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Dec 10, 2023

The tiny town of Merin Falls [Part 1]

(this is repost of my original reddit story so it's still structured for reddit. TW: mentions of blood, violence, gore, assault, and stalking. Nothing too graphic, but this is the set up for a horror story.)

Today had been a pretty slow day, so when I eventually found myself on Reddit, I whittled away my shift by reading through some of the posts in this particular sub. As I was on some post, about fifteen stories in, my coworker pointed out that some of the stuff we've seen would probably be interesting for some of you here. He suggested that I put a few of the more...bizarre? Creepy? I guess horrific? Stories about weird shit that happens in our small new England town.

So, as I'm sure you've heard before, I'll start by saying I live in a small town. It's settled in the northeast, a ways up from the Bridgewater triangle, and on the hill above a small bay. It's old, and has a history of witch trials and war battles. If you've ever seen a horror or Hallmark movie you've seen a town just like it. From calm summers to colorful falls, with old Victorian homes settled in old neighborhoods, complete with soccer moms and honor roll kids. This place is chock full of the American dream.

For context, we're small for this area. Like really small. One school, town square, a few neighborhoods, some mom and pop shops. We have a few docks down at the bay, but nothing bigger than a small motor boat. We do have one guy who lives on his boat, but it's a single room ship. Officially our population is about 1000-1500 on a good year. Unofficially, we stand about 2000 consistently. We'll talk about why at a different time, for now I just wanted to put it in your mind how small we're actually talking.

This place looks and operates like a normal New England town on the surface. Of course, I wouldn't be here if it actually did. There's a lot wrong with this tiny town of Merin Falls.

I spent a while today rolling around in my brain for what story really works for a start. See, we get a lot of weird, dangerous, unexplainable stuff out here. But starting off with true horror is a bit of a challenge. After six years, and for some other reasons, I’ve become a bit numb to some of what happens here. Not all, but some, and the ones that stick with me really aren’t something I want to dredge up just yet. But after some thought, I settled on one that I think will serve as a good look into what living here is like.

The day in question was a pretty typical day, maybe four or so years ago? I had gone into work, had a total of four customers. I remember because Iian still has a polaroid of each one tucked away and dated in his portfolio. This is one reason I started to hang around with him, his need to take way too many photos means I have easy access to memory triggers. But we’ll talk about that on a different day. For now all that matters is I had four customers. Holly Baker, came in the early hours right at open, she bought three binders, a sharpie, and a roll of yellow duct tape. I rang her up with no issue, my coworker Iian took her photo as she was checking out. She left and we were dead until around four o’clock. That was when Mrs. Miller came in with her rat dog and her spineless husband.

Mrs. Silvia Miller, is a rather irritating thorn in my side. From my first day working here she’s come in at least once a week in order to make snide comments about my appearance or moral choices, and make laughably bad attempts to return items she never purchased. She’s every retail worker's nightmare. (And no, unfortunately this is not the story about her being a horrible monster) Her antics have gotten so bad over the past six years that we have rules specifically for her. I’ll explain them in more detail in a later post, but she’s not allowed to shop when it’s just me on shift. We do not accept returns from her. Ever. And all of her receipts have a stamp that says “Non returnable. All sales are final.” These rules extend to her husband, a short stumpy man who looks like a frog next to his witch of a wife. As well as her kids, on the off chance they take the time to visit the old crone.

I remember this interaction clear as day, without the need for a trigger. Silvia had come in ranting and raising holy hell about some folders she had purchased from Arthur, on a day when I wasn't working. I listened to her diatribe as she gestured rapidly with her free hand, her faux pearl bracelet looking like it was going to snap off her knobby wrist. After five or so minutes I just stopped her, took her receipt, and pointed at the massive hot pink stamp that was glowing in the black light. With a look that I can only describe as, complete and utter entitled bitch bafflement, the look a Karen gets when the manager doesn't give them free stuff. She turned up her crooked hooked nose and snatched the receipt. Then she turned on her heels, a cheap pair from the thrift shop, of which she had painted the soles red with what I can only assume was cheap spray paint. Then with the fury of a western wind, headed for the door in a huff. Her shaking bug eyed rat and amphibious husband in tow. The former clutched in her cheaply manicured claws, and the latter being dragged by the scruff of his threadbare suit. The Millers are what you would call high class white trash.

The third customer was a guy I can't remember, but since Iian has a photo with the same date, I'm gonna assume he was there. From the photo, I can see he was an inch or so taller than me, gaunt face with some dark stubble, thin lanky limbs, and curly dark hair down to his shoulders. He was wearing some casual shorts and a tee shirt, and….round Ozzy Osbourne sunglasses indoors….for some reason. What strikes me as off on this one, is we have a lot of photos of him, but Iian doesn't remember ever taking them. And, for my weird memory issues, I can't bring up a single image of him in my mind if I'm not looking at a photo. It's like he just blinks from existence when we look away. There's a lot of photos of him actually….I wonder if he’s a regular? I’ll check the cameras for him at some point.

The last customer came in just before close. I call her Thelma, but I don’t actually know her name. She’s not local, but she is a regular. For whatever reason she drives out to this podunk to buy her music sheets from us. Thelma is always dressed in a similar outfit, just different colors and patterns. Always a top with 3/4 sleeves, a skirt that fits her closely but not tight that ends at the ankle in a ruffle. Sunglasses, sometimes she keeps them on. And her wiry gray hair is always up in some clip ponytail, updo thing. The top is always solid or stripes, and the skirt is always some kind of floral. Her shoes are either sandals, heels, flats, or sneakers. I wish I had more to say about her, but she never says much. Just comes in, wordlessly gets her blank sheets, checks out, pays cash, and bails. She did the same thing that day. Not a word more than needed, sunglasses on the whole time. Have I mentioned my store is lit up mostly by black lights? Yeah she makes no sense to me. But she doesn’t cause problems so I like her well enough. After Thelma left Iian and I cleaned up, locked up, and he headed home. We waved as I was taking my key from the door. We go in opposite directions, save for the off day when he walks my way with me so he can stay with Ryan for the night. That night was not one of those nights.

So there I was walking alone. It was a warm night and I was in a pretty good mood after everything that day. I’d made it a good six blocks when a car pulled up next to me. They rolled up real slow and kept pace with me. I didn’t give them any attention. Instead the hand on my opposite side was reaching for the knife I keep on my belt. I have a few on me at all times, I lived on the road for a while before I landed here. You figure out a lot about how to keep yourself safe in places like truck stops and roach motels. My knives won't save me from a bullet, learned that the hard way. But guns are rare in this area, instead kidnapping and other person on person crime is higher. But when they rolled their window down and I heard a whistle, my eyes just rolled.

Travis Heartly was the star of the football team back when he was in high school, now he was a community college drop out who could not understand the word no. Or fuck off. Or I will stab you and not feel bad in the slightest. He’d taken a liking to me just a few weeks after I had moved to Merin Falls. Unfortunately for him, I had sworn off guys. Not love, just guys. After getting abused three times in a row, I realized that me and guys romantically just don’t work. Travis didn’t get the memo apparently. He would come into my shop, near daily, and ask me out. Waste my time with his small town bragging. Act like a general Neanderthal. When Luther finally had enough and banned him from the store, he just started waiting outside for me to leave. Wait in my favorite coffee shop, bar, library, you name it he stalked it. His car was an old beat up sedan his mom gave him. He cleared out the back and put a bed in there. Needless to say that didn’t help his case when he busted into the shop excited to show me his new ride.

This car he was in however, was a rather nice Lexus. He was still beside me, calling out for my attention. I of course would not be giving him any. So he opted instead to move up the block and park right in the next street I needed to cross. Because of this move, the idiot gave me enough time to pull my larger blade from my boot. It's a good three inches longer than the belt knife, and an inch broader. See, my boots are clunky steel toed work boots. I don’t really need them, but old habits die hard, and hold big knives. I stopped a few yards away as he got out. We were close in age, though he had a good two years on me, but I had about six inches on him so I guess we're even. Still, after his flunk out, he’d taken up booze and dropped his work out. So his once toned body was slowly fading into the start of a beer belly and unkempt stubble.

He closed the door and leaned against the car,”Hey! How was work?”

“Leave me alone Travis.”

His expression dropped,”Come on, what did I do? Was it the roses? Look I just thought maybe-”

“Oi.” I cut him off, ”Shove it. I’m not interested. Now beat it.”

“Come on Am.” his voice was pitiful. He had his choice of girls when I moved here. He was pretty, young, fit, and locally famous. But when he clung to the freaky new girl, they all moved on after a year or so. A fair amount of his classmates were hooked up with someone new. Iian liked to gossip about his school a lot at work. In a small place like this most of the kids never really leave. But, his problems weren’t my issue.

“Move.” I ordered

He was looking at me like I’d just kicked a puppy.

“Fine.” I started to cross to the far side of the street. He panicked and ran toward me, closing the distance in a moment as he grabbed my upper arm. He'd learned not to try and grab my forearm. I always hold my knives down, with the bunt to my arm, blade out. In the event I need to block, or get grabbed from behind it's quicker to defend myself. Think Rambo or Hunter from the bad batch. Say whatever you want, but it's saved me more times than I want to admit.

“Wait!” he pleaded,”Please just one chance! I promise, I can-”

I ripped my arm away and rounded around with my free hand. The fist collided with his nose, I felt a crunch and heard a bone snap. Travis stumbled back and grabbed his now gushing nose. Tears welled and fell in rivulets as he looked at me in shock.

“I told you not to fucking touch me.” I spat and stepped back several feet. I kept my eyes locked on him and my guard up,”Try that shit again and I’ll do worse than break your nose. When a woman tells you no for two straight years, believe me she is not going to change her mind dumbass.”

He just looked at me, tears and blood running down his face. I’d always told him no. No maybes, no waffling. Always a direct no. And I’d put up with his stalking, but he’d never touched me before. This time he crossed a line he hadn’t realized was there. The look in his eyes was either rage, or passion. And I really didn’t want to know which. He’s the kind of guy who wants a woman to ruin his life. I guess he thought I would fit that bill.

He was right, but not in the way he wanted.

This standoff lasted for maybe a minute before headlights came slowly up behind us. Travis made the connection before I did. He saw the red and blues and bailed off into his Lexus. I watched him peel out from where he had been. I didn’t move until officer Lison parked and stepped out of his car. I lowered my knife and slid it into my boot as he walked over to me.

“Amber? Was that Travis I just saw?” he asked, he sipped on his coffee, getting a few drops caught in the edge of his salt and pepper mustache.

I turned and rubbed my hand, it was bruising from where I had punched him,”Yeah. He tried to grab me when I went to walk away this time.”

“Shit.” Lison chuffed with a bushy browed scowl,”What an ass.”

His reaction was so flippant, I just...I busted out laughing,”That’s all you got Boris?”

“What?” he asked confused,”He is. Plus he’s getting thrown in lock up tomorrow anyway.”

This made my laughter stop, it was my turn to be confused,”What did he do now?”

Another sip of his coffee,”Grand theft auto.” he shrugged,”Lexus was stolen from a lot east of town. That's why I stopped.”

“You’re kidding.” I asked slack jawed.

“Nope. I don’t think he even realized he was on camera.”

“So what? He just took it in hopes of a date night?”

“Looks like it if he was here for you. He’s a desperate man.” he shook his head,”Wanna lift home?”

I thought about it for a second,”Sure. Thanks Boris.”

We hopped in his cruiser, and made light conversation for a few blocks. Three blocks from my house though, a call came over the radio. Some mix of cop lingo and garbled static that I couldn't really understand. He did though, Boris looked concerned and stopped the car. He gave me a look I couldn’t really place,”Look, kiddo. I gotta respond on this one, but it’s back that way,” he gestured behind us,”It’s an all night type deal. Are you good for the last few blocks?”

I nodded,”Yeah, you go do what you gotta man. Thank you for the help, and the ride.”

“Any time Amber.” He nodded, his face looked a bit forlorn,”You should be safe from here, but be careful.”

“Always.” I smiled as I slid out of the cruiser, my boots hit the pavement and I walked behind the car to the sidewalk. Boris took off a moment later, back down the way we had come.

I should have asked how he knew Travis wasn’t around. I know now that's what he meant when he said I was safe. The look in his eyes should have clued me in, but I just figured it was part of whatever call he had gotten. I was right. Doesn’t make it easier for him though.

He’d get six calls of the same nature that night. And he wasn't the only one, a total of twenty eight similar calls came in one after another. None of them could be explained. He still blames himself for the two that survived, and the rest that didn't.

Boris Lison had lived in Merin Falls his entire fifty seven years of life. And he’d known Travis for all twenty one years of his. He’d been close with the football star's grand dad. But after his spiral, the officer just felt bad for the kid. That made it hard for poor Boris to pick him up off the pavement that night. The official story was that he crashed the Lexus into the retainer wall because of his erratic behavior. Some of the officers even insinuated that it was on purpose after my rejection and breaking his nose. That he had finally snapped and tried to end it all. Claiming mental illness was easier than trying to explain the gaping hole in his chest. Or how he had been dragged out of the car through the back windscreen. How he ended up a good half mile from the car. Or why he was frozen almost cryogenically with his heart yanked halfway out of his ribcage by the time Boris had found him. How he survived for the following week is beyond all of us. Not that he was any help in explaining anything. By the time I was ready to leave the hospital myself the following week, Travis tried to use his bed sheets and window for his own way out. I can’t say I blame him. I probably would have done the same after what happened. He spent the next two years in the Merin Falls psych ward. His time there was a horror show of its own.

What happened that night scarred a lot of people in this town. Unfortunately, myself included, both physically and mentally.

Boris had just gotten out of sight and I started making my way down the block. My body was still on high alert from my encounter with Travis. Every noise, flash of headlights, each passing car made me freeze. I'm not a skittish person. Anxious sure, but it's a quiet anxious. Not jumpy. Something in the air had me on edge. It felt like each step dragged me through a slurry of static and shaved ice.

My feet trudged onward. Alarm bells flagged in my brain, each thud of my heart sent a scream from the back of my mind. They all called me to turn and run. But….I didn't.

I should have.

The further I went the worse the feeling of unease got. Then, after a block, I saw something. A dark figure crossed the street ahead of me. I watched as it moved from my side to the other, then back again. Stopping in my tracks, my brow furrowed. It was like looking at something dipped in Vantaa black. My brain wanted to warp around it, like it was a void between two images that should be touching but weren't.

The way it moved, it wasn't….it wasn't right. Like a shadow blinking in and out of existing, but never moving all at the same time. I was frozen the moment my eyes caught it. My skin prickled as ice slinked in a slurry through my veins. I could feel the sludge crawling up the back of my neck as the thing turned to me. Whatever this was, I wasn't supposed to have seen it.

Thoughts raced in my mind, 'I've dealt with weird shadows before, if I tell it to leave it should right?'

'No wait, why isn't my mouth moving?'

'Hold on why can't I mo- wait is it getting closer!?'

A scream was lost in the void of my throat as I realized that the creature was moving in static flashes toward me, or was it? It was close, then it was miles away, a few yards, miles and miles, feet, then inches.

‘Shit!’

Freezing blood pounded in my ears as this...this thing...I couldn’t form a real thought as it neared me. What should have been it's face, instead just a chasm of inky blackness, was inches from mine. If it had eyes I couldn't see them. But I could feel them. It felt like a numbness trailing over me as it tried to understand what I was. Panic clutched my chest as the numb feeling hovered over my heart. The ice in my veins rushed to the center of where it was staring. A choked groan seeped from my throat as I felt the muscle in my chest freeze to a halt.

'How am I even still breathing?'

'Wait...am I?'

I couldn’t tell anymore.

It’s arm moved as it flashed back several feet again. Looking at this thing hurt. Like I was watching a game character glitch in and out as it tried to move. Just rapid, glitchy, morphing, shapes of shadow. It looked humanoid, but entirely not at the same time. Raising its arm I felt cold static touch the skin over my heart. My top was probably fucked, but I quickly didn’t care as I felt it slowly pushing it's claws into my flesh. I couldn’t scream. Gods I wanted to. I wanted to cry out in pain and terror. This creature was ripping my chest open. Claws in the shape of a perforated circle were digging, boring their way to my heart. Determined to remove the icy lump of muscle and sinew from where it was caged in bone.

Silent tears rolled down my cheeks, so hot they burned like flames as they fell. As they left blazing trails, it occurred to me as the heat faded, I couldn’t feel anything but the pain in my chest anymore. A sickening ‘*CRACK’* sent a new wave through my body. White spots floated and flitted around the edge of my eyes. Like sick fairies drawn to the scent of blood. This thing was taking it's time.

It enjoyed watching me suffer. Frozen in fear and pain.

The next thought that crossed my mind was so horribly clear,’I’m going to die here.’ I wish I could say I had some awakening and I snapped out of it. Or that in that moment my life flashed before my eyes and I saw the error of some choice in my life. But no. In that moment, alone with that thing, it’s claws reaching for my frozen heart, I just wished for one more moment. The image that did come to my mind just as the white began to take my sight wasn’t something deep, or wise, or heroic. It was a smile. A smile I knew would never look the same if I died. From that day on it would be tinged with sadness. Of not knowing what happened. Maybe she would think I just left. I prayed, for the first time in so many years, a silent thought,’Please, let her hate me. Don’t let her linger. Don’t let her search. Forget me and be happy.’ And that was it.

Everything went white.

I woke up two days later in a hospital bed. The nurse beside me was changing an IV bag. His eyes caught mine as they fluttered open, with a professional manner he told me I was in the hospital and to not move. After calling the doctor and running a few tests. Things like asking me for information, grip strength tests, stuff like that. They told me what happened. Just as I passed out, before I was gored by a shadow thing, Ryan had found me. He said I was just collapsed on the sidewalk cold, with a ring of stab wounds on my chest. He called 911 and they rushed me to the hospital. I had a few cracked ribs, and they said it was nearly impossible that all of the stabs had missed major arteries. But it wasn’t. That thing wanted me alive to the last second. Ryan found me two hours after I left the shop.

It had frozen me there for two hours.

I was in the hospital for recovery for a few days. Iian and Ryan checked in on me every day. Arthur and Luther came by a few times too. They even paid for my bills. I really love them so much. I don’t know where I’d be without them all. Once I was released, Iian stayed with me till he believed I wouldn’t keel over. Within two months I was healed up, a perfect ring of five exactly matching scars, centered right over my heart. As soon as the doc cleared me, which took a bit, she’s a thorough woman. I was in the tattoo parlor the next day getting a new piece to accent my new scars. That thing tried to kill me. But, I’m no coward. I was scared shitless, I’d only felt fear like that once before that day. Despite that, I lived. Somehow. So I’m owning it. Just like the one on my back. My shoulder. The bullet scar in my thigh. And the bands around my wrists.

Each scar is a memory. Each tattoo, a way to take back control in a small way. Every horror story leaves a scar of some kind. Mine were physical this time. Next time maybe we’ll look into the ones on my mind. But for now Iian is bugging me to check in, I didn't realize how long I've been typing. I’m Amber Haze, and I’ll be back soon with more from the tiny town of Merin Falls.

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