Emilie, Stan and I enjoyed our grandmother’s tales. During school breaks, Mom and Dad drove the three of us to her home in Plimmerton. It was a small coastal village, an hour’s drive north of Wellington. Everything about the place was tiny. It was simple. There...
There’s an old, abandoned mission in the hills west of Tucumcari, New Mexico. It’s about a 3-hour hike from the nearest access point by car. It’s not marked on any map and there’s no clear trail to it, but if you had a day or...
The roaring twenties became a different time for all of America as the economy took a massive plummet. The depression sank about every industry like a stone and families of every class felt the impact. Throughout the Hoovervilles set up around Riverbend, there was one...
The top half of Councilman Jones’ body hung by a steel cable looped around his neck and tied off to an old oak tree on one end. It was still dripping blood, bones and veins and torn bits of intestines dangling down where the legs...
I moved into my new apartment nearly a month ago. The building’s exterior looked a little run down, but the rent was unbeatable for where it stood. The other tenants all seemed quiet enough and the hallways didn’t smell like piss and stale beer like...
The trail was too quiet. I knew she was watching me from somewhere either up the steep slope to my right or from the tangle of undergrowth to my left. I would have welcomed the snap of a twig to alert me to her position...
Peter Pan is not what most people think he is...
Simza stumbled through the dark forest, tripping over indiscernible tree roots in the darkness. She sensed that something was wrong with the baby, and was afraid, but she had no one to confide in. She had wandered away from the camp when she started feeling...
I. Without, the night was cold and wet, but in the small parlour of Laburnam Villa the blinds were drawn and the fire burned brightly. Father and son were at chess, the former, who possessed ideas about the game involving radical changes, putting his king into...
After a short time of exploring the Oklahoma territory where they were forced to go, a group of Native Americans stumbled upon a mysterious plant while hunting. This plant looked like a gnarled tree root, with so many twists and turns within its seemingly fragile...
“When is Miracle Girl coming?” I asked and got a stony look of disapproval from my uncle in return. If he read comic books, he’d appreciate my nickname for an immortal elementary schooler. Grandpa laid his good, gray eye on me. The filmy, unseeing one wandered...
We all have that friend who we wish we could have done more for. Who we wish could have done better. I’ve been thinking about that a lot recently. See, it all goes back to my friend Clark, and the horror we both encountered six...
I grew up in a small town in the Midwest. Now when I say that it’s a small town, I mean other people from my state have never even heard of it. That being said, for such a small town it actually has a pretty...
I found it three weeks ago, or rather, I found them. A knotted circle of fur, claws, and death. Six rats, tangled together by their tails, thrashed about my front lawn with little direction. Their shrieks pierced the air of what was normally a quiet...
“I want to hear about the Spindler.” Logan listened as the voices of his three friends talked. He watched as the fire before him dwindled. “You sure you wanna do that, Lexi? In these woods?” Logan’s back was firmly set against the back of a broad, old oak;...
Jack Mckay huddled in the cold midnight street with a pale green sleeping bag encasing his lower half. Spindled trails of light reflected off the gleaming roads from damp lampposts. But the cold wasn’t what gave Jack his nightly jitters—not by a long shot. The...
During nightly hours of yore, in a time of horror and war, I would sit on a dank oak bench with my eyes shut, calm and closure. Then, my eyes open when I sense a figure approach me with grace. One of nature’s eccentric frights perched itself above...
Dear Mr. Valentine, As per your request, I've collected reliable morsels of information from the many and often incoherent accounts that detail the events which transpired in Merton on September 2nd, 1996. It is only with great reluctance that I reveal this information to you, for...
People always get the wrong end of the stick when I tell them that my grandad was a Nazi. I mean, of course he was in the Leipzig branch of the Hitler Youth as a teen, joined the party when old enough and, in December...
When I was a child, the mummers came to town. It was not quite Solstice’s Eve yet. The nights were long and dark, and most nights a thin, jagged coat of haw frost would top the trees in glistening frigidity. What few horses the rich owned...
I consider myself to be a logical being. My experiences in life have led me to such a conclusion that approaching problems from a skeptical and logical viewpoint is in my best interest and is, as far as I understand it, the best way to...
Bitter cold was nothing new for Northern Alberta, especially not for January, and the cacophony of wind that tore through the woodlands was nothing if not wholly familiar and almost comforting to the one that huddled in the tree line, obliterated from vision by the...
I’m unsure of what to say. All I can say is that I’m scared. Very scared. My hands shake violently as I hastily scribble down a few words onto the coarse wooden tablet. This is my only hope. “In the month of Tammuz, day 25...
It had to be close to 12 now. The silver gleam of the full moon was spilling through the woodland trees, illuminating all it touched. Evan looked at his watch. It was 5 minutes to 12. Although it was not a necessity, Evan wanted to get...