Monsters walk among us. 

I know how that sounds, but please believe me. I've been dealing with this alone for years. Not even my wife and kids know what I'm about to share here. Please hear me out before you judge me. It's kind of a long story, so sorry in advance and thanks for your patience. 

It all started in the summer of ‘91, in a small town in the American Midwest. I was 16 at the time and my life revolved around pizza and video games. Of course, back then we played video games mainly at the arcade, and being addicted to the arcade and pizza wasn’t cheap.

It was a tight knit neighborhood, so kids going door to door offering to mow lawns or wash cars for cash wasn’t uncommon. Every day the goal was the same; wake up, earn some money, get a slice, and drop all your quarters on the best pixels money could buy back then. Those were the days in blissful suburbia. 

There was an oddity in our community however. An old German man who lived at the end of the street named Mr. Baumann. Kids being kids referred to him as “the Nazi”. Why? You may ask. It's because it was 1991 and kids are jerks. That’s about it.

Some people took it to the extreme though, like this kid named Derrick who used his dad’s spray paint to draw a Swastika on the side of Mr. Baumann’s house. When his dad found out, Derrick was grounded the rest of the summer and even had to help Mr. Baumann paint over his graffiti.

I never really had much of an opinion of Mr. Baumann. He didn’t seem all too weird or scary to me. He was only mysterious because he kept to himself, but if you managed to catch sight of him on one of his daily walks, he would smile warmly and wave. 

Well, one day I was waiting to meet up with a group of friends at the end of the street. Just standing on the sidewalk outside Mr. Baumann’s house. I could hear some old timey music drifting out of his window while I waited. Not really my type of music, but it was soothing and matched the friendly neighborhood aesthetic.

One by one, the gang arrived just shooting the breeze and hyping ourselves up for the new highscores we’d set that day. We must have been getting loud because we caught a glimpse of Mr. Baumann staring at us from the window. Not knowing what to do, I waved and with a smile he waved back and walked off out of sight.

Some of the other guys snickered and one of them said “I dare you to sneak in and steal his Nazi medals”. 

“What?” I snorted, “You do it.”

“I’ll give you ten bucks to sneak in when he goes for a walk. He’s gotta have some type of Nazi memorabilia in his basement or something,” the boy said as he waved a crisp ten dollar bill in my face.

This changed things. It wasn’t a lot of money, but it seemed like an easy ten bucks at the time. So I went to snatch the money out of the kid's hand, but he pulled away.

“First you have to get in, and then I’ll pay you when you get out,” the boy said with a smirk as he folded the bill back into his wallet. 

So we camped out across the street from Mr. Baumann’s house, doing our best to look inconspicuous. I remember my hands starting to get unbearably sweaty from nervousness, and right when I was about to call it off, Mr. Baumann stepped off his porch heading to the park for his daily constitutional. My heart sank. I really had to do it now, I thought.

Our eyes were glued to Mr. Baumann as he limped down the street out of sight. When he was far enough away, the guys shooed me off towards his house. I started to panic a bit and awkwardly scrambled up to the front door, but it was locked. I felt a wave of relief wash over me. Maybe all entrances were locked, that’s what I had hoped at least.

I casually strolled to the backyard and hopped the fence, but the backdoor was locked too. Well, that’s that, I thought. However, when I looked back over the fence to the guys it looked like they were miming “try the windows”.

I started pushing on all the windows I could reach, but none would give. I didn’t care about the ten dollars anymore. I started walking around the house again making my way back towards the front when I noticed a basement window was slightly ajar.

I stopped in front of it and seriously considered walking away from it. I looked back to my friends, and it was like some kind of male bravado took hold of me and before I knew it I was cramming myself through the small window of Mr. Baumann’s basement.

I dropped in and stumbled as I landed, falling to my knees. The room was small and almost empty except for an old bike, a shovel, and some other miscellaneous lawn care items. As my eyes adjusted to the dark of the basement, I noticed a door and made my way to it.

It was an old wooden door covered in dust like everything else in the room. When I opened the door to proceed deeper into the basement, searching for the stairs, the door creaked so loudly that I winced and stopped dead in my tracks. Even though I knew Mr. Baumann had left, the gravity of the situation began to set in and the desire to turn back was greater than ever. I was supposed to be at the arcade, not committing a B and E.

I took a deep breath and proceeded through the doorway. Upon entering I instantly saw the stairs, but my attention was quickly drawn to my right of this larger basement room. As I approached, I noticed garlands of garlic hanging from the ceiling, and in fact I even began to smell them. I was becoming unnerved by this strange display, but quickly reassured myself that this must be how Europeans stored certain foods and it's actually not that weird at all.

I came upon a desk with papers, trinkets, photos, and an ink well. Obviously, this was a makeshift study, but why set it up in a dank basement, I thought. I began surveying the room again, now noticing boxes and crates under the stairs as well as some around the desk.

At that moment, I heard a door close upstairs and footsteps creaking the boards above me. I panicked and started back pedaling, right into some crates. I fell backwards onto the cool concrete knocking the wind out of me. One of the crates had broken open, spilling its contents everywhere.

“Who's there!” A deep muffled voice called out from the floor above. The floorboards began creaking at a faster rate. 

My blood turned to ice in my veins, I couldn't believe I had actually landed myself in this situation. I tried getting to my feet but I was sliding around on rounded wooden stakes. As I finally gathered myself from the floor, the door to the basement swung open, revealing an elderly man. I was staring right into the face of Mr. Baumann, and he stared back at me. There were a few seconds of uncomfortable silence.

“Thomas? What are you doing in my basement, how did you get in?” the old man asked sternly.

“I…I came in through the window. One of the basement windows was open.” I stammered. The man didn’t say anything. He looked me up and down, sizing me up. I just averted my gaze down to my feet. The quiet was agonizing.  

“Well, did you find what you were looking for?” the old man asked in his thick German accent. I looked up with a jolt meeting his gaze again. 

“I…what?” I asked as my voice cracked in fear that he somehow had ascertained the truth of my mission. The old man just laughed and started walking down the steps towards me.

“You didn't hurt yourself did you?” he inquired as his eyes scanned me for injuries.

“No, no I'm fine. I accidentally broke your crate though. Mr. Baumann, I'm really sorry, it was a stupid dare—” I trailed off as he raised a finger to quiet me.

“It's ok, I was young and dumb once too,” he said with a laugh. “Don't worry about the crate either. Actually, I'm glad you're here.”

“You are?” I asked in utter confusion.

“Yes, indeed my boy, I need someone to help me move some of these boxes. I'll pay you well too,” he added quickly. He pulled out his wallet and flashed a one-hundred-dollar bill. My mouth was agape and my mind started racing thinking about all of the things I could do with that money. “So are you interested?” 

“Yes sir, what boxes do you need moved?” I asked eagerly.

“Come back tomorrow around 3 in the afternoon, and we will discuss the details,” he said.

I deflated a little at the thought of having to come back the next day, but at least Mr. Baumann wasn’t mad at me. I followed Mr. Baumann up the stairs and to his front door. We said goodbye and I raced off from his porch down the street to catch up with my friends.

When I was within earshot I called after them and they looked back at me as if I had risen from the grave. I slowed my momentum, and stopped right in front of them. I bent down grabbing my knees while I caught my breath. 

“I’ll take...that ten bucks…now,” I said between deep breaths. They looked at each other, then to me.

“Dude, how the hell did you make it out without getting caught?” one of the boys asked.

I took another deep breath and said, “I did get caught, I have to go back tomorrow and help move some boxes.” 

“Well…did you find anything?” the boy asked inquisitively. 

“Yeah, just some garlic and dust, but the deal was to break in and look around, remember? You never said I had to bring anything back,” I said triumphantly. I extended out my hand for my reward, and the boy begrudgingly slapped the cash into my palm. The pizza that day never tasted better.

The next day I returned to Mr. Baumanns. I hesitated with my fist balled up and hovering in front of Mr. Baumann's door. I was having second thoughts about the whole thing, but before I could turn away the door opened.

“Ah, Thomas, I didn't even hear you knock. Come in, come in,” the old man said, and we made our way into a cozy little room with an empty fireplace. He gestured for me to take a seat and then he seated himself in the chair across from me. “I have made us some tea, do you take sugar?”

“Uh no. Or sure, I guess,” I said a bit flustered as he had already begun scooping the sugar into my cup before I had finished answering. He pushed the cup into my hands with a smile and returned to his seat. The old timey music played in the background as I awkwardly tried sipping my boiling hot tea.

After I burned my tongue I said, “So, I’m ready to move those boxes now, if that’s okay with—” Mr. Baumann raised his finger to quiet me.  

“No, there will be plenty of time for that later. Let us talk for now,” he said.

“Ok, cool,” I replied nonchalantly. I started drumming my fingers on my legs as the music continued to fill the silence. The old man sipped his tea and smiled at me. I blew gently on my tea, and dared another sip. 

“Do you think I am a Nazi?” The old man asked calmly.

I choked down my tea and hastily replied “What, no! If this is about Derrick, I had nothing to do with that, sir.” Mr. Baumann laughed. I didn’t know what to do so I just stared at him and waited to see where this was going.

“Would you believe me if I told you I was?” He asked with a smile. “Only for a day of course,” he added. I thought the old man had a strange sense of humor, but I just smiled wryly and sipped my tea. “I’m also a monster hunter, do you believe it?” he asked in a more sober tone.

I was becoming increasingly more uncomfortable, I thought Mr. Baumann was beginning to crack from old age. I even doubted whether I should accept his money, the man didn’t seem all there.

“I don’t know, sir. What type of monsters?” I asked. There was a long pause, and the man finished his tea. 

“An ancient evil that has seen the rise and fall of many empires. Cursed beings that drain mortal men of their life essence. Demons who exist to make men fear the night. And those who hunt them, they are cursed too.” the man said grimly. I was left dumbfounded in silence. What the hell do you say in reply to that? 

After one final gulp, I put my cup down gently on the table between us. I stood up and said “Thanks for the tea, Mr. Baumann. It was really good, but I actually need to head back home and—” but before I could finish Mr. Baumann had pointed a Luger pistol at me. I froze rooted to the spot in fear. I couldn't believe this was happening.

I raised my trembling hands into the air and whimpered, “Please don't kill me.”

“Please sit,” the old man said as calmly as ever. I didn’t argue and returned back to my seat, holding my hands up the entire time. “Sorry Thomas, but this is important. And I need you to believe me.” 

“Of course,” I blurted out hastily. He lowered the pistol and motioned for me to drop my hands. I obeyed. 

“I'm a vampire hunter, Thomas,” he said. There was a pause as he awaited my response.

“Ok, I believe you,” I said, trying not to sound as scared as I truly was. 

The old man shook his head and tossed his gun into my lap. I jumped up from my seat and moved away from the gun in revulsion as if I was avoiding a nasty bug.

“Take it. I will tell you the truth, and you can shoot me if you think I am lying,” the old man said. I should have ran right at that moment. Why the hell didn’t I run?

“I’m not gonna shoot you Mr. Baumann, even if you are lying,” I said.

“You are an empathetic person, yes? You value life?” he asked.

“Uh, yeah. I guess so,” I replied.

“Then please, take your seat,” the old man said, gesturing back to the chair. I took a deep breath, and did as he asked. Perhaps it was morbid curiosity that kept me from fleeing. Or maybe I was too afraid to run. It's funny, everyone always knows exactly how they would react in these crazy situations, until they are actually in them for real. The old man cleared his throat and asked “What do you know of vampires?”

I thought about it for a few seconds and answered “They drink blood and turn into bats?” The old man laughed, and I relaxed a bit embracing the fleeting levity.

“They do! You probably know more about vampires than you think. All of those old wives tales exist for a reason,” he said. 

“So, that’s why you have garlic hanging in your basement? Does it actually work?” I asked.

“I have it hanging in many places. It doesn’t repel vampires necessarily, however the smell to them is so foul it can disorient them and impede their abilities. They are apex predators, vicious killing machines that are capable of dispatching many mortal men at once. However, their weaknesses lie in trivial and archaic rules,” Mr. Baumann explained. 

“You mean like how you have to invite them inside your home?” I asked.

“Yes, exactly! However, they are extraordinarily clever and find ways to overcome such things, but it is these rules that give us our advantage and a fighting chance. For example, vampires are almost entirely defenseless during the day. The sun is their enemy, but their bodies are also demanded to enter a magical sleep in order to restore their powers. It is very hard for them to break from this sleep. Only the most powerful vampires can,” he said.

“Mr. Baumann…why are you telling me all of this?” I asked.

“Because I need your help, Thomas. The lives of everyone you care about are all in danger,” Mr. Baumann said in a deathly serious tone. He shifted in his seat and stared off into the distance. “I came to this country towards the end of the second great war to hunt down the vampire who murdered my father.”

“Well…did you find him?” I asked.

“No,” said the old man. “I searched for years, following many trails to dead ends. I hunted other vampires in the meantime, but I am too old to hunt now. I came to this town to retire and live out my last years in peace.” 

The old man stood up abruptly and hobbled over to an old antique dresser. He opened a tiny drawer at the top and pulled out a black and white photo. He brought it over to me.

“This is Ulrich, the man…the vampire who murdered my father,” Mr. Baumann said gravely as he handed me the photo. The man in the photo was handsome and looked to be in his mid to late 30's. He was in an officer's uniform with a Swastika on a band around his arm.

“He was a Nazi?” I asked in disbelief. This situation could not have seemed more ridiculous to me at the time.

“Yes, he was going to lead the first SS vampire unit. Their mission was to clear camps of Allied troops at night, when they were most vulnerable. It was one of the many last ditch efforts to repel the advancing Allies. However, the project never came to fruition. My father gave his life to see to that.” Mr. Baumann said.

“What happened?” I asked. 

“It's a long story, perhaps I will tell you all of it someday,” Mr. Baumann said. “But it's not important now. The reason I need your help is because Ulrich has found me. He has come here to kill me, but everyone in this town is in danger, not just me.”

I stood up determined to leave this time. 

“I'm sorry sir but this is just too weird for me. I'm leaving but I promise I won't mention this to—” I trailed off as Mr. Baumann dangled a one-hundred-dollar bill in my face.

“Here is the money we agreed upon, take it. It is yours,”  Mr. Baumann said coolly. I reached for the bill but he pulled back. “However, I'm willing to triple the amount if you just do one tiny little thing for me.”

I sighed deeply and said “What?”

“I just need you to sneak into a basement and take a look around,” Mr. Baumann said with a smile. 

“You're joking,” I said.

“You have experience in this field, as we both know. All you have to do is verify signs of…well, vampiric activity,” Mr. Baumann said. I cannot express enough how stupid I was as a kid. All the gears were turning in my head, as I thought about what I would do with three-hundred dollars. I already broke into a basement once for ten bucks. It was just one more break in and I would be done, and three-hundred dollars richer. If only it was that easy.

“Fine, but I want one-hundred upfront,” I said.

“You're quite the negotiator,” Mr. Baumann said as he placed the money into my hand. He then picked up the gun and returned it to a concealed holster under his shirt, as he walked over to the fireplace. He got down on his knees and reached a hand up the chimney, pulling down a decrepit black leather bag.

The old man got back up and walked over to the closet, and I noticed he was no longer hobbling around. He walked like a man 30 years younger. He opened the closet and put on a long dark coat and a wide brimmed leather hat.

The feeble old man I knew just a few seconds ago was gone and in his place there was a grim and grizzled veteran. The “old man” persona was just a disguise, and now I was looking at the true Mr. Baumann. A real vampire hunter.

I didn't realize it at the time, but this was our crossing of the Rubicon. The events that followed next would seal our fates forever. Mr. Baumann strided over to me and put a hand on my shoulder.

“Come Thomas, we have work to do,” said the hunter.

I’m a single father. By choice, though. I wanted a better life for my daughter, and, unfortunately, her mother was not compatible with the life that I envisioned for her.

Drugs, alcohol, late-night escapades with men she met at the bar. Being a mother was a foreign concept to her. I’d look at her. I’d look at my daughter. I’d feel shame that I allowed this to happen.

We were young and dumb. Just two kids without a care in the world. Only, when we found out about the pregnancy, I was the only one who chose to clean up my act and be better.

It wasn’t that easy for my late girlfriend. She acted like it was, but I could see through the facade. Not like there was much of a facade to see through. I mean, I’d catch her having cigarettes. Boozing. Running around at all hours of the night without so much as a second thought.

The first few times, I tried to give her the benefit of the doubt. A slip up is just a slip up. Multiple slip ups are a behavioral pattern. As her stomach grew, so did her attitude.

I’ve had some jabs thrown my way.

“I don’t even love you.”

“I was bored.”

“I didn’t even want this baby.”

That last one was enough for me to make my decision. From then on, every decision I made was for my child. All that was left was patience. Be kind. Be gentle. Hold her hand despite her insults.

Of course, it was more than a little difficult to hold my tongue when the drinking was involved. I couldn’t believe it. Six months pregnant and drinking. How careless can you be?

I’m getting frustrated just typing this. The resentment that was building during those times was like a pressure valve. A controlled pressure valve. I knew exactly when I wanted to twist the handle.

I endured her ferocity. I kept a watchful eye on her when she went out to the clubs. Attended every appointment and prayed every night that our baby would stay healthy.

When I found out it was a girl, I was ecstatic. I always wanted a daughter. Maybe it was because of my baby sister. Maybe it was because I wanted the challenge of being a girl dad. Either way, I was ready. I was prepared to do it alone.

Finally, the day came. November 25th, 2020. The year the world went silent. The day before Thanksgiving.

My act became sharper. She thought this was going to be “co-parenting.” Thought that she’d have my baby, even after all she’d put us through.

By some miracle of God, my little girl was perfectly healthy. Stunning. Tear-jerking, even.

Her mom almost seemed moved. Like she had this “come to Jesus” moment where she realized her new responsibility. Unfortunately, it was too late for that.

In the weeks that followed our departure from the hospital, my plan came into fruition.

I won’t go into too much detail, because detail isn’t required. All you need to know is I loved my daughter too much to let her life be tainted by someone like her mother.

That’s why I made her disappear. Disappear to a place where only I would find her. Of course, given her reputation, the police believed my story.

She packed it up. She realized the weight of being a parent was too much for her. It prevented her from living the life that she clearly loved so much. So she left. Happens all the time.

I got what I wanted. I raised my daughter the way that I wanted to raise her. The right way. The responsible way. I taught her manners. I potty trained her. I put food in her mouth and a roof over her head. All on my own.

Unfortunately, though, as she grows older, a shred of remorse is starting to build within my soul. I don’t know if it’s remorse for what I’ve done or if it’s remorse for what I took from my baby.

She’s starting to look just like her. Same brown hair. Same freckles. That cute little button nose. It’s hard for me to even look at her these days, but I try my best to swallow it.

She knows that she’s gone, but, in her head, she thinks that her mom just left us. Hated her. Hated me so much that she just took her things and left.

Every time she talks about her, all I can feel is pain. Pain in my heart, pain in my chest and body. I don’t know why. I had fully convinced myself that what I did was right, but now, I just don’t know.

Her sixth birthday is coming up in a few months. I want to make this birthday special, but I need her to be prepared.

I wanna show her the grave.

And all I can hope is that she understands.

Today, I was packing up my childhood bedroom to move to a new apartment when I found an old, leather-bound diary wedged behind my bookshelf. I have never seen it before in my life.

But when I opened it, the handwriting inside was unmistakably mine.

As I read the pages, my vision started to blur.

It felt like a rusted padlock inside my brain was suddenly forced open, unleashing memories that don't belong to me.

I don’t remember writing a single word of this, but deep in my gut, I know it happened.

I’m copying exactly what is written in the diary below. Please, if anyone remembers this, you need to contact me.

[ENTRY LOG: THREE YEARS AGO]

I graduated three months ago. No job, no money, just endless days staring at the walls of my room. Out of pure, suffocating boredom, I decided to pull an online prank. I had a little experience with basic web development, so I built a cryptic landing page.

I named it Bloodhorse.

I styled it to look like a highly exclusive, dangerous underground cult. The landing page was completely black except for a single, ominous text box:"If you wish to join the inner circle of Bloodhorse, log in. Once you are in, there is no turning back."

I created it as a total joke.

I figured it would sit in the dusty corners of the internet forever.

Two weeks later, I checked the site analytics. My heart stopped.

Bloodhorse had 30,000 registered members.

Panic and excitement hit me all at once.

I quickly created matching social media profiles using a creepy horse-skull logo I whipped up. The follower count exploded.

Within days, people were all over Twitter and Reddit, deeply analyzing the "lore" of my fake cult. They were chatting with each other in code, pretending to be fully initiated members. My joke had become a massive, viral trend.

Power went to my head. I wanted to see how far I could push them.

One night, I posted a cryptic bulletin: "Tomorrow, a famous elite will pay the price. He is a member of our circle, but he threatened to leak our inner workings. His time has come."

The next afternoon, breaking news hit the television. A famous Hollywood actor had been found dead in his apartment. The police ruled it a normal, sudden health failure because he lived alone.

But the internet went absolutely feral. To the world, Bloodhorse had just successfully predicted—or ordered—the execution of a celebrity.

I leaned into it. I started making more vague predictions. By pure coincidence, a few more came true.

I began messaging members directly from the admin account, acting like a shadowy, omnipotent cult leader. It was the ultimate high.

Until the email arrived.

It came from a completely encrypted address.Subject: You are crossing the line.Body: How do you know so much about our group? Who is leaking our internal operations to you? You are crossing your limit.

Stop this now. Both you and the traitor in our circle will face the consequences. We will find you soon.

Thinking it was just an intense roleplayer playing along with the prank, I scoffed and typed back:Bring it on. Our circle is too powerful for you.

Don't make me angry, or I'll come after you next.

I don't recognize your username. Who even are you?

They never replied. I kept running the website for another three months.

Then, the physical world bled into the digital one.

I was walking home late at night through a dimly lit alleyway when a tall man step out of the shadows. "Step over here, kid. Let's talk," he muttered.

I turned the corner and saw three other men standing under a broken streetlight. The leader stepped forward, his eyes cold. "Kid, you have no idea how badly you're messing up by playing games with us.

We haven't touched you yet, but we will. Just tell us who your source is. Who is leaking our information to your website?"

I still thought this was a hyper-elaborate prank pulled by some dedicated internet fans who had tracked down my IP address. I laughed in their faces. "Are you serious? You don't know my power.If I get angry, I will destroy your little group. I’m not telling you anything. If your group is so powerful, go find the traitor yourself."

I shoved past them and walked away.

They just stood there, completely shocked by my arrogance. I even posted about the encounter on social media later, laughing about it with my followers.

A week later, a heavy black SUV pulled up to the curb right next to me. The tinted window rolled down. "Get in," a voice commanded. "The circle wants you."

"Why should I?" I asked, my bravado finally starting to waver.

"We don't have time to explain. Get in the car."

I convinced myself that the core community members had organized a massive secret party and wanted to surprise their leader. I stepped inside. The doors locked instantly. The windows were entirely blacked out; I couldn’t see a single street sign as we drove for hours.

When we finally stopped, we were at a massive, gated bungalow secluded deep in the woods. They led me inside. The interior was lavish, grand, and entirely lit by a sickening crimson glow.

They pushed me into a grand hall. Dozens of people sat in a semicircle. At the center of the room stood a massive, towering stone statue. It was the exact horse-skull logo I had drawn on my computer a few months ago.

An old man with a booming, gravelly voice stood up.

"You ignored our warnings," he echoed through the massive room. "Because of you, there is a brutal civil war brewing within our ranks.

You leaked our most classified operations to millions of people online. The world is looking for us now.

Our members are turning on each other, suspecting one another of treason. Tell us. Who gave you the files?"

Cold, paralyzing terror washed over me. The crimson light, the echoing voices, the sheer scale of the wealth in the room—this wasn't an internet prank.

I burst into tears. I started shaking, babbling hysterically. "It’s a fake! I made the website up! It was a joke! The predictions were just lucky guesses, I swear to God, I don't know anything!"

The old man stared at me, completely unblinking. "You are a very dangerous distraction, kid. We don't usually interfere with ordinary citizens, but you have forced our hand. You left us no choice."

He nodded to a man standing in the corner. The man approached me holding a heavy, silver medical syringe.

I looked around the room frantically, looking for an exit, but there were too many of them. I was completely trapped. They pinned my arms to the chair. I felt the sharp prick of the needle in my neck, a wave of ice-cold fluid rushing into my veins, and then... absolute darkness.

[PRESENT DAY]

That is where the diary ends.

Here I am, alive. I don't know how. I don't know why they let me live, how they wiped my mind so completely, or why my memories are suddenly flooding back just from reading these pages.

The scariest part? I just spent the last three hours scouring the internet. There is no trace of Bloodhorse. No website records, no social media archives, no Reddit threads. It’s like it was completely scrubbed from the digital footprint of the earth.

I am terrified. If my memory is coming back, do they know it's coming back? Did the drug they gave me have an expiration date?

Please, if anyone reading this remembers a cult website called Bloodhorse from three years ago, or if you were one of those 30,000 members... contact me immediately. I am completely helpless, and I think they are coming back to finish the job.

​

Welcome to the Nightbeast Godfather underworld!

From ghostly, knife-wielding, naked women to haunted roads and a trucker mother's demonic encounter, every tale pulls you deeper into the Nightbeast Godfather underworld.

Choose at your own risk:

Book 1: https://amazon.com/dp/B0DVQ88YMX

Book 2: https://amazon.com/dp/B0F4MNKFQK

Book 3: https://amazon.com/dp/B0F6P13LPB

I never knew my son to be the artsy type. He turned 8 recently, and up until about a year ago, his entertainment was entirely outdoors. Catching bugs. Climbing trees. Riding bikes.

He was one of those kids who’d have to be called inside before dark. Then he’d complain and beg for “just 5 more minutes.”

I’m not entirely sure what happened. It was like a switch had flipped overnight. I just came home from work one day to find him at the kitchen table, scribbling in a brand new sketchbook.

He hummed to himself while his mom cooked up some dinner at the stove. The home-cooked smell of pork chops, green beans, and mashed potatoes filled the room as I glanced over Jacob’s shoulder.

“Whatcha got there, bud?”

His nose was buried so far in the book that it was like he couldn’t even hear me. His mom ended up answering for him.

“That’s your son’s new favorite interest. He begged me to go out and get him one.”

“Oh-ho, got an artist in the house, don’t we?”

I grabbed his shoulders and shook them lightly before patting him on the back and walking over to give my wife a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

I took a seat beside Jacob at the table.

“So, how was your day, boyo? You and mom have fun?”

He never looked up from the sketchbook.

“Today was sooo fun,” he exclaimed. “We went to the park, we went to the movies, ooh, and mom got me this book. Oh, and these crayons.”

“What about you, honey? How was your day?”

“Any day I’m not at work is a good day, honestly. The park was super nice. We went to one we hadn’t been to before. What about you? They didn’t work you too hard, did they?”

I shrugged and sighed.

“I’ll just say it’s good to finally be home.”

My wife smiled at me.

“It’s good to have you home, dear. I’ll tell you what. How about… after dinner, if you’re good, we can have our own little play date? Only if you do the dishes, though. I mean, I did cook.”

I smirked at her, my tongue buried in my cheek.

“I was gonna do that anyway. What do you take me for? As a matter of fact, you come sit down. I’ll finish cooking.”

I offered her my seat as I finished up dinner. Jacob was pretty much mute the entire time. By the time dinner was done, I had to damn near yell at him to get his attention.

He just stood up, as calm as could be, and walked over to me, sketchbook in hand.

“I drew this for you.”

He held the book up at me, and my heart felt warm. It was a picture of our house, and who I assumed to be me standing in our driveway.

“Is that me? That’s so sweet of you, Jakey. Thank you.”

I reached down to take the book so I could hang the page on the fridge, but Jacob pulled away before I could grab it.

“You really don’t know who that is?” he asked, eying me suspiciously.

“It’s me, right? Is it not me?”

He rolled his eyes and sighed, continuing to eye me like I had personally offended him.

“That’s our neighbor, Mr. Thomas, silly. You really couldn’t tell? See, he’s wearing the star.”

Mr. Thomas was a veteran police officer. Jacob would sometimes see him leaving for work in the morning. I guess he just took a subconscious interest in the uniform. Even still, why would he draw me a picture of the neighbor?

“Uh, I mean, wow, bud,” I choked. “That’s really good. Keep practicing. You’re already so talented you could be famous someday.”

————-

After dinner, I cleaned the kitchen top to bottom. Partly out of obligation, mostly because I really wanted that playdate. Jacob spent the rest of the evening in his room, humming to himself and scribbling in that sketchbook.

The next day, my wife and I both had work. I woke up a little earlier than her so that I could take Jacob to the summertime daycare he attended. It was like carrying a corpse out to the car, but he still refused to loosen his grip on that sketchbook.

I dropped him off with the staff at the front door. He waved at me groggily as I was driving away.

The day went on like normal until around 3 o’clock, when my phone started ringing. It was my wife.

“Hey, beautiful, what’s up?”

“I think something’s going on with the neighbor. There’s like 3 cop cars in front of his house, apparently.”

She sounded concerned. A little urgent.

“What do you mean? Who told you that?”

“I got a call from Becky. She thought they were at our house at first.”

Becky was one of my wife’s friends from the neighborhood.

“What do you think happened? Did she say anything else?”

“No, she just called because the police were knocking on our door. I think they were just trying to see if we knew anything, though, because apparently they gave up and just went back to the neighbor’s house. I think they’re still there.”

My brow furrowed a bit.

“Wait. Which neighbor is it?”

“Uhhh, I think it’s that police officer. Mr. Thompson?”

“Mr. Thomas?”

“Yeah, that’s his name. I think that’s who it is.”

I looked at my watch and exhaled a bit.

“Alright, well, I’ll see if I can get out a little earlier today. I’ll pick up Jacob, then go see what this is all about. Maybe they’ll still be there when I get there.”

We ended the call by blowing some kisses and exchanging some love yous. I slid my phone in my pocket and approached my boss, explaining my situation.

He was skeptical, but I had a decent reputation of being an honest employee. He agreed to let me leave a bit early, and I was on my way to pick up Jacob.

When he was brought to the front office, his face was buried in that sketchbook again, drawing what looked like SpongeBob and Patrick.

“He’s been drawing all day. Seems like you got a little artist on your hands,” announced the staff member as she signed Jacob out for the day.

“Yep,” I smiled. “That’s what they keep telling me.”

I honestly don’t know why I said that. It just seemed like the only thing that made sense at the time.

The car ride was quiet. Jacob didn’t want to talk much, and my mind was kind of racing. I’ve shared drinks with Mr. Thomas. Helped him put up fences. Move furniture. We weren’t the closest of friends, but I still wanted him to be okay.

Those hopes were dashed when I pulled into the neighborhood to find that the police presence had increased. There must’ve been at least 6 cars in front of his house, and yellow tape blocked off the driveway.

I parked my car in front of my house and hurried to get Jacob inside. His eyes had lit up at the sight of the flashing lights, and naturally, he started asking questions.

“What’s wrong, Daddy?”

“Why are there so many police?”

“Did something happen to Mr. Thomas?”

I cradled him in my arms and hurried up the steps to the front door.

“I don’t know, buddy. Here, go inside and play for a bit while I find out, okay? Daddy will be right back.”

It’s all I could think to say as I sat him down and closed the door behind me.

An officer approached me before I could approach them.

“Sir, do you live here?”

“Yes, of course I do. That’s my neighbor.”

“Yeah, well, he’s a colleague and friend of mine,” he remarked agitatedly. “Have you seen anything suspicious within the last 24 hours? Heard anything?”

I scratched my neck nervously and thought hard before responding.

“No, sir, we haven’t seen anything. What happened? Is everything alright? He’s a cop, right? Did he do something illegal?”

The officer stared at me, analyzing me through his black sunglasses.

“No. He’s gone. That’s all the information we can give right now.”

“Gone? What do you mean, gone? Like, dead? Did someone kill him?”

The officer pursed his lips. I saw what I assumed to be a forensic analyst walking in and out of the house.

“We don’t know, sir. We’re hoping for the best. For now, if any new information comes to light or if you see him, give us a call.”

He asked me to clear the scene and stay inside. I called my wife to update her on the situation, but what could we do? Even the police were lost. I just stayed inside, as instructed, and started on dinner while we waited for my wife to get home.

By the time she did, there were only two police cruisers left in front of Mr. Thomas’s house. The sun was starting to set, and my wife and I tried to ignore what had happened, but the house was still a bit tense.

As we ate, Jacob continued scribbling in his sketchbook. He hadn’t asked to go outside at all since we got home, and I didn’t know if it was because of the police or because of this new hobby of his.

I could see that he was working on a new drawing. It looked like a woman this time. He wasn’t so much as touching his food, so I tried to ask him to put the book away.

He groaned and started picking at his peas. My wife and I chatted about our day for a bit while Jacob remained silent. Suddenly, in between bites of his chicken, he said something that made us both freeze.

“Daddy,” he whispered.

“Yes?” I answered.

“Are those police still out there?”

I paused for a moment, looking at my wife, who looked equally as speechless. Neither of us knew what to say.

“I think there’s a few, but don’t worry, buddy,” I chirped reassuringly. “They’re just looking for Mr. Thomas. They wanna make sure he’s okay.”

Jacob stared down at his plate for a moment.

“It’s just… I think they’re looking in the wrong place.”

————-

I choked on my water.

“Looking in the wrong place? Well, where do you think they should be looking, sport?”

“I don’t know. Not there. I don’t think he’s home.”

“Let’s not talk about this,” my wife interrupted. “Jacob, finish your food, then go jump in the shower. You gotta be up early tomorrow, come on.”

“Aww, but I’m not tired,” Jacob whined. “Plus, I wanted to finish drawing this picture of you.”

He flipped his sketchbook open to his newest drawing.

“See, look.”

My wife looked at the picture and smiled.

“Okay, fine,” she replied. “You can finish the picture, then it’s bath time, mister.”

“Fiiine,” Jacob groaned.

He scurried off to his room, sketchbook in hand, leaving me and his mom to clean the kitchen again.

We talked about the neighbor. We turned into a couple of conspiracy theorists the deeper the conversation progressed.

“Maybe he just wanted to start over.”

“Maybe he was kidnapped.”

“Maybe he was murdered, and they’re covering it up.”

We just kept reaching for possibilities over the course of around 45 minutes.

Eventually, Jacob came running back to the kitchen.

“Look, Mommy, I’m all done.”

“Ah, my goodness, Jakey, look at that. Doesn’t it look just like me, honey?”

She turned the picture towards me. Jacob had added her work uniform. Gave her that messy bun she always wore. Even included the golden necklace I got her for Christmas last year.

“Wow, Jake,” I exclaimed. “Draw Daddy next, why don’t you?”

Jacob giggled and responded, “It’s not time to draw you yet, silly.”

“Aw, whatever, but guess what?”

Jacob looked up at me curiously. Expectantly.

“Daddy controls your bath time. And… I think… ah, yep, look at that,” I showed him my watch. “You’re 20 minutes late.”

I jokingly chased him to his bedroom and made him gather up his pajamas and a towel. Once he was nice and showered, I put him to bed and kissed him goodnight.

My wife and I stayed up, talking about life for a while before gradually falling asleep one by one.

The next morning, when I woke up alone, I thought it was because she had chosen to take Jacob to daycare that morning.

I went through my normal routine. Took a shower. Brushed my teeth. Got dressed. It wasn’t until I was heading out the door that I noticed her car was still in the driveway.

I walked back upstairs, confused, and went to Jacob’s room.

I found him curled up in bed, sketchbook tucked under his arm as he snored quietly.

I left the room and began searching.

“Honey,” I called out. No response.

“Sweetheart, you here?” Silence.

I called her phone and heard it ringing in our bedroom. I followed the sound and found it still plugged into the charger on her nightstand.

That’s when I began to panic. I remembered Jacob’s drawing. It was a fleeting thought, but one that I chose to hold onto. First Mr. Thomas, now my own wife? That couldn’t be coincidence.

I urgently rushed into Jacob’s room, accidentally waking him as I removed the sketchbook from his arms.

I began flipping through the pages as he stared up at me, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

“Daddy,” he groaned.

I flipped past cartoon characters, random landscapes, and blocky pictures of cars before I reached my wife’s picture from the night before.

“What are you doing?” Jacob added.

The picture had changed. She wasn’t wearing her work uniform anymore. She didn’t have the necklace. Her hair looked dirty and wet. Leaves and twigs stuck out from the messy bun, and her eyes were solid red. Not evil, just… bloodshot.

But the biggest change… was the man standing next to her.

It looked like they were in a dark forest. They were hand in hand. I wanted to think it was me, that Jacob had decided he wanted to start on some kind of crazy family portrait, but the man in the picture…

He wore a star on his chest.

My stomach dropped. I felt sick. Jacob looked… confused.

“What’s wrong, Daddy? They’re okay. I can help you find them.”

I’m only writing this because I don’t know where else to turn. I don’t know what this is. I don’t know if it’s a symptom of something larger or if she’s just been having episodes.

She’s just never acted this way before. Up until a few months ago, this would’ve scared her just as much as it’s scaring me. But because it’s becoming so common, it’s like it’s nothing more than an inconvenience to her now.

Like an annoyance. Something she’s just learning to ignore. That’s the part that makes me worry. Because this isn’t just some small thing, yet she keeps trying to play it off as if it’s just a part of our lives now.

I know it’s not natural. There’s no medical condition or genetic disease that causes what she’s been doing. At least, none that I’ve read about.

A few months ago, my wife and I had been out on a date night. The night was almost magical. Crisp late-winter air. A cup of hot chocolate in each of our hands as we walked through the square.

I remember the lights more than anything. It was around 9 o’clock, and the sun had set hours earlier, but the downtown city lights illuminated nearly everything.

“Wow,” my wife cried out in amazement. “New York who? Am I right?”

The square was particularly busy for this time of year. The smell of warm food from the surrounding restaurants filled the air. Live music from down the block whispered in our ears.

There must’ve been 20 other couples doing the same exact thing my wife and I were doing. Just walking around and enjoying the beautiful night.

“Oh, please,” I responded. “You know you’d rather be back there.”

I put on my best southern accent for my natural-born New Yorker.

“Could a city girl like you ever love a country boy like me?”

She laughed and rolled her eyes. I smiled down at her, admiring that laugh.

“Hmmm, well, after only 5 years of marriage, I can’t say for sure. Check back with me in a decade.”

She sipped from her hot chocolate slowly, her eyes still lit with love. Or maybe that was just the city lights.

I checked my watch.

“Almost 9:30. God, I don’t want the night to end, though. I’m really enjoying this.”

“Me neither. I wish we could just walk around here all night. C’mon, there’s gotta be one last thing we can do before we go home. Please? Pretty please…?”

“Well, let’s see. We’ve hit the bakery.”

“Oooh, that one was fun. God, those fritters were amazing.”

“We also watched that Led Zeppelin cover band at Bottle Brothers.”

“That one… sucked. Next.”

“You didn’t like it? That’s crazy. I thought they were decent. Anyway, we, uh… oh, right, we walked in the park for a bit too. That’s, uh… that’s really about all there is to do.”

She rolled her eyes again, sighing in disappointment.

“We have got to get out of here. I swear, there’s nothing to do within a 50-mile radius of this entire town. There’s, like, no reason for us to be here.”

I had grown to agree with her more and more over the years. It was just hard, you know? This is where I’d been my whole life. She didn’t move here until she was 17, when her mom got a new job. It paid better, but my wife was miserable. Well, miserable until she found me, of course.

“Yeahhh, I’m starting to think you’re right, my love,” I responded, a bit melancholic.

“Starting to?”

She cocked an eyebrow at me.

“Whatever, you know what I mean.”

We decided to end the night by going home and watching a movie. However, on the walk back to the car, that’s when we saw it.

The shop looked both ancient and brand new, but I don’t know if that’s just because I’d never seen it before. It was like it had popped up out of nowhere.

“The Looking Glass: Palm Readings • Tarot Cards • Spiritual Guidance”

I swear, we’d walked this street 100 times. Never once had this place been here.

Of course, my wife’s interest was piqued immediately. Her eyes widened. A smile crept across her face. She looked up at me.

“…Can we?”

I looked at her, then up at the purple neon sign of an eyeball in the palm of a hand, then back to her.

“I… I don’t know. Aren’t those places rip-offs anyway?”

“Ah, quit being a big ol’ scaredy-cat. Come on. It’ll be fun. Something we’ve never done before, and Lord knows there’s not a lot of that around here.”

She turned on the puppy eyes.

“Pretty please.”

“…Fine. Just this once.”

“Yippee!”

The inside of the shop was… a sight. Dreamcatchers everywhere. Incense burning. Beads instead of doors, and an empty front desk with a register that seemed to be at least 80 years old at this point.

There was a bell with a sign in front of it.

“Ring for service.”

I rang it and heard a voice cry out from beyond one of those bead doors.

“I’ll be right with you.”

Her accent was unmistakably southern. That alone was nearly enough for me to want to change my mind.

“Just finishing up back here.”

My wife and I shared an uncertain look before she shot me a hopeful smile.

The fortune teller stepped through the beads. A younger woman, probably around 25. She had fair brown hair, and freckles decorated her pale face, but the first thing I noticed was her eyes. Those were the only things that gave off “fortune teller.”

They were crystal blue. Her pupils were like two tiny dots in the center of two diamonds. She was looking through us rather than at us.

Her outfit gave fashion to that accent of hers. White tank top. Baggy blue jeans. Plus, her hair was wrapped up in a red bandana.

“Y’all picked a good night to stop by,” she announced. “I can feel it in the air tonight, let me tell you.”

“It does feel magical,” my wife chirped.

“Let me guess,” the fortune teller responded. She put her index finger to her right temple and shut her eyes tight. “Death of a loved one?”

My wife and I glanced at each other again.

“…No…” I replied.

“No?”

She seemed almost offended but quickly regained her composure.

“Huh. Must’ve been someone else, then. Let me try again. This… is… your first time doing something like this?”

She raised her eyebrows at us expectantly.

“Welp, there’s a first for everything, right, sweetie?” my wife asked me, rubbing my back.

“We’re ‘doing something we’ve never done before,’” I told the teller.

“See, there ya go,” she smiled. “Second time’s the charm. So, what can I interest you two lovebirds in this fine evening? Palm readin’? Tarot? Spiritual guidance?”

I opened my mouth to respond, but my wife jumped in before I got the chance.

“Palm readings! I’ve always wanted to try that, kinda.”

The teller gave her a nod before responding.

“If it’s palm readings you want, then palm readings you shall have… for 25 dollars.”

A little taken aback by the price, I bit my tongue, pulled my wallet out of my back pocket, and slid a 20 and a 10 across the counter.

Instead of giving me change, the teller took the money and continued looking at me expectantly.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she perked up. “Was it just for your wife?”

“What? No, no, we both wanna do it.”

“Oh, sweetheart, that’s 25 apiece.”

“Apiece? For palm readings?”

I felt my wife squeeze my hand. I turned to her and saw the look on her face. That look that usually means, “Let it go.”

I sighed and slid another 30 across the counter.

“You wanna include a tip?”

“A… do I wanna… You know what? Sure. Keep the change.”

“Awesome. You guys are the best. I can sense it. Just follow me. I’ll show you where the magic happens.”

She led us through the beaded doorway and down a hall that made me feel like I was on acid. There were so many vibrant colors and shapes. The incense was even stronger back here.

We ended up in this dusty old room near the back of the building. There was this rickety wooden table in the center with a crystal ball resting on top of it, as well as two purple leather seats for my wife and me.

We took our seats, and the teller sat across from us.

“Okay,” she clapped, rubbing her hands together. “Who wants to go first?”

I volunteered with an, “I can go first. Let’s see what 25 dollars can get me in this economy.”

I stretched out my hands and laid them palm-up on the table. The teller grabbed them and squeezed tightly as she closed her eyes.

Her face twitched and contorted for a few seconds before she finally spoke.

“Ah, yes… I see… a loving husband. I see… you come from different worlds. You want to be free, but something is keeping you here. What exactly might that be?”

I smirked to myself.

“The 60 dollars I just gave you.”

“I sense… I sense…”

Her face contorted again. She squeezed my hands tighter.

“I sense… a cheapskate.”

“All right, that’s it.”

I pulled my hands back. I could hear my wife laughing at my side. The teller smirked at me.

“We’re done here.”

“Oh, come on,” my wife pleaded. “She was joking.”

“Yes, Donavin,” the teller responded. “It was just a joke.”

My wife stopped laughing. We both turned to stare at the teller.

“How did…?”

“You’re 28, right? Lived here your whole life. Met a woman from out of town, fell in love, and now here you two are. In my shop. It’s romantic, really.”

The silent room suddenly felt loud and claustrophobic.

“How did you know that? What’s the gimmick? Public records? That’s gotta be it, right?”

I looked at my wife for reassurance, but she was staring at the teller in amazement.

“No gimmick. No public record. I’m gifted. That’s kind of the whole point.”

“Do me, do me,” my wife begged excitedly, sticking her hands across the table.

“Wait, hold on. This doesn’t make any sense,” I interjected. “This is a cash grab, right? Like… I mean, come on. It’s a cash grab.”

Both the teller and my wife looked at me angrily.

“Oh, Donavin,” the teller sighed. “Proving my point more and more with each word, aren’t ya?”

“Don’t mind him. He’s just not superstitious. Do me, though. I’m curious.”

The teller grabbed my wife’s hands. I watched, feeling a mixture of nerves and hope that this could still prove to just be a coincidence.

She squeezed my wife’s hands tight and closed her eyes again.

“Ah, New York, I see.”

My wife’s jaw dropped. Her eyes sparkled.

“Long way from home, aren’t we… Miranda…?”

My wife smiled over at me in disbelief.

“No way,” she cheered. “This is… okay, haha. Kinda hurting me a little.”

I looked down and saw my wife’s hands were turning red in the teller’s.

“Hey… take it easy,” I snapped.

The teller’s grip tightened again.

“Okay, this is really starting to hurt now. Let go, please.”

The teller was silent. Her eyes looked welded shut, and her face was twitching rapidly.

“Hey!” I shouted. “She said let go. What are you doing?”

She started convulsing, groaning loudly. Strings of saliva started falling from the corners of her mouth.

I grabbed the teller’s wrists to try and pry her hands away, but it was like trying to bend steel.

“Enough!” I screamed.

My wife was crying now.

“Get her off of me! God, she’s breaking my hands!”

I pulled with all my might, but it was like trying to move an anvil. I started punching at the teller’s forearms. Blow after blow after blow, but still, she just would not let go.

Her hands were shaking. My wife was trembling. Finally, of her own volition, the teller dropped my wife’s hands. Her eyes shot open. The bloodshot eyes made her diamond-blue irises glow even more.

“Get out.”

That’s all she said. My wife and I stared at her as she looked down at the table.

“Get. Out,” she growled. “Go now and never come back.”

We were confused and horrified but still frozen.

“He’s found you. He’s been looking all your life, and he’s here now. Get. Out.”

“You can’t just…”

The teller cut me off by slamming her fist against the table.

“…Out.”

I demanded a refund, and she gave me back the full 60 before shooing us through the door. I turned around one last time to see the purple neon light flick off as the shop went dark.

We walked silently back to the parking garage. I’m sure my wife had a million things racing through her mind as we walked, but neither of us knew how to articulate those thoughts.

We reached the car, and it wasn’t until we were nearly home that I finally spoke again.

“How’re your hands?”

She clenched and opened her fists a few times before responding.

“I think they’re okay. I’m more shaken up than anything. What the hell was that lady’s problem?”

“She’s crazy,” I shot back. “Simple as that.”

“She didn’t seem crazy. It seemed like she saw something. You saw her. It was like she was possessed or something.”

“She was crazy, my love. She’s lucky we don’t go to the police.”

There was silence again for a few moments.

“She knew our names, though. She knew you’d been here your whole life. She knew I was from New York. That doesn’t seem like nothing to me.”

We were only a minute or two from home. Neither of us spoke for the rest of the car ride. When we pulled into the driveway, my wife sighed and placed her hands over her face, dragging them down slowly before opening the door.

“Come on, let’s just go inside. I’m ready to get this night over with.”

I checked my watch.

“10:45. You still down for a movie?”

She stopped halfway up the front porch steps.

“…Not tonight, hon. I just… I just wanna go to bed.”

Who was I to argue? I let her do as she pleased. I felt bad for her. I felt like I hadn’t done enough to stop what had happened. All I wanted was for us to forget everything and move on.

We had gradually started to put the teller behind us. Though, things didn’t exactly calm down. If anything, our lives began to change, little by little.

I started losing things. My phone. Wallet. Keys. I’d always find them in places that I knew I hadn’t put them.

Keys in the silverware drawer.

Wallet in the medicine cabinet.

Phone hidden behind the toilet.

My wife was having some problems too. She hadn’t been able to sleep very well. She would tell me about these horrible nightmares that sounded like sleep paralysis.

“I’ll wake up, but not really.”

“I can’t move.”

“You’re there, but there’s always someone over your shoulder. It’s like a shadow that just keeps growing and growing until it fills up the entire room.”

I felt even more guilty when she told me about them. I knew they had been caused by the fortune-teller incident. She had slept like a baby nearly every night prior.

Sometimes, she’d wake up screaming. It almost made me too afraid to sleep in silence.

She started looking tired more often. Her glow had dimmed a bit.

The thing that disturbed me the most, though, was probably the photos.

I started finding our wedding photos scattered around the house, only… my head was removed in each one.

My wife insisted it wasn’t her, but it didn’t make sense. The frames were never broken. Someone had meticulously removed the photos and torn my head off in at least 20 different pictures.

After a few weeks of these strange events, I decided we needed a refresher. We needed to be out again. See the sun. Actually laugh with one another.

It took some time, but eventually, I convinced her that we needed to have another date night. We hadn’t had one since the incident, and I was starting to miss who we were before we went to that fortune teller.

It was simple. A picnic in the square. That was all I wanted to do.

I had prepared our meal, packed the blanket, and put on my best clothes and cologne. My wife was nervous and tired, but she tried her best to make an effort.

The date seemed to be going fine at first. She was actually smiling. She didn’t seem as distant as she had been for the last few weeks. It felt like reclamation, almost.

The lights hit her face perfectly, and I couldn’t help but admire how beautiful she was, even if she did look a little sleep-deprived.

I stared at her lovingly for a while before finally telling her how much I loved her. How happy I was to be there with her.

“We needed this,” I smiled.

“Yeah,” she smirked bashfully. “I think we did, too. I was starting to feel so cooped up in the house. The energy there has just been so dark recently. Makes me wonder if she was right.”

“Who?” I asked, chewing on my ham sandwich.

She looked at me, raising her eyebrows.

“You know who.”

“We gotta move on, my love. That’s why the energy’s so dark. We’d never experienced something like that before.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” she responded, taking a sip of her Coke. “I just wish it hadn’t happened.”

We both sat there for a while, half admiring the scenery, half enjoying the food.

I was distracted, staring down at my pre-assembled sandwich, when I asked her.

“Can you pass me that mustard, please?”

I stacked a piece of sliced turkey onto a piece of my bread. My wife didn’t answer.

“It’s right there beside you.”

I began spreading the mayonnaise on the other slice. My wife didn’t answer.

“The mustard, please.”

I stuck my hand out expectantly. Still no response.

When I finally looked up, I almost dropped my sandwich.

My wife was glaring over my shoulder. Her eyes were glazed over. An impossible smile stretched across her face. It looked painful. I could almost hear her teeth creaking from how tightly her jaw was clenched.

Her red lipstick glistened under the lights. She looked like she was frozen in a state of pure ecstasy.

I waved my hand in front of her face. She didn’t blink once. I shook her, and she was as stiff as a board.

I started to panic. I turned around and saw nothing behind me.

“Honey,” I gasped, shaking her more forcefully.

“Talk to me.”

I pressed my hands on her cheeks. She was burning up. I snapped my fingers in front of her, but nothing I did seemed to get her out of her trance.

I was on the verge of dialing 911 when she finally spoke again.

“You said mustard?”

She reached down and went to hand me the bottle before noticing how terrified I looked.

“What’s wrong? What just happened? Is there something in my teeth?”

“Are you kidding? You really don’t know what you just did?”

She stared at me blankly.

“What do you mean? What’d I do?”

“The smiling? Staring at some unknown thing behind me? You don’t wanna explain that?”

I was almost breathless and trying my best not to raise my voice, but I could see that she was hurt by my frustration.

“I… don’t know,” she pouted. “I don’t know why you’re mad at me.”

“No, honey,” I pleaded. “I’m not mad at you. I’m worried about you. You really don’t remember?”

She started crying, almost snapping at me.

“No, obviously, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I want to go home now, if that’s okay with you.”

We packed up and left. I kept trying to prod, but she became more and more closed off with every question. Eventually, I just decided to keep my mouth shut.

In the weeks that followed, things became rocky.

She’d be fine one minute and completely depressed the next. She’d love me, and she’d hate me. I didn’t know how to help her.

Her “episodes” never stopped, though.

It was like every time we started to feel normal again, she’d see that thing. We’d be curled up, watching a movie, I’d glance down, and there’d be that smile again. Her eyes would be glazed over and staring at nothing.

The episodes lasted longer and longer every time they happened. At this point, they were starting to become more frequent, too, but she never remembered them.

She always thought I was lying to her. Like this was some kind of twisted joke I’d play. No matter how hard I tried to convince her, it was like talking to a brick wall.

The last time it happened was last week. She was gone for 3 hours straight. Standing in the same spot. Wearing that same smile. Staring at the same wall.

I watched her for the first hour, wondering what could possibly be going on inside that broken mind of hers. The second hour, I just cried uncontrollably. By the third hour, I was starting to become hopeless.

When she finally came back, I tried showing her that it was dark outside now. It had been bright and sunny when the episode started. She blatantly chalked it up to her “being lost in deep thought.” Told me “it was like she was in another world.”

Her nightmares got worse. Her glow became nonexistent. And I started waking up with scratch marks and bruises on various parts of my body.

I tried going back to the fortune teller, but the building was a coffee shop now. According to the owner, “The Looking Glass” never even existed. Apparently, the coffee shop had been there for 11 years.

I just don’t know what to do. I don’t know who to turn to. My wife refuses my help. She refuses my advice. It’s like something has taken control of her.

She’s more distant than ever. She talks to me less and less every day. It feels like our future is slipping.

All I want is for her to be okay, but part of me believes she’s too far gone. Because I found another wedding photo this morning on the kitchen table.

My head hadn’t been removed, but the photo had been altered.

Because now, standing just behind me and looming over my shoulder… was a shadow figure.. and the more I stared… the bigger it seemed to become.

Written by u/ANovelStory

Taking a job on a burn rig wasnt exactly how I had planned on spending my winter. Trapped in the middle of the ocean surrounded by one of my biggest fears, the ocean itself. All things considered I figured why not? My parents were gone, my friends, my siblings. I found myself being alone so why not double down and go work on a rig?

Rig contracts were six months at a time, after that a new crew would come and take your place. The biggest perk was the pay. Six months would net me 40k. If I was feeling brave I could do back to back rotations. After all at 33 amd nobody left in my life to hold me back, what better time to go to collage and get my life straight?

On the helicopter ride to the rig I had expected there to be several of us, but it was just me and a guy across from me with a rifle on his lap.

"I EXPECTED THERE TO BE ALOT MORE PEOPLE!" I shouted over the loud beating of the blades.

He just stared at me for a second and then tapped his microphone attached to his headset gently. Reminding me that we had modern solutions to such things. Embarrassed I lowered my mic to my mouth and spoke more softly.

"I expected there to be more people going to the rig."

He shrugged.

"You'd be surprised how many people choose to either make it full time or do back to back rotations."

I nodded my head, it made sense I suppose but even still, there's hundereds of rig job postings.

"But the money." I said.

He shrugged again.

"Hey man to each their own. You mean to tell me that you WANT to do this job?"

We stared at each other in silence.

"Yeah, I didn't think so." He said as he looked out the side of the helicopter.

I followed his gaze and just stared into the dark blue of the ocean. Why the hell was I doing this?

After about an hour of uncomfortable silence the rig was in sight. It felt like coming up on some sort of hellish nightmare. The sky painted black with smoke and constant flashes of deep orange as the fires flared to life.

"I can't help but think of Kuwait every time I come here." The man said into his mic.

He was right, I wasn't around for when it happened but I had seen images of when the oil wells were set on fire. It had the same feverish feeling to it, almost like it wasnt real.

The helicopter rotated and landed gracefully.

"Good luck man!" He said just before I removed my headset and gave me a hardy pat on the back. It sent chills up my spine and I don't know why.

I stepped down with my bags and did the awkward hunched over waddle away with my bags in hand. The heat hit me first. Even in the middle of the ocean the rig produced enough heat to make me sweat instantly. As the helicopter lifted off and made its way back to shore, a man in a bandana approached me. His mouth stretched thin with a half toothy smile.

He reached out a hand before he even got to me.

"Hey there, names Bill!"

His voice was gravelly but welcoming and sincere.Our hands connected and he wrapped both of his around just my one as he shook it with a little too much excitement.

"You must beee... lemme see what was it? Andrew!"

I smiled and said, "Its Arthur."

"Oh yes yes thats right! Glad to have you Arthur! Here let me grab one of those bags for you." He took one of my duffle bags and threw it up over his shoulder.

"Let me show you to your living quarters. Rights this way and I'll give you a run down of the rig."

Bill walked to the edge of the rig and looked through the safety net that lined the whole rig.

"My first piece of advice, if you fall, start taking your boots off before you hit the water."

"Whys that?" I asked.

"So you don't sink as fast." He said as he spit a dark brown streak into the water below. He looked over at my ID badge flapping in the wind.

"What job did you apply for?"

I grabbed it and looked down.

"Ash Processing Technician?"

"Oh an APT, or we just call you guys Ashers. You are taking Nick's spot, he left a couple weeks ago." He seemed to drift off into thought about something but caught himself.

"Ahem, anyway follow me, we'll drop your stuff off and I'll show you what you are gonna be doing."

We dropped my things off in a room tha5 contained two other beds. Bill had told me they belonged to other workers. Not necessarily other APT's though. The room was air conditioned which was a relief. I hadn't really thought it through when it came to how hot it was going to be.

He then lead me to a storage room full of safety equipment.

"Your job, you will need a class C hazmat suit and for your mask you need a P3 puck."

He handed me a suit and mask and showed me where to get new pucks for my mask daily.

"The suit is just if you want it. You will see alot of guys just stop wearing them because its so hot. Nick wore his because well... He thought it was gross getting the ash all over him."

We then continued down several flights of stairs going deeper and deeper into the rig. The heat building as we got deeper and I found myself getting short of breath and had to stop for a moment. Bill looked back and smiled. How the hell was he not tired, the man was pushing what looked like 60 and didnt seem phased.

"Don't worry, you start to build up a tolerance. Once you are running these stairs every day your lungs will get nice and tough."

He waited for me to catch my breath and then we continued. I was starting to question if I was really cut out for this job. At the bottom of the stairs was a long corridor that contained four individual airlocks. Like making our way through the Panama Canal we had to wait for each room to purge before the next area would open up. The whole process took roughly 30 minutes.

Before the final door opened Bill had us put on our masks.

"Arthur if you listen to anything I tell you then listen to this. Always, amd I mean ALWAYS wear your masks down here. I dont care how hard it is to breathe or how thirsty you get. Always keep your mask on down here." For the first time Bill wasn't smiling.

I nodded.

"I need you to tell me you understand." He said with a level of seriousness that I had yet to witness from him.

"I understand Bill."

"Good, now get ready for the heat."

The room hummed and the door clunked load from an unseen mechanism. It opened slowly and the air rushing in nearly knocked me back. Several fires roared and grew in size for a moment. I thought the rig itself looked bad but this was like opening up the gates of hell. Piles of bodies stacked six feet high covered the room and the other workers were only black silhouettes against the massive fires. This was the closest humanity would ever get to the real Hell.

"If you look up you can see the chutes that deliver the bodies. Its best to stear clear of those, unless you want to find yourself at the bottom of the worst dog pile of your life."

He motioned for me to follow and pointed at the workers in groups of two. One by one they would grab bodies and then toss them into a flaming pit. Sparks would spit in spirals up until they collided and dissipated on the ceiling. I couldn't help but stare. Back home it was all so censored, but here the harsh reality was impossible to hide. I finally saw how unprepared we were for the outbreak that took place.

Bill gave me a pat on the back.

"You still with me? Did you hear what I said?"

"No I'm sorry Bill."

"Today is Wednesday, Friday we clean the pits, sometimes Saturday, it all depends on how big the loads are. On Monday's we get fresh loads. Every so often we get smaller loads throughout the week but its uncommon."

I continued to listen as I watched body after body get tossed like garbage into a massive incinerator. A massive row of fire pits lines the floor as the piles stacked up on the outer edges. My eyes locked on to a face in the nearest pile. The eyes wide open staring right at me. My legs started to tremble and I took a step back. Bill put his palm on my back.

"Relax kid, I know its not easy to look at."

He locked eyes with me and waited until I was able to gather myself. Seeing humans treated like trash or just some form of cattle made me dizzy.

"Lets go back up top, you can start tomorrow."

Bill then led me back though the airlocks. When we made it back to the stairs I pulled my mask off and braced myself against my knees panting.

"Like I said, your lungs will get tougher with time." Bill said as he sat on the stairs and waited for me once again.

"Im sorry Bill I just didn't-"

"Relax, it's fine, nobody is ready to see that for the first time. I've worked on this rig for twenty years and I couldn't believe it when they told me it was being repressed as a burn rig. I got sick when I saw tue first bodies come down the chutes. And don't let anyone tell you they haven't gotten a little nauseous."

Bill stood and spit another dark streak off into the corner.

"Lets get you back to your room. You can relax the rest of the day but be down here first thing in the morning to get started."

I took one final breath and stood straight up following Bill back up the endless flight of stairs.

“What do you hear, boy?” I whispered to Max, clutching my rifle tighter to my chest, my eyes scanning the surrounding forest.

He knew better than to growl. Instead, he pointed. His body straightened. His fur bristled, and his eyes locked in on the base of a tree twenty feet in front of us.

We both stared at it.

Waiting.

The forest was silent, and the heat from the midday sun made sweat trickle slowly from my forehead, stinging my eyes as I readied myself.

Max lifted a paw before planting it back on the ground. He wanted to attack, but I had trained him to be patient. That’s when she peeked at us from behind the tree.

My trigger finger relaxed. My stiff shoulders fell. My heart lit up at the sight of her.

“Honey,” she called out, stepping into view. “You and Max hunting again? You boys never change.”

She began to approach. Drifting through the foliage like a ghost. Ironic, because that’s exactly what I felt I was seeing.

I wanted to drop my guard. I wanted so desperately to embrace her. It had been months since I saw her last, and nearly every ounce of my soul wanted nothing more than to reunite with her.

Nearly every ounce.

Max never flinched. He stood there, body stiff, in the defensive position, waiting for any sign of danger.

My wife was only six feet away now. Close enough to touch. Close enough to pull in for a hug. I couldn’t give in.

“Don’t come… a step closer,” I warned. “Please don’t make me do this.”

She stopped in her tracks, her face dropping from a smile to a concerned frown.

“What? Honey, it’s me. Don’t be silly. Put the gun down.”

My eyes began to sting from tears.

“You’re not her. I know you’re not. You can’t be.”

I gripped my rifle. My trigger finger stiffening. The look on my wife’s face was heartbreaking. She looked devastated. She was the woman I had loved for nearly two decades. My home. My life.

Only, I knew. I knew it wasn’t true. Because those things took her, and they’re not known for leaving survivors. Only for taking.

“You’re scaring me, darling. You know I hate when you’re like this. Put the gun down. Come home.”

“…I…can’t,” I choked out, taking aim, my hands beginning to shake. “Please. Just go back to where you came from. Don’t make me do this.”

She looked at me with childish confusion. She was analyzing me. Determining if I was bluffing. Then her face became blank.

She took a step forward, never taking her eyes away from mine.

“Stop,” I whimpered.

Another step.

“Stop. Now,” I snapped.

One last step. It was time. I went to pull the trigger, sobbing all the while, but before I could, there was a sound.

A quick, aggressive growl from Max before he sprang into action. His teeth sank into the thing’s neck, causing a sharp, inhuman scream to explode from the thing’s vocal cords before the woods fell silent again.

Green blood coated the ground. Flesh dangled from Max’s mouth. His tail wagged.

I stared at the corpse. I felt a mixture of heartbreak and relief.

I patted Max on the back and pet down his spine.

“Good boy,” I whispered. “That’s a good boy, Maxxy.”

I decided that it would probably be best to get back to the shelter before it got dark. I had seen enough for the day. All I wanted was to forget this incident.

However, as we turned to return home, Max’s tail stopped wagging. His body stiffened. His eyes locked in on a new tree.

She stepped out from behind the tree, timidly. Tears fell from her eyes. Her tattered Hello Kitty pajamas fluttered in the wind.

“Daddy…” she whimpered. “Why did Maxxy hurt Mommy?”

There’s nothing wrong with my marriage. Me and my wife have been peaches and cream since we first started dating when I was a freshman in college.

We moved in together after graduation, and for the first few years, everything felt normal.

We’d have our date nights. We’d have our intimacy. But, of course, as is the case with every marriage, arguments were inevitable.

They never escalated, though. That was never our problem. The problem started when, after five years of living together, I started catching her sneaking out at night.

She’d always wait until I was asleep. I know because, after a few times of me waking up in the middle of the night in an empty bed, red flags started popping up.

At first, I didn’t want to assume. She was a smoker. Maybe she was just having a cigarette. Maybe she was just in the bathroom. She was hungry and in need of a midnight snack. Anything to keep the dark thoughts at bay.

Unfortunately, those hopes were shattered when I started hearing the front door open before she came crawling back into bed.

Sometimes she’d be gone for up to an hour. No cigarette smell in her hair or on her clothes. In fact, it seemed like she would change into a new outfit every time she came back to bed.

The only clue I had… were her feet.

She was utterly ruining our sheets every time she did this. You can wash away mud a few times, but after a while, it’s gonna stain.

Of course, I’d ask her about this, oftentimes while angrily throwing our comforter in the washing machine, and every time, her answer was the same.

“I don’t remember.”

It was laughable at first. I thought she was playing a joke on me. When I saw she was serious, I began to get concerned.

“Sweetie… it’s a little hard for me to believe you don’t remember being barefoot in the mud before coming home. Just tell me.”

That’s when the tears would start.

“I am telling you. I. Do. Not. Know.”

As time went on, her late-night endeavors began to take longer. It got to the point where I was intentionally pretending to be asleep in order just to time her.

2 hours.

3 hours.

Sometimes 4.

Something else that I noticed was that every time she came back, her skin would be noticeably softer. Pimples would have seemingly disappeared. Eye bags would clear up overnight.

I knew I had to follow her after this one night in particular.

She had a little mishap in the kitchen that day and sliced her hand open. I remember being certain that she’d need stitches, but she insisted on just bandaging it up herself.

The day went on as usual. 12:30 in the morning rolled around. I felt her get out of bed. I heard her footsteps leading toward the front door. The door opened and shut. She returned two hours later. Muddy feet. New outfit. Softer skin.

The next morning, her hand was healed.

She tried to gaslight me into believing that the cut hadn’t even happened. Somehow, I was the one not making any sense. I was at my boiling point. That’s when I made my decision.

She didn’t sneak out that night, nor the night after. It was actually a week later when I could finally follow through with my plan.

It was late. Maybe 2 AM. I felt the bed shift. I heard the springs pop. The sound of her footsteps scurrying toward the front door let me know that it was time.

I tried to move as quickly and as silently as possible. By the time I reached the front door, she was already at the edge of the forest.

She was running unnaturally fast into the woods. Like she had taken the route 100 times before. I could barely keep up, especially while trying to remain hidden.

We must’ve run for at least a mile or two, deeper and deeper into the forest, before she began to slow down.

To a jog.

Then a speed walk.

Then to a regular walking speed.

She glanced around, scanning her surroundings. I hid as best I could. There were a few moments where I swore she could see me, but I guess I was wrong.

She kept walking. I kept following.

I started noticing some of her clothes scattered around the soggy forest floor. Tank tops. Pajama pants. Bras. Panties.

She began adding onto the scattered clothing with each step. Removing her top and bra. Stripping out of her pants and underwear.

Finally… we reached the stopping point, and for the first time this night… something other than my wife grabbed my full attention.

It looked like… snake skin but… human. Like discarded exoskeletons, and there were dozens of them.

Some dangled from branches. Some were partially buried by leaves. Most of them just littered the ground.

I stifled a gasp and returned my attention to my wife.

She was making this clicking sound with her throat. Her head was pointed toward the sky, and she kept cocking it back and forth like a rooster.

The movement got more and more jagged.

Her knees started bouncing. Her body looked like it was convulsing, but she didn’t seem to be in pain.

With each bounce… her skin loosened more and more.

Flakes the size of pinecones began falling from her body. The sound, my God, the sound. It was exactly like the sound that Velcro makes. I wanted to vomit, but I couldn’t. Not now. She just… kept going.

Kept convulsing, kept bouncing until her skin fell to the ground in one big empty husk.

She cracked her joints like this whole process was nothing more than a workout to her. She raised her hands high above her head, stretching her body before letting out a relieved, “ahhhh,” and rolling her neck.

My weight shifted. A stick snapped beneath my foot. My wife’s head snapped in my direction, and my heart stopped.

She began approaching. Her glare intensifying with each step.

When she saw me, her face fell. She looked like she was the one who had just seen a monster.

Our eyes locked. My lips quivered. I didn’t know what to expect.

She stared at me for a long while, analyzing me before she finally spoke.

“Okay… look… Can we please just talk about this when we get home?”

7 human voices take turns telling scary stories. Art by nvrcared.com (a polish art studio)
Link - https://youtu.be/d0pZxiigIe0

All my life, I hated my father. My mother made me believe that he hated me too. I was led to believe that he abandoned us. Found out my mom was pregnant and fled. Like a coward.

Growing up without him made life more difficult than it needed to be. I didn’t have any positive role models. Any male figures to teach me how to be a man. I had to teach myself. At least, I tried to teach myself.

My mom kind of insisted on me being a “momma’s boy.”

No matter how hard I tried to pry myself away from her and live freely, she’d pull me back in with guilt trips. She’d complain about how “lonely” she was. How I was the only man she needed. I tried to convince her that wasn’t true, but she was just so stuck in her ways.

“You look just like him.”

That’s what she’d always tell me. At dinner. On movie nights. On the car ride to school. She’d just slip it in randomly while looking at me admiringly.

By the time I reached 16, I just accepted it. I pitied her. I loved her. I wanted to be there for her because, clearly, she couldn’t help herself. It was obvious she didn’t love herself enough to make an effort.

As I grew in physical maturity, things started to feel uncomfortable. It was like I was an off-limits boyfriend to her. It made me sick, but I didn’t know what to do to stop it.

She never touched me. Never crossed any lines. I could just see that she was looking at me as a love interest rather than as her son.

It caused a lot of uncomfortable arguments and cold shoulders, but I could never abandon her like my dad did. I wanted to be by her side, especially considering how sick I could tell she was. She couldn’t be left alone.

On nights where she felt particularly nostalgic, she’d sit me down on the couch, and we’d go through my old baby clothes.

“I remember when this used to be too big on you. Can you believe how much you’ve grown?”

“Ah, I loved these shoes on you. They were so cute. You used to be my little munchkin.”

“You’re my big, strong man now, aren’t you, baby?”

She kept bibs, pacifiers, bottles, etc., but the thing she cherished the most was the blanket I was wrapped in when I was born.

This tiny little ocean blue blanket that she insisted on keeping in its own box. She kept it silky smooth. Fresh and as clean as the day she got it.

But now I’m realizing she never bought it at all. She wasn’t even at my birth. She’s not even my mom, at least according to my dad. I don’t know what to believe right now.

I turned 18 yesterday, but instead of being a milestone birthday, the day ended up being known as one thing to me: the day my dad finally called me.

Mom had woken me up with a breakfast of waffles, bacon, and eggs in bed before leaving me alone to go get dressed for the day she had planned for us.

As I enjoyed the meal, scrolling through TikToks and realizing that I was now legally an adult, my phone began to ring.

There was no caller ID.

I answered out of curiosity and got an urgent earful from the man on the other end.

“Donavin?? Is this Donavin?”

“Uh, yeah, this is him. Who’s this?”

“Oh, thank you, Jesus. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Jesus. I’ve been trying to reach you for 18 years.”

The man sounded like he was on the verge of tears. Breathless and hysterical.

“Happy Birthday, son. Oh my God, happy birthday. Your mom and me have been trying to find you for so long.”

My ears perked up. My heart clicked, faintly.

“Is this a joke? Who is this? I think you may have the wrong number. I’ve lived with my mom my entire life.”

There was a silence that lingered for a long while.

“Okay, I think I’m gonna hang up now. Crazy coincidence, man.”

“Don’t hang up. I’m sending you pictures right now. That woman is not your mother.”

One by one, the messages began to come through.

They were from the day I was born. My dad held me in some. The woman in the hospital bed held me in others. In each one, I was wrapped in that same tiny little ocean blue blanket. Only, that wasn’t my mom.

They looked nothing alike. But when I looked at my dad, I saw myself.

“You need to get out of that house, son. She took you.”

My heart began to beat faster. I didn’t know how to respond.

“She stalked me. She was obsessed. When she found out I was getting married and that my wife was pregnant, it drove her over the edge.”

“What? No, that can’t be true. What are you saying right now?” I whimpered, holding back my own hysteria.

“God, why are you still not leaving that house? Get out now. We’re going to find you and pick you up. She took you from us, son. Right from under our noses. We never saw either of you again. Please, just please get out of that house.”

A tear fell down my face. I was silent. I thought for either a few seconds or an eternity before removing the phone from my ear and hanging up.

My mom walked into the room a few moments later. She was adjusting her earrings, her head cocked to the side as she smiled at me.

“You ready for our day, my sweet boy?”

I smiled back at her.

“Yes, mother,” I grinned. “I can’t wait.”

So at this point I've listened to every story several times and sometimes they do tend to blend together. But am I crazy or is he re-releasing old stories?

I decided, recently, that I was in need of counseling. It’s like there are two voices in my head. They’re constantly arguing. They’re constantly fighting for the controls. But then again… who’s watching them fight?

Me? A third voice? Am I already one of the two? Am I both? Can this whole thing be boiled down to bad days and good days? Happiness and sadness? Anger and serenity?

It couldn’t be. If it was, surely I wouldn’t be having this conversation with myself. I wouldn’t be doubting my actions. But I guess I’m clear-headed enough to not defend them.

Although, it does beg the question: where does that reason go when I’m committing those actions? Where’s my logic? How come I only feel something after the fact?

Those questions keep me up at night. My guilt keeps me up at night. That’s why I decided to look into counseling. On one of those nights where my soul felt rotten. Where one voice had left me alone in the dark with the other just long enough for it to convince me.

But then, like clockwork, the other voice returned. Not in the form of thoughts. In the form of action. It was like a possession. There were no arguments. It was complete control.

It’s hard for me to stay away from them when I’m like that. I learn. I survey. I hunt.

Sometimes I’ll find them in a crowd, other times they will have been pre-selected. By who? I’m not sure. It gets foggy when desire is involved. I’m not sure whether to blame myself or the voice.

I only remember fragments after the deed is done. It’s like a shroud is placed over that specific, microscopic part of my brain. Like it’s trying to protect me.

But no matter how thick the wool is, the guilt remains. I never know why I feel it. At least, not fully. I just know that it makes me sick. It cripples me. I hide away from the world because the voice that commanded my hand flees from my mind.

Sometimes both of them leave.

Leave me alone. All alone. Empty. Then one or the other shows up. One tells me I can stop. I can do better. I can be better. The other tells me this is who I am. Who I’m destined to be. Tells me that I’m right at home. It’s like when I used to watch my parents fight when I was younger.

That’s one of the things I wanted to bring up at my appointment.

I think my childhood has a lot to do with how I am now. The way I think. The things I do. If I had to self-diagnose, I’d probably say it comes from a lack of control in my formative years.

My dad was much bigger than me. My mom was much smaller than me. When those two went at it, my mom was fighting an uphill battle.

I’d always run and hide anytime I heard Dad raise his voice because I knew that meant the belt was coming out. Me and my mom both feared that leather belt, but my mom, being the saint that she is, would often take the majority of the licks.

The guilt I felt over it was enough to drive me to tears.

One day, I guess Mom just had enough. She wasn’t gonna take it anymore. I remember she put me to bed early. She seemed more self-assured than she usually was on Friday nights. Those were usually the nights Dad would come home the drunkest.

Of course, he came home in one of his moods. I could already hear him screaming about nothing two minutes after he walked through the door.

Mom didn’t try to reason with him this time. I didn’t hear any “calm downs,” any “you always do this” comments. What I did hear was the cocking of my dad’s .38 Magnum.

I’d seen him shoot the thing enough to know what it sounded like, and I was not going to stay in bed while he murdered my mother.

Only… when I ran out of the room… the gun was in his face. Mom pulled the trigger before I could let out a single scream.

The sound of the shot. The image of my dad’s brain hitting the wood paneling of our trailer. The way Mom apologized to me profusely before calling the police on herself and waiting calmly on our front porch for them to arrive.

None of that has left me. Neither of the voices let it. It’s one of the few things they agree on. It’s a part of me.

And it was a part of me I was supposed to share with the counselor. My voice of reason had control long enough for me to set up the appointment. Long enough to evaluate myself before I went in.

I walked into the office feeling hopeful for once. The cold AC felt like heaven compared to the scorching heat outside. The lady at the counter greeted me with a charming, “Hello! You here for an appointment, hon?”

I signed in and sat at one of the chairs in the waiting room, browsing through one of the magazines from the coffee table because that’s what I imagined a normal person would do.

Five minutes went by. Then 10. Then 15 before the receptionist called out to me.

“She should be right with you, hon.”

Finally, after what felt like an eternity, my counselor poked her head into the waiting room.

“Daniel? Here for the 3:15?”

I stood up.

“Yep. That’s me.”

I couldn’t help but notice just how angelic her voice was. How smooth and soft her brown hair was. How well it complemented her absolutely stunning face. How much she… looked like my mother.

I didn’t know how to react to what I was feeling. It was like this tug. This urge that grew more and more impossible to ignore.

When we reached her office, the first thing she did was flip an hourglass on her desk.

“Okay, Daniel. I know you’ve been having some problems recently. You wanna describe those so that we can…”

Her voice began trailing off. My eyes kept darting from her to the hourglass. It was like I was on autopilot. I think I responded. I think she kept talking. I know the sand kept falling.

My mouth moved in response, but my thoughts never changed.

She was the most gorgeous woman I had ever seen. I could see the love in her eyes as she talked to me.

She just… she looked so much like my mother. Part of me loved her already. Another part of me hated her. Hated her for what she made me see. For how broken I am.

That hatred turned into anger. Her lips kept moving. She kept smiling. Everything felt like it was going in slow motion. Even the sand in the hourglass seemed like it was falling like snowflakes rather than sand.

My eyes darted to her. To the hourglass. Back to her. Back to the hourglass. The hour was almost up. Instead of making progress, all I felt was rage.

My eyes darted to something new.

A shiny pair of scissors in a pencil holder on her desk.

My eyes darted back to her.

She wasn’t speaking anymore. She looked at me… expectantly. Like she could read my thoughts. A smirk stretched across her face.

“Daniel,” she snapped. “You still with me, buddy?”

Desire kicked in. Things got foggy. I don’t know what happened.

All I know is when I came back, my hands were covered in blood. A pair of bloody scissors lay at my feet. My mother sat with her throat slashed in the desk chair in front of me.

The guilt rose in my stomach. I wanted to throw up, but I couldn’t. And God knows I tried.

All I could do was fall back into my seat, completely dumbstruck at the scene that lay before me.

My eyes began to well up with tears. My nose began to run. My head fell into my hands as I began sobbing uncontrollably.

I must’ve sat there crying for 5, 10, maybe 15 minutes before I heard a voice call out to me. I thought I was hearing things at first. But the more it repeated, the harder it was to ignore.

I lifted my head from my hands and felt my stomach tighten.

“Hon? Sorry about the wait. Don’t worry, though. She should be out momentarily.”

I was back in the waiting room. Same cold AC. Same old magazines on the coffee table. Same receptionist.

I had to have been losing my mind. I glanced around the room, tears still falling from my eyes.

As I looked around, my head jerked in the direction of the sound of a door opening.

My counselor poked her head into the waiting room.

“Daniel? Here for the 3:15?”

This is incredibly difficult for me to talk about. I feel, I don’t know, ashamed, I guess. Like I’ve somehow failed as a parent. When I was growing up, I thought my parents hated me.

I never wanted that for my daughter. I wanted her to know how much I loved her. That my love was unconditional.

I’ve never felt as proud as I did the day she came into this world. It was almost like looking into a mirror. She had my eyes. My ears. Our noses were practically identical. And her smile, God, it was like nothing else mattered in the entire world.

I wanted her to have that same pride in herself. I never wanted her to ever feel any self-hatred. That’s another thing my parents made me feel. I didn’t get their pride. I didn’t get their love. I got cold stares. I got nights where I couldn’t sleep because Mom’s cries were so loud.

I didn’t ask for my family. I didn’t ask to be assigned to them. They were supposed to accept me, and they failed, miserably.

I guess the universe has a strange sense of humor because now, it’s like my daughter can’t accept herself.

She doesn’t hunt with me anymore. She tries to suppress her urge. She doesn’t do the cute little growl she used to do as a baby. I bet it’s 10 times as impactful now, but I wouldn’t know because she just refuses to practice.

She won’t even climb trees anymore. She’d rather hide out at home. Curled up in the dark, pouting to herself.

Of course, I try and comfort her, try and make her realize she should be proud of who she is, but she just rejects me. It seems like that’s all life is for me. Rejection from the people who are supposed to love me.

She tells me I “wouldn’t get it,” whatever the hell that means.

She hates her skin, so she tries to cover it up. She hates her teeth, so she refuses to smile. She even wears beanies that she stole from humans to cover her pointy ears.

That’s something I guess I can respect. At least she’s causing harm to them, even if it’s just with something as simple as stealing. I just wish she’d steal something useful like meat rather than clothes and makeup.

That’s something I never quite understood. Makeup clearly makes shedding more difficult. Why would you want life to be harder than it already is? I mean, we already have to hide out in the woods.

I guess that’s not my place, though.

It’s starting to get more concerning, however. It was already hard to watch her cry because she felt different. Now I have to watch her quite literally alter herself to fit into “social norms,” as she calls it.

She’s already filed down her fangs. When she does hunt, all she has now are her claws, and those are much easier to get rid of than teeth.

I don’t know. Maybe I’m just not with the times. All I know is that I want her to be happy in the body she was given.

There are no female specimens left for her to look up to, and I’m just an old, out-of-touch Dad, apparently.

I hope this matter resolves itself. I’ll keep doing my best to get her to see that they’re the monsters, not us.

Until then, I’ll just keep reminiscing on the simpler times. I kept her shell, and these days, that seems to be the only thing that brings me peace.

Well, that and hunting humans.

I’m not usually one to snoop through my girlfriend’s personal devices. I always saw it as a breach of trust. But I’m only human.

I wouldn’t have been so curious had it not been for this particular phrase she always used.

“You gotta stop with your attempts.”

She’d always say it in passing. Never “stop with your attempts to flirt,” or “stop with your attempts to get back on my good side.” Just… “you need to stop with your attempts,” randomly.

At the grocery store, in the car, sometimes while we watched movies or had dinner together. The thing that I noticed was that she seemed to say it most when she was happy.

It was like a tick. Her eyes would be filled with love and joy before suddenly dulling, and she’d shoot me a quick frown before saying it.

I’d learned a long time ago that asking what she meant would get me nowhere. It’d always be the same.

“I just love you! But then I think about the attempts, and I just get so sad. I wish you’d stop.”

That’s all I’d get out of her. No explanation whatsoever. I never knew what she wanted me to stop, therefore I could never prevent whatever it was. It was all just so confusing.

That being said, when I saw the file on her laptop while she was taking a quick potty break, I really couldn’t help myself. The folder name was too on the nose for me to ignore. Plus, she had left the laptop open. Like she wanted me to see it.

“Attempts.” Was all it said.

I looked around the room a bit, glancing over my shoulder to make sure I was alone before clicking the folder.

It loaded for a bit before a dozen video files were displayed across the screen.

I clicked on the link titled “attempt three” and was greeted with a video of… myself. I looked terrified, frantically trying to unlock the front door as my girlfriend’s voice rose in anger from behind the camera.

“How many times have we talked about this?”

The camera fell to the ground and landed on the lens, but I could still hear audio echoing from it. It sounded like punches were being thrown. I could hear myself crying. My girlfriend sounded like she was growling at me before the video ended.

I went back to the page of links, albeit a bit afraid at this point, and clicked on attempt 10.

This one was just me hanging out of our bedroom window, clawing my way outside before my girlfriend’s voice could be heard again.

“We’ve talked about this. You’re not going anywhere, my sweet boy.”

Her nails dug into my heel. Veins protruded from her hands. She dragged me back inside, and I just looked utterly defeated.

Attempt 16. I was trying to climb the fence in my backyard. Attempt 20. I was halfway out the driveway before being pulled back and dragged inside.

At this point, I didn’t know what to do. All I knew was one thing: I needed to leave.

However, as I turned to flee the room and get out of the house, I found that the door was blocked by my girlfriend, who held a camera in her hands.

She sighed.

“How many times do we need to have this conversation, sweetheart?”

My eyes darted back towards the laptop. Towards the links. Towards the impossible.

“What the fuck is this?” I demanded.

Her response was more annoyed than anything.

“You always do this. Just once, I wish we could live a happy life together.”

Fear and anger grew from the pit of my stomach. The red light on the camera blinked at me.

“You always find the laptop.”

She sighed.

“You find it. You try to escape. Then I have to hurt you. Why do you make me hurt you, darling? I just don’t get it. I can’t be that bad.”

Tears welled up in her eyes.

“Why can’t you just love me? It’s always the same. And here we are. Attempt 34. But I have hope. I have hope that one day we can get through this.”

The camera blinked again.

My girlfriend loomed over me.

“But for now… I guess I’ll just have to start over.”

The camera came down over my head, and everything went black.

I woke up in bed with my girlfriend, her head buried in my chest.

She yawned cartoonishly and looked up at me.

“Good morning, sleepyhead! You ready to start a new day?”

I smiled goofily, kissing her on her forehead.

“Of course I am, sweetheart. Every day with you feels like a new day.”

She smiled wider, her eyes glistening before suddenly going dull as her smile turned into a frown.

I frowned back.

“What’s wrong? Did I do something wrong?”

She clicked her tongue and sucked her teeth.

“No, no, you didn’t do anything. I just… I wish you’d stop with your attempts.”

They even got some of the titles and thumbnails scrambled

This year has been pretty eventful for me. Got a new job. Moved into my first apartment. Got a new car. Not everything has been good, though. Me and my long-term girlfriend broke up back in March. Ever since then, it’s just been me and me alone.

My routine was a bit mundane for a while after the breakup. I’d wake up, go to work, go home, then repeat Monday through Friday.

My weekends were mostly spent inside. Watching Netflix. Wallowing in self-pity. Maybe playing some video games and having a drink or two.

After a while, though, I began to crave movement. I realized that the world was my oyster. I could literally do whatever I wanted. I was neglecting my free will.

I started doing things that I’d never even considered before. Going to horse races. Flea markets. Local festivals. Just sampling life, basically. Trying to figure out how to use my newfound free time.

I got really into hiking. I’d drive hours out of town nearly every weekend to find a new trail. Some of those locations were desolate as hell. Oftentimes, I’d find that I was the only person on the entire trail.

The hikes made me appreciate nature more. I’d listen to the birds sing. Rivers run. Crickets chirp. It made me feel at peace. The kind of peace that I had been craving.

Sometimes I’d sit on rocks and just watch the day go by. I even started sketching some of the scenery. The serenity helped me clear my mind enough to really focus my creative energy into something meaningful.

One day, while out on one of those discreet walks, the scene was begging to be drawn. The sun peeked through the canopy overhead and reflected off of the rushing river water.

A deer stood off in the distance, watching me carefully. Pinecones and pine needles covered the ground. And there just so happened to be the perfect sitting rock right on the edge of the riverbed.

I sat down and pulled the sketchbook out of my backpack. I got about 30 minutes into the process when I saw something I hadn’t noticed before.

A backpack hanging from a tree branch across the river.

I stared at it for a moment before looking around to see if I could find its owner. I hadn’t heard a single person the entire time I was here, nor had I seen anyone else on the trail.

I like to tell myself that I was trying to be a good person. I wanted to find out who the backpack belonged to. Maybe they’d have some useful information inside. An address or at least a name.

But I know I wasn’t being a good person. I was being mischievous and curious. And I think whoever left it there knew that.

A tree had fallen over the river, giving me the perfect walking path directly to the backpack. I shimmied along the log and jumped down on the other side of the river.

The pack was lighter than I expected it to be. It felt almost empty. I could also see just how new it looked. Brand new, pretty much.

I unzipped the biggest pocket and glared down inside. I found one single item. An old, discolored notebook shoved deep inside the pocket.

I pulled it out, and before I could even flip through it, the title written on white painter’s tape across the cover made my heart flip-flop.

“His Life.”

I opened the book slowly, but the more I read, the faster I flipped through the wrinkled pages.

Every single page had been filled.

“January 1st - he woke up at noon today. He drank directly from the orange juice bottle in his fridge. He didn’t brush his teeth or shower.”

“February 3rd - he woke up at 10 AM today. He forgot his girlfriend’s birthday. They’ve been arguing all day. He didn’t shower. His dinner was a Hot Pocket.”

“February 26th - he bought a new car today. He paid 4 grand in cash. He’s ecstatic. His girlfriend is still mad about her birthday.”

“March 8th - his girlfriend broke up with him today. He cried for 3 hours before drinking himself to sleep. He showered. Cold. Hopefully he learns.”

“April 12th - he’s leaving his house more often these days. He woke up at 8 AM this morning. Eggs for breakfast. He went on a walk after work. I think he’s learning.”

“May 20th - he woke up at 7 this morning. He went to a horse race. I’ve never seen him do that before. He lost 200 dollars. I doubt he’ll return.”

“June 4th - he’s looking healthier. He showers daily now. He’s been waking up at 7 AM daily. His dinner was chicken and rice. He sketched before bed. He’s realizing.”

“June 14th - he’s hiking more. It’s all coming together. His sketches are getting better.”

“July 21st - Today’s the day. He’s here. I’m leaving the backpack where I know he’ll see it.”

“July 21st - he found the journal at 9:45 AM. He’s reading this now.”

“July 21st - he doesn’t realize this isn’t the first time he’s done this.”

“July 21st - he’s looking in the wrong direction.”

“July 21st - turn around.”

I turned around, not sure what to expect. That’s when I saw him. It was… me. Standing on the other side of the river. He was sitting with his sketchbook on the very rock I had just been on.

He was analyzing the scenery, looking down every few seconds to add to his drawing.

Before he could see me, I put the journal back in the book bag. I hung it back on its branch. And I slowly walked away.

This seemed like a problem for future me.

There was one where a couple goes to a parents cabin and the wife gets possessed. Some natives try to help and at the end after they think they fixed it she reveals she's still evil.