Papers of all kinds are what my mother collected. I say “collected,” but the reality show doctors on my TV call it “compulsive hoarding.” I often lay awake at night looking at my stack of unread books and wonder if I will transform into the same person in my old age; this action would be …
Shebna’s feeble voice reverberated like a drunken piano chord in the damp seven-foot square room. He thudded against the wall, all skinny wrists flailing and wrenching in volcanic blasts of weakened bone, muscle, and sinew. His home is a mosquito farm. A choked whisper of a man that knew nothing of his captors beyond scattered …
This is Ronny, the sweetest A/V nerd that ever walked the earth. He would never do anything to hurt anyone, until one day when he was hired by a motel manager to install security cameras. It seemed like an innocent gig at first, like any other. But when he realized he wasn’t being asked to …
Halloween, 1918 Jory hums a pleasant tune as he washes his hands. The white tiled walls of the embalming room reverberate his sonorous voice like a concert hall. Behind him, Peter’s body lies prone on a metal table. Still humming to himself, Jory dries his hands and sets to work. He shaves the back of …
“Oh fuck, no, shit, shit…” Sara mumbled to herself, more out of concern for her own safety than for that of the dog she’d just ran over. To be fair, this wasn’t a part of the city you’d want to get out of your car in. A man approached offering help, startling her, and she …
I think the strangest thing about lying there in her arms was how comfortable I was with the entire situation. Hours before, the first sight of them had come. I’d been warned countless times of their existence, and given a plethora of methods to skirt their spells, yet despite all this, I never expected to …
It was at the witching hour did she awaken, feeling as if somebody had been sitting over her bed while she was asleep. Yet, when she peered into the darkness, she could make out nothing but the four walls black that surrounded her. It was the witching hour did he awaken, feeling her eyes upon …
In the heart of the city stood a small library, tucked away between an abandoned convenience store and a grotto of trees predominantly used for smoking and drinking. While this library was very indistinct — a dilapidated building that housed the elderly who clung to dusty pages, and the young who sought out memories of …
The muggy air wrapped around him in a tightly-knit blanket, warm and moist from his breath and sweat that lingered and trickled down his face and neck. Red burns had been dragged across his shoulders and back, and briefly dotted his cheeks. His eyes constantly blinked moisture away as he worked. A fan hummed over …
Jakob had been telling me about the fairy people for weeks, but I’d always assumed it was the fruit of an overactive imagination. Every night, he’d ask me if the fairy people were coming. I remember it so distinctly, “Daddy? Are the fairy people gonna come tonight?” I let the words echo in my head. …
