“Your job…your sole life responsibility for the rest of your natural life is to keep that door shut….always! The house is yours…you can do what you want with it regarding restoration or upgrades. But, you need to live here until the day you die. I inherited it from my grandfather. […]
As I sit here now beside my pond and watch the autumn fog dance along the water, and as the leaves whisper and chatter to one another as the wind lets them, I think of my wife, and how sorry I am I can’t live the rest of my days
When my grandfather passed away during an early winter, my family scrambled to rid the house of his belongings before the first major storm. The asphalt-shingle roof of his one-story home was collapsing inward after years of neglect and most of the windows were boarded up with cheap plywood. Instead
There are always plenty of strange rumors circulating in small towns across the world. The one I grew up in has everything from tales of lizard creatures beneath the woods, to a bizarre bridge that leads you somewhere else if you cross it on foot. Still, the one tall tale
Never Enter the Old Corn Maze on Halloween Read More »
It’s Halloween eve. The night is delightfully crisp, with a bright, low-lying moon. The thrill of anticipation can be felt in the air. The autumn leaves blow with a scritch-scratch along the pavement outside, accompanied by a moderate wind that chases them playfully into every corner and crevice, around trees,
It started when a friend of mine came over, which led to us speaking at length about our childhood homes. He grew up in a different province where things seemed so much different than the way it was for me. I began the first few years of my own life
A Childhood Phone Number Read More »
“Come on. Just pick a damn bag!” “I have to choose the biggest one!” Henry and Anna fought in a corner of the store while I laughed at them from the otherside of the candy aisle. We didn’t feel like going trick-or-treating today. We were supposed to be in Orlando,
“She was right again.” Old Farmer Bill threw one more load of hay in the trailer.“I thought I’d be able to finish it today. Agnes knew what she was talking about when she said I was overdoing myself. Almost fifty years of marriage and she’s been right every single time.”
Faces in the Pumpkins Read More »
Anomaly: 18-9-6-20 RiftData File #19/23/2015Event recount #1Inspector on site: Det. Mitchell Anderson PITFSite Area 2_New York1400 hours-32 minutes-18 secondsSituation: Victim01 and Victim02 work in a cash/credit transaction office. The two friends share an office in the tax department when Victim01 leaves for the storage department to get more paper for
It all started with a simple schoolyard rhyme. No one knew the original incarnation, only a fragment of it survived and was circulated amongst our school. “A pail of snails lifts the veil to Blackbart the Frail.” Blackbart became an amalgam of the boogeyman and a wish-granting genie. Lara was
All You Need Is A Bucket Of Snails Read More »
When my daughter Violet was born, I didn’t have much to offer her. My wife and I both worked, but housing was expensive where we lived and much of our income went towards renting our cramped two bedroom apartment. Owning our own home was still just a dream then. All
All the Stars in the Sky Read More »
It has been a long time since I reveled in the fears of those I used to prey on. It could be said that I reformed from my old ways. Well, the old ways of my kind. Not just my own. There was a time when I enjoyed the hunt
Halloween: When the Masks Come Off Read More »
“I saw him again last night.”“Who?”“The Man”.“Oh yeah,” James chuckled. “Same.”“Oh really?” I nervously giggled in response. “What did you see?”“Just the usual, he was just having a good look round, not doing anyone any harm.”This had become a running joke between James and I ever since we moved in
Fear, a concept that our brains have created for what? Protection? The sheer thrill? Wrong, we feel fear for our survival, plain and simple. Everyone looks at fear differently, the fight or flight response is a great example. When met with fear we choose to stand our ground in an
The Corn Is Breathing, Now I Hear Them Whisper Read More »
The Traveller Series I’ve travelled to parallel universes. The worlds I’ve seen are terrifying I’ve travelled to parallel universes. The worlds I’ve seen are terrifying – Part 2 I’ve travelled to parallel universes. The worlds I’ve seen are terrifying – Part 3 First off, I need to clarify something. I
I was transported to a hellish alternate universe. This is my story. Read More »
In college, Thomas Eiden had studied under a professor named Dale Collins. While that name is meaningless to most people, he was a legend in journalism circles. He had worked for the New York Times for decades back when that had really meant something, and he had used his platform
A mild night in the New England countryside. An empty field with an omnipresence of untrimmed grass and wild weeds left to grow unabated. The field is surrounded by a lumbering audience of trees. The moon casts its glows of judgment, the dim light graciously cast is swallowed by a
Composer of the Unknown Read More »
Read Part One Here It’s been about three months since my whole incident with The Expanse. I had been seeing my new therapist. Tiffany, for pretty much that entire length of time. She was on the younger side and had only really been working in the field for a few
The Horrors Of The Backrooms Part Two Read More »
I didn’t know what to think as she slinked towards me, fresh from her afternoon swim. Still in her favorite black bikini. Wet hair slicked back. Wearing pitch-black sunglasses that concealed the intent of her green eyes. She told me once her eyes were sensitive to bright sunlight, but the
Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve had a number of well-intentioned people in my general orbit comment that they’ve noticed a large uptick in the amount of alcohol that I’ve been consuming. That’s a fancy way of saying that I’ve been drinking myself into a stupor every night. Now,
Toby’s JournalEntry 1April 5th, 1990 So, I asked my daddy to buy me this journal. He’s always been a great father, even though he isn’t the same after my mom died. He was always big on teaching me how to write, and stuff. He said words are the most important
The Bridge Outside My Bedroom Window Read More »
I moved into my current house with my parents three years ago in 2006. Seems so long ago now that the number is in front of me. But, you’re not here to listen to me reminisce about times that have since passed. So, I’ll try my best to get right
The Horrors Of The Backrooms Read More »
Part 1 “We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity,and it was not meant that we should voyage far.” —H.P. Lovecraft Why did I slay one Abraham Andrew Allerton, Doctor of Psychiatry? It wasn’t a case of an eye for an eye
The Allerton Device Read More »
It was a breezy September evening. The yellow glow of street lights reflected off the rain-slickened sidewalk. I was making my way back from volleyball practice. I usually took the bus, but I ended up missing it that day and didn’t feel like waiting another twenty minutes for the next
A Face In The Dark Read More »
