“I never thought a childish prank would save me and my brother’s life.” It began in late September, my family cat had passed from old age a few weeks prior. I missed her terribly and assumed the strange things that began to happen were just echoes of my grief. When […]
The Cat Scratching at my Door Read More »
I like mornin’ best in summer. Chet don’t, cuz he’s fifteen and likes his sleep, but I’d rather make my own breakfast, get chores done quick – enjoy the rest of the day if Mama gives me a choice. Let Chet take the afternoon. He thinks he’s winnin’, but he
My years of school have finally come to an end. With that in mind, I wanted to enjoy myself as much as I could before coming to grips with the rigors of adult life. After all, I did bust my ass within those four years just to earn a worthless
The Cat Killed Curiosity Read More »
I heaved a sigh of relief after closing the hallway door and glanced down at the skittish little furry friend at my feet. My dog, Chip, practically latched himself to my ankles as he followed behind me, quickly tapping his paws against the hardwood floor in excitement. He was a
Which One Was The Real Thing? Read More »
I’m in the engineers union, but I don’t have a degree in anything. I go to job sites all over the state and mark elevations for excavation. I hike around placing a GPS marker on the ground, push a button and the little screen on top tells me a few
Encounter on the Olympic Peninsula Read More »
“There it is again. 37 feet down. It’s right below us,” I shouted over the hum of the engine. The white and green 26-foot Bayliner, lovingly dubbed the Karmanos, slowed as I brought the boat to a crawl. Dark waves lazily slapped against the dull, aged hull. The sun vainly
Everybody loves the woods, until they follow you home. When my father came back from the military, we bought our first house—a boxy, two-story affair on the woodsy outskirts part of town. I was twelve, going on thirteen then. Our neighborhood was a little off the beaten path, nestled somewhere
Forever and Always Read More »
“Dang!” Eleanor’s husband cried. “The damn thing bit me!” He grabbed his triceps and looked at her with an expression that mingled pain with surprise. Eleanor was as surprised as he was. Jonathan, her husband, was not the type to whine about an insect bite. He was the muscular type
Being the only person that lives near a cursed, murky, swamp-like lake sounds quite creepy, stupid, and moronic, I won’t lie to you, it kinda is. Most of the time anyway, but I’ve come to realize that not everything here is all bad, a lot of it in fact is
Tales From Lake Bottomless: Levi The Leviathan Read More »
I work in a psych ward. It’s a really strange ward, however. Most people have either done something horrific or had something unordinary happen to them. The unordinary happenings were the more frightening of the two. Reading through the files of certain patients always made my skin crawl though. In
Jess steadied her breath as she saw the buck. She was behind a fallen log dug deep into the blanket of snow that lay across the ground. She brought her rifle up to her shoulder and rested it on her cover, moving ever so slowly as to not startle the
What Waits in the Cold Read More »
I have been a hunter since a very young age. A wanderer of the silent woods, a stalker of the croaking marshes, a drifter of the sighing deserts. My father was a hunter as was his father. I would say it runs in our blood, but I think it runs
Not many people take me seriously. I get it. Someone with a traumatic past, like mine, must be nuts, right? But, I know what I’ve seen. I know all too well. You see, I’m a Bigfoot hunter. But, I don’t like calling it that. First, there is more than one
Please stay away from Wayne National Forest Read More »
He tried not to get too close to the man because he smelled like salty chum and rotten fish. Eventually, the scent receded as he went inside the cabin for a nap, leaving Dr. Peters alone on the deck with his pen and yellow-paged notebook. The marine biologist sat by
It started three months ago. The missing and dead animals. I had proof of what was doing it. I even had the sheriff come to my house. But they think I’m crazy. Now, I’m being accused. I need undisputed proof. I have tonight to get it. If I don’t make
The crowd roared from behind the barricades. Slips of paper and bank notes waving about in their greasy hands. Little flags of fortune that would either be raised or burnt. Many were laughing and drinking from unlabeled bottles, others were shouting encouragement or insults, whilst some were stubbing their cheap
I used to look out the rusted iron bars of my window and dream about being a bird. The chain that shackled me to my bed was just long enough to reach the windowsill, and so every night after my father would visit my room I would lie awake and
A Talking Crow Taught Me to Fly Read More »
At first, I didn’t think anything of it. My neighbor would stop to chat with me, leash in hand, and I would catch glimpses of the metal slider dangling from its belly. I assumed it was wearing a piece of pet clothing, or that perhaps it was the byproduct of
My Neighbor’s Dog Has a Zipper Read More »
There I was, scratching my ninth scratch-off ticket in a row at my local convenience store. My eyes widened with hope, but also sank in with the anticipation of disappointment. The other eight representations of my gambling fuel rested in pieces inside the store’s waste bin. Revealing each number using
The Cat With Human Teeth Read More »
3:30 p.m., 1-September: One three-person party entered the Rio Grande National Forest in Hinsdale County, Colorado. They consisted of Trevor Nyson (37 years old) and Matilda Nyson (33 years old), a married couple, and Benny Nyson (8 years old), their only son. 5:31 p.m., 1-September: Trevor and Matilda, highly distraught,
Monster Hunting and Other Inadvisable Behavior Read More »
When I joined the case at 47 County Street, I didn’t know what to expect. As a social worker, I see all kinds of screwed up things from child abuse, to children abusing their parents. Yet, when I got the reports from that household, I wasn’t expecting much. The initial
A Child Like No Other Read More »
Do you ever just sit and watch your sleeping dog? Observe as their little feet run along the ground, just waving halfway in the air as they let out innocent half-gruntled barks. Have you ever just wondered what’s going on inside their sleeping minds, what they’re dreaming about? Maybe it’s
My Dog Dreams About My Death Read More »
I’m going to tell you about a town—a town you should never go to. For your protection, I won’t tell you the name or location. But I’ll tell you this: if you ever think you might be in this town, get the hell out of there and don’t look back.
“Christ,” I muttered to myself, as the first flakes of snow started to fall. They gathered in fuzzy clumps over the windshield before my wipers cleared them away. I’d been waiting for fifteen — no, twenty minutes now — in my sister’s driveway. Had I chosen to wait inside with
It Wasn’t a Reindeer Read More »
