THE VOICE

About six years ago my brother lived in a house in North Miami, Oklahoma. He would sit in his living room and watch TV at night and occasionally feel a presence in the hallway.

His six-month-old daughter slept in the room to the right side of the hallway. Weeks went by and he felt more disturbed by this presence. He would walk into his daughter's room (she would wake up crying in the middle of the night for no reason) and feel unnaturally cold.

So he told my mother, her friend, and I about what was happening. We came over one night when everyone was gone and brought two baby monitors. We put one in my niece's room and one in the living room with us.

After some time the flame of the candle we had lit began to sway. No wind was in the house. We talked to the monitor, hoping to get a response. After some time we heard old-style music and a voice say, "You don't know what hell is like."

It freaked us out and we ran out of the house frantically. We only went back after my uncle (a former priest) blessed the house. We later found out that an elderly man had lived in the house. He had also died in this house. 

He hung himself in my niece's room.

Story 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.

THE RUSSIAN SLEEP EXPERIMENT

Kudos to whomever wrote this one. It creeps me out.

Russian researchers in the late 1940s kept five people awake for fifteen days using an experimental gas based stimulant. They were kept in a sealed environment to carefully monitor their oxygen intake so the gas didn't kill them, since it was toxic in high concentrations. This was before closed circuit cameras so they had only microphones and 5 inch thick glass porthole sized windows into the chamber to monitor them. The chamber was stocked with books, cots to sleep on but no bedding, running water and toilet, and enough dried food to last all five for over a month.

The test subjects were political prisoners deemed enemies of the state during World War II. 

Everything was fine for the first five days; the subjects hardly complained having been promised (falsely) that they would be freed if they submitted to the test and did not sleep for 30 days. Their conversations and activities were monitored and it was noted that they continued to talk about increasingly traumatic incidents in their past, and the general tone of their conversations took on a darker aspect after the 4 day mark.

After five days they started to complain about the circumstances and events that lead them to where they were and started to demonstrate severe paranoia. They stopped talking to each other and began alternately whispering to the microphones and one way mirrored portholes. Oddly they all seemed to think they could win the trust of the experimenters by turning over their comrades, the other subjects in captivity with them. At first the researchers suspected this was an effect of the gas itself...

After nine days the first of them started screaming. He ran the length of the chamber repeatedly yelling at the top of his lungs for 3 hours straight, he continued attempting to scream but was only able to produce occasional squeaks. The researchers postulated that he had physically torn his vocal cords. The most surprising thing about this behavior is how the other captives reacted to it... or rather didn't react to it. They continued whispering to the microphones until the second of the captives started to scream. The 2 non-screaming captives took the books apart, smeared page after page with their own feces and pasted them calmly over the glass portholes. The screaming promptly stopped.

So did the whispering to the microphones.

After 3 more days passed, the researchers checked the microphones hourly to make sure they were working, since they thought it impossible that no sound could be coming with 5 people inside. The oxygen consumption in the chamber indicated that all 5 must still be alive. In fact it was the amount of oxygen 5 people would consume at a very heavy level of strenuous exercise. On the morning of the 14th day the researchers did something they said they would not do to get a reaction from the captives: they used the intercom inside the chamber, hoping to provoke any response from the captives they were afraid were either dead or vegetables.

They announced: "We are opening the chamber to test the microphones step away from the door and lie flat on the floor or you will be shot. Compliance will earn one of you your immediate freedom."

To their surprise they heard a single phrase in a calm voice response: "We no longer want to be freed."

Debate broke out among the researchers and the military forces funding the research. Unable to provoke any more response using the intercom it was finally decided to open the chamber at midnight on the fifteenth day.

The chamber was flushed of the stimulant gas and filled with fresh air and immediately voices from the microphones began to object. 3 different voices began begging, as if pleading for the life of loved ones to turn the gas back on. The chamber was opened and soldiers sent in to retrieve the test subjects. They began to scream louder than ever, and so did the soldiers when they saw what was inside. Four of the five subjects were still alive, although no one could rightly call the state that any of them in 'life.'

The food rations past day 5 had not been so much as touched. There were chunks of meat from the dead test subject's thighs and chest stuffed into the drain in the center of the chamber, blocking the drain and allowing 4 inches of water to accumulate on the floor. Precisely how much of the water on the floor was actually blood was never determined. All four 'surviving' test subjects also had large portions of muscle and skin torn away from their bodies. The destruction of flesh and exposed bone on their finger tips indicated that the wounds were inflicted by hand, not with teeth as the researchers initially thought. Closer examination of the position and angles of the wounds indicated that most if not all of them were self-inflicted.

The abdominal organs below the ribcage of all four test subjects had been removed. While the heart, lungs and diaphragm remained in place, the skin and most of the muscles attached to the ribs had been ripped off, exposing the lungs through the ribcage. All the blood vessels and organs remained intact, they had just been taken out and laid on the floor, fanning out around the eviscerated but still living bodies of the subjects. The digestive tract of all four could be seen to be working, digesting food. It quickly became apparent that what they were digesting was their own flesh that they had ripped off and eaten over the course of days.

Most of the soldiers were Russian special operatives at the facility, but still many refused to return to the chamber to remove the test subjects. They continued to scream to be left in the chamber and alternately begged and demanded that the gas be turned back on, lest they fall asleep...

To everyone's surprise the test subjects put up a fierce fight in the process of being removed from the chamber. One of the Russian soldiers died from having his throat ripped out, another was gravely injured by having his testicles ripped off and an artery in his leg severed by one of the subject's teeth. Another 5 of the soldiers lost their lives if you count ones that committed suicide in the weeks following the incident.

In the struggle one of the four living subjects had his spleen ruptured and he bled out almost immediately. The medical researchers attempted to sedate him but this proved impossible. He was injected with more than ten times the human dose of a morphine derivative and still fought like a cornered animal, breaking the ribs and arm of one doctor. When heart was seen to beat for a full two minutes after he had bled out to the point there was more air in his vascular system than blood. Even after it stopped he continued to scream and flail for another 3 minutes, struggling to attack anyone in reach and just repeating the word "MORE" over and over, weaker and weaker, until he finally fell silent.

The surviving three test subjects were heavily restrained and moved to a medical facility, the two with intact vocal cords continuously begging for the gas demanding to be kept awake...

The most injured of the three was taken to the only surgical operating room that the facility had. In the process of preparing the subject to have his organs placed back within his body it was found that he was effectively immune to the sedative they had given him to prepare him for the surgery. He fought furiously against his restraints when the anesthetic gas was brought out to put him under. He managed to tear most of the way through a 4 inch wide leather strap on one wrist, even through the weight of a 200 pound soldier holding that wrist as well. It took only a little more anesthetic than normal to put him under, and the instant his eyelids fluttered and closed, his heart stopped. In the autopsy of the test subject that died on the operating table it was found that his blood had triple the normal level of oxygen. His muscles that were still attached to his skeleton were badly torn and he had broken 9 bones in his struggle to not be subdued. Most of them were from the force his own muscles had exerted on them.

The second survivor had been the first of the group of five to start screaming. His vocal cords destroyed he was unable to beg or object to surgery, and he only reacted by shaking his head violently in disapproval when the anesthetic gas was brought near him. He shook his head yes when someone suggested, reluctantly, they try the surgery without anesthetic, and did not react for the entire 6 hour procedure of replacing his abdominal organs and attempting to cover them with what remained of his skin. The surgeon presiding stated repeatedly that it should be medically possible for the patient to still be alive. One terrified nurse assisting the surgery stated that she had seen the patients mouth curl into a smile several times, whenever his eyes met hers.

When the surgery ended the subject looked at the surgeon and began to wheeze loudly, attempting to talk while struggling. Assuming this must be something of drastic importance the surgeon had a pen and pad fetched so the patient could write his message. It was simple. "Keep cutting."

The other two test subjects were given the same surgery, both without anesthetic as well. Although they had to be injected with a paralytic for the duration of the operation. The surgeon found it impossible to perform the operation while the patients laughed continuously. Once paralyzed the subjects could only follow the attending researchers with their eyes. The paralytic cleared their system in an abnormally short period of time and they were soon trying to escape their bonds. The moment they could speak they were again asking for the stimulant gas. The researchers tried asking why they had injured themselves, why they had ripped out their own guts and why they wanted to be given the gas again.

Only one response was given: "I must remain awake."

All three subject's restraints were reinforced and they were placed back into the chamber awaiting determination as to what should be done with them. The researchers, facing the wrath of their military 'benefactors' for having failed the stated goals of their project considered euthanizing the surviving subjects. The commanding officer, an ex-KGB instead saw potential, and wanted to see what would happen if they were put back on the gas. The researchers strongly objected, but were overruled.

In preparation for being sealed in the chamber again the subjects were connected to an EEG monitor and had their restraints padded for long term confinement. To everyone's surprise all three stopped struggling the moment it was let slip that they were going back on the gas. It was obvious that at this point all three were putting up a great struggle to stay awake. One of subjects that could speak was humming loudly and continuously; the mute subject was straining his legs against the leather bonds with all his might, first left, then right, then left again for something to focus on. The remaining subject was holding his head off his pillow and blinking rapidly. Having been the first to be wired for EEG most of the researchers were monitoring his brain waves in surprise. They were normal most of the time but sometimes flat lined inexplicably. It looked as if he were repeatedly suffering brain death, before returning to normal. As they focused on paper scrolling out of the brainwave monitor only one nurse saw his eyes slip shut at the same moment his head hit the pillow. His brainwaves immediately changed to that of deep sleep, then flatlined for the last time as his heart simultaneously stopped.

The only remaining subject that could speak started screaming to be sealed in now. His brainwaves showed the same flatlines as one who had just died from falling asleep. The commander gave the order to seal the chamber with both subjects inside, as well as 3 researchers. One of the named three immediately drew his gun and shot the commander point blank between the eyes, then turned the gun on the mute subject and blew his brains out as well.

He pointed his gun at the remaining subject, still restrained to a bed as the remaining members of the medical and research team fled the room. "I won't be locked in here with these things! Not with you!" he screamed at the man strapped to the table. "WHAT ARE YOU?" he demanded. "I must know!"

The subject smiled.

"Have you forgotten so easily?" The subject asked. "We are you. We are the madness that lurks within you all, begging to be free at every moment in your deepest animal mind. We are what you hide from in your beds every night. We are what you sedate into silence and paralysis when you go to the nocturnal haven where we cannot tread."

The researcher paused. Then aimed at the subject's heart and fired. The EEG flatlined as the subject weakly choked out, "So... nearly... free..."

Story source.

Image source.

WHOOPS

One evening, a mother and father were invited to a party. They couldn’t get in contact with their usual babysitter, so they decided to ask their next door neighbor, an old lady, to take care of their six-month old baby son. The old woman said she would be delighted to help them out.

They told her they needed to leave by 8pm, but when the time came, the old woman had still not shown up. The husband gave her a phone call and asked her what was taking her so long.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said the old woman. “I forgot all about it. I’ll come over right now.”

When the old woman came to the door, the mother and father were already making their way to the car. They gave the old woman instructions to put the baby to bed at 9pm and put a chicken in the oven so it would be cooked for the next day’s dinner.

While the couple were at the party, the mother decided to phone home and check on the babysitter. When the old woman answered the phone, the mother asked if she had put the baby to bed yet.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said the old woman. “I forgot all about it. I’ll do it right now.”

“And have you put the chicken in the oven?” asked the mother.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” said the old woman again. “I forgot all about that, too. I’ll do it right now.”

The mother just rolled her eyes and hung up the phone. She couldn’t really complain because the old lady was babysitting for free.

After the party, the mother and father drove home and when they opened the front door, the old lady was there to greet them. They thanked the old lady for taking care of their baby and she went home. The mother decided to go upstairs to check on the baby, but when she walked into the child’s bedroom, she was shocked to see an uncooked chicken lying in the crib.

Downstairs, the husband smelled smoke coming from the kitchen. He opened the oven and shouted upstairs to his wife “You won’t believe this, Honey! That forgetful old lady has gone and burned our chicken dinner!”

Image source.

HELPFUL GUARD

Being a night guard in a hospital is not so hard, except for the fact that sometimes you get so scared that you keep on imagining things. I tried to console myself that the weeping I heard was in my own head. 

But it wasn’t so easy.  

I finally got curious and went ahead to check. The weeping sound was increasing as I neared the operation theater. I went nearer, but didn’t find anything. I sighed and was about to retreat when I saw a small boy hiding behind a potted plant. He wasn’t wearing any clothes. I thought he was cold so I offered him my jacket. He took it.  

“What are you doing here at this hour? Did you get lost?”  

“I can't find my mother,” he said still crying.  

“Don’t cry,” I said and picked him up. “I will find you for her. Tell me the room number.”

“I don’t know the room, but I can show you where she is kept. Please take me.” 

He had stopped crying and I took him. He kept on giving me directions. I was amazed. He didn’t have a doubt where to go.  

We reached a room and he said that this was it. But to my surprise, it was the morgue.  

I took him in. I don’t know why, but the boy was so mesmerizing that I took him there without any second thoughts. 

He pointed towards a corpse cupboard numbered 453 and said, “please put me in there.” 

My mind was so numb I didn’t realize what I was doing. I pulled the cupboard. Inside it laid the beautiful, lifeless body of a woman. I put the boy in and closed the cupboard. 

"Thank you," he said.  

I was about to leave when I realized I had lost my mind. I quickly opened locker 453. But it was empty. No small boy, no female corpse. Only my jacket lay there. There was a patient profile beneath that. 

It read: 

Anna Adams: Died of heart attack when she heard the death of her son during operation. 

Below that was the picture of her son. Alex Adams.  

The same boy was smiling at me from the photo.

A STAMP FOR TEDDY

During the war, a soldier faithfully wrote to his mother every week so she would know he was all right. One week she didn't get a letter and immediately began to worry. Within a couple of weeks she got a letter from the Army saying that her son had been captured and was being held in a Prisoner-of-War camp, and they assured her that they had no reason to believe the American prisoners were being mistreated in any way. 

A few weeks later, the woman finally received another letter from her son. 

It read: 

Dear Mom, 

Try not to worry about me, they are treating us well and I'll be released as soon as the war is over. 

Make sure that little Teddy gets the stamp for his collection. 

Love you,

Joe

The woman was overjoyed to hear the news, but was confused because she had no idea who "little Teddy" was. She decided to steam the stamp from the envelope and have a look. 

When she did, she saw something written on the back of the stamp: 

"They've cut off my legs."

THE PSYCHIC

She was nervous and excited as she approached the psychic's store. Normally, she didn't go in for fortune telling. But her best friend had visited the psychic a few months ago, and everything the woman had predicted came true. Everything! The new boyfriend, the new job, the marriage proposal, a small win in the local lottery. Obviously, the psychic was a genius! 

The room she entered was surprisingly open and pleasant. She smelled coffee in the air, and fresh flowers were on a stand by the window. She smiled to herself. Somehow, she had pictured an old gypsy caravan and a dark-haired woman in flowing robes. But the pert, crisp woman approaching her did not look psychic at all. 

They sat down at the table, and the woman did a reading of her palm. The psychic frowned a bit in concentration. Then the psychic asked if she would like a Tarot card reading too -- free of charge. That was different from what had happened to her best friend. For a moment she felt a trace of unease. Then she shrugged and said okay. 

The psychic studied the cards carefully. Then she looked at her palm one more time. Finally, the psychic looked up into her eyes, realized that she was feeling nervous, and said soothingly: "Your future is very clear, my dear. I've recently changed my policies, and now put my predictions in a sealed envelope for my customers to read in the privacy of their homes. It is to show customers my credibility in the psychic arts -- that I am not 'reading their expressions,' but have truly seen something in the palm and cards." 

She blinked a bit, but was impressed. It made sense, after a fashion. The psychic had asked her no questions at all, just read her palm and the cards. So any prediction she put in the envelope would be proof of her powers. The psychic hurried into a back room, where she could hear the faint sound of pen and paper. Then the woman returned with an envelope. 

"Thank you," she said to the psychic, and shook her hand. Then she hurried out to the car, eager to get home and read the predictions in the envelope. What would they be? A rich husband? A career change? Travel to exotic places? 

She had just pulled out into the fast lane on the highway when a semi-truck swerved to miss a careless sedan that pulled into the lane right in front of it. She had a single glimpse of a massive shape coming toward her when the truck slammed into her car, crushing it completely against the cement divider. 

When the girl's body was removed from the wreckage, the envelope was found lying beside her. It was presented to her grieving parents, who opened it. The note inside contained four words: "You have no future."

MASTERPIECE

I've been lying down for hours now. It's 5:35 a.m. and there's not much I can do. You know what the worst part about my situation is? I'm in the same room as my parents. They keep looking at me, and I can't help but look back and try not to cry or scream. Their eyes are focused on me and their mouths are wide open. There's a strong scent of blood and I feel paralyzed with fear. 

Here's the thing: The second I make any hint that I'm not asleep anymore, I'm completely fucked. I will die and there's nobody around to save me. I've been trying to think of a way out, but the only idea I have is to rush for the front door and scream for help, hoping any neighbors hear me. It's risky, but if I stay here, I'll surely die. He's waiting for me to wake up and see his masterpiece. 

You're probably wondering what's going on. I do tend to get ahead of myself sometimes. 

About three hours ago, I heard screaming from the other side of the house. I got up and went to check on the noise before realizing I had to use the restroom. Instead of doing the smart thing and investigating, I used the bathroom first. I could've gotten myself killed right then for my stupid actions. I did my business and took a peek outside the bathroom. There was blood on the carpet. I got very worried and ran back to my room, hiding under the sheets like the pussy I was. I tried to convince myself to go back to sleep - that it was just some really vivid dream or something. 

But I heard my bedroom door open. Like the terrified child I was, I peeked out from under my blankets to see what was going on. I could see something dragging my dead parents into the room. It was not human, I can tell you that. It was hairless, with no eyes or clothing. It walked like a caveman, with its back slouched as it dragged my parents. But this thing was much smarter than any caveman. It was aware of what it was doing. 

It propped my Dad up on the edge of my bed and made him face me. It then sat my mother down in the chair and positioned her towards me as well. It then started rubbing its hands on the walls, staining them with blood, and then drew a circle with the devil's pentagram in it. This thing had made what it would probably call a masterpiece. To finish it off, it scribbled a message into the wall that I could not read in the darkness. 

It then positioned itself under my bed waiting to strike. 

The scariest thing now is my eyes have adjusted to the darkness since then, and I can read the message on the wall. I don't want to look at it, because it's terrifying to think about it. But I feel I need to see, before I'm killed. 

I peek at the creature's masterpiece. 

"I know you're awake."

Source unknown.

MARLBORO SLAUGHTERHOUSE

The Slaughterhouse is located on land, which used to be a farm, but was long ago incorporated into the property of the nearby asylum. How this land became hospital property is where this chilling tale begins. Apparently there used to be a farmer named Mr. Allen who once worked the land, raised and slaughtered livestock there, and generally lead the life of a normal, rural New Jersey farmer. His family, I've been told, had owned and farmed the expansive tract of land for generations. 

Then, one day the State came along and seized his land, telling him that they needed it for the mental institution, and that they had the authority to take it under their right of eminent domain. So they forced the farmer off of his own property, and began using the fields that he had cultivated to grow food to feed the asylum's inmates. 

Naturally the farmer was furious, and did not vacate his property without a fight. He would often be seen wandering the fields he once worked, hollering threats and cursing at any hospital employees who came into his sight. After hospital officials padlocked his house, he would repeatedly break in and continue to live there. When they called the police on him, the authorities had to drag the farmer away kicking and screaming. In a rage he vowed revenge against the hospital staff, and anyone else who dared trespass on his land. 

Eventually, out of sheer anger and frustration, the farmer went completely insane. Then, in an ironic twist of fate, Mr. Allen was committed to the very mental institution, which he so despised and had sworn vengeance against.

As the story goes, the farmer spent many years at the asylum, keeping pretty much to himself. After awhile, the aging Mr. Allen seemed to no longer be a threat to himself or anyone else. He had even gained enough of the trust and confidence of the orderlies to be allowed to join inmate work details outside the asylum's walls. Being a farmer by trade, it was not surprising to any of the officials at the hospital that he volunteered for duties in the institution's gardens and greenhouses, and he even tended to the institution's livestock.

Then one day, after working in the same fields, which he had once owned, the old farmer was nowhere to be found. The overseers rounded up all of the inmates to go back to the asylum, and Mr. Allen was just gone. A massive manhunt ensued, but after several weeks of searching, there was still no sign of him. It was as if he had just been absorbed back into the landscape that he was once so much a part of. Now at this point in the story you might be thinking "good for him, he sure showed them." But the legend doesn't end here, in fact it is really just beginning. You see, apparently farmer Allen had never really forgotten what the State had done to him, nor had he forgiven them for stealing his farm. 

Several weeks had passed since the old farmer had made his escape, and things around the asylum grounds had pretty much gone back to normal. Then people started to report hearing horrible animal noises coming from the Slaughterhouse late at night. Witnesses said that the unearthly racket sounded like the death squeals of pigs being butchered. Although people at the hospital were used to hearing these noises during the day when the Slaughterhouse was operating, it was quite unusual to hear them at night when no one was supposed to be there. Patients were starting to become disturbed due to the ghastly sounds, and many inmates had to be restrained or sedated at night to keep them from totally freaking out. 

Although the hospital sent police out to investigate the Slaughterhouse, no one was ever found trespassing. However, it was soon discovered that some of the farm animals were missing. Then one day something happened that would change the course of everything at the institution forever. 

Workers arriving at the Slaughterhouse early one morning were shocked when they entered the building to find the carcasses of various pigs, sheep, and calves strewn around the killing room floor. To make the gruesome discovery seem even more eerie, the walls were smeared with the blood of the animals. Scrawled across the white brick walls were warnings like "I SEE YOU" and "TONIGHT ALL WILL DIE."

The butchers at the Slaughterhouse notified the superintendent of the hospital, and a decision was made that that night an armed guard would pull an all night security shift at the Slaughterhouse, just in case the unknown intruder returned. That evening the blood curdling squeals of dying pigs once again echoed over the fields of Marlboro, yet no call was made to police from the night watchman, so everyone at the asylum felt confident that all was well. 

The next morning all seemed quiet and normal as the butchers approached the old Slaughterhouse for another day at work. There were no dead animals laying around, and no new bloody graffiti, but there was no security guard to be found anywhere either. The men called for him, but there was no answer. Then, one of them saw something unusual – a small stream of blood, which ran across the killing room floor, then trickled down the drain in the middle of the room. The men followed the tiny red river into the next room, then traced it right under the huge steel door of the meat freezer, which was still locked. 

I can only imagine what went through these men's minds when they swung back that enormous door and caught their first glimpse of the grisly spectacle within. There, hanging by a hook from an overhead meat rack, was the blood soaked body of the night watchman, still in uniform, frozen solid, with the decapitated head of a large pig where his own head used to reside. All around the wall of the freezer were writings on the walls – ramblings about greed, and pigs, and revenge. 

Around town the gruesome discovery was kept as quiet as possible, but in a relatively small community such as Marlboro it is hard to keep such a thing a secret for long.  No one was ever convicted, or even charged with the crime, yet everybody around here had a pretty good idea who the killer was, though nobody will talk about it openly to this day. The Marlboro Psychiatric Hospital has since closed its doors for good, and the old Slaughterhouse has stood abandoned and open to the elements ever since the whole incident took place. Crazy farmer Allen was never heard from again, though legend has it that he still roams his fields in search of trespassers. I was told that he even goes back to the old Slaughterhouse at night, where he sits in the attic staring out over his land through a hole in the building's crumbling roof. I've been told that sometimes people who live close to the old farm still hear the faint sounds of animals in their death throws emanating from the ruins of the Slaughterhouse.

Story source.

Top image source.

NODS

You volunteer at the mental health clinic. Given the dangerous nature of the residents, they assigned you the rooms of the less violent patients. The suicidal. Those who hear voices. Those that don’t say anything at all. 

You become close to a mute man named Arthur. He is a rapt listener, willing to nod his head for hours as you tell him the story of your life. You mention your past, your present. The people involved in both. Your hopes for the future. 

Arthur just nods. 

After several months of listening, you figure that you owe it to Arthur to get him out of the clinic. He can’t be happy sitting in a room by himself nodding at interns everyday. You talk to the supervisor of the clinic. You argue that he isn’t harming anyone. That he grooms and feeds himself with no problems. That perhaps his condition is a physical aliment. 

The day comes when your arguing pays off. The supervisor has agreed to let Arthur go. You rush to his room to tell him the news. “You’re free!” You shout. “Isn’t that great?” 

Arthur just nods. 

You write your name and address on a piece of paper. Hand it to him. “I’m going to miss having someone to talk to.” You say. “But now you can write me. I can learn all about you. Like why they were so insistent in having you in here, pal. I had to fight Dr. Thanner everyday to get you out.” 

He looks at you and takes the paper. Just nods. 

You go home, feeling good about yourself. You brag to everyone you can tell, friends, family, classmates, co-workers, about how you came through for Arthur. You even fall asleep with a smile. 

That night, your eyes snap open. Screams, unearthly screams wake you up. 

Then you see them. Your mother. Your father. Your friends. Your classmates. Your co-workers. Lying on your floor, their blood soaking into your carpet. Your walls stained with carnage. Their heads bashed in, their eyes missing from their sockets. Everyone you know dead or dying. 

You whimper and see a man standing in the doorway. 

It’s Arthur, holding the piece of paper you gave him. 

Your entire body shaking, you choke out. “Are you here to kill me?” 

Arthur just nods.

THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPH

One school day, a boy named Tom was sitting in class and doing math. It was six more minutes until school let out. As he was doing his homework, something caught his eye. His desk was next to the window, and he turned and looked to the grass outside. It looked like a picture.

When school was over, he ran to the spot where he saw it. He ran fast so that no one else could grab it. He picked it up and smiled. It had a picture of the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. She had a dress with tights on and red shoes, and her hand was formed into a peace sign.

She was so beautiful he wanted to meet her, so he ran all over the school and asked everyone if they knew her or have ever seen her before. But everyone he asked said "No." He was devastated.

When he was home, he asked his older sister if she knew the girl, but unfortunately she also said "No."

It was very late, so Tom walked up the stairs, placed the picture on his bedside table and went to sleep.

In the middle of the night Tom was awakened by a tap on his window. It was like a nail tapping. He got scared. After the tapping he heard a giggle. He saw a shadow near his window, so he got out of his bed, walked toward his window, opened it up, and followed the giggling. By the time he reached it, it was gone.

The next day he asked his neighbors if they knew her. Everybody said, "Sorry, no."

When his mother came home he even asked her if she knew her. She said "No."

He went to his room, placed the picture on his desk and fell asleep.

Once again he was awakened by a tapping. He took the picture and followed the giggling. He walked across the road when he was suddenly hit by a car. He died instantly, picture in hand.

The driver got out of the car and tried to help him, but it was too late. He saw the picture and picked it up.

He saw a beautiful girl holding up three fingers.

Image source.

CREEP

So a few years back I was visiting some friends in a nearby city. The night went well; it was good to catch up with them again, as I hadn't seen them for a while. As the hours wore by, we began to walk towards one of their houses.

Which would be when we heard a blood-curdling scream coming from a side-street. Now, normally in a strange city, I wouldn't investigate this - but we were in a vaguely suburban area, it was relatively well lit, and there were a few of us. So, the girls in the group stayed on the main road, and the guys went to take a closer look.

The screaming did not stop. It sounded like it was coming from a nearby house, and it sounded like the screams of a woman. Maybe a child, perhaps. The lights in this house were on, and as we approached it I vaguely considered calling the police.

But the scream was not coming from the house; it was coming from the garden in front of it. In the gloom I could not see anything distinct, but I could now tell that the scream was coming from the branches of a tree. Something inside that tree was rustling violently, although thanks to the darkness I could not tell what. I exchanged glances with my friends, we paused, and suddenly the shaking - and screaming - stopped.

Silence for a moment. My friends and I exhaled.

And then something moved through the trees, rapidly, and before we could react it was gone. Glances exchanged again, but we were quickly satisfied that whatever it was had left. We walked back to the girls, and continued the evening as planned.

The next morning, I walked back past that same street.

On the road, there was a fresh chalk outline of a body.

Creep source.

Image source.

DAY 26: THE OCTOBER GAME

THE OCTOBER GAME

By Ray Bradbury 

He put the gun back into the bureau drawer and shut the drawer.

No, not that way. Louise wouldn't suffer. It was very important that this thing have, above all duration. Duration through imagination. How to prolong the suffering? How, first of all, to bring it about? Well.

The man standing before the bedroom mirror carefully fitted his cuff links together. He paused long enough to hear the children run by swiftly on the street below, outside this warm two-story house, like so many grey mice the children, like so many leaves.

By the sound of the children you knew the calendar day. By their screams you knew what evening it was. You knew it was very late in the year. October. The last day of October, with white bone masks and cut pumpkins and the smell of dropped candle wax.

No. Things hadn't been right for some time. October didn't help any. If anything it made things worse. He adjusted his black bow tie. If this were spring, he nodded slowly, quietly, emotionlessly, at his image in the mirror, then there might be a chance. But tonight the entire tonight world was burning down into ruin. There was no green spring, none of the freshness, none of the promise.

There was a soft running in the hall. "That's Marion," he told himself. "My little one". All eight quiet years of her. Never a word. Just her luminous grey eyes and her wondering little mouth. His daughter had been in and out all evening, trying on various masks, asking him which was most terrifying, most horrible. They had both finally decided on the skeleton mask. It was “just awful!” It would “scare the beans” from people!

Again he caught the long look of thought and deliberation he gave himself in the mirror. He had never liked October. Ever since he first lay in the autumn leaves before his grandmother’s house many years ago and heard the wind and sway the empty trees. It has made him cry, without a reason. And a little of that sadness returned each year to him. It always went away with spring. But, it was different tonight. There was a feeling of autumn coming to last a million years. There would be no spring.

He had been crying quietly all evening. It did not show, not a vestige of it, on his face. It was all hidden somewhere and it wouldn't stop.

The rich syrupy smell of sweets filled the bustling house. Louise had laid out apples in new skins of toffee; there were vast bowls of punch fresh-mixed, stringed apples in each door, scooped, vented pumpkins peering triangularly from each cold window. There was a water tub in the centre of the living room, waiting, with a sack of apples nearby, for dunking to begin. All that was needed was the catalyst, the impairing of children, to start the apples bobbing, the stringed apples to penduluming in the crowded doors, the sweets to vanish, the halls to echo with fright or delight, it was all the same.

Now, the house was silent with preparation. And just a little more than that.

Louise had managed to be in every other room save the room he was in today. It was her very fine way of intimating, Oh look Mich, see how busy I am! So busy that when you walk into a room I'm in there's always something I need to do in another room! Just see how I dash about!

For a while he had played a little game with her, a nasty childish game. When she was in the kitchen then he came to the kitchen saying, “I need a glass of water.” After a moment, he standing, drinking water, she like a crystal witch over the caramel brew bubbling like a prehistoric mudpot on the stove, she said, “Oh, I must light the pumpkins!” and she rushed to the living room to make the pumpkins smile with light. He came after, smiling, “I must get my pipe.” “Oh, the cider!” she had cried, running to the dining room. “I'll check the cider,” he had said. But when he tried following she ran to the bathroom and locked the door.

He stood outside the bathroom door, laughing strangely and senselessly, his pipe gone cold in his mouth, and then, tired of the game, but stubborn, he waited another five minutes. There was not a sound from the bath. And lest she enjoy in any way knowing that he waited outside, irritated, he suddenly jerked about and walked upstairs, whistling merrily.

At the top of the stairs he had waited. Finally he had heard the bathroom door unlatch and she had come out and life below-stairs and resumed, as life in a jungle must resume once a terror has passed on away and the antelope return to their spring.

Now, as he finished his bow tie and put his dark coat there was a mouse-rustle in the hall. Marion appeared in the door, all skeletons in her disguise.

“How do I look, Papa?”

“Fine!”

From under the mask, blonde hair showed. From the skull sockets small blue eyes smiled. He sighed. Marion and Louise, the two silent denouncers of his virility, his dark power. What alchemy had there been in Louise that took the dark of a dark man and bleached the dark brown eyes and black hair and washed and bleached the ingrown baby all during the period before birth until the child was born, Marion, blonde, blue-eyed, ruddy-cheeked? Sometimes he suspected that Louise had conceived the child as an idea, completely asexual, an immaculate conception of contemptuous mind and cell. As a firm rebuke to him she had produced a child in her own image, and, to top it, she had somehow fixed the doctor so he shook his head and said, “Sorry, Mr. Wilder, your wife will never have another child. This is the last one.”

“And I wanted a boy,” Mich had said eight years ago.

He almost bent to take hold of Marion now, in her skull mask. He felt an inexplicable rush of pity for her, because she had never had a father's love, only the crushing, holding love of a loveless mother. But most of all he pitied himself, that somehow he had not made the most of a bad birth, enjoyed his daughter for herself, regardless of her not being dark and a son and like himself. Somewhere he had missed out. Other things being equal, he would have loved the child. But Louise hadn't wanted a child, anyway, in the first place. She had been frightened of the idea of birth. He had forced the child on her, and from that night, all through the year until the agony of the birth itself, Louise had lived in another part of the house. She had expected to die with the forced child. It had been very easy for Louise to hate this husband who so wanted a son that he gave his only wife over to the mortuary.

But - Louise had lived. And in triumph! Her eyes, the day he came to the hospital, were cold. I'm alive they said. And I have a blonde daughter! Just look! And when he had put out a hand to touch, the mother had turned away to conspire with her new pink daughter-child - away from that dark forcing murderer. It had all been so beautifully ironic. His selfishness deserved it.

But now it was October again. There had been other Octobers and when he thought of the long winter he had been filled with horror year after year to think of the endless months mortared into the house by an insane fall of snow, trapped with a woman and child, neither of whom loved him, for months on end. During the eight years there had been respites. In spring and summer you got out, walked, picknicked; these were desperate solutions to the desperate problem of a hated man.

But, in winter, the hikes and picnics and escapes fell away with leaves. Life, like a tree, stood empty, the fruit picked, the sap run to earth. Yes, you invited people in, but people were hard to get in winter with blizzards and all. Once he had been clever enough to save for a Florida trip. They had gone south. He had walked in the open.  But now, the eighth winter coming, he knew things were finally at an end. He simply could not wear this one through. There was an acid walled off in him that slowly had eaten through tissue and bone over the years, and now, tonight, it would reach the wild explosive in him and all would be over!

There was a mad ringing of the bell below. In the hall, Louise went to see. Marion, without a word, ran down to greet the first arrivals. There were shouts and hilarity.
He walked to the top of the stairs.

Louise was below, taking cloaks. She was tall and slender and blonde to the point of whiteness, laughing down upon the new children.

He hesitated. What was all this? The years? The boredom of living? Where had it gone wrong? Certainly not with the birth of the child alone. But it had been a symbol of all their tensions, he imagined. His jealousies and his business failures and all the rotten rest of it. Why didn't he just turn, pack a suitcase, and leave? No. Not without hurting Louise as much as she had hurt him. It was simple as that. Divorce wouldn't hurt her at all. It would simply be an end to numb indecision. If he thought divorce would give her pleasure in any way he would stay married the rest of his life to her, for damned spite. No he must hurt her. Figure some way, perhaps, to take Marion away from her, legally. Yes. That was it. That would hurt most of all. To take Marion.

“Hello down there!” He descended the stairs beaming.

Louise didn't look up.

“Hi, Mr. Wilder!”

The children shouted, waved, as he came down.

By ten o'clock the doorbell had stopped ringing, the apples were bitten from stringed doors, the pink faces were wiped dry from the apple bobbling, napkins were smeared with toffee and punch, and he, the husband, with pleasant efficiency had taken over. He took the party right out of Louise's hands. He ran about talking to the twenty children and the twelve parents who had come and were happy with the special spiked cider he had fixed them. He supervised pin the tail on the donkey, spin the bottle, musical chairs, and all the rest, amid fits of shouting laughter. Then, in the triangular-eyed pumpkin shine, all house lights out, he cried, "Hush! Follow me!" tiptoeing towards the cellar.

The parents, on the outer periphery of the costumed riot, commented to each other, nodding at the clever husband, speaking to the lucky wife. How well he got on with children, they said.

The children, crowded after the husband, squealing.

“The cellar!” he cried. “The tomb of the witch!”

More squealing. He made a mock shiver. “Abandon hope all ye who enter here!”

The parents chuckled.

One by one the children slid down a slide which Mich had fixed up from lengths of table-section, into the dark cellar. He hissed and shouted ghastly utterances after them. A wonderful wailing filled dark pumpkin-lighted house. Everybody talked at once. Everybody but Marion. She had gone through all the party with a minimum of sound or talk; it was all inside her, all the excitement and joy. What a little troll, he thought. With a shut mouth and shiny eyes she had watched her own party, like so many serpentines thrown before her.

Now, the parents. With laughing reluctance they slid down the short incline, uproarious, while little Marion stood by, always wanting to see it all, to be last. Louise went down without help. He moved to aid her, but she was gone even before he bent.

The upper house was empty and silent in the candle-shine. Marion stood by the slide. “Here we go,” he said, and picked her up.

They sat in a vast circle in the cellar. Warmth came from the distant bulk of the furnace. The chairs stood in a long line along each wall, twenty squealing children, twelve rustling relatives, alternatively spaced, with Louise down at the far end, Mich up at this end, near the stairs. He peered but saw nothing. They had all grouped to their chairs, catch-as-you-can in the blackness. The entire program from here on was to be enacted in the dark, he as Mr. Interlocutor. There was a child scampering, a smell of damp cement, and the sound of the wind out in the October stars.

“Now!” cried the husband in the dark cellar. “Quiet!”

Everybody settled.

The room was black black. Not a light, not a shine, not a glint of an eye.

A scraping of crockery, a metal rattle.

“The witch is dead,” intoned the husband.

“Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee,” said the children.

“The witch is dead, she has been killed, and here is the knife she was killed with.” He handed over the knife. It was passed from hand to hand, down and around the circle, with chuckles and little odd cries and comments from the adults.

“The witch is dead, and this is her head,” whispered the husband, and handed an item to the nearest person.

“Oh, I know how this game is played,” some child cried, happily, in the dark. “He gets some old chicken innards from the icebox and hands them around and says, ‘These are her innards!’ And he makes a clay head and passes it for her head, and passes a soup bone for her arm. And he takes a marble and says, ‘This is her eye!’ And he takes some corn and says, ‘This is her teeth!’ And he takes a sack of plum pudding and gives that and says, ‘This is her stomach!’ I know how this is played!”

“Hush, you'll spoil everything,” some girl said.

“The witch came to harm, and this is her arm,” said Mich.

“Eeeeeeeeeeee!”

The items were passed and passed, like hot potatoes, around the circle. Some children screamed, wouldn't touch them. Some ran from their chairs to stand in the center of the cellar until the grisly items had passed.

“Aw, it's only chicken insides,” scoffed a boy. “Come back, Helen!”

Shot from hand to hand, with small scream after scream, the items went down, down, to be followed by another and another.

“The witch cut apart, and this is her heart,” said the husband.  Six or seven items moving at once through the laughing, trembling dark.

Louise spoke up. “Marion, don't be afraid; it's only play."

Marion didn't say anything.

“Marion?” asked Louise. “Are you afraid?”

Marion didn't speak.

“She's all right,” said the husband. “She's not afraid.”

On and on the passing, the screams, the hilarity.

The autumn wind sighed about the house. And he, the husband stood at the head of the dark cellar, intoning the words, handing out the items.

“Marion?” asked Louise again, from far across the cellar.

Everybody was talking.

“Marion?” called Louise.

Everybody quieted.

“Marion, answer me, are you afraid?”

Marion didn't answer.

The husband stood there, at the bottom of the cellar steps.

Louise called, “Marion, are you there?”

No answer. The room was silent.

“Where's Marion?” called Louise.

“She was here,” said a boy.

“Maybe she's upstairs.”

“Marion!”

No answer. It was quiet.

Louise cried out, “Marion, Marion!”

“Turn on the lights,” said one of the adults.

The items stopped passing. The children and adults sat with the witch's items in their hands.

“No.” Louise gasped. There was a scraping of her chair, wildly, in the dark. “No. Don't turn on the lights, oh, God, God, God, don't turn them on, please, don't turn on the lights, don't!”

Louise was shrieking now. The entire cellar froze with the scream.

Nobody moved.

Everyone sat in the dark cellar, suspended in the suddenly frozen task of this October game; the wind blew outside, banging the house, the smell of pumpkins and apples filled the room with the smell of the objects in their fingers while one boy cried, “I'll go upstairs and look!” and he ran upstairs hopefully and out around the house, four times around the house, calling, “Marion, Marion, Marion!” over and over and at last coming slowly down the stairs into the waiting breathing cellar and saying to the darkness, “I can't find her.”

Then… some idiot turned on the lights.

Image source.

SHARKS

My father was only 48 when he died of lung cancer. Looking back on that time in our lives, which by now has been reduced to a scattered mosaic of thoughts and recollections, one thing stands out, and still remains with me to this day: the utter unfairness of that. It was shattering to lose him in general, and at his relatively young age, but for him to succumb to a disease that implied he hadn't taken care of himself, or that he'd been careless -- that was a cosmically offensive finale for a man who prided himself on living as healthy a lifestyle as possible. For lung cancer to grow inside someone who'd never once smoked -- and he didn't; not cigarettes, not cigars, not even pipes -- made about as much sense as...well, I don't even know. Any halfhearted metaphor I could muster would sound petty in comparison.

Granted, I was young when this happened; I'd yet to learn the lesson that cancer didn't follow the rules. It didn't matter if my father smoked two packs a day or none, ever, in his life. Cancer was cancer was cancer. It cared hilariously little for textbook arguments. It cared little that my father ate healthy, got his eight hours, and walked our dog, Betsy, to the park and back every morning, without fail. His only real vice – if you could call it that – was a single glass of red at dinner.

Despite this, whichever god- or non-godlike force that drew his number didn't care about the particulars. It pointed at him -- just another anonymous human being in a sea of billions -- and assigned him his fate. And like all the other personal tragedies that befell him during his life, he accepted it without a fuss. He didn't rail against it, didn't muse aloud, "Why me?," didn't go seeking sympathy.

That wasn't his style.

Read the rest...

SAM'S NEW PET

Sam stayed with his grandmother when his parents went to Mexico for their vacation. “We are going to bring you back something nice,” his mother told him. “It will be a surprise.” Before they came home, Sam’s parents looked for something Sam would like. All they could find was a beautiful sombrero. It cost too much. But that afternoon, while they were eating their lunch in a park, they decided to buy the sombrero after all. Sam’s father threw what was left of their sandwiches to some stray dogs, and they walked back to the marketplace. One of the animals followed them. It was a small, gray creature with short hair, short legs, and a long tail. Wherever they went, it went. “Isn’t he cute!” Sam’s mother said. “He must be one of those Mexican Hairless dogs. Sam would love him.”

“He’s probably somebody’s pet,” Sam’s father said. They asked several people if they knew who its owners were, but no one did. They just smiled and shrugged their shoulders. Finally, Sam’s mother said, “Maybe he’s just a stray. Let’s take him home with us. We can give him a good home, and Sam will love him.”

It is against the law to take a pet across the border, but Sam’s parents hid the animal in a box, and no one saw it. When they got home, they showed it to Sam. “He’s a pretty small dog,” said Sam. “I’m not sure what kind he is,” his father said. “I think it’s called a Mexican Hairless. We’ll find out. But he’s nice, isn’t he?”

They gave the new pet some dog food. Then they washed it and brushed it and combed its fur. That night it slept on Sam’s bed. When Sam awakened the next morning, his pet was still there. “Mother,” he called, “the dog has a cold.” The animal’s eyes were running, and there was something white around his mouth. Later that morning Sam’s mother took it to a veterinarian. “Where did you get him?” the vet asked. “In Mexico,” she said. “We think he’s a Mexican Hairless. I was going to ask you about that.”

“He’s not a Hairless,” the vet said. “He’s not even a dog. He’s a sewer rat—and he has rabies.”

Story source.

Sculpture source.

RIP RAY BRADBURY

THE LAKE

Ray Bradbury

The wave shut me off from the world, from the birds in the sky, the children on the beach, my mother on the shore. There was a moment of green silence. Then the wave gave me back to the sky, the sand, the children yelling. I came out of the lake and the world was waiting for me, having hardly moved since I went away.

I ran up on the beach.

Mama swabbed me with a furry towel. "Stand there and dry," she said.

I stood there, watching the sun take away the water beads on my arms. I replaced them with goose pimples.

"My, there's a wind," said Mama. "Put on your sweater."

"Wait'll I watch my goose bumps," I said.

"Harold," said Mama.

I put the sweater on and watched the waves come up and fall down on the beach. But not clumsily. On purpose, with a green sort of elegance as those waves.

Even a drunken man could not collapse with such elegance as those waves.

It was September. In the last days when things are getting sad for no reason. The beach was so long and lonely with only about six people on it. The kids quit bouncing the ball because somehow the wind made them sad, too, whistling the way it did, and the kids sat down and felt autumn come along the endless shore.

All of the hot-dog stands were boarded up with strips of golden planking, sealing in all the mustard, onion, meat odors of the long, joyful summer. It was like nailing summer into a series of coffins.

One by one the places slammed their covers down, padlocked their doors, and the wind came and touched the sand, blowing away all of the million footprints of July and August. It got so that now, in September, there was nothing but the mark of my rubber tennis shoes and Donald and Delius Arnold's feet, down by the water curve.

Sand blew up in curtains on the sidewalks, and the merry-go-round was hidden with canvas, all of the horses frozen in mid-air on their brass poles, showing teeth, galloping on. With only the wind for music, slipping through canvas.

I stood there. Everyone else was in school. I was not. Tomorrow I would be on my way west across the United States on a train. Mom and I had come to the beach for one last brief moment.

There was something about the loneliness that made me want to get away by myself. "Mama, I want to run up the beach aways," I said.

"All right, but hurry back, and don't go near the water."

I ran. Sand spun under me and the wind lifted me. You know how it is, running, arms out so you feel veils from your fingers, caused by wind. Like wings.

Mama withdrew into the distance, sitting. Soon she was only a brown speck and I was all alone. Being alone is a newness to a twelve-year-old child. He is so used to people about. The only way he can be alone is in his mind. There are so many real people around, telling children what and how to do, that a boy has to run off down a beach, even if it's only in his head, to get by himself in his own world.

So now I was really alone.

I went down to the water and let it cool up to my stomach.

Always before, with the crowd, I hadn't dared to look, to come to this sot and search around in the water and a certain name.

But now…Water is like a magician. Sawing you in half. It feels as if you were cut in two, part of you, the lower part, sugar, melting, dissolving away. Cool water, and once in awhile a very elegantly stumbling wave that fell with a flourish of lace.

I called her name.

A dozen times I called it.

"Tally! Tally! Oh Tally!”

You really expect answers to your calling when you are young. You feel that whatever you may think can be real. And some times maybe that is not so wrong.

I thought of Tally, swimming out into the water last May, with her pigtails trailing, blond. She went laughing, and the sun was on her small twelve-year-old shoulders. I thought of the water settling quiet, of the lifeguard leaping into it, of Tally's mother screaming, and of how Tally never came out….

The lifeguard tried to persuade her to come out, but she did not. He came back with only bits of water-weed in his big-knuckled fingers, and Tally was gone. She would not sit across from me at school any longer, or chase indoor balls on the brick streets on summer nights. She had gone too far out, and the lake would not let her return.

And now in the lonely autumn when the sky was huge and the water was huge and the beach was so very long, I had come down for the last time, alone.

I called her name again and again. “Tally, oh, Tally!”

The wind blew so very softly over my ears, the way wind blows over the mouths of sea-shells to set them whispering. The water rose, embraced my chest, then my knees, up and down, one way and another, sucking under my heels.

"Tally! Come back, Tally!"

I was only twelve. But I know how much I loved her. It was that love that comes before all significance of body and morals. It was that love that is no more bad than wind and sea and sand lying side by side forever. It was made of all the warm long days together at the beach, and the humming quiet days of droning education at the school. All the long autumn days of the years past when I had carried her books home from school.

“Tally!”

I called her name for the last time. I shivered. I felt water on my face and did not know how it got there. The waves had not splashed that high.

Turning, I retreated to the sand and stood there for half an hour, hoping for one glimpse, one sign, one little bit of Tally to remember. Then, I knelt and built a sand castle, shaping it fine, building it as Tally and I had often built so many of them. But this time, I only built half of it. Then I got up.

"Tally, if you hear me, come in and build the rest."

I walked off toward that far-away speck that was Mama. The water came in, blended the sandcastle circle by circle, mashing it down little by little into the original smoothness.

Silently, I walked along the shore.

Far away, a merry-go-round jangled faintly, but it was only the wind.

The next day, I went away on the train.

A train has a poor memory; it soon puts all behind it. It forgets the cornlands of Illinois, the rivers of childhood, the bridges, the lakes, the valleys, the cottages, the hurts and the joys. It spreads them out behind and they drop back of a horizon.

I lengthened my bones, put flesh on them, changed my mind for an older one, and threw away clothes as they no longer fitted, shifted from grammar to high school, to college. And there was a young woman in Sacramento. I knew her for a time, and we were married. By the time I was twenty-two, I had almost forgotten what the East was like.

Margaret suggested that our delayed honeymoon be taken back in that direction.

Like a memory, a train works both ways. A train can bring rushing back all those things you left behind so many years before.

Lake Bluff, population 10,000, came up over the sky. Margaret looked so handsome in her fine new clothes. She watched me as I felt my old world gather me back into its living. She held my arm as the train slid into Bluff Station and our baggage was escorted out.

So many years, and the things they do to people's faces and bodies. When we walked through the town together I saw no one I recognized. There were faces with echoes in them. Echoes of hikes on ravine trails. Faces with small laughter in them from closed grammar schools and swinging on metal-linked swings and going up and down on teeter-totters. But I didn't speak. I walked and looked and filled up inside with all those memories, like leaves stacked for autumn burning.

We stayed on two weeks in all, revisiting all the places together. The days were happy. I thought I loved Margaret well. At least I thought I did.

It was on one of the last days that we walked down by the shore. It was not quite as late in the year as that day so many years before, but the rest evidences of desertion were coming upon the beach. People were thinning out, several of the hot-dog stands had been shuttered and nailed, and the wind, as always, waited there to sing for us.

I almost saw Mama sitting on the sand as she used to sit. I had that feeling again of wanting to be alone. But I could not force myself to speak of this to Margaret. I only held onto herand waited. It got late in the day. Most of the children had gone home and only a few men and women remained basking in the windy sun.

The lifeguard boat pulled up on the shore. The lifeguard stepped out of it, slowly, with something in his arms.

I froze there. I held my breath and I felt small, only twelve years old, very little, very infinitesimal and afraid. The wind howled. I could not see Margaret. I could see only the beach, the lifeguard slowly emerging from the boat with a gray sack in his hands, not very heavy, and his face almost as gray and lined.

"Stay here, Margaret," I said. I don't know why I said it.

"But, why?"

"Just stay here, that's all…"

I walked slowly down the sand to where the lifeguard stood. He looked at me.

"What is it?" I asked.

The lifeguard kept looking at me for a long time and he couldn't speak. He put the gray sack on the sand, and water whispered wet up around it and went back.

"What is it?" I insisted.

"Strange," said the lifeguard, quietly.

I waited.

"Strange," he said, softly. "Strangest thing I ever saw. She's been dead a long time."

I repeated his words.

He nodded. "Ten years, I'd say. There haven't been any children drowned here this year. There were twelve children drowned since 1933, but we found all of them before a few hours had passed. All except one, I remember. This body here, why it must be ten years in the water. It's not…pleasant."

I stared at the gray sack in his arms. "Open it," I said. I don't know why I said it. The wind was louder.

He fumbled with the sack.

"Hurry, man, open it!" I cried.

"I better not do that," he said. Then perhaps he saw the way my face must have looked. "She was such a little girl…"

He opened it only part way. That was enough.

The beach was deserted. There was only the sky and the wind and the water and the autumn coming on lonely. I looked down at her there.

I said something over and over. A name. The lifeguard looked at me. "Where did you find her?" I asked.

"Down the beach, that way, in the shallow water. It's a long, long time for her, isn't it?"

"Yes, it is. Oh God, yes it is.”

I thought: people grow. I have grown. But she has not changed. She is still small. She is still young. Death does not permit growth or change. She still has golden hair. She will be forever young and I will love her forever, oh God, I will love her forever.

The lifeguard tied up the sack again.

Down the beach, a few moments later, I walked by myself. I stopped, and looked down at something. This is where the lifeguard found her, I said to myself.

There, at the water's edge, lay a sand castle, only half-built. Just like Tally and I used to build them. She half and I half.

I looked at it. I knelt beside the sand castle and saw the small prints of feet coming in from the lake and going back out to the lake again and not returning.

Then…I knew.

"I'll help you finish it," I said.

I did. I built the rest of it up very slowly, then I arose and turned away and walked off, so as not to watch it crumble in the waves, as all things crumble.

I walked back up the beach to where a strange woman named Margaret was waiting for me, smiling...

Today has not been a good day. Now it's even worse.

RIP, Ray Bradbury. Thank you so much for everything you've written.

Especially "The Lake."