THE OCEAN

I never saw the ocean until I was nineteen, and if I ever see it again, it will be too damn soon. I was a child, coming out of the train, fresh from Amarillo, into San Diego and all her glory. The sight of it, all that water and the blind crushing power of the surf, filled me with dread. I’d seen water before, lakes, plenty big, but that was nothing like this. I don’t think I can describe what it was like that first time, and furthermore, I’m not sure I care too.

You can imagine the state I was in when a few weeks later they gave me a rifle and put me on a boat. When I stopped vomiting up everything that I ate, I decided that I might not kill myself after all. Not being able to see the land, and that ceaseless chaotic, rocking of the waves; I remember thinking that the war had to be a step up from this. Kids can be so stupid.

I had such a giddy sense of glee when I saw the island, and its solid banks. They transferred us to a smaller boat in the middle of the night, just our undersized company with our rucksacks and rifles. We just took a ride right into it, just because they asked us to. The lieutenants herded us into our platoons on the decks and briefed us: the island had been lost. That was exactly how he put it. Somehow, in the grand plan for the Pacific, this one tiny speck of earth, only recently discovered and unmapped, had gotten lost in the shuffle. A singularly perfect clerical error was all it took. It was extremely unlikely, he stressed, that the Japanese had gotten a hold of it, being so far east and south of their current borders, but a recent fly-over reported what looked like an airfield in the central plateau.

We hit the beach in the middle of the night. I’d heard talk of landings before, and I’m not ashamed to say that I was scared shitless. I don’t know quite what I expected, but it wasn’t we got, that thick, heavy silence. Behind the lapping of the waves and the wind in the trees, there was… nothing. No birds, no insects, just deathly stillness.

Another hundred yards deeper into the eerie tranquility of the jungle, we stopped in a small clearing for the officers to reconvene, and it was obvious even they were spooked. I wasn’t a bright kid, but I knew enough to know that something was very wrong. It was like the whole island was dead. I remember I could only smell the sea, despite the red blossoms dangling from the trees.

It wasn’t an airfield, on top of the plateau. I can’t tell you what it was, because I’ve never seen anything like it, and I don’t think anyone ever will. It was sort of like the Aztec pyramids, but turned upside down, so that it sank, like giant steps, into the earth. You’d get the basic idea of it, but that somehow fails to capture the profound unearthliness of the structure.

There was no sign of individual pieces in the masonry. It appeared to have been carved out of a single immense block of black rock into a sharp and geometric shape. It was slick and perfectly smooth like obsidian, but it had no shine to it. It swallowed up even the moonlight, so that it was impossible to see how deep it went, or even focus your eyes on any one part of it, like it was one giant blind spot.

Our platoon drew the honor of investigating the lower levels, so we descended the stairs as the rest of the company surrounded the plateau. We took the stairs slowly and carefully, after the first man to touch one of the right angle edges cut his hand on it.

At odd intervals down the steps, there were several small stone rooms: simple, empty, hollow cubes of stone with one opening, facing the pit in the center. There was no door that we could see, and with the opening being four feet off the ground, you’d have to put your hands on that black razor sharp edge to climb into it.

We circled the descending floors, shining our lights into each of the small structures. They contained the same featureless black walls and nothing else; no dust, leaves, or foliage from the jungle. The whole monument was immaculate, as if the place was just built, but that couldn’t be right. The whole structure felt incalculably old to me, somehow.

Down near the bottom, you could see that it simply sloped away into a darkness that swallowed the flashlights. We tossed first a button, and then a shell casing down into the pit. We waited in the unearthly silence, but no sounds returned. No one spoke. We simply turned away from the yawning abyss and continued our sweep of the bottom rung and the last of the small structures.

The body in the back corner was almost invisible at first in the thick shadows, but the long spill of drying blood reflected the light of our flashlights, and it led right to him. He was coiled tight, arms around his thighs, and his face tucked into his knees. You could see that he was badly cut. His clothes opened in ragged bloody tatters to reveal the pale skin and bone beneath it. He may have been dressed in a Japanese uniform, but it had been reduced to ribbons. I only had a few seconds to look at him before we heard the first shots.

It echoed in the still jungle, swallowed almost instantly by the blanket of quiet. By the time we reached the top, the rest of the company had vanished. There were shell casings on the ground and the hot smell of gunpowder in the air, but they were gone. The trees were deathly quiet around us, and there wasn't a trace of the nearly fifty other men that had come ashore with us. I could taste bile rising in my throat as panic threatened to cripple me. I felt crushed between the yawning pit and razor edges on one side and the dead jungle and the pounding ocean on the other. The silence rang in my ears and I struggled to still myself.

They were just inside the jungle, waiting for us. They came out from between the trees with all the sound of a moth, simply sliding into our view.

I can try to tell you what I saw, the same as I did to the army doc on the hospital ship when I first woke up (and half a dozen other various officers over the following months), and you’ll have the same reaction they did; that I was a dumb country rube suffering from heatstroke and trauma. That I was crazy.

You know me. You know I’m not crazy. And I remember every second of that night with crystal clarity.

The thing, the first one that caught my eye, was wearing the skin of a Japanese soldier, all mottled with the belly distended from rot. The head drooped, useless and obscene on the shoulders, tongue swollen and eyes cloudy. I could see where it was coming apart at the ill-defined joints, with ragged holes in the drying flesh. At the bottom of each of these raw pits was blackness, deeper than the stones of the buildings; a darkness that seemed to churn and froth like an angry cloud.

The thing moved suddenly, the head snapping and rolling backwards as it dashed toward us. I had my rifle clasped tightly in my hands, but it simply didn’t occur to me to fire. All I could do was gape silently at the macabre sight bearing down on us, and think absurdly of my mother’s marionettes.

A gun went off beside me, and I turned to see a dozen more of the horrors darting silently in on us. Among them were a few more rotting and swollen forms, but the majority wore the same uniforms as us, and were pale, fresh, and soaked in blood. More bullets zipped through the air, and I saw the grisly things hit again and again, but they never slowed. I caught a glimpse of the First Sergeant’s vacant, glassy eyes as his head dangled limp from his shoulders. I saw the great ragged wound in his back and the shuddering darkness that inhabited his corpse when he leapt just past me without a sound, landing like a graceful predator onto the soldier beside me. The others around me began to drop in a silent dance of kinetic energy and blurred motion

I was on the track team in high school, and it could have got me to college. I didn’t need an invitation. I just ran. I ran blind through the jungle, bouncing off of tree trunks. I ran until I saw the ocean, and it struck a new ringing note of terror in me. I don’t remember actually deciding to swim, but when I turned back to the tree line, I saw one of the white and bloody things emerge, running on all fours, the hands splayed wide and the back contorted and cracked in an impossible angle.

To this day, the mere thought of the ocean still brings on a cold sweat, but that night I let it embrace me. I let the tide drag me out to sea, if only to bring momentary relief from the impossible monolith and terrors on the island. The days I spent drifting offshore and blistering in the sun were a welcome release from the silent island.

I never saw the war. They sent me home as soon as I recovered.

It was comforting in a way, when I thought no one believed me. It allowed me to believe that it never happened, that it was a product of my mind. However, as I got older, I’ve found that it is pointless to lie to anyone, especially yourself. I know what I saw.

Someone else believed me, too. I’ve seen maps of where they tested the hydrogen bombs in the South Pacific.

Story source.

RAKE

During the summer of 2003, events in the northeastern United States involving a strange, humanlike creature sparked brief local media interest before an apparent blackout was enacted. Little or no information was left intact, as most online and written accounts of the creature were mysteriously destroyed.

Primarily focused in rural New York state, self proclaimed witnesses told stories of their enounters with a creature of unkown origin. Emotions ranged from extremely traumatic levels of fright and discomfort, to an almost childlike sense of playfulness and curiosity. While their published versions are no longer on record, the memories remained powerful. Several of the involved parties began looking for answers that year.

In early 2006, the collaboration had accumulated nearly two dozen documents dating between the 12th century and present day, spanning 4 continents. In almost all cases, the stories were identical. I've been in contact with a member of this group and was able to get some excerpts from their upcoming book.

A Suicide Note: 1964

"As I prepare to take my life, I feel it necessary to assuage any guilt or pain I have introduced through this act. It is not the fault of anyone other than him. For once I awoke and felt his presence. And once I awoke and saw his form. Once again I awoke and heard his voice, and looked into his eyes. I cannot sleep without fear of what I might next awake to experience. I cannot ever wake. Goodbye."

Found in the same wooden box were two empty envelopes addressed to William and Rose, and one loose personal letter with no envelope:

"Dearest Linnie,

I have prayed for you. He spoke your name."

A Journal Entry (translated from Spanish): 1880

I have experienced the greatest terror. I have experienced the greatest terror. I have experienced the greatest terror. I see his eyes when I close mine. They are hollow. Black. They saw me and pierced me. His wet hand. I will not sleep. His voice (unintelligible text).

A Mariner's Log: 1691

He came to me in my sleep. From the foot of my bed I felt a sensation. He took everything. We must return to England. We shall not return here again, at the request of the Rake.

From a Witness: 2006

Three years ago, I had just returned from a trip from Niagara Falls with my family for the 4th of July. We were all very exhausted after a long day of driving, so my husband and I put the kids right to bed and called it a night.

At about 4am, I woke up thinking my husband had gotten up to use the restroom. I used the moment to steal back the sheets, only to wake him in the process. I appologized and told him I thought he got out of bed. When he turned to face me, he gasped and pulled his feet up from the end of the bed so quickly his knee almost knocked me out of the bed. He then grabbed me and said nothing.

After adjusting to the dark for a half second, I was able to see what caused the strange reaction. At the foot of the bed, sitting and facing away from us, there was what appeared to be a naked man, or a large hairless dog of some sort. It's body position was disturbing and unnatural, as if it had been hit by a car or something. For some reason, I was not instantly frightened by it, but more concerned as to its condition. At this point I was somewhat under the assumption that we were supposed to help him.

My husband was peering over his arm and knee, tucked into the fetal position, occasionally glancing at me before returning to the creature.

In a flurry of motion, the creature scrambled around the side of the bed, and then crawled quickly in a flailing sort of motion right along the bed until it was less than a foot from my husband's face. The creature was completely silent for about 30 seconds (or probably closer to 5, it just seemed like a while) just looking at my husband. The creature then placed its hand on his knee and ran into the hallway, leading to the kids' rooms. I screamed and ran for the lightswitch, planning to stop him before he hurt my children. When I got to the hallway, the light from the bedroom was enough to see it crouching and hunched over about 20 feet away. He turned around and looked directly at me, covered in blood. I flipped the switch on the wall and saw my daughter Clara.

The creature ran down the stairs while my husband and I rushed to help our daughter. She was very badly injured and spoke only once more in her short life. She said "He is the Rake".

My husband drove his car into a lake that night, while rushing our daughter to the hospital. He did not survive.

Being a small town, news got around pretty quickly. The police were helpful at first, and the local newspaper took a lot of interest as well. However, the story was never published and the local television news never followed up, either.

For several months, my son Justin and I stayed in a hotel near my parents' house. After we decided to return home, I began looking for answers myself. I eventually located a man in the next town over who had a similar story. We got in contact and began talking about our experiences. He knew of two other people in New York who had seen the creature we now referred to as the Rake.

It took the four of us about two solid years of hunting on the Internet and writing letters to come up with a small collection of what we believe to be accounts of the Rake. None of them gave any details, history or follow up. One journal had an entry involving the creature in its first 3 pages, and never mentioned it again. A ship's log explained nothing of the encounter, saying only that they were told to leave by the Rake. That was the last entry in the log.

There were, however, many instances where the creature's visit was one of a series of visits with the same person. Multiple people also mentioned being spoken to, my daughter included. This led us to wonder if the Rake had visited any of us before our last encounter.

I set up a digital recorder near my bed and left it running all night, every night, for two weeks. I would tediously scan through the sounds of me rolling around in my bed each day when I woke up. By the end of the second week, I was quite used to the occasional sound of sleep while blurring through the recording at 8 times the normal speed. (This still took almost an hour every day)

On the first day of the third week, I thought I heard something different. What I found was a shrill voice. It was the Rake. I can't listen to it long enough to even begin to transcribe it. I haven't let anyone listen to it yet. All I know is that I've heard it before, and I now believe that it spoke when it was sitting in front of my husband. I don't remember hearing anything at the time, but for some reason, the voice on the recorder immediately brings me back to that moment.

The thoughts that must have gone through my daughter's head make me very upset.

I have not seen the Rake since he ruined my life, but I know that he has been in my room while I slept.

I fear that one night, I'll wake up to see him staring at me.

IMAGINATION

There it goes again. Something definitely moved this time.

It was very brief, but out of the corner of your eye, you saw something. But wait. All the doors are locked, no pets, and your parents won’t get home until 10. So there’s no way something moved. It’s just your imagination getting the best of you. Sitting alone in your room, the only light emitting from the monitor of your computer, you stare into the darkness for several minutes. Just to be sure. 

Now you feel silly. What were you thinking? Of course there’s nothing there. What are you, 6? Go back to what you were doing.

15 minutes later, as you prepare to go to bed, you’re in the bathroom. The shower curtains shift. Wait… no. Stop spooking yourself. It’s just an overactive imagination, filling your head with what isn’t really there.

You gaze into the mirror at yourself. You say it to yourself, slowly and clearly, “Imagination.” With a sigh, you turn the lights off and head towards your room.

Laying in bed, you stare at your ceiling, dark and foreboding, only the motion of a small fan disturbing the calmness of the night. A shadow from the light in the hall shifts. No. No, no, no. Stop it. It’s your imagination. Just that. Go to sleep, you fool.

But then, just when you’re about to drift off to sleep, at the phase no one remembers when they wake, you sense something in the darkness. It’s your imagination, leering down at you.

With a jagged, macabre smile.    

NO ONE WAS HOME

A mother and father decided they needed a break, not having much alone time in the almost a year since their young son, Toby, was born. They wanted to have a night out, dinner, maybe a movie, and the honeymoon suite at a local hotel to possibly give Toby a little brother or sister. They called their most trusted babysitter, who unfortunately was already engaged for the evening. But she did refer a good friend of hers, Opal, who she swore could be trusted. They spoke with the new babysitter and agreed to have her arrive no later than 6:30 so the parents could get an early start.

As the parents got ready to paint the town red, Toby lay on the floor, gnawing on his teething ring in the den off to the back of the house. At shortly after 6:20 the father walked past the open doorway and saw an elderly woman sitting in the rocking chair facing the child, her back to the doorway. The father was slightly startled as his wife hadn't mentioned the sitter had arrived. He spoke to her as he straightened his tie in the mirror on wall opposite the doorway.

"Oh my, I'm sorry; I didn't hear you come in. We appreciate you coming on such short notice. My wife put some a chicken in the oven for you. The numbers for the restaurant and hotel are on the counter if you need to reach us. We will be home around 9 tomorrow morning. Goodbye Toby, I love you."

He hurried down the hallway as his wife was coming down the stairs, meeting her at the bottom his wife asked, "What were you saying, dear?"

"Oh nothing, I was just giving the sitter instructions. We should hurry so we can make our reservation on time," he replied grabbing his coat as he unlocked the front door.

They went to the car and were in such a rush they didn't notice the car pull into the drive way not 15 seconds after they pulled out. They proceeded to have the best night out they could remember. The wife become somewhat concerned shortly after arriving at the hotel when she called home and no one answered. The husband calmed her as he pulled her into bed, kissing her neck.

"Don't worry dear, she's an older lady and it's almost 10, she must have gone to bed after putting Toby down."


The next morning after a nice breakfast they arrived home to find a note on the door. It read: 

I arrived at 6:30 as agreed, but no one was home.
If you had made other plans, I would have appreciated if someone had called me. 

Opal

The husband gave his wife a confused look as she put a hand to her mouth and her face turned white. She threw open the front door calling out for her son. There was no reply, in fact there was no sound at all in the house, just the smell or some burned meat. She ran up the stairs as her husband raced to the back of the house the find the kitchen filled with smoke. He turned off the stove and used pot holders to grab the smoldering pan or charred meat and drop it in the sink. His wife came into the kitchen crying into her hands

"He's not here! Toby's gone! She took him!"

The husband then took her in his arms as she cried. It was then that he noticed blood on the lid of the trash can. A pit formed in his stomach as he left his wife and opened the trash can. He exhaled as he realized that it was only the chicken his wife had made. It was then that his eyes shot wide open as his wife let out a fresh scream of horror. As he turned toward her, he caught sight of the melted remains of the teething ring on the bottom of the open oven.

OLD HAG

It's a simple enough thing. It's all a part of the body's sleep processes. Sleep Paralysis, right? No big deal, really. Your body produces a chemical that paralyzes your body during R.E.M sleep to prevent you from hurting yourself by thrashing about during your dreams. No big deal.

Okay, so you opened your eyes and you can't move your body. It's the chemicals. Oh, you can keep trying to wriggle those toes, but it's not happening. Forget it. Just relax. It'll go away. It's fine. It's normal.

Oh, now there's something pressing on your chest, real hard; it's making it hard to breath. It's heavy, so very heavy, whatever's on your chest. Chemicals. It's all chemicals. Stop trying to scream, it won't work. Your throat muscles are paralyzed too. You still can't breath.

You are staring at a blank ceiling, you can't stare anywhere else. Shadows flit across your vision, forming shapes you try not to think about. A clawed hand, a flash of jagged, shadowy teeth. All images from your subconscious. A face forming above yours, leering through black void eyes. You think you hear whispering. Angry hissing, like a snake that's been disturbed.

Suddenly, a sharp white light briefly flares in the room as a car pulls down the street, dispelling the shadows. The weight is gone. You can breath, your hands clench sheets.

You feel an eternity has passed by, but it was all the work of a moment. You wriggle, just to prove to yourself you can. You sit up, take a deep breath and then laugh a little at yourself. Sleep Paralysis. Stupid.

You turn to shake your wife awake, eager to share your experience. You feel paralyzed again, but it has nothing to do with Sleep Paralysis. You stare at the blood, the jagged wound in her throat, her wide, staring eyes, mouth opened in soundless scream.

You survived your Old Hag Syndrome.

She didn't.

BORDER CROSSING

There was a couple from Texas who were planning a weekend trip across the Mexican border for a shopping spree. At the last minute their babysitter canceled, so they had to bring along their two-year-old son with them. They had been across the border for an hour when the boy got free and ran around the corner. The mother tried to find him, but he was missing. The mother found a police officer, who told her to go to the gate and wait. Not really understanding the instructions, she did as she was told. About 45 minutes later, a Mexican man approached the border, carrying the boy. The mother ran to him, grateful that he had been found. When the man realized it was the boy's mother, he dropped him and ran. The police were waiting for him. The boy was dead, and in the 45 minutes he was missing, he had been cut open, all of his organs removed, and stuffed with bags of cocaine. The man was going to carry him across the border, as if he were asleep.

"REALISTIC"

In rural southern Illinois, a toy company began selling "realistic" baby dolls to expectant mothers. Apparently, after one mother had her child, the toy baby would start crying. Eventually, the "rocking motion" advertised to calm it down wouldn't work, and you couldn't get it to stop without shaking it. Eventually when it started crying the parent would have to beat it, and the beatings and thrashings would have to get harder and harder to get it to be quiet. The only thing that seemed to shut the baby doll up permanently was to bash its head against the wall to destroy whatever mechanism triggered the crying. On more than one occasion though, neighbors called the authorities to report child abuse, and when the police arrived they found the bloody remains of infants smeared across the walls and the floor. In most cases the mother couldn't understand why the police were there; she just "got rid of the stupid doll," as she rocked a baby-shaped bundle in her arms.

BAD DREAM

"Daddy, I had a bad dream."

You blink your eyes and pull up on your elbows.
Your clock glows red in the darkness; it's 3:23.

"Do you want to climb into bed and tell me about it?"

"No, Daddy."

The oddness of the situation wakes you up more fully.
You can barely make out your daughter's pale form
in the darkness of your room.

"Why not, sweetie?"

"Because in my dream, when I told you about the dream,
the thing wearing Mommy's skin sat up."

For a moment, you feel paralyzed;
you can't take your eyes off of your daughter.
Then, the covers shift beside you.

UNKNOWN CHILD

Recently, my town (a city in Northern Kentucky, just across the river from Cincinnati, Ohio) started “ghost tours” during the month of October. Until the late 1950s, my city used to be full of gangsters, mafia, and gamblers, so there were plenty of murders, suicides, and other weird happenings going on to ensure a history full of tragedy.

Last month, my wife, my parents and I went on this particular walk that consisted of walking around a few blocks of the city, looking at old buildings and listening to stories that took place at these locations. My parents grew up on one particular street that was included in the walk, so they were able to verify most of the stories for us. When we got in front of the building my mom grew up in, the woman guiding the tour told us a really creepy story that I’ve been trying to verify for over a month now, but I can’t seem to find any information online about it.  

As the story goes, three or four years ago in the dead of winter (I think it happened on Christmas Eve, but I’m not sure) the police found a young boy around age 10 standing outside the door of the building that used to be my mom’s apartment. A couple of murders have taken place in that building, but that’s another story for another time. Anyway, the young boy that the police found was wearing only a thin pair of shorts and nothing else. No shoes, no shirt, despite there being snow on the ground and temperatures below the freezing mark.

The police tried to ask the boy questions about where he had been, who his parents were, why he was standing there, etc., but the boy either refused to answer or said he couldn’t remember anything.

The police ended up taking him to Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, and posted police bulletins throughout the county in an attempt to locate the boy’s parents and bring him home. Oddly, no one ever showed up to claim him.

After he was taken to Children’s Hospital, he began to exhibit strange and disturbing behavior and was taken to a psychiatrist where he underwent some form of psychological testing. This is where the story gets even weirder, but being as though I’m not a psychiatrist, I don’t know the exact names for terms, etc. On this particular test that he underwent that diagnosed psychoses, he was found to have scored a level of 7. Our guide then told us that Ted Bundy had undergone the same test and scored a level of only 4.

Despite being in the system now for a few years, the child has never been claimed by anyone, and has in fact begun to exhibit stranger and more disturbing behavior as the years go on. In fact, the tour guide told us that the county who has custody of the now teenager is so disturbed by his behavior that they have recommended keeping him in custody until the age of 18, and afterward transferring him to a secure location because they’re so concerned that when he is released he will harm someone.

Granted, this could have been a great spooky story that was merely intended to scare willing patrons, until a member of our group spoke up and told us that he was a psychology student at the University of Cincinnati, and that his class had been discussing this child’s case.

Last but not least, let me add one more detail. The street that we were on is reported by some paranormal societies to be one of the most “evil” streets in America, due to the number and nature of some of the deaths that have occurred there. Does the fact that this child was found in one of the most “evil” locations in the USA have anything to do with his disturbing mindset?

Story source.

LIGHTNING

We had just moved into a little ranch house in the suburbs. Storybook neighborhood – quiet, friendly neighbors, picket fences, the whole nine yards. Suffice it to say that this was supposed to be a new start for me, a recently single dad, and my three-year-old son. A time to move on from the previous year’s drama and stress.

I viewed the thunderstorm as a metaphor for this fresh start: one last show of theatrics before the dirt and grime of the past would be washed away. My son loved it anyway, even with the power out. It was the first big storm he’d ever seen. Flashes of lightning flooded the bare rooms of our house, imparting unpacked boxes with long creeping shadows, and he jumped and squealed as the thunder boomed. It was well past his bedtime before he’d finally settled down enough to go to sleep.

The next morning I found him awake in bed and smiling. “I watched the lightning at my window!” he proudly announced.

A few mornings later, he told me the same thing. “You’re silly,” I said. “It didn’t storm last night, you were only dreaming!”

“Oh…” He seemed somewhat disheartened. I ruffled his hair and told him not to worry, there should be another storm soon.

Then it became a pattern. He would tell me how he watched the lightning outside his window at least twice a week, despite there being no storms. Recurring dreams of that first memorable thunderstorm, I figured.

It’s easy to hate myself in hindsight. Everybody assures me there’s nothing I could have done, no way I could have known. But I’m supposed to be the guardian of my child, and these are useless words of comfort. I constantly relive that morning: making my coffee, pouring milk over my cereal, and picking up the newspaper to read about the pedophile local authorities had just arrested. It was front-page stuff. Apparently this guy would select a young target (usually a boy), stake out their house for a while, and take flash photos of them through their window while they slept. Sometimes he did more. My stomach sank as the connection was made.

At the time, it was merely something from a child’s imagination. In retrospect, it is the scariest thing I’ve ever heard. About a week before the predator was caught, my son came up to me in his pajamas. “Guess what?” he asked.

“What?”

“No more lightning at my window!”

I played along. “Oh, that’s nice; it finally died down huh?”

“No! Now it’s in my closet!”

I’ve yet to see the photos police have collected.

Story source.

M SHOW FAN CLUB

When I was 9 years old I had a favorite TV series. It had human actors and actors in animal suits and funny and educational clips in between. I don’t want to name it because it was a really good show and this story is not at all a fault of the show. I will just call it “The M Show.”

The M Show was running for years and I had been watching it for as long as I can remember. I always sat down, straight after school with my older sister Scarlett and my best friend Brandi, who lived next door.

It was our ritual, every day the three of us sat together – with sweets, if our moms allowed it, or else with apples or grapes – and in the breaks of the show we talked and gossiped about all those important issues in our lives.

Then, I remember it was a warm summer Friday, Scarlett found a prize competition in one of her girl magazines. It asked questions about the show and first prize was a travel with your parents to Disney World. But even better, everybody who sent in the correct answers would become a member of The M Show Club, a fan club for the show. The same day, after watching the M Show, the three of us huddled together on the couch to answer the quiz.

The questions were very hard; they asked details about old episodes of the show. Without Scarlett, Brandi and I would never have managed to answer all the questions.

Scarlett begged our mom for stamps and envelopes and we filled the three envelopes each with a paper with our names and contact details and the answers to the questions. Scarlett even told us to vary our answers slightly so that we wouldn’t be called out for cheating.

The letters were sent off and every day we all rushed to the mailbox to get our The M Show Club badges. When the first snow began to fall we stopped checking the mailbox. Brandi was still passionate about the show and watched it every day, but Scarlett lost interest. When Scarlett stopped watching I too began to skip the show. Brandi still came over, but she was the only one watching. I sat next to her while working my way through Scarlett’s old girl magazines.

It was early spring. I remember there were tulips in our garden and my mom reprimanded me for plucking two to decorate the kitchen table. But right after her lecture she handed me a small square letter with my name printed on it. The back said “Welcome to The M Show Fan Club.”

There was not much in the envelope – only a short leaflet that welcomed me to the club and a small ID card with my name on it, a big logo of the show and in black letters “The M Show Fan Club,” and in the line below, in big black letters, the word “Member.”

Brandi got her envelope the same day. She was glowing with happiness. Scarlett was jealous at first, but two days later she got her envelope too.

From then on, every Friday, each of us received a leaflet about the show with photos and anecdotes and background information on the characters. Occasionally the leaflets also called on the club members to promote the show and to watch out for “The M Show Tour.”

Either way, it worked: We loved the show afterwards. I think from that day on, after I proudly stuffed the membership card in my bag, I didn’t miss a single episode.

Then, in mid-June, we all got two leaflets. The first was the usual one with facts and photos. But the second was an ad:

“The tour bus is in town – this is your chance to become an ‘Elite Member’!”

The bus was coming the next Sunday to our town. We were all allowed to go. We were beyond excited.

The leaflet didn’t have much information and that was before we had a computer at home. The tour bus would arrive at 1pm and the main characters of the show would be there to welcome everybody and play games with us. Those that participated in at least four games would be upgraded to “Elite Member”-status and receive a new, golden membership card.

Those nine days of waiting for “The M Show Tour” were some of the longest in my life. Brandi and Scarlett and I planned every day how we would take photos with each of the characters and then play games with them. I secretly dreamed of beating Scarlett at the “knowledge game,” where our knowledge about the show would be tested.

On Saturday Scarlett went to a birthday-sleepover at one of her friends’ houses. The parents were supposed to bring Scarlett back by 12 on Sunday.

Around 12:30 Brandi came running to our house. She knocked on the back door, like she always did, and I let her in. Brandi was beyond excited; her mom had volunteered to accompany the three of us and she wanted to go early so that we wouldn’t miss anything.

My mom called the house of Scarlett’s friend, but they didn’t pick up their phone. She said that Scarlett would be home soon – early enough to go on time.

At 12:45 Brandi’s mother came over to ask for us. She said that we would have to leave so that the queues wouldn’t be too long. My mom said we should wait for Scarlett, but Brandi threw a tantrum; she was scared that she wouldn’t be able to hug all the characters if we came late.

Brandi’s mom decided to drive. I wanted to come along – but my mother said that she would drive Scarlett and me. I felt like I was being punished for Scarlett’s being late. I begged. I cried.

Nothing helped; Brandi went alone.

Her friends’ parents dropped Scarlett off at 13:40. I was mad at her, but my mom said if I made a scene we wouldn’t go at all. I relented.

We arrived around twenty minutes later at the big parking lot where the bus was scheduled to stop. We saw the crowds from the distance, parked the car and walked over.

I asked my mom where the characters of the show were; she said that they were just behind the crowd.

They all held the “The M Show Tour” flyers, but it looked as if the crowd were mostly parents. They stood in a half-circle towards the edge of the parking lot. Some of them looked concerned, but most of them were laughing and talking.

My mom spotted Brandi’s mother at the other end of the half-circle; we walked over to her. Brandi’s mother was one of the worried ones.

She told us that the bus had been there, together with all the animal figures from “The M Show.” They had a large bus with the “The M Show” logo and they handed out sweets.

One of the animal figures had explained to the parents that they had built a set outside of town where we all could make our own short film with the characters of the show. They said they would drive everybody there.

They took the children first. They were all so excited that few parents objected. Still, three or four parents came along and that calmed the rest. The next bus was supposed to arrive within a few minutes, to bring everyone to the set.

When I heard that I was excited like never before.

I ran to the street to look around so I could be the first on the bus. Scarlett followed me.

I didn’t see the worried expression when Brandi’s mother talked to mine.

I didn’t understand why the police came not even an hour later.

In Monday’s episode of “The M Show” one of the characters came on stage and told us to call our parents to watch the show. Our mom was already sitting with Scarlett and me.

The character said that “The M Show” didn’t have a fan club.

That week Brandi’s parents cried a lot. I was still sure that Brandi was okay, I thought she just had so much fun that she didn’t want to come back.

She must have had a lot of fun; she never came back.

Brandi’s mother cried even more, that Friday, when the small parcel arrived.

There was a new “The M Show Fan Club” membership card for Brandi. It was golden and said “Elite Member” in big, bold letters.

The parcel also contained a video. It was only a minute long; a minute of Brandi at the set of “The M Show.” She was wearing the same dress as when she came over to our house that Sunday morning.

On the video she Brandi smiling; an actor in a big animal suit stood next to her, silently.

“Hi mom, I really like it here,” said Brandi. “I really wish you could be here.” Then she laughed.

“I’m sorry the others were late. I’m sure they would have loved it too.”

Story source unknown.

CLAP CLAP

One day, a young married couple went hiking in the mountains. As the sun began to set, they realized that they were lost. The wife was getting worried, but her husband tried to calm her down and assured her that they would eventually find their way back to their car. However, after walking for hours, they still had no idea where they were.

It was growing dark and the man and wife were getting desperate. They didn’t have a map or a compass with them and all of the trees looked the same. Just when they were about to give up hope, they came across an old cabin in a clearing.

The cabin looked as if it had seen better days. It was dilapidated and seemed like it hadn’t been used in a long time. Some of the windows were cracked and broken and a lot of the tiles had fallen off the roof. The husband knocked on the front door but there was no response. When he turned the handle, it slowly creaked open.

Inside, they found it was in a bad state of disrepair. There was very little furniture and the floor was covered in a thick layer of dust. As the couple cautiously looked around, they noticed a strange atmosphere and a peculiar musty smell.

The walls were covered from floor to ceiling with graffiti. Written in red paint, the words, “Death! Death! Death! Death! Death!” were repeated over and over again.

The man and woman were unnerved. With a shaking hand, the husband reached out to touch the wall. He was horrified to find that the paint was not yet dry.

The couple were very frightened, but they had nowhere else to go. They knew that the mountain was dangerous at night and there were lots of wild animals prowling the woods. Despite the creepy writing on the walls, they decided to stay the night.

Going upstairs, they found a moth-eaten mattress that was covered in stains. The husband and wife wrapped themselves in an old piece of carpet to keep warm and tried to make themselves as comfortable as possible under the circumstances. They lay down together on the mattress and eventually managed to fall asleep.

Sometime after midnight, the couple were awakened by a strange rustling noise. It sounded like someone or something was moving around outside the shack.

“Did you hear that?” asked his wife. “I think there’s somebody out there.”

Her husband listened for a while, but he didn’t hear anything. He got out of bed and walked over to the window. It was too dark outside to see anything. Opening the window, he stuck his head out.

“Who’s there?” he called nervously.

There was no answer.

He was about to go back to bed when his wife said, “Maybe it’s someone who can’t speak…”

The husband returned to the window and said, “Is there anybody out there? Clap once for YES and twice for NO.”

He strained his ears to listen. The stars twinkled in the night sky. The crickets were chirping loudly.

All of a sudden, he heard a loud CLAP!

The man turned to his wife and said in surprise, “You were right. There’s someone out there.”

He leaned out the window and his eyes scanned the darkness. he couldn’t make out anything in the pitch black.

“Are you the owner of this cabin?” he asked.

CLAP! CLAP!

“Are you a man?”

CLAP! CLAP!

“You’re a woman, then?”

CLAP! CLAP!

“Are you human?”

CLAP! CLAP!

A chill ran down his spine. He swallowed hard and croaked, “Did you come here alone?”

CLAP! CLAP!

“How many are with you? Clap once for each person…”

CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP! CLAP!…

Story source.

FATHER AND DAUGHTER

Late one evening, a husband and wife were enjoying a romantic drive along a lonely mountain road. They were just rounding a sharp bend when a little girl came tearing out of the bushes by the side of the road. She stood right in the path of their car, holding out her hands and crying loudly.

The husband was so shocked by her sudden appearance that he almost ran over her. Luckily, he managed to swerve at the last moment and avoid her. Glancing in his rear view mirror, he saw her running off into the darkness. She couldn’t have been more than 6 or 7.

When they had calmed down, the couple began to dicuss what they had just seen.

“What is a little girl doing out here all alone after dark?” the husband wondered.

“I don’t know,” replied his wife. “It gives me the creeps. Do you think she was a ghost?”

“I don’t think so,” said the husband. “She seemed so upset. Maybe she was lost and in trouble…”

Just then, they noticed a man on the road ahead. When the man noticed their car, he put out his hand and flagged them down. The husband pulled over to the side of the road.

The man was out of breath. “Have you seen my daughter?” he asked.

He said that he had taken his daughter for a walk along the mountain trail and they had lost track of time. In the darkness they had become separated and now he was desperately looking for her.

The couple told him they had seen a little girl running across the road only a few minutes before. The husband felt so guilty about not stopping for the child that he offered her father a lift back to where they had seen her.

“No thanks,” replied the man. “You don’t have to that. Thank you very much though.”

When they described where they had seen his daughter, the man thanked them again for their help and took off running down the road.

A week later, the husband and wife were watching TV together. On the news, a reporter was saying that the dead body of a little girl had been found on a lonely mountain road and the police had arrested the man who murdered her.

Looking at the picture that was displayed on the screen, the couple were horrified.

It was the same man they had spoken to.

He wasn’t the little girl’s father at all.

The little girl had been struggling to escape the clutches of her kidnapper and, without knowing it, they had helped him catch her.

Story source.

MELVIN

I used to be a ventriloquist. I auditioned for the 4th grade talent show at my school and I won with my pal, Slappy. In 5th grade, I wanted a better dummy. So at an antique mall, I found Melvin. He has real hair and these icy blue eyes that move side to side. They seem to pierce your soul. This will scare those bastards at school.

We auditioned and won again. Melvin was more popular than Slappy, and I got to sign a kid's forehead last year!

After that, me and Mel started an internet series that is still on YouTube. But a few years ago I gave up ventriloquism.

It could be due to my loss of popularity or my lack of joke-writing ability. Or it could be because of the nightmares.

Every few nights I'd wake up in a cold sweat with chills running down my spine. In the nightmares, Melvin would mutilate my family members and say it was because he wasn't getting what he wanted. I started to go mad. I heard voices in my head after that. Melvin's voice, telling me what a worthless piece of shit I was, and how I was only something because he let me be something. I was alive because he let me live.

I made the mistake of telling my family. They took me to a therapist. But when that didn't work, they put Melvin under the house, in the crawlspace. That only made things worse. Melvin's face would appear in my dreams with his twisted grin and piercing blue eyes. He'd open his big red mouth and release a garbled, high-pitched laugh, like an action figure whose batteries were dying. Then blood would flood out. My family began to worry for my mental health, but I knew why this was. It was because Melvin wasn't getting what he wanted.

A month later, I found him in the crawlspace. The voice in my head was going mad. Melvin was furious with me and he threatened to kill my family and make me watch. I pleaded with him to change his mind. I told him I'd do anything if he'd change his mind. He told me he wouldn't kill them...if I did.

I tied him up and put him in a trunk, which I tucked away in the basement. I knew the nightmares would continue, but I had to protect my family.

The next day my therapist asked me to bring Melvin to her. I did so, believing she could stop Melvin. But when I got Melvin out, I set him on the couch next to me, and he opened his mouth and a siren wailed out of it. Meanwhile she told me Melvin was just a dummy and it was all in my head. I started screaming and she ran out of the room to get help. Meanwhile, me and Mel sat on the couch screaming.

So now I'm in the hospital receiving treatment. I don't know what happened to Melvin after my "episode." My family probably got rid of him. I still have nightmares about him. Blood flooding from his mouth, from behind his piercing blue eyes. The doctors keep telling me it's all in my head. I started to believe them. Until I got the news.

My family was dead.

Source.

HIGH-CHAIR

A young couple were waiting impatiently to leave on their first vacation since the baby was born but the woman’s aunt, who would be babysitting, was thirty minutes late. The young woman called her elderly aunt to find out what was going on, and the old woman apologized for her forgetfulness, and said she’d speed right over. Since the aunt was only a couple miles away, the couple decided they’d go ahead and go rather than wait for her and risk missing their flight.  

Two weeks later when the couple returned they were horrified to find the baby still in its high-chair where they’d left it, except now it was dead and bloated, covered with flies. The aunt really had sped, and unfortunately crashed and died before she made it over.

Image source.

DON'T LOOK BEHIND YOU

In the town where I lived, there was an abandoned apartment with two floors. It had broken windows and dirty, crumbling walls, so no locals would ever go near it.

One day, me and my friend decided to explore the place. It was still early in the afternoon and there was a lot of light, so we ventured to the second floor.

And there on one of the doors we found some graffiti.

We went closer to have a look and found some words that said: “I am in the room ahead.”

We decided to go through the door.

We walked until we reached a fork and on the wall it said: “I am on the left.”

We were getting slightly scared but decided to turn left.

Then we came to the place where there were rooms on both sides of us.

And on the wall it said, “My head is on the left and my body is on the right.”

My friend, as soon as he saw it, lost nerve and ran away. But I decided to stay and, mustering all my courage, walked through the door on the right. I walked to the farthest wall in the room and on the wall it said: “My body is underneath.” 

I looked down and on the floor it said: “My head is coming here from the room on the left. Don’t look behind you.”

RESOURCEFUL

In the winter of 1944, with overtaxed supply lines in the Ardennes, a combat medic in the German army had completely run out of plasma, bandages and antiseptic. During one particularly bad round of mortar fire, his encampment was a bloodbath. Those who survived claimed to have heard, above the screams and barked commands of their Lieutenant, someone cackling with an almost otherworldly glee.

The combat medic had made his rounds during the fire, in almost complete darkness as he had so many times before, but never had he been this short on supplies. No matter. He would do his duty. He had always prided himself on his resourcefulness.

The bombardment moved to other ends of the line, and most men dropped off to sleep in the dark, still hours of the morning – New Year’s Day, 1945. The men awoke at first light with screams. They discovered that their bandages were not typical bandages at all, but strips of human flesh. Several men had been given fresh blood transfusions, yet there had been no blood supplies available. Each treated man was almost completely covered, head-to-toe, with the maroon stain of blood.

The combat medic was found, sitting on an ammunition tin, staring off into space. When one man approached him, and tapped him on the shoulder, his tunic fell off to reveal that large patches of his skin, muscle, and sinew had been stripped from his torso and his body was almost completely dried of blood. In one hand was a scalpel, and in the other, a blood transfusion vial. None of the men treated for wounds that night, in that camp, saw the end of January, 1945.

ENDINGS

Jesse flipped through the records in the clearance rack at Second Spin, one of the many stores down on Main Street. He had recently gotten into older music, and further, collecting it on vinyl. There was something mysterious about vinyl records that Jesse found intriguing, precisely because the end of the record era pre-dated Jesse’s birth by thirty years, give or take. He spent much of his free time searching through the many vinyl crates in Second Spin. Every record he pulled out and examined was like a treasure—forgotten for years until he came along to discover it.

While on one of his routine searches, he pulled out a record that had an interesting design. Its entirely black cardboard folder was in pretty flawed condition, as if it had been in many homes over the years. There was no title on the front, and when he flipped it over, he saw the record contained only three songs:

  

1. Demon of Darkness

2. Invoke

3. Endings

  

Jesse was annoyed by the lack of information on the album, such as the record company that had produced it, or even the name of the band that had recorded it...but there was something about it that compelled him to bring it home. The vinyl at Second Spin was cheap, so he decided to take the risk and give it a try.

After getting home, Jesse nudged the front door open with his shoulder – a daily necessity – and made his way into the cluttered house he shared with his father. Jesse’s mom was no longer in the picture, and a true bachelor pad their household had become. If the pizza boxes sitting on the couch were only a week old, then they considered the place to be squeaky-clean.

He threw his backpack on the floor and ran up to his room with his newest acquisition. He slid the record out of the folder and held it up under the light. The entire record was black, and there was no label. He plopped the record on the spindle of his record player, dropped the needle in place, and impatiently waited. It began playing so he lay down on his bed, listening to the music slowly pouring through his crackling speakers.

Not bad, Jesse thought to himself as the first song ended and the next began. And it wasn’t. It didn’t bring the house down, but it wasn’t entirely incompetent like some of the other stuff he’d brought home before. And each song sounded pretty different from the one previous.

It was good. Not great.

Jesse had the feeling he had bought yet another record that would end up in his trade-in box—a hazard of being a collector. He sat up in bed to retrieve the record from the player when the last track began—the one called ‘Endings.’

Jesse had never heard anything like it, and he sat very still, as if moving even an inch would interrupt this strange feeling that had come over him. Then, very slowly, as the song continued to play, Jesse stood up, went over to his desk, and opened the drawer. He rifled through the drawer until he found what he was looking for. He leaned his head back and drew the scissors’ blade over the taut flesh of his throat. Blood dribbled immediately down the front of his shirt, and the flesh of his neck tore open with ease, widening quickly in a muddy, red smile. Jesse even made it as far as slicing another gash through his throat before he fell back onto the floor, blood gushing out of his wounds with such intensity that it splattered the ceiling above. As Jesse lost consciousness, and as the final song faded to a close, his own blood dripped down on him from the ceiling, splotching him and the floor around him with crimson dots.

* * *

Shelly excitedly tore the wrapping paper from her newest gift as her grandparents looked on. Her gift had an odd shape: big and square, but very thin, like a giant cracker. She had no idea what it could have been. She ripped off the last of the paper and held her gift in her hand. And she still had no idea what it was.

Her grandfather chuckled. “Now that you’ve seen the gift, it’s time for a history lesson,” he said.

“Oh, no. No stories, grandpa,” Shelly said, pouting.

“We didn’t have CDs in my day—back when horses pulled carts and we communicated by tapping rocks together,” he said, his eyes twinkling. “We listened to these—they’re called records.”

“Well, how do I listen to it?” Shelly asked. She took the record out of the folder and held it up. “It looks like a tire,” she said.

“They’re not all that different from the CDs you listen to these days,” said Shelly’s grandmother. “They were just bigger, that’s all.”

“You’ll need what’s called a turntable to play it, honey,” Shelly’s grandfather said.

“So I gotta spend money to use one of my own birthday gifts?” Shelly asked. “That’s stupid!”

“Who said you had to spend money?” her grandfather said, bending down and lifting a turntable – decorated with a single colorful bow – onto the table.

Shelly looked at it, utterly confused. “How does it work?”

Her grandfather chuckled and took the album from her, laying it carefully down on the player and placing the needle at the record’s very edge. The music began to play out of the modestly sized speakers that were hooked into the back of the player.

“See that?” he asked. “Neat, huh?”

“I guess...” she said, her disappointment in the gift more than obvious.

“Well, it won’t hurt you to experience a little culture,” he said, upset by his granddaughter’s attitude. He slid out his chair with a screech and stood up to make his way into the kitchen. “I’m getting some more coffee.”

“Did I make him mad?” Shelly asked her grandmother, frowning.

“No, of course not, honey,” her grandmother lied. “He just gets frustrated sometimes because things are so different now than they used to be.”

Shelly lowered her chin to the tabletop so her eyes were level with the needle’s point. The second song had ended and the third was just beginning.

“What band is this?” Shelly asked.

“We don’t know, actually,” her grandmother answered. We found the player in a pawn shop and this was the only record the man had.”

“Why did you buy it if you didn’t know who the band was?” Shelly asked, confused.

“Well, your real gift was the player, sweetie. Not the record. We both saw it one day and thought you would really get a ki—” The words droned to a halt in the old woman’s mouth and she began staring off in the distance, as if immediately stuck in a trance.

“Grandma?” Shelly asked.

Shelly’s grandmother turned her head and stared at her granddaughter for a moment before picking up the empty cake dish in front of her and smashing it into several sharp pieces, one of which she then drove into the young girl’s right eye. Shelly shrieked in pain, but her cries were cut short by another slash with the shard, this time across her temple. The gash left behind was deep. The C-shaped flap of skin hung down over her ear, revealing a patch of her light-brown-colored skull, which was barely visible through the thin membrane surrounding it. Her blood flowed like a river, and soon she became limp in her grandmother’s arms. Shelley’s grandmother dropped her small body fall to the ground with a hard, sickening thud before walking into the kitchen. Her husband was in the process of rushing out to see what had happened when he stopped in his tracks, seeing the blood on his wife’s white sweater and the blank look on her face.

“What is it?” he demanded. “Is Shelly hurt?”

She didn’t respond, but instead pushed him roughly back against the kitchen pantry door and grabbed the large cake knife from the empty platter on the kitchen table, which she stabbed with great force into his throat. The blade easily plunged through the man’s skin, muscles, and bone before splintering the wooden cabinet behind him. She let go of the knife, which easily supported the weight of her husband, and held his face in her hands. A single tear fell from his left eye as his last breath left his body. She left the kitchen and walked into the bathroom where she turned on the bathtub faucet at full blast. She lowered herself into the tub until she was flat on her back. She then waited patiently for the water in the tub to rise—to invade her body and take her away.

And in the dining room where the family had convened to share the joy of Shelly’s tenth birthday, the last track on the album ended, and the needle fell into the last groove – the gutter – emitting nothing but static...letting any listeners know that there was nothing more to come.

* * *

Kirby walked in, wearing his tacky, punk-rock jacket, smiled a suspicious smile, and tossed the record at Sarah.

“Oomph,” she said, catching the record without trying to spill the coffee that was on the desk next to her computer. “Thanks for that,” she said finally.

Kirby smiled again and sat down next to her, kissing her once on the cheek. “Got you a present.”

Sarah held up the album and looked at it questioningly.

“Song list is on the back,” he told her.

Sarah flipped over the album and read off some of the titles. “What band?” she asked.

“No idea,” Kirby said, shrugging.

“Where’d you get it?” Sarah asked, taking the record out of the folder. She turned it around in her hands to search for a label and found none.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” he said, grinning devilishly.

“I’ll believe anything you tell me because you’re crazy enough to do anything,” Sarah replied.

“My brother came across it at work and gave it to me...” Kirby said, coyly looking down at the desk, along which he absent-mindedly dragged his finger.

“No way, really?” Sarah asked, looking at the album again, as if its lineage would now be more obvious. “Won’t he get in trouble for that?”

“Nah, are you kidding? That’s been sitting in the evidence room for years and years. No one’s going to notice it’s missing.” He grinned again. “So...are you going to play it?”

“I can’t play it if I don’t even know who recorded the thing,” Sarah said, pretending to dismiss the record altogether.

Kirby flashed Sarah the smile that made her fall in love in the first place.

“I’ll think about it,” Sarah said, smiling scornfully.

Kirby laughed. He bent over her desk for a quick kiss. “I’ll see you tonight.”

Sarah watched Kirby walk out the door before turning her attention back to her computer screen. After another hour’s worth of typing, she printed her work and then walked out of her office with the mystery album tucked under her arm. She nodded hello to the radio DJ as he made his way out of the studio after having finished his set. She slipped through the door, took her seat, and lifted the headphones onto her face after the commercial break was through. She slid Kirby’s record into one of the station’s many players and prepped it for broadcast.

“I have a special gift for you, boys and girls,” Sarah said into the college station’s bright red microphone. “A mysterious record hit my desk tonight. I know nothing about it—not even the band that recorded it. Three songs total...and here they come.” She dropped the needle slowly in place to play the album. As the record began spinning, she leaned into the microphone one more time.

“Let’s hope this brings the house down.”

 

Image source.

THE BLACK DOLL

A single mother lived alone with her newborn baby. She was not able to work and she had no living relatives and no friends to help her, so she found it very difficult to cope on her own.

One day, the mother went out shopping for groceries and left her baby at home alone. On the way home, she met with an accident and was killed. She was not carrying any identification at the time and the police were unable to figure out who she was. Nobody came forward to claim her body, so she was buried in an unmarked grave. She had no living relatives, which meant that nobody noticed her disappearance.

Two months later, the dead mother’s landlord noticed that he hadn’t received any rent from her. He visited her house and knocked on the door. When nobody answered, he opened the front door using his duplicate key. He went inside and found the house was in complete darkness. The electricity had been cut off.

He walked around in the dark, going from room to room. All of the woman’s furniture and clothing was still there. In the bedroom, he found a black doll lying in the middle of the floor. 

“She must have left in a hurry,” he said to himself. “She didn’t take anything with her.”

Then he heard a rustling noise. It was coming from the black doll. He bent down to pick it up, but the moment he touched it, the doll crumbled apart in his hands. Hundreds of cockroaches scurried away. All that was left was the skeleton of a baby.