was packed floor-to-ceiling with absolute junk, filling giant clear and multi-colored plastic tubs stacked on top one another. "Who's stuff is it?"
With the statement, I looked back and realized that Eddie and I were the only two left in the room. Ellie must have noticed my sister's discomfort and led her to the next room. Eddie was quiet for a minute, almost searching for an answer. "I really don't know. Dad's I guess." And with that, it was as if the thought was out of his mind, because he turned away from the staircase and continued on his tour of the house. Nothing else stuck out like that staircase, and no other room had the same kind of insane clutter as that basement seemed to have.
The Twin's bedroom was large and about as plain as the rest of the house, though it definitely had more in it than all the other rooms (leaving out the basement) combined. The children owned dozens of books and puzzles. Ellie had an impressive collection of porcelain dolls that my sister couldn't keep her eyes off of, while Eddie's pride was a heavy stone chess table with perfect little glass pieces. They definitely had more than I expected, but I could see why they found our more modern toys had a wider appeal.
Still, we found fun easily. Both mothers and other oddities were out of our minds for hours as we played pretend and Eddie taught me how to play chess. Without notice, much of the day had passed and I eventually had to use the restroom. I tried to remember where it was but failed and had to ask the Twins. "Aw man, you forgot already?! I told you, the main bathroom is busted so you'll have to use the one in my mom & dad's room. It's just down the hall."
I asked one of them to go with me but they both laughed and asked if I was serious. Embarrassment washed over me and I quietly led myself out of the room.
Isaac's bedroom door was open wide and I could see the staircase from the hallway. I entered the room and veered off to the bathroom, which had a huge jacuzzi tub that had clearly never been used. After finishing my business, I exited the bathroom and began to leave before my curiosity stopped me and the staircase caught my eye again. Isaac had told us he'd be in his office, I told myself. He wouldn't notice or care if I just went down the staircase and into the den. I could run right back up and nobody would even know!
There wasn't even a question in my mind before my feet started moving and my hand went for the cold, metal rail. I almost expected a loud, rusted creaking sound when I put the first bit of my weight onto the top step but found the entire thing to be surprisingly stable and quiet. Immediately, being on the thing felt dreamy and the quick trek down was suddenly taking much longer as I studied the design of each step as my foot landed on it. Before I knew it, I was in the living room, and staring into a deep, crowded hole. I snapped back to the moment and realized that I probably needed to go back up before I got into trouble.
Before I could turn and escape back up the stairs, the low sound of humming coming from below caught my attention and I froze in place. Shoot. I'd been caught and my grandma would not be happy to hear that I'd been misbehaving when she was already so stressed. The humming continued, quiet and sad. I actually look back now and recognize the song as If Tomorrow Never Comes by Garth Brooks, though at the time I only felt it was extremely familiar. Somehow, my brain began to reason that the Twins had lied, and their mother really was around, in her craft room. Again, my feet began to move before my brain could put reason behind the steps and I was descending into the basement.
Almost immediately, I knew that my initial suspicions were wrong as soon as I hit the landing. The basement was much too dark for anyone to see anything down there. The walls of filled containers seemed even higher and more close together than they did from upstairs, but formed a path that led deeper into the basement. On the floor, I noticed literally dozens of moth balls spilled everywhere, a familiar scent that I picked up the moment I'd entered the house but couldn't place until then. Up close, the smell seemed almost enough to knock a full grown adult out, but I ignored it as the humming continued from somewhere in the darkness. I started following the sound and called out, sorta clumsily, "Hello? Uh, Eddie and Ellie's mom? I'm sorry to come down here it's just-"
I turned a corner in what now began to seem like a maze of junk and the humming halted, cutting off my speech and stopping me in my tracks. The manufactured corridor was nearly pitch black without the illumination from upstairs, though a little light still leaked through the cracks between containers. I stood there in silence for a moment before the humming picked up again, which seemed less pretty now and more labored, sour notes coming between low whimpers. I started feeling for the walls, continuing into the basement and towards the sound. I gasped after almost slipping on a large cluster of mothballs and the humming stopped yet again. The moment was much shorter and the humming never resumed. Instead, I heard someone softly gasp, then one of the loudest cracks I have ever heard in my life, like stomping on million dried branches.
Startled, I froze again for a long time, my curiosity dropping for a moment and reality reminding me that I was deep within somewhere I wasn't allowed to be. Before my good sense could make me turn around, something crashed somewhere in the basement. Pink light leaked through cracks on the far side of the basement. Again, everything sensible retreated to the back of my mind and I slowly began making my way through the zig-zag of big tupperware tubs and junk. Too much junk, I started to think as I turned the final corner.
Nobody was down there, but it was clear that one of the topmost containers had been opened and something had fallen out. It was a little music box with a bright pink light inside. I suddenly felt stupid, realizing that the music I heard could have easily come from this, although it didn't make much sense and the quiet tune didn't match. I walked over and picked it up. A container lid sat next to it. I grabbed it as well and recoiled at the foul smell that stuck to it, unbelievably somehow cutting through the raw stench of mothball.
On the other end of the row, there was the normal staircase that led up into the kitchen. It was clear at the other end of the house and even Isaac would notice, his office was right next to the kitchen. I didn't care anymore, though. It would be better than trekking all the way back in the dark, and they were gonna notice my absence regardless.
I picked up the lid and music box again, holding them far away from me as I searched for and spotted the tupperware container they likely belonged to at the very top of a stack. Somehow feeling a naive sense of courage after all of that, I began trying to climb up to put them back. Soon, I found myself standing on the very edge of a container and reaching with all of my might to just tip the little music box into the bin. After a moment or two, I was finally able to push it over, but not without my fingers catching the edge of the open bin. The surprise made me lose my balance and soon I was falling backwards. My caught hand pulled the bin down with me as the momentum caused my legs to knock the others I'd been standing on forward.
The contents of the container hit hard and heavy, causing my head to smack the ground. My vision blacked out and I laid there, feeling woozy. The smell from the container hit harder as well and I fought the pain and nausea.
I closed my eyes for a while, listening for an adult or one of the other children to inevitably come find me but as a few moments passed in silence, I started trying to move myself. Something heavy laid on top of my chest. I finally opened my eyes and my vision started coming back. As they adjusted, I realized almost immediately that a pair of glassed-over eyes were staring back at me. A girl, frozen stiff in the fetal position, lay on top of me, head laying lax over my shoulder, peering straight into my soul. Panic rose and I began to scream.
Fighting pain, I scrambled out from underneath the tiny dead girl, though I had trouble standing up. One of the other containers had also been knocked open, a much more decayed woman slumped out, feet bent unnaturally close to her face. The contents of another had clearly been jostled and I could see wispy black hair poking through the junk packed around the poor girl I knew was inside. Another scream rose but caught as the creaking of the basement door caught my attention and light from above spilled over decay.
Isaac looked in shock at the scene below him, covering his mouth to stifle a gasp before stepping backwards and running away to somewhere else in the house. The man was caught.
I froze there for a moment, having seen enough horror movies even at that age to know that he would probably be coming back with a knife or something. I really didn't want to be in that basement anymore. The girl with the glassy eyes stared blankly into me, and I finally pulled myself up off the floor, I weighing my options. I could go back, through the dark, and return to the spiral staircase or I could chance the set of stairs in front of me.
The sound of movement from above, in the kitchen, made the decision for me.
It took me another short moment to make myself go back through the zig-zags of variously colored tubs, frightened of what was probably inside, but fear of being killed overcame the fear of those who'd already met the same fate and I started running, only looking down at the floor below me to avoid slipping on mothballs. My vision was limited, though, and I fell a few times though I tried my best not to knock any more containers over. The scent of death had already almost completely overwhelmed the pungent mothball smell.
Through the persistence of fear, I'd almost gotten to the looming spiral staircase when a creak came from the other side of the basement.
I froze as Isaac called out "Helloooooo?" and began descending the stairs. Each footfall felt like a punch in the chest as I struggled to snap myself out of it and get moving again. I'd only need to pass through one more narrow passage and then turn the corner. I did my best to move quietly, quickly, but while still avoiding the mothballs. One fall could be it for me.
"You're not in trouble. I just want to talk. I promise." His voice was fake-gentle, almost sarcastic and annoyed. It made my heart race faster and faster. Still, I did my best to control my breathing, keeping low and quiet as I passed container after container, wondering again if they all held the same horror.
From upstairs, I could hear Amanda and the Twins calling out my name. Isaac had heard it, too, because I could no longer hear his footfalls on the concrete floor. By then, I was inching around the last corner. I peeked behind me one more time and saw someone sticking their head out at the end of the corridor. At first, I thought it might be Isaac - about to close the distance between us.
Then, I saw those glassy eyes. A shush escaped her decaying lips and she disappeared back into the darkness. I couldn't stop it - I just started to scream. Staying quiet, playing it safe, had completely gone out the window. Swear to God, I practically launched myself around the corner and towards the towering staircase, somehow avoiding the last of the mothballs without even trying. I ascended the twisting steps as quickly as my sore legs could take me. I couldn't bring myself to look back to see if the dead girl or Isaac were in pursuit, just keeping my eyes upward as the living room slowly came back into view. Amanda stood across the room, in the doorway. The Twins were nowhere to be seen.
"What are you doing? What did you do?"
Before I could respond, there was a loud but quick gasp from below. The noise itself practically propelled my body forward. I grabbed Amanda by the wrist and we ran back to grandma's house. Nobody followed. My sister continued to protest and beg for an explanation, but I said nothing as I grabbed the corded phone off the receiver and dialed 9-1-1.
It took a moment to get the dispatcher to take me seriously, believing at first that it was nothing more than a prank call. Eventually, I suppose the details were too much to ignore and the woman said she'd send a car over. She kept me on the phone while we waited, instructing me to lock both the front and back doors, and to stay away from the windows until we saw the blue and red lights of the cop car. By that time, Amanda had also realized that I wasn't joking and began to softly cry. "What if he hurts the twins? What if he hurts Ellie and Eddie?" I worried for them as well, but fear overcame worry.
Soon, we saw the flashing lights and watched from the front window as two cop cars came down the street, one pulling into our driveway and another continuing down to turn into Isaac's driveway. Our officer was a girl - short with light blonde hair tied high in a ponytail. She asked questions and I tried my best to give detail, but it was hard to focus as more cop cars pulled past, then an ambulance, then two. There would also be news vans, but that wouldn't come until later, when the word got out that a serial killer had been living among the quiet houses of that rural neighborhood.
Though not every tupperware contained a body, it was difficult to accept how many brutal murders he'd gotten away with. 15 women and girls, each with broken necks, over the span of six years. Isaac was smart - he'd put together the perfect cover family, only getting rid of his wife when she started to wise up to his awful deeds. He was charming, no doubt about it. Had my childhood curiosity not gotten the best of me, who knows how many more lives he'd end?
Speaking of lives ending - Isaac was found among the bodies that night, in the basement. Died of a heart attack, though there were whispers that his neck had been broken. The twins had locked themselves in their bedroom. Their father had taught them to do so whenever they heard commotion in the basement. They never knew what was taking place below the floors of their eerily bare home.
Somehow, our traumatic experience was enough to finally sober our wayward mother and tether her down. That was certainly the last time we ever had to stay with Grandma long term, and even in adulthood, I still avoid long visits if I can. The house still stands empty, unsellable with a reputation that so far precedes it, and I can barely look at it for fear that those glass eyes will be peeping out of the window.
My boss, Mandy, called from the back office. Moments before, I had heard her cellphone ring and already suspected that we'd be going on a rescue. The animal shelter she owned was closed for the night and the evening volunteers had already arrived, but it wasn't at all uncommon to be called to pick up a stray at the last minute.
I'd never head out the door for the evening knowing there was an animal I could help, so although it would normally be the night staff's responsibility, I assured Mandy that I would accompany them on the rescue. Again, this wasn't out of the ordinary, but still my normally trusting boss seemed apprehensive. "This seems like a touchy case. Are you sure? I can take responsibility for it." I assured her that she could go home for the night.
Mandy was my mentor for the first decade we knew each other, teaching me everything she knew about humanely rescuing and adopting out animals, though the latest few years we've been more at equals. I can do anything she can do, so it was strange that she would question my capability at all.
Still, she conceded and explained the situation, albeit briefly as she had mentioned that it was a time-sensitive emergency.
"SPD called us with a possible vicious animal case after 911 was dispatched to a residence in which a man was threatening his own life. When EMT and SPD arrived, they found that the guy had some kind of dog locked up in a back room, but the thing is either terrified or possibly feral, because it's barking and snarling so loud that nobody will go back there to get it. I could hear it on the phone, it was so damn loud..."
Again she seemed apprehensive to let me go, and I could tell she wanted to say more, but I was already in emergency mode. Grabbing the keys for one of our rescue vans from behind the counter, I repeated again that I could handle it, and would call her if it was an absolute emergency. I met up with a young volunteer, Russ, and we set out to the location.
The drive was a little long, but soon pavement turned to gravel and the lines of houses turned into uneven rows of single-wide and double-wide trailers. It was only a few minutes after that when the lights of all the police vehicles started to become more visible in the distance.
The trailer we pulled up to was isolated from the rest by two empty lots where other single-wides used to stand on either side. Now all that was left were the cement foundations, which were littered with garbage likely belonging to the arrested resident. Even inside the car, parked behind several cop cars, Russ and I could hear the barking and the snarling.
Many of the neighboring residents had gathered at the very edges to look on. Meanwhile, several officers kept the crowd calm and talked among themselves, though it didn't seem like anyone was truly in a rush to even go near the trailer.
A rather tall and buff looking officer noticed our van parked and called out to a few officers around, who accompanied him as he briskly jogged over to our location. I hopped out of the drivers side and slammed the door closed, latch meeting home just as the officers arrived. "Hey! Thanks for coming!" One of them, a tiny brunette with a tight ponytail, called out. "We.... Well, really don't know what to make of this one!" The buff one added.
Almost as if on cue, the animal inside let out a rather loud growl that brought everything to a standstill for a moment.
There was a hush, but Ponytail snapped out of it first. "We don't really know what the story is. The subject has already been taken into custody and is on his way to get the care he needs. Real delusional, though. Probably crazy."
Muscles cut in. "Wasn't crazy to be afraid of that dog." He let out a forced chuckle but said nothing more, letting us get down to business. Russ grabbed a plastic kennel as well as a lead, collar, and restraining pole.
Here's the thing; we weren't terribly shocked by this situation. Russ and I always go into any rescue with a normal level of apprehension and in cases like this, that's much higher. Still, it definitely wasn't the first time we'd shown up to a scene like this and totally defused the situation in minutes. The cases that seem more dangerous always resolve themselves faster. We thought this would turn out the same.
The two of us stepped onto the porch and even before we opened the door, the sound was loud enough to make you want to cover your ears. The barks were deep, crazy low compared to anything I'd heard in all my years rescuing animals. Still, we continued inside.
The first thing that stood out was the lack of.... anything inside the trailer. It's not uncommon to find folks squatting in abandoned trailers around here but this place was SPOTLESS. No furniture. No clutter. Not a single speck of dust or dirt. Nothing like the environment outside. It almost seemed like an empty rental. Despite the look, though, there was a kind of smell. Not a scent, more of a presence in the air. Hot. It burnt the nose.
"Well it doesn't sound like this one's gonna get any nicer the longer we stand here. Let's do it." Russ decided, and I nodded. He was right; strangeness aside, the job needed to be done.
We put together a plan, although it was flimsy.
We found some garbage outside that we could use to guard ourselves. I had a toddler mattress, Russ had a large slab of plywood. We'd open the door to the back bedroom. It would then either charge us, we'd have to coax it out, or just go in and grab the thing if all else failed. I barricaded myself off to the side of the bedroom, in a small alcove to the left that would normally house a washer and dryer. He braced himself down the hall, facing the bedroom door. If it came blasting out, Russ could take the hit. I wasn't strong enough to brace against a giant charging dog but I was cunning enough to coax a confused animal hiding in a dark room out.
My partner signaled that he was ready, I counted to three, and the door swung open before I could get a grasp on the knob. It was as if the motion stole the sound from inside the room because growls ceased to reverberate through the metal shell of the trailer.
For a moment, it seemed like we were just waiting, but nothing emerged from the room. I couldn't see much inside from the angle I'd barricaded myself into and it still looked extremely dark in there. I started making kissy noises and listening for a possible reaction. Nothing. Silence. "Russ? Anything?" He had barricaded himself just out of my line of vision.
Again, silence. I had started to sweat some time before, but hadn't noticed until the silence had set in. I was drenched in it by then, and the room was so unbearably hot. It hadn't been a few moments before, though the smell in the air betrayed it. I called out to Russ again and, instead, was met with a response from inside the room. A powerful, aggressive growl.
In situations like this, we're trained to use gentle approach with calm speech.
"It's okay little baby." I whispered out. "C'mon." The aggression died down for a second, so I did it again, and again, and again while trying my best to peer into the pitch black room and catch a glimpse of the animal we were trying to rescue. Nothing moved, though the growling weakened.
I called out for Russ again, no response. The sound upset the animal again, so I resigned myself to the idea that my co-worker would be no help.
Gentle speech worked for a while but once the growling wouldn't quiet anymore, I turned to the treats. I grabbed a marble sized bit from a baggie in my pocket that smelled something like bacon. As lightly as I could, I tossed it into the room.
Usually, you expect one of two sounds; the small little pitter of the treat hitting the floor, or the quiet slap of dog jowls. The growling ceased, but no other sound came from the room. I leaned over my makeshift barricade as far as I felt safe. Again, the room was entirely black. A window should have been directly in my view, but it wasn't.
Something emerged from the darkness. The treat I'd tossed rolled out into the hallway and stopped perfectly in front of my barricade.
I stared down at it for a moment before a blasting bark, feeling warm and moist as if it were right next to my face, cracked into my eardrum and frightened me back into the corner. The growling resumed afterwards and, for a moment, I considered running away.
Maybe it just felt like a last-ditch effort before high-tailing it out of there, but I started reasoning with it, or maybe I was just trying to replace some of the gentle talk with something less repetitive. "We're just trying to help little guy." I cooed. "It's gonna be okay. We're going to find a home for you, I promise."
The sound from inside the room changed. Still a snarl but somehow more distant. Quiet. Small. It seems stupid, but I kept going. "Someone out there is gonna love you. Just let me help you, little baby."
The heat, and the burning smell, started to recede. The growl had gone, and there was an overall pressure that lifted. It almost made it easier to think. I called out to Russ again, but still got no response, although the noise didn't cause an upset this time. Finally, I found the courage to stand up. I grabbed my phone from my pocket and turned on the flashlight.
It seemed, already, like the darkness had somehow receded. I actually thought the sun was coming up, I could finally see that back window.
I shined the light into the room.
Like the rest of the trailer, it was devoid of clutter or furniture. Except a tiny wicker rocking chair, which inside sat a bisque porcelain doll. She was pale with glass eyes that were green and spiral curls that were dark brown. Next to her, there was a red gasoline can and a BIC lighter, like someone had set to burn her.
I almost couldn't believe it. I started shining the flashlight all around the room, but there wasn't even a closet to hide in.
Confused, I turned back to the other end of the hallway to relay my findings to Russ.
The plywood that had been used for the other barricade had a huge, black burn in it. Bits of the edges were still orange with heat. Behind it, my slightly burned colleague lay unconscious.
In a few moments, I would learn that the aforementioned exchange only lasted fifteen minutes - a half an hour tops, although it felt like hours. The rest of that evening moved much quicker. Russ suffered second degree burns on his arms and was quickly carted off to the hospital. The authorities started dispatching officers to survey the area for the assumed escaped "dog" while others pressured neighbors back into their home. Meanwhile, I called Mandy, who gave me strict instructions to follow immediately. Somehow, I knew she'd know what to do.
By this time, there were only two officers in charge of guarding the scene from curious pedestrians and journalists. I lied, telling them I'd forgotten an expensive piece of equipment inside.
I guess she didn't seem all that strange to anyone else on the scene. Although I'd suspected at first that they might take her for evidence, she still sat there in her rocking chair. Perfect curls popped out from a magenta-colored bonnet. One fragile leg dangled off the edge of the rocking chair, while the other was bent underneath it. I grabbed the entire chair and carried her back outside, joking out an excuse to the officers. "My Mom loves these things." They didn't seem to care.
To my surprise, Mandy was waiting for me when I brought the van - and the doll - back to the shelter. She seemed tightly-wound and concerned, but she took the porcelain juju off of my hands before sending me home for the night without another word beyond thanking me for doing the job.
I would come back the next morning to find the doll, rocking chair and all, sitting in Mandy's office. That's where she stays, as far as today, and our staff treat her as if she's a living part of the family. This is only done at the request of our boss - who is convinced she can find a home for the thing.
Minus a few instances that could just as easily be written off as coincidence, things have been pretty uneventful since.
Russ, however, has refused to return to the shelter.
Working for CPS is a sad job, but it's normally not as bad as everyone thinks.
Sure, there are the obviously depressing parts. The whole reason we have to intervene is because something internally destructive is hurting the family dynamic. At the same time, we get to work with these families and do a lot of good. In fact, with the proper counseling, we remove far less children and see more families healed. It's not uncommon that a person is only a poor parent because it's all that they know. People learn.
There are situations that are out of our hands, though, that are the worst. Those ones where no matter how much you help, you just feel like something higher is at play. You find yourself feeling like you're just waiting to clean up the mess.
In our branch, management has always tried to even out cases as much as possible. They wanted to be sure nobody became overwhelmed. Still, there were certain social workers with us that were more pressed to get the job done than the others. "Case-closers." I used to be one of them until recently, with an unsolvable case that's nearly ruined my life.
For privacy reasons, we'll just call this the Hall Case.
It didn't start out abnormal. It was challenging, sure. 8 year old kid being pulled back and forth between a nasty divorce in process. Two whackjob parents, neither of which seemed fit to care for themselves, let alone their daughter. Still, that's not something at all uncommon with us. This particular case had just run for a very long time.
One misconception about CPS workers is that we make the final decisions regarding what happens in these cases. Really, we're just mediators. Here to gather the information in a direct setting, make observations, and report back to those in charge.
I wish it were how it is in films. Reading a file and report isn't the same as observing damage in real time. If I had the choice, I would've placed the little girl with a temporary foster within weeks. Instead, her parents guarded her like a prized gem and fought to near violence to keep her as long as they could. One parent would get their two weeks with the child and we'd have to threaten to intervene when she finally needed to go back to the other.
Things changed when the father, Mr. Hall, was arrested in an unrelated criminal drug case. This gave Mrs. Hall free reign to keep the child as long as she wanted. I guess was partially relieved, knowing at least one of them was away from the child. It also meant I could focus on monitoring just one parent.
However, this is where things begin to get strange.
Mrs. Hall calls me on the day of her scheduled counseling appointment with a question about possibly switching to an alternative counselor. I explained that they'd have to be approved by me and any non-CPS counseling has to be monitored by the case-worker (myself) for a month or so before they can go unattended. She seemed glad but... unconcerned? Like a very "sure, yeah, whatever" attitude.
However, when I tried to meet her at the address she gave for the next counseling session, she and the girl weren't there. The building on the property was a church called "Church of Milcom" that seemed recently occupied but was then empty. It didn't seem that strange to me, in the moment. Churches hold counseling sessions. Maybe we got our times mixed up, I worried. Still, I had to report that they missed the counseling session, which didn't look good for Mrs. Hall.
The next session came and went with no word. Two more days and my superiors sent me to check on the house. Empty, car gone. An elderly neighbor strolled across the lawn as I was leaving and explained that he hadn't seen either of them in a while, likely since the last I spoke to her.
With the evidence mounting, we finally got the local police involved and put out an alert. It seemed very likely that Mrs. Hall had run off with the child. I hated when it came to things like this, but at least it was certain that she would finally be arrested and the little girl would be placed somewhere safe.
Despite all of this seeming very clean cut, I couldn't shake that church out of my head, so I started to do some research. The building was owned by the city but wasn't supposed to be inhabited by anyone, let alone a seemingly fully established church just from a glance. Stranger still, there was no record of a "Church of Milcom" anywhere in the city, state, or country. I brought this up to my superiors, but for some reason, it was left out of the proceedings.
The most helpful tip came surprisingly from Mr. Hall, though not immediately and not directly.
Initially, it was a natural step in the process to go question him in jail, he was the first person we came and saw, but his estranged wife had seen to it that he wouldn't have a clue where they'd go. He said that she'd changed so much over the several months that they were separated, he couldn't fathom where she'd take their daughter. Meanwhile, it seemed like some time behind bars really woke him up, and he seemed more concerned for his daughter than ever before.
For weeks, things stayed the same. We got dozens of false tips and strange individuals trying to claim some involvement. Nothing came of any of it.
When a call came from the jailhouse that they'd possibly recorded a call between Mr and Mrs Hall, we rushed down to hear the recording.
The conversation starts our casual, him clearly not wanting to alarm her. He gently asks her where she's gone. Her air is light and unbothered as she explains that her new church had them on an important trip. She promised she would come back better than ever before. This clearly worried Mr. Hall, the statement lacking the mention of their daughter, which he brings up. There's a long pause on the other end before she gleefully replies that their daughter is going to help in the most wonderful way.
Mr. Hall can't hold his composure anymore and begins to sob, which isn't what Mrs. Hall wants to hear, causing her to hang up.
It was a very strange and very sad exchange. Apparently, after the call, they had to move Mr. Hall to a different area of the jail as he was inconsolable.
Meanwhile, I reported this back to my superiors who, unshockingly at this point, did very little with the information. Their report reflected the religious fanaticism but wouldn't acknowledge the Church of Milcom's involvement at all. Without this information, I knew somewhere inside that nobody would be able to find them.
I started to lose hope as the days went on. We got a call from the jail that Mr. Hall was having nightmares about his daughter. These nightmares made him entirely certain that she was already dead, causing him to lose hope. He was moved to a psychiatric facility to be kept on suicide watch.
This case unsettled me to no end. I couldn't give my other cases the proper attention. I couldn't focus in my personal life. Meanwhile, I was terrified to admit that I had begun to have nightmares as well. This poor little girl, screaming at me from within raging fire. It was almost too much to stand.
I still don't know how she got my personal number, but I was snapped out of one of these nightmares by the ringing of my cellphone. Without really bothering to check the caller ID, I answered to be greeted by Mrs. Hall. All of her certainty and cheerfulness from the jailhouse phone recording was gone, replaced by fear and confusion. She spat near nonsense at me through ugly, unstifled sobs. From the mess, I pulled the information that she was at home.
I put her on mute for a moment as I retrieved the landline from it's base, calling the police and then my superiors to get permission to go to the scene. Afterwards, I got dressed and rushed towards the house.
The police were only just arriving on the scene, awaiting my own arrival to accompany them inside the house. The front door was already partially open and Mrs. Hall sat in a disheveled mess on the couch, still weeping into her phone as if I were still on the other end. However, as she realized that we were inside the room, she jumped up with overwhelmed excitement, sobbing even louder as she threw herself into my arms.
Immediately, there was a lot that was very different about this woman. Although her face was seized up in fear, I could tell that her skin was much smoother and cleaner. Hair that was damaged from years of chemical processing was now silken and new. She even had a bright new set of teeth. Even though she seemed to have lost her mind, Mrs. Hall could've passed as 15 years younger.
It was difficult getting full words out of her, but she didn't need to tell us where the girl was. The police had already slipped past us to check out the rest of the house, and they were indicating toward a back bedroom door that was sealed shut with broken pieces of wooden furniture and nails. There was an awful smell coming from the other side, which put a pit in everyone's stomach but also pushed them to remove the boards quicker.
This is when Mrs. Hall lost it. She tore away from me and began barreling towards the officers in the hallway, screaming for them to stop. She was detained and removed as the final board was removed from the door. Before it could even be sat down, the bedroom door opened from inside.
A foul smelling 8 year old appeared in the doorway, asking if she was allowed to come out now.
There was something strange and casual in her tone that would have felt slightly off if we weren't all so shocked and relieved to see her. I led her out and it should have been the end of everything.
I wish it was.
Initially, both parents were in separate psychiatric facilities, and we really didn't have much to go on. Besides, the case seemed pretty cut and dry to anyone besides myself. There were things I still wondered and worried about, like the Church of Milcom. I wasn't able to get anyone to hear me out, even when the elderly neighbor I'd talked to earlier had gone out of his way to let the authorities know that a grey bus full of people dropped the mother and daughter off that day.
Meanwhile with nobody to care for the Hall girl, we had no choice but to place her with a foster family. The family asked us within two days to begin looking into other options for her and straight brought her back after four.
First and foremost, she smells terrible. The stench of rotten meat has continued to permeate from this girl. More-so, she's just... scary.
At first, she confronted me about the nightmares. It was so casual, I barely caught what she'd said. She had to repeat herself twice; "the nightmares are never going away." Afterward, she continued with the conversation like nothing but I was too shaken to finish speaking with her. It was true, the nightmares hadn't stopped. I still had horrible dreams about this little girl engulfed in flame. It always seemed like she was saying something, but I could never hear her over the roar of flames. Either way, she somehow knew.
It became more serious, to me, when I found her with burnt photographs, which she claimed she'd stolen from another CPS worker's cubicle. There were still cinders falling from the burnt edges, but I couldn't find any sign of matches or a lighter and she wouldn't have had enough time to hide them.
The idea of taking some time off sounded better and better with each passing day. I even started to talk with another caseworker about possibly transferring the Hall case over to him yesterday evening. As if the universe was intervening, my superiors called me into their office with an emergency. The Hall girl disappeared from her current foster home. Even worse, one of her foster brother's was badly injured.
I wasn't allowed to attend on this scene, though I wasn't given a reason why. I was luckily able to convince the coworker who had been there to show me some of the photos she'd taken. At first, I couldn't honestly tell what had happened. This poor kid's neck looked like cooked ham. Only upon closer inspection did I notice the finger impression. Adult finger impressions, literally burnt into this poor child's neck.
I'm not sure if my superiors found out about me seeing these photos, or if everything had just come down the point of blaming me for not preventing any of this, but I was put on indefinite leave this morning.
The boy is in a coma and can't explain what happened, and the Hall girl is still missing. They're treating it as a kidnapping, linking the burns to an unidentified assailant. Now, with everything coming together, I'm entirely sure that's not what happened. It doesn't matter what I think though, at least not at this minute.
I know that when I go to sleep tonight, the nightmares are going to continue. This case.... I don't want to give up on it, but I'm terrified. I'm also not entirely sure this little girl is done with me. I have lots more research to do, I just hope I can go back to helping people after this.
It wasn't the way I carried myself and it wasn't the way my family was. Sure, we were poor, but we weren't dirty or anything. It was just that stupid town we lived in. Rural, but rich. If your parents didn't either own a farm or work on one, you were considered one of the poor kids. The trash.
Of course, there are choices that didn't help my reputation. Call it teen rebellion I guess, but sometimes I think I tried to out-trash people's opinions once I got older.
That's how I, along with my best friend Mick, started hanging out at the junk yard.
Now it wasn't really a junk yard, not officially. The woman who owned the land was a hoarder and that's putting it generously. I mean acres upon acres of land with just.... stuff on it. Rusted down cars by the dozen, broken appliances, and other piles upon piles of junk.
Delia, a wispy haired woman with a thick southern accent, owned the land. Growing up, we heard all kinds of stories about her. Mostly that she was some kind of witch, though the adults just said she was crazy. I'd overheard my mother talking about her many times after crossing paths at the market or whatever. "Such a nice lady. It's sad she's so nuts. All that money and all that land, but she's too focused on crap!"
And she really was. Hell, most people in town stopped throwing certain stuff out because they knew she'd just come pick it up before the trash men could come. Instead, they opted to drop things off. That's actually how our fascination got sparked.
Let me point out that Mick's parents were never around. Dad was a trucker, mom worked double shifts. Me being an only child, and my mom almost always being home to care for me, Mick was essentially my brother and was always with me, from kindergarten on. That's why he was with me that day, when my dad was dropping off our old fridge. The coils that kept the freezer cold had finally crapped out for the last time.
Delia came out from a trail of trashy treasures poking out of overgrown grass. She gave my father a smile that was magnetic and I was completely enamored with her life, as was Mick. I mean, from everything I'd learned so far, I'd assumed that she'd be wild and unhappy. At least embarrassed by her situation. This woman radiated positivity. I mean, I'd seen her before in town and she LOOKED happy, but she truly had this energy that was hard to hate.
Later that same week, Mick and I hopped some fences until we got onto Delia's property. You didn't need a map to know, you could see the pile-up from a mile away. Exploring her land was something we'd talked about from the minute Dad took us back home. We were both 14 and a little too old to be playing pretend, but we couldn't stop coming up with ideas for how we could make the junk yard our battlegrounds.
We went a few times without being caught. We sneaked around and there was a definitive thrill we both derived from the fear. However, when Delia found the two of us, using garbage piles as barricades for an imaginary war, she was still bright and positive. We both quickly stopped our play and did as kids often do; lined up to be reprimanded. Instead, she put a hand on Mick's shoulder. "Ain't much to do 'round here, eh?" We both shook our heads.
"Ayup. Always been like this. If you kids are really lookin' to have some fun, you might wanna walk about five minutes that-a way." She pointed further into her land. "Cars'n stuff are a little less rusted. Don't want you kids getting some kind of infection on my watch." She smiled and turned away, starting off in a different direction. Mick spoke up. "Wait, we can play here?"
Delia turned, same smile still on her face. "Well sure! Just be careful and respectful of my things, y'understand?" We both nodded and she set off again, stopping every so often to check out a discarded item before gently placing it back down and continuing on her winding but meticulous path.
She'd been right, just heading a couple minutes into the junkyard provided with newer garbage, and other landscapes that seemed almost like something out of fantasy. Our imaginations ran wild. We hung out there almost every day. Most, we wouldn't even see Delia. I mean, there was just so much land and so much to do there. Our paths rarely crossed.
Still, we'd see other people around sometimes. We weren't the only cast-offs to find a refuge there. Sometimes, you'd find homeless people sleeping in abandoned cars and campers. People would also look for junk parts. It wasn't that abnormal to have your play be interrupted by someone wandering.
We found a huge expanse of field that was nothing but refrigerators and other appliances. Newer, older, and in various stages of rust. We'd imagine that they were trees and that we were chasing one another through the forest, a bounty hunter and an escaped convict. I was getting ready to turn the corner around an old Frigidaire and "arrest" Mick when the creaking, moaning sound of rust broke the both of us out of our imaginative story-line.
Mick stood up from his knelt position and came up next to me as I turned myself around to search for the source of the sound. My eyes searched between rusted husks until they landed one one of those old 60's models, the ones that look like a spaceship. The door had open just a crack before stopping.
I started to turn away when the groaning noise returned again. Sure enough, the door was opening.
The door creaked a little further and I could see fingers curled around, holding on and cautiously opening from inside. Fear had turned my body heavy as stone, but the sight made Mick yelp. The fingers quickly pulled back into the fridge and the door slammed closed again.
We stayed like statues in place for a while, waiting for the door to open again, but it didn't. Arming ourselves with nearby scrap metal, the both of us crept over to the fridge and pulled on the door. It didn't want to give way until the two of us pulled with both hands. It was stuck shut good and creaked much, much louder when we opened it.
The inside was bare, nothing, no person. Just rust.
Neither of us wanted to admit to how frightened we were, but we weren't exactly ready to just resume play either, so we quietly backed off of the area and ran home.
It was probably the longest time we'd spent away from Delia's land. Being away didn't stop us from constantly speculating, once we knew we were safe, of course. There were moments where we rationalized to the best of our ability, but it didn't take long for that to descend into stranger explanations when rationality clearly couldn't apply anymore. We had to go back.
It's strange. Delia's land is so expansive, that it's kind of hard to find the same place two days in a row. We found other fields of fridges and other appliances, but not that field with that refrigerator. It took two weeks and almost forgetting about it entirely for us to stumble upon it once again.
We both went straight to that same old fridge. It looked like it could have been blue in it's heyday, but years of rust and sunshine had faded it away. The door had been closed again. It wasn't nearly as hard for the two of us to get open this time and we found it unsurprisingly empty.
The two of us stood there in silence for a moment before it seemed like Mick got an idea. "Close me inside!" He climbed in before I could protest and started trying to pull the door closed on himself, which clearly wasn't working. I didn't immediately step forward to help and instead protested. "What if the door gets stuck? How am I gonna explain that to my mom?"
He laughed as he continued to try to pull the door closed, rocking the fridge and nearly knocking it over. "I can hold my breath a real real long time, you'll figure out the rest."
Sighing, I resigned myself to closing the door on him, though not all the way initially. I could hear him from inside. "All the way! All the way!" The door touched the frame and settled there. I stepped back and stood again in silence.
A few seconds passed.
"Hey? What's it like?" No answer, not even a muffled one. I rolled my eyes and stepped back towards the fridge, grabbing and yanking the door back open with surprising ease. "Yeah, you're not gonna scare me-"
Empty.
For a moment, it was like my brain just stopped functioning. I stared dumbly at the rusted back of the old fridge. Before my thoughts arranged themselves, I already felt myself stepping forward and touching the inside, pushing hard against the back. Smacking it. Punching it in a frightened panic.
I started yelling for Mick. Yelling into the empty fridge until rationality started to pull me back again. I backed off and began searching the other appliances, tearing doors open and frantically yelling for my friend. I opened every single damn door on every fridge, deep freeze unit, and oven with no luck. He wasn't behind them, or among the outlying piles of trash. He was just gone.
As if on cue, or maybe even her own instinct, Delia approached from somewhere unseen. "What's goin' on here? Y'all gotta find somewhere else to play." She stopped and looked around at all the open doors, concerned. "Hey.... where's that other kid?"
I started to break down. I could barely explain through the sudden burbles of sobs that were coming from somewhere inside my gut. My mind couldn't make sense of what was happening, but Delia didn't seem particularly shocked and just sighed before going around and closing all the doors, shaking her head as she got to her work. She kept repeating "This is bad. This is real bad for us, kid."
Once all the doors were closed again, she came back over to me. "Show me which unit he went into." I lead her over to the spacey 60's fridge. She closed and opened the door a few times with no change. She backed off and sat down on an old toaster oven. At first, I thought she was deep in worried thought, but after fifteen minutes or so, it became clear that she was waiting for something.
Then, there it was again. The creak and groan of a rusted hinge, trying desperately to open against time's toll. Only this time, it was one of those meat storage freezers that open from the top. Whatever was crouched inside had pushed the lid open just a sliver. Glossy, silver bauble-like eyes peered out from the darkness inside. They were round and wide, with no iris or pupils to the cascaded swirl of chrome color that made them up.
Just as the lid started to close again, Delia leap't to her feet and barreled towards the freezer. It noticed, tried to retreat faster, but couldn't disappear before the surprisingly spry old woman had yanked the door open entirely and peered inside. Her face was painted with both fear and fury as she shouted inside. "Don't you dare run, you coward bitch!"
A scream erupted from somewhere deep inside the freezer, high pitched and almost metallic sounding. A black, disgustingly contorted hand reached up toward Delia and gripped her hard on her arm. It yanked her a little, but she wasn't budging. Instead, she reached her other arm down with it. "You give that kid back, god damn it!"
It was clear that she was trying to pull the thing out.
Every instinct told me to run, but I couldn't move. My legs had become jelly beneath me and I'd knelt down moments before without noticing.
She'd gotten some good pull on the thing and I was starting to become overwhelming frightened that I would have to see those disgusting chrome eyeballs again, but it seemed it had also started to realize that she had the upper hand. It let go of her arm and she let it go in turn. Then, she was holding onto something heavy, pulling it up to the surface.
He'd come up headfirst, Delia pulling him under the shoulders with all of her might. Mick was unconscious and dirty, looking as if he'd been gone for days, although it hadn't been more than an hour. As the last of his legs came up, she collapsed backwards and barely dodged his body toppling onto her. My own body was finally responding to my brain again and I sprinted over to them. She was already trying to shake him awake with no response.
It was only when I knelt down and began begging him to wake up did his eyes start to flutter. Then, his entire face scrunched up in pain as blood began to pool from his tear ducts and run down his face. Pain overwhelmed his body and he screamed.
"My eyes! My fucking eyes!"
Delia quickly rose to her feet and began to leave.
"Stay with him. I'm calling 911. You better come up with a good story by the time they get here, kid."
I tried to comfort him through his wails and pain, but I was overwhelmed and terribly frightened. I could stop my eyes from darting between each and every appliance in the field, terrified of seeing those swirly, sickly baubles peeking out again.
thank you guys for reading my last story! i got reddit silver for the first time for ANY of my stories and i’m like.... pretty stoked about it! lmao
i got a lot of “wholesome nosleep” comments to but that means people got the feeling i wanted them to have! it’s got a lot of underlying meaning in regards to like... trusting people, life changing situations, perspective, and moving on.
The first thing I remember is crawling out of the dirt. My eyes and lungs both burned with it. The soil was loose, however, and getting out of the shallow hole was easy enough.
Before I knew it, I found myself standing in the middle of a wooded clearing. My head pounded, ears rang, and blood felt like it was pumping to the point of bursting. I clenched both hands at my sides a couple times until it all calmed down. Then, there was a smell. Firewood. There had to be somebody nearby.
I walked for a long time, following the smell until I came across a community-owned cabin. There were lots in the mountains here. Wow, yeah. I did recognize this place. I'm from a little farm town nearby. More memories flood in, but I pushed them to the back of my mind as I walked up to the cabin and knocked on the door.
I opened my mouth to speak, announce my presence, but dirt fell out and words wouldn't form. The door opened anyway, and a happy-looking older man with a thick black beard stood inside. He spoke in a heavy accent I couldn't put my finger on. "Ah! There you are! I have been waiting!"
I racked my flooding memories but found nothing of this man. I opened my mouth again but still couldn't form words. "Oh my, must mention that you will not be able to speak now. It's okay. You don't need to! I can explain!"
He gently grabbed my arm and I felt my rushing blood calm a little bit more. He lead me inside a surprisingly well-furnished little cabin. "I know these are for everyone but I do not think anyone is missing this one!" He chuckled and led me towards an armchair that sat in the corner, pulling the throw blanket from the back and wrapping it around my shoulders.
That's right. It had been freezing cold. Why didn't I feel it?
"Now I can not really explain how you got into your.... situation."
Stupidly, I opened my mouth to question this, knowing no sound would come out. Bumbled and gurgled, still better than nothing at all, but no words.
"You do not remember how you got out there? Ah. I guess that explains some things. Well... I have been staying in this cabin for many years. I guess you could say that I consider myself the caretaker of this patch of the woods, being as far away from all things as it is."
He pulled a silver tea kettle from a shelf, filled it with water from the faucet, and set it atop a small single-burner hotplate. "I spend time around the woods, keeping an eye on things. I fish and hunt for most of what I eat, which is what brought me to the river and brought me to you."
I remember being wet.
"You were in bad shape, dear friend. Took a high fall, right into the water, or so I guess! So... I did what I do with everything I find here. I allowed the dirt to take care of you."
He went on to explain that he'd come out there a few years back to hide from the world. People were already burying things in the woods long before he'd come, but he didn't fully understand the healing properties until he was hurt in the forest himself.
"I always forget the word for it. When something makes your skin rash?"
By this time, I was able to burble out simple words. "Allergy." It sounded like my tongue was glued to the bottom of my mouth. Came out more like "Awuhgee!"
"Yes! I have allergy to bees. Did not know this until I was stung. A bad allergy, too, apparently. I just remembered collapsing into the dirt. Shaking around a lot. When I woke up, I felt weird but.... better."
He didn't know who had buried him. "Perhaps the forest swallowed me up." That's when he began testing things. Burying hurt animals that he'd found. His conclusion?
"Dead things? Does not work. Almost dead things? Magic." Injured animals turned to people, which brought him back to me. "You should not have been so close to the edge. You are tiny. Wind would blow you over. Anything would, easily."
"I think was pushed." The words hung in the silent air for a moment. It took a while for my savior, who called himself simply Nyn, to respond. "How?"
That was something I hadn't figured out yet. Parts of my memory still stood black and void.
The cabin was somewhere deep beyond the trail limits of the natural park my town is fairly popular for. Nyn had explained earlier that the cliffed area I'd probably fallen off of into the river was the general edge before only experienced hunters and campers ventured, usually with permits. I personally wasn't that type, although enjoying a long walk through nature was not unusual for me, even in colder weathers.
I sipped my cup of tea. The warmth traveled down my chest. I felt something shift somewhere deep inside, but wrote it off as pain from the fall, although the sensation doesn't register as painful. "It comes in and out. I remember planning to meet someone here and I remember parking my car, but I don't remember WHO I came to meet and I don't remember what happened once I got here. I do remember how that shove felt."
And I did. It put chills down my spine, especially without the memory to go along with the sensation. The impact was hard.
Nyn frowned, saying nothing. We sat there for a while. His face didn't give away what might have been going through his mind, but I wasn't doing much to conceal my own thoughts from being painted in my expressions. I'd never experienced something like this. Hell, I'd never even blacked out drinking. Digging through my mind was almost painful, and felt as if something inside of my brain itself was intentionally blocking the memory. Again, I felt strange shifting inside my chest but ignored it.
After a while, Nyn stood up again, heading towards the door. "Where are you going?" He stopped, and turned to face me, a chipper look on his face again that seemed a little false. "Nobody else will protect this place. It is special, remember." I tried to stand, but although I'd gained back much of my strength, my legs still felt weak beneath me. I plopped back down in the chair again. "Stay. Rest."
I fell asleep in the chair almost immediately after he left, and had nightmares of being buried alive in a coffin of snakes. Panic rose as I felt one get.... inside me somehow. Dodging organs, making it's way toward my brain. It was enough to wake me up screaming.
Nyn was apprehensive about letting me leave, that became clear very quickly. He seemed genuinely concerned, although he said nothing when I asked him to show me the way home. "I don't think I'm going to remember as long as I'm here. I'm sure they're looking everywhere for me back home." I explained.
We walked through the trees for a long time that day, and even with the circumstances, it was probably one of the nicest nature hikes I'd ever had. The cold didn't sting my skin, the jacket Nyn loaned me wasn't necessary. I had a feeling that he didn't need his, either. The smells of fresh soil, river water, and pine overpowered my senses in a pleasant way that almost reminded me of being at home. Warmth tickled that familiar place in my chest that I'd normally ignore, and I embraced it. I could see why Nyn loved this place, wanted to protect it.
We reached a high, steep cliff-side. "Mostly easy." He points to a ledge outside of my reach. "It is impossible to reach with no help, but you can do it easy once you get up there."
There was a previous me, I remembered, that hated heights and would find herself nervous right about now. Instead, the moving inside my chest calmed rising fear and I felt that no matter what, I would make it.
I stepped a boot into Nyn's clasped hands, ready to boost me, but he paused to look me in the eyes. "Please. Come back." I nodded, although the thought that I might come back had never crossed my mind. It quickly left my mind as well once I got my footing on that high ledge.
It wasn't just easy to climb up the cliff. My limbs moved with ease in a way that almost felt too natural, like something else was piloting altogether. I pushed down that fear as I too quickly propelled toward the top ledge and almost tossed myself over onto the path.
Immediately, I felt different.
The movement in my chest, which had become somewhat consistent by that time and otherwise calming, had gone erratic and fast. Nervous. Like Deja-vu, I flashed back to that nightmare and remembered the snakes.
Whatever, I brushed it off as I hoisted myself to my feet and began following the long path back to the parking lot.
Trying to ignore the undeniable slithering in my chest, I started focusing on the missing gaps of my memory. The darkness that stared back only taunted and tormented me, giving no hints as to what I might have gotten myself into. A splitting feeling broke my concentration and I winced back at the pain in the middle of my chest. The movement inside had now stilled. I cautiously reached for the collar of my jacket and shirt, and gently pulled away and down.
It looked like a fresh cut, smack in the middle of my breasts. It was maybe about an inch in length, but seemed deep. However, no blood seeped from the wound as I stared, frozen in the middle of the trail. It definitely hadn't been there before, but where did it come from? Could that nervous squirming be responsible? No feeling there responded.
Cautiously, I poked a finger at the slit. Crumbs of fresh soil fell out into my shirt and I recoiled immediately. My heart started to race. What should I do? I could go back to Nyn, but would he even know? No. He would have told me. Something was really wrong. I needed a doctor. A hospital. So I ran.
As I began to pick up speed, my body bounced and I could feel more dirt fall from my chest wound, which only caused my panic to worsen as tears began streaming down my face. My heart pounded with every step until trees broke and I could see parked cars. As I'd figured, my car was no longer there, but I hadn't really planned for it to be anyway. The walk from my apartment wasn't far and if my fiance, Clint, wasn't home I could call my mom to take me to the ER.
The further I got away from the park, the harder my head started to pound.
More crumbles of earth fell from the bottom of my shirt as I walked. Trying again to tune it out, my mind was brought back to my fiance and mom, now realizing that either of them could have easily been the one to push me. Suddenly, my imagination ran wild with possibilities and my mind was successfully tuned away from anything else.
Between the two of them, they both had motive. Neither relationship wasn't doing great and both stood to benefit from my insurance had I died. Sure, both of them were normal people, but all things considered, nothing felt normal anymore.
Cautious squirming in my chest snapped me back to reality as I stood in front of my apartment building. Having lost my keys during the fall, I'd have to either knock on the front door, or enter from the back with the hidden spare key. Both Mom and Clint's cars were parked out back in the parking lot, as well as my own. Confronting them at the door decidedly sounded like a bad idea, so I chose the back.
I opened the back door as quietly as I could and although I'd been lucky enough that neither of them were in the kitchen when I came in, the noise was still obvious and both quickly came from different parts of the apartment to investigate. Clint looked like he hadn't slept in days. Mom had a cellphone in her hand and the puffy, redness of her face made it clear she'd been crying. Upon seeing me, the phone dropped from her hand. "ALLIE!!!!" She booked across the room.
Heat came from the wound in my chest, a painful burning that almost felt as if the cut was opening up by itself. I clutched my hand against it and my mom stopped before full-on hug tackling me. "Oh honey, you must be injured from the fall." By this time, tears had started to well down my fiance's face as he also began coming towards me. The burning got much worse and I raised my other hand in front of me in an effort to signal for them to stop.
I fought against the pain to speak. "Which one of you pushed me?" The words came out as a growl, a voice I barely recognized as my own. They both looked shocked. "What? Neither of us! You don't remember?" I shook my head, throbbing pain inside my skull almost blinding. I squinted my eyes and winced against it.
I expected either of them to be offended. Defensive. Guilty. Instead, I saw genuine concern on their faces. Mom finally spoke up.
"Honey... There was a man." And there it was. The words flew from her mouth, into my ears, and pulled the curtain back from my memory. We'd all three gone up to the park, mom meeting up with my fiance and I, because it was where Clint had proposed to me. We were celebrating the year anniversary, as finances had put our wedding on indefinite hold, but we were trying to stay positive about it nonetheless.
We met up with my Mom, who was taking pictures of us, right in front of that same ledge, when a man with a black beard leaped from the shadows and tackled me off the cliff.
"He almost went over with you. He didn't even seem to care. His smile was so.... creepy. He was so genuinely happy." Mom said.
"He just charged back off into the shadows after that. It hadn't even been a minute and you were just.... gone." Clint said.
"We immediately went and got the police, but they've fought us every way." Mom started crying, something she'd been holding herself back from doing the entire time. "They wouldn't even search for you! They... wouldn't.... believe.... us!" She sobbed. Each little bit of new information smacked my throbbing head like a shotgun blast. It all made sense. Nyn was responsible.
I expected sadness, fear, or really anything besides anger to wash over me, but fury began welling up and twisting inside. Breathing started becoming harder and harder as the chest splitting pain now became worse and worse. Clint noticed my discomfort and took a step towards me.
In a second, something tore through and the searing in my chest stopped within an instant. Something warm and wet pushed through my wound and out into my shirt, trying desperately to figure a way out and wiggle free. On instinct, my hands came up and pulled the collar of my shirt down again, revealing to the room the seeping earthen wound of my chest.
Only now, a vine-like, eyeless serpent jutted from the open sore. Grass filled the gaps in between as it slithered out further, wriggling and casing the room while simultaneously stunning both of the individuals in front of it. My hands started to shake. What the fuck was this?
I remembered the dirt. The nightmare.
Mom spoke up. "Allie..." She gulped. "Allie what the hell is that thing?"
The earth serpent turned an eyeless gaze toward my mom and extended further from my chest, getting closer and causing her to back away. Artificial light glinted off golden brown flecks that peppered it's slick, bright green body. "Allie stop! Fucking stop!" Clint darted over and slammed into it, attempting to push the thing away. It didn't budge. Instead, brown spikes arose from inside and dug into his skin like daggers. He cried out in pain and leaped backwards.
"Allie.... you're a fucking monster!"
I could see his skin swell and welt up as he retreated with my mom into the next room. The serpent's body had already smoothed back over by this point and was starting to retreat back into my chest.
Within an instant, I found myself out the door. I was running. Away from my apartment. Back to the park. Back to the cliff. To Nyn. To answers. My movements were painful but quick. I couldn't imagine how crazy I must've looked. I sped past joggers and hikers as I weaved through each path towards the cliff. The climb down was even easier than the climb up. The serpent saw to that, from inside me.
Again, the feeling changed as soon as my feet touched the ground. The swimming in my chest became more controlled, calm, and much less frightening. The smell of fire once again led me straight to the cabin where Nyn lived. He already stood out on the stoop, as if he'd been waiting for me. His overjoyed demeanor almost made me forget his responsibility in this, but the churning in my chest became angry again, although this time it caused no pain. In fact, here, it felt natural. Controlled.
"You are back! I am so glad!"
I shook my head at him and, almost as if I commanded it to myself, the vine passed through my chest again, climbing over my collar and out into the sunlight. It began to sway there, getting a good read on Nyn. As it did, beautiful leaves began folding out from it's sides, basking in the warm rays, looking almost gold. He didn't seem surprised. "I needed someone like me."
He lifted his sleeve and revealed a slit. A similar, though darker and dryer vine peeked from his wrist before retreating back inside. "I do not let it out. It was big one time, when I left here like you. I do not give it any sun though and I do not think about it." Nyn pulled his sleeve back down and that was it, as if having dirt and plant matter inside of you was something completely natural. I didn't care, though. My own serpent kept my mind on what was important.
"You did this to me." My voice came out overlapped with the voice of another; harmonic, beautiful, and terrifying all at once.
His gaze dropped to the ground, along with his happy demeanor. "I did not want to be alone. Nobody ever comes back. You had people. If they saw you being a monster, you would come back. I knew this. I knew this!" His voice quivered, but my anger was undeterred.
"You did this. It's your fault. You turned me into a monster. I can never go home now. I felt like I was going to die out there. The pain..." Words kept frantically falling from my mouth while tears fell similarly from my eyes. Mud came with and streaked my cheeks brown. Nyn stepped forward, possibly to comfort me-
CRACK!
The serpent whipped it's body, fast enough to render itself nearly invisible to both of us, and struck Nyn somewhere hard. Just as quickly, it recoiled back close to my chest.
Nyn blinked once before toppling over, his head cleanly falling off onto the ground in the opposite direction, severed. Dirt poured from the stump of his neck as the body twitched for a few seconds before going still. I stood there frozen, as did my serpent, almost stunned at the action it had committed. Stunned that it was capable- stunned that WE were capable. I couldn't deny that I wanted him dead from the moment I found out he was responsible. The serpent knew that too. She did the dirty work for me. For us.
My friend.
Something moved inside Nyn's sleeve before the tiny, malnourished little vine labored itself out into the sunlight, now uprooted and quickly dying. My own retreated into my chest as I collected her sister and began the trek back out into the forest. Instinct brought us back to the clearing, and I chose a perfect spot in the soil before digging a tiny hole for Nyn's serpent. She deserved a better chance. More writhed under the dirt as they accepted her.
By the time I returned to the cabin, all that was left of Nyn was a mount of dirt and wildflowers, which I strode past and went inside. I could never go back to my apartment, but I knew that I was already home.
warning: this story has light themes of depression, suicidal thoughts, and drug use.
I didn't always feel low. This depression came from years of life kicking me in the teeth, nothing more. Nothing less. I never saw myself living to be old, never made plans to be something someday. Maybe that's why I became nothing, and why I ultimately knew that I didn't want to be around anymore. Of course... I couldn't work up the courage to directly harm myself, at least in the beginning. Nah. Instead, I stuck little needles in my veins and injected myself with poison of the worst kind.
It brought me down further, just where I wanted to go. Every stab into an available vein was a little prayer to God that I wouldn't be here the next day. I'd come up angry afterwards and look for the next chance. The next hit. The next drop further down into nothingness.
There's a rock bottom for everyone, and I hit it hard. Picture a disgusting apartment unit in a sea of many disgusting apartments. People passed out on vomit and blood-stained mattresses in an otherwise unfurnished flophouse, surrounding me as I cried into nothing. Cried about nothing. Tried to babble out some form of explanation to the uncaring or unconscious faces around me, but the spins came and only gurgles and whimpers escaped my cracked lips.
Before I fell out, I remember thinking "This is it. I took too much. It's finally over."
In a split moment, I was upright again. Worse still, I was stone cold sober and beginning to really withdraw. How had I gotten on the roof? I was sure I had been on the mattress in the room. Shaking my head, trying to bring myself to some sort of clarity, I wondered if I had finally come up here to do the deed. I looked down at the street far below, feeling the crawling of my skin and desperately wishing I could go use. But what was the point? I was already here. Why climb down now?
"I wouldn't want to see you do that."
The voice came from somewhere behind me that I couldn't pinpoint, although the roof was small so it couldn't have been that far away. The sound smacked my head, reassuring the crashing headache that reminded me again that somehow, I was no longer high. I looked down at the street again. "Go back inside your apartment, then."
"Well, I can't really do that. Not when I can help you."
I didn't look back. "Nobody can help me. They've never been able to. It's not like I can just magically fix my life."
"Well..." He chuckled. His voice was low and smooth, a hint of a smile with every word. It made my skin crawl a little, actually, considering the circumstances. Still, he went on. "I wouldn't call it MAGIC but I can definitely fix you up."
"How?" At this point, I start to turn my head, but he stops me with an *Ah ah ahhhhhh.*
"You can look back at me when you're climbing off that ledge. If you don't intend to do that yet, then just sit and listen for now."
The wind hit hard and almost knocked me to my side. For the first time in a long time, I felt an uncomfortable, hot pain in my chest. Fear. The apartment building was seven stories up and the wind harsh. I could easily topple over and fall, but why did I care? Hadn't I just wanted to die? This man could be one of dozens upon dozens of weirdos living in this complex, just fucking with some kid he clearly sees is at the end of his wits.
"Looks dangerous up there."
"That's why I climbed up..... Make your point. I don't have all night."
"Ah. Of course! You're right. This isn't necessarily an extended offer. If you don't take it now, you won't get it *eeeeeever!*" He sang the last word in a high, comical, almost mocking tone. "Anyway. I guess I'll cut to the chase. How much would you pay to have the peak version of what your life could be?"
I grimaced at the thought of what this weirdo might mean. "I don't have any money, and I'm not going to suck you off if that's what you mean."
He laughed. "Certainly not! I never said you had to pay directly!" He waited for me to say something, but I just waited silently. He sighed. "Look. How about the ultimate fix in a very literal sense? What would you give for that?"
I found myself staring down at the street again, which seemed much further down now than before. He knew. He'd clearly been in my shoes. Did he have some quick fix for this horrible problem? Some method to sobriety nobody else knew about? The wind hit me hard again and I braced myself against it. Before I could think about it, the words "Oh god, anything!" slipped from my lips and I found my body turning around to come off the ledge.
My feet landed on the black tar of the roof, but my eyes were met with a vast, empty space. I looked around, but there was nowhere anyone could hide. The heavy, loud door that led to the roof hadn't moved an inch from it's closed position. Somehow, someway, I was completely alone. I sighed, feeling sick and aching for a shot. Had I hallucinated? I guess it wouldn't nearly be the first time.
Perhaps something deep down inside me wanted to live, I began to think. Maybe it talked me out of it. I rolled over these thoughts in my head as I started toward the door. As I reached for the knob, I felt something hit me hard over the back of the head, and I blacked out.
I came to at sunrise in a bedroom I didn't recognize. Everything smelled clean. New. Fresh. Something moved beside me and my head shot quickly to the side. Black hair gently fell over an angelic face as the woman sleeping next to me unconsciously turned in her deep slumber.
This was my girlfriend. Wait, was it? Where did that memory come from? More keep coming. Matilda. College. My job at the hospital. It's not exactly like.... flooding? It's more like remembering something early from your childhood that you hadn't though of in forever. Something simple knocks one piece of a memory loose, and more comes back. It's exciting but not necessarily overwhelming.
I got up and grabbed the sleep pants I'd shed before bed the night before. It's kind of strange, knowing I was on that roof last night and yet somehow 100% remembering being right here. Quietly, as to not wake Matilda, I crept out of our bedroom and down the hall, to our shared office. Opening up my laptop, I started going over every bit of information saved. Every file, every photo. It all adds up to.... a really fucking perfect life. I'm married to my high school sweetheart (who I would have met had I not dropped out) and we're both physical therapy doctors. I can track myself back to the college I graduated from. Each hospital I interned at. My email is even full of letters from my mother who, before that day, I most certainly knew I hadn't spoken to in nearly seven years.
Yet there I was. Sitting at my computer. In a home I owned. With a beautiful wife. Even moreso, I was more than just sober. I was clean. I'd never had anything worse than weed and the occasional acid hit in college after finals.
Despite this, the memories of before still remained just as fresh, leaving my mind feeling crowded. I thought again of the voice and how it had disappeared so suddenly once I'd come off the ledge. I suddenly felt stupid for thinking that I had hallucinated. Maybe someone really had been there. Maybe.... he really could fix people. I had to know for sure, so I returned to the apartment complex, not really knowing who to look for but desperately needing to at least thank this person.
Where the towering apartment building once stood only remained a pillar of burnt remains and broken metal, ash and smoke billowing from the wreckage. News vans stood nearby as onlookers and mourners alike stood just outside at barricades. I parked and began to walk closer. Nothing remained of the building and I didn't recognize anyone in the crowd. Had anyone gotten out.
From behind me came that same voice. "Nope. Not a single soul got out."
I didn't move or say anything. I didn't need to.
"It was a hefty price to pay, but hey! Miracles don't come cheap! Of course, not all of those people were apathetic druggies like yourself, working folk just trying to get by, but that's the price you pay I suppose!" He laughed loudly now, over a crowd that didn't hear or didn't care. I suddenly felt something pat my shoulder lightly, a hand much too thin and burning hot. "Take care! Your life is worth something!"
It begins with the click and whir of a tape being played. Light buzzing for a moment. Finally, a young woman's voice speaks up.
"This is Dr. Tiffany Abshire with the children's emergency unit. It is currently 4:27 P.M. on August 2nd. This will serve as a personal log under these extreme circumstances, rather than typing it out. Only an hour ago, this department received a call from emergency services with warning that they would be bringing in a rather large number of children. We weren't given much information beyond that. Our staff prepared the entire emergency wing; transferring less serious cases up to another floor of the hospital. The children that arrived were not what we expected; malnourished looking, but not in terrible condition other than the dirt and grime on their school uniforms. Nurses have placed each child in their own individual room. There was also an adult woman with the children and while we assume this is the teacher, we cannot be sure until we can get someone from Psych at City Hospital. The woman is catatonic and unresponsive, seeming in the worst condition of the group. I will be joining Dr. Fieldsman in the initial interviews with these children, but we can't do much for them until we can contact the school and the parents."
The tape resumes that light, low buzziness that indicates a pause between recordings for about five seconds before the doctor picks up again.
"Dr. Abshire. It is now 5:30 PM and we haven't gotten anywhere with the children. We have no records for these patients and finding a way to reach their school has been challenging. The officer in charge of the case came and spoke with me shortly after the children arrived. He states that he was driving on a bridge that passes over the nearby lake when he spotted a rather large passenger boat out on the water. The children were desperately waving for attention, for rescue. Shortly afterward, 12 young students and their catholic school class monitor were pulled up onto the bridge from the boat, which apparently had died some days or even weeks ago. He didn't know much beyond that. He made a personal comment, something that always makes us feel a little more optimistic as doctors. "They seem like strong, resilient little kids. More hungry than anything else. I think they'll make it."
bzzzzzzz.
"Dr. Abshire. 6:30 PM. Dr. Fieldsman and I did a short round, just getting names and making sure the children were in stable condition. They all are in generally brave spirits, I don't think I've heard a single child cry for their parent. It's almost a little odd, but it has left our staff feeling at least optimistic about their overall health. As for everything else, well.... We're having a hard time identifying these children. No parents or local schools have reported children missing. The police are doing a nationwide search, but it will take a while. For now, Dr. Fieldsman and I are waiting for the green light to treat the children anyway. They could all use an IV drip to get their hydration levels back. I've also sent one of Fieldsman's techs to the cafeteria to bring back snacks for the children."
bzzzzz.
"This is Dr. Abshire and it is 7:43 PM. We got the go-ahead to treat the children at around 7. Fieldsman and I went around and explained to the children to the best of our ability, something we're not really used to as we normally deal mainly with the parent. It was surprisingly easy, though. Most of them didn't seem to mind, still more concerned with when they'd be given dinner. On a personal note, I felt a little horrible when they brought up food. We've been so concerned with identifying them even though feeding them would greatly improve their treatment. Strangely enough, though, Fieldsman's tech came back and passed out tiny bags of chips and cookies to the patients. They remained untouched when we did another round to check on their progress. As for their monitor, she still hasn't spoken. Someone is on their way from Psych and will hopefully be giving her the help she needs soon."
bzzzzzz.
"Dr. Abshire. 8:19 PM. Things have taken quite the turn as the children and monitor both have become incredibly agitated over the past some 30 minutes. She still wont speak, but the children are demanding food. We've reassured them that the hospital serves dinner soon and they'll be fed, but being children, they've become very impatient. It's understandable, but a few have already gone to the extreme of ripping out their IVs in anger. Psych send someone but being the oh so fantastic group of doctors they are, they could only come up with someone who can sedate their monitor. I guess they hope calming her down with bring her lucidity back."
bzzzzzzzzzz
"Dr. Abshire. 8:40 PM. The children were served dinner and all finally seemed quiet for about three minutes before trays of grilled cheese & tomato soup came flying from doors. One of the nurses that was in one of the rooms could be heard loudly chastising a child before we heard a large smack and cry of surprise. The nurse sprinted from the room in tears and shouted that the child had punched her before running off to the restroom to likely cry. From there came the sound of shouting from all 12 patient rooms. The children have protested that what they were given was not food, but we're not sure what they mean by that. Dr. Hayim clocked in around this time and organized a team of nurses and techs, which will attempt to calm the children, or at least prevent them from causing harm to themselves or others. Hayim says that if needed be, she isn't afraid to sedate them."
Bzzzzzz.
"Abshire. One of the children just bit a tech in his throat. He's not severely injured but he'll need to be moved to City Main for for it anyway. I personally tried to talk to their Monitor afterward. I got a first name; Amelia. Other than that though, the sedatives have her incoherent and unhelpful, although not for lack of trying. She mumbled and babbled and even tried to get out of the bed. Her assigned nurse settled her down and nearly as soon as her attention dropped, so did her consciousness. Dr. Hayim just put in a request to sedate all of the children to prevent further harm to any staff. Additionally, the nationwide search for a possible missing class of children has shockingly turned up nothing. It's quit puzzling; we see a lot of unwanted kids come through here over the years, but it doesn't seem plausible that a whole class of private school children would be so unloved that they weren't reported missing."
Bzzzzzzz.
"This is Dr. Abshire and the time is 10:30 PM. Normally, I'd be going home right around now. I just can't leave when I'm needed on a case so honestly baffling. I don't think I could sleep if I tried anyway. These kids have just gotten stranger and more aggressive. Chief of Medicine has refused to approve any sedatives, so we're pretty much all hands on deck down here. Fearing for the safety of our staff after two more techs were hit/bitten, we've pulled them from the rooms and have had no choice but to lock the children in until we can find space for them in safer quarters, the Psych wing. Until then, our staff hasn't much to do besides deal with other patients and watch the children through the tiny window of each door."
Bzzzzzzzzz
"Dr. Abshire. Staff is becoming increasingly worried as the children have turned their destructive, angry behavior onto themselves. Hitting, biting, scratching, throwing themselves into walls. Painting with their blood. Just screaming. Many of our techs and nurses have left, too afraid to deal with the situation any further. Fieldsman tried to slip out as well but Hayim stopped him with a swift slap in the face, accusing him of losing his compassion for sick children. I'm not sure what we're going to do next but...."
The voice on the tape trails off but the soft buzz didn't resume. Dr. Abshire's breathing can even still be heard as her attention is pulled away from the recorder, and to something else.
"Is that.... Amelia? Amelia?! Hey, what are you doing out of your room?!"
Bzzzzzzz.
Before any speaking starts, there is a lot more clear and distinct chaos in the background. Yelling and laughter. It all sounds very frightening although it begins to distance as Dr. Abshire's panting can be heard. There is the sound of a door closing and a little more shuffling around.
"This is Tiffany Abshire. I am hiding under my desk, in my office at City Children's. I'm so scared."
A pause.
"Amelia let the children out of their rooms. They went berserk. Within moments, the nurses station of the emergency wing became an absolute madhouse. I've never seen anything like it. Frail, sickly little children, coming at full grown adults with the strength of men. No. Not men. Monsters. I watched as two little girls dragged Dr. Fieldsman, one leg each, from one end of the hall to the other, playfully laughing and skipping as he bled from two very distinct bite marks on his neck. When they reached the end of the hallway, both screamed TAG before pouncing onto him again. I broke my eyes from that gruesome scene but they only locked onto another, and another, and another. I crouched down behind a toppled-over stretcher but it was almost immediately knocked into by Dr. Hayim, who was fighting off a bucktoothed seven year old with a stainless steel tray until Amelia got ahold of her. She actually said not so fast. She spoke with a fairly posh english accent that I didn't notice at all when she was mumbling at me earlier. With one swift motion of her hands, Hayim's neck was broken and her body dropped heavily to the floor. That's when Amelia's eyes locked with mine and I knew I had to run. It was over already anyway. Every adult there lay dead or dying on the floor, knelt over by hungry children who tore at them with teeth and nails."
Another pause.
"Oh god. I think they're coming."
Sure enough, tiny footfalls accompanied by an adult's approached at a frighteningly rapid pace in the background of the recording. Abshire is whimpering as the door slowly creaks open and another woman's voice, deep and very posh, is heard on the tape
"Just one more, darlings! We'll leave this wretched place and go home!”
Dissonant cheers come from three or four small voices.
There is another pause, and then indescribable screaming for only a moment before the tape cut out. There are no more recordings after this.
After listening to all of this, I put the recorder in the drawer of the desk that I had found it under. Upon being hired here at City Children's, I was excited to be a doctor making a difference in an emergency wing that I was told was recently abandoned by it's staff as some kind of "worker's strike." Since coming here, however, nobody seems to believe that story and now that I've heard this recording, I don't believe it either.
I've since been looking around the hospital and while I've found a few things that are frightening, nothing has struck me more than a plaque with a photo that hangs in the middle of the emergency wing's nursing station. It's an award given to outstanding doctors and staff, with each staff member's name engraved on their own little gold plate. The photo is missing, but three standout names are there.
Dr. Kyle Fieldsman. Dr. Davina Hayim. Dr. Tiffany Abshire.
Benji was our miracle baby. We tried and tried. We saw doctors who looked us dead in our faces and told us they could help, only to rip the metaphorical carpet out from underneath us later on when they told us there was nothing more they could do. Somehow, our sweet little boy found his way into the world anyway.
Of course, my husband and I immediately begun to dote on him, especially with our time. We've put everything on halt to make sure he has a wonderful life. Friends laugh at us. "He's not going to remember any of this! Why do so much?" It's such a strange question for the both of us. It was never about whether he'd remember; it's about how much he'd value it as an adult.
Now that he's getting into the next stage of his development, he's started to speak a little, which we both absolutely love. We were so excited to learn what kind of person that he's going to be, and it brought us to fantasize a lot about what kind of child we would ultimately raise. It kept us up into the night. Talking. Planning. Pausing every so often to listen closely to the baby monitor, savoring every coo and gurgle between low, sleepy breaths.
Every once in a while, he'd talk in his sleep. It was babble, really, but it was incredibly sweet to listen to. I don't think either of us expected to hear anything coherent, so I think that's why it caught us so off-guard the night we heard "Mommy, where are we going? I'm scared." come through ever so quietly from the other end of the baby monitor. The voice was tiny and impossibly high. As you can probably imagine, we practically tripped over each other booking it to the nursery. Benji slept quietly, entirely undisturbed.
Later on, after all locks in the house had surely been checked, checked again, and locked once more for good measure; we gently moved Benji's pack & play into our bedroom, doing our best not to wake him. Both of us agreed that what we had heard was likely some kind of interference. We settled into bed and began dozing off. Just as sleep and I were about to meet, a tiny voice cut through the darkness again. "Mommy.... it's cold...." I froze, eyes shooting open to quickly scan the room for any intruder. Empty. Benji slept soundly in his pack & play. I couldn't be sure at that moment, but I swore that his lips were moving as the tiny voice continued to whine for her mother. I whispered my husband's name. "Yeah. I hear it."
A moment later, a woman's voice arose from our little Benji's lips. "Don't worry, sweetie.... we're just.... going for a walk in the snow. It'll be fun!" The voice changed again. "Okay, mommy..." Quiet.
"Where are you going?"
"I'll be right back. Be a good girl. Stay right here."
"Okay."
"I love you."
Quiet again, for a long time. The little girl's voice is back, and it's much more frightened. "Mommy?! Mommy, where are you?! I'm getting sleepy! It's so cold! Mommy!"
We continued to listen until the words faded back into the coos of a sleepy infant. We both got up out of bed and tip-toed across the bedroom to check on our son. He slept soundly, unaffected. The both of us sat next to his pack & play and watched him until the sun came up. Benji arose with a smile and a "maam hi!!! daaaaa hi!!!!" like he did most every morning.
Not really knowing what to do, I think we both kind of chose to believe it was an isolated incident at that point, more than grateful that those aching words had not affected our perfect little boy. When it happened again for two more nights, though, we both became extremely panicked.
Let me tell you that with your first kid; you really have no idea what's going on at any given time. They tell you that no pregnancy book can prepare you, and you kind of have to learn by ear. Every person's upbringing unfolds differently. Still, tearing through pages and pages of google searches and research brought not a single account by another parent of strange voices coming from their babies.
I think maybe it was that reason exactly why we chose not to tell anyone at the time, thinking that people might assume we were lying or, even worse, take our boy away from us. Honestly, though, I think it might have even been a little bit due to curiosity, too.
Still, we had no answers, so it was my husband that suggested these might be memories. At first, I kinda didn't get it, but he explained.
"Y’know... they say that little kids can remember their past lives. What if he just remembers really really well?"
It was an odd suggestion, but really the only one that made sense at the time. For the next few nights, we stayed up and listened to the impossible words that exited our baby's mouth. Plans to sleep afterwards almost never came through. We found ourselves awake for hours after, thinking of the little girl and how her mother left her to die out in the cold.
It was around this time that Benji began remembering something different. We waited quietly for the voices of the little girl and her mother to come. Instead, they were replaced with the voice of a man.
"You want to leave me? You bitch! Try and leave!" Angry words spilled out of our little son, followed by the timid and frightened voice of a woman. "Honey, please slow down!"
"Don't tell me what to do, you fucking cu-" The words are abruptly cut off. There is no drift away. Benji, instead, flinched for a moment before immediately resuming his sleepy breathing pattern. In the morning, he woke up just as happy and unbothered as always. This was much more troubling than before, but it didn't change how completely helpless we felt, so we just continued to monitor the situation, rationalizing that he'd eventually grow out of it.
The two narratives began to bounce back and forth, some nights providing longer versions of these memories. Some nights, nothing came through at all.
We'd almost gotten used to it after awhile, even discussing moving him back into his nursery soon. Actually, it was the last night before we planned on doing so when a young man with a very heavy Russian accent came through. "Hello? Please? Turn on the light??" Silence. "Please! Some person! Hello?!" Silence again for a long time. The voice started to cry.
This was abruptly interrupted by a dissonant chuckle that set my skin on fire with fear. The chuckle turned into a loud cackle, which turning into wailing horrendous laughter.
The Russian man came through again. "Oh my god. What are you doing? No! No!"
What followed was the most horrifying, blood-curdling scream I think I've ever heard. These screams went on for forever, breaking every few moments to gag and gasp for air. Both of us stayed frozen, overall unsure and frightened, until our sleeping baby actually began writhing violently. This set both of us into a panic and before anything could be said by either of us, my husband was to his feet, ready to wake up Benji. Looking back, I wish I would've stopped him, because the shock brought our son's eyes open wide as the deep scream went high and loud, back to that of an infant.
Since then, he hasn't stopped screaming.
It's been fucking days. He won't accept food. Sleep, of course, is absolutely out of the question and I fear that the neighbors will be calling CPS any day now. Maybe we deserve it.
Neither of us knew what to do, so we put Benji back in his nursery. We have to keep him in there at all times. I wish I could hold my little miracle baby, but the screaming is enough to drive you to terrible, horrible things. I caught myself fantasizing about what would've happened had he never been born and I realize how awful that is. I truly am a horrible mother. Still, even knowing how much of a blessing he is, I would do anything to make that crying stop. I don't know how much more I can take.
If your little one begins talking in their sleep, just let them. Don't even listen to it. Shut the door. Turn the volume down on the baby monitor. Let it pass and whatever you do, don't wake them up. Anything they might remember can't be any worse than this waking nightmare we brought into reality.
My girlfriend and I are just finishing up road tripping around the US, seeing concerts, attending festivals, visiting landmarks, etc. As you can imagine, we've seen a ton. It's been great, but by the time we started our long journey back to our home state, the trip had taken a lot out of us. Not just physical exhaustion, we'd nearly drained our savings for the trip as well. The plan had always been to drive straight through, taking turns at the wheel while the other slept. With tension rising as time passed, the plan quickly changed and we looked for the cheapest (but still nicest) hotel we could find.
Later, we found ourselves pulling up to the building directly next to the highway that would be our haven for the night; a cheap chain hotel with a bright sign that read "NIGHTLY $4O, WEEKLY $200" and a giant parking lot nearly packed full of semi-trucks. There are two more hotels on the same side of the highway underpass similar to this, two gas stations, and a fast food restaurant. The crowning feature of this small area, however, is a goliath stone cross that almost looms from the other side of the highway. It towers over everything, including the church that stands behind it and is illuminated by two bright white spotlights. To be truthful with you, this SOUNDS very odd when typed out but after weeks of driving past countless places like this, it's all just something I've come to shrug off as very mid-west.
The lobby wasn't packed like the parking lot, but there were more people wandering around the main floor than I'm used to seeing in near any hotel. Mostly gentlemen, reading books, eating cup noodle, watching the news, and chatting joyfully. It actually kind of reminded me of living in the dorms during college. Very friendly environment. I found myself surprised at how just... nice everything was for how not nice you'd expect it to be, you know? Still, we didn't really pause to reflect on that before checking in and quickly rushing to our room. My girlfriend did a quick check of her side of the bed and was asleep within minutes, but even with how tired I felt, I couldn't bring myself to go to bed so early and decided to check over the entire room.
Fairly clean. Carpet was really new, too. Not bad for the price. I sat down on the edge of the bed, feeling satisfied enough. Still, I pulled out the nightstand drawer, more-so to satisfy my curiosity about hotel bibles than anything else.
Instead, there is this dark blue composition notebook. I've been reading it for a little while now.
It seems to be a journal, with many of the entries summing up the mostly uneventful days of the writer, a truck driver with a wife named Lynae. The writing itself is really messy and although I can tell that the author is deeply thought and well spoken, many of the larger words are spelled phonetically; smart, just not book smart. The journal is really full and some of the earlier entries are really interesting, detailing run-ins with hitchhikers and feuds with other drivers. The entries stop very abruptly and the last few are particularly unsettling. I can't be entirely sure, but I think those were written in this room.
These are the last few entries. I've copied them down and done corrections to make it overall more legible, but otherwise I haven't changed anything.
___________________________________________
July 27th
The money is in and it is good! I knew Bone would come through for me on that last haul. Now I just gotta get the rig back home! I'm glad I finally have the money to stop and rest in a real bed, too. The old cabin just ain't as comfortable as it used to be. Maybe that's what I'll be fixing next! I called Lynae and let her know I was coming home and she near squealed over the phone. I'm thinking now's the time to get her that pretty ring. Anyway, I saw Monty again today and asked if he was gonna return my MP3 player but he just kind of shrugged me off. It was pretty damn rude, actually. Knew his parents didn't teach him manners. He just got up in his truck, wasn't even gonna stick around. Weird actually, he almost always sacks up for the night, doesn't like driving after dark. Oh well, hope he enjoys a nice night drive! All over nothing!
Anyway, seems time to hit the hay! I'll be headed out tomorrow morning and I'll hopefully be home for supper!
July 28th
Woke up this morning with the worst kind of headache. You know the kind that stings behind the eyes, burns your nose? Awful. Soon as I got out of the bed, the nausea hits. Damn it! Happens after every long haul; I get some bug off some dirty oldie who ain't never heard of antibacterial soap and I have to sleep it off in some crummy hotel. Fucking figures. Anyway. Seems like this place is much less crowded than last night and near all of the fellas that are here are total strangers to me. I wandered around a little bit, went to the lobby and grabbed some good stuff from the snack machines. Hung out for a few minutes, too, but instead of the normal circulation of news and talk TV, the counter girl was watching some weird black and white film. I ended up just going back to my room, throwing up a little, and getting some sleep. I napped until now, which it's pretty late. I'm getting 1 AM on my room's alarm clock.
I went downstairs to grab some clean clothes from my rig and smoke a cigarette but the front and side doors of the building were locked. I didn't see any employees around though, so I figure they're on their late night break. I hung out down there for a while and waited for someone to come open it but gave up eventually. If I'm being honest, I was feeling a little uncomfortable. It was too damn quiet. Plus, that church changed the lights shining on that giant cross. They're red. What a weird color for a church to pick. I don't know, maybe the fever is just making me loopy and paranoid. I better try to get some more sleep.
July 29th
When I woke up this morning, the alarm clock said it was already well past noon. I thought it couldn't have been right because it was still pitch black in my room, no light shining through the open curtains at all. I got up and sure enough, it was still pitch black outside. So I figured my clock was broken. I guess the fever's got me feeling more and more irritable since I got here, otherwise I don't think I would've even brought it up let alone complained, but I yanked the cord from the wall and left my room.
The lobby was still empty, door still locked, and no employees in sight. I rang the little bell on the counter but nobody came. Hell, I waited in that lobby for a damn hour and nobody came! I'm starting to feel worse, too. My head is pounding so hard and I can't get any damn medicine since I've searched high and low for an unlocked exit and found not a single one. I don't really have any choice except to lay down and rest. Tried to watch TV, but all it's pulling is the weather channel and black & white movies, so I guess I've been watching the weather channel for a couple hours now. I'm going to try to rest more.
Oh. By the time I turned on the weather channel, it was saying it was 2 PM. The clock for sure was not wrong, but I have yet to see any sign of the sun.
August 2nd
It's still dark outside and according to the weather channel's date, I'm missing some days. My head is so foggy that if I didn't remember at least a little from the other day, I don't think I'd question the initial notion that I just... slept through it from being so damn sick! I'm not sure that's what this is anymore. I'm not sure what this is at all anymore and frankly, I'm scared as shit.
The bit I can remember is only a small sliver of time. I got up and near shit my pants when I saw that not only was the alarm clock plugged back in, the damn thing was set again. I remember checking the door to find that the privacy lock was sure enough in place. Unlocked it and I swung open the door but then it all goes blank after that. Now I'm here and it's more than a day later and there's some kind of music coming from somewhere. Searched for it but found nothing.
As for the cross, they turned the lights off all together. I went up to the fourth floor to get a good look outside. Seems like everyone just left... All the haulers.... Gas station attendants.... Highway drivers.... Everyone. My rig is the only one in the parking lot. I'm beyond scared... I could break out but I'm so weak.
Aug 3rd
My door was open when I woke up. All the doors to all the rooms are open. People's things are sitting around but there are no people. I've stopped pretending that this is normal. Something is so fucking wrong here and I can't even find a single clue as to what's happening or why it's just me. I've slammed my whole body weight into doors, searched high and low for keys or any damn thing that might help me get out of here. Nothing. It doesn't even seem like there's a world out there anymore. Like something just picked the hotel up, emptied all the people out besides me, and let darkness swallow the rest of it up. I can't see anything beyond the parking lot. Somewhere out in the vastness, though, I can hear that music from yesterday. It's something low, with a lady's voice singing over a very slow and out of key piano. She sounds sad but I can't make out what she's actually saying. I think I would be more concerned if the noise itself didn't make my headache so much worse. Instead, I just feel angry.
[[The entries no longer have dates after this and I can only assume they are each separated by at least a day just due to the previous writing pattern, but who knows.]]
xxxx
I've spent a lot of time wandering around the hotel. At first, I tried closing all the tenant doors again. It made me uncomfortable to see them that way, but as soon as I'd hear the latch and I'd turn away, they'd loudly swing open again. Scared me shitless, as you can imagine. Then, after a couple more times, pissed me off. Even despite my fucking throbbing headache, all of the rage within my chest spilled out of my throat in a torrent of screams. As you probably could guess. My screams haven't received a response beyond that same sad song that only gets closer. Or louder. I don't know.
I've started searching through the rooms. Going through people's things. I wonder where they are. Did they get to leave? Or did they go somewhere else? I'm still not sure. Does it even matter? Things are getting worse for me regardless what happened to them.
xxxxx
The parking lot is gone. It seems like the closer the darkness creeps towards this place, the worse my headaches get. I've tried to move to a higher room to get away from the darkness, but then I wake up back in my original room again. The weather doesn't play anymore, but the black and white film channel does. I've tried to sit down and watch it, but after a couple minutes, it ends up being far too painful. I can't... describe the pain. It's everywhere. It's in everything, god damn it.
xxxxxx
First floor is gone. The cross is back though. It's illuminated in that same strange red light, taunting me from out in the darkness.
I've been through every inch of this damn place, trying to find some kind of haven away from this madness. I tried to go downstairs at one point. Into the darkness. My ears are bleeding now but I made it back to my room in one piece.
xxxxxxx
Oh god. Dear Jesus Christ. Her singing is now screaming. The piano is grating. I wanna go home.
xxxxxxxxx
I think this very well might be it. If you'd believe it, the higher floors went before this one, making it damn clear that this has always been coming down to me. It's been coming for me since I got here. I think even Monty could sense it.
Despite having every light in the room on, as well as every single one I could steal from this floor, it just keeps on growing dimmer. The girl. She's not screaming anymore. She doesn't need to scream. She knows I hear her. It's like she's right over my fucking shoulder, whispering right in my ear. And just like that, someone is knocking on the door. Darkness is seeping underneath like black smoke and I know I don't need to answer. It's creeping over the pages, up my arms, shoulders, face, and into my mouth.
Lynae, I'll miss you.
___________________________________________
I'm really.... shocked. It could easily be.... anything..... but something between the too comfortable vibe in the lobby, the handwriting, and the overall feeling I've had since picking the journal up absolutely tells me that there's something to this. Now that I've got it all copied down, I'm getting my girlfriend up. We're taking this journal down to the front desk. God fucking willing, we're leaving as soon as we can.
My girl is all I've got. I'm a fuck up, ex-junkie. My friends have disowned me and my Mom says she barely knows who I am. I've got my girl, though. I've got my Diane.
I don't remember how we met. Don't find myself remembering a lot lately. I do, however, remember the ad we saw on a bulletin board at the free clinic.
"Drug trials, start today! Make $200 fast!"
Below were a couple paragraphs that I mostly skimmed through for the important stuff. I called Diane over from the counter, showing her the flyer.
Three hours later, we found ourselves standing in front of a large medical building in an expensive part of town neither of us would normally find ourselves in.
The medical staff that worked inside of this building all seemed really nice. They could have looked at us like the scum we are but instead, they wore perfect white smiles that hid absolutely no judgement. We're both directed to the sixth floor, Wing F. The light there was a little more bearable, dim and warm. We sat in soft waiting room chairs and worked through about a dozen pages of legal bullshit and medical paperwork, mostly making sure we didn't have any specific allergies or any hang-ups about side effects.
Diane and I were taken back separately. The doctor I got was an old man who wore a huge metal cross around his neck. Like everyone else in the place, his demeanor was incredibly kind. I was given two pills and told to come back at 8 AM.
We waited for side effects. Vomiting, nausea, maybe even a little high to get us really happy. Nothing happened. Next morning, the doctor jotted it down on his clipboard and it was on to the next one.
I won't lie; results were pretty up and down. I don't remember every single one of the medications we tested, or the effects they had on us. There was one that made my piss green. Another that put Diane to sleep for nearly 20 hours. Most times, though, they didn't do much of anything that we noticed.
Recently, we went in for another check-in. As per usual, we sat in the comfortably-lit waiting room and prepared to report another asymptomatic dose for the both of us. Diane's doctor, an older woman with thick round glasses, came out. She was followed by a man in a suit. The doctor seemed nervous. Diane was asked to follow them.
Nobody ever came out to bring me back for my own appointment. Actually, now that I think about it, the entire place was pretty deserted. The nurses station, which was normally almost too crowded with friendly but chatty young nurses, sat silent and entirely empty.
Almost two hours later, Diane came storming out. She grabbed my wrist and basically dragged me all the way home, wordlessly. Took a minute to get it out of her once we got home, but she explained that her doctor mixed her next test medication up with something extremely experimental that she hadn't been green-lit to give out yet. Nobody would tell her what it was, but that it had a very unsavory effect on another patient.
Two hours were spent arguing with them about staying at the facility to be monitored and tested on. She felt fine, was asymptomatic, and didn't see any reason to stay there if they weren't going to pay her, so she charged out before anyone could stop her.
She decided for the both of us; we were done doing drug trials.
That evening was perfectly normal. We talked about the possibility of getting employed for real into the early hours of the morning. Another day passed. She did started feeling fatigued and a little shaky, but brushed it off as mild withdrawal symptoms. We'd been going at these trials pretty much nonstop for months, so it didn't seem unrealistic.
Days later, I woke up sometime way past 2 PM, as I did most days. Something cut through the lazy afternoon silence, a breathless sound that was almost buzzy. I stayed completely still and I listened for a few moments, trying to make it out.
It was a barely audible whisper, coming from beside me in the bed. I turned over to face Diane, who had fallen asleep spooning me.
It was like all the color had been drained out of her. Her naturally tanned skin was now colorless and translucent, revealing blue veins underneath. Cataracts clouded both eyes as they stood open wide, seeing nothing. Her lips didn't move and were barely parted.
Can't. Move.
Can't.
See.
Panic rose up in my chest. I went to touch her but recoiled back at the heat. Her skin felt like hot metal. Not being able to move her, I asked if she could breathe.
Don't. Know.
This only puzzled me and frightened me more. I thought back to the legal papers we'd signed. They said we had to come to them for help if any side effects became serious. Moving Diane would definitely be a no-go, but I could at least try to bring someone back here to help. I kissed her as gently as I could on the forehead and headed to the medical building.
The same smiling people filled the building. The same bright lights shined from the ceiling. However, Wing F was locked. Dark. Deserted. As if on-cue, security appeared behind me and escorted me out of the building. I asked a dozen questions on the way but received no response. Nobody lost their happy demeanor, but they wouldn't look at me.
I raced home.
Diane remained in the same spot as I left her. Unmoved. Unmoving.
There. You. Are.
I told her it was time to go to the hospital. She didn't respond. Preparing myself for the burn, I slid a hand under her side, hoping to lift her. Any physical pain was distracted by a horrifying, guttural scream of pain that escaped Diane's lips.
DON'T.
NO.
I moved my hand away as quickly as I could. It stung but showed no damage. I tried again, ignoring the burn. Even a gentle touch brought out gurgled pain groans from somewhere deep within her. I finally stepped back and gave up, collapsing back into the wall and sliding down into a sitting position.
No sound came from Diane for a while, though I knew she was still in there. I crawled into bed, facing her. I asked her what we should do.
Don't. Know.
So that was it for a while. We just lay there together. Hours became days. She didn't need to eat or breathe. She couldn't feel anything unless I touched her, but she was still in there somehow! She could still communicate, though barely through permanently frozen lips. She couldn't see anymore, but I could still play her favorite music. Something resembling hums accompanied every song.
Two weeks. The man in the suit showed up on our doorstep. Behind him was one of those private medical transportation vans. He asked for Diane and was fairly frank, stating that she was legally obligated to allow them to test on her, regardless of what they had accidentally dosed her with.
I lied. Told them she had died due to a reaction to the medication. He didn't seem to buy it, maybe knowing what the medication could do, so he said that it was of no matter and asked where she had been buried. I lied again, stating that she had been cremated and given to family. This didn't satisfy him, but I slammed the door in his face and locked it before he could reply.
Since then, there have been lingering men in suits outside of our house a couple times a week, but I try not to leave. In this day and age, it's fairly easy to almost never leave your home. I can work here, and I can order food here. I can pay all my bills online and anything else I need can be ordered, too. I never have to leave my girl.
She seems happy, though I guess I can never be sure of that. Sometimes, I think me keeping her here may be... inhumane. Maybe she would be better off dead, or maybe the doctor's at the hospital could cure her. No. Like the men in the suits, they would probably just take her away.
Plus, I don't want her to be dead. I couldn't stand it if she were taken away from me. She's everything to me.
Something keeps scaring my pregnant neighbor and I [PART 2]
REDDIT
A few days have passed and I'm just.... not quite sure where to even start.
After my previous post, I had to leave my parent's house. Everything in my being told me that I didn't have to go home; I could stay at a hotel or even sleep in my car. Instead of driving towards the apartment, I began to just drive aimlessly, lost in indecisive thought. I ended up doing this until sunrise without really realizing it. The daylight gave me a little more courage so after stopping off for gas, I went back to my apartment.
An overpowering swampy smell greeted me upon entering the building and only became stronger as I ascended towards my apartment. Shockingly, my door was slightly ajar. The knob was wet.
Not knowing what contact with that.... goo might do, I lightly pushed on the door itself. It swung open to reveal a living room that, to anyone that had never been inside before, looked entirely normal. Nothing of monetary value had been stolen. However, every single poster, photograph, painting, and linen was gone. My entire bed had been stripped as well as all curtains. The closets had been rummaged. Nails awkwardly protruded from walls, holding up nothing. While searching my apartment, I had to avoid several pools of black saliva that looked almost like tar. The smell stuck inside my nostrils.
Frightened and not sure what to do, I called my brother, Vince. "Dude... are you fucking with me?" He almost joked sleepily over the phone. My tone told him that, indeed, I was serious. Within fifteen minutes, he was at the door. Neither of us said anything for the first few moments as he wandered around and confirmed that I had told him the truth. Vince put a hand on my shoulder. "I'm... so sorry. I really don't even know what else to say." I couldn't come up with a response beyond "what the fuck should I do?"
"I'm gonna be honest with you - this is beyond crazy as fuck." He sighed, rubbing his face with both hands. I asked him if he thought I should call the cops. "I don't know, man... and tell them what??? A scary spitman broke into your apartment???" He actually chuckled at the thought, and I had to as well. He was right; involving law enforcement would likely confuse things further. "I have to be at work in a couple hours, but I can help you clean this up. I'm sure mom has some blankets you can have and I'll come crash on the couch tonight if you absolutely need me to."
I'm counting myself more grateful for my family by the day lately. I don't remember why I loved solitude so much.
The puddles of saliva were thick, almost coagulated. I found an old dust pan under the sink and we used it to essentially shovel it into a bunch of gigantic bowls and a few mop buckets. It took much too long and made Vince late for work. I found myself disposing of the goop alone. Dumping it down the drain didn't seem like a great idea, so I carried the bowls and buckets out of the building, one at a time, and dumped it into the sewer. Anyone that might have seen me would've thought I was crazy, but I realized I didn't care as the disgusting smell began to dissipate as more of the shit went out the door.
During this time, Tiffany's apartment was silent, and I counted myself grateful that she didn't have to be here for any of that. I hoped that she was having fun with her mother and had put this horrible place out of her mind for the time being.
Afterward, I went to the hardware store, bought a new knob and deadbolt, and installed them. I didn't handle the old knob with my bare hand despite the fact that we had cleaned it and threw it into the dumpster along with pretty much everything not nailed down that had touched the goop. It had grossed me out before, when there was just a little bit of it on the other side of a window or shellacked over my door's peep hole. The smell is what truly averted every single one of my senses and made it overwhelmingly uncomfortable to experience. It was the smell that brought it all together.
After checking the locks on the windows, I spent the rest of the day researching. Although I didn't find much on the saliva, I did find out a few interesting things about my apartment lot itself. First and foremost, the place isn't all that old. It was built in the 60's as luxury apartments. In the 80's, one of the town's bigger factories shut down, and residency drastically declined. The complex's reputation became synonymous with crime for a while as ownership bounced around from person to person before it went abandoned for a few years starting in 2010. During this time, there are several forum posts on different urban explorer sites about the lot. These were mostly unhelpful. However, one of the most detailed posts provided a hand-drawn map. Each building in the lot was drawn as a simple square and labeled. Some had notes. Mine, along with one other, had rather large Xs through them. Then, the note simply "Unsafe."
I kept an ear out for Tiffany, but our floor stayed silent.
Later on, last night, I still found myself going over that word again. Unsafe. It could have meant a myriad of regular things but after everything, that didn't seem exactly right. Up until recently, this place had never felt unsafe to me, but now I wonder how I ever lived here without fear. These thoughts were interrupted by my phone buzzing on the coffee table, Vince letting me know he'd arrived. I was grateful not only to be with company, but also that he'd decided to call before knocking. I slipped on some house shoes and jogged out to greet him. He'd brought mom's leftovers along with several huge blankets. "Sorry, mom wanted to be sure you had enough." We both laughed and headed back upstairs.
Only a few hours later, Vince had passed out on the couch and I found it harder and harder to keep my own eyes open. After all, I had barely slept in days. Instead of heading into my bedroom, I made a makeshift bed in my recliner and almost immediately dozed into slumber.
I couldn't tell you what time I was shaken from sleep this morning, but the sun was definitely up. My brother stood over me, sleepy but terrified. "Dude.... did you hear that fucking scream???" I hadn't and shook my head to indicate such. Vince didn't say anything and instead walked over to the front door and looked out the peep hole. "Your neighbor's door is open."
Tiffany.
Sleepiness forgotten, I got up and within just a moment or two, we were both standing at her open door. A slightly weaker version of that horrible swampy scent lingered from somewhere inside the apartment. I lightly called her name. Silence, no answer. Vince shoved me ahead. "Let's go look." The living room itself was normal. Boxes of baby things sat unmoved since the last time I'd been there. Upon reaching the mouth of the hallway, I could see that someone had removed the blanket we'd put over the window before and the window itself was slightly cracked open. My heart started to race and something inside me kept saying "turn around and leave" but I couldn't. Instead, I headed directly toward the bedroom.
The smell in the room was thick, but the cracked window ventilated it enough to make it breathable. The floor had an entire layer of goop, which I barely noticed until it was too late and I had already stepped in it. Overwhelming nausea and dizziness sucker-punched me, tried to take me down. Instead, I steadied myself against the door frame and fought for consciousness.
Through vision that came and went, I saw that something was wrapped up on the bed in the shredded remains of my missing bedclothes. Ignoring my wobbly knees and the disgusting muck that now covered my feet, I moved into the room and toward the bed. A tiny, bloody face poked out from the center of the bundle. The little baby girl slept deep but I could tell she was breathing normally. I reached out for her before finally losing consciousness.
I woke up about three hours ago in the hospital. My brother had been fairly close behind me the entire time but wouldn't enter the room after observing how it had affected me. Instead, he called 911 and apparently had been on the phone with them the entire time. I hadn't noticed. Emergency services arrived and Tiffany's mother was later called. She was surprised; she hadn't seen her daughter since her ultrasound and assumed she was just fine at home. Tiffany had not gone to stay with her mother as she said she was going to.
The baby is healthy and although they're still waiting on DNA tests, they're fairly certain it is Tiffany's and that she was born within the past 24 hours. Investigators are almost entirely certain she wasn't born in the apartment either, and had likely been placed there by a separate party.
I'm running a dangerously high fever. Doctors are testing the saliva from the floor but, so far, I haven't heard anything new about it. I'll tell you; I feel like shit. That fucking smell is caught in my nose, my head feels like it's going to explode, and I've long since run out of stomach contents to vomit up. From here, I don't know where we go. The police have taken over and marked our entire floor a crime scene. Not that I could go home anyway. I've never been so sick in my life and they have no idea what's wrong with me. This feels like it's out of my hands, at least until I get better, but I don't know when that's going to happen.
I really hope that Tiffany is okay, but I don't feel optimistic.
Something keeps scaring my pregnant neighbor and I
REDDIT
Just to get the easy introductory stuff out of the way; I moved into my apartment four years ago, mostly due to an overcrowded upbringing that I just couldn't stand living in anymore. The building I moved into is fairly small, with only 12 units spread over three floors, two next to each other on the left and right of each floor. I remember how lucky I felt; the entire place is newly refinished, and I was given first pick of the entire building. I chose third floor, the left unit closest to the back. Almost the entire time I've lived here, no one else has claimed another unit on this floor. I suppose the others chose lower-down apartments to avoid a regular two-flight ascent. Since there is no reason for anyone to visit my floor if not visiting me, it's mostly quiet and completely deserted at all times. Nothing ever really happens here.
About a month ago, someone finally moved into the apartment directly across from me, on the right side of floor three. Admittedly, I found myself feeling a little worried at first. You grow up in a tiny three bedroom with six siblings, you learn to savor seclusion in an indescribable way. I hadn't even seen who it was yet, but I was already running over all the possibilities in my mind. It could be a couple, always fighting into the early hours of the morning. They could be some annoying musician, or maybe drunk college guys. I remembered my direct downstairs neighbor, an elderly woman named Gertrude that nearly always wore the same robe, kept her TV cranked nearly full-volume 24/7, and could absolutely talk your ear off for HOURS if you had the misfortune of crossing her path while trying to retrieve your mail. I hoped for anything but that.
I kept an eye out, but my mysterious new neighbor didn't leave their apartment for days and our floor stayed gratefully but still somewhat oddly quiet.
I didn't actually meet them until a few days later, when they came and knocked on MY door. I checked the peep hole and was surprised to see a short, beautifully smiling pregnant woman standing on my welcome mat. She held a foil-covered plate in her hands. I clicked the deadbolt to the unlocked position and swung the door open. The smell of cookies hit me like a school bus and I couldn't help but smile at the cute woman standing before me. She had curly dark hair tied in a neat ponytail atop her head and wore a flowered sundress that complemented her largely-protruding belly perfectly. She greeted me warmly, introduced herself as Tiffany, and handed over the plate of cookies. We talked for a few minutes before she headed back to her apartment.
Now I'm a pretty shy person, but I almost immediately liked her. Tiffany is sweet, somehow manages to look pretty every single day, and smells so strongly of cookies at all times that you can sense her coming just by the scent. Sure, I wasn't planning on becoming BFFs or anything. However, I always wave when I see her from afar around the lot, and we've chit-chatted many times while getting our mail.
I've never asked her much about her pregnancy. I don't know much of anything about it besides the fact that she's very far along, but I don't necessarily expect for someone who barely knows me to spill their life story anyway.
I savor my solitude, but deeply value the budding friendship.
Two nights ago, I was torn from sleep by the sound of someone rapidly banging on my apartment door. Rubbing my eyes, I continued to lay there in the dark for a moment before sluggishly rising out of bed. I wrapped myself up in a fairly small throw blanket that hung over the back of my desk chair. The knocking became more urgent and rapid, which finally fully snapped me out of my drowsy fog and I picked up the pace. Pulling the blanket tighter around my shoulders, I stood in my bedroom doorway, which is at the end of the hallway and faces directly at my front door, across the apartment. Hallway light shined inside from a tiny sliver underneath the door, only slightly dimmed by the clear shadows of small feet. By the time I'd reached my living room, the familiar smell of baked goods lingered in the air and I only really needed to glance out the peephole to confirm that it was, in fact, Tiffany.
I unlocked and opened the door to find that, yes, my tiny neighbor had been knocking on my door. However, I didn't expect that she would be crying. She wore a long pink maternity nightgown and had her arms wrapped tightly around her chest. She didn't raise her gaze to meet mine and, instead, stared intently and directly in front of her. Tears streamed down her cheeks but barely broke her gaze.
Her voice quavered, but she adamantly asked if she could come in. I quickly moved out of the way to gesture that she was welcome to enter and she moved past me as fast as her body could take her. Shutting the door and locking both locks, I turned to hopefully comfort my frightened neighbor. She was crying into her hands, facing away. Not actually really knowing what to say, I asked what had her so upset. Tiffany didn't immediately respond and instead, tried to compose herself. Even still, I could barely understand her through her tears and had to gently ask her to clarify, which only frustrated her. "Someone tried to get into my apartment, damn it!"
I immediately found myself feeling puzzled. Why did she leave her apartment if someone was outside, trying to enter? Why didn't she call the cops? Still, in that state, I didn't feel comfortable barraging her with a dozen questions. Instead, I asked if she wanted me to call the cops. It was possible that she might not have a working phone, and that could explain why she came here. She shook her head. "I just... don't think this is a situation they can help."
I honestly didn't know what to think. I mean, I barely know this woman. Still, good conscience wouldn't allow me to send a clearly very frightened pregnant woman away. So, I told her to tell me everything. We could always go to the police after, and even promised to back her story up. She sighed.
"I don't sleep much, with all the kicking these days" She gestured to her swollen belly. "It's not that big a deal, I'm gonna miss out on tons of sleep once she's born anyway. Still... I get pretty paranoid fairly easily, so hearing a knock on my door so late pretty much immediately set my anxiety on high." She paused, shuffling her footing. Damn, I cursed myself for not automatically offering her a seat. I couldn't imagine how uncomfortable she must have been, so I asked her if she would be more relaxed sitting down on the couch. She gladly obliged, still going on with her story as she moved across the room. I sat next to her. "I wasn't even going to check it. Hell, there's no reason for anyone to be visiting anyone this late. Still, the knocking kept on. I started to tip-toe towards the door and nearly got to the peep-hole when the knocking just right-out stopped. I gave it a second before I looked out and saw someone wearing a hoodie, already standing at your door. I guess I thought you had a late visitor, and they'd confused my door with yours by mistake, so I left it alone."
I thought for a moment; sure, maaaybe one of my brothers might have tried to stop by, but that late at night? It didn't feel likely. I wanted to say that, but she clearly wasn't done.
"I kind of put it out of my mind and headed toward my bedroom, hoping sleep would finally come along for me." She then gestured to my hallway. "Your apartment is identical to mine. Bedroom at the end of the hall?" I nodded and she continued. "Just like mine. I can see all the way from the mouth of the hallway into the bedroom. There's that window right there on that back wall." Her voice started to shake. "It was like... perfectly dark enough inside. I don't think I would have seen anything if the lights had been on. Easily, I could've entered the room with the lights on, faced away from that window, clicked off my lamp, and gone to sleep believing that absolutely nothing was out of the ordinary.”
She stopped again, the trembling now spreading all over, Tiffany clearly trying desperately to find her next words and get them out clearly. "It.... I don't know who it was, but I think it was whoever knocked because they wore the same hoodie. I don't know how someone could have been standing out there.... it just simply isn't possible but they stood right there. The face was hidden by the hood but..... something wet hung out from it and pressed against the window. I think it was their tongue, but I couldn't be sure at that moment because it was absolutely far too huge to be... like... anyone's tongue. I saw their hands were on the window itself and I thought, for a second, that's how they were holding themselves up. It scares the shit out of me to think about but, in reality, it was desperately pushing the window against the lock."
She stopped one more time, now almost definitely about to break down in tears again. "I think it noticed me because it froze.... before pressing itself harder against the window, giving it a good lick in the process. That's when it finally became too much to handle and I started to feel overwhelmingly dizzy. I turned away and booked out of the apartment, slamming the door behind me. It's stupid... but even though I knew that once the door was shut, I wouldn't see it anymore...... I couldn't make myself look behind me until I got here."
I sat there next to her for a moment, trying to absorb everything I'd just heard. I felt horrible for her; it was shockingly clear that, at the very least, she 100% believed she saw someone outside of her window. The fear for her, regardless, was very real. At the worst, someone could be out to hurt her and her unborn child. It wouldn't have been hard to get up there with the right ladder.
If what she said was true, this person had also spent a short period at my door as well.
Tiffany cried quietly as we both spent a few moments otherwise saying nothing before I told her that she was more than welcome to stick around my apartment until morning. I didn't see myself falling back asleep and didn't necessarily want to be on my own after hearing all of that, either. We spent the rest of the night trying to stay off subject, talking about literally anything besides how afraid we were. She asked a lot of questions about me, although she didn't really want to talk about herself. I learned a few things, mostly that the baby's father was completely out of the picture, but nothing really important.
Only when the sun had long since risen did either of us feel comfortable enough to leave. I followed her to her apartment and we cautiously checked it over for intruders. Each room was safe and secure, all windows locked and no trace that anyone had entered the apartment. Her bedroom window, however, had several strange smudges on the outside. This confirmed that, at least to some extent, SOMEONE had been out there and I personally didn't see Tiffany somehow getting a ladder and climbing up to her own apartment, to smear mystery slime onto her own window.
We proceeded to cover the window with a rather large blanket before she felt confident enough to be by herself and assured me that her mother would be coming by to take her to a doctor's appointment in a few hours. Meanwhile, I wanted to check outside for any trace that someone had been out there. The base of both sides of the building were lined with various bushes, none of which had been visibly disturbed in any way. Additionally, there weren't any leg imprints in the dirt that would indicate the use of a ladder. Despite this, from the ground, I could still see the smudge on Tiffany's window from outside.
These findings were enough that I, myself, no longer felt comfortable being alone. I ran up to my apartment and quickly changed before locking up and driving over to my parents' gratefully crowded house, where I stayed late enough that my mother practically kicked me out.
I arrived home to find Tiffany outside of her apartment, though she didn't seem as nervous as when I'd left her. In fact, her overall presence lifted my own mood quite a bit. She explained that she was still pretty afraid to be in her apartment by herself, and wondered if we could just hang out for a few hours. I was glad for the company and we filed into my apartment.
Tiffany had print-outs of her ultrasound and she sat on the couch as she gladly gabbed on about her appointment, never really bringing up the events of the night before. This made it easy for it to slip my mind for a moment, too. I told her to pick a movie as I tossed a cheap frozen pizza into the oven. She awkwardly lowered herself to the floor, sat cross-legged in front of my bookshelf, and started browsing my blu-ray collection. I set the timer on my phone, headed back to the living room, and sat down on the couch. However, a light tap on my door brought me immediately back to my feet. I looked over at Tiffany, who had dropped a random movie case she had been reading. She froze, gaze locked down to the floor in front of her. Another set of knocks, much heavier this time. Still, we stayed unmoving in silence.
The door handle began to furiously jiggle and instead of moving towards the door, I moved towards Tiffany, who was now hugging her chest again.
It continued to rattle for a minute, the person on the other end actually pushing and pulling at the door, possibly hoping to wiggle the lock loose or break the doorknob itself.
Suddenly, it stopped. All noise and movement from outside the door ceased entirely. Still, we both stayed still and listened for the sound of footsteps retreating towards the stairs. When I never heard that sound, some overwhelming curiosity pushed me towards the door. As quietly as I could, I pressed my right eye up to the peep hole.
It took a moment for my vision to adjust, but even through the initial blur, I could see two dark and empty eye sockets peering directly at the door. They were elongated, stretched to the point of straining and cracking the sickeningly yellowed skin around them. Everything seemed slightly wider through the sight, but this was... inhuman. Something far too solid and detailed to be some trick of the eye. There wasn't a nose to speak of, and whatever had previous been there seemed almost like it had been brutally ripped off. At first, I thought to myself that the thing's jaw looked like it had been broken, and it was hanging slack. The longer I looked, however, it seemed more-so stretched into place, pulled far beyond it's limits, somewhere far past anything defined as broken. A long, blackened tongue seemed to be the only thing unfrozen about it's face as it lazily moved from one side of the jaw to the other, never quite finding a comfortable place to rest. Saliva dribbled down the cracked, horribly mangled chin.
I wanted so badly to back away. I wanted to take my eye off of it, to forget I ever saw anything like it, but I stayed frozen there until I heard Tiffany's voice from behind me, asking what was out there. It had definitely heard, as it turned it's hollowed-out gaze directly at the eye of the peep hole.
It leaned closer,
and licked it.
Nausea and dizziness overwhelmed me. Everything went black for a moment and I was suddenly on the floor, Tiffany kneeling beside me, more than nervously looking back and forth between me and the door. I blinked a few times, hoping it had been a mere hallucination but still knowing everything I had seem was far too real. After a moment, she helped me up and I looked out the peep hole again before anything could be said. The hallway was empty, but the peep was deeply smeared with black-tinted saliva.
I knew she didn't wanna hear it, but I told her everything I saw.
Again, we found ourselves waiting for anything to happen until morning, trying again to stay off the horrifying subject, this time to no avail. There was no avoiding it. Forty-billion questions rose from both of our throats like hot bile: What the fuck was that? Why is it bothering us? Were we the only people dealing with this? Where the hell do we go from here?
When the sun rose this morning, Tiffany called her mother, who picked her up immediately. Again, I immediately came here, to the safety of my family home. Mom could clearly tell how disturbed and frightened I was. I couldn't tell her everything, so I just told her that someone had been messing with people's doors at night. She tried her best to reassure me but without knowing the truth of the situation, it did little to help.
However, my younger brother overheard and at least somewhat saw that there was something more. He offered his laptop to me and started showing me a few sites, which eventually led me to just write everything out.
I really don't know where to go from here. I fear for myself but I fear even more for my neighbor and her unborn child. She said she was going to stay with her mother tonight, but with nowhere to sleep here, I know I have to go home later. I'm just praying to several gods I don't necessarily believe in that last night was the end.
The stalking started lightly enough. I noticed a customer in the shoe store I work in that did more wandering around the store than actually looking at the product. After a while, I finally confronted the guy. I almost immediately recognized him as a weird, kind of nerdy kid I'd had a few classes with in high school, but didn't say anything as I didn't have any real exchanges with him. I searched my brain for his name, and remembered that it was Kyle. His face brightened up at my approach and I assumed he was glad to have an employee offer help. I asked him if there was anything I could help him with. He continued to smile and almost seemed tong-tied. The exchange didn't become uncomfortable, however, until he answered my questions with "you're just always so beautiful" and reached to touch my hair. I flinched back, which didn't seem to deter him much as he continued to try to touch it.
Gratefully, a co-worker saw my clear discomfort and intervened. I was able to slip away, to the safety of the back room, but it didn't deter him from staying in the store long enough to cause security to escort him out. From there, it was every single day. He was at my work, wandering around, asking other employees if I was on schedule that day and if he could speak to me. He'd often refer to me as his girlfriend. He wrote notes, too, to be given to me. In them, he told me that his obsession ran back to high school, but didn't manifest until he'd come into my work at random and saw me for the first time in a few years. It changed everything about his life, and he said that he always imagined us together.
It only got worse when he was banned from the mall the store resided in all together. I hoped so deeply that this was enough to make him go away. However, when I returned to my car at close, I found roses and a photo of me, getting into my car the night before, with "see you at home" written in red Sharpie. I began to panic, frantically glancing around the parking lot, before realizing that the note likely meant that Kyle probably knew where I lived and could even be there already.
I finally called the police, too afraid to even go in the direction of home before being entirely sure it was safe. Sure enough, the dispatched officers found my lock picked. A trail of rose petals lead from the door into the bedroom. He had gone through my clothes, picked out a dress and set of lingerie, and laid them out on the bed. Additionally, there was a fabric baggie with a few small bones, some twigs, and a red feather tucked under my pillow. There was no note this time, but the message was clear enough for me.
Despite the obviousness of the situation, the police would not pull charges against Kyle. The absence of a hand-written note couldn't 100% connect his stalking to the break-in. Helplessness washed over me and I realized pretty quickly that I couldn't live alone anymore. I had an extra room and one of my co-worker's, Adrian, had recently been abandoned by a roommate. This was supposed to make me feel safe, and maybe even scare off my stalker, but it didn't deter him at all. He knew that breaking in was risky, but he'd still leave things in the mailbox, my car, buried in our yard, etc. Just anywhere he knew I'd find it, really. There were a lot more of those little fabric baggies with weird items inside. A friend once joked that it was witchcraft, but I didn't find it all that funny.
During this time, he drove past my house twenty to thirty times a day. This is not illegal, so the police did nothing, even when he clearly parked across the street and watched me from his car.
Obviously, Kyle misunderstood my roommate situation, became jealous, and began threatening Adrian. These were much darker and more violent. There was a point where Adrian's mother called him in tears. Someone had killed their outdoor cat and left it in a "unspeakable position" on the hood of her van. I was later sent photos of what barely resembled a cat, baking in the hot sun on the hood of a car. Black paint circled the gore and there were four weird, barely legible symbols painted in what I can only assume was cat blood.
Again, the police could not prove that this was Kyle, so they did nothing aside from advising that the car not be drove until a mechanic could confirm that it hadn't been tampered with. Adrian quit his job and moved in with his mother. I couldn't stand being alone, so I had no choice but to break my lease and move back home with my own parents. I haven't spoken to Adrian since and he began actively avoiding me. I didn't blame him. I was fucking terrified for myself and everyone around me.
Kyle already knew where my parents lived. The day after move-in, I woke up to more roses on my car hood and two large gift boxes stuffed in my back seat. I sighed. Checked the car for weird bags. Found one tucked under the hood and tossed it in the trash.
Soon, this became the routine. Throwing shit in the trash. Constantly checking over my shoulder. Anyone close to me became too threatened to stick around. My constant rejection only made Kyle's weird "gifts" more violent. Roses, chocolates, and presents became dead strays, animal blood smeared onto my car or the house, and threatening notes. In these notes, he continued to state that he was "giving me chances to come to him on my own" but was "losing his patience" and promised me that he had a "fool-proof way to make me his" but I wouldn't like it. "It'll be painful. Trust me. He'll make it hurt." He often referred to another man in these letters, but only when giving these ultimatums.
There were a few closer encounters. He'd wait until I was in a crowded public place, at least alone enough that he could get in close proximity without being recognized. Once I noticed him, he knew his time was limited and would speedily begin proclaiming his love for me and begging me to be with him (between insults and cursing, mind you) before running off to avoid being caught. By this time, the police had done absolutely nothing for me, but once hearing my story, most public places and shops were more than willing to give me any security camera footage that contained the exchange in hopes that I could use it for future charges.
By this time, Kyle had been stalking me for nearly a year. I spent every single day in fear, but I was starting to feel like I had everything I needed to finally get him. All it would really take was a definite step over the line of the law just once. However, just when it seemed like karma might finally bite him, everything stopped. No weird little baggies. No gifts or threatening letters. I didn't immediately feel hopeful; I didn't normally see him every single day before, he always at least took one day off, but after two weeks of absolutely nothing, I was ready to believe he might have given up.
This was not the case, and I was only informed of this fact by being knocked out from behind while trying to get into my car after work. I don't remember falling forward and striking my face on the top of the car door. I don't remember collapsing. I do remember, in a split moment, thinking to myself "I knew he didn't go anywhere."
I came to consciousness for a few moments in the trunk of my own car, but couldn't keep awake. I didn't snap out of it until hours later. My vision was blurry and dark, and I tried to move my arms and legs, only to find them bound with something plastic and far too tight, zip ties. They were pressing much too hard into my wrists and I stopped moving entirely to minimize the pain. Blinking a little more, my vision finally started to come back and I began taking in my surroundings. I was laying on my side on a metal-framed bed with white and pink floral sheets. The room was otherwise bare of furniture besides an old, shade-less lamp placed in the center of the floor. The windows were covered with black trash bags. I listened for movement outside of the room, but heard none. For what felt like hours, I laid there in silence, afraid to move and knowing that there was absolutely no way I could escape with my ankles bound.
Kyle finally entered the room, carrying a very full-looking backpack. "Oh good! You're awake. It's required that you're awake for this." My mouth wasn't covered but I didn't dare say anything. He saw the fear on my face but was unsympathetic. "Don't look at me like that. You should have listened. You brought this upon yourself." Kyle sat the backpack down on the floor and began unloading the items inside. He pulled out an empty mason jar, a large zip-lock of black powder of some sort, another zip-lock with... some kind of animal gore inside, four varying sized blades, and a tiny green book. I thought back to every creepy little fabric baggie, to every threatening and ritualistic usage of dead animals/blood, and suddenly wondered why I had barely thought of it, even deemed it as nothing more than "fear tactic."
He started pouring the black powder into a large circle, the lamp in the center, which he then proceeded to empty the gore next to. It smelled horribly of rot and copper, I had to fight my gag reflex. He then grabbed the smallest of the four knives and fear began to well up worse than ever before. I couldn't keep quiet anymore and started pleading for him to let me go. I cried, told him I swore I'd never tell anymore. He just chuckled. "Oh give it up. If you really meant that, you would have let me love you in the first place. You wouldn't have made it come to this." He said this while pointing the knife at me and I shut my mouth. Kyle then grabbed the jar, opened it, and sat down with it and the knife in the center of the room. He cut into the palm of his hand and began allowing the blood to flow into the jar.
He didn't need much before he was satisfied and began using the blood to create another very thin, concentric circle inside the black powder, right around the lamp and gore.
He dumped the rest onto the crude pile of animal gore. Then, Kyle reached his hand into the jar, wiped up the caked blood inside with his hand, and proceeded to smear it all over his face. With his other hand covered in blood, he approached me and covered my face as well. It had cooled and started to become sticky, and the overwhelming smell of it started to make me nauseous again. He turned away wordlessly and snatched the green book from the floor. He opened directly to a page he had bookmarked with a similar red feather to those I'd often find in his weird bags. Before reading, he turned to me and smiled.
"You're going to love this."
He looked back to the pages and began reading off the contents. It registered like complete gibberish at first before I realized that he was reading, or actually butchering reading off another language. I don't know if it was Latin or Italian or fucking Klingon. He stuttered over some words, mispronounced others several times over before either feeling content that he'd pronounced it correctly, or otherwise assuming it was "close enough" and moving on to the next word. If I hadn't been so frightened for my life, I would have found this grating and annoying.
Despite the lack of grace, whatever he was saying was doing /something/ for sure. I felt the bed start to shake under me. The bulb of the center of the lamp began flickering. From nowhere, a circling wind picked up within the room and I could smell something much more rotten above the blood on my face or the soaked animal remains in the center of the room. I could no longer hold my stomach and threw up bile onto the mattress under my head. Kyle didn't notice as he continued to stumble over words, speaking faster now and no longer stopping to correct his jumbled reading and mispronunciations.
It suddenly seemed like the room itself was occupied by a darkness. I felt like a billion eyes were on me, Kyle, and the whole room. He paused his chanting and began to laugh wildly. "Yes! Here he comes! He's really coming! He's finally going to make you love me! Rejoice! Hahaa!" He cheered for a moment before turning his attention back to the book and resuming.
The darkness started to take a centralized form, which was genuinely just a towering pillar of concentrated.... blackness. Somewhere from within, red light burned inside, which was the only thing that separated its shape from the rest of the enclosing darkness. Soon, the light of the lamp reflected off of nothing except the bed, myself, and Kyle, who looked at the being with excitement and wonder.
He spoke, but it sounded much quieter than before, the sound being almost eaten by the darkness around us. "I can't believe you're here! I can't believe you came to me!" No sound came from the pillar at first. It instead moved forward towards the pile of gore. The darkness of it's body moved over-top of the remains, and the red light glowed brighter from within for a moment. It moved backwards to it's previous position and the red light inside of it darkened a little after a moment. The gore had disappeared and every drop of blood was now cleaned from where it sat. Kyle saw the overwhelming silence as a chance to speak again.
"I beg that you consider my wish. I seek love, but she won't be with me." He gestured to me. "I don't need her soul as long as she can't fight my love. Please make it happen."
A high tone screamed from the pillar and pieced through my ears into my brain. Words, almost like my own organic thought, entered my brain. The voice was stern, deep, and emotionless.
Bumbling fool.
We are no slave of yours. Disrespect is not tolerated.
Kyle clearly received the words directed at him and fell to his knees. "No! It's not fair! I brought you here! I control you! You will listen to me!"
The responding tone was higher this time, but the voice penetrating my mind was still calm and unaffected.
You have shamed us enough.
Before Kyle could react, the pillar began to glow red through the blackness of its shape more now than ever before as it swiftly floated forward and over his entire being. The room fell completely still and no more noise came from the shape. Moments passed as it didn't move, but I started to notice that the darkness surrounding the room itself began to dissipate a bit. It was then that the darkness of the pillar's form turned red and mist-like. The air within the room itself became filled with the moisture before the figure started to dissolve, leaving no trace of Kyle.
The room was empty and quiet, as normal as it had been before, although a moisture still hung thick in the air. At this point, I couldn't have moved if I wanted to. Shock had overcome me and I was far too busy running through a billion questions inside of my head to even consider my originally underestimated predicament. However, not too long afterwards, I heard voices coming from somewhere outside of the house I was being kept in. I started screaming as loudly as I possibly could until I heard the crash of the door being broken down.
Obviously, due to a year's almost non-stop stalking, the police and my family had a pretty good idea of who to look into as soon as I didn't return home from work. Kyle's mother gave him away pretty quickly, telling the police that she'd kicked him out a few years before and he'd moved into a small house his grandparents had left him. She also said that he'd been doing "devil-worshiper shit" in their basement, being the main reason she decided to kick him out. She didn't initially say anything about these "interests" the few times police did take my stalking case seriously enough to question her. "Look, I was already known as the stalker kid's mom. I didn't need the extra label of crazy satanists added on." She added on "This IS a strongly Christian household."
I could even speak after being untied and removed from the room. I didn't start speaking until I was hooked up to sedatives at the hospital. Still, I was both horribly afraid of looking crazy myself, and also afraid of what might come after me if I told the truth. Instead, I decided to test the real story out on my mother in private, who believed me but begged me not to tell the police or doctors. "This is... beyond anything they can understand or help." So we ultimately fabricated a story that I woke up in the house alone just before the police arrived.
Since then, Kyle has been marked as Wanted and On The Run. It's been quite some time since and my life has actually gotten better. In fact, I've been extremely lucky, more-so than ever in my life. I finally was able to obtain a job in my ridiculously elusive field and left the mall shoe store behind me. I also met the love of my life, which was coincidentally my biggest crush from Jr. High, who moved away when we were kids but came back a few months after my abduction when her job surprised her with a promotion that moved her there.
Despite this, I still have nightmares. Not of Kyle; I know for a fact that he's never coming back. I just can't get the pillar out of my mind. I don't think it would ever come back for me. In fact, I felt like a bug on the cosmic scale in comparison to that... thing, but I can't shake the feeling that I saw something people aren't supposed to see and I fear the more I talk about it, the more I risk my own life and soul.
