The Pencil Man

The cedar smoke from the campfire clutched at our lungs, a thick, gray shroud that seemed to isolate us from the rest of Camp Oakwood.

I remember the heat on my face and the prickling chill on my spine. That was the night I met Adam. He was a pale kid with eyes that seemed too large for his head, sitting just outside the amber glow of the flames.

“You guys want to hear a real story?” Adam asked. His voice wasn’t loud, but it cut through the chatter of the other campers like a razor. “Not a ‘hook-hand’ story. A true one.”

The counselors had gone to fetch more marshmallows, leaving six of us alone with the encroaching woods. We all leaned in. Adam’s face was half-buried in shadow as he began the tale of The Pencil Man.

“The Pencil Man doesn’t have a face like yours or mine.” Adam whispered, his hands mimicking the motion of sketching in the air. “It’s…unfinished, like a rough draft. Smudged features, eyes that are just dark, graphite pits. He wears an orange-brown suit that looks like it’s made of old, textured paper, and his shoes are so black they look like holes in the floor, but the hair—the hair is a shocking, vibrant pink, like a brand-new eraser.”

Adam told us about the Pencil Man’s power. He carried a jagged shard of lead that never grew shorter. Anything that he drew became flesh and bone. If he drew a wolf, you’d hear the snarling in your ear. If he drew a door, he could walk through your wall, and if he drew a line across your throat…Well…the drawing made it a reality.

“He’s looking for a canvas.” Adam said, his voice dropping to a crawl. “Once he puts you on the paper, you don’t belong to the world of skin anymore. You belong to the lead.”

By the time that Adam finished, twenty minutes had passed in a heartbeat. The fire had died down to glowing embers. I was shaking. I didn’t want to be near the woods anymore. I stood up abruptly, mumbling something about being tired, and began the long walk back to Cabin 9.

The woods were suffocatingly dark. Skritch. Skritch. Skritch.
I froze. It sounded like someone was dragging a nail across a chalkboard, or a heavy pencil across thick parchment. I spun around, my flashlight beam cutting through the pines. Nothing.

It’s just the wind.

Suddenly, a hand slammed onto my shoulder. I shrieked, nearly dropping my light.

“Gotcha!” Adam barked, doubling over with laughter.

“Adam! That wasn’t funny!” I yelled, my heart hammering against my ribs.

“Your face, Mark! You looked like you saw him!” Adam said as he wiped a tear from his eye, his laughter finally subsiding into a guilty grin. “Sorry, man. Seriously. It’s just a story. Come on, let’s get some sleep.”

We walked back to the cabin in silence. The bunkhouse was empty; the other boys were still at the fire. I crawled into my sleeping bag, trying to shake the image of that faceless man in the orange suit out of my mind.

Eventually, exhaustion won.

Skritch. Skritch. Skritch.

I woke up in total darkness. The sound was coming from the floor.

“Adam!” I hissed. “Stop it! I’m not kidding. It’s two in the morning.”

There was no response. I looked over at Adam’s bunk. He looked like a lump under the covers, perfectly still. The scribbling grew louder—fast, rhythmic, frantic.

“Adam?” I said.

I grabbed my flashlight and clicked it on. The beam swept across the floor, landing on a notebook that hadn’t been there before. It was open. On the page was a crude, vibrating drawing of a man in a suit with pink hair.

As I watched, a hand—pale, flat, and outlined in thick black charcoal—reached out from the paper and gripped the edge of the wooden floorboards.

My breath hitched. A head emerged. It was exactly as Adam described: a blurred, smudged mess of a face, like someone had tried to rub out his features with a thumb. The pink hair was coarse, like plastic bristles. The Pencil Man pulled himself out of the notebook, his orange-brown suit rustling like heavy cardstock.
I scrambled back, reaching for Adam.

“Adam! Wake up! Adam!” I shouted.

I ripped the covers back. The bed was empty. Not just empty—the sheets were flat, as if no one had ever slept there. I looked around. The other bunks were gone. Even the windows were gone. I ran for the door, but my hands met flat, cold wood where the exit should have been. The door had been erased.

I turned, sobbing, to see the Pencil Man standing in the center of the room. He didn’t speak. He didn’t have a mouth to speak with. He simply pulled a long, jagged pencil from his sleeve and began to draw in the air.

Lines of black ink hung in the physical space, forming a shape. A nightmare that I’d had since I was six—a spindly, many-limbed thing with needles for teeth. The Pencil Man flicked the drawing toward me.

The creature fell to the floor, instantly three-dimensional and smelling of wet ink. It lunged. I screamed, diving under a table. In a moment of pure survival instinct, I kicked a heavy footlocker, triggering the latch. As the monster charged, I ducked, and it slammed headfirst into the iron corner of the chest, collapsing into a heap of static-filled lines.

I stood up, trembling, facing the creator.

“What do you want from me?!” I screamed. “Why are you doing this?!”

The Pencil Man tilted his head. He began to draw again. Faster this time. He held up the paper.

It was a drawing of me; but I wasn’t in the cabin. I was a tiny, stick-figure dot inside a vast, white rectangle. Around the dot were words written in jagged, frantic cursive:

“STAY. STAY. STAY.”

I felt a sudden, sickening pull, like gravity had shifted ninety degrees.

The next morning, Adam woke up in Cabin 9. The sun was shining, and the birds were chirping.

“Mark?” he called out, rubbing his eyes. “Hey, Mark, are you up?”

The cabin was empty. Mark’s boots were by the bed. His flashlight was on the floor, but Mark was gone. Adam stepped out of bed, his foot landing on a stray piece of paper.

Adam picked up the paper, and the blood drained from his face.

It was a highly detailed sketch of Mark. He was pressed against the “glass” of the paper, his hands flattened as if screaming to get out. His eyes were wide, the pupils rendered as frantic, messy scribbles.
Underneath the drawing, in Mark’s own handwriting—but shaky, loopy, and descending into madness—were the words:

“It’s so bright here, Adam. It’s so white. There are no shadows. There is no air, only the smell of graphite. I’ve been walking for miles, but the paper never ends. I tried to bleed, to make a mark, but my blood is just red ink. Do you like my new face? The Pencil Man fixed it for me. He rubbed out the parts that felt pain. I’m fine now. I’m just a sketch. I’m just a scribble. I’m just…OH NO! HE’S STARTING TO SHARPEN THE PENCIL AGAIN! ADAM SAVE ME! NO DON’T! SAVE ME! THE ERASER IS COMING! THE ERASER IS—”

The rest of the page was a smear of gray dust. Mark was gone, tucked away in a sketchbook where the sun never sets and the lines never stop moving.

Do you hear that? That faint sound against your wall? Skritch. Skritch. Skritch.

The Pencil Man is coming! Whatever you do…don’t look at the paper!

Credit: Noel Haynes II