These. Damn. Chills! I don’t remember when they started, I just remember having them…always having them. They’re the reason why I always wear layers, even in summer. Why I sleep with so many blankets. Why when I’m told to turn the heating down because the temperature of my room rivals a sauna, I never can….
At my young tender age, painting was the only psychoanalysis I ever needed to retreat to, or how common people call it therapy. Every hour in the morning until the sun rises, my brush strokes back and forth. It tells a part of a story I wish to tell, but I am only full of…
The Careys had spent months searching for an apartment in the city. After sleeping on friends’ floors from July through the beginning of September, they were ready to have a home of their own. Their friends had been more than welcoming, but the search was growing tiresome. “Hon…” said Owen from the couch one night…
The native crouched over the dying fire pit, he was making circle with the skulls. The smell of the jungle was overpowering, and he could he the distinct yipping of Jackals in the distance. The painted tribesman muttered unintelligible words in an unknown tongue hovering over the circle in the flickering firelight. His eyes snapped…
This curious item once belonged to the English theatre actor James Fontaine. He was best known for playing the role of Hop-Frog, a jester character from the stage adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s story of the same name. It was during one particular performance in 1922 that he lost his life to a freak onstage…
This thing on? I guess it is. I can see the little light on the recorder and it isn’t flashing just yet. This is a…well, OK. It isn’t a last will of any sort. It’s a recording of the freaky stuff I just saw. Saw and ate. Oh god, that was bad. Not the previous…
Since before I could remember, I’ve wanted to be a mother. It seemed my whole childhood and teenager years were spent yearning for a child of my own. By the time I was nine, I had names–and color schemes for the nursery–picked out. All I needed was someone to make them with. But college was…
Sometimes as adults, we remember the days when we used to go out and have adventures. More than going out to eat at 3 in the morning. More than sneaking into our lovers bedroom after words against her parents will. But the cave exploring adventures. Trespassing near that little cottage in the middle of the…
I finally understand! See, silence is key. It’s tranquil. Noiseless. Golden. That’s the true beauty of it; at its very essence, its very core. It can mean nothing at all, or absolutely everything. Why didn’t I see it before? WHY?! …Or should I say who? I remember tossing and turning deep in sleep when I…
In a fire station in California, there is a light bulb that is always on and has never, ever burned out. If you read Numbers 16:41-45 from a King James Bible (other versions don’t work) in the same room as this light bulb, the light bulb will dim significantly. If you keep reading until Numbers…
In the most deserted part of Wyoming there is a restaurant. There are no roads leading to it, no signs advertising it. It’s just there, in the open. Walk inside however, and you will learn two things. One, it’s jam packed with people talking, eating and enjoying themselves. Two, the entire place looks like it’s…
Do you remember those home videos from back in the day? You know, when every special moment of your life was recorded on a video camera before smartphones existed? Well, I certainly remember them. My mom used to own a video camera, and she recorded some videos when me and my sister were very young….
When Adam had been much younger, he had gotten lost on a walk through the woods. He had become separated from his parents and wandered into an abandoned church. It was an Autumn afternoon, the leaves had curled up into claws, and the darkness waited to drape itself completely over the last shreds of the…
I think it was my somewhat strict upbringing that fostered my intrigue for horror. Following the path of god and basking in the sun’s rays is all well and good… but the forbidden aura of all things creepy called to me even from a young age. Imagine the delight of my first library card. Here…
The first time I met Ada Klesco, she caught ahold of my hand and held it for a very long time. At first, I assumed that it was just a handshake, but there was no particular movement involved. We just stood there, in the living room of a house on Lago Street that our mutual…
The sweet old lady rocks rhythmically in her recliner. Her head nods often in approval as she agrees wholeheartedly with her favorite evangelist late this evening. This has been Mrs. Weatherford’s routine every night since her late husband left her alone and vulnerable. The preacher is hitting his groove on this exciting paid advertisement, “The…
The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the early part of the 20th century is one of the most important episodes in the field of Bible scholarship. They have been studied and transcribed for decades, so it was quite a shock when an unnoticed Hebrew text was found in the collection. The theology of…
Don’t is a contraction we hear all too much. As a child, it was all I heard. “Don’t play with this” “Don’t touch that” “Don’t go here” etc. It was my father’s favorite word. As I grew older, I stopped taking it seriously. I realized if I did what my father told me not to,…
The Hum is what people have called a phenomena that occurs in some places in the world. It is a low-frequency humming noise that sounds not unlike a distant running engine. However, the source can never be found. Even with microphones and all sorts of audio technology The source of the Hum has yet to…
You awake at a crossroads. You have no idea how you got there or how long you have slept. There are five signposted directions to take: Life, Death, Fortune, Fate and Destiny. As counter-intuitive as it may seem, you must, MUST, take the road to Death first. When you arrive at your destination after hours…
A thousand miles away, there is an attic. No one knows about the attic, for a very good reason. If you were to stand outside the building the attic is in, you’d be hard pressed to find the courage to enter the crumbling, ragged building. Outside, on a plaque that’s been torn at and faded…
Outside, the night air breathes, shaking the tree branches and making you so much gladder that you were inside, snuggled up on the couch. You had just changed the channel, from cartoons to the news so you could know the weather for tomorrow; instead of the weather, you were greeted by a straight-faced reporter standing…
I live in a small apartment by myself, on the fifth floor. One night, a while back, I heard strange noises coming from down the hall. They weren’t shouts and they weren’t banging noises and they weren’t people fucking. They were weird. They sounded like gurgling. Loud gurgling. Normally I don’t give a damn about…
My grandfather served in the European Theater of Operations during WWII, an experience he rarely talks much about. I’ve only managed to coax one story out of him. He and a low-ranking officer (granddad was an enlisted man) were travelling by jeep somewhere in Belgium with a cache of much-needed ammunition. Taking a wrong turn…