Hi, before I start this, I want you to know that I believe in paranormal experiences but also I am pretty skeptical of these things. Also, I want to add that I’m an avid hiker and tend to do hikes by myself and have done this specific trail 2 times before. I pride myself on knowing everything that is around me at all times.

I would like to add I had a 3 gallon water pack with me and had already eaten lunch for the day. I am not anemic or have any problems with low blood sugar. And I was not dehydrated. I do not suffer from panic attacks or any other mental disabilities except for ADHD. 

Today I thought that I would go for an easy but long hike (12 miles to be exact). I had the day off from work and wanted to really enjoy it. I went to Jennings State Forest in North Florida, the Pioneer Trail to be exact. the first hour and a half was really calm. Not a lot of people out only passed maybe one person on the trail. 

I then got to the river that the trail goes alongside and chilled out there for a while. Everything was really normal. Birds were out and frogs were croaking as normal. 

 I then went up the little foothill (approximately 5 miles into the trail) and then all of a sudden I hear what sounds like tongue clicking all around me and the feeling of being extremely watched. Plus no more noise from the animals and the forest got really dense and dark. I did my absolute best to scan the area around me. No animals were visible or people.

I really tried to brush it off as the clicking had stopped. To add I do keep a firearm with me on my hikes as i am trained to carry. I figured if anything it was in my head and I was fine. So I kept pushing on because I really wanted to get the most out of this hike. About five minutes later, I found myself extremely disoriented, which is more than very unusual for me. 

in detail, I felt extremely clammy in the hands and all over. I couldn’t see anything in front of me. I was so disoriented. I grabbed my gun with my left hand (I’m a right handed person). I was very close to just ringing out a shot because I thought that this is my last moment here. The only way I can describe it was I felt like I was on the brink of falling into a dream or maybe a different reality. 

The path was extremely easy to see yet, I had no idea where I was and still felt extremely watched. I had to sit down or else I would’ve fallen over. I felt as though i had been drugged (which was not the case).

Then all of a sudden the clicking started again, and I became even more disoriented, couldn’t catch my breath, worse than any disassociation possible. I’ve never felt like my life was in more of a threat. I felt as though I had crossed over into a different place. Everything became blurred. The trees around me were no longer visible. All I could do is feel that I was holding my gun. 

The next moment I knew I had to leave. I had to get out of there. Completely disoriented I started running right back down the trail into what I thought was the right way. Since the beginning of my disorientation, I hadn’t moved off trail, so I had a pretty good idea of how far I had to turn to run back trail. 

I started running falling, tripping. Until I could tell, I got down the mountain. As I got down the mountain, I came back to my senses. I kinda looked at where I had come from and then I sprinted for another 10 minutes. I tried to call anybody I knew, but my cell had no reception. 

Finally, my phone connected, and I got in touch with a family member who I recounted the whole thing to. I was out of breath and in a complete state of shock. I spent so much time in the woods and I’ve never had anything like this happen to me. Never have I felt like my life was in such danger, my whole life flash before my eyes.

 I can’t seem to explain what sounded like (human) tongue clicking all around me. It felt almost hallucinating.  I walked it off, and once I finally got out of the woods I still felt loopy and disoriented. 

Any ideas? I have heard of missing 411 in the past and people said it may line up with that. Let me know if you need any more details or if you’re interested.  Thank you and sorry for the spelling. 

I never thought I’d be glad to leave her behind.

That’s what I told myself when I left the cabin. I told myself I needed to escape. I was suffocating in that house—the dust, the silence, the shadow of the plantation hanging over everything. My grandmother, who raised me with such fierce love, could never understand why I needed to go. But she always told me to follow my path, even if it meant leaving her behind. "You have to go, Reed. You’ve got a future," she would say, every time I thought about staying.

I thought I could handle it. Thought I could make a new life for myself at college. I thought the distance would help me forget the weight of that cabin, the way the past seemed to linger there, never quite gone.

But now, sitting on this train, the envelope in my hands, it feels like I’ve never left at all.

She’s gone.

The lawyer, or whatever he was—he came to me in the city a week ago. A cold man, with his gray suit and his dull, monotone voice. He said my grandmother had passed. That she’d left everything to me. Everything.

The plantation, the house, the acres of land she kept alive with memories and little else. All of it was mine now.

There was a part of me that wanted to tell him no, that I wanted nothing to do with it. But I couldn’t. Because I knew what she wanted. She always wanted me to take care of it, to keep the legacy alive, even if it was a broken thing. The sugar mill had been dead for years. The fields were overgrown, the house was falling apart. But it was still ours.

And now it was mine.

The train rattles on, and I open the leather-bound ledger the attorney handed me. It smells like dust and old paper, the kind of smell I remember from when I was a kid and would sit in her lap, listening to her stories. Her handwriting is neat, delicate in a way that doesn’t match the strength I remember in her voice. She used to talk about the plantation, about the history buried in the land, like it was some living thing. She never talked about leaving it behind, never spoke of selling it. It was always ours, no matter how run-down it became.

I flip through the pages. Her notes. Her calculations.

And then, there it is.

“The chest is buried under the old oak. Eighty-eight silver coins. If the time comes, it will be yours to find.”

I read the words over and over, trying to make sense of them. My heart starts to race, and I feel the tightness in my chest, the one I’ve carried with me since I left that place behind. A treasure? Buried on the property? I never knew. I don’t know why she never mentioned it, but maybe that was her way of testing me. Maybe she knew that someday, I’d need a reason to go back.

Eighty-eight silver coins. I can’t even imagine how much they could be worth. If I found them, I could sell the plantation. The whole thing. I could finally escape, pay off my student loans, maybe even move far away, away from the house, away from the ghosts that linger in the corners of my mind.

But it’s wrong, isn’t it? My grandmother, the woman who raised me, who taught me everything about loyalty and family, wouldn’t have wanted me to think like this. She would’ve wanted me to take care of it, to restore it to what it once was. She never gave up on the land, even when it seemed impossible. She poured everything into it.

I let the ledger fall open to the next page, my fingers trembling.

“I’ve kept the farm alive with hope, Reed. But it’s time for you to decide what you want. Don’t carry the weight of this place on your shoulders forever.”

Her words. But it’s not enough. I can’t help but feel like I’m failing her by thinking about selling it. By thinking about walking away from the one thing that kept her alive for so many years.

But I know, deep down, that I’m going to do it. I’m going to find those coins. I’m going to sell the plantation. I’ll bury the past for good.

And still, I can’t shake the nagging feeling that maybe, just maybe, my grandmother knew all along that I’d be the one to end it. The one to let it go.

The train clatters along the tracks, and the sky outside turns pale, as if it understands my dilemma. I stare out the window, fighting the guilt creeping up on me. It’s wrong, but I have to do it. I have to. I can’t live like this anymore.

I can’t live with her ghosts.

When I arrive in Marrow's Hall it hasn't changed. The town looks and smells exactly as it did when I left. The sun hides behind a haze of sickly yellow clouds and the cicadas sing in the stale wet heat. I feel suffocated and watched.

There's no reason to linger in town. After the train leaves, I walk across the tracks towards the old road that leads to the plantation. The road is overgrown, unpaved and with a strip of grass running down its middle, as wagon ruts became tire tracks, and eventually it was all just a path.

I brought my backpack with me, because I expect to make this quick. I'll visit the plantation, unlock our cabin and pack her things. I know a grocery delivery found her, and she was on the front porch. They say she was sitting in her chair, there, just staring.

Somehow, I still expected her to be there. I wasn't mourning her yet, I hadn't really realized what it meant that she was gone.

When I got there, a strangeness was waiting for me.

It was early evening and there were no lights on in the cabin. It suddenly hit me that I was alone without her. I'd never see her again.

Somehow the pain of losing her had waited. I sank to my knees and started to cry.

When I unlocked the door and went in, I realized the task before me was far greater than I had allowed myself to realize. Packing all her things, selling the plantation, digging up a treasure - it wasn't going to be a quick visit and it wasn't going to be easy.

I make some tea, feeling how she must have felt, like the ghosts are all I have left.

"Your great-great-great-grandfather was a slave. When he was freed, he built this place. This plantation is our family's legacy." my grandmother had told me.

There's this fear in me, of knowing too much about the past. She knew, and it haunted her.

The first night at home is always the worst. That's how it should be, anyway.

Perhaps the past should just stay buried, perhaps it has no place in our lives. I could hear how the past walked around, searching for itself. It was out there, in the night.

I listen, and it stops and knows I listen. I look, peering into the creaking darkness, and it is looking back at me. I can feel it, angry with me, judging me.

My nightmares are a cold sweat, and when I wake up it is still dark, still night. Shouldn't it be morning?

I light a candle, humming to myself to try and alleviate the vague sense of dread.

Why is the front door open? It is so dark, and I feel a chill, I look and see that someone is there. Someone is standing in the cabin, just a dark figure, hunched and menacing, holding a pearl-handled cane.

Who is there? I want to say the words, I want to ask them who they are. I want to speak, but there is a fear growing inside me. It starts out like a dream, as though nothing is happening at all, and then the fear rises, growing ever more solid and threatening.

I am gripped in silent terror, my trembling hand holding the only light, the flickering candle. I see that it isn't a someone at all, it is a something. Something from the bayou, something dripping and moving towards me. Why is it here?

My eyes shut and open, and it is closer, slowly closer, and I am trapped, cornered in my bed. It has eyes, pure white glowing orbs beneath a black veil. It is staring at me, approaching me, and it uses the cane, coming ever nearer.

If I didn't wake up, it would have stood over me where I slept, its silent form and that cane. I sensed it was a weapon, and it would break every bone in my body if it got close enough. Panic floods me and I drop the candle, turning to run for the window in the back.

Now it makes a sound, like a kind of sigh, a kind of moan. It makes a sound that is almost like a voice, almost like a wind. It is a gasp, a frustrated empty noise. Like air being sucked into the void of a coffin. This thing, it is from a grave, as I open the window, the smell betrays this fact. Something unliving, that walks again.

When I am outside, I turn and look, my panic subsiding after I escape. I cannot believe what I've met. I see it is like a woman, staring at me from the window. She is vengeful and awake, staring pitilessly at me.

"I'm out, I'm gone." I say to her. I take off running towards the road.

Something catches my foot and I am falling. I don't hit the ground, I am falling for too long.

When I open my eyes, I am in a ditch. I've hit my head on a pile of branches. I feel a kind of numbness in my cheek, and an ache that feels like it stopped bleeding hours ago. I pull a piece of wood out of my face, with relief and agony intermingled. I discard the bloody splinter and climb out of the ditch, my clothes torn and muddy.

The sun has risen, and I think I'm safe now. I see her there, in the daylight, a dark figure, searching along the road, her back to me. I leave the ditch and return to the cabin, locking the door, shutting the window. I see her out there. She knows where I am now, she saw me.

I have to get out of here. I know she'll kill me, beat me to death with her cane. Whatever she is, she moves slowly, but relentlessly. I am worried the lock on the door won't stop her. No, that or I am trapped inside with her out there.

The ledger is my only friend. There are photographs in there of my ancestors. On instinct I search among them for an answer, and I am rewarded with one. Sometimes it is better not to know.

"What are you?" I stare at the photo. She looks blind, but she can still see me anyway. I have made her angry. I go to my grandmother's desk and begin searching among her papers for any clue. It is all I can do.

That thing is out there, and she is circling the cabin. Could I outrun her? Somehow, I don't think it is possible. Wherever I go, the window, the door. She is always on the other side. Sometimes she moves so slowly, of course I could outrun her. Then she just appears in front of me. No, there is no escape if I make a break for it.

With the door locked she doesn't seem to be able to come inside.

My research finds me in the pages of an old diary. I find out who Sugar Cane was, her strange name, her cane and her blindness. Except she could see things in people.

"One hundred silver dollars for the land and house." I read. Dollars?

I read how my family had cheated her. She was allowed to live in the very cabin I was hiding in, while we kept the house and the sugar mill and the land. The money, or most of it, was still buried somewhere.

"Let me make it right." I said through the door. I felt her rage, awakened somehow by my own greed to sell the place and take the money. "I'll leave it all to you. I'll just go back to school. Just let me bury my grandmother."

I opened the door slowly, flinching, worried she would end me anyway. One blow from her cane and my bones would shatter, like in my nightmares. I watched her go, she sat beneath the old tree between the cabin and the dilapidated house I was never allowed to play in as a child.

I stared, my eyes fixed on her, but it was as though she were part of the ground, the tree, blending in with the darkness of the shade. Then, I couldn't see her. I was still looking where she had gone, but it was like she was always there, just part of the place.

I took my backpack with me, leaving everything as it was. My grandmother was to be buried in the cemetery in Marrow's Hall. I left the plantation behind, never to look back. I'll pay my debts on my own, make my own way in this world.

The ghosts can keep what belongs to them.

When I put my grandmother to rest, I tell her I have made things right. And that is how it will remain.

My housekeeper is the swarm.

About 3 weeks ago, we decided to hire a housekeeper. My husband and I, both in our mid-forties, just purchased and renovated our dream home. My husband, Calvin, is an investment banker, and makes a sizable salary, so I was able to retire early around a year ago. That being said, the new house is bigger than I am used to cleaning, and the upkeep was too much for me to handle alone. After a nasty fall from a ladder while trying to dust the banister, my husband suggested we hire a professional to pick up any slack. As he said, what good is retirement if we can’t enjoy it? We have the ability to hire someone to help us, so why not do it. With a broken wrist and a new fear of heights, I agreed.

The housekeeper we hired came to us through a friend of a friend of Calvin’s from the office. There was no interview, she just showed up at the specified date and time and got started. Her name is Denise. She is an older woman, maybe in her sixties, put together, and very punctual. She shows up at exactly 4 pm every Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday. She is quiet. Very, very quiet, and never looks you directly in the eye. It’s gotten to the point that making casual polite conversation with her is impossible. She just sort of smiles at you, but it doesn’t meet her eyes. Frankly, she unsettled me all along, but I told myself I was just weary about letting someone I didn’t know very well into my home by myself, feeling restless sitting on my butt while someone else cleaned my house, etc.

I didn’t grow up in a position where having a housekeeper would even be an option, I was taught that cleaning, fixing and keeping your house was your job and yours alone. That extended beyond housekeepers to repairmen, contractors, plumbers, and anyone else you’d have to pay to do a skill you could learn to do well enough yourself. My husband is from a completely different background , and grew up surrounded by personal chefs, nannies, house keepers, and pool-boys. I figured that this dysphoric feeling must be rooted in an inferiority complex. She was just a diminutive elderly lady who didn’t like to chat at work, why was I so worked up?

Well, I got my answer.

Denise was wiping down the dining room table when I entered the room. She was moving so awkwardly she almost looked like a marionette. I was about to ask her if she wanted anything to drink when I heard the buzzing. It was faint, like when there’s a mosquito in your room but it’s far enough away that you can’t see it. Just a discreet humming. I zoned out for a second, puzzled, trying to identify the sound. I looked around to see if there was a bug flying around, and when I looked back at her, she had stopped wiping. She was staring straight at me. She stared at me for more than a minute. It felt like hours, and she never blinked. Not once.

The longer we stared at each other, the more I noticed the uncanny features of her face. I guess I had never really looked at her before, studied her eyes, her nose, her mouth. Her lips were thin, bloodless, and wrinkled in a way that didn’t fit her age. Her nose was flattened into her face, like the sinuses had simply collapsed, or the cartilage had just rotted away beneath the flesh. Her skin sagged in ways that I couldn’t attribute to any emotional wear. She wasn’t particularly thin, or heavy, so the amount of loose skin that weathered her features didn’t make any sense. She looked like a piece of poorly cured leather draped over a vaguely human frame.

Before I could stop myself I gasped and staggered back into the doorway. Her face tracked me, but her eyes didn’t move in their sockets. I gave her an uneasy smile and backed out of the room. I could see her face following my movement all the way out of her line of sight.

I brought it up to my husband that night as we ate dinner, but he just looked at me in a way he has never looked at me before. Like I was crazy. I stuffed my fear back down with the rest of my pot roast and told him to forget it. I could tell by the wrinkle between his brows he didn’t. I sat on this horrible feeling in my gut until Thursday, when she came back.

Thursday was a horrible, stifling day. I avoided her like the plague, which had never seemed difficult before, but now was a Herculean challenge. Every room I walked into, she was there. Every corner I turned, she was waiting. Every door I opened, she stood perfectly still on the other side. I eventually moved outside to the garden with a book, content to spend the next few hours on a lawn chair and not inside with Denise. I was beginning to settle in when the hair on the back of my neck stood up. I whipped my head around and saw her there, wiping down the sliding glass door on the back of the house. Her neck was extended out from her body like a grotesque, fleshy snapping turtle, bloated and shiny. Her skin was pulled taunt now, the wrinkles smoothed by the tension of this unnatural extension. I fell out of my chair, scooting backwards on the grass as far away from this thing as I could. Her eyes were like pool balls, big, bulging, and soulless. They stared at nothing, yet right at me all at once. Her neck slowly retracted back into her torso, her skin creased once more, and she shuffled uncoordinatedly away from the window, back into the shadows of the house.

I stayed out there until the sun had long since set and my husband came home. I tried to explain what I saw, but he just shook his head at me in disbelief. He slept on the couch that night. I don’t think I can make him believe me.

She came back on Sunday.

I resolved to just ignore her. I fought with Calvin intermittently on Friday and Saturday, begging him to fire her, but with what cause? Her work was good, better than good. The house was spotless. She hadn’t said anything nasty, hadn’t stolen anything, wasn’t rude, violent, or neglectful of her job. How could we fire a sweet old lady? When I tried to explain she was anything but, he just scoffed, said he was going for a run, to check some emails, or to the grocery store, and dismissed me out of hand.

Sunday was hell. I sat in my bedroom, cross legged on my bed, and watched the clock. She would be gone in four hours. For four hours I just had to pretend there wasn’t an ungodly abomination wandering around my home, free to enter any room.

We made it to hour three before she came into my room. She shuffled into my room with a polite little knock on my door. She had a basket of laundry in her wizened, lumpy hands, and set the basket down on the edge of my bed with a small, slow nod in my direction. She began putting away the folded clothes, the normalcy of the situation throwing me for a loop. Had I really imagined it all? I knew in my gut I couldn’t have, but I also knew I was staring at the wispy gray hair and stooped frame of a regular old woman, putting away my clothes in their designated drawers with practiced, slightly trembling hands.

I sighed to myself, tamping down the fear working its way through my gut, and got out of bed. I began to help her, offering her a small smile, like a peace offering. I was sure she was just as upset by my behavior as Calvin must’ve been, worse even. This poor lady had just been doing the job she was hired and paid for, and here I was, hiding from her like a petulant child.

Just as these feelings began to override the panic that had been freely flowing through my brain for the last week, I heard the buzzing. Loud, close, and suffocating. In my periphery I could see her, mouth hanging open so wide I could see she had no teeth. No gums, no tongue, no discernible throat. Just a vast, open pit, amplifying the fluttering of hundreds of tiny wings. A large botfly crawled from the horrible expanse, slowly working its way across her lips in tiny bursts of movement. I didn’t feel the tears on my cheeks until then. I had begun to silently cry. More flies began to emerge from her, as if drawn out by my salty tears. A few flew free from her nostrils, and one crawled lazily across her unmoving eye before burrowing back under the drooping lid.

I think I passed out after that, and my head hit the side of the nightstand. I have a concussion and a large contusion on my temple. My husband came home and found me unconscious, bleeding profusely, but breathing. I guess the staff at the local ER told him I had low iron, and that had probably caused the fainting. He’s been very attentive, but whenever I try and bring up the thing he calls Denise, he shuts me down. I think he’s trying to sweep all of this under the rug as anemia, stress, and some spell of delirium. Maybe he already knows the horrible truth. I feel like I don’t even know him anymore. I’ve been on bed rest for the past day, and will be for at least another couple of days. I’m supposed to be taking it easy so I don’t pass out again. Standing or doing anything even lightly active could drop my blood pressure and trigger another fainting episode.

I’ve made peace with all of this, I think. I just wanted to write this and put it out there with the hope that somebody might believe me. I don’t know what’s going to happen next. The swarm has infested my home. Tomorrow is Tuesday.

“Good morning, friends! Lets rise and shine. It’s time for morning medicine and breakfast. Please make your way to the cafeteria. Let’s have another amazing day!”

I’m so sick of the morning announcement. Every morning at 7:00 on the dot. I stare up at the intercom waiting for the announcement to end. It’s too happy… it feels like fake happiness.

I don’t want to be a part of this. I don’t want to be here. I just want to find my family. I don’t want to see “mom” or “dad” again.

I was placed in a psychiatric facility. Not like the ones you see on tv. There were no cells, no uniforms. The walls were colorful and full of motivational posters and drawings. They gave me my own bedroom. It felt more like a summer camp. The doctors all wear T-shirt’s and jeans. They act like they’re our friends. It’s not fooling me.

I’ve been here for a week now. The hospital sent me here. They told my “parents” that it would be good for me. I guess some kids have a hard time adjusting after traumatic incidents. This would be a good place for me until my memory started coming back.

My memory never left. They think my real life was all a dream. That I’m imagining things from the coma, but I remember everything. My real mom, my real dad, Jenny, the nurse lady, the woman.. her smile. I know what’s real.

The man and woman convinced the hospital that I was their son. I don’t know how. I don’t look like them, I’m not even sure if they know my name. I mean, they must, but how could they prove it? Did they make a fake birth certificate or medical records? Were their bandages even real? How did they find me?

I needed to figure out why this was happening, and how I was going to get out of here. The only problem was, I need a guardian to release me. The man and woman come here everyday to see if I remember them, if I’m “getting better”. They actually think I’m going to leave with them. I refuse to talk to them, I won’t acknowledge their existence. Why are they pretending to be my parents? What do they want with me?

I went to the cafeteria. Thankfully they don’t force me to take any medication. That’s for the kids with real issues. I grabbed a carton of milk and a tray with waffles; definitely frozen waffles, and ate as fast as I could.

I didn’t want to talk to anyone. I wanted to eat and go back to my room before they showed up again. Families come to visit their kids from 9:00-12:00. The man and woman have been here everyday by 9:05.

I’m going to tell doctor that I don’t want to see them again. I don’t know how much longer I can get away with it, but it’s buying me some time. I just need to go back to my room so I can think in peace.

I’ve been keeping a journal. Everything about my life before the crash. Details about my mom, like how she loved cooking but hated baking. She always played music while she cleaned the house, and she always left the nightlight on in her room incase Jenny got scared. And my Dad. He’s big and scruffy. He looks mean, but he’s like a teddy bear. I wrote about the time he put up a basketball hoop in the driveway, and stayed up with me way past bedtime to teach me how to shoot. Or when he bought me and Jenny special capes and turned the whole living room into a fortress so we could play superhero’s.

Jenny.. It’s been so hard to write about her. Every time I try, I start to feel tears in my eyes. I’m so worried about her. I need to get out of here and find her. I have no idea where she is, and if she’s alone or not.

The tears start filling my eyes again, and that’s when I heard a voice. “You need to go with them.”

It sounded like a young girl. I looked around the room. I’m all alone. Am I going crazy? The voice was too clear to have imagined it. I stopped and in a shaky voice managed to say “…hello?”

“Don’t say anything. You need to trust me. If you want to get out of here, you need to play along.”

I feel the voice at the back of my neck. It makes all the hairs stand straight up. This can’t be real. I look around the room. I check under the bed and behind the bookcase. I even check places that don’t make sense like the bedside drawer and under my pillow.

“Please! You need to listen. When the man and woman come today you need to talk to them. Tell them you’re not ready to leave yet, but you think you’re starting to feel better. Tell them they look familiar.”

Out of sheer panic and confusion l grab my journal and in big letters write “WHY WOULD I DO THAT?”

The voice responded to me saying “You need them to trust you.”

“AND WHY SHOULD I TRUST YOU?”

I felt a chill run down my back. I froze as the voice whispered

“Mighty Matt, it’s me.”

CW- Gore

I’m not a big fan of the woods. It was my biggest concern when the kid started living with me, that they wouldn't share that with me. Fortunately for me, or, unfortunately in general, we’re pretty similar. I wasn’t always afraid of woods though. I actually used to love them.

When I was younger, I lived near the woods. They were my backyard, and everyday I’d go inside to walk and think and kick leaves and snap sticks. It didn’t matter how long I walked in there, where I walked, I always found myself at a small descent, one I’d follow onto a sandbank. A little river would be what kept me from passing to the other side. I’d tried to swim over just a couple times, but something would always keep me from having the guts to go all the way. I think what scared me most was the depth. You could only take a single step into the river before it instantly dropped off into what seemed like infinite darkness. So, I always sufficed with just sitting against the grassy drop off into the area and reading something or other. I recall very few of the books I read back then.

Anyways, that’s not really important. One day, I was reading there when I heard something collide on the sand bank. It was a rock. I looked all around and couldn’t figure out where it had come from, till I happened to see another one as it was falling toward the sand bank. It had come from somewhere ahead of me. Over the river. The other side. I remember just sitting there, watching the other sand bank, waiting for another rock to fly over, but one never did. My eyes became fixed on the dark between the trees. Something had to be there.

Eventually, I left for the day. I just couldn’t relax again. I didn’t return for a while. The thought that there was something else over there watching me had been too much. Especially with how much my mind loved to run itself ragged. I imagined all kinds of horrible creatures on the other side of that river. A zombie? A ghost? A cannibal? The only reason I could think of that last one was from a friend sending me a particularly gory video over text a few months before then that still has me squirming when I think about it.

I think it took about two weeks for me to gather up the courage to go back there. Home was just too uncomfortable a place to read. Too noisy. So, back through the woods, to my comfy little river bank. I sat there, reading whatever book I’d picked up from the library, and it was nice. Then I heard that sound again. The sound of something slamming against the sand. It was a rock. It had landed quite close to me, close enough to grab. So I did, and holding it in my hand, I found a word scratched into the back of it.

It said “HELLO”, though it was difficult to really read. I looked back over at the other side. There was nobody there. Again, just the river bank, just the trees. With some sort of sincere...curiosity? I’m not sure what I was feeling, but it was strong enough to compel me to stand, pull my arm back, and send the rock flying back to the other side. I watched it fly, managing to avoid falling in the river and land on the sand opposite me. I watched. Waited. Nothing, not for a minute or two, until another rock came flying up from the other side, somewhere behind the trees, landing next to me. This one also had a message written on it, just as messy.

“ASK FOR SOMETHING”

I stood there, thinking. It felt too good to be true. If it was, though, should I waste it asking for something I didn’t really want? I decided eventually to ask it for a book, one that had just come out at the time. In truth, I really didn’t expect anything to happen. Maybe it would throw over another rock laughing at me or something embarrassing. Instead, though, I saw something larger coming up from the other side, shadowed against the sun. I reached out my hands and was somehow able to catch it. The thing was light, and...was a book. The exact book. I looked at it, felt it, scrubbed my thumb over the pages. My heart soared. I thanked whoever it was on the other side, again and again, when another rock came over.

“SEE YOU TOMORROW”

I promised it I would come tomorrow, and after that, no more rocks. I left when the sun seemed ready to touch the horizon, over the moon for the gift I’d just received. I was sure to spend the whole night reading it.

I had kept my promise to come back the next day, this time with the intent of getting to know the thing. It had given me a gift, after all, so in my little head, that must’ve meant it wasn’t so bad. I arrived there, and waited, till I saw a rock coming over the river.

“HELLO”

I asked it for its name, and got another rock in response.

“ASK FOR SOMETHING”

I was confused. I tried asking it again, but nothing. I decided to be tricky. I said what I wanted was its name. After a moment, another rock came over.

“FRIEND”

That seemed so cute to me. It felt like an animal, kind and curious. I thanked it for the gift, and another rock came over.

“SEE YOU TOMORROW”

I took the friend rock with me that day. I still have it now. It’s always gonna be with me. That’s something I came to terms with a long time ago.

I came back everyday after that. I thought it was a much nicer place to be already, what with not having to be yelled at by my mom for being forgetful or doing something she thought was stupid. That didn’t happen when I was there. It felt nice. I can’t lie though, all the free things I got from this FRIEND were nice too. I was always careful not to ask for anything that felt too big though. I didn’t want to feel like I was taking advantage of someone for something too nice. A rule I try to stick by even now, to the best of my ability. Though, that’s more because of FRIEND than anything else. You see, there’s one gift that thing gave me that trumps all the others in weight.

It had been about three months since I started interacting with FRIEND. I had mostly given up on actually asking for things, the stress of accidentally asking for something that was too much always hanging over me. Instead, I would just ask it questions. Things like how long are you arms? How deep is the river? What did you eat today?

“LONG AS BRANCH”

“TOO DEEP FOR YOU”

“SOMETHING SQUISHY”

That day, though, I didn’t have a question. I remember being mad. Sad? Mom had yelled at me that day. Louder than usual. Scarier than usual.

“You little fucking idiot!”

I had tried making my own lunch cause I was scared of waking her up, and made some mess on the counter. It made her so angry, I remember being able to see her eyes bulge. She looked like a monster. All of that was stewing around in me while I sat at the river, holding FRIEND’S greeting rock. I wasn’t sure if I should ask for it, but, I really wanted it. More than anything.

I asked FRIEND to make mom stop yelling at me.

The rock took a while to come over. It felt like I was watching the earth itself in a state of deep thought. When I grabbed the rock, it only said one word.

“TOMORROW”

I waited there for a long time, hoping maybe it would throw over something else, something more immediate, but it didn’t. I eventually relented, and returned home for the day. When I exited past the tree line into our backyard, I remember mom standing there on the porch, staring right at me. She was crying.

She came down the steps and walked toward me, bending down to hold me close. I didn’t understand why she looked so sad, I was more so uncomfortable having to maneuver around her large and firm belly. She didn’t say anything to me after that, but it felt as though there wasn’t really anything to say. At least, I felt like it would be a quiet night.

It was. Dinner was silent, and I wasn’t disturbed at all while I did my homework or when I eventually went to bed. Even the next day, I came down ready for school and mom didn’t seem to say a word. She had made me lunch, though. Seeing that had made me feel...good. Really good, actually. Had FRIEND caused this? Then what did it mean by tomorrow?

I pondered on that, all throughout the school day, barely able to focus on reading. It had actually made me a little nervous. If things were going to stop being noisy on there own, maybe I had bothered FRIEND for nothing. I hoped it was possible to take back my request then. FRIEND was my friend, after all. They didn’t deserve to have their time wasted like that.

So, like usual, I got off the bus, made my way to backyard and past the tree line, wandering and wandering my way through the woods, waiting for the river to come into view. The time it took to get to the river was never consistent, but I can’t recall a time where it felt like it took forever. This time was no different. Actually, it was different. It felt faster than any other time. I think now that FRIEND was probably the cause for that. It must have been excited for me to see what it had done. To help. To make my mom stop yelling. It’s gift to me was waiting there, in the sand, next to a rock, a message written on it.

“SEE YOU”

Next to the rock was something I had seen before in one of my science textbooks. Maybe a couple times in films. Described once or twice in books I had read. I knew what it was, anyway.

It was a fetus.

It wasn’t moving.

I was frozen solid. I couldn’t...process it, if I had to explain why I so efficiently shut down. I just looked at it, wind occasionally blowing sand onto it. Eventually, I slid down to the little thing and bent down, scooping it up in my hands. I remember trying to recall in my mind if there was an obvious difference when it was a growing boy or growing girl.

To me, it just looked like meat, but I knew it was more than that. When the thinking became unbearable, but I promise, I thought about a lot there, I climbed my way back up, holding the fetus against my chest. The walk back felt slow, like everything was stretching. Pulling, tearing.

I exited the tree line, and saw the porch door open. From this far away, I could still see my mom’s feet over the couch’s arm, the red dripping down on the carpet. I went to a neighbors house and asked them to call the police. I never went to see what mom looked like. I could imagine it, and, I didn’t want to remember her that way. There’s something about a clear mind that brings such logic to you I’ve found.

I ended up going to live with my extended family. My aunt is a good person, she did her best for someone who never planned to have any kids. I did my best not to be a burden on her, like I was on my mom. I really...always was a burden on her.

As for FRIEND, I never went back to that river. I’ve never gone into any woods, thinking that maybe if I ever went inside any, I’d end up right back there. That didn’t mean it left me alone though. It just comes to me now. Rocks tapping against my window. Every night. I never bothered trying to catch a glance at it. For years, I didn’t even respond to it. I deserved this. Of course I deserved this. I finished Middle School, graduated from High School, spent two years in college and ended up moving into the room above the shop I work at, and still, it throws rocks, waiting for me to ask it for something.

Eventually, I did. I asked it to let me take responsibility.

I’m...not a big fan of the woods. My sister isn’t either.

This happened a few weeks ago, now that I'm fully sitting down to write it all out.

As of writing this I've turned 18. Happy Birthday to me. I really don't know where to begin.

I guess at the start.

I used to live somewhere in Maine, with my parents. But they weren't the best, and I couldn’t live there anymore. It wasn't living at that point, it was surviving.

So one afternoon when my mom passed out, needle in her arm, I stole her keys, packed my things, then stole her car.

I only had 36$ that I had taken with the keys. But I didn’t care, I wanted to leave.

After a few hours, I needed gas, and so I stopped at a gas station next to a truck stop. I was hungry, so I bought snacks, peanut butter m&ms and I forgot what else, then I filled my car up.

I sat and ate the other stuff I bought, still can't remember, when I saw how dirty this trucker’s truck was. It gave me an idea.

I walked over to the trucker and told him I was needing gas money, that I had lost my wallet going home. Then offered to clean his truck for 30$. Thankfully he agreed. Saying “Good looking out boy, I was planning on a tryna hook a few lizards tonight. Hell if you get it good I may give you a nice tip.” I wasn't sure what he meant, but I quickly followed him to his truck. He said something else, then patted my back. I got to cleaning.

It wasn't that nasty, or dirty. Just a lot of empty containers. It took 30 minutes, and he was gone for an hour. But when he came back, he was excited about how clean it was. “Damn boy, I haven't seen it this clean in years. You know what. Take it all.” The trucker said to me, then handed me 2 100$ bills out of a stack as thick as my arm.

I went to my car happy, and decided I wouldn't stop again until I needed gas. To save the money.

The trip was decent, but boring. It all looked the same, until I hit West Virginia.

I decided to take a more scenic route through the mountains that my GPS offered.

There had also been a sign for gas, and food. So I took the exit.

After 15 minutes down a road full of curves and surrounded by thick forest I had made it to what once could have been called a town.

It had a gas station that had pumps that were out of order, and 3 busted up buildings with more busted houses deeper into town.

I needed gas, so I stopped, not knowing the pumps don't work, I pulled into the gas station and parked right outside of the doors.

As I went into the store, I could feel the cashier staring at me. I thought nothing of it, I have Maine tags in West Virginia.

When I entered I went straight to the counter. Then asked for 40$ on whichever pump worked. “Ain't any of them work.” The Cashier said, with a thick southern drawl. “Where is the next gas station that has gas?” I asked, kind of frustrated. “Well, if you take a right when you leave here, then go on down the road for 10 minutes, take a left, then continue for another 20 minutes you'll be in the town next over.” The Cashier explained, chewing tobacco. “Alright, sounds good.” I said, hoping I'd have enough gas to get there. “You better get goin’, it ain't safe out here at dark for tourists.” The cashier said, kind of harshly. Now I know he was just trying to scare me back towards the highway. “Why is that?” I asked, smugly. “These animals out here ain't like what you have up north. Nothing like it. Just take my advice. Maybe go back the way you came, bud.” The Cashier said, spitting tobacco after his sentence. “I think I will be fine, thanks anyways.” I said, leaving the store. I wish I would have listened.

I took his directions, unknowingly I took the wrong left, and that turn took me on what seemed like an endless road, covered in forest. After 20 minutes of driving I took out my paper map, but according to the map I wasn’t on a road, I was in the middle of nowhere. Same with my car's GPS device.

After another 20 minutes I was almost out of gas, and decided to turn around. Hoping I'd have enough to get back to the run down gas station.

10 minutes after I turned around, I was out of gas, and stuck on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere. I either walked back, or waited for someone to drive by. It was also starting to get dark, and I had no flashlight. So I decided to stay in the car, and hope someone drives by.

Once it got dark, I turned the car on to listen to music. Not like the battery dying would make my situation worse.

After 30 minutes since the sun set, I started to hear things. Nothing that would cause too much panic if I was in a different situation.

There was a distant howl, from something I have never heard before or since. Leaves and sticks falling from the trees above onto my car, Like something was jumping from branch to branch.

After an hour the howls had stopped, but heavy footsteps off and on from the edge of the woods kept me from dozing off. I assumed it was a bear, or a curious deer. Regardless, I wasn't checking.

Once the noises stopped being as frequent I couldn't keep my eyes open. I started to doze off.

I fell asleep for what felt like 30 seconds when I heard the scrape of nails against my car window. Jolting awake, to see 3 long scratches next to where my head was.

I jumped into the passenger seat, and screamed. Like a bitch, I'll admit it. But I thought it was a bear, but I was wrong. So wrong. After a minute of silence, I heard heavy breathing behind me, and whipped around to see some creature drooling, and breathing at the window where my head was again.

It was not a bear, I am not sure what it was. I can describe it. It looked like a giant squirrel, which now might make this story less believable. But I wish I was lying.

The head was covered in blood, dried and fresh. Teeth yellow, and rotting. Eyes blacker than anything I have ever seen.

I screamed again, of course, and jumped into the back seat, looking for anything I could use as a weapon.

I eventually found an umbrella. But before I could even think what I could use it for, glass shattered and the creature was in the car.

I opened the door, and jumped out of the car, running into the road. The creature was digging through my car, looking for something.

After a minute it had found it, my peanut butter M&ms.

It ate the package whole, then coughed and choked a little.

I was frozen, what could I do? It had my car, and I was in his territory.

But by some sick luck, headlights began to shine from afar, and the creature retreated into the woods.

The Cashier from the gas station pulled up, yelling for me but I was still frozen.

“Get the fuck in the car, that thing wont stop til the morning. You can stay with me.” The cashier said, ushering me into his car.

After a second I came back, and hurried into his car.

He started to speak again, But I was still dazed.

Before he could take the car out of park, his window busted, and he was ripped from the car. All I could hear was his body being violently ripped to pieces, then I jumped in the driver's seat, and began to drive.

I felt a bump as I drove away, knowing for sure it was that cashier. With no time to be upset, I started to drive as fast as I could. While stupidly staring in the mirror to see if the creature was following.

It was faster than I predicted, then I crashed into a ditch because I was more focused on what was behind me than in front of me.

I tried to move the car, hoping it wasn't too deep. But I had no luck, and then I heard a thud on the roof above me.

I quickly scanned the car, for anything to protect myself. When I opened the glove box, a hand gun fell out. I grabbed it and checked to see if it was loaded. It was. So I fired 2 shots into the roof.

As soon as the second bullet pierced the roof, the creature let out a horrible scream, the only thing I can think of that is close to the sound it made is an Aztec death whistle.

After the scream, it was silent. The sun was just starting to peek over the trees, and I decided it was now or never.

I quickly scanned the trees, seeing movement far ahead of me. I decided to go for it. I let off 3 more shots in the direction of the creature. Another scream, then a loud thud, like it had fallen from the trees. I quickly checked the trunk of the cashier's car, hoping maybe for gas, or food.

I found gas, a full 5 gallon tank. I quickly made my way back to my car, filled it up, and jumped into the driver's seat. Then drove away.

It has been 3 weeks since this happened, I haven't seen anything on the news regarding the cashier, or a giant squirrel creature being found dead.

I made my way to Illinois, far from any mountains. Just how I want it to be until I die.

If anyone has any explanation on what attacked me, please let me know. I can't find anything online. Maybe it's a were-squirrel.

You don’t notice how quiet things are until it’s too late.

When we first moved into this neighborhood, I didn’t think twice about the perfect lawns, the identical houses, or the stillness that hung in the air. Everyone was so polite—almost unnervingly so—but that was normal, right? At least, that’s what I told myself.

But now? I can’t stop hearing the hum of the engines. They come at 3 AM, like clockwork. And if you’re still awake, still alive, you’ll know they’re coming for you.

I made the mistake of wandering my house after midnight. I thought I was safe. After all, I’d just moved in. I didn’t know the rules. I didn’t know what happened if you broke them.

And that’s how I found out. That’s how they found me.

.

.

.

The house was perfect. Too perfect. I moved into a seemingly idyllic neighborhood, just like in the brochures. The kind of place where every house looked identical, with neat lawns and white picket fences. It felt like something out of a dream—or maybe a nightmare.

My first afternoon, I decided to take a walk around the block to stretch my legs. It was a quiet street, the kind of silence that felt too thick, too intentional. As I passed a few houses, I noticed something odd: every window was either shut tight or covered with heavy curtains, as if no one wanted to be seen.

Then I met Tom.

He waved from his porch, a welcoming gesture that almost felt rehearsed. He was an older man, with a scruffy beard and a knowing smile. He didn’t have the kind of smile that made you feel comfortable, though. It was more like a smile you give someone when you’ve seen too much, when you know something they don’t.

“Hey there!” he called out. “You’re new around here, huh? Don’t worry, you’ll get used to the place. It’s quiet, peaceful... if you follow the rules.”

I smiled back, unsure of how to respond. “Thanks, yeah. Everything seems nice so far.”

“Nice is one way to put it.” Tom’s grin lingered a little too long, and he leaned in, lowering his voice. “But... after 3 AM? You won’t see anyone out. People here stay inside. The patrol doesn’t like it when you break the curfew.”

“Patrol?” I raised an eyebrow. “What, like the police?”

Tom’s eyes flickered, just for a second, like he’d said too much. “No. Not like that. Just... the patrol. They keep things... in order. It’s better not to test them.” He chuckled, but the laugh felt strained, almost like he was trying to cover something up.

I nodded, uncomfortable. “Right. I’ll keep that in mind.”

Tom gave me one last look, his expression unreadable. “Good. You’ll learn. Just... stay inside when the clock strikes 3.”

I turned away quickly, the hairs on the back of my neck prickling. The conversation had felt too pointed, like he was trying to warn me without saying too much.

Day 3:

I couldn't stop thinking about what Tom had said. The patrol. The idea that some kind of enforcement existed that made people stay inside was unsettling in itself, but the more I thought about it, the more the whole town felt like it was suffocating under its own skin.

The silence here wasn’t just a lack of noise—it was an absence. It felt like the town was holding its breath, like everything was waiting for something, someone to make a wrong move. And that thought gnawed at me, the anxiety slowly building as I settled into this quiet, rigid routine.

The first strange thing happened on the third night. I woke up at 2:45 AM, my body alert for no reason at all. There was nothing in particular that had woken me up, but I could feel the weight of the house’s silence pressing in on me.

I went to the window, thinking maybe it was just the sound of wind or an animal. But outside, everything was still. The streetlights were too bright, casting long shadows on the empty sidewalks.

Then, I heard the engines.

At first, it was just a distant hum, but it grew louder—closer. My heart skipped a beat. I pressed my face to the glass, straining to see what was happening.

A convoy—three black SUVs, all identical, gliding past my house. The engines were eerily quiet for vehicles of that size, the only sound coming from the tires rolling across the asphalt. The headlights didn’t illuminate anything in their path, but the SUVs cast an unsettling, almost unnatural glow. The convoy moved in perfect synchronization, like they were searching for something... or someone.

I didn’t know what to make of it. The cars didn’t stop. They just kept going, disappearing into the night.

But the hairs on my arms didn’t lie. I knew they weren’t just passing by.

Day 5:

I started to notice the patterns. The town was quiet during the day—too quiet. But at night? It became unbearable. People didn’t walk the streets, didn’t linger outside. They simply... disappeared indoors, as though the town itself was closing in on them, forcing them to retreat.

One afternoon, I ran into Tom again. He was standing on his porch, staring out at the street like he was waiting for something. When he saw me, his eyes flickered with that familiar look, the one I couldn’t quite place.

“You seen the patrol yet?” he asked, almost too casually.

“Yeah,” I said, still unsure about what was happening here. “I saw them last night.”

Tom’s smile was tight. “Good. You’re starting to understand. You’ll see more of them if you’re... out of line.” His eyes darted toward the street, then back at me. “Better to stay inside, trust me. That’s how it goes here. Everyone’s got their place.”

I blinked, uneasy. “What do you mean, ‘their place’?”

He sighed, a soft, almost wistful sound. “The patrol... they don’t take kindly to those who stray. It’s a necessary thing. Keeps us all safe.”

But his eyes—his eyes told a different story. They weren’t just warning me. They were pleading with me to stay in line, to keep my distance from whatever lay just beneath the surface.

I felt the weight of his words hanging in the air, suffocating the space between us. “Right. Thanks for the heads-up.”

Day 7:

The unease only grew. I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong, that the town was too perfect, its routine too rigid. The windows were always shut tight, the doors locked, and the people—when I did see them—acted like they were in a trance. Their eyes were always too hollow, too guarded, as if they’d seen things they couldn’t speak of. Things that weren’t meant to be understood.

And then, I found the records.

Old newspaper clippings, buried in the library’s dusty archives. The town’s history was blank—no real stories before the 1940s, just a few vague mentions of a prosperous settlement that suddenly appeared in the late 1800s. But in the margins, scrawled in faded ink, was a single line that made my stomach drop:

“The Patrol is an offering to the ones who walk in shadows. The price is paid, year after year.”

The words felt like a slap in the face. Offering? What did that mean? I couldn’t understand it. The more I searched, the more I realized how carefully the town had hidden its past, like a wound buried under layers of lies.

But what really disturbed me was the pattern in the clippings: every few years, someone went missing after curfew. A pattern that no one spoke of aloud but everyone seemed to know.

The Day I Broke the Rule:

I should have left. I knew I should have left.

I couldn’t stop thinking about the strange history of the town, the clippings I’d found, the things Tom had hinted at. I needed to understand. I needed to see if the patrol was real—if they were really just protecting the town, or something more sinister.

At 2:45 AM, I slipped out of bed, heart racing in anticipation and dread. I crept down the hallway, each step feeling like a violation, like I was walking further away from safety.

I reached the window, heart in my throat. There they were—three black SUVs, parked just outside my house. The engines hummed softly, like a heartbeat. A synchronized, mechanical rhythm. I pressed my forehead to the glass, watching the lights flicker across the street.

Then, a knock.

At first, I thought it was a mistake, a stray sound. But then it came again—louder, more insistent.

I turned to the door, my breath catching in my throat. It was happening.

Before I could react, the door opened by itself. There, standing in the doorway, was Tom.

But he wasn’t the man I’d met a week ago. His face was hollow, his smile stretched too wide. And behind him, the convoy soldiers had appeared—silent, methodical, and terrifying.

“You didn’t listen,” Tom said, his voice barely above a whisper. His eyes were too cold now, as if he’d known the end had come. “None of us ever do.”

I tried to move, but my legs were frozen. The world outside had gone dark, and all I could hear was the buzz of the convoy engines.

And then the door slammed shut behind me, locking me inside.

Day 10:

I don't know how long I've been here.

The days blur together. I try to remember the faces, the names, the things I once knew. But everything is fading—like a memory lost in time.

I don’t know if I’m still alive. Or if I’m part of them now.

But the patrol... they’re always watching. Always waiting. I can feel it in the air. And when the clock strikes 3 AM, I know what happens next. I can't get caught again.

It started with a feeling—a strange, unshakable sensation, like I was being watched. At first, I thought it was just my imagination. After all, I’ve always been a bit of a paranoid person. But then, small things began to happen. My keys would disappear from the counter, only to show up in my jacket pocket hours later. My phone would ring, but when I answered, there’d be nothing but static. The sense that something—someone—was out there, pulling strings, started to grow stronger.

One night, I woke up in the middle of the night to a soft voice calling my name. It was faint, almost like a whisper in the back of my mind. At first, I thought it was a dream, but when I sat up, fully awake, I could feel it—a presence in the room with me. The air was heavier, colder. The voice came again, this time more insistent. “Come.” That’s all it said. Just “Come.” My heart raced as I scrambled out of bed, my body frozen between fear and curiosity. I couldn’t explain why, but something in me was drawn to it, pulled by an invisible force that I couldn’t resist.

The following days blurred together. I found myself doing things I didn’t remember agreeing to, walking down streets I didn’t recognize, talking to people I didn’t know. It was as though I was being guided—led by an unseen hand. At first, I thought I was losing my mind. But then, I found the notes. They were tucked inside my jacket pockets, always handwritten in a neat, precise script. The notes would say things like, “You’re closer now” or “It’s time.” The strangest part? They were addressed to me, as if someone—or something—had been planning every move I made for weeks.

One night, I arrived at an old, dilapidated building on the outskirts of town. I wasn’t sure how I got there, but the moment I stepped inside, everything fell into place. I could hear the whispering again, only this time, it wasn’t a voice. It was more like a hum, resonating deep within my chest, vibrating through my very bones. The walls seemed to close in around me as I walked down the hallway, each step guided by that invisible pull. At the end of the corridor, there was a door. And on the door, a note: “You’ve done well. Come inside.”

I don’t know what’s inside that room. I don’t know what’s waiting for me. But somehow, I know this: Something has plans for me. And I’m not sure I’m ready to find out what they are.

I hesitated in front of the door, the humming sound now vibrating in my head like a heartbeat. The note was still fresh in my hand, but it was almost as if the words had melted away in my mind, leaving behind only a feeling. A sense of inevitability. This was the next step. I could feel it in my bones, deep in my chest. I didn’t understand it, but I knew I couldn’t turn back.

With a deep breath, I gripped the handle and pushed the door open. The room inside was dim, lit only by a single, flickering lightbulb hanging from the ceiling. The air was thick with dust, and the floor creaked underfoot as I stepped inside. The walls were covered in strange symbols—shapes I couldn’t quite recognize, but they seemed to pulse with a faint energy. A chill ran down my spine, but I couldn’t move. I was rooted to the spot, drawn to something at the far end of the room.

There, in the center of the room, was a chair. It was old, weathered, with straps across the arms and legs. And in that chair, sitting as if waiting for me, was a figure cloaked in shadow. I couldn’t make out any features, just the vague outline of a person—or something else—shrouded in darkness. My heart pounded in my chest, and I wanted to run, to flee, but my legs wouldn’t listen. I was being pulled forward, like a puppet on strings.

“You’re late,” the figure said, its voice a low, gravelly whisper that sent shivers through my entire body. I didn’t speak, couldn’t speak. I was paralyzed, trapped in whatever force had guided me here. “But we’ve been patient with you,” it continued. “We’ve watched, and we’ve waited. You’ve followed every step, every twist of fate. You’re ready.”

For a moment, I thought I might faint, or perhaps I was already dead. This was no ordinary dream or nightmare. This was real. But before I could process the full weight of what was happening, the figure stood up slowly, its presence overwhelming. “You’ve been chosen,” it said, its tone colder now, almost final. “To become part of something greater.”

Suddenly, the symbols on the walls flared to life, glowing with an unnatural light. The air grew thick and charged with energy, crackling like static. The room was alive, and I was at its center. My body shook as the voice continued to speak, growing more insistent, more commanding.

"Now, sit." The figure motioned toward the chair, and against my will, my legs began to move. I tried to fight it, but my body obeyed, walking toward the chair as though it had a mind of its own. I sat down, the cold straps tightening around my wrists and ankles as the figure leaned closer. Its face still obscured, but I could feel its gaze, burning into me.

And then, as if the moment had been waiting for this, it spoke one last time:

"Tonight, your life as you knew it ends. Welcome to your new reality."

I stood there for a moment in the quiet, my breath slow, the remnants of what had just happened still swirling in my head. The weight of it all—the transformation, the ritual—pressed down on me like an invisible hand, suffocating my thoughts. I looked down at my hands, still trembling, and then at the door, the exit. The world outside was waiting. But nothing felt the same anymore. It was like I had crossed a line, stepped into a new reality where I didn’t belong, where I wasn’t me anymore.

I stumbled out of the building, each step heavy, my body still reeling from whatever force had altered it. The night air hit me, cold and sharp, but it did nothing to shake the feeling that I was being watched. The world around me was still the same—quiet, suburban streets, dim streetlights, distant sounds of traffic. But I knew better now. I wasn’t the same. They were still out there. And they were waiting.

I made it a few blocks before I stopped walking. My breath was shallow, my chest tight. That voice—the one that had guided me, the one that had led me into that room—echoed in my head again. “You’ve been chosen,” it said. But this time, there was something more to it. A finality. A purpose. I was part of something now, something bigger than I could ever understand. And I could feel it in every step, in every breath. I wasn’t free—not truly. Whatever plans they had for me, I had already become a part of them.

I looked up at the sky, the stars barely visible through the haze of city lights. For a brief moment, I thought I saw a shadow moving across the moon, a figure, too large to be real. But before I could blink, it was gone, as if it had never been there at all. The chill in the air grew colder, biting into my skin, and I realized: I wasn’t just walking through the world anymore. I was walking into it, as if I had been placed here for a reason.

I didn’t know what they wanted, or who they even were, but I knew one thing: whatever had happened to me, whatever I had just become, was just the beginning.

I walked out of the building and into the world that had once felt familiar. But now, it felt alien—like I didn’t belong, like I was a part of something else now. And as I took my first step out of the building, I realized one thing with terrifying clarity:

Whatever plans were made for me… they were far from over.

I've always been honest on here, but I feel the need to preface that none of this is a joke. That giddy nervousness I expressed in my last two posts is gone, along with any joy, laughter, relief. All that's left in their place is guilt.

I worked with Jess again last Thursday. It was an agonizingly boring shift so we chatted throughout. I remember she vented about her annoying little brother, her janky car, and how she'd stopped taking her meds because they were giving her insomnia. I matched her energy with complaints about my fast food habits and the draft in my bedroom because some idiot frat bro threw a beer bottle through my window. I wish I could remember every detail about that night but besides our conversation, most of it escapes me. I can only picture the ultraviolet lights, Shawn Mendes on the radio, Jess' jet black hair and Arctic blue eyes.

It feels disrespectful to continue writing, but I'm too selfish to stop. Every day since, every passing second, all I can think about is relieving the burden of knowledge I've been left with.

I was scheduled for Saturday afternoon with Jess, but an hour before the start of my shift I got a call from my boss, Monique. She said Jess couldn't come into work so I'd have to manage things by myself. I asked if any other coworkers could fill in and she promised she would check, but we both knew no one would answer this last-minute. That meant dozens of 6-10yr olds, seven hours, four parties, and just one of me. Our contracts state we're only allowed to work in pairs, but the bowling alley isn't known for respecting contracts. Shit happens; the show must go on.

I arrived just early enough to set everything up for the parties. I lugged chairs, dragged tables, troubleshot the decade-old computer until all the names loaded onto the screens. By the time the first parent arrived, I was in my zone. I had shoes on half the kids before the families had finished decorating. Once the shoes were done, the names were up, the drinks were bought and bowling had commenced, I took a deep breath. The hardest part was over, I assumed.

But after an hour or so of playing games on my phone, one of the birthday kids approached the counter. He placed a tiny hand on the false granite and blinked at me a few times. "Hello. Hello...? We don't have any balls left."

I tore my eyes from the screen and straightened up. "Don't worry, I'm on it." I hopped off the chair and followed him to lane 9.

When the balls aren't coming back, there are two places they might be. They could be clogging up the ball-return tunnel at the front, or they could have fallen inside the well at the back. Since I'd had a bad experience with lane 9 already (see my first post) I wasn't eager to dive back into the well, so I opted to check the front instead. I lifted the cover on the ball-return tunnel, and though only a portion of the cover is removable, I immediately spotted the problem: There were five or six jammed balls within my reach. I crouched over the tunnel, pulled each ball out, and rolled them back to the kids. Once I couldn't see any more, I asked the kids to throw another ball. That way I can verify that there aren't any jams further up the tunnel, since a single stuck ball guarantees a massive pile-up. The birthday boy nodded, threw a yellow one straight into the gutter, and I waited. I listened for the characteristic sound of plastic and resin rolling over smooth metal bars.

I kept waiting. Then I heard it drop.

It was moving slower than expected, but I wasn't too concerned. Not until the rolling came to a slow stop. No knocking, no tell-tale signs of a jam. It just stopped somewhere further up the tunnel.

I told the kid to throw another ball.

This one came down fast, smooth. I nearly let out a sigh of relief before it reached the same section of tunnel that the previous ball had gotten lost in and a grating sound filled the room. I'd never heard anything like it. Instead of metal on resin, it was like sand on rock or nails on tin. I looked around and saw that most of the partygoers were unphased. Either the music was too loud, or they were too inexperienced with bowling alleys to know that what they'd heard wasn't normal. But I knew. I began to rise when both balls shot down the uncovered portion of the tunnel in succession and made a perfect landing in the ball catch a second later. The kids cheered and I put the cover back on. I knew something was wrong but I put the cover back on.

The grinding continued on and off for the rest of the afternoon. While the kids sang happy birthday and ate their cake, I listened to the tunnel gargle, sputter like it was struggling to cough something up. The longer I sat, the more human it seemed. It's stomach growled as motors spun in the back. It's throat, dry and raw, strained itself each time a ball passed through. It's felt-laid mouth delivered them, tempting the children's hands dangerously close to the abyss of its esophagus. My ear had been trained to hear the most miniscule of malfunctions. No one else noticed.

The last parties were supposed to bowl until seven, but by six-thirty they were tuckered out. As the parents put the used shoes on the counter and rolled their disposable tablecloths, I shut off the lanes with the click of a mouse. Every lane except 9.

It had run out of balls again. That didn't matter to the kids since they'd stopped playing, but it mattered to me. Whoever worked tomorrow would be annoyed if I left them an extra problem to deal with, and besides, I was curious. The sound had returned, this time more tinny as though a penny were rolling around in the dark. There had to be a logical explanation, so before the building emptied out I decided to test it again. I lifted the covers, removed the few balls that I could reach, then threw another.

It hit the headpin. I sucked in my breath and waited to hear it drop into the tunnel like the others had, but no noise followed. Even the tinny scraping had ceased. The ball must be stuck in the well, I thought. Maybe that's my sign to leave. I got up and replaced the cover before heading back to the counter for my coat and purse. Inventory was done and the cash was locked. I was checking the times for the bus when I heard the the slow roll of something stiff and small down the tunnel. It meandered like a wobbling penny, but kept its momentum as it traversed from the far end toward the ball-catch. The basin. I approached slowly and lowered my gaze, till the exit of the tunnel held my full attention. It coughed and coughed, and spat out a little white ball with dents and shrivels on all its sides. After several rolls I noticed one pole was pink in colour, marked with squiggly veins. On the other pole was an iris, Arctic blue.

I calmly stood, ushered the parents and kids through the front door, then called the police.

You may be inclined to tell me that it wasn't Jess' eye, that I was seeing things or making some unfounded assumption. But this isn't one of those up-in-the-air questions. This is real. The police identified Jess' body after unscrewing the cover over the tunnel between lanes 9 and 10. I wasn't allowed to watch when they removed her, but I learned plenty through word of mouth. Her body had been stretched along the edge of the tunnel, wrung thinner with each passing ball. The pressure had knocked her key from her hand, her change from her pocket, her teeth from her gums, her eye from its socket.

They said she climbed in. The tunnel is narrow but so was she, so it's a possibility. Thing is there was no smell, no blood. That was my first thought. Why did it take so long for me to realize? It was a rational question, because rationalizing was all I could do in my state of shock. No blood, no smell, no reason for her to climb in. It was only once they got me in a blanket and took me into the backseat of someone's car that the terror fully set in.

Jess was gone forever, and though we weren't incredibly close, it was impossible to comprehend. I'd seen her just two nights ago, animated and well... alive. I can't say that she was particularly vibrant during our boring shift together but she was alive. Now she's so gone that even if her soul were to somehow return to her body, it wouldn't last for more than a few ragged breaths. Her parents will never get to say goodbye, her little brother will never get to hear her apologize for their spat, and Monique will never forgive herself for not being there. She was only 17. I was older, more knowledgeable. Maybe Monique will never forgive me.

It's been two days but they've already declared her death an accident, the result of a "mental health crisis." She hadn't been taking her pills, after all. And she had the key to the bowling alley on her, so she could have let herself in at any point the night before. The tunnel was just narrow enough for her to squeeze inside but be unable to crawl back out. Plus, the autopsy found that one of her shoulders had been dislocated antemortem. She'd tried her best to escape. She'd fought. They think she was dead before the first ball rolled down that tunnel, but it's not conclusive. If she wasn't, then she was alive until I turned on the machines at the start of my shift.

Maybe it's just the denial or the guilt eating me up but I refuse to believe that this was just a "mental health crisis." Jess was fine the last time I talked to her, and she was the last person I could imagine climbing into a suffocatingly tight hole by herself at night. I said in my first post that she scares easily and I stand by that. When I told her that something touched my hand in the well on lane 9 she not only believed me; she insisted we only go back there together. She also lived on the other side of town and her car wasn't in the parking lot. Am I expected to believe she walked to the bowling alley? The night buses don't take you out this far. She would have been walking that road for at least 45mins, sometimes in the pitch dark.

But anything can be explained away with a "mental health crisis," right? I don't think so, and I'm pretty much the only one. Even Monique -who believes in ghosts- told me that it was disrespectful to make up "conspiracy theories" so soon after her death. The more I push and prod, the worse I feel. I already know it was my responsibility to protect her because she was younger, vulnerable. Then to think that I'm turning her death into some spooky reddit story for a bunch of strangers... Even though I've given fake names and kept my descriptions pretty general, it feels exploitative.

There's only one reason I chose to write this, and it's not karma or upvotes. I want people to hear my side of the story. I want people to know that I grabbed a hand under lane 9 and that I saw something round that wasn't a ball. That I told Jess this, that she believed me, and that now I realize that I should've quit and forced her to join me. Because I've survived whatever fucked up shit is happening here, but I would have never stayed a second longer if I'd known I'd lose Jess. 17 is so young... That past Saturday I was worried I'd scare her; now I wish I'd scared her more.

I'm going to send in my resignation tomorrow morning. I can't do this anymore.

“After careful consideration of our current workload, your schedule has been altered for the week. Thank you.”

I stared blankly at the email on the screen.

“— Sent from my iPhone.”

What an asshole.

I sighed and slumped back against the wall, sliding the phone into my pocket. “I hate it when they do this.”

“You’ll get used to it,” said the man next to me—a guy named Steve with a beard and a red hoodie. I shrugged and nodded.

The warehouse was mostly empty, and we all sat around, bored out of our minds. It wasn't like there was a whole lot going on, anyway. The warehouse was a pretty quiet place. Everyone was waiting to go home for the day, but a couple of late packages were holding us up.

“Your turn, man.”

I turned toward the voice. It was Steve, sitting at a table and motioning toward a deck of cards. I leaned forward and peeked over his shoulder.

I took a step toward the table.

And then, everything went black.

I was disoriented for a moment.

This, I should mention, was not an uncommon occurrence; the maintenance guys rarely did their share of work when it came to the electrical systems. We each let out an annoyed sigh.

“Give it a second,” Steve said.

Sure enough, the backup generators kicked in a moment later and the building lit up once more. We shifted in our seats.

“Alright, go on.”

The lights flickered off again and the generators died down. We all looked around, waiting for something to happen.

“Damn maintenance again,” an older man named Jerry sighed. “Well, then, guess we have to do their job again.”

“I’ll stay here,” said a man named Mike sitting at the opposite end of the table, “doesn't make too much sense for all four of us to go.”

Jerry nodded and stood up. Steve and I sighed heavily and rose to our feet as well. There really wasn’t anything better to do, we supposed. We took a flashlight from a bag and walked down the aisle, shining it along the boxes on either side.

We reached a metal door at the end of the aisle. Jerry opened it and led the way down the hall, with the rest of us following behind him until we made it to a small door on the left.

“Anyone got the key?” Steve asked.

“One of these ought to do it,” I said. I reached into my pocket and pulled out a large keychain.

Just then, a loud crash sounded from the warehouse. We all turned simultaneously. It sounded like a box of product had just fallen over.

“Sounded like it came from Mike’s sector. Poor bastard’s gonna be here ‘till twelve cleaning that up,” Steve chuckled.

I went through about four keys before one finally clicked, and we pushed the metal door open. The space inside was entirely dark. Jerry scanned the space with his flashlight.

We walked inside and approached the generator. I stood back and so did Steve; Jerry had probably fixed a dozen of these by now. We thought it best to let him do his thing.

He seemed to pause for a moment, then tilted his head. “Well… that’s strange.”

Steve and I exchanged a glance, then looked back at the old man.

“Well?” Steve said.

“It’s not broken,” Jerry turned toward us and paused for a moment. We stood in silence.

“It’s just turned off,” Jerry chuckled, then his chuckle died down. “Who’d switch off the backup power?”

“Huh, weird,” Steve shrugged.

“Yeah, well, it’s nothing,” Jerry said. He turned back to face the generator. “I’ll turn it back on, then we figure it out, yeah?”

Jerry reached for the lever attached to the generator.

“Stop.”

My heart stopped for just one, brief second. We all turned to face the voice.

“Jesus! Mike, the fuck are you doing?” Jerry jumped back.

Mike was standing in the doorway, illuminated by Jerry’s flashlight. My heart went back to normal as soon as I saw him. He had really managed to scare me.

I imagined the shadow at the doorway—Mike— would start laughing at any moment, and I could already see that Jerry wasn’t going to be happy about it. The old man wasn’t usually one for practical jokes.

“You’re not funny, man; I thought you were staying behind,” Steve crossed his arms, and I chuckled. But Mike didn’t answer. We stood in silence for a moment, the flashlight lighting up Mike's features. He seemed emotionless, almost blank.

“Real scary, jackass. Can we turn the generator on now?” Jerry wasn’t having it, and turned to the generator.

“Can we keep the lights off?” Mike whispered. It was a hushed, plain whisper. Something about it felt wrong.

Jerry turned around again, and I saw a concerned expression on his face.

“Something wrong, Mike?”

Mike didn’t answer immediately, and his shadow stared back at us.

“Mike?” Jerry asked again.

“Keep it off, please,” Mike said.

Mike’s voice was a whisper—barely audible—and something seemed entirely wrong about it, but I couldn’t quite place it.

The situation was slowly starting to feel uneasy. I turned away from Jerry and Mike to look at Steve, who was still behind me. As I suspected, Steve was growing uncomfortable as well. He took a step back, and he slumped against the wall.

It was almost as if my brain had realized that something didn’t make sense, yet I hadn’t fully become conscious of it. Steve, however, seemed to have the answer.

He tapped on my shoulder and I turned to face him. I could hardly see his face in the dim light, and yet, clearly, there was an uneasy expression on it.

“Look…” he whispered to me, “his mouth.”

I tilted my head, unsure what he meant.

Just then, Jerry spoke up.

“Is there a reason why I can’t turn on the light?”

I turned to face him, but before I did, Steve whispered to me.

“His mouth, it’s closed.”

“I don't want you to see,” Mike whispered in the doorway.

The blood froze in my veins; that was it—Steve was right; Mike was speaking, yet his mouth hadn’t opened.

“Wait…” I said, maybe too loud.

Mike slowly turned his head, staring blankly into my eyes. It was a dead, cold gaze, and something about it made the air around us freeze. It was at that moment that I noticed how pale his face was, and how light his body had seemed the entire time.

He was looking at me, but it didn't feel like it. I felt as if he were looking over my shoulder, or staring through my body.

And then, without warning, his body went limp and he slumped forward, falling to the floor like a doll.

“Let me fix it, then—”

His voice continued from behind him.

My face went pale.

The light failed to illuminate beyond the room. The space behind Mike’s body was entirely dark. It was there that the voice had come from—Mike's voice was speaking from beyond the doorway.

“Jerry,” I whispered, “there’s something back there. Turn on the light, now.”

Jerry was frozen, but snapped away and nodded. He lifted his hand and placed it on the generator.

Nothing crossed the threshold. I am sure of it. And yet, Jerry still gasped and the flashing fell to the floor.

“Wait—stop,” he whispered at first, then a panic settled in, and a muffled voice cried out. “Stop!”

“Jerry!” I screamed.

“Please—” a wet, tearing noise stopped him abruptly and a low gurgle replaced his voice. There was a brief moment of silence. Nothing fell to the floor. He was still standing.

My eyes widened suddenly and I took a few steps back. Steve did the same.

The flashlight lay on the floor, pointing toward us and barely illuminating the room. Nothing could be seen behind the flashlight. The dark, enclosed nature of the room made it impossible to make anything out.

A soft, repetitive tapping sound could be heard coming from the corner. It started out frequent and fast, but the pause between taps slowly grew longer. Something shifted.

“Please don't… turn on the lights.”

A voice sounded from behind the flashlight.

“Who are you?” I asked, taking another step back.

“Is something wrong?” The voice answered, barely audible.

In what felt like an instant, I felt the room grow unbearably cold.

The voice—It was Jerry. No, it couldn’t have been Jerry; it sounded like him, but it was too soft. It didn’t make sense.

We stood in silence with nothing to break the suffocating air that was settling. Whatever was in the corner—Jerry, or what had Jerry’s voice—had almost seemed to disappear. I wondered whether it was even still there, but the gentle tapping repeated itself.

Something stepped in front of the flashlight.

It stepped directly in front of the beam and its leg covered the light. I made out the form of a shoe, but everything else was hidden.

“We can go back,” the same whispering voice—Jerry's voice—returned. “We can still work in the dark, together.”

It took another slow, awkward step forward. The leg seemed numb, weightless, almost like a puppet. It landed its step but the foot failed to stiffen upon landing, and its ankle bent to the side.

“What do you want?” I asked, my voice trembling.

“Will you speak to me… If I look like you?” the voice seemed to distort for a second, almost like an old DVD player coming across a scratch in the disk. It sent a shiver across my body. Something about it seemed foreign.

The figure stepped into the light. The features were vague and blurred, but its form was entirely familiar.

It was impossible to mistake Jerry’s appearance. His clothes, the shape of his body… there was no doubt in my mind that it was Jerry.

I lifted my eyes to meet him in the face, but the second I did, my stomach dropped. I let out a gasp—something in between shock and disgust. I felt like vomiting, but I could only stand and stare in disbelief.

“Something is wrong?” The voice whispered.

His mouth didn’t move. No; there was nothing to move at all.

The blood dripped onto the metal floor, tapping gently against it. It was an awful, repetitive sound that seemed at once muted and magnified—failing to reverberate through the room as if the walls were soundproof, yet it pounded against my skull. The rhythm of the tapping was perfectly stable.

His shirt was saturated and heavy with blood, and a large pool was quickly forming at his feet. There was nothing—absolutely nothing—to even suggest that he was alive. His head slumped down and his arms were limp at his sides. His eyes were obscured; I could feel their lifeless, empty quality. And his mouth—I didn’t see his mouth.

There was only a deep, thick stream of red running down the space where his mouth should have been; all I could make out was a gaping hole of flesh. The light made the blood look like tar; it was dark and thick, almost black. His nose, his mouth, his chin, all of it was gone; only loose, hanging pieces of torn flesh, and the black splotch of blood, could be seen.

I tried desperately to distract myself—to look away or think of anything else—but just as I thought I would drift off, and find that I had been dreaming…

Tap.

With every drop of blood that fell from the wound, I was brought back to reality. I tried to stop the drops—to hold them in the air with my mind—to freeze time so that I wouldn't have to hear another rhythmic, repetitive tap on the metal floor. It was useless. My body had accustomed itself to the rhythm of the drops. Whenever it was time for a drop to hit the metal, I anticipated the sound.

Tap…

I waited for the next one.

Tap…

I knew another drop would fall soon.

…

I anticipated the sound, but it didn’t come.

My body was thrown out of the rhythm, and the silence created a void.

…

“My mouth is open, now.”

Tap.

I had nearly forgotten about the figure in front of me. Now that I was out of my trance, I saw him in the murky, shadowy light.

I saw more of things which made my stomach feel heavy and sick: white teeth still intact, reflecting what little light there was, spontaneously attached to the flesh itself. There were scratches on his face and neck, too—some superficial, others splitting his flesh and revealing black voids as the light failed to reach the inside of the wounds. I was too shocked to react.

I saw something else unusual. His shirt wrinkled and the cloth accumulated toward his shoulders, and his body seemed light, almost as if he were floating. It seemed as if he was being held up by the shoulders.

“Please, stop,” Steve spoke from behind me. I had almost forgotten that Steve was still behind me, watching the same scene. I was grateful for his voice; it made me stop thinking about the body for a moment. Still, it was only a moment.

“Is something wrong, still?” The voice reacted immediately. The sound was hushed, but it was still clear. Its enunciation was perfect.

“Yes! All of it!” Steve finally broke. “Nobody… nobody can talk without a jaw! Nobody can speak without a throat! Leave us alone! Turn around and stop this!”

The room fell quiet again. It gave me a chance to hear the dripping of the blood onto the floor, slower now. Its cadence was lost, the rhythm now unpredictable. The thing—whatever it was—didn’t answer.

Tap, tap.

—Tap.

The blood struck the metal floor at random intervals.

Tap-tap.

On cue with the last drop of blood, Jerry’s corpse went limp. He fell to the ground with a thud, face first. Blood splattered on my boots.

“Turn around?” The voice continued.

The voice was still behind him. Of course it was—I already knew that. It had always been behind him. Steve was right; you need a mouth to speak… a throat, too. Lips. A tongue. There are many things that allow humans to speak. I saw none of those things on Jerry's body.

I think we both realized what was supposed to follow, even before it happened.

Steve screamed.

Before I could even react, a wet snap sounded from the space behind me. I covered my mouth with my hand, stopping myself from making a sound.

I fell to my knees, still facing the other direction. I couldn’t bring myself to turn around. Jerry and Mike lay in front of me, and I knew Steve was still standing behind me. I covered my face with my palms.

I wanted to cover my ears, too; I knew exactly what I would hear next. I didn't want to hear Steve's voice.

“What…”

My hands moved to my ears, but it was not enough.

“...What is wrong?” Steve's voice sounded from behind me. This time it was different; it sounded as if Steve were speaking through a bad radio. His voice was warped. I wanted to cry.

This couldn’t be happening—none of it made sense. I couldn’t think straight and I wasn’t sure I even wanted to make the effort. To be honest, I just wanted it all to be over.

“Turn around, he said. But…” The voice distorted as if a radio had lost its signal. I almost expected to hear static. “...you are still afraid.” The voice had no emotion whatsoever. It was completely monotonous—there was no feeling.

I exhaled slowly, and a tear ran down my cheek.

“You cry,” it whispered.

A silence followed.

“I am hurting you?”

I couldn't stand it. I was confused. Its question—at least I thought it was a question—was so direct, and yet it spoke so plainly that I couldn't grasp what it had attempted to say.

“Yes… you are,” I finally said.

A moment of silence.

Steve was released. He landed next to me on the metal floor, his body lying on its front. I turned to look at him.

For that exact second, my heart seemed to stop beating. I was too shocked to think.

Steve's neck was bruised and deformed—broken. Although his stomach faced the floor, his head defied the direction of his body…

Steve's head had rotated enough to face the ceiling. His eyes met mine.

“I see, then.”

For the first time, I noticed a touch of emotion in the whisper—almost like it suddenly understood, like a child realizing it had done something wrong.

The lights suddenly flickered on.

I looked around suddenly, but all I could see were the lifeless bodies of my coworkers and the deep pool of blood that had formed where Jerry lay. There was no sign of the voice.

I turned around. Still, there was nothing.

To this day I don't know what happened. I can't comprehend what it was or why it had killed my coworkers that day, or why it had suddenly vanished. In truth, I am still entirely confused.

All I know is that, if ever you encounter what I just described, do what I did… let it know that it is hurting you.

Maybe… and it almost makes sense, it couldn't comprehend what it was doing.

Have you ever had a sinking feeling in your soul when being alone? That void that can only be filled with an interaction with another person. I remember that feeling, only now I know that true loneliness lies in the mountains.

Watching as 24 hours pass by with no sign of life, only yourself, has a way of slowing the world down. I don't know why I'm logging this, maybe I hope someday someone may read my ramblings. Or maybe I'm doing exactly what it wants.

I've had so much time to think over how I ended up in this situation. The series of events that led me to this point. How easy it would've been to not be here. To never see that crashed war plane. To never get the stupid idea to see it in person. To simply stay in my warm home and watch cheesy horror movies.

But instead, with just a jacket and a backpack full of granola bars. I turned the keys to my ignition, put in the GPS and left. Not prepared for anything. I never was as my wife would say. She always admired my wistful unpreparedness. Wishing she could possess herself not to worry about so many details. God, I miss her.

The thought never crossed my mind to even tell anyone where I had gone. I was alone, no other person climbing with me. No stranger passing me by on the breathtaking trail on the Appalachian. I actually counted myself lucky for having the whole mountain to myself.

The B-29 bomber was about 2 miles down the glacier. I was excited, so naive, thinking I would make it back home before the sun had time to set. The weather was nice enough, and I had done the 10 miles up the mountain with no fits, so any worry was absent from my mind.

The snow was that of a fantasy. It felt as though I could see the design of the crystals before they landed. But as time went, as I climbed down the ice towards the plane, the bright fluffy textured snow turned thicker. The speed of the wind blared between my ears like a siren that was warning me to get off the mountain. A sign that I ignored.

I kept going, thinking to myself "the cold will pass, the wind will stop, the snow would melt".

I thought I had seen the worse a winter storm could get. In my hometown the snow would get high, but manageable. The temperatures would fall, but I never needed more than an extra layer to walk outside.

Except the snow never slowed down; the temperature kept dropping and the wind kept howling. The areas around me began to disappear, and the ground was becoming quicksand, slowly sinking me into its grasp. I had never felt this type of cold before. Any part of my body, exposed or not, felt the wind pierce down to the bone.

The weather became unbearable as I went down the mountain. I couldn't feel my toes walking beneath the snow anymore. My hands became useless, turning bright red and leathery. The sensation of needles constantly biting my skin was overwhelming my entire body. My face felt like it had no expression no matter how much I crinkled my nose or furrowed my eyebrow. I kept my head down trying to cover up as much as possible, it was no use, the only shield was other parts of my body sacrificing itself to spare one another from the bitter wind.

I couldn't gage wear the trail was anymore, the snow covered everything. The reality that I would not make it home started to sink in. I wanted to give up then, burry myself underneath the snow and wait for someone to rescue me just so my body would stop aching from the wind.

*Thud*

It was then that my head rung form hitting a flat wall. I looked up to see a cabin, so out of place I almost couldn't believe it was real. I thought I was hallucinating until I opened the door and felt the cold breeze no more. I shook off the pound of snow that had begun to form on my back. Threw my bag to the ground and huddled in the fetal position on a cot.

I was a combination of numb and exhausted. Sleep evaded me because of how bad my body was shaking. When I regained feeling in my arms and legs, I was able to take off my jacket so it could dry. Only then was I able to investigate what had saved my life. The place seemed like a survival cabin. I remembered hearing about them in high school. The forest service would build a shelter on mountains to save idiots like me in emergencies.

There wasn't a lot of space, maybe the size of a small bedroom. Accompanied by a workbench, and 2 windows. One above the bench and the other across the room to the right where the cot was. It's not a warm paradise by any means, but it blocked the cold air.

I checked my phone to confirm what I already knew, no service. The light was quickly disappearing making it almost impossible to see anything around me. There was no light switch, so I had to resort to my phone's flashlight. I suspected the storm would last no more than a night or two. I emptied my bag of food and water onto the workbench, calculating that I had enough to last me till then. Mistake, mistake, mistake.

The first night is when it started. If I had known what would follow, I would've never stepped foot into the cabin.

The first thing I remember was the wind brushing against my face shocking me awake. The door was open and not just a slight crack I mean the door was all the way against the interior wall. In the brief moment where my eyes had just opened, I noticed something... something that was not meant to be on a mountain. I only noticed again right before I had shut the door. At the time I only wanted to go back to sleep, so any sense of danger was not something I possessed. Only now, I know what I saw. A mirror... A thin body mirror starring directly at me sleeping.

When I awoke the next day, I thought the whole thing had to be a dream. To ease my mind, I opened the door again to see nothing but white. "A dream", I told myself.

That day the snow would start and stop irregularly. Anytime I had the thought to try my luck down the mountain, the weather would force me against it. So, I waited... and waited, but after a while I knew I was staying in the cabin another day.

Searching around my new little home, I found a couple wooden toys under the bed. They both were the same human-like figurines. "Why is everything made out of wood?", I thought. It was then that I took a closer look into the structure of the cabin. Everything seemed to be made out of actual trees. I'm sure that sounds stupid, but it was like someone had crafted everything by hand. There was clay in between the logs on the wall to cover any holes. I wasn't sure how survival cabins were built so it wasn't out of the realm of possibility that they used the land to build it. But the thought that I was living in someone else's home was not a comforting one. "What if they came back? Would they force me to get out?", there was barely enough space for me as it was. I started to come up with speeches just in case I had to plead my case.

I kept checking my phone, mostly out of habit, but also for missed calls, texts, any notification that would magically appear. But the screen never changed, and my optimism kept spiraling. I had to shut it off to conserve the 5% battery I had left. I tried to sleep, hoping that the nightmare would end when I woke up again. But the bare mattress might as well have been a sheet of paper, protecting me from a concrete floor. It was strange, I had remembered the bed being much more cushioned. By the end of the day, I found myself playing with the toys like action figures.

The task to do absolutely nothing bore fast, I was thankful to be leaving the next day. If I had to stare off into space one more time I was going to lose it. Fresh air sounded like heaven to me at that point. No matter how much shock my body would feel from the numbing gust of air. The door began to taunt me, wanting to open its latch so the barrier between mother nature and I could be funneled through it.

Knowing that I still had some control left empowered me. That at any time I still had the choice of opening the door and letting the cold air face me. My gratification, however, was short lived. This time, I knew I wasn't dreaming. When I opened the door, I was confronted by a person standing against the night sky in the distance.

Not questioning how someone could've possibly made it up the mountain I shouted out. "Hey! Hey!! I need help! Help!!".

When he turned to look at me he was noticeably sluggish. It took him a solid 20 seconds to fully face me. That doesn't sound like a lot but in real time it was as if he moved in slow motion. Silence echoed off the mountain, there was no wind no squeaking snow, nothing but the sound of my breathing. The moon was my only light source only allowing me to make out a helmet and some kind of jumpsuit he was wearing.

"Hey man are you ok?", I yelled at him. I began to worry that this was the man's cabin. I didn't know what else to do. He stayed stiff, unfazed by the cold. I started to feel bad for the man, maybe he had lost it. I didn't want to leave the cabin, but I couldn't let someone else stay out there to freeze to death. So, despite my better judgment, I zipped up my jacket and turned on my phone's flashlight. But the second both my feet touched the snow, the mysterious man sprinted full speed at me. I was horrified as his body looked like it had no spine.

The speed he was going seemed superhuman. I barely had time to turn around and close the door before he was right behind me. I held it with my body, waiting for the impact. But there was nothing, nobody barreling at the door, no footstep right outside, not even a knock. It was too quiet, my breathing the only sound again. Until that silence was suddenly cut by belting laughter. I covered my ears fearing my eardrums would tear from how emphatic the noise was. It felt like I was inside of a speaker. Laughter was the closes thing to describe it because it wasn't a normal sound. It was like someone who was trying to imitate laughter.

The man or whatever it was didn't stop for 5 straight minutes, not even to catch his breath. It felt like being in a continuous loop. "Shut up, shut up SHUT UP!!", I kept saying. But nothing made it stop. It sounded like combinations of a mentally insane person's laugh an animal's screams. My body was shivering, realizing that I had nobody, no friendly neighbor, or first responder to help. Just a piece of wood separating me and the crazed man or... or thing. I had no control left. After the laughter finally stopped, I kept my body against the door. Nothing was getting in or out of the cabin.

I awoke in the same position, unaware when I fell asleep. I immediately searched around to confirm if anything was moved or stolen. But everything seemed in the right place. I took a sigh of relief knowing that whatever was out there couldn't have survived the night. I felt like I was already losing my mind in 2 days.

Didn't feel like 2 days, more like weeks. Have I become this dependent on my phone and TV to occupy my day? That two full days without a bright screen changes my perception of time. I needed to eat something to take my off this thought. After finishing my food and drinking my portioned water I felt hopeful that today could be the day I escape this nightmare. Only, when I went to look outside, the window was blocked. The only thing I could see was a clear reflection of myself.

I wanted nothing more than to get out. The cold wind slapped me in the face as I kicked open the door to run. The cold still singed my entire body, but I didn't care. I would rather take my odds with the weather than stay another night at that cabin. The sun that was peeking through the thick clouds warmed me just enough to give me hope. But after just 3 minutes my heart felt like it was about to explode. My breathing slowed; the air was so thin I had no more oxygen to inhale. I collapsed on the hard snow, heeling over and puking all of the granola out of my stomach.

The tears forming in my eyes dried out instantly. I went to wipe my face when I saw my fingertips beginning to turn as white as the snow beneath me. No matter how bad I wanted to leave, the mountain wouldn't let me. I stood up off my knees, the cabin was too far away now. My hope did not exist anymore. Sinking, cowering down in between my legs, I gave up. Dying sounded better than frost burning through my skin. My cries couldn't be heard nor seen.

When I gained consciousness, I knew I didn't die. That rich smell of pine had become too familiar. My back felt sore when I rose from the bed. "How long was I asleep?", I thought. I checked my hands; normal. I went to look at myself in the window mirror, only to see the snow glowing.

I didn't care to check if any of my stuff was gone, I knew it didn't want that. It wanted me right here, in its human sized doll house.

The usual empty workbench in front of me now held a notebook and pen. I felt sick... I still am sick knowing that there is no escape. I tried to ignore the paper and sleep away all my worries. This only made my mind wander.

"Why mirrors? Why does it want me here? Why doesn't it just kill me? Why, why, why?"

I was beginning to learn that sleep was impossible during the day. The paper and pen had a magnetism that kept drawing me in. I resisted, trying to throw the notebook out entirely, but my body wouldn't allow it. And before I knew it, I was writing the first paragraph.

What do I do now, I don't know. I'm too tired to think anymore. Maybe tomorrow will bring a bright sky and a hot sun that melts ice. Tonight, when I sleep, the windows will have been bordered up and the door barricaded.

I'm alone, I'm stranded, and I'm afraid... Most of all, of what will happen when I am not conscious.

who is mya why do i miss her

I DID NOT WRITE THAT

I set up the trail cams after something got into my chicken coop. It wasn't a fox or a coyote—they leave messes. Bloody ones. Let me tell you, I’ve cleaned up more than a few of those over the years. This one? It was precise. The wire was clipped, the latch was open, and four of my best layers were gone without a trace. I live out here alone, so I had no one to back me up when I told the story, but I know what I saw. Or, rather, what I didn't see.

And I didn’t see no damn coyote.

“You sure about that?” Hayes asked, down at the general store.

“I know what a mess they make. Someone stole them.”

“Who’s out here stealing your hens, Carrie?”

“I don’t know.” I slapped my money down on the counter. “That’s the point of the cameras. I’m going to see who took them.”

Hayes looked amused. “You think that chicken-thieves are going to come back around a second time?”

“Yes.”

“And if they don’t?”

“Just give me the damn cameras.”

And up they went.

The first few nights, I caught the usual critters: Raccoons scuttling through the underbrush, a few deer passing through, even a bobcat slinking along the tree line. But they didn’t clip the wire and cleanly steal my hens, so I left them be.

It was five nights before something else came onto the screen.

At first, I thought it was a mountain lion. Big, sleek, moving low to the ground with purpose. It padded right through the frame of my western-facing cam at 2:47 AM. But something about it was...off. The legs were too long. The way the skin bunched around the joints looked unnatural, like it had extra folds it didn’t know what to do with. And when it turned its head slightly, the eye was all wrong—too round, too bright, like a human eye catching the light.

I convinced myself I was seeing things. Low resolution, bad angle, maybe even a trick of the light. But I kept the cameras up.

The next night, it came back. This time, I got a full body shot. The skin around its shoulders was peeling, like an old leather jacket stretched over something too big for it. I could see the wet sinew beneath, the way it glistened under the moon. The face was the worst part—it had the shape of a mountain lion, but the edges didn’t sit right, as if it had been pulled too tight, and the mouth...

The mouth turned to the camera, and it smiled.

Then it was gone, vanished into the darkness.

I had no proof for it, but I knew in my heart whatever I’d just caught on film was the culprit. That *creature—*it was the one that took my hens. Just my luck that it wasn’t the local kids bored and looking for something to do. Just my luck it had to be...whatever that was.

I didn't sleep that night. I kept the shotgun by my bed, every light in the house on. My closest neighbor is six miles out, and I wasn't about to call the sheriff over a mountain lion with a weird face. But I didn't shut my eyes once. It was just...wrong feeling to do that.

“You’re letting it get to you, Carrie,” I exhaled. “Acting just as bad as when you were drinking. Got yourself jumping at shadows.”

Nope. There was no chance I was tricking myself into relaxing. My eyes were still open when the dawn came.

The night after that, the camera by my coop caught it standing on two legs.

It was blurry, sure, but the shape was unmistakable. It had the hind legs of a big cat, but its torso was wrong—too long, too thin. The skin had sloughed off in places, leaving exposed ribs and raw muscle. The face...it wasn’t a cat’s anymore. Does that make sense?

It still had the skull of a cat. The ears, the fur. But the fur was sort of slipping back like a hood and the muzzle had been twisted up somehow, or bent down, or just car-hit broken in a way that let the smile get wider, the mouth gaping open in a way no animals should.

And the eyes.

No doubt about it.

Human.

It looked at the camera again and then I watched as it took its hands and snapped the chicken wire with its bare hands.

I ran out at dawn, yanked down every camera, and dumped them in the shed. I figured if I ignored it, it would go away. Childish? Sure. But what else could I do, go out there and face it? Just the thought had me shaking in my boots, so I told myself I was seeing things. That I had been awake too long, looking for something that wasn’t there.

This morning, I found the last remaining trail cam sitting on my front porch. I know I didn’t put it there. I hadn’t even looked at the footage yet. My hands shook as I clicked through the files.

The final image was taken at 3:12 AM. The creature was no longer walking through the woods. It was standing right in front of the camera, too close, its torn skin hanging in strips. Its mouth was open wide, its lips peeled back, revealing rows of jagged, uneven teeth. And its eyes—they were staring right into the lens. Into me.

Then, in the last frame, it screamed.

I don’t remember throwing the camera. I don’t remember running back inside. But I remember the sound. It wasn’t caught on video, but I heard it. A high, keening wail, like metal tearing, like something forcing its way through flesh that was never meant to hold it.

I haven’t left the house since. I don’t know what it wants. But I know one thing: it’s watching me now...and hands that can snap wire can easily figure out how to open a flimsy wooden door.

I don’t believe in tarot, not in the mystical sense. The cards don’t whisper, don’t pull strings behind the curtain of reality. They don’t know the future. What they do—what I do—is tell stories. And people love stories, especially when they’re about themselves.

Most of my clients don’t want the truth. They want reassurance. They want to be told that their ex will come back, that their business will succeed, that they’ll win the fight they’re afraid of losing. They want validation, a sugar-coated narrative where everything works out.

And I give it to them. Not because I’m a fraud, but because it’s what they need to hear.

That’s why I noticed him the second he walked in.

The man didn’t hesitate at the threshold, didn’t browse the shelves lined with incense and cheap crystals. He moved with the kind of deliberate control that made my skin crawl. He was tall, gaunt, with sharp features and sharper eyes. His clothes were unremarkable—pressed slacks, a plain dark coat—but everything about him felt too composed, like he was wearing a disguise made of normalcy.

He sat down across from me without a word, folding his hands neatly on the table. I waited for the usual: love, money, success. But he just tilted his head slightly, watching me the way a bird watches an insect, and said—

“I’d like to know about the end of the world.”

The request sent a strange shiver through me. Not just because of the words, but because of how he said them. He wasn’t asking out of curiosity, or fear, or desperation. There was no urgency in his voice.

It was like he already knew.

“Not exactly a common reading,” I said, forcing a small laugh.

The man just watched me, unmoving.

I hesitated, then reached for my deck. If this was a joke, I’d play along. If it wasn’t... well, the cards would do what they always did—tell a story.

I shuffled. The cards were worn and familiar against my fingers, their edges softened by years of use. Usually, I let my clients pull their own cards, but before I could ask, three leapt from the deck and landed on the table, facedown.

Past. Present. Future.

Something about the way they landed made my breath hitch. But I pushed the feeling down and flipped the first card.

The Past: The Tower

A ruined tower, crumbling under a black sky. Lightning splitting stone. People falling from its heights, their arms outstretched in silent screams.

Destruction. Upheaval. A warning ignored.

The story was clear—there was a moment when things could have changed. A moment when people had a chance to stop something terrible. But they didn’t. Whether out of fear, selfishness, or simple indifference, they let the opportunity slip away. And now we were living in the fallout.

I exhaled slowly, my fingers suddenly cold.

The man said nothing. Just watched.

I turned over the second card.

The Present: The Hanged Man

A man, suspended upside down. Bound, but serene.

Waiting. Watching. Not acting.

My mouth went dry.

This wasn’t inevitability. It wasn’t some cosmic force pushing events toward disaster. The only reason things weren’t being stopped was because the people who could stop them weren’t. Not because they were powerless—but because they didn’t care enough to try.

The air in the shop felt suddenly wrong, heavy and too still. I glanced at my client, but if he felt anything, he didn’t show it. His expression remained unreadable, his gaze steady and sharp.

I didn’t want to turn over the last card.

But I did.

The Future: Death

A skeletal figure in black armor, astride a pale horse. A banner unfurled in bony hands.

People kneeling. People falling.

There’s a lot of feel-good nonsense about the Death card. People like to say it means transformation, rebirth, a new beginning. But sometimes, it means exactly what it looks like.

This was one of those times.

The instant the card hit the table, something shifted in the air. The temperature dropped. My stomach clenched, my heart pounding against my ribs. I told myself it was just a coincidence, just a story the cards were telling.

But across from me, the man smiled.

Not a smirk, not an amused twitch of the lips. A smile. Small. Satisfied. Like he had just received confirmation of something he already knew.

A strange, creeping wrongness crawled up my spine.

I cleared my throat, forcing my voice to stay even. “That’s... unsettling.”

The man chuckled. “It’s good to have confirmation.”

That was enough. I didn’t want him here anymore. I didn’t want the cards in front of me. I didn’t want to know what the hell he had been looking for in that reading.

“I’m ending the session early,” I said, sweeping the cards back into the deck. “No charge.”

He didn’t argue. He stood smoothly, reached into his coat, and placed a few crisp bills on the table. Too much. More than the cost of the reading.

I stared at the money. When I looked back up, he was already walking toward the door.

But just before stepping outside, he paused.

Turned.

And with that same unreadable smile, he met my gaze and said—

“See you around.”

Then he was gone.

I sat frozen for a long time, staring at the empty doorway.

The air still felt off, like the room itself had inhaled and forgotten to exhale. I swallowed hard, my mouth dry. My hands were cold.

Finally, I forced myself to move. I reached for my deck, ready to put it away—but hesitated.

The Death card was still on the table.

I turned it over, face-down, and pushed the deck aside. Then I grabbed the cash the man had left and shoved it into the drawer beneath my desk. I didn’t count it. I didn’t care.

I just wanted to stop thinking about the feeling that had crept into my bones when I turned over that final card.

I don’t believe in tarot.

Not in the mystical sense.

But that night, I locked up early. I didn’t touch my deck again.

i had just bought a few acres after my husband had passed and settled into what would have been our dream retirement home.

as i stepped out onto my porch, sipping my morning coffee, i noticed a lone deer grazing in my front yard. it's brown eyes seemed to lock onto mine, and for a moment, we just stared at each other. she was a beautiful buck. i brushed it off as mere curiosity, after all, deer were common in Virginia’s rural area.

weeks passed and i began to notice strange occurrences around my home. sometimes, tools would go missing, only to reappear in strange places. or i would hear whispers in the wind, faint but unmistakable. and then, there were the shadows. dark, twisted, almost human-like shapes that seemed to move of their own accord, darting around the edges of my vision.

on one a crisp sunday night, i was closing the curtains, and that when i caught a glimpse of the deer standing farther back than usual, near the treeline. it’s eyes seemed to gleam in the fading light, and for a moment, i could've sworn i saw something else standing just beyond it. a darker shape, tall and imposing, that seemed to blend seamlessly into the trees.

my heart skipped a beat as i spun away from the window, my mind racing with questions. what the hell was going on? why the hell is this deer behaving so strangely? and what the fuck was that other presence lurking just out of sight?

i tried to shake off the feeling of unease, telling myself i was just spooked, but the image of those piercing eyes and the dark shape beyond lingered in my mind. i knew wanted to get to the bottom of this, but did i really need to solve this mystery? as i turned to head back to my routine, i couldn't shake the feeling that i was being pulled into something much larger, and much more sinister, than i could've ever hoped for.

that night, i barely slept. my ears straining to pick up any sound that might indicate what was going on. just as the first light of dawn was creeping over the horizon, i heard something. a low, rustling sound, like leaves being disturbed. i froze, my heart pounding in my chest, as the sound grew louder. then, the window creaked open, and a cold breeze swept into the room. i spun around, my eyes scanning the darkness, and that's when i saw it. the same deer, standing in my bedroom, its eyes glowing with an otherworldly light.

i tried to scream. my voice was frozen in my throat. the deer began to move closer, its eyes fixed on me with an unspeakable hunger. and, just as all hope seemed lost, everything went black.

when i came to, i was lying in bed, my heart still racing. it was morning, and the sun was streaming through the window. i must have dreamed the whole thing, i told myself…except i knew then that it wasn't just a dream. i felt a shiver run down my spine. something was out there, watching me, waiting for me.

as the days passed, i found myself growing increasingly uneasy. the deer's nocturnal visits became a constant presence, a lurking shadow that hung over my home like a specter. i tried to convince myself it was just my imagination running wild, but the sense of being watched persisted. every evening, around dusk, the deer would appear in my yard, its large brown eyes fixed intently on my house. it would stand there, motionless, watching with an unnerving intensity that made my skin crawl.

i tried to shoo it away, but it wouldn't budge. instead, it would back away slowly, its eyes fixed on me. glaring at me. taunting me. i turned around to close my door and she was gone. it’s as if it had disappeared, but i knew that she would be back. and next time, i had a feeling that she wouldn't be alone.

i stopped going out as much. i didn’t look out the windows. i couldn’t bring myself to make a huge mistake.

sunday rolls back around and i woke up to the sound of rustling leaves and snapping twigs. i looked out the window, and my heart nearly stopped there were hundreds of deer in my yard, their eyes shining like a sea of lanterns. they were packed tightly together, their bodies swaying gently in the breeze. the deer seemed to be... pulsing, as if they were connected by some unseen force. when suddenly, almost.. as if in perfect synchrony, they turned their heads towards my house. towards me. i felt a cold sweat break out all over my body as i realized that i was the focus of their attention. whatever they were waiting for, it was me. i was left shaken, wondering what had just happened. was it some kind of bizarre animal behavior? or was it something more... evil? as i stood there, trying to make sense of it all, i felt a creeping sense of dread.

months passed and the deer's behavior became increasingly erratic. they would appear in my yard at all hours of the night, their eyes glowing like embers in the dark. they seemed to be patrolling the perimeter of my property, as if they were guarding something. for a while i felt safe, but it soon faded and i became more weary.

it started to feel like i was under siege, with the deer gathering in my yard like an army of sentinels. i couldn't sleep at night, my ears just begging to catch the sound of their hooves on the grass.

soon, the leaves changed colors and september hit.

i saw something that made my blood run cold. as i looked out the window, i saw one of the deer approaching my front door. it sniffed at the threshold, its ears twitching nervously. suddenly, it let out a high-pitched bleat, and the other deer forcefully gathered in the yard, turning to face my house in complete unison. they seemed to be waiting for something to happen, their eyes fixed on my front door with an unnerving intensity.

as i stood there, my eyes fixed on the figure beyond the treeline, i felt it again. a sense of dread washing over me. the deer, still motionless, seemed to be waiting for something to happen, their eyes fixed on the figure with an unnerving intensity. a figure, shrouded in darkness, didn't seem to be moving. just stood there, its presence seeming to fill the entire yard. yet i couldn't make out any features. only thing i could sense, was its eyes on me..boring into my skin. suddenly, the lead deer took a step forward, its hooves clicking on the pavement. the others eagerly followed. their eyes fixed on the figure as they moved closer. a sense of unease growing inside me, as if i was witnessing a scene from a horror movie. the deer, now gathered at the edge of the porch, seemed to be waiting for the figure to make its move. i, on the other hand, was frozen in terror, unable to do anything but watch as the events unfolded before my eyes. i could only stand there, my heart pounding in my chest.

and then, just as it had appeared, the figure disappeared. vanished from thin air. the deer, still gathered at the edge of the porch, seemed to relax, their ears twitching nervously as they sniffed the air.

that’s when it finally hit me. i had to get out of there. i grabbed my keys and made a run for my car, not stopping until i was miles from my house. i looked back in the rearview mirror, i saw the deer gathered in my yard, their eyes glowing devilishly. i knew then that i would never be able to go back to that house again.

i’m sitting in a dennys parking lot writing this down in case they find me. if you ever find yourself living alone, near the Appalachian Mountains, don’t look further. don’t look into the woods. if you hear something, pretend you didn’t. save yourself and learn from my mistakes.

stay safe folks. i’ll try to do the same.

I never believed in aliens. Not really. Sure, I’d binge-watch Ancient Aliens like everyone else, but it was always just entertainment. That was before the signal. Before everything changed.

It started three weeks ago. I’m an amateur radio astronomer—just a hobbyist with a backyard setup. I’d been scanning the skies for years, mostly picking up static and the occasional satellite blip. But that night, I caught something different. A repeating pattern, faint but unmistakable. It wasn’t random noise. It was a signal.

At first, I thought it was a glitch. I recalibrated the equipment, checked the software, even rebooted my laptop. But it was still there. A series of pulses, precise and deliberate. My hands shook as I recorded it. This was it. The moment every stargazer dreams of. Proof that we’re not alone.

I uploaded the data to an online forum, hoping someone could help decode it. Within hours, the replies flooded in. “This is huge,” one user wrote. “It’s coming from Gliese 581,” said another. A red dwarf star, 20 light-years away. I stayed up all night, poring over the comments, my heart racing. This was history in the making.

But then, things got weird.

The signal changed. It wasn’t just pulses anymore. It was… a message. At least, that’s what the experts said. They couldn’t translate it, but the structure was too complex to be natural. I felt a mix of awe and dread. What were they trying to tell us? And why now?

A few days later, I started hearing it. Not through the radio. In my head. A low hum, like a distant engine. At first, I thought it was stress. I hadn’t slept much since the discovery. But the hum grew louder, more insistent. It wasn’t just noise. It was a voice. Or something like a voice. It didn’t use words, but I could feel its meaning. It was calling me.

I tried to ignore it. I stopped using the radio, unplugged everything. But the voice didn’t stop. It was always there, whispering, tugging at the edges of my mind. I couldn’t eat. Couldn’t sleep. I was losing myself.

Then, the dreams started.

I was standing in a vast, dark chamber. The air was thick, almost liquid. In the center of the room was a machine—a massive, pulsating thing covered in shifting patterns. It looked alive. The voice was louder here, echoing in my skull. “Come closer,” it said. Not in words, but in sensations. I could feel its hunger, its curiosity. It wanted to know me. To understand me.

I woke up screaming.

The dreams came every night after that. Each time, I got closer to the machine. I could feel its presence, cold and alien, probing my thoughts. It was studying me. Learning. I tried to fight it, to shut it out, but it was too strong. It was inside me.

Last night, I couldn’t take it anymore. I went back to the radio. Maybe if I sent a signal, I could reason with it. Beg it to leave me alone. I tuned the equipment to the same frequency, my hands trembling. The hum in my head grew louder, almost deafening. I pressed the transmit button.

“Please,” I whispered. “Stop.”

For a moment, there was silence. Then, the machine appeared.

Not in the room. In my mind. It filled my vision, its patterns shifting faster, more violently. The voice was a roar now, overwhelming, consuming. I fell to my knees, clutching my head. It was too much. I was going to die.

But then, it stopped.

The machine vanished. The voice was gone. The room was silent. I sat there, shaking, tears streaming down my face. I don’t know how long I stayed like that. Hours, maybe. But when I finally stood up, I knew it was over.

I haven’t heard the voice since. The signal is gone too. I’ve checked every frequency, every channel. Nothing. It’s like it was never there.

But I know it was real. I can still feel it, deep inside me. A faint echo, a shadow in my mind. It’s watching. Waiting. I don’t know what it wants, or why it chose me. But I know it’s not done with me. Not yet.

I don’t sleep much anymore. When I do, I dream of the machine. And I know, one day, it will call me back.

Until then, I wait. And I pray it doesn’t find someone else.

Hello everyone. I don't normally talk about this or even allow myself to think about this at all. However, seeing everyone else in this sub relay unusual stories without judgment has persuaded me to tell this story. Besides, it feels fair to Eliza to finally get this out there.

Just for some context, throughout school, I was somewhat of an outsider. I wasn't in the "unpopular, bullied loser" category, though. There were certainly a few kids like that in my school system until high school when most of the bullies of the grade calmed down quite a bit and took to just making fun of people behind their backs so as to avoid a lasting reputation as a bully. At least, that's what I think. I was just an outsider. I remember a few kids trying to test me in elementary school a couple of times; I just didn't back down the first time, and the second time, I punched the kid in the throat. It wasn't a hard punch, but it was quickly determined, I hope unconsciously, that there were much easier targets to deal with. This makes me sound like some macho tough guy; I most certainly am not, unfortunately. If given the chance, I would have to define myself as an "introvert with a sullen demeanor that's actually polite" instead. 

I sat alone through school and didn't really make friends until 7th grade. Our second period was math. I'm not a genius, but I'm pretty hard-working, and the general inefficiency of the American school system, especially down there in the deeper parts of the South, allows for minimum effort with top grades. I would do my work quickly, and then I'd just read or draw something in the back for the last two-thirds of the class. I was drawing a picture of Hellboy on some notebook paper; I had just seen the Guillermo del Toro film when the principal walked in with a girl at his side. He called out to all of us:

"Hello everyone! This is Eliza, she'll be joining your class. She's new, so be nice."

He put some stank and an evil eye on that last part, and then he started talking about where she was from and how he knew she'd like our class and other stuff like that. She was already pretty tall, she had dry-looking, long, black, curly hair, there seemed to be bags under her eyes already, and she had a scar from a cleft lip. I saw some of the girls give each other a "she's gross and I'm trying to tell you I'm normal by visibly acting like she's gross" look while the principal was still talking. I think she saw this, but she didn't look embarrassed or sad; she just looked tired and resigned. Slowly, most of the other people in the class gave each other similar looks, but I still didn't. Then we looked at each other. There wasn't some sort of cheesy love look or blushing of the cheeks; we just locked eyes for a moment before I looked down and got back to drawing. 

Finally, the teacher got done yapping, and he walked out, leaving Eliza still standing in the doorway. The teacher gave her a moment before he said:

"Just sit down wherever."

She walked over to the seat in front of me and sat down. The teacher stood up, walked over, and handed Eliza the work we were doing.

"Help her with what we're doing today if she's behind, okay?"

"Yeah, no problem."

She wasn't behind; I suppose her old school had higher benchmarks because she told me she was working on the stuff we were doing a year ago in her sixth-grade class. She burned through the sheet of basic geometry in 10 minutes before turning around to talk to me some more.

"Is that Hellboy?"

"Yeah, I saw the movie last night with my Mom."

"That's nice! My dad took me to it a couple of days ago."

"Did you like it?"

"Yeah! It was kind of gross, though."

I laughed.

"Yeah, but I think that's part of the point for some people."

We went on talking about movies, then bands, then food, and so on for the rest of class. Our shared love of metal and bad movies made us friends quickly. I could tell a lot of great stories that we had through the short remainder of middle school up till a couple of months before the end of our senior year, but that's not really what this story is about. We never had any sort of relationship beyond being friends, and we both never dated anyone throughout the rest of our time in school, but I like to think near the end there were some signs of a blossoming relationship, but now I'll never know.

We had a lot of shared hobbies, again the love of similar media, but we also both liked to read, though I was much more of a fantasy guy, and we both loved exploring. Originally, it was just walking through the woods, but around early junior year, we took to exploring the unending supply of abandoned buildings around our area.

This was actually a pretty regular pass time in our town. There wasn't much in our area in the way of hangout spots and fun stuff to do, so it was pretty much either bowling, playing games at home, or wandering around. It was somewhat stigmatized by the police; some of us "explorers" had taken to keeping a close watch on the obituary pages and local word on who'd recently died. After that, they'd break in and ransack the house before families came to collect the deceased's belongings. Me and Eliza never took to that, but I guess the attraction of untouched life savings and perhaps a lesser feeling of guilt because the person's already dead got to some people. But, for the most part, all of us stuck to actual abandoned buildings.

We started with seriously decrepit spots; there's lots of old barns, I mean like 50+ years old, scattered around for people too nervous for old houses to start with, but we quickly got over that and started into some of the more interesting places. We checked out an old chapel with a basement with a bunch of old church documents, a small abandoned paper mill, the two abandoned Dennys, and various abandoned houses. We even went to a notorious trailer where a woman got murdered by two meth heads. It was all really fun, and we got a lot of great Polaroids and b roll horror footage out of it.

As I said, the cops weren't the happiest with this pass time, but they had other problems, and as long as we didn't cause any actual issue for them, they left it alone. However, there was one place that was not effectively forbidden. It was some old office building-looking place; we'd snuck down there to see it once, and it didn't have an official name. The cops just told us, "Stay away from that building a couple of miles back behind the old chapel, alright?" They always seemed to say that in such a cryptic and serious way. In the absence of a title, it came to be called Tartarus. A bit cheesy, I know, but its name was effective for creeping out middle schoolers and freshmen.

One of my buddies, Larry, said he went in there once. He told me he took one step in, heard some odd noises, and got the hell out of there. He said, "I don't know, man, something was wrong with that place." Even though Larry was a sleepy pothead, that pushed us to stay away for a while. 

By the end of our senior year, Eliza and I decided we weren't going to college to waste thousands of dollars just to have no guarantee we could get a job we'd probably hate. We decided we were both going to the local trade school, a decision that both our parents supported. They let us know they'd put us through it as long as we had jobs and paid some rent. With all this in mind, we both realized that we probably wouldn't have time for exploring as much if we weren't already tired by the end of classes and shifts, not to mention we were both turning 18 soon and would lose much of the leniency of the local police and court system for trespassing. Therefore, Eliza started talking about one last trip to Tartarus.

I remember us sitting at lunch talking about it over a week before. There we were, like normal, at the back corner of the lunch room, where small groups of people like us sat. By this time, we'd both gotten a bit more used to social interaction, and we were on good terms with most of the other "cliques" in school; we even went to some parties here and there, but we still preferred being a quiet duo. At the right end of the table were the "hackers," kids who thought logging onto the dark web to order LSD and phishing their way into the principal's email made them hackers, and on the left end were the back-backwoods kids, if you know what I mean.

Eilza'd gotten even taller, the scar on her lip had faded, but it was still there, and she looked even more tired for some reason, but she was always upbeat. I miss her so much now.

"I don't know, Eliza, we've already gotten our share of the urban exploration thrill; maybe we should just let it go or visit some of the old spots one more time."

"Yeah, you're probably right, but it just sounds so cool. What if we just went into the lobby like Larry did? If something's up, we'll bail."

We went back and forth like this for the rest of that lunch period and for a couple more after, finally:

"Alright, well, if we're both carrying our knife, our phones, and you've got your pepper spray, I'm in, but seriously if somethings weird, we leave, alright?"

"Yeah, of course!"

And then we were there, in my run-down truck, just a half mile from Tartarus.

The walk there was uneventful from what I remember, but we both remarked how, just like when we came to just look at the building, there were no noises from animals or birds, and it was just a couple hours past noon still. That already made me try to convince Eliza to turn back with me.

"Well, maybe a wolf pissed nearby or something, it's probably normal, right? Again, we're just gonna check out the lobby. Come on!"

Basically, you come out of dense trees straight into an oval-shaped clearing with this small office building on its back edge. The rest of the clearing in front of the entrance has no trees, but the grass does get somewhat grown up. We assumed that every once in a while, the police must've trimmed it down when they came out to inspect it, or maybe, being government property, they still had to keep up with it some here and there.

We walked up, and I tried the door with a knot slowly forming in my stomach. It wasn't locked or anything; it opened, and inside was a dusty front lobby. There was a large wooden receptionist desk, moldy cushioned chairs, and a dead rat in the corner. That sounds simple, sure, but I quickly understood what Larry meant. The atmosphere was dense; it felt that as soon as I entered, my vision had just slightly condensed somehow, and there was this horrible quiet stillness. Also, I could just barely pick it up, but I smelled something. Something odd. It wasn't strong enough to describe at that point, but it definitely wasn't a good smell. Eliza broke the silence.

"I get what Larry means."

"Yeah, I know."

We meandered there in the lobby, looking around cautiously and opening the desk drawers for a long time. But Eliza was too curious.

"Well, it feels weird in here, but I still want to see a little more."

She asked me to come along with a look.

"There's not even gonna be anything here, though. It's unique, yeah, but it's just some more dusty space-"

"Exactly! There's nothing special here, so we'll just go up a floor, look around for a second, and then head out."

"No, Eliza, let's just go."

As she would sometimes do, she ignored me and acted as though I'd agreed. She started walking towards the hallway behind the receptionist's desk.

"I'm out of here. Good luck!"

Sometimes I would hold myself to ditching her like that if she was being this way, but she called my bluff this time. No one should explore an abandoned building alone. Still, I tried to make it sound real. I shuffled around loudly in one of the side rooms we hadn't looked into, and then I loudly tried the front door to sound like I was leaving. I say tried because it wouldn't move. Between the double doors was a slight gap which the sunlight was peering out of; between the gap, I could see that something was stuck either on or between the two handles outside, and by how little the door would give, it was something solid. It hadn't been there before.

I was exploding with stress in an instant, but I kept calm. You have to, especially in dangerous environments. I quickly went to the window beside the front entrance; when it wouldn't open, I picked up one of the chairs and threw it at it. It was hard plexiglass. It wasn't gonna break that easily. I turned around and made my way down the hallway Eliza had gone down.

We'd been in similar situations like this before; we'd explored too far into a part of the old chapel that was hard to get into and even harder to get out of, and once, we'd even encountered a homeless junkie. Through these situations, and others like it, I learned that you can't freeze; you have to keep moving and keep thinking no matter how badly your muscles are seizing up from stress. I must've looked kind of funny, if not also a bit alarming, as I speed walked down the hall with a deadpan face save for wide-open eyes.

She wasn't on the bottom floor or in the little side rooms and offices beside the stairs. I wanted to call out to her, but I felt too afraid to break the silence. Finally, she called out to me.

"John?"

I could tell there was fear in her voice, and she'd gotten quieter. I climbed the stairs and made my way to the break room she was in. She was in the doorway. When I'd gotten over and peered my head into the room, my stress nearly doubled. There was some sort of ritualistic circle on the floor. The window of the break room was broken open, not big enough to squeeze out of, and it was still a plexiglass window, and a breeze was flowing in. The circle was drawn with salt, and the breeze was gently and slowly, ruining the circle. In the middle was an eye with odd lines drawn around it, like tentacles or like the lines kids draw on the sun. On the perimeter of the circle were candles, and there had to have been a hundred of them lining it. I didn't count, but the circles started being lit at 12:00 and ended somewhere around 6:15.

I was still behind Eliza, still in the doorway, peering over her shoulder. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw movement. I looked over. For just a second, I saw someone, or something in hindsight, looking out of one of the offices down the hall. It looked like a person, but they were wearing a mask, a very tight mask. The mask only had eye holes, and it appeared to have been made from the mismatched pelts of various animals, but behind that mask, I saw wide dead eyes staring straight through me before they slid out of view from the open door.

I looked around frantically for any other signs of danger. I was so stressed by this point I felt sick, and that odd smell had gotten much stronger now. 

"Did you see that?"

"See what?"

"Someone was down the hall."

She paused for a moment before shifting out of the doorway and turning towards the stairs, grabbing my arm to pull me with her. I pulled back.

"The front door's been barred, and the windows won't break."

Eliza was tense before, but now she was frozen. What could be done? There was no exiting, we didn't have phones, and there was someone, someone wrong, here in the building with us. The only thing I worked out in my head was that we'd have to find this guy, and since he was probably the one who barred the entrance, we could get him to show us another exit.

"Look, do you still have your pepper spray?"

"Yes."

"Get it out. I got my knife. We'll be alright. Whoever locked us in can get us out; we just gotta go confront him, c'mon."

We were both afraid, but again, we'd been through stressful situations before, and I guess she knew I was right. We started walking down the hall together towards the side office I'd seen their head pop out of. Unfortunately, it was not a side office. It was a staircase. After a moment of hesitation, we headed down. Measuring levels by the height of the stairs leading to the second floor from earlier, we must've gone down three more levels past the first floor. There were other floors on each level, but their doors were caved in with rubble. The bottom floor really gave credence to the name Tartarus.

The atmosphere was even denser. My vision seemed even more processed and slightly red, and the smell, God, the smell. It was strong enough to be recognized now, but it's not possible to describe it. All I need to say is that it was completely foreign and nauseating. 

It was, just like the second floor, a hallway with little side rooms. This floor was not illuminated by the bright sunlight outside and the multiple windows. Instead, there were buzzing fluorescent lights overhead. At the back of the hallway was what looked like at the time: an office with frosted glass windows. When we opened our door, the office's door closed.

There seemed to be little other choice. I did think about going back and trying to claw my way through the plexiglass with my knife, but this seemed like a faster, more direct option. We started walking down the halls. Most of the side rooms were old server rooms, with dusty metal cabinets full of archaic computers, archaic for 2004, but some of the side rooms were simply black pits of darkness. For all we could see, they could have gone back 10 yards or 10 miles.

About halfway through, that level's door closed, and the hollow metal chunk echoed painfully loudly through the hall and down those dark rooms and much farther than I would have liked it to. I still didn't see any other option, especially when we heard a small click from the door's lock, so we just kept going towards the office. When I was finally standing in front of it, my hand just a few inches from the knob, my vision felt so distorted it was like a red magnified screen had been placed over them, the smell was so powerful I could barely stand it, and there was an alternating hum in my ears. 

"Don't, John."

Eliza's voice was barely even a whisper. But it was too late; I was here now, and I almost felt compelled to, and I suppose I may have been, in hindsight. Maybe I was going to open that door no matter what.

It was a rusty and empty room. The floor was either bare concrete or covered in dirt. At the end of it was an odd metal door, or hatch really, with a loose chain attached to it at the top. At the very back left corner of the room was a ladder leading into a trap door to another level; at the top of the ladder, I saw a man's legs.

"Hey!"

I ran forward to try to climb up and catch him. When I had gotten halfway there, and after Eliza had followed me just enough to get out of the doorway, the legs quickly disappeared up the closing hatch, and the office door slammed shut behind us. 

It's hard to describe how I felt. I can tell you all about how I froze and how my throat felt dry and all that, but it won't relay how horrible I felt. I never got a word from Eliza about how she felt at that moment. We were trapped, and figures were now collecting behind the frosted glass windows. Many figures of many different shapes and sizes. Most seemed human, but some didn't seem to have the right shape. I don't mean just a missing arm; I swear that, admittedly, through a frosted glass window, I saw some of them with missing heads, with impossibly crooked spines, and a couple were rotund in anatomically inaccurate ways, at least for one person. However, this is all beside the point now. The chain had begun to lift.

I looked over at Eliza; she seemed 10 years older with all the stress on her face. She was crying, there were stress lines across her face that wouldn't look out of place on a 90-year-old, and she was hyperventilating. I ran over to try and comfort her, but then the chain tightened, and the metal hatch had begun to lift.

Somehow, the smell had intensified once again, and there was some horrible noise that was coming out from behind the hatch. It was like a moan from some animal that can't exist, like some ungodly mix between a goat, an alligator, and a cat, and intermixed with the moan were the distorted and weak cries or screams of different people.

After the hatch was halfway up, I saw it coming out of the darkness. Imagine a large eye; I can't compare it to any animal's eye you'd know in a mass of sickly green flesh. Surrounding the eye on the rest of the body were human heads morphed into the flesh. They were all crying or screaming. Some of them warned us to get away, and some of them begged for help, but most didn't even seem able to speak. I'm sorry, but I'm not comfortable describing it in any more detail. It's already been too much to write that.

It was coming towards us faster than it should have been able to without legs. We both panicked when it was just a few feet from us. I ran to the left, and she ran to the right. That was the only difference. It decided on her, for some reason, and she was cornered. Eliza started screaming.

"JOHN, HELP ME!!! OH GOD!!!"

The hatch was still open. I heard her scream when it finally had her, and I ran down the tunnel it came out of. I heard her screaming for me to come back and not to leave her there, but I just kept running. I heard her yells echoing for a long time. I think it was a long time. It felt like I was in that cave for hours.

It's all like a fever dream now, but I remember hearing these odd noises around me. I kept stepping on something soft and wet, only to hear it cry out, similar to how the monster had. The cave was thin, and, thank God, there was no light for me to see anything around me or to see where I was going, so I just kept my hand on the wall beside me while I kept running. I stumbled over these small masses of otherworldly flesh and over rocks until I saw the light.

I had come to the end of the cave, and I was standing in its large opening. I remember there being an altar, a worn-down stone altar with the iconography of the monster and the circle I saw earlier. There was one depiction of the eye, bare and covered with flames, falling out of the sky, but there was another one, now covered in more heads than it was covered in when I encountered it, and its eye was projecting some portal or rift, and there were winged eyes flying and small headless cat-like creatures coming out of it, but behind them was something large, and its skeletal seven fingered hand was reaching of the portal.

Now that I think about it, it was still daylight outside, so I couldn't have been running through the cave for too long. Again, it's all still like a blur, getting down the little hill the cave was housed in, going towards the road I'd seen in the distance from the cave's head, and having the police called on a freaked out and dirty teenager on the side of the road just aren't memorable details considering what had just happened.

I wish I could tell you about some sort of closure to this horror, but I don't have anything of the sort for you. I told the police what had happened, every detail of it. It wasn't like they gaslighted me or brushed me off or something. They just lied and knew I knew. They came to the house one day, talked to my parents in private, and then sat me down and told me Eliza had died falling through the floor, exploring Tartarus. When I argued, the officers simply got up and left without saying another word. My parents made me let it go, but they never told me what the officers had said to them, and these days, I'm not sure I'll ever bother to ask. And I haven't heard from Eliza's parents at all. She never even had a funeral. 

I still think about her. I pray she's dead or perhaps that I was hallucinating, but I fear that she's still down there. Screaming and crying with all the others. 

I'm sorry, Eliza, but I'm not going back.

I'm not joining you.

I'm not stepping another foot in an abandoned building ever again.

Forgive me.

I got out of prison six months ago, and I’ve been scraping by ever since. Spent a few weeks in a shelter, then another one, then a few nights in the park when I got sick of the smell of piss and desperation. Eventually, I landed here—a crumbling little house on the bad side of town, the kind of place where the cockroaches own the lease and the wind howls through holes in the drywall. It ain’t much, but it’s got a roof, and after what I’ve been through, that’s something.

But ever since I walked out those gates, I haven't felt alone.

I keep seeing him—Susan.

Yeah, you read that right. His name was Susan. He was my cellmate for two years, a wiry little guy from Mississippi with a slow, syrupy drawl and a grin that could charm a snake. He used to say he got the name from his grandma, who named him after some long-dead uncle. "Old family tradition," he told me, like that explained anything.

Susan was a Satanist. Not the kind that just wears pentagrams and listens to heavy metal. No, Susan believed. He used to sit on his bunk for hours, eyes closed, whispering things under his breath. He said our bodies were just rentals, that the real us was something bigger, something waiting to break free.

"You ever feel it, boy?" he'd ask me, voice low and conspiratorial. "That tug at the back of your mind? Like you ain't really in your skin, like somethin' in you is strugglin’ to wake up?"

I told him he was full of shit.

Three years ago, he hung himself in our cell. No warning, no note. Just tied a bedsheet to the bars and stepped off the toilet like he was boarding a train. I remember the sound his neck made. It was quiet. Too quiet.

I didn’t think about him much after that. Not until I got out.

Now I see him.

Not full-on, standing-in-front-of-me see him. Just flickers. A shadow in the corner of my vision, a shape in the bathroom mirror when I look away. And his voice—God, his voice.

"Well, ain't this just pitiful?"

He talks to me like he used to, all honey and hellfire, like a televangelist working a crowd.

"Look at you, scroungin' in the dirt like a goddamn insect. Ain't you tired? Ain't you ready to rise?"

I try to ignore him. I tell myself it’s PTSD, a guilty conscience, whatever. But he won’t shut up.

And the worst part?

He’s starting to make sense.

At first, it was just little things. I’d catch myself thinking about what he used to say, about how the body ain’t nothin’ but a cage, about how the soul is meant to ascend. Then I started feeling it—the tug he talked about, like something inside me is straining against my ribs, desperate to break loose.

Last night, I woke up to the sound of my own voice.

I was whispering. Chanting.

The words felt familiar, but I don’t know what they mean. I bit my tongue so hard I tasted blood just to make it stop.

I’m scared.

I don’t want to end up like Susan. I don’t want to wake up one day and find myself standing on a chair, a noose around my neck, stepping off into nothing.

But I can feel him, pressing closer, curling around my thoughts like smoke.

And I’m starting to wonder if maybe—just maybe—he was right all along.

I’ve heard of a place, a so-called Forest of Fears, and decided that it would be our next hiking destination. Carl, Petra and I loved hiking, and this place was said to be filled with mystery. I had heard whispers about it from locals—stories that it fed on the fears of humanity. We thought it was all just an urban legend designed to keep people away, to protect the forest from government influence, or so we thought.

The forest had a name, but we’ll just call it The Forest of Fears for now. The rumors said that strange things happened there, and I wasn’t sure what to believe. Still, the allure of something unexplained drew us in. We started our hike, laughing and joking, dismissing the stories as just that—stories.

It wasn’t long before Petra noticed something strange. She pointed at the trees and said,

"Look, there’s a pattern. Faces... faces in the bark."

I laughed, ever so skeptic.

"It’s just pareidolia," I told her, explaining the phenomenon: the brain’s tendency to see familiar patterns, like faces, in random shapes. "Nothing more."

Petra wasn’t convinced, but Carl decided to take a picture to shake off the creeping unease we were all starting to feel. He grinned, holding up the phone, and we posed.

"Wait, look at this..." he said, sounding rather terrified.

"The expression on one of the faces in the tree had... changed, it now looked like it was smiling."

But when we checked the tree ourselves, it appeared unchanged.

“Stop it, Carl. This place is already creepy enough. You don’t need to scare us further,” I told him, trying to dismiss the unease crawling up my spine.

But as we ventured deeper into the forest, the faces became more detailed, more humanoid. We still tried to brush it off, telling ourselves it was all in our heads, until something caught Petra’s attention.

“Do you see that?” Petra whispered, pointing to a vague figure in the distance.

I turned and froze.

The figure resembled Petra’s little sister, who had passed away long ago due to illness. It was distant, too vague to make out clearly, but the shape—her shape—was unmistakable. And then we heard it—a faint, childish laugh.

Before we could react, the figure bolted into the forest. Petra tried to chase after her, but we grabbed her.

“No, Petra! We need to go back. It’s getting dark, and those stories... maybe they weren’t just legends,” I said, trying to calm her down.

We started heading back, but something was wrong. The forest felt alive, almost as if it were shifting, changing around us and even watching us. The path had vanished. The trees seemed to move, blocking our way. We couldn’t go back.

And then I saw it.

A vague figure in the distance, standing tall among the trees. My heart sank. It was my father—my abusive father. He was massive, his form feeding off my deepest fear: the fear of losing control.

"You can't hide behind your mother now," his voice boomed, sending a cold chill through me.

Petra and Carl saw it too. We couldn’t stay. We turned and ran, faster than we’d ever run before, but the forest only grew denser, the trees closing in. The panic set in, and we realized we were lost.

In our haste, we lost Petra. She was gone, vanished into the trees. The forest seemed to swallow her whole, and the fear that had been creeping at the edges of my mind began to intensify.

Carl's breathing became erratic. He stopped running, his face pale, his eyes wide. He was frozen for a moment, and then he started to shake.

"She's gone... she's really gone... I can't... I can’t lose anyone else."

I turned back to him, trying to hold it together. I could see the panic in his eyes, and it made my own heart race. Carl had always feared losing people dear to him. It had always been his biggest fear—losing someone close. I’d never seen him so terrified before.

I grabbed his arm, trying to steady him.

"CARL, CALM DOWN. She can’t be too far away. We’ll find her. Just stay with me."

He shook his head, his body trembling.

"I—I can’t... What if she’s gone for good?"

The dread in his voice was overwhelming. I pulled his hand yelling "we will find her!" and then we continued running, screaming out her name, but there were no signs of her.

And then, we stumbled upon it.

An enormous tree loomed in front of us, its bark twisted and deformed. The face that stared out from it wasn’t just any face—it was Petra’s. Her face, contorted in fear, was etched into the tree’s trunk, distorted and warped by whatever dark force was at work in the Fearwood.

We stared at the grotesque image of Petra, but then, I felt a cold hand grab my shoulder from behind. I froze, a shiver running down my spine. That touch... I’d felt it before. It was familiar, a voice I thought I’d left behind long ago—my father’s voice.

Before I could react, the tree before us seemed to shift. The bark rippled, and there, next to Petra’s face, was my own. My face—twisted, contorted by fear—right next to my best friend’s.

At that moment, I knew. The Fearwood had claimed us too. We weren’t leaving, and our faces were left to be seen by the very next curious hikers.

You'll need context for this, so here's the first part.

Comments in the first post have asked very good questions. Is Christopher an alien, a robot, an empty husk. Truthfully, I still don't know, and I don't know what's scarier. The not knowing, or finding out the truth.

The months have passed in the way a day can. Slow, syrupy, agonizing, the clock on the wall refusing to move. Yet dizzying and quick, each moment forgotten in the next. Time has not made things easier.

Disclaimer, if there are any typos or mistakes, it’s because I’m typing this out on mobile in a chair on the porch while my husband is asleep in bed. I’m really hoping I can finish this in one sitting. For those of you who recall, I made a post about the odd circumstances

Christopher, my husband, is maintaining the charade around our son Bry so easily that it makes me question if that night outside the bathroom had ever even happened. Every so often, I catch him looking at me in a way he never has before. Neither drunkenly, nor sober and renewed by Regen Services. Unreadable and blank. Even his old rages didn’t make me shiver the way these stares do. He doesn’t look at Bryan this way, and I hope that just means that Christopher is less inclined to keep up the appearance of a normal man. This is impossible; the old Christopher was never this kind and charismatic. Everyone has noticed.

Friends are chalking it up to his recovery from his previous “incident.” A stroke, which sent him through a glass window from the upstairs, and paralyzed him from the neck down from the impact with the ground. We’re pretending that he got some breakthrough spinal and neurological surgery. Who would question the recovery of a man so deathly ill and suddenly back from the brink? I, however, cannot stop questioning it.

Regen Services had myself, my parents, my in-laws, even Bry, sign a contract of total silence — letting it slip what the procedure entailed would involve a massive lawsuit we could never afford to recover from. We all understood. Cloning was hardly a stable procedure, and after the free service they provided we weren’t in a place to bite the hand that fed us.

Christopher denies it, but he’s been having intense dreams, something his old self never experienced before. He rolls in bed, he struggles, he fights, he talks. He talks.

“No,” he says most nights. “It’s dark...I don’t want to go…not enough room...”

Sometimes, he whimpers. “I’m burning.”

“Lost,” he says every time he sleeps, without fail. These are just a few things he speaks in his dreaming. Most disturbingly, tonight, “We can’t tell her...she...burn.”

I don’t know why I consented to the Regen procedure. Had I known what my life would become after it, I wonder if I would have said no. If I had to pin a reason, I’d have to place it on the fact that I didn’t want to be found out for poisoning him. To be jailed and leave Bryan alone in the world. At first, it was just a little, to make him sick of drinking and sober up. Then, it was punishing. For once, he wasn’t targeting me. In fact, he even needed me. It was nice to have him depend on me in a way that didn’t hurt. In hindsight, I’m repulsed by what I’d done, and as much as I could try and blame it on the years of abuse, they were still conscious choices I had made each time I tipped the blue liquid into his stiff drinks.

I realize I’m admitting to what I’ve done on a public forum, but given the circumstances, I doubt anyone would truly believe even one tHing I have to say. Maybe that’s for the better. At this point, I would dread risking anyone else by getting them involved.

Things didn’t click for me right away, which the adage about hindsight being perfect once something goes awry certainly applies. I think the technical term, though, is I’m a dumbass. Maybe I was just looking for a sense of normalcy to hold onto, confirmation that things were finally resolved after years of agony. All the same, it’s on me for not seeing things for what they were as they were happening.

A few weeks ago, Bry and me were out in the yard. He was at his practice goal, shooting pucks into the net. Or trying to, half the time. He’s aiming to be on the team again now that he’s going into his sophomore year. Kid’s so lucky he got his father’s stocky physique. I was out putting down salt on the driveway while Christopher shoveled the excess from the last snow off the edges.

“What happened?” Chris seized my hand up, where red scratches lined the backs of my knuckles, too odd a place to bandage.

“Neighbor’s cat.” I took my hand back. “He usually doesn’t come around, but I think I scared it when I was pruning the bushes yesterday. He jumped out and got me.”

“They look deep,” he frowned. “Did it bite you, too?”

“Yeah, but I cleaned the cuts well. They’re already scabbing over.”

The mechanics of the moment are blurry, but best I recall, Bryan’s puck somehow bounced off the frame of the net and over his head, even though he moved for it. Next I knew, I was off my feet, spun round in a tight grip. When my brain caught up to the moment, I realized that Christopher had lifted me off the ground in a single arm. ThE puck was clutched in his hand; he’d caught it.

He stalked up to Bryan, anger that even at his most drunk was rarely directed toward the back of our son’s head. Now, his expression was something I was familiar with. Not processing how improbable it was that he was able to not only move me out of harm’s way in the time it took to take a breath, but to catch the puck midair like he was fucking Mike Tyson. (I just googled it, I guess I meant Michael Jordan, Mike Tyson is the ear biting guy.) I slunk out of his arm and stood between the two of them. Bryan hadn’t even turned around yet.

Christopher’s face immediately dropped. Not angry, not regretful, just...nothing. Like the face he made in the mirror when he memorized his old memories.

“You nearly hit your mother, Bry.” He threw the puck over Bryan’s head and it bounced off the garage door to a rolling stop in the snow on the yard

“Sorry!” Bry apologized, and picked the puck up in his red, freezing hands. “I was just thinking about going inside. Fingers are numb. I’m gonna make some hot chocolate.”

“Cinnamon in your mother’s,” Christopher agreed for me. “Chocolate syrup in mine.”

“Oookay, wasn’t an open invitation, but yeah, I’ll make them.”

I glanced around once Bry was inside, checking for neighbors, and stared up at him, heat in my eyes.

“What the hell was that?”

“He almost hit you.”

“On accident,” I clarified. “Never, and I will not yield on this, never look at my son that way ever again.”

“Our son.”

I flinched without realizing, reminded for the first time in days that this man, indeed, is not my husband. Not really. But isn’t he? He has his face, his hands, his body, his voice. Even if it is all...cloned.

His memories. The way he refers to himself as if the Christopher I married was a separate person, could that be the way he processes the apparent memory loss from the procedure? I consider this, even now, sitting in the freezing dark and my ass cheeks going numb. I’ve done a little Google detective work, searching for instances of memory loss how some visualize relearning memories. A few describe seeing it as if sitting in a theater, watching a movie play that they only somewhat recognize. I don’t know how to broach the topic with Christopher. Especially after what he’s done just over the past week.

My son, despite his stature, has been bullied at school off and on throughout his life. The primary issue is his stuttering. He’s mostly conquered it due to speech therapy and finding a group of friends through making it onto the hockey team. Those kids are Loyal, through and through, but they can’t fight all of Bry’s battles for him. The other thing that adds fuel to the fire — my son is gay. I have no issue with it, despite growing up a southern Appalachian farm girl. Feels like we get a rap of being bigoted and closed-minded. Maybe I fall just on the right side of that particular country apathy — I don’t give much mind to any aspect of a person so long as they work hard and keep kind while doing it. Bryan believes in God, and still attends service even after Chris and I stopped going to church, and this is his journey to take, however it lands him. My job is to love him anyway.

Kids at his school aren’t always that accepting. He’s had the N-slur, hard R, thrown at him when out around town, or at school when no faculty was around to overhear. I’m half black, and Bry inherited my father’s textured hair. He used to wear it in a few styles that didn’t hide his heritage, but since starting high school he’s started shaving it down just short of bald. I can see the way it hurts daddy whenever he and mama come round. I thought this progressive city’s with pretty neighborhoods were supposed to be better about these things, but no. And, of course, they were blatantly homophobic to Bry as well.

“There’s a couple other gay kids at my school,” Bry once said. “But the way they’re treated isn’t half as bad as I get it.”

Especially that shit-eating Tyler. I’ve never met a Tyler who wasn’t awful in some way, but the Wilke’s son took the cake, and someone else’s cake, too. Well-known for randomly egging houses year round, but especially in the weeks leading up to Halloween. He destroys mailboxes by driving his expensive car into them. Regularly shoplifts and shakes his peers down for money. It’s even rumored he threw something into a trashcan fire some homeless people were using to keep warm. It caused the flames to burst out of control and burned one woman so badly that she lost use of her hand. The police hate him but, predictably, he’s the mayor’s son. Or nephew, from what I’ve heard. Adopted after his drug abusing parents abandoned him as a toddler. If he wasn’t such a demon I’d probably care.

Bry came home three days ago covered in deep bruises, eyes nearly swollen shut from his broken nose.

“Oh my God!” I screamed, jumping over the back of the sofa, nearly falling on my face from the tangling of blankets that followed with me. “What happened?!”

“I’m...fine…” Bry stumbled for some paper towels and pressed the wad to the blood pouring out of it. “I think I need to go to the hopsital,” he mispronounced the word with his swollen lips.

“Chris! Chris!” I wailed, hands fumbling around, trying to find a place to put my hands that wouldn’t hurt him further.

Christopher came down the stairs in a quick, but even tempo, almost robotic in hindsight. When he found us in the kitchen, his face burned with rage.

“What happened?” His voice was cold and level, a stark contrast to his expression, I don’t know how both things could exist at the same time.

“Walking home,” he breathed between statements, nose too swollen to breathe through. “Car. Hit me. Sidewalk. Can’t seee...”

Bryan went limp, and between my screaming and blood freezing, somehow Chris got us to the hospital faster than any ambulance could.

x

The ER team brought him back, and the several hours of him being treated dragged on. The police asked us questions, but I hardly heard them through the roaring in my ears, a sound like being outside on the wing of a plane as it flew. Besides, we didn’t know much. They followed us as we followed the doctor to see him in his room. He was covered in bandages and hooked up to tubes. His left are was in a sling. Broken. He wouldn’t be able to play hockey for months, and it was easy to deduce it was his primary reason for the tears down his face.

“Tyler. Wilkes.” He bit out the name through the brace on his chin. His jaw was dislocated, apparently. “Please.”

“Don’t let him get away with this,” I pleaded to the officer taking notes.

“Son, easy now.” The other officer put his hands in his pockets, stance uneasy. “Why do you think it was him?”

“He just told you,” I said. “Arrest him.”

“We need evidence. Camera footage, or an eye witness.”

“He is an eye witness!” I flung my hand toward my beaten boy.

“We all know that’s not how this works,” the note-taking officer sighed and put his pad of paper away. “Even on the television.”

All this back and forth, and Christopher silently watches.

“His. Car.” Bry grunted out, new tears of obvious frustration contorting his face. “Please. Help!”

“Listen,” one of them leaned in to Bryan, true sympathy on his face. “We’ll do what we can. This is...if it is him, this is something new, worse. We might be able to get him. Might. I don’t want to get your hopes up, kid.”

I sat beside Bryan as he sobbed brokenly in time with my own tears. The officers left, telling us they’ll keep in touch. As if that mattered.

“They’re never going stop him,” I whimpered, head in my folded hands. “He’ll kill someone someday if they don’t. Oh, Bry. Bry.”

I cried myself to sleep in the chair, and I regret it even now, in a way. I would have seen Christopher leave before visitor’s hours were over. A nurse checking in on Bry ended up waking me, but honestly I needed it. I’d fallen asleep at the worst angle. I stepped out of the room to call Chris. He didn’t answer. I tried again, moving to the waiting room, and still got no answer. Maybe he’d gone home to sleep in his own bed, but even then my gut instinct was that something was wrong. Regardless of why, I’d be angry if he left me stranded here without a car. When I finally got hold of him, dawn had broken on the horizon.

“Hello?” He was out of breath, I had figured he was on a morning run.

“Where are you?” I hissed in a whisper.

“I had to take care of something at home,” he tried to regain his breath. “How’s Bryan?”

“You left when our son is in the hospital?” Something inside rang with wrongness, not for the first time.

“I had to take care of something at home,” he repeated flatly. “I’ll be back soon as I can.”

I dragged my hand down my face. When I looked down, I realized Bryan’s blood was on my clothes. I nearly threw up.

“Fine. When you do, I’ll go home and get a shower.”

We hung up. I went back to Bry, and waited for Chris to return.

It did no good Pretending I didn’t know what was going on, but I have to remind myself these circumstances were beyond abnormal. The second night Bry was in the hospital, Tyler Wilkes was mugged. Beaten within an inch of his life. Police assumed it was a baseball bat that broke his legs. There were no such things as coincidences with Christopher anymore.

A few hours ago, I brought the kitchen trash to our big bin. The smell hit me with such a thick, deep rank I don’t think I’ll ever forget it. I knew before I found it. What I found. God, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what will happen from here on out. I don’t know how things will get worse from here in out. They can only get worse.

In a bag wrapped in a plastic bag, wrapped in another plastic bag, wrapped in another plastic bag, in one of those thick thermal bags you can get to insulate food from the grocery store — bloodied clothes, and worse:

The neighbor’s cat.

When I was ten years old, I drowned in a lake. 

I was gone for eight minutes. No pulse. No breathing. The doctors said it was a miracle I survived without brain damage, let alone survived at all. My parents called it divine intervention, they were religious after all.

But I wasn’t the same after that day. 

Not just because of the flashbacks, or the fact that I stopped going near water entirely. Hell, I couldn't even shower for weeks after–I know, gross. But something else was wrong. 

I stopped sleeping. Completely. 

At first, the doctors thought it was trauma. My body was flooded with adrenaline, making rest impossible. They ran tests, kept me overnight in sleep studies, even put electrodes on my head to monitor brain activity. But, the results just confused them. 

My brain acted like it was sleeping. It cycled through REM patterns. My body entered the rhythms of someone in deep sleep. But I was awake—fully aware of every passing second, every movement around me.

I should have been exhausted. Delirious. Unable to function. But I wasn’t. I never felt tired. I never needed sleep.

It should have been a real gift.

That’s what people told me when I got older. “Imagine all the time you have now!” They said. “No wasted hours!” and “Think of all the hobbies!”

But they don’t understand. They don’t know what happens when a person is awake for too long. Because we’re not supposed to be. Because there are things in this world that only come out when we sleep.

And if you stop sleeping, they notice.

At first, it was small things. I’d see flickers in my peripheral vision. Shadows that disappeared when I turned my head. I thought it was just exhaustion manifesting in weird ways—except I never felt exhausted.

Then, the whispers came. 

I’d hear them at night, murmuring just below the threshold of comprehension. If I turned on the lights, the voices stopped. If I played music, they slipped beneath the soundwaves. No one else heard them. No one else understood what was happening because, well, it was just so inconceivable. I mean, you see it in horror movies, but those are just movies.

Then, they started getting closer.

One night, when I was sixteen, I woke up to find a man standing at the foot of my bed. This was the first time I had seen ‘them’.

He was tall and thin, dressed in a black suit that looked soaked through, as if he had just climbed out of a lake. His face was… wrong. Not distorted, not monstrous—just wrong. Like something had copied a human face but got the details slightly off. His lips were too thin. His nose too sharp, too long. His skin too smooth.

But his eyes—-His eyes weren’t there at all. Just two hollow voids, darker than the rest of the room. I wanted to scream, to move, to do something—but my body was locked in place. I don’t know how long we stayed like that. Minutes? Hours? I didn’t blink. He didn’t blink. He didn’t even breathe.

And then, just as the sun began creeping through the blinds, he vanished. Like I wasn’t even worth his time. Like he was just checking on me. Watching over me, making sure I was safe.

After that, I saw them everywhere. 

A woman in the reflection of my bathroom mirror when I got up in the middle of the night, watching me with her mouth stretched too wide, like she was screaming in silence.

A child sitting on the floor of my room at 3 AM, smiling as he looked at a toy car dripping in water.

A thing—a shape I can’t even describe because it was wrong in ways my brain couldn’t comprehend—perched on my ceiling, its head crooked like a broken marionette.

They never moved when I looked at them directly.

Just watched.

One night, when I was eighteen, I got brave (or stupid) enough to whisper, "What do you want?"

The man in the soaked suit smiled—slow, knowing. ‘You’re not supposed to be here.”

I didn’t know what he meant. I didn’t want to know. But I do know this—every night, people all over the world close their eyes and sleep peacefully, unaware that something watches over them, keeping them safe. 

Because something does.

And I think I was supposed to die in that lake. I think whatever governs the space between wakefulness and sleep—the thing that lets people drift into unconsciousness safely—I think it missed me that day.

I don’t think I was supposed to come back. And now I’m stuck. Awake in a world where I was never meant to stay. Because sleep isn’t just rest. It’s protection. 

And when you stay awake too long, they start to notice. They realise you can see them.

And now, after twenty years of sleepless nights, the whispers have changed.

Not a warning. Not a threat. Just a fact.

"Time’s up."

I don’t move. I don’t breathe. Because for the first time since I was sixteen years old, they moved. The man in the suit tilts his head, just slightly. The woman in the mirror curls her too wide mouth into a smile. The child on my floor stops smiling.

And the thing on my ceiling—it climbs down.

They were never watching over me. They were waiting.

And now, I finally understand.

I wasn’t supposed to come back that day. 

And tonight, I won't.

If we had a normal asphalt driveway instead of a concrete one, I probably wouldn’t have even noticed it. But the bloody tire tracks stood out starkly against the pale concrete.

And they were clearly coming from my vehicle.

I froze in place. The golden light from the garage spilled out from behind me, illuminating them. They were dark and thick at the end of the driveway, fading to pale pink as they got to the garage.

I must’ve hit something.

I swallowed. I hated hitting animals. In fact, I’d only hit one animal in my entire life—a squirrel that ran under the tires before I could even blink. The blood was so fresh and dark at the end of the driveway—I must’ve just hit it on our road.

I crouched to the ground, my heart pounding, fearing I’d see the mangled body of some poor raccoon or something stuck to my tires. But there was nothing. Just the blood.

I walked down to the bottom of the driveway and glanced around, turning on my phone’s flashlight. But I didn’t see anything. Just the empty street dotted with cars, lights glimmering on the houses across the street, people moving inside as they got ready for dinner.

Huh.

I looked down at the thick, fresh, shiny blood imprinted on the concrete.

Maybe it’s… paint? Or a puddle of discolored water?

I finally went inside, somewhat unnerved. Said a quick hi to my husband and started heating up dinner for myself.

I watched the bowl twirl in the microwave, but I wasn’t relaxed. The longer I thought about it, the more it didn’t make sense. My husband and I had hit animals before, and we’d never made tire tracks of blood before. I mean, did a squirrel or raccoon even have that much blood?

Maybe it wasn’t an animal.

Maybe it was a person.

No. I pushed the thought out of my head. That’s ridiculous. I couldn’t run over someone without even realizing.

But my eyes aren’t on the road a hundred percent of the time. I never check my phone, but I have to use the stupid touchscreen to adjust the heat. What if someone ran out while I was adjusting it? What if I ran them over without noticing?

What if it was a child?!

No, no, no. There is no WAY I wouldn’t have noticed hitting a person. Even if it was a child. I would’ve felt a bump. I would’ve seen something. I would’ve—

“You okay?” Dave asked, walking into the kitchen.

“Yeah,” I muttered.

“You’ve just… your food’s been done for a while. And you’ve just been staring at the microwave.”

“There’s blood on my tires, for some reason.”

His eyebrows raised. “For some reason?”

“I guess I hit an animal or something. But it couldn’t have been far from the house, because the blood would’ve worn off by then. But I don’t see any animal out there. It’s just… it’s really weird.”

“That is weird,” he said.

We faded into silence. I ate some. But it still… it still bothered me. What if I hit someone and it didn’t kill them? What if they’re crying for help right now, half alive, and they’re going to die unless I get them help?

Someone else would hear them, right?

I would hear them?

… Right?

“Give me a second,” I said, getting up and walking towards the garage.

“Okay, sure.”

I walked back out to the driveway. The blood was still there, shining gold in our outside lights—but duller, now, as it began to dry. I swallowed. That’s a lot of blood.

If it is blood at all.

Okay, just shut up, get in the car, and drive.

I backed out of the driveway, and slowly drove down our street.

If I did hit something, it wasn’t far. The blood would’ve worn off the tires before I pulled into the driveway, if it were far. It had to be somewhere on our street—if it even happened at all. I drove slowly down our street, high beams on. I scanned every nook and cranny that the headlights barely reached: shadows pooling under cars, a pile of leaves and sticks.

I didn’t see anything.

Maybe you hit an opossum, or something, and maybe a fox already came by and snatched it for dinner.

We did have a lot of foxes.

That was the most likely thing.

But then—wouldn’t I see a blood smear on the road?

But the road was dark. So maybe not.

Either way, there was no half-dead person crying for help in the middle of the road—so my mind was at ease. I sighed and pulled back into the driveway. You didn’t hit anything. Everything’s okay. Everything’s fine.

I was so distracted in my own thoughts that I pulled into the driveway crooked. Sighing, I put the car in reverse to fix it.

No.

In my backup camera.

There was a dark, tangled mass at the end of the driveway.

Pale limbs. Dark hair. Contorted in a way that looked wrong. Dark, shiny liquid seeped from the person’s abdomen.

Nonono—

I just drove there, that wasn’t there—it wasn’t—

I blinked, and it was gone.

I sat there for a minute, my entire body shaking. Then I put the car in park and slowly crept towards the end of the driveway, peering around the edge of the car. My legs were weak underneath me. I clung to the side of the car like a mountain climber clings to the side of a mountain, every step feeling like I would tumble down and never get up.

I got closer, closer, closer—

Nothing was there.

The driveway was empty.

No person.

Just the same bloody tire tracks from when I first pulled in.

I leaned against the side of the car, relief flooding me, my legs almost giving way.

Just my imagination.

It’d looked like a woman. With white clothes and dark hair. Tangled and crumped, bent unnaturally, my mind barely able to tell what exact position she’d been in. But I’d… I’d misinterpreted what I saw. Maybe a trash bag or some leaves blew by. And my brain, in its panicked state, said it was a woman who’d been run over.

Because I was staring at that spot, the spot where she’d been lying, right now. There was absolutely nothing there.

I finally turned around and made my way towards the front of the car. But as I took a step—I saw it, on the concrete, clear as day.

Hair.

A lock of dark hair, poking out from underneath the car.

Nonono.

It can’t be.

I lowered myself, inch by inch. It’s just a stick. Dead grass. Something. My heart pounded so hard I saw stars. I leaned down—but I still couldn’t see if anything was under the car. I got down on my hands and knees, and took a deep breath.

I can’t do this.

Oh, God, please, let there be nothing there.

My arms and legs shook. I stared at the lock of hair, just a few inches from my hands. Not sticks. Not leaves. Hair.

Please, no—

I pressed my cheek to the concrete and looked under the car.

A woman stared back at me.

Nonono—

Her hand shot out and yanked me under.

The concrete scraped my back. The metal chassis of the car bit into me. But she was so strong. In seconds I was staring up at the dark metal underbelly of the car, claws digging into my arm.

I was screaming.

My screams sounded so small under the car.

And that’s when I realized… I was alone. The woman was gone. I was lying flat on my back, under the car, alone.

Squelch.

I turned—the concrete painfully scraping my scalp. I could see two pale, blood-soaked feet in the gap between the car and the driveway. Like the woman was just… standing there… next to the car.

Then she turned and walked away.

Squelch, squelch, squelch.

Seconds later my husband came barreling out of the house. He helped me out from under the car, absolutely panicked. “What happened?!” he kept asking, but I didn’t have a good answer.

I’d almost think I imagined it—if it weren’t for the bloody bare footprints, staining the concrete. Fading to pink as they meandered into our garage.

I don’t think I’ve ever run over anyone.

But how can I know for sure?

"God damnit I know I had a lighter around here somewhere"

I looked down at the passenger floor for the third time in as many minutes. Sadly, having just cleaned it for the first time in a month, I could see clearly that there wasn't a lighter that had gotten away from me.

"And I just left the shop. I don't wanna stop again" I whined out loud again to no-one in my truck.

The day had already been such a long day. After 11 hours on the roof in the heat, dodging tempers of ornery journeymen while trying to keep my own in check, my pre-roll was calling my name. It'd only take a minute to stop at a gas station but, as I felt the dried sweat and roof grime making my forehead tight, I didn't want to go into another store.

The light turned green, and I ended my search to focus on driving. The sun was coming in at the worst angle; just low enough that there was no point in even trying the visor. I aimed my eyes towards the pavement and tried to take in my surroundings, half with my peripheral vision. I was only 20 minutes away from home but damnit that just so happens to be the perfect length of time to smoke, take the edge off the day, and mentally prepare for the chaos I was going to walk into at home. Lucy had been with all five kids by herself for now going on 13 hours and was desperately in need of a break herself. This recent good weather was going to make for a nice paycheck, but I hadn't had much energy left to play by the time I get home.

"That pre-roll would really help on that front. I can't believe I don't have something to light this with"

As I came up to the intersection the light changed from green.

"Fuck it. I'm stopping on yellow"

I pulled open the center console, out of sheer stubbornness, and proceeded to rifle through the change and random papers. Another car pulled into the right lane as I spotted my saving grace.

"Hell yeah! I knew I had something"

I picked up the branded book of matches I had grabbed from the dispensary on fifth weeks prior.

"Knew I would need these eventually"

I struck the first match of the book and watched as the satisfying flame guttered for just a second and then caught. I watched as it licked its way towards my fingers and enjoyed the smell of sulfur or phosphorus or whatever it is. With a practiced flick of the wrist, I put out the flame and added the still smoking end of the match to the pile of butts in my ashtray.

"Cleaned out the whole truck and forgot the ash tray"

The joint stuck just a little uncomfortably to my lip as I spoke. I checked my mirror and the light again. Still red. I tore another match from the book and struck it once, then twice. I flipped it over and tried a third time. The little flicker of flame grew brighter as I brought it to the end of the joint and pulled. As I inhaled, I flicked out the match and placed it on top of the previous one. I looked through my passenger window to see the car that had pulled up beside me and made eye contact with the driver as I held in the hit. Sometimes I think that was the last time I ever inhaled because it feels like I haven't exhaled fully since.

The car was unremarkable (A Honda something I think) but I will never forget the driver. He was wearing an undone white button down with a white undershirt. The outfit was either new or hardly worn. They had that stiff look of clothes that haven't quite settled around their owner's shoulders. The stark white cuffs of the sleeves contrasted with the gnarled hands of a man who'd spent a life working with them. He had black hair flecked with grey you could only see because of the sun hitting it. The man had fair skin that wasn't quite pale. The kind that would burn but never tan. He was fit bordering on underweight, almost gaunt but not weak looking. He appeared, as he looked me eye to eye, to be about the same height as me.

In those eyes I saw...everything all at once. His eyes were opened to the point of looking like it hurt. Bushy eyebrows so high up his forehead as to seem like they were trying to climb away. I could see the whites of his eyes all the way around his iris almost bulging outward as he stared. The angle of the sun showed piercing blue that nearly glowed with a manic intensity. a cloud blocked the sun for a moment light made a shadow appear to flicker from inside the neon eyes darkening from blue to black as if reflecting the match I just put out. The corners of his eyes aimed as high as they could but after a lifetime of wear still pointed just ever so slightly downward. like his eyes tried to smile and frown at once. They were eyes that had seen and would see more than could be imagined. Eyes that couldn't ever unsee again. Unmoving, and unblinking, and unreal. Focusing on me as if trying to make me see what they had seen. Reaching out to me like they were trying to force the images they had been shown out of them and into me through sheer force of eye contact.

I tore my eyes away from those pools of what I knew instantly to be insanity and all of the hairs on my body stood on end. I couldn't look away from the driver though as my eyes simply moved downward to his smile. It was as if his face was longer than human. Like there was more than could be taken in all at once. It was as if I could only deal with one facet of his expression at a time. While his eyes held me, I hadn't seen the grin. His mouth was spread so wide that the edges of it almost touched the creases at the corners of those awful eyes. You could see not only every tooth but black hollows of his cheeks beyond them. Teeth clenched together so tightly the muscles of his jaw writhed like snakes under his skin. An expression that could only technically be called a "smile" because I had no other word for it.

As I tried, unsuccessfully, to look away from the other car, some still rational part of my brain questioned if the light was still red and how long I had been sitting there. Smoke I had forgotten I had pulled in forced its way out and I coughed but still couldn't bring myself to move consciously. I was pinned in place by the smile I could feel more than see through the cloud now in my passenger seat. As the smoke cleared, I saw the man held a book of matches of his own. He struck the match (perfect light on the first try) and simply set it down out of the view of the window. As his white shirt yellowed and darkened I saw he hadn't just put it down. And still he "smiled". As white on white turned to red and brown, he "smiled". As red and brown turned to black, he never stopped "smiling".

Part One

Part Two

In the next moment it lunged at me like a viper, but without moving at all. An invisible spike of cold intent stabbed at my mind with a force that almost whipped my head back, nailing me to the seat. As I reeled from the assault, it began picking through my thoughts, patiently searching for something very specific. 

I stared at the thing in my lap as my body sank into deep shock. It tilted its head and smiled a thin smile, head nodding serenely as it stabbed at my mind with its thoughts. Through waves of outrage, I gaped at it, unable to move.  

I could see now that everything about it was unnatural.  The way it breathed, the way it slowly blinked its eyes. Its body was small and frail, but the very air around it radiated with a potent strength.  

Now that my eyes were adjusting to the light, I could see that its own eyes were deep set and knowing, devoid of pity, and they glittered at me from their sockets.  

I can’t begin tell you how much I wanted to get away from that thing. Every nerve and muscle screamed at me to get far away from it. That instinctive voice screamed at me to run.  

Kill it if you can, but run.  

The other thing I felt was pure dismay. That’s the only word for it. The very fact that this thing existed filled me with a dread that I can’t express. Knowing that it crawled the earth was bad enough, but being trapped in this small space with it… having it touch me… feeling its cold, invisible tendrils burrow their way deeper into my mind… ‘Violated’ is the closest word I can think of to describe how I felt, and that falls very, very short.  

Its mind swarmed with a darkness so foul that I dared not examine it any closer. My eyes continued to look ahead at the weak vessel perched on my legs. As it sifted through my memories, I could feel how immense the true nature of the thing was. It surrounded me, enveloped the car and surrounding bushland outside. The radius of its presence must have reached a kilometre at least. Now that I was connected to it, I could sense all of the animals who quivered within that radius. They clung to their branches and flattened themselves against the earth, instincts reeling against the vast intruder. The trees themselves groaned at the transgression of it, and the grass screamed. 

I don’t know how I managed to do it. I’d never been in a situation remotely like this, an internal fight for survival, but for whatever reason I instinctively exhumed some Taylor Swift lyrics and thrust them into the searching, ice-cold tendrils that scooped and picked at my memories. The thing’s smile faltered as it was forced to process the lyrics one word at a time, as I silently shouted them.  

While it was brushing aside this inane string of words, I sensed a brief gap in its assault and I took it. Willing my body to act, I lunged at it with my left hand in one swift movement, my right hand flicking the driver’s door unlocked. I had to grab this thing by the neck and smash its head into the dashboard.  

But it was quicker than me.  

I’d managed to get the door unlocked, but before my left hand could close around its neck, it flooded my mind with its memories. Centuries of them. They gushed into my head - a cacophony of sight and sound, faces and rooms. 

Looking up out of a crib. Bumping along a road in a baby carriage. Endless baptisms. A procession of mothers crying, screaming.  Hundreds of them… and fathers… siblings. Hundreds of hundreds.  

My skull felt as it was about to burst, and my arms fell limp at my sides, dead as my tongue. The force of its immense will rode behind the flickering memories, rising like a monolithic tidal wave. This wave eclipsed my own will, engulfing it, washing it away to nothing. I knew in that instant that it didn’t yet know my name, and that’s what it needed to control my body.  All the same, it could overwhelm me with its own vast memories to the point where I would be crippled physically.  

The thing closed its eyes for a second, and I could feel it abandoning its search through my memories and it began picking at the frontal lobes of my brain, digging for my motor cortex. It began gathering up the threads of me that carried the signals to my limbs in its spindled mind-fingers, like a spider savaging another’s web. It gripped at these untended threads of me with a workman-like familiarity. I was reminded of an old woman I’d once watched skin a rabbit in Peru. She had carried out the operation with such sure-handed ease that she must have committed the dull atrocity hundreds of times.  

-Thousands.- 

The thing casually projected the word into my head, not bothering to speak out loud now that we knew each other. It gathered up the last threads of me like a puppeteer picking up a dropped marionette, and it squeezed.  

My senses screamed in protest as the last shred of control was crushed from me, the flow of command from my mind to my body pinched off like a kink in a hose. I knew that I would be unable to move until it released its grip.  

The connection between us meant that I could sense other things now. I knew somehow that it couldn’t access my memories while it was squeezing this conduit closed. And it didn’t care that I knew.  

Every nerve in my body sang with raw outrage. It was the worst, most intimate abuse that I had ever suffered in all my short years, and I tugged at the threads of myself with all my might.   

-Mine. -

The thing stated it as fact, and so it was. The wave of that terrible word thundered through me, dragging me with it. My mind screamed a hollow note as I lost my grip. 

It had me now, and it crawled into my mind like a greasy spider. 

I was suddenly saturated with the sour taste of the thing as it showed itself to me. It pointed to the jumbled chaos of images, sounds and thoughts - the legion of memories that it was now cramming into my mind.  That first wave was nothing compared to this. I turned my focus towards them, searching for a weakness. In the chaos, it allowed me to know a few truths: 

This thing was ancient. 

It had no name.  

It had travelled here long ago on a wooden ship.  

Folk tales had only guessed at its true nature. 

It needed mother’s milk to feed.  

The resentment that it felt towards humans for being dependant on us to survive was a bottomless pit of seething revulsion. It especially loathed women with a fiery hatred that I can’t begin to describe.  

It grew tired of me probing for answers, and it silenced me with more words, not bothering to speak them aloud. 

-Where is he?-

It cocked its head at the dark window. And internally conjured up the face of the man who’d been outside the car.  

-I don’t know. Outside somewhere-

There was no point lying to this thing. I couldn’t tell exactly which of my thoughts it could still monitor.  

Beside us, Natia twitched in her sleep under her purple coat. Her dream had caught an echo of the thing as its will pulsed from its soft head, penetrating rock, tree, flesh and mind. I could feel Natia retreating into her sleep for refuge, deeper. Deeper. 

The thing ‘spoke’ again. 

-You’re not ready to be a mother. But you could be.-  

It showed me a series of young women from its past, smiling down as it fed. A carefully curated stream of memories that felt worn, like dog-eared pages in a favourite book. This was its adoption pitch.  

-I can make you happy- 

It flooded my brain with sweet endorphins, and I felt my body relax, smiling despite myself.

-That’s it, pet- 

My smile faded. It was doing something to me now, manipulating the settings deep in the core of me.  

My breasts began to ache.  

-Oh God no- 

-It takes only two sunsets. I’ll be very hungry by then-  

The thing smiled a bitter imitation of a smile. It’s hard to describe how sickening it is to see such an insincere expression on the face of a baby. It licked its lips.  

-I will NOT!-

I shouted back into the abyss with all the strength of thought I had left.  

-Fuck you- 

It didn’t like this. 

The ‘smile’ evaporated on its lips, and its tiny red tongue disappeared back into its mouth. Its eyes closed and it wedged a new kind of image into my head. It played out like a movie and branched out into dozens of possibilities. Every one of them began with me killing Natia. One strand saw me drag her twitching body into the forest and driving off into the night. Another had me waiting by the road covered in her blood, held in place until a passing car found me. One showed me scalping Natia with my car keys and wearing her hair as a hat.

It could tell which of these scenarios upset me the most because they soon shone brighter and sharper than the others. The clearest, most vivid ones involved me eating Natia’s heart by the side of the road. For a full half hour it showed me these possible futures, painting each one in lurid detail.  

-Insult me again…-

It nodded towards Natia, who slept on peacefully. Then it showed me a selection of young women that it had actually forced to carry out its vilest fantasies.  Brief red scenes of abject horror swam into view. I will never forget them. 

A procession of families it had defiled through the centuries, its victims making victims of their loved ones.  

It had forced them to eat and eat until their gullets were clogged with flesh. Now it flashed me the glimpses of the remains, labelling each one in turn: 

Husband… wife… wife… daughter… twin 

-See?-

It showed me how it had made them smile as they did it. 

-See?- 

-Yes. Very creative- 

-More?- 

-Please no…- 

-Manners, then-

-Yes. Okay. Manners. I see. Yes- 

Natia stirred again. The thing did not break eye contact with me. A few minutes ago I had wanted with all my soul for her to wake up and save me from this malignant little fucker. Now I prayed that she stayed asleep. There was no telling what this thing would do to her. I had to get us out of this. Somehow.  

There was something about its threats that felt hollow…false somehow. It didn’t have my name yet. Most of the memories it had shown me featured young women that looked like me. And yet… it hadn’t exerted this control over me and forced my body to perform its twisted acts. Why? I could sense that it desperately, urgently wanted me to be its little meat puppet. It needed the key to fully control me, and it didn’t have it yet. 

DON’T LET IT KNOW YOUR NAME 

The cold thing in my lap twitched. It didn’t like my new train of thought. It syphoned fresh horrors from its memory into mine. These brief scenes flooded into my skull on an endless black tide. Each one had been preserved and examined thousands of times by their creator, and bore the careworn taste of cherished memories. A toddler eating his baby sister. A nosy priest forced to chew on the shards of a mirror. A woman puppeteered into peeling the soft skin from the underside of her wrist with a potato peeler and feeding the twisting skin to the family dog.  

And then there were the births.  

It had clearly crawled up inside dozens of young women through the ages to simulate a natural pregnancy and it treated me to a first-person view of its many harrowing deliveries. It had been saving these. The number of suspicious midwives that it had disposed of once they’d remarked on the lack of umbilical cord and placenta were in the thousands.  

It began to tell me that my own birthing scene would soon be added to the collection and I knew immediately that this was not just a hollow threat. It was going to crawl into me feet first whether it could puppeteer my body or not. It would hold me in paralysis until it was ready to be ‘born’ if it had to. Everyone I knew would believe that this thing was my baby, and if I told them otherwise, it would not end well for me. I knew it in the marrow of my bones that this was my future.  

I stared through these new horrors, telling myself they were just a trailer for some forced-birth horror movie that I had no interest in watching.  

I pulled my thoughts out of their spiralling tailspin of panic. I needed to distract this thing in a way that still allowed me to think and plot an escape. Song lyrics had worked… I needed something I could recite mindlessly, on repeat. I quickly settled on the alphabet.  

I thought-shouted my ABCs slowly and with great purpose, firing each letter into the middle of its face. It grimaced, and began to internally swat the letters away. I experimented with a faster pace, thinking each letter in a monotone. This was less effective. Was it the sing-song nature of it that did the job? The alphabet was basically just… what was it? Twinkle, twinkle little… 

-Be quiet!-

Wait… you know what would be even worse/better?  Happy birthday.  

I began shout-singing Happy birthday in my head, making sure to conjure the most obnoxious singing voice I could muster.  

I felt the thing release its grip on me. Just a crack. My arms and legs tingled. I could twitch my fingers. The thing had closed its eyes, and I could feel it slip through the crack it had just made and rummage around in my mind again with its ice-cold fingers. It was desperate now to find what it needed while it batted away at my happy birthday to yous. 

My name.  

That’s what it needed to drive me. Otherwise I was just a car without the keys.  

-happy birthday, dear… babyyy…- 

I was dangerously close to singing my own name there but I focused on the dark, furrowed face in front of me and sang to it so that my own name couldn’t enter my mind. 

Shit. How long could I keep this up?  I sang until I had four renditions completed and was rounding on the fifth. Why had I picked a song with an interchangeable name in it? I had to change the channel. In the second it took me to discard ‘Happy birthday’ and reach for ‘Pop Goes the Weasel,” the thing seized on my momentary lack of focus and scurried deeper into my head, searching for the key.  

Nothing.  

I started skipping round and round the mulberry bush and the rummaging halted. It really, really hated this one.  

-the monkey stopped to pull up its socks…- 

‘What in the fuck?!’ 

Natia was awake. She rubbed lazily at her eye, staring at the newborn baby sitting upright in my lap. She smiled a sleepy smile.  

‘Girl are you seeing this?’ 

The bloated slug of my tongue pushed against my teeth. I could barely move it, much less conjure speech. 

The thing turned to Natia and opened its blue eyes wide, in an adorably comic act of cutesy surprise.  

‘Hi,’ it simpered. ‘What’s your name?’ 

Natia’s head retracted, eyebrows poised in a quizzical ‘the fuck did you say to me?’ kind of way.  

Her face dropped and she turned to me, ‘Girl, what did I tell y...’ The words trailed off as we locked eyes. Tears streamed down my face and fear poured out of me. I was in a fight for my life, and she saw it immediately. 

I felt half of its focus seep out of me and gather itself before stabbing into the depths of her. It happened in less than a second. My vocal cords were released and a sob escaped my chest. 

My hand fumbled blindly for the door handle.  

Natia convulsed beside me. A single jolt. The thing had kept a spike of itself tethered to the base of my skull, and through this sinewy thread I sensed that it was quickly gathering up the threads of her. It had her completely, and it shrieked her name over and over again into the deepest recesses of her mind. How?  How had it found her name so quickly? I kept singing loudly inside the breached confines of my head. My skull rang with it.  

-…pop goes the weasel-

The thing turned its small, vast, terrible, delicate head towards me, eyes glinting with the purest spite.  

-I’ll have her get a name out of you, pet- 

Whatever it was doing to Natia, it was almost done. She would be its instrument, and together they would torture my name out of me. There was no way I would be able to fight her off - even if I wasn’t in this weakened state.  

I knew that it had already ruled out Natia as a possible surrogate. It found the very idea of breast feeding from her brown skin repulsive beyond comprehension, and it disliked being inside her head very much.  

She was fighting back. Hard. It needed to dedicate more of its strength to finish the job on her.  I could hear the distant echoes of her fighting through the thin tunnel that still connected me to the thing in my lap. Her will was strong. She raged and stormed against it, pushing back with every ounce of strength she had. The baby shook with the effort of penetrating her iron mind. Suddenly, I felt the thing release me so that it could dedicate every ounce of its resolve to the battle. I knew that she was no match for it now. The thing shook with the power of its renewed assault.  

The baby surrendered its grip on my motor cortex, but kept a spike of itself deep in the base of my skull, to monitor my thoughts. Now released, my limbs flooded with blood, and they prickled with a million pins and needles.  My hands were mine again, and I went to seize the shuddering baby by the throat so that I could throw it out into the night where it fucking belonged. But my arms flailed at the air in a weak spasm. I knew then that it would take time to regain full control of myself. The front part of my brain felt bruised and crushed.  

A blast of cold night air ripped into the car with a load ‘thunk.’ Before I knew what was happening, an arm reached into the car through my now-open door and grabbed the baby by the throat, ripping it from my lap and yanking it out into the howling night.  

The man had returned. I swung my head towards him and saw that he was standing in the rain and wind, holding the little beast at arm’s length.  

‘Let ...them g..go!’ He shouted.  

The baby writhed and gasped, its tiny legs kicking at the air.  

‘Tony... let...go!’ it cried in its little voice, ‘Die!’ The air around them rippled with the invisible force of its commands. 

Beside me, Natia cried out as the thing withdrew completely from our heads, wrenching itself from our minds. It felt like someone had just yanked an ice pick from the base of my skull. My mind felt like an open wound. Natia screamed for both of us.  

Once we were free, the man quickly scooped the thing into his arms. 

‘…nuh no!’ My mouth felt like someone else’s.  My head lolled towards him.  

‘Kuh… k..kill tha’ fffeck..’ 

The thing screamed in its baby voice and thrashed weakly in the man’s arms. He spoke loudly to it.  

‘I’ll t...take you back to her… just…’ He wrestled with the thing. Its frail body was no match for his strength.  

‘Just leave them alone.’  

Natia fumbled with her car door, throwing it wide open and stumbling out into the night. The wind rushed through the two open car doors, finally gaining entry.  

The man shook the thing by the throat.  

‘Leave them ALONE!!’  

‘You k…kill that fucking thing RIGHT NOW!’ Natia screamed.  

She stumbled around the bonnet towards the man and the defenceless baby/thing that had just defiled us.  

The man took a step back.  

‘Just ...stay c..clear.’ He shouted.  

‘I’m sorry.’ His voice broke, ‘So sorry!’ 

Natia gripped the edge of the bonnet for support, panting and gathering herself together.  

I clenched and unclenched my fists. 

‘L…let thum.. g…go!!’ I shrieked.  

I could still feel the strength of the thing’s influence radiating from it, saturating my wounded, gaping mind. It was like being drowned in sour milk. I needed it far away from me, to be out of its cruel radius.  

Natia looked at me. Her face blanched at the sight of me. One side of my face had slackened, my left eye sagged. I could barely see out of it. She started to cry.  

As the man was turning to head back towards his car, parked somewhere ahead in the dark, I caught a glimpse of something pale scurrying up his chest to peer over his shoulder.  Over the roar of the rain and wind I heard its harsh little voice.  

‘Natia!’ 

She froze, mid sob and stared at it.  

‘Eat her.’  

The air shook with the command, and the rain that fell between them vibrated itself to mist.  

The man stumbled, shouted something and smothered its mouth with his hand, bolting into the night.  

Natia stood perfectly still, staring at the spot where the man and baby had been, water vapour swirling around her. I willed my legs to move. I needed to be running. NOW.  

I'm not exactly sure how I got here. One minute, I'm going to sleep in my apartment like always. Next, my eyes open to a dark small room, almost like a closet. A door is on one wall, but it doesn't look like a closet door. It almost looks like a front door, of a house. You know, the ones with the squares? But no window on it. I can't quite make out the colours, my eyes are adjusting to the dark as best they can. The handle of the door is round, can't tell if there is a lock, just the doorknob. I’m sitting on carpet, unsure of the colour but it feels like an office carpet. Not very comfortable, more made for function than anything. I'm wearing my pajamas that I wear to bed, nothing in my pockets, no watch because I don't wear it at night.

I get up off the ground and stand on my feet. Was I drugged? Did someone kidnap me? No, that can't be right. I live alone, unless my dog did this which I highly doubt. I mean, I do live in an apartment building, but I don't have any issues with neighbours. Nor are there any creepy ones, at least that I'm aware of. Well, unless you include 308, but I think they are some stoner kids living with a parent. I don’t know, it’s usually a couple of teenagers who always seem paranoid and one older woman. Maybe it’s a sex thing? A Sugar Momma? Ugh, I don’t want to think about that right now. I go to open the door, and the knob turns but doesn't open. I try pushing, pulling, lifting, but it doesn't budge. That's strange, maybe it's stuck? Or maybe it is locked and I'm in danger?

Some time passes, I'm sat on the ground just listening, waiting. If someone really has brought me here, there must be a reason. Eventually, they will have to show up and explain, right? But what if I'm a target, a victim? Maybe I was taken by some maniac who plans on sacrificing me? Is human sacrifice still a thing? Or is that just in movies and shows? Can’t be real. Either way, I can't keep waiting. I decide to call out "Hey! Anyone there? I'm stuck in this room!". Silence. I bang on the door and continue calling out. The stillness of the air is my only response.

Dread creeps over me. Why is someone doing this to me? Am I the only one? Is the room soundproof? That must be it. It makes sense if you kidnap people to put them in a room no sound can escape from. But, if I am to be killed, it's not in this room. It might be dark, but there's nothing else in this cramped space except me and this door. Wait, what about a light switch? I feel my hands along the walls in hopes of finding anything different. The ceiling isn't out of reach, so I try there too, hoping for a light source. But I find nothing. Everything feels flush and smooth, definitely purpose-built. It really is a small space, with nothing besides a door. What is going on? What about a toilet? Am I expected to shit on the floor? This feels so inhumane.

Panic starts to set in. I'm going to die here. I've been kidnapped, and whoever did it wants me dead. They don't even have to kill me, they can just wait it out. What kind of sick and twisted individual would do such a thing? Or, is it more than one? Is it a group? How should I know? I just want out! I can't stay here! Life was going well enough for me, I’ve been seeing Abigail for a few weeks now, my job had a management position open in the office above me that I applied for, and I get on well with my family and friends. Why is this happening to me? Did I do something wrong? Did I upset the wrong person?

All of a sudden, I hear it. Voices. From past the door, maybe in a different room? They aren't loud, so not too close by, but close enough that I can get help! "HEY!" I shout out. I bang on the door, the walls, anything to get attention. "PLEASE! HELP ME! I'M TRAPPED IN HERE!" I continue banging and banging. The voices continue talking, and even some laughter. I can't quite make out what they are saying. "PLEASE! I DON'T WANT TO DIE IN HERE! DO YOU WANT MONEY? I'LL PAY, JUST PLEASE LET ME OUT!" I plead and shout for what feels like 20 minutes. The voices carry on talking and laughing, my cries go unheard. Or are they ignoring me? Did they put me in here? Are they responsible? Those sick bastards! I start ramming my body against the door, hoping I can break free. I ram a few times, then try kicking the doorknob. Anything, I have to try anything to escape. I don't understand why they won't help me. Can they even hear me? How can I hear them if they can't hear me? I exhaust myself with trying to break the door open but only hurt myself in the process. The voices eventually fade away, who were they? My right arm and shoulder hurts and my foot aches from kicking. I sit back down and just sob.

My mind continues to wander. How could someone have kidnapped me? They must have broken into my apartment, but I would have woken up from the sound. Also, the dog wouldn’t just let someone break in. Well, maybe they would; Prince is only a small Pomeranian after all. Probably piss himself and hide. They must have knocked me out or drugged me. Maybe before? I did go for a drink before going home, but I only had two drinks in a local bar. I saw the bartender make them, no one else could have spiked them. Unless it was the bartender? Fred. But why? I had been a loyal customer to him for years. I mean, maybe only a few times a month, and not spending too much, but I never caused him problems. He even tells me his terrible jokes, and calls me Toby (short for Tobias). But if it isn't him, then who? And when? Is he working for someone else? I just don't understand.

I decide to try and peer under the door, it's not a big gap, but I might see something. I lie as flat as I possibly can, but my legs bend upwards against the wall, there just isn't enough space. But it's enough to look under. Darkness. Just. More. Darkness. I can't make anything out. No movement, no lights from anything electrical or powered, and no noises. Nothing. Just more nothing. What is this place? It feels so intentionally designed. Who would build a dark, soundproof murder basement? I suppose serial killers and psychopaths would. Am I in more danger than I thought? But if so, wouldn't someone have come to check on me by now? I don't know how much time has passed, but I can't continue freaking out. There has to be a way out. I have to be somewhere. Even in the middle of nowhere, I can escape.

But how? I've tried calling for help, I've tried breaking the door open with what I have, and it doesn't budge! How much time has passed? If only I had my phone, then maybe I wouldn't still be trapped in here. Trapped. I keep saying trapped. Am I really trapped? I mean, I fell asleep in my apartment, then woke up here. Maybe I'm not actually awake? Maybe this is just a dream. A weird, claustrophobic dream. Yeah, that makes sense! I shouldn't be freaking out, I should try waking up! I smack my face. It hurts, but I'm still here. I smack it again. Stinging pain, but still trapped. How else can I wake up? Just keep telling myself it's just a dream, and to wake up. Wake up. Wake. Up. WAKE UP!

I'm sat back on the ground. Tears are rolling down my face. I don't think this is a dream. I don't think anyone knows I'm gone. I don't think anyone is coming to help me…

Okay, deep breaths. I’ve got to not give up all hope. Think. What about the walls? The floor? I’m not in some concrete box, right? I stand up and begin knocking on the walls, seeing if anything sounds off. Hollow sounds would be weaker points, right? I tap and I tap. And sure enough, one spot on the wall opposite the door sounds hollow! Okay, let’s not get too excited. I take off my shirt and wrap it around my hand. Okay, let’s see if we can damage this wall. I wind up a hit, and suddenly I hear it. Whistling. I freeze. I don’t like it. It’s chilling, calm, pleasant sounding. It must be who is behind this! I’m frozen in place, a bead of sweat rolls down the side of my face. The whistling gets closer, louder, I can hear footsteps now. Sounds like not everywhere is carpeted. The whistling stops. I hold my breath.

A light switch flips in the other room. Enough light is creeping under the door! I can see my little prison! The walls are a dullish grey colour, I turn around, and the door is a dark green. The footsteps continue, I slink to the floor, back against the furthest wall from the door. I look up, grey ceiling, plaster perhaps? I eye the floor, light blue carpet, definitely makes me think of an office space. I turn to face the door, and I spot it. Two dark shapes in front of the door. Whoever it is, is standing in front of the door. Is this it? Am I going to meet the culprit of my kidnapping? Sweat drips from me as I’m panicking as quietly as I can. Do I talk? Would that be wise? Is that what they want? Why am I here? Who is this? I’m so fucking scared. A jingle of keys breaks the silence. This is it. I’m going to die. Unless I can fight him? Her? What if they aren’t alone? I can worry about that after breaking out of here. I quietly move my legs, I rest a hand on the ground to help myself up. They cough. The hand that I’ve wrapped my shirt in, I wind it back. The moment the door opens, I’m throwing the first punch. I’m not staying here. I’m not dying here. Not without at least trying to escape.

Moments pass, no other noises can be heard. Come on. Come on! Open the fucking door! What are you waiting for? You KNOW I’m here! You PUT ME IN HERE! Just give me the chance. I’m getting angry, so very angry. “Come on you Fucker!” I shout out in rage. More silence. I look down, the shadows are still there. They haven’t moved. Still just past the door. I give the door a kick, “OPEN THE DOOR YOU FUCK!” No response. “What do you want with me?!?” Just more silence. Wait, it’s faint but, it sounds like scribbling. Are they… taking notes? What is this? “Why me? What could you possibly want from me?” I plead through the door. The scribbling stops. They begin walking away. That’s it? What were you writing? Am I just another victim to you? What the fuck is this? I drop to the floor and peer while the light is still on.

The other room is bigger, the walls are a clean white. The floor looks smooth, not carpet. Concrete? Tile? I can’t fully tell. My eye darts around, looking for the person who walked away. I see no one, there is a large opening on the right side, looks like it leads to a hallway? Otherwise, the room is empty. What is this place? The light turns off. Is the switch further away? Maybe more than one? Remote controlled? Could be an app, that’s a thing these days. Damnit! I wish I could leave this fucking room!

I feel so empty. Why? Why did I deserve this? I'm so sorry to whoever I wronged, but I don't think it was bad enough to deserve this! Please. Someone. Just, anyone. Open the door. I need help. I don't understand, and I'm so tired. I'm so so tired. I can't think of anything else to do. Maybe I should just rest, and wait for whatever comes next. My vision begins to drift off…

No! I can’t fall asleep! Who knows what will happen? I have to figure this out. I have to escape. I can’t just die here! But what am I supposed to do?

Wait… the wall! The fucking wall! I turn and face the hollow spot I found before. I knock on the wall again, just to make sure I remember. Sure enough! It sounds hollow! This might be my only option right now. I throw my fist against the wall. It feels sturdy, but not very sturdy. I think… I think I can break this. I throw another fist, then another, and another. My hand hurts, but I can do this. I throw another, and I feel the wall bend a bit. Wood? I run my other hand along the spot, and it doesn’t feel flush anymore! Hope. I have hope. I punch again. The wall makes a snapping sound. I must be breaking it, I can’t stop now. I throw another, and with one more my hand goes through the wall. Oh my god. I did it. I pull my hand back and try to break the opening more. A sliver of light can be seen from above. It illuminates pipes, electrical cables, and some insulation. If I can make the hole bigger, I think I can squeeze in there! I begin pulling at the opening some more, trying to make any leeway, when suddenly a shriek ricochets within the space. I freeze and listen. It sounds… close. Scratching can be heard against a different wall. What the fuck is this place?

A hissing sound startles me. I start to feel lightheaded. Is that… sleeping gas? No! No! I can’t fall asleep! I collapse to the floor, hoping to avoid the gas as much as possible. Then the sound comes from the room next to mine. Fuck! I can’t escape! What am I supposed to do? The sound continues hissing, and I begin to smell something off. The gas is in the room with me, it’s only a matter of time. I try to ram the door again, then I try to throw a punch at a different wall. My vision is getting hazy, I’m slowing down. The gas must be kicking in. I slump to the floor, and my breathing slows. What’s going to happen to me? Is this just some kind of game to them? Like that SAW movie? But I haven’t been told anything. I just know… they’ve taken me… Wherever this is.

When I wake up… I’m getting some answers

My father was always obsessed with hunting. We lived, fortunately, in middle-of-nowhere Texas where the nearest gas station was about a 30 minute drive away. This meant going grocery shopping was a luxury my parents couldn't afford- so most of our food was either grown or hunted. I have fond memories of my mother making 'mamma's surprise'- whatever was seasonally grown and whatever my father slung over his shoulder and hauled back at the end of the day. Due to the fact we lived in the middle of nowhere, I didn't get much interaction with other people and didn't really understand how things worked for a long time. My mother attempted to homeschool me but that just consisted of learning how to prepare meat properly and how to hide from Dad when he came home after a day of not catching anything. I loved those lessons from my mother. We would stand side by side as she would pluck the chickens and I would chop the carrots and the broccoli. My father also 'homeschooled' me, but that was just him showing me his second obsession- taxidermy.

'You need to honour the animal, son', he would exclaim with a deep intensity, wrapping an arm around my shoulders as he marvelled at his handiwork. The head of a deer that I watched him hack off was nailed onto a mount on the wall; the skin stretched over a crooked wooden armature, lolling to the side slightly with the weight of it. Its glass eyes shined with a quiet misery that I couldn't quite place at 10 years old. The rest of the deer's body was stuffed as well, put in a 'standing' position- my father had broken one of it's legs carrying it home so the body looked lopsided and wobbling on an unsteady gait. I always hated it. The basement downstairs was full of them- bears, foxes, wolves, deer, ducks- you name it, it was crudely stuffed with wool and hay and kept in the basement like a museum. Dad treated them with a disturbing reverence.

At 16, my father started coming home with food less and less. Something about the 'population drying out in the area' and that he had to widen his hunting range. The woods were big enough after all. I heard him and my mother having heated arguments about it a lot, until one day, he picked up his rifle and left us with a final slam of the porch door. My mother really wasn't the same after that. No more lessons in preparing food, no more laughing and joking, just scrubbing the same fork for hours on end as she stared vacantly out of the window. She became a whisper of a woman; I hated my father for making her like this.

I thought he'd left us forever until a month later he came back with two sopping bags of meat. He shoved them in my mother's hands and barked at her to cook dinner. She stiffly turned around and walked into the kitchen to begin preparing it. I followed after her to ask if maybe I could help.

"Mamma? Do you want me to help? It would be nice, we haven't cooked together in so lo-"

She slammed her hands onto the counter. "Go to your room."

"But-"

"DON'T MAKE ME REPEAT MYSELF! THAT'S NO FOOD FOR YOU, GO AND THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU'VE DONE!"

This uncharacteristic rage make me physically jump; she'd never even so much as raised her voice towards me, let alone scream at me. I walked into my room mostly confused than anything.

This kept happening- dad would come home, tell her to cook dinner, and she would scream at me for nothing and send me to my room. All of our dinners now were a some wilted vegetables and some dry meat. My mother would never, ever let me in the kitchen when she was preparing dinner.

My mother had become so, so thin- her normally round, smiling face was replaced with gaunt cheekbones and ribs that poked out of her paper-thin skin. My father would scream at her for not cooking me dinner and come into my room with a plate later. I really didn't like whatever he kept bringing home but it was that or going to bed hungry. It was stringy and chewy and dry at the same time, not like the stuff I was used to. They would argue again, and then he would disappear into the basement for the rest of the night. If I listened hard enough, late at night, I could hear her sobbing from the kitchen. There was one night in particular that that I sat with my ear at the door so I could hear them clearly.

"I can't do this Mark, I can't do it to him, I can't. Please don't make me do it" my mother gasped, hiccuping with sobs.

"You can't act innocent. You're a part of it too." he hissed.

"WELL I DON'T WANT TO BE ANYMORE! YOU'RE SICK MARK, YOU'RE SICK! I endured it for this long, it was a last resort, but you've taken it too fucking far now."

"Then leave."

I heard my mother sniffling, the rustling of some clothes, and the familiar slam of the porch door. My father approached my room with thunderous footsteps that made my adrenaline rush.

"I'm going to be gone for a few days. Hunting trip."

And with that, he was gone. I was alone.

It was four weeks of solitude until he returned. My mother still hadn't returned and I was sick with worry. It was deep into the night and I had came to for a second to be met with that familiar anxiety that my father's presence always brought. I heard him slam open the porch door with a huff, and slowly drag what sounded like a large deer down to the entrance of the basement.

BANG

He slammed the carcass onto his worktable- I knew that bang, I'd heard it so many times I had to properly listen to not tune it out. He would now slice the carcass' stomach open and remove all the innards for us to eat. It depended on what parts he wanted to keep, like if he only wanted to mount and stuff the head he would skin the rest and chop off the parts for us to use in cooking. This sounded like he was wanting to stuff the head.

I crept downstairs and walked closer and closer to the door to the basement to hear what he was doing more clearly.

I heard the wet splat of the innards going into the bucket to give to me or my mother and the cracking of tendons and bone as he sawed through the neck. I heard him huff in exhaustion and let out a small laugh. It was quiet for a while, as this part was stuffing and sewing. This silence went on for hours as I assumed he poured over the carcass with meticulous detail, he always did. 'Honour the animal' as he said.

I must have fallen asleep sitting next to the door, as when I stirred the light of the morning poured down the hallway where the basement door was. I heard my father start to move as I quickly became more aware and stumbled to my feet, running and tripping up the stairs as the basement door opened. I went straight into my bed and faced the wall as I pretended to sleep, my father's footsteps close behind.

My heart hammered against my chest as he opened the door and crept towards my bed. He loomed over me and lowered his head to whisper in my ear;

"Don't go into the basement. I'll know if you do."

It was a tense atmosphere for the next few weeks. My father would virtually live in the basement, only going out to hunt and come back in the early hours of the morning. There wasn't a word exchanged between us, but he did always hand over the meat to prepare food with. I knew enough from my mother to survive, and I would dart out into the kitchen to make my food and quickly go back to my room, not wanting to even interact with my father. There was one night, though, that he had made food for me. He left it outside of my room. The meals had downgraded further- it was now just a pile of brown meat slopped onto the plate, no vegetables or sauces. It was either that or going hungry- I had done a lot of that while my father was away and didn't plan to anymore.

I retreated back to the safety of my room and began to eat. I was used to the stringy and chewy texture but this was a lot harder to get through than usual, it was like chewing a belt. I was chewing so harshly that a sudden squishy pop was enough to nauseate me and spit it out.

What was left on my plate was a half chewed eyeball. Optic nerve still in tact and sticking to the wet surface of the eye. This was no deer eye, or a bear eye, or a rabbit eye. It was a human eye. I wanted to cry and vomit at the same time but all I could do was stare at what was left of it on my plate. I started to hyperventilate as I felt bile rise up my throat- rushing to the bathroom, to empty my stomach, my plate clattered to the floor covering the eye in the brown mincemeat. After gagging over the toilet for an hour, I gathered the courage to pick up my plate and cover up the eye and take it out the back and bury it in the back yard with the rest of our compost.

I was glad my father was hiding away in the basement but I needed answers. I was too afraid to confront him so my plan was to go into the basement and look at what kind of game he was bringing back out of his 'widened hunting area' I didn't want to think about the alternative if the deer population was drying out.

I waited until the early hours of the morning the next day when I heard for sure my father slamming the porch door behind him. I crept out of my room, towards the door to the basement, my breathing rapid and heart thrumming in my mouth. The door's lock clicked as I turned the handle and pathetically pushed the door open a slice to be met with that familiar stench of rot. But this time, much, much stronger. It left a sour taste in the back of my throat that made my stomach churn and my eyes wince and I padded down the stairs, like I was anticipating something to jump out.

I was met with the familiar scene; bears stood in a permanent roar, deer heads covering every wall and shelf, rabbits put on pedestals that lined the floor. Antlers covered the door and the furthest wall. Even just standing there gave me chills that ran up my spine. My eyes darted over every mount and pedestal, checking if both eyes were there- to my horror, both eyes were there in every model in the room. I was grasping for answers as I turned around to see my father's newest mount, tucked away behind a stack of wood used for the armatures.

There laid, eyes closed serenely, my mother's head.

I couldn't move, or breathe, for that matter. I was sweating and shaking, but my feet were frozen to the floor. Reaching a shaky hand out, I gently peeled back one of the eyelids. There was nothing there but viscera.

In my state of shock, I hadn't heard the porch door open. I felt my stomach drop even further as my father's familiar footsteps thump down the stairs. Turning the light off, I hurried to hide behind a stack of wood and antlers in the furthest corner of the room.

The door opened.

I tried to hold my breath and will my presence out of existence.

THUMP

THUMP

I'm sure he was over me now, just watching for signs of movement. My hands slowly rose to cover my mouth and muffle my terrified breathing. I was lucky, it was still quite early so it wasn't light enough to clearly see me unless I made any sudden movements. It felt like hours of him quietly watching me. My eyes were screwed shut from the fear so I could only hear his breathing.

After a while, he tore his eyes away from my exact spot and sat down at his workbench, slamming down his large bag. I watched with wide eyes as he dragged a torso out of the bag and began slicing. The thing with my father was, when he concentrated he blocked out all sound around him, like getting tunnel vision.

I knew if I played it right, I could make a break for the stairs and out the front door the front door.

I waited until he was hunched over with his back towards the door to make my escape. I launched myself to my feet, almost tripping over in the process. Our eyes met. My father's eyes were flat and devoid of life, bloodshot and fixed on my position. As I yanked the door open, I could heard him rise from his chair and start to gain on me. In my attempt to crawl up the stairs, he grabbed on to one of my ankles- the air being pushed from my lungs in a weak scream. I struggled and fought and kicked but his grip was iron tight. He raised his saw he used to cut through the bones of deer and went for my ankle. I was faster, and kicked him in the nose with all my might. He let go with an angry scream- I couldn't hear much else except for my pulse roaring in my ears as I crashed through the porch door and into the woods.

I turned around for a second to see my father, saw in hand, clutching a bloody nose. I knew if I stopped, he would catch me immediately. I managed to run far enough to hide out in the gas station far, far away from his cabin.

Every time I peek my head out from wherever I'm hiding, I swear I can see his silhouette in the distance. Watching me. Biding his time- as you all know, my father loves to hunt.

Sara and I talked for years about going to Mexico. Our college years were behind us, but we felt we had missed out. We focused on our studies. Looking back, we both regretted not accepting those invitations. Best friends and boyfriends begged, but we felt a duty to stay. To tell the truth, we felt superior; it felt good pretending to be more scholarly than the rest. But working through our twenties, we felt the dreaded three-zero looming on the horizon.

We both had a hell of a time getting the same week off work at the end of March, but we managed it. I called in all the favors I had left. The time leading up to the trip dragged; every working hour felt like two. Sara wasn’t much of a planner, so in my free time, I plotted out an itinerary that would recapture our youth. Looking at it now, I see how delusional it was—drinking, clubbing, drinking, touring, snorkeling, drinking. My dread of aging had me on the edge of psychosis.

From planning to sitting on the plane felt like a dream. Sitting next to each other was essential. Sara was terrified of flying, so we drank enough to forget the possibility of falling out of the sky. We were both single at the time, so we had secret dreams of finding a mysterious man, rich and handsome, to swoop in at the resort. At least I did. Maybe she was more tethered to reality, but I doubt it.

We hit turbulence on the way down; thick fog blocked our view. We had enough to exchange nervous laughter rather than panic as we made contact with the landing strip. Once we landed, the fog felt more comforting—it limited the extent of the world. Being drunk in a new city in a foreign country was not ideal, but we made it to the resort. I think we took a cab, but I can’t remember. Sara was holding me up by the time we finally got to our room.

I woke up feeling like a railroad spike was through my forehead, my lips dry, and my guts churning. My body reminded me I wasn’t 21 anymore. Sara was already up, making eggs and toast. I didn’t deserve her. We chatted about our hangovers and plans for the first day. I had originally planned for bars, but that no longer seemed like a good idea. We looked online for tours or attractions nearby. It was noon by the time we sorted the wheat from the chaff and booked a tour of an Aztec pyramid a few hours outside of the city.

More cabs and a long bus ride later, we were standing at the foot of the structure with our guide, a short Mexican man who spoke English better than most people back home. The fog was still hanging in the air, but the pyramid was still imposing, even more so partially obscured behind the haze. Sara grabbed my hand as we looked up. The distant past felt alive. There was something romantic about it—time, sacrifice, human striving, aging. I felt her hand, and my heart fluttered.

The guide was going on and on about climate shifts and human sacrifices. We were absorbed in our own fantasies about the past and the people who built this. We had walked around the entire structure twice before he stopped talking. I think he picked up on being ignored because he was gone when I looked back over my shoulder. There was no one else in sight. Just Sara and me, laughing and dreaming together in the fog.

I don’t remember who came up with the idea to scale the steps. I can’t handle thinking it was me, but I can’t bring myself to blame her. There was something about the fog, finally being in Mexico, together; we were at the top of the steps looking out—gray fog and vague trees were the only things visible. I felt like I was living five years in the past. Sara put her hand around my waist.

I experienced a flood of emotions that made me feel like I was floating three inches off the ground. Her hand was holding me tightly. I let myself go, I turned to kiss her. Only it wasn’t her. Whoever I was before that moment is dead.

Holding me was a squat, muscular man. His dark skin stood in contrast with the white robes and head covering. He looked and felt ancient—not just old, but from another time. He spoke, and his words meant nothing to me, despite my years of Spanish.

I pushed away and just barely broke free from his grasp. Standing at the edge of the main platform, I could see it all. The central plinth was slick with blood. A body lay on top. Her body. The man stood, his white clothes stained with blood. He held a thick piece of viscera in his left hand. Sara’s heart. It might as well have been mine. He smiled and brought the flesh to his mouth.

I let out a shriek and ran down the stairs. Too fast. I made it halfway down before my feet failed me, and the ground caught me, my hands softening the blow enough to keep me from blacking out.

I scrambled to my feet and took one last look up. The man stood triumphant, blood running down his chin. I felt my brain starve for oxygen as I sobbed and ran.

They found me heaving as I shuffled down the side of the road. I was taken to the hospital; blood ruined my dress where he had held me. I told them what happened. I begged them to go and find Sara, to find the man. The police came hours later while I was hooked up to an IV drip. They told me in broken English that there was no blood, no man, and no Sara.

They won’t let me leave the hospital. They say I am unwell and that they need to continue their search for Sara, but I know they won’t find her and that I won’t ever see her again.

but here, Right now I’m petrified. Even the adrenaline coursing its way through my veins can’t get my body to move. The thing In front of me screams; and it’s the loudest, most agonizing thing I’ve ever heard in my life. If I had to put it into words it sounds like every bit of pain to have ever been experienced.

“JACOB GET OUT OF THERE!!”, My girlfriend screams; but I could barely hear her over the sound of my eardrums bursting. I try to turn to her but my body isn’t responding. Even the slight sting in my hand has gone numb.

“FUCK!”, I feel myself yell but no sound comes to me. Suddenly all my Mother’s rants about not doing stupid things to impress other people flash through my mind. The thing Infront of me inches closer and I feel the weight of its steps course through my entire body.

“JACO-”, My girlfriend’s screams are muffled; a constant and sharp ringing is all I can hear. I feel its breath condense on my face. By now the thing was within an inch of me. I tightened my muscles until my nails dug into the fresh cut on my hand, shocking my immune system. I felt my legs pound against the ground. My ears popped and my girlfriends screaming invaded my surroundings.

“FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK, FUCK”, I yelled as I ran through the graveyard. The cool night air kissed my face as blood returned throughout my body. But no matter how fast I ran, the gate appeared further and further away. I ran until my shins cracked and my knees popped; then my legs gave out. Dirt buried itself into my eyes and a rock pounded against my forehead. The world around me was spinning. A cold and slimy hand wrapped itself around my ankle and twisted it; I screamed in pain. “ I’LL NEVER DISRESPECT YOUR LAND AGAIN! I PROMISE! I’M SORRY!”, I pleaded. I dug my nails into the dirt but it’s pull was stronger and I was yanked back so fast I didn’t register my nails being ripped from my fingers. And then everything went black.

……….

“Babe, Come on. You don’t actually have to do this” my girlfriend said.

I opened my eyes, In Front of me stood a familiar short and rusty gate. What the fuck, Was that all a dream? I opened my mouth to ask to leave. “Of Course I do, I ain’t no pussy”, I retorted and hopped over the gate. What the fuck? No! No! No! I held onto the gate, cutting my hand on it’s rusty edge. “Shit!” I muttered under my breath.

“Trespassing on sacred property to prove you’re not a pussy is a very pussy thing to do!” My Girlfriend yelled and I wish I listened.

“SHUT UP AUTUMN”, I yelled, even though she was right.

“Wow…” Autumn said, I could practically hear her crossing her arms. “Oh well, leave it to the big strong man to make his own decisions” she mocked. I stayed silent, again she was right. just then a primal roar echoed through the cemetery; I felt my body freeze up. An impossible creature was standing not even three feet away from me.

“JACOB RUN!!” Autumn screamed. I’ve never been afraid of the unknown, but here, right now, I’m terrified.

It began the night my cat vanished. The last time I saw my cat Tom; He had been sitting on the windowsill looking out from the window apartment on the 23^(rd) floor. Tom’s black fur was illuminated by the lights of fireworks that boomed across the sky to celebrate the new year. My other cat, Jerry had been curled up next to me as we rested on the couch. Jerry’s grey fur was soft and comforting as she purred lightly. I remember the glow of red digits from the alarm clock next to the couch, 12:03 am. I’d missed the new year celebrations, but all I needed was right here. I don’t recall when exactly I dozed off, only the gentle purrs of Jerry welcoming me into the sweet release of sleep. I never even got to say goodbye to Tom.

I don’t remember the dreams I had, but I’d awoken from my couch in a panic. It was morning, and I was late for work. Before I left I quickly poured a handful of food into both Tom and Jerry’s bowls. Jerry had bolted from her bed like a bullet as soon as I took the bag out of the cabinet. But Tom didn’t come. I thought nothing of it, assuming Tom had found himself a spot too hibernate in for the day per his morning routine. So, after both bowls where full, I left. The thought of Tom’s absence that morning itched at my mind the whole day, so when I came home I immediately called for him. But he never came. Jerry brushed against my leg lightly, hoping to be petted while ignorant to my growing panic. I searched through the house for any signs of Tom, every crevice of my apartment, every corner and under every piece of furniture. After everywhere was clear, the gravity of the situation finally dawned on me. Tom was gone.

I’d only seen my neighbours a couple times in the past, once when I’d moved in alongside a sprinkle of short interactions throughout the years. My apartment was at the right-hand side at the end of the hall. To the left of me was a couple with two kids. I could always hear the parents yelling the kid’s names all hours of the day when they wouldn’t do their chores. And directly across from my door was a sweet old lady who lived alone. When I’d moved in a few years back she had baked me an entire plate of cookies as a welcoming gift and would always leave cards through my letterbox when it was my birthday. I could always hear her TV echoing out into the hall, switching off at 10:22pm every night. 

I decided that if anything perhaps Tom had somehow gotten himself into either of the neighbouring apartments. But when I knocked on both doors to ask if they’d seen Tom, there was only silence from beyond. Yet when I put my ear to both doors I swore I could hear the muffled sound of hushed voices unintelligible through the door. I knocked and called on both doors, but nobody came. No-one came to the door of any of the several other apartments on my floor either. I don’t recall either tenants ever moving out, surely I’d have heard them. But in the end, I was alone with only hushed voices to accompany me. 

It'd been only a few days or so after Tom disappeared that it happened, the day ‘something else’ appeared in my apartment. I’d cried almost every day and every night for Tom, but when I came home late one night after a particularly busy day of work did I find it. A new cat, one I hadn’t seen before. They were sitting upon the windowsill I had last seen Tom on the night he vanished. This cat was large, far larger than Jerry who had taken it upon herself to lay next to the new cat as if she’d known it her whole life. The new cat had light brown fur and long ears; I’d seen exotic felines like it on nature documentaries before, but I couldn’t place its exact species. When I’d walked through my door it stared at me with large eyes that seemed almost welcoming. I thought I’d been hallucinating in my grief after the loss of my cat, but this new cat’s fur was just real as Tom’s had ever been. It was so soft that I’d find myself spending entire hours just petting it. I was confused of course, afraid too. But the new cat made no move to attack, nor even hissed when I approached it. Only gazing at me with its large eyes.

I don’t know why I kept it. I knew something wasn’t right, yet I allowed this new cat into my life with open arms. It didn’t even need to be named either; all I did was pet it once and suddenly a simple name it had inscribed itself into my brain, “Plum”. Anytime I wished for their presence it was somehow always there, it knew when I needed it. Tom’s disappearance had left a hole in me, and this new cat helped fill it. It probably wasn’t even legal to own a cat like that in this part of the country, but I made sure not to tell anyone about it. I never even let anyone visit either, but it’s not as if I had many visitors to begin with. It seemed like Plum had already been trained too, they’d come when called, take baths when needed and eat when I filled their bowl. It was as if Tom had never left. They’d happily rest against me, let me pick them up (even though they were quite heavy) and even let me dress them up with whatever cat accessories and clothes I put on them. When I’d record or take pictures of Plum they’d relish in the presence of it, they’d bound around happily like a child. I’d always find Plum and Jerry curled up together on the washing machine enjoying its vibrations. Or often on the same windowsill I’d found them on initially. It was as if Tom had never even left. I was happy, Jerry was happy, and Plum was happy. 

Then things… changed. I don’t know when exactly they did, but ‘events’ began to occur for no explicable reason or cause over the course of a few years. It started with the priest, or at least that’s what he claimed to be. My door doesn’t have a peep hole, so I didn’t see exactly what he looked like at the time, and I knew better than to open the door to strangers. For all I know he could’ve been a priest. I never buzzed him into my apartment, nor even tell him about my name despite his frequent use of it. Every time he spoke through my door he would click his tongue or make a sound like he was calling a cat, the ‘wishwishwish’ or 'shshshshsh' sound most owners would use.

His voice sounded so calm, yet his words so delirious “The year of our saviour nears every day, Allison.”, “Allison, don’t listen to the cries beyond the walls”. I stopped responding after that, letting him continue his religious murmurings. I could see his silhouette under the door for the next twenty-three minutes, he muttered words I couldn’t decipher the entire time before turning to walk further down the hallway. This event on its own just seemed like a one off, I’ve dealt with strange Jehovah witness’ interactions in my past home before, so I’m used to odd religious ramblings. This was just another one of those, I hoped.

Then there was the meowing. I’d wake up suddenly to the sound of loud meows that echoed through my entire apartment. They didn’t come from Jerry or Plum, who both lay asleep on the chair in the corner of my bedroom. The meowing itself, while echoed, had sounded almost muffled, as if it had been coming from beyond the walls. I listened intently to it for the entire duration, however in what felt like an instant did it end as quick as it had started. It wouldn’t have concerned me too much at first since any of the other could have gotten their own cat even if I hadn’t heard any noise from the other apartments in over a year. But as I recounted the meows, I couldn’t help but notice how raspy it had been, and I knew I recognised it. It sounded like Tom. Cries from beyond the walls.

The next morning, I just chalked it up to me having dreamt it, as much as it hurt me to do so I was still grieving my missing cat. I’d checked every inch of my apartment and had already attempted to contact my neighbours but to no avail. The thought of Tom being trapped in one of my neighbours’ apartments drove me into a terrible panic, the thought that I couldn’t help him escape the locked doors and muffled voices of the other rooms hurt me. However, as I looked towards my windowsill, where the new cat sat, did their warm gaze help me forget about my worries. It helped me to calm down and slowly I did. Tom had been gone for about two years at this point, and now the Plum was here. Here for me. 

Another night did one of the last few strange occurrences over those few years happen. It was the night I had the dream. I never usually remember my dreams, yet every detail of every corner and every specific sight remain as clear in my mind as my own memories do.

I was standing in my bedroom which had somehow merged itself with the bathroom, and my cupboard no longer had doors and seemed to extend further than the light could reach. I walked… or more accurately glided into the front room where the window lay as an enormous glimpse into the world beyond. The landscape before my apartment block was no longer the city, but rather an endless world of golden grass upon a beautiful blue sky. The grass gleamed like a valley of coins and riches far greater than the mind could perceive. It was so beautiful, yet as my eyes focused did I begin to notice the things that littered the field. Corpses, a countless number of skeletal frames half sunken and covered by the flakes of grass that surrounded them. Each looking torn, limbs and skeletal parts strewn about in a frenzy as if each one had been ripped apart.

They didn’t look human. Some of the corpses where large, while others matched the size of dogs or cats. However further on in the fields did I notice people standing in the grass. One which appeared to be a man was ripping large pieces of grass up and throwing the shredded pieces over himself, his face full of joy as he danced in it. Another looked to be a young girl, she seemed to almost be in pain as she covered her ears in a desperate attempt to drown out a sound that I could not hear. Another just sat with both arms tied by what appeared to be some type of straight jacket. Those were the ones I noticed, but dozens more people littered the fields beyond. It was then I noticed something far beyond the horizon, the sun rising. However, when my eyes focused I realised what I saw wasn’t the sun. A billion limbs that dragged along the sky replacing the blue with a mesmerising pattern of everchanging shapes and colours. I felt my skin crawl as its presence filled me with such an unimaginable sense of dread I woke up almost immediately. I struggled sleeping for a few months after that, but it was only a dream. 

There was also the ‘mice’, this happened throughout the duration of my time with the new cat. While ninety nine percent of the time Plum was well behaved. Occasionally did I punish it when they’d act up, whether it be tearing up the place with scratch marks or the strange markings that seemed to appear on the walls. I would yell at them for this, and they’d hiss. Every hiss would reveal the huge sabre teeth that lined its mouth, I knew they wouldn’t hurt me, nor bite me. But it still bothered me, nonetheless. In the end, despite the cat seeming trained it was still a wild animal. Every time it acted out I’d find one of their ‘gifts’ placed at the foot of my bed. They’d give me mice as an apology, which on its own sounds normal for a cat. I’ve heard plenty of horror stories where owners find dead birds placed Infront of their door. But I swear not a single one of the mice it gave me ever had anything actually ‘inside’ them. They were just… skins of mice that it would place on the edge of my bed as an apology.

I would have convinced myself that Plum was the one that skinned them, perhaps tearing them open with those sabre teeth. However, one time when I went to touch one of the mice did it bolt up and jump away from my bed before seeming to be ‘swallowed’ by the wall it ran towards. It didn’t run through a mouse hole, it just, ‘shifted’ through the wall like a drop of water slipping into the ocean. I called an exterminator on some occasions, making sure to hide Plum when they would arrive, but the exterminator said they never found any signs of any mice infestations. But they did tell me I really needed to ask my neighbours to make less noise, it was hard to concentrate with how loud their footsteps and voices where. But I still only heard silence from the other apartments, I had no idea what the exterminator had been talking about. So, I double-checked and put my ears to each of the doors yet all I still heard was the same muffled muttering that I had heard long ago when I was searching for Tom. I just assumed the exterminator had been hearing the sounds of the city echoing through the apartment, so I didn’t bother much. And yes I did also get my hearing checked after this too, but nothing ended up being out of place. The new cat continued gifting me the mice, and I made sure to throw them out the window each time by their tails.

The final night feels like so long ago now. It’d been years since I’d had the new cat, and he’d become a core part of my life after Tom vanished. I’d already ordered several more accessories to try on the new cat for more photos. There was no build-up nor climax to what happened. It just… happened. Me, it and Jerry where a family. And that night was when that family had ended.

It was somewhere in 2022. I bolted awake, my entire bed drenched in a layer of sweat. My eyes darted towards where Jerry and Tom- Plum had usually slept, yet when my vision adjusted to the darkness of my room did I see the empty chair that sat in the corner. Just as soon as I had noticed their absence, did the meowing return. As muffled as I had heard it so long ago, yet it almost seemed weaker than it had before, far more tired. A desperate panic set in as another set of meowing joined it, even through the walls did I recognise Jerry’s cries alongside Tom’s. “Jerry? JERRY!” I cried before lunging from my bed towards the door as I entered the front room of my apartment. In my peripheral vision I could see the shape of Plum laying on the windowsill like they’d done so many times prior, but I didn’t care to look at it. Ever since this new cat had entered my life, things had felt so very wrong, I couldn’t shake the feeling that past its warm eyes did something bubble just beneath the surface, that somehow it was responsible. This was no longer a dream, and the reality of the situation became so clear. I strained my ears to listen in on the direction of the meows, finding their source come from beyond the blank wall of my kitchen that lay perpendicular to the window. I pressed my ear against the wall, hearing the meows echo through it louder than I ever could before. “TOM!? JERRY?!” I yelled as tears streamed down my face as the meows grew louder.

I grabbed a hammer from under my sink that I’d bought after my encounter with the ‘priest’. I immediately began hammering the wall, bashing it in with as much force as I could muster. I made a hole big enough to fit my hands through and It was then I began to claw at the drywall, digging my fingernails into it until they bled, and my fingers ached. I pulled and pulled at the wall as chunks of it tore away in my grasp. As I looked into the hole I had created, it seemed to open up on the other end into the apartment next door. It was the apartment the couple and their kids had once lived in. The meows of my cats were as clear as ever. Beyond the hole was dark at first, yet when I focused on the other end of the opening all I could make out where the shapes of what looked to be dozens of bodies brushing past the hole in an almost silent dance, each person wore robes adorned with a stream of scratches and markings similar to the ones the new cat had clawed into the walls. From the level of where the hole was created I couldn’t see their faces, only their bodies as they continued to dance in circles passing the hole over and over again. It was only when one of the figures seemed to stop In front of the hole and crouch down did I see the ghastly rubber mask vaguely shaped to look like Plum upon on their face, alongside the cold bloodshot eyes that lay behind the diamond shape eyeholes. 

I fell backwards after seeing them. Quickly scrambling onto my feet as I sprinted towards the front door of my apartment. As I ran I glimpsed towards the windowsill where the cat with long ears sat, it’s face no longer adorned with the same warm look I had seen so long ago when it had first come into my life. Its eyes were no longer warm but adorned with a cold stare that only sent shivers down my spine. I knew the cat never had that many eyes, something had changed in it, Its body shifted larger than before bearing markings upon it's fur that now gleamed with a subtle crimson hue, but I didn’t care to stay one more second in that apartment. When I grabbed at the door handle it swung open immediately, its locks undone despite my vivid memory of having locked it when I arrived home earlier that night. But that didn’t matter anymore, I pulled it open and ran into the hallway.

Whatever had masked the sounds the exterminator spoke of was gone, I could finally hear what they had spoken of. The chanting was so loud and the footsteps like the sound of a hammer being bashed against my skull. The muffled talking I had heard before only a glimpse into the actual reality of the rampant chanting that filled the whole building. As I began to run forward down the hall did at once every single door of the hallway swing open at once, each in an instant becoming occupied with dozens of figures that seemed to pour out from the doors simultaneously. A flood of cloaked figures in the same masks filled the hallway with their presence. There were so many of them and they all continued chanting as loud as ever a strange hymn of worship, a song of joy. 

It began the night my cat vanished. Tom’s black fur had been illuminated by the lights of fireworks that boomed across the sky to celebrate the new year. My other cat, Jerry had been curled up next to me as we rested on the couch. Jerry’s grey fur was soft and comforting as she purred lightly. I remember the glow of red digits from the alarm clock next to the couch, 12:03 am. I’d missed the new year celebrations, but all I needed was right there. And now it was gone.

Plum sat next to me as I lay on the couch, their fur warm and soft like grass on a summer’s day. Each graze of its fuzz brought forth a deep sense of satisfaction. But each time my fingers made contact did clumps of my own skin tumble off them like wool. It hurt so very much, but I was content, and Plum was happy.

I don’t know how I got here.

I don’t know if this message will reach anyone, if these words will ever be seen by another pair of human eyes, but I have to try. It’s the only thing keeping me tethered, the last shred of proof that I existed before… before this.

The internet barely functions. Every site I visit is a graveyard of error messages, hollow white pages that refuse to load. I tried emails, social media, other forums, anything that might signal my presence, that might let someone—anyone—see me. But everything is dead.

Except this.

This single, forsaken forum.

I don’t know why it works. I don’t know if it’s a glitch, an anomaly, or something else allowing me to be heard. Maybe it’s all part of the nightmare. Maybe it’s laughing at me, watching me flail in the dark. But if you can read this, if my words still have weight in the world beyond, then I have to believe there’s still a way out.

But time is slipping. Faster each day. My thoughts unravel like thread pulled from a fraying tapestry. Each morning, I wake with the whisper of something missing, something stolen in the night. The world around me feels thinner, hollowed out, bleeding into nothingness at the edges. But one thing remains.

A certainty, rooted deep in my bones.

Something is wrong.

I remember coffee. The smell of it, rich and warm, coaxing me from sleep. My wife in the kitchen, her presence humming soft and steady through the morning. Sunlight spilled through the blinds, painting golden stripes on the walls, comforting, familiar. It was the kind of morning where the world felt right, where the air hummed with the quiet promise of normalcy.

The kids were sluggish at the table, half-awake, idly stirring their cereal. My wife handed me my coffee—just the way I liked it. I kissed her forehead, ruffled my son’s hair, and promised I’d be home for dinner.

Then I left. The same routine. The same commute. The same turn at the intersection where the streetlights always flickered.

And then—

I remember leaving work, the sun dipping low, tired but content. I remember the drive home. The warm glow of our windows. The smell of dinner drifting through the door.

I remember going to bed.

Then nothing.

Then I wake up here.

At first, I didn’t understand. The room was wrong. The light slanted in at an unnatural angle, the bed was stiff, unfamiliar. The air reeked of something sterile, suffocating. The walls—too white, too clean. Empty.

I sat up, the motion sluggish, my body sluggish. And then—I looked down at my hands.

They weren’t mine.

Thin, brittle, veined with blue like old paper crumbling at the edges. My breath stuttered. My stomach coiled. I turned, my gut a sinking stone, my gaze catching on the mirror across the room.

And the man staring back wasn’t me.

He was ancient. A husk of a man, skin creased and weathered, hair sparse and white, eyes sunken and rimmed with exhaustion. A stranger. A mask stretched over brittle bones.

I tried to scream, but the sound died in my throat. My heart jackhammered in my chest. I stumbled to my feet, legs trembling beneath me.

I had to find my wife. My kids. I had to understand what was happening.

The hallway was too bright, too pristine. The air stank of disinfectant and something artificial, something wrong. My footsteps were too loud in the stillness. Then—

A woman in scrubs, her smile practiced, gentle, too gentle.

“Mr. Patterson! You’re up early today.”

Her voice was syrupy, warm, wrong.

My thoughts stalled. My mind blared white noise. My name isn’t Patterson.

I opened my mouth, grasping for something solid, for my name, my home, anything—but my mind was an empty cavern, echoing with a question I couldn’t answer.

The day passed in a fog. The nurses—too kind, too careful—spoke to me as if I belonged here. The others—frail, hollow-eyed, adrift in routine—shuffled in silence. The TV droned on in the background, a static buzz I couldn’t focus on.

And then, suddenly—

Night fell.

That’s when the fear sank its claws into me.

First, it was the silence. Not the natural quiet of a sleeping house, not the distant hum of traffic or the whisper of wind against the windows.

This was a hungry silence. A thick, swallowing quiet, pressing down like something was listening.

Then—

A giggle.

Soft. Playful.

A child’s laugh.

I shot upright, my skin prickling, my breath trapped in my throat. The sound drifted from the hall, light, teasing.

My stomach churned. My son—

No. Not here. My son was home. He was safe.

Wasn’t he?

Shadows shifted beyond my door. Small. Barefoot.

I squeezed my eyes shut, my pulse hammering, my mind clawing for rationality. A nurse’s kid, maybe. Someone’s child up late, wandering.

Then—

The footsteps came closer.

The air thickened, dense with something unseen. I stared at the crack beneath the door, my breath shallow, my fingers gripping the sheets until my knuckles ached.

There it was—

The giggling came again.

Right outside my door.

I didn’t sleep. I watched the sliver of dark beneath the door, waiting for something I couldn’t name.

Morning came.

No one mentioned the laughter. No one spoke of the shadows. As if it hadn’t happened at all.

As if it was only me.

The days blur, slipping like sand through my fingers. My memories fade faster each morning. The nurses smile, their voices soft, patient. Too patient. The residents shuffle through their routines like they’ve done it forever.

But at night—

The laughter grows louder.

Sometimes, I hear whispers. My name, maybe. A reminder.

But Thursdays—

Thursdays are the worst.

Every Thursday at exactly 7:37 PM, my bed shakes. Not a tremor. Not a gentle vibration. A violent jolt, like something trying to rip the bed from beneath me. I sit up, gasping, clawing at the sheets—

nothing.

Only the clock, its numbers glowing.

7:37.

Then Friday comes, and it resets. The memories wipe clean.

Except lately—

I’m starting to remember.

Flashes. A dashboard. Rain. A road slick and black. Headlights. The screech of twisting metal. A crash.

7:37.

Thursday, January 30th.

And the laughter—

My son’s voice. My child’s giggle. But that’s wrong. They’re home. They’re safe.

Aren’t they?

Who? Who is safe?

Tonight is Thursday.

Tonight, the giggling will come.

Tonight, at 7:37, the bed will shake.

And at midnight—

I won’t remember.

I have to remember.

I have to remember.

If anyone sees this…

Tell me I’m not alone.

I know what the title sounds like, but I can assure you that I am not a teenage boy freaking out about puberty. I truly am in a position where I can't shave. Not just my face, but everywhere. My arms, chest, legs, even the hair on my head- it's changing and I can't stop it. This has gotten so far out of hand that I figured I may as well look online, in case anyone might know anything about my condition. 

I was born with very pale hair. Not quite albino, but very light all the same. My skin and hair both have always had very little pigment. My hair is almost white and my eyebrows and eyelashes are nearly invisible. Most days, if I go out without sunscreen, chances are I'll come home colored like a tomato from sunburns. In fact, I was even bullied throughout my childhood because of my appearance. I had a hard time making friends because my parents insisted I stay inside most days. Well, if I'm being truthful, I was bullied because I was a sickly-looking kid with a lisp who liked anime. But my appearance and fragile skin definitely did not help me.

I got used to it, of course. And it doesn't bother me anymore now that I'm an adult. But a few weeks ago, I noticed that the hair on my face was darker than usual. I normally keep myself clean shaven but sometimes I'll forget to shave for a day or 2. When I looked in the mirror, I saw a 5 O'clock shadow which was far, far darker than it usually was. It was still only stable, but it was unusual enough for me to notice. I shaved it off with no issue and forgot about it until the next week.

Normally, I live by somewhat of a schedule. I need to shave maybe once every 2 or 3 days. But after I started noticing the darker stubble, that time began to shrink- I needed to shave every 2 days. Then every day. Then twice daily. It got to the point where I thought about growing a beard just to be done with it. But I didn’t want to give up.

I went to my doctor and explained my situation to her. She, at first, assured me it was likely nothing. But she recommended I keep a track of how many times I needed to shave for one week. I did as she asked, the final tally for that week was 24 times. She said I might have something called hypertrichosis. I googled it later because her explanation went over my head. What I can gather is that it's a condition caused by either cancer, medication, or metabolic disorders that causes abnormal hair growth. 

She prescribed me this hair removal cream that smells like burnt rubber and garbage. I’m meant to use it on my face twice a week, and that's meant to keep the hair off. But it hasn’t been working at all. It removes my own hair, the light blond colored hair, but the dark hair stays on. It's spreading, too. At first it was just my face, but now my arms and legs are growing darker hairs too.

I decided, “Screw the cream, I’m just gonna go back to shaving it off.”

It had gotten so long that I had a short, black beard and hairy arms. But when I tried to shave again, it bled. My hair bled. Thick orange-red liquid dripped off of the ends of the hair. And it hurt too- the skin of my face ached and itched. I finished the painful process and showered to wash the substance off of me. Exhausted, I went to bed.

The next morning, it had all grown back even longer than the night before. Spiky, almost chitin-like follicles protruded out of the skin on my face, arms, legs, and chest. And that’s when the itching started- horrible, non stop itching anywhere the hair was. I went back to the doctors but they had no idea what to do, other than giving me an anti itch cream. Luckily, that’s helped enough to allow me to sleep most nights.

But my hair hasn’t stopped growing. I was looking at myself in the mirror earlier today. The hair must be about 2 inches long. But when I looked closer, I almost vomited into the sink. They’re segmented. They protrude out of my skin and, after about 3⁄4 's of an inch, they have a clear joint where they bend like spider's legs.

I’m heading back to the doctor’s today. Any outside advice is welcome. I have a sinking feeling that time may be of the essence here- the itching is getting worse and, to my horror and disgust, I think they're starting to move.