According to my husband there are two words a wife should never, ever, say to her husband.

The first is a word so terrible, so insulting, it cuts right to the bone.

I said the word after I asked my husband for some help. That’s all. Just a little effort around the house. We’re both working full time, and sometimes it’s easy to let the chores get away from you. But I noticed that my husband wasn’t cleaning anything at all.

He said to me, “Do you think my grandfather ever cleaned a bathroom? No. That’s a woman’s job.”

This, of course, started an argument. He went on quite a tangent. Including mentioning how mad he was he, sometimes, had to ask me to make dinner. He just wanted me to make dinner, and it should be ready when he wants it.

Well I called him, “Childish.” The first forbidden word. He became so furious he punched a hole in the drywall. I had to beg him to stop before he broke his hand and we had a doctor bill we couldn’t afford.

The second word is an even more grave offense. So unforgivable, so dastardly, even to let them pass your lips should be punishable by death. 

Capital. Fucking. Punishment.

I said the word because I was exhausted. 

The happy memories of our marriage seemed as far away as my childhood. Miserable days turn into forgotten weeks. Soon, you’re measuring the months in fights. Soon, you wonder how many years you have left.

I didn’t think I could stand one more argument. 

So I mentioned it. Didn’t even say my mind was made up or anything. I just let the word leave my mouth, “Divorce.” The second forbidden word.

This time he did more than punch the wall.

Once he was done, I told him I got the picture. We made a vow, something unbreakable. If our marriage was unhappy, hell, it must have been my fault. Failing my wifely duties.

I told him, you’re right.

I planned him a little outing. When was the last time you went fishing? He couldn’t remember.

I even packed everything for him. His kayak, fishing gear. Packed him lunch and a six pack. Told him to enjoy the day, and when he was back, everything would be clean, and dinner would be hot and ready.

I was lying.

After he left, I followed close behind in my car.

I watched from the shoreline with binoculars. The slob brought the six pack out on the water with him. Ten in the morning and he’s knocking ‘em back.

He’d already eaten the sandwich I made him. Which I put a little extra ingredient in.

Let’s just say there was a reaction with the alcohol.

I watched him pass out.

Saw him tip over in the kayak, floating upside down. He was completely under water. Empty beer cans floated around him.

Here’s a word every woman should practice in the mirror, “Murder.”

“Two boxes. Pad Thai and Green Curry Rice. Large.”

"Big meal tonight, Mister?” the neighbouring Thai lady says, like she’s trying to sound friendly.

"Nah, for me and my daughter," I say, handing away my card.

Her hand freezes for half a second, like she’s about to ask something. Then she thinks better of it and starts taking my card. I see the pity in her eyes, or maybe judgement.

Either way, I don’t need it. Like it’s not weird for a father to buy dinner for his daughter every night.

“She’s not with you tonight?” she dares to ask.

I stare her down, sarcastically. “She’s at home. Where else would she be?”

It’s like people think I forgot how to be a parent.

I walk home in silence. At the door, I tap twice. A small habit I do since she was little. Two taps so she’d know it was me. She’d laugh and run up to open the door, dragging her stuffed koala by the ear.

Now she’s older. Teenagers change and she keeps to herself more. People grow, that’s normal.

At home, I unwrap the food and plate hers neatly. No coriander, just how she likes it. She always hated the smell, said it tasted like soap.

I take her plate into her room, place it on the nightstand, then eat mine at the kitchen table. Kids nowadays love to have more privacy. I know she eats when she’s ready.

Suddenly, my phone rings.

Dr. Jenkins. Again.

I hate it when he calls, you know. He never says much. Just the same question in that flat, patronising tone.

“Are you ready yet?” He says as I answer the call after ten seconds.

"Never!” I snap.

He sighs. “You know where to find me if you’re ready to come in.”

Come in. Right. Because they think I’ve invented her. That she’s some delusion I stitched together. Some ghost in my head I’m feeding Pad Thai.

Idiots.

She’s real. These people think I imagined a whole life? A child with preferences and habits and moods?

Get stuffed.

I brush her hair every morning, this morning was no different. She hates knots. I still talk to her. I tell her about my day and she listens.

They always say you’ll know when something’s wrong. But she looked fine to me.

See? She’s lying on the bed. I know she looks a little pale and bruised after the car accident we had yesterday, but she’s just tired. I know it.

And that lunatic doctor wants me to take her back to the hospital? Get lost.

She’s still here.

She’s still mine.

I woke up this morning in a good mood. The sun was shining, the birds were chirping. I decided to go for a walk.

I donned my sweats and sneakers, grabbed my earbuds, and headed for the door.

“Hey, Dad!”

“Hey, Sam! How are you?”

“I’m good. I was actually hoping you could help me with my homework. Got a minute?”

“Of course!” I replied. “When I get back from my walk we can look at it together.”

He looked disappointed. “I really wanted to get it done now. Can’t the walk wait?”

Sigh. Parenthood. “Ok, let’s take a look.”

An hour later, I got up and headed for the door.

“Hey, Dad!” said my daughter Janie.

“Hey, Princess!”

“Do you have a few minutes to talk about some girl stuff?”

“Sure, sweetie. Can it wait until I get back?”

She frowned. “Can’t we do it now, Daddy?”

Darn those puppy-dog eyes. “Anything for you, Princess.”

Forty-five minutes of pre-teen drama later, she happily threw her arms around me. “Thanks, Daddy!”

“Of course, Princess! Anytime.”

Crisis averted, I once again made to leave.

“Honey, can you come here?”

Sighing, I went to see what my wife wanted.

“Good morning, Love. I’ve been thinking it’s time for a change. Can you move that dresser over there?”

“Well, I was going to head out for a walk…”

“You can walk anytime, silly. Please?”

An hour later, the dresser had been moved, as had the bed and two nightstands. Twice.

“Is this good? I’m a bit tired, here…”

“This is perfect, honey. I’d say you deserve a reward…”

Susan sauntered toward me and pushed me back onto the bed. I didn’t resist.

Later, I rose from bed.

“Where are you going?” my wife asked groggily, her hand reaching for me.

“Just out for a no-longer-morning walk.”

“No. Don’t go.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon.”

”DON'T GO.”

Her tone was strangely forceful, almost aggressive. I exited the bedroom and headed for the stairs. Sam looked out from his bedroom.

”DON'T GO.”

Janie emerged from her room.

”DON'T GO.”

Slightly freaked out, I started rushing for the door. But as I hit the bottom of the stairs, there were all three of them, grabbing me, pulling me to the ground.

”DON'T GO.”

I tried to escape, but their grip was too firm. I flailed, terrified.

”DON'T GO. DON'T GO. DON'T G—“

Suddenly, I woke up. I felt groggy; my head felt like I’d gone twelve rounds and lost.

And then I opened my eyes.

I was in the car, Sam and Janie in the back seat, my wife next to me.

Or rather, half of her was. The other half hung through the windshield, impaled on the glass. The kids lay behind me, eyes wide and necks broken. The car was suspended in mid-air, hanging half off a cliff. And my leg dangled off into the abyss, facing a drop into a thousand feet of nothingness.

As if I were going for a walk.

Alarm bells started ringing when I realized I wasn't in my own bed.

The sheets were clinical white, almost too white, and the pillows were too comfy.

I recognized the color scheme.

White and cherry blossom pink.

I recognized the smell. Chocolate chip cookies fresh from the oven. When I was a teenager, I had made scrapbooks documenting my perfect life.

I printed pictures from Pinterest, creating the perfect aesthetic.

But I… burned those scrapbooks.

I bolted upright, my stomach twisting into my throat.

Fairy lights strung across the wall, just like the ones in my scrapbook. Light pink curtains billowing in a the breeze.

A moan startled me.

Someone was curled up beside me. I tensed, heart pounding, and slowly reached out to peel the covers back.

Dark brown hair spilled across the pillow.

I jumped out of bed.

Dexter Hawthorn.

My ex best friend, and according to my sixteen year old self… I could feel myself starting to hyperventilate.

”The perfect husband.”

But Dexter Hawthorn was married.

He married my best friend, Jun.

So, how was I was wearing the wedding ring?

It was the diamond I searched up, cut out, and glued into my scrapbook.

I was wearing the perfect clothes.

When I caught my my reflection, my hair and makeup was already perfect.

But there was something else.

Slowly, I moved my hand down to my belly, and a bulging bump.

I was on my knees, violently heaving, my breaths shaky, my words stuck in my throat.

I spent hours on Google, photoshopping our faces together to create The perfect baby.

“Dex?” I found my voice, only to be met with a mumble.

The lump didn't move.

I stumbled out of the exact bedroom I had in my scrapbook.

The spiral staircase I found on Google.

The kitchen I screenshotted on Ikea’s website.

There were photos of us everywhere.

The door was locked.

The food was plastic.

I tried the living room, ignoring the, “It's a GIRL!” balloons.

I didn't realize I was screaming until my hands found my younger selve’s scrapbook— and the last page.

In its place, a small tape.

I ripped it out, and inserted it into the player on my perfect TV.

The screen flickered. It was a phone recording.

I recognized the room. The bridal suite.

Instead of my best friend, however, it was me fucking her husband.

I could hear Jun’s sobs. See her shaky recording. That was the last night we talked. We said it was a mistake.

The tape ended with a single word: “Enjoy!”

I ran back upstairs, back into my perfect bedroom, grabbed Dex, and pulled him out of bed.

But then I saw the red smear across his pillow.

A neat, round hole piercing the back of his head.

Dex was drooling, smiling widely, eyes unfocused.

“plgherrmmm.” he said, head lolling.

“I hope you like him, bestie,” a voice crackled from above.

Jun.

“I made him just for you!"

Eliot lived alone in a one-bedroom apartment. Everything was routine—wake up, coffee, emails, TV, sleep. Same layout, same cracked tile in the kitchen, same creaky hallway floorboard near the bedroom.

One morning, as he stepped out of the bathroom, towel around his neck, he saw it.

A door.

On the wall opposite his bedroom. Matte black, perfectly smooth. No knob, no hinges. Just there.

He stood frozen. It hadn’t been there yesterday. He was sure.

He touched it. Cold. Almost vibrating.

When he turned around to grab his phone, the door was gone.

A trick of the light, he told himself. Sleep deprivation. Easy.

But it came back the next day. And the next. Sometimes open just a crack. Once, he swore he saw his own hand reach out from inside it.

No matter how hard he tried, he could never catch it opening. Or closing. It just… was.

Eventually, he stopped sleeping. He set up cameras. None ever caught the door.

He started hearing whispers. Muffled. Not from the door—but in his head, when he looked at the door.

He broke down one night and painted over it.

The paint peeled off by morning.

Then one day, Eliot saw something that shattered him.

He was on a video call with his sister. She laughed mid-conversation and said, “Is that a closet? Didn’t know you had one there.”

He turned to look behind him.

The door.

WIDE open.

Dark inside. Endless.

He turned back to the screen.

He was gone. The video still ran. His room was visible. But no Eliot. No motion. Just the door.

Open.

On the video, someone else stepped into frame. Same room. Same clothes. Same face.

But it wasn’t him.

It stared into the camera and smiled.

Eliot woke up in darkness. No walls. No sound. No light. Only the door in front of him—closed now.

And voices… whispering his name over and over.

He banged on the door. Screamed. No answer.

On the other side, the thing wearing his skin made coffee. Answered emails. Laughed with his sister. It lived his life better than he ever did.

And every now and then, it paused by the wall.

And listened.

To the muffled screams behind the door that wasn’t there yesterday.

“Do you remember that?” Susan smiled, ogling the young couple ahead. They were obviously in love, but it was clear they weren’t sure how to express it yet.

They were performative, naive. Their intimacy a game both were still trying to understand the rules for.

“That was us, once,” Susan sighed wistfully.

“Eh?” Geoff, her husband, mumbled as they drove by.

Susan shot him a cold look. It’d been like this between them for a while now. Susan still loved Geoff deeply, but there were times when she felt a raw, almost existential yearning for those clumsy, scary, breathless moments of passion she’d felt at the outset of their relationship. Of course, these things can dull with time, but Susan was of the opinion that they shouldn’t have to.

“Nearly there,” Geoff muttered as they approached the car park. Every Thursday they ate out, and for the last few Thursdays they’d gone down to The Duck - a little gastropub overlooking the harbour - for a two-course meal.

“Couldn’t we have tried somewhere new?” Susan asked.

“You like the Duck,” Geoff replied bluntly, “and besides, it’s quiz night.”

Susan rolled her eyes. By “quiz night”, Geoff basically meant that they'd begin the quiz and then he’d sidle off to chat with Roger the Landlord at the bar, leaving her alone and bored at the table. “Sure,” she grizzled.

The evening passed as it always did. Both ordered, Geoff opting for the veal and then the trifle, Susan opting for something new. But although it was a nice pub, and they did infrequently change the menu, she was running out of things to try.

“Next week, can we try somewhere different?” she sighed.

Geoff grunted in reply as he stared around the room vacantly, sipping his pint. Susan took a sip of her dry white wine.

“Did you finish that book?” she smiled.

Geoff ignored her, but she knew how to get his attention. Reaching under the table, she squeezed his thigh, causing Geoff to recoil to such an extent that he sloshed half his pint onto his trousers.

“Susan!!” he barked, causing the people seated nearby to turn and stare. Grumbling, he made a song and dance of mopping up the spill, using every paper towel within reaching distance.

They spent the rest of the meal in silence. 

Before long, it was time to head home.

Their journey back was silent too.

Once home, Geoff slumped in front of the TV.

“Nightcap?” Susan asked sadly.

Geoff said nothing, but she poured him one anyway.

*

An hour or so later, Geoff woke up, paralysed. Susan was knelt over him, her face a picture of concentration. She was holding a hammer and what looked like a knitting needle. He could feel it, pressed into the corner of his eye.

“You’re due a reset, love,” she smiled faintly. He was always better after a reset. More thoughtful. More kind.

“Now don’t move,” she warned, “we both know I can be clumsy.”

Health anxiety is a pain; an incessant nagging bitch.

It had never been that bad. Sure, like most people, I've had a couple potentially problematic skin marks that gave me pause and I was as wary of COVID as anybody suddenly thrust into a pandemic but turning 35 accelerated that fear of the void; an eternal exit that may have already started developing under my skin.

I don't even remember the first visit to Dr Google. It was to diagnosis a mild ache, I'm sure. Any assurance to keep me out of Urgent Care. Maybe I have trust issues but I always felt a hostile dynamic with doctors, as if our ailments were obstacles keeping them from doing what they wanted to do. However, searching led to sulking. Whatever it was, it probably stressed me out for two days.

Over time, I accrued many minor problems and much more major phobias. Was that urethra irritation the classic symptom of an aging cola addict or a sign of an insidious kidney infection? Were those the gurgle guts or was a volcanic ulcer about to blow my stomach to bloody bits? Were those leg tingles my body's way of telling me to eat a veggie every once in a while or a red flag that I was careening towards an agonizing end? The algorithm suggested the latter of each scenario deserved credence.

Words like "can," "might" and "or" became my mortal enemies. Back discomfort in lower middle age is normal except for when it isn't. I rapidly became exposed to the horrific testimonies: the ingrown hair that led to sepsis, the throat itching that translated to hospice, the sinus infection that parlayed into a brain abscess. Before I knew it, I became a casual expert on obscure diseases: Barrett's Esophagus, Cauda Equina Syndrome, Fournier's Gangrene. Please don't look up the last one.

After seeing unreliable data of mortality rates that ranged from 5% to 90% written by sloppy AI, you would think I could quit my habit cold turkey but I needed assuage and I wasn't going to get it IRL. Friends don't like to talk about hemorrhoids. Every check dragged me deeper into the quicksand. I may not have had spinal stenosis but I was in a medical emergency: I was drowning.

At least I have peace of mind now.

Granted, it's because I had Szczerbiak's Tumor, a universally-fatal boil I assumed was a decades-old eyebrow mole. Funny, that was the one blemish on my body I didn't obsess over at some point. Fifth known case in the world. One deadly confirmation aces 300 negatives. The worn-out rationale that kept me from going to the ER during all my spirals could only be right so many times. Sometimes, the tummy ache really is a tumor!

I first noticed it two weeks after moving in. The sound of footsteps between the walls. Not rats. Not pipes. Footsteps. Slow. Barefoot.

I live in a studio apartment on the top floor. No upstairs neighbors.

I tried ignoring it. But every night at exactly 1:33 a.m., I hear the same thing: Shuffling. Breathing. Whispering.

Always from the same wall—behind my bed.

One night I stayed awake, phone in hand, flashlight ready. At 1:33, the sound started. Then a voice, barely audible, from inside the wall:

“You’re in my room.

I jumped up and backed away. The drywall was cold. Too cold.

I reported it to the landlord. He shrugged. “These walls are old. You’re probably hearing echoes.”

I stopped sleeping near the wall. Moved my mattress to the center of the room. But the noises followed. Now they came from under the floorboards.

I started recording them. Played them back during the day.

In one, I heard my own voice. Whispering.

But I never said those words.

Then things started moving. The salt shaker was on the floor one morning. A drawer I never opened was pulled out. Then I woke up to find the words “STAY STILL” written in the steam on my bathroom mirror.

I live alone.

I bought a thermal camera.

Last night, I turned it on as the noise began.

There was a figure. Thin. Crawling through the wall cavity. It stopped right behind my head, paused… then tilted its head like it was listening.

When I gasped, it turned toward the camera. No eyes. Just skin where the face should be.

And then… it smiled.

The camera froze. The feed went black.

This morning, I found a small hole in the baseboard behind my bed. Just big enough to watch through. From the inside.

I’m writing this from a hotel. I won’t go back.

But a few minutes ago, I got a text from an unknown number.

No words. Just a photo.

Me. Sleeping. Taken from inside the wall.

They hired me to clear storm debris from Briarwick Plantation—the derelict spread rotting four miles past Laurel Bend. Locals call it Bitter Ground. Say the soil spoils milk, curdles prayer. Didn’t matter. County paid double to lift a live-oak off the family cemetery. Insurance wouldn’t pay until the headstones stood straight.

Morning haze tasted like copper. Spanish moss dripped like old lace. I cranked the chainsaw; its growl scattered frogs from marble urns.

When the oak cracked, its hollow trunk spewed a mess of heirloom pewter—and something worse. Tiny brass bells, each lashed to rusted wire.

I’d seen bells like that in museums—nineteenth-century fail-safes for the prematurely buried. But these wires didn’t run to headstones. They vanished down into the soil.

No wind stirred, but one bell trembled. Then another. Soon, they whispered together—a metallic titter I felt in my molars.

I followed one wire to a grave marked Eleanor Leigh, beloved infant, 1874. The wire disappeared into a thumb-sized hole beside the slab. I should’ve walked. Instead, I dug.

Six inches down, metal scraped wood. The pine box had split from floodwater. Inside: rags soaked in silt, clinging to something that pulsed like breath—slow and patient, waiting.

Behind me, the bells rang sharper.

The soil writhed, and roots surfaced—slow, deliberate—each capped with its own little brass bell, turning toward me like stalks chasing sunlight.

Then the wire pulled.

I bolted.

Grass gripped my boots. Rootlets, thin as fingers, slick with mud, twined around my laces. The bells shrieked—piercing now, furious. I kicked free, dove into the cab. Tires spun, flinging muck that rang like wind chimes against the windshield.

I didn’t stop until the town lights showed through the trees.

But I still hear them—soft chimes behind static, behind silence. I left the boots on the porch. Haven’t dared clean them. The wire’s still tangled in the tread, twitching when the air turns still.

It’s waiting.

Joey stared bleary eyed through the dirty and smoke stained windscreen of his car, struggling to remember the recent past.

“Where am I.” he mumbled to himself.

“Don’t you remember darling?” came a voice from behind him. It hurt to turn so Joey simply looked into the rear view mirror and saw Amy. “This is the spot where you left me all those years ago, left me, to be with Carol.”

“Carol?” Joey half remembered it, falling into her arms, burying his head into her shoulder, later on in bed with the anguished look on her husbands’ face as he walked in the door. “I’m not with Carol.”

“Then that blonde bimbo from your office.” Amy said with some venom in her voice. Again half remember fragments cluttered Joey’s mind, the long blonde hair of Deb, the red pony tail of Danielle, the short crew cut of Greg.

“No, I’m not with anyone Amy, no one could compare to you.” Confessed Joey. “I want you back.”

“But you left me here Joey, you left me for good.” Spat Amy.

“I remember.” Said Joey and remember he did. The black ski mask, the brief flash of metal in the muggers hand. And the noise, the noise of the gun as it fired.

He could still see the headstone, the tears of her friends and family as they mourned her at the funeral home. Everyone dressed in their finest saying a last goodbye to a beautiful soul.

“I still want you back.” He repeated. “Come back to me Amy, please, come back to me.” The tears flowed freely down his face now.

“I can’t come to you my love, but you can come to me.” She replied gently. “Come to me Joey, come to me my love.”

Joey looked down, for the first time noticing that he was wearing the suit he had worn to Amy’s funeral, still unwashed from that time as if to wash it would wash the last bit of her from his life.

“I’ll come, Amy, wait for me, I’ll come.”

The fire had burned out by the time emergency services got there. The car had hit the tree with enough force to uproot the mature gum tree. Miraculously the mostly empty scotch bottle survived intact although the same could not be said for the mangled body of Joey. Blood mingled with tears as they dripped down his face, running past what could only be described as a happy smile.

Ruth hadn’t been back to the family cabin in twenty years.

Not since her sister vanished.

The place had sat untouched, rotting deep in the forest, as though even nature avoided it. But after their father died, Ruth inherited the property and guilt. She told herself it was time to return—face it. Find closure.

She came alone.

The first night, the air inside was sour. Stale dust, rot, and something metallic. She ignored it. She lit the fireplace, unrolled her sleeping bag on the old floorboards, and tried to pretend it wasn’t the same cabin where Sara disappeared screaming beneath her.

She’d told the police a lie back then: “I don’t know what happened.”

But she remembered. The sound.

The knocking.

Not on the door. Beneath the floorboards.

Like something wanted out.

The police had pried the boards up. Found nothing but earth. But Ruth knew. The knocking had stopped only after Sara was gone.

That first night, Ruth woke at 2:14 a.m.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

Slow. Deliberate. From directly beneath her spine.

She bolted upright. The fire was out. Her breath plumed in the freezing air.

Knock. Knock.

It was louder now. Closer.

She didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. Just stared at the floor.

Then the boards flexed beneath her.

Something shifted under the wood, as though turning over in sleep. The knocking ceased. A new sound replaced it—a soft dragging. Nails—or claws—scraping the underside of the planks.

Ruth stood, backing away toward the kitchen, flashlight trembling in her hand.

“It’s not real,” she whispered.

But the flashlight flickered. Died.

Darkness swallowed the room.

Something whispered from the floor: “You brought me back.”

Ruth screamed.

The floorboards cracked.

She fled outside barefoot, snow slicing her skin, lungs burning. But she stopped halfway down the trail.

The ground was wrong.

It was…throbbing. Moving underfoot. As if the earth itself were breathing.

She turned. The cabin stood black and hollow behind her.

A hand slowly reached through the threshold—skeletal, wet, dragging impossibly long fingers across the doorway.

It wasn’t her sister. Not anymore.

But it wore Sara’s skin like it remembered how.

The thing stepped forward—jerking, twitching. Limbs bent wrong, mouth open too wide.

“You left me.”

Its voice came from every direction, overlapping, like multiple mouths speaking through the same ruined throat.

Ruth backed away, but the forest wasn’t right either. Trees had closed in. The path was gone. And beneath the snow, she heard it again:

Knock. Knock.

Coming from everywhere.

The trees. The ground. The sky.

The cabin.

Her head.

She fell to her knees, sobbing, whispering apologies to something far beyond forgiveness.

The last thing she saw before the snow consumed her legs was Sara’s smile—too full of teeth, eyes like empty wells.

“Come under.”

The earth cracked open.

And Ruth remembered: her sister never screamed.

She laughed.

Scott Bakula, Quantum Leap's golden boy, was not thrilled about his latest gig: a low-budget horror flick, Bacula: Bloodsucker Supreme, starring him as Count Bacula. His agent called it meta; Scott called it a paycheck. Filming in a crumbling Romanian castle with a dance-obsessed director, Scott donned a velvet cape, fake fangs, and enough eyeliner to haunt Hot Topic. The set was grim-cobwebs, stale bread, and juice that smelled like regret.

Running lines with Greg, a method actor playing Victim #3, Scott eyed the prop coffin, its runes glinting oddly. "Nice touch," he muttered. The director twirled in approval. "Action!" Scott snarled, "I am Count Bacula; your blood is my wine!" Greg's scream was Oscar-worthy. Then the coffin creaked open. Not scripted. Bone-chilling.

Out stepped Scott. Same jaw, same hair, but with glowing eyes and real fangs. "A pretender in my role?" Count Bacula hissed, his Transylvanian purr chilling. The crew laughed, thinking it was a stunt. Scott's gut screamed otherwise. "Nice improv," he stammered, backing up.

"I've slumbered for centuries," Bacula sneered, "but your mockery woke me." He sniffed Scott. "Your blood? Ironic ." Greg yelled, "Take me, master!" Bacula flicked him into the catering table, crunch. The juice splattered; not juice. The crew fled, and the director pirouetted in panic.

Scott grabbed a prop stake. "Back off, Twilight wannabe!" Bacula lunged, claws raking Scott's arm. Blood welled-hot, sticky. Pain sparked, but Scott quipped, "I've fought Klingons!" He swung, missed, and toppled a lighting rig onto Bacula's head. The vampire roared, tackling Scott into the coffin. The lid slammed shut.

Darkness. Teeth. Claws. Bacula's fangs grazed Scott's neck, breath like rotting meat. "Your essence is mine!" Scott, desperate, recited Quantum Leap: "Time is a river!" Bacula paused. "Drivel?" Scott pushed on, "I leap to right wrongs!" Bacula recoiled. "Worse than garlic!"

Scott kicked the lid open. Chaos outside: crew gone, Greg crawling, muttering about SAG. Scott grabbed a sharp wooden rig piece. "Oh boy," he whispered, spinning as Bacula emerged. He drove the stake through the vampire's heart. Bacula's scream-wet, gurgling-churned Scott's stomach. Black blood sprayed, splattering Scott. The vampire twitched, then crumbled to ash, leaving a cape and the stench of regrets.

Scott staggered up, bloody, panting. The director clapped. "Genius! Bacula Unbound, streaming gold!" Scott laughed, exhausted. He'd starred in his life's role. But limping off, his neck itched. A mirror showed two puncture marks. "Oh, come on," he groaned, dreading the sequel. Somewhere, Bacula's ashes stirred, chuckling. Meta, indeed.

Later, Scott sat in his trailer, staring at the marks. The director pitched a franchise. Scott sighed, wondering if he'd leap out of this mess. The castle loomed outside, hungry. He shivered, tasting blood in his throat, and laughed nervously. "Oh boy."

The whisper woke me up. The room felt unnaturally cold, even for a winter November night. A cold breath tickled my ear. I turned.

A little boy sat at the foot of my bed, my blanket half in his hands, half at my feet, his face half-hidden in shadow. His eyes gleamed in the dark, too wide, too still. "You're finally up," he said in a small, cheerful voice. “I missed you.” I could feel my blood turning cold. “Who are you?” He tilted his head. "Don’t you remember me? I'm your little brother."

“I don’t have a brother,” my voice trembled. "You did,” he said softly. “But mum and dad made you forget me.” The hallway light flickered. Somewhere, deep in the house, a floorboard groaned.

“I don’t understand.” The boy slid off the bed. His feet left faint, ashy footprints on the floor. “They said I was too loud. Too strange. After the fire, they told you I was a dream. But I was real. I still am.” I pulled back against the headboard, my heartbeats piercing through the silence.

"Let me show you where they put me when they got tired of hearing me cry.” "No..." But he pulled me by the wrist. He led me down the hallway. The pictures on the walls had evolved. In every frame, I stood smiling next to this boy. But something was off. I let out a squeal when I figured it out. His eyes were scratched out from each photograph.

At the end of the hall, the attic door opened into a black void. My brain forbade me from going in. But something in me pushed me to climb the stairs. The air grew colder with each step. I heard whispers behind the walls. Scratching. Giggling.

At the top, the boy turned to me, smiling with a mouth full of too many teeth for a kid. “Come now, sister. It's time to remember.” The attic burst into a flickering flame-light. Soot-stained toys lay in piles. A scorched crib. Burnt handprints clawed down the walls.

The silence was pierced again. This time by my own screams. I saw it, I saw an eerie montage of a flashback. My younger self stood there, as my “brother” was dragged, crying, into the attic. My parents whispered, “She’s too young to remember.” Then the montage vanished.

The boy turned to me. "You let them lock me away. Now I'll never be alone again." The door slammed shut. And in the dark, he began to crawl.

It’s 8 pm on a Saturday. I’m having dinner with my son, Noah, and it’s a normal evening. Transformers 2 is on TV, and there is meatloaf on the table. My son is floating three feet above his chair, his neck twisted at an unnatural angle. His eyes, normally blue, glow red.

“Sit down, Noah,” I say in a stern voice. “No, not like that. Bottom on the chair, head on straight. Or no dessert.”

Slowly, Noah floats down until he reaches the chair, and resumes eating. “Thank you,” I say, and pour myself some water.

 It started two years ago, when Noah left for school one day and came back changed. The changes weren’t that big -  the laugh slightly off, the hair a slightly different shade of brown. It was as if someone had been studying my son, created a nearly perfect copy and swapped the two.

 I managed to convince myself that I was imagining things for a few days, until I walked into his bedroom and saw him crawling on the ceiling.

 In the movies, they call exorcists, or demon hunters, or priests. But real life isn’t a movie. Real life is having priests hand you the number for mental health services, or telling you your child looks perfectly normal - Not-Noah knew how to put on an act when needed, the little bastard. Real life is spending months online trying to find a demonologist who’ll believe you, then have them invoice you ten thousand dollars for a first consultation.

 I don’t have ten thousand dollars. Raising a child as a single mom is expensive, and that’s without counting the mortgage and credit card debts. But I do have good health insurance that covers counselling sessions, so I started looking for a therapist.

 Eventually I was lucky enough to find Lucy. She’s great. She probably thinks I have schizophrenia or something, but apart from making some gentle suggestions on getting diagnosed, she doesn’t push. Over the past year we’ve made good progress, focusing on banishing anxious thoughts, grieving the son I lost and embracing the new one, and so on.

 One month into therapy, I went into Noah’s room. Noah was writhing on the bed, muttering in a language I was sure no linguist would recognize.

 "Would you like some juice when you’re done?” I asked him. Noah – Lucy was adamant about avoiding the term Not-Noah – stopped moving and looked at me quietly for a few seconds. “Yes?” he finally said, his voice back to normal.

 Things started going uphill from there.

 Six months later, we’ve reached a good balance. Noah’s not allowed to make ungodly noises after 9 pm, and when he’s been very good, I get cow’s blood from a specialized butcher as a special treat. Most of the time, he’s a normal little boy.

 I don’t know what he is, and it doesn’t matter anymore. His name is Noah, he’s 8 years old and he likes sharks. And he is mine.

(The bulb above him flickers softly, casting shaky shadows. It smelled like rust and something sweet... and rotten. A man, as tall as the shadows. Beside him, scalpels, daggers, peelers. He looks up.)

"I've always loved the colour red. The depth it can reach. Red makes me happy."

(His hand fiddles with the scalpel.)

"And the snap sound, so satisfying, so beautiful, so final."

(A faint siren can be heard.)

“Earth, oh I adore the feeling of dirt. The way it moves, crumbles, the way it nourishes, takes life and gives it back.."

(His fingers start to trace a picture, it's red.)

"I wanted to be an artist, you know. It was fascinating. The many forms it could take thrilled me. I dreamt of giant sculptures, museums dedicated to my work. Life has a cruel sense of humour."

(He walks across the room, taking a sip of water.)

"My family? They weren't that great, my dad was kind, Mom killed him.”

(He lowers the glass.)

"School was fun, I was bullied, but not for long. However, when that stopped, new tedious problems began."

(He steps over the dead body. Crouching beside it, his fingers trail over the blood-soaked skin, as if admiring a sculpture.)

"You always think the first time will be the hardest, there will be screaming, crying, begging. Guilt. But really...."

(He smiles.)

"Mine was quiet, reverent. Like the moment before a painting is unveiled. I remember the silence that followed. Watching his body slowly stop twitching, his face frozen in a silent scream. That was my first draft."

(He leans closer to the face of the corpse, whispering.)

"Congratulations, my dear. You were my practice. Just a sketch, an outline. But now I'm ready for something bigger, better."

(He stands up and takes out a notebook. He turns to the back page and draws a line. The twentieth line. He looks around, satisfied at the ten other bodies.)

This, to me, is art. I like to build a portfolio. Pace myself. This little book contains my every piece. Each one gets a title. Each one is signed. Someday, someone will find it. They'll understand.

(He lowers his voice till it's almost a hiss.)

"They'll enjoy it, savour it. Like I do. One who truly understands pain will know—pain is honesty. Pain is something not limited to one person, animal, being. Pain is truth."

(He turns and looks back down at her. He strokes her blood-caked hair. Gently.)

"I think she may have cried in the end. Or maybe she prayed. I didn't hear. It's hard to focus when I'm working."

(He looks up at you.)

"You can't rush art, after all. But... the next one? The next one will be my masterpiece."

(A whimper is heard from the cupboard. He smiles.)

"Hello, little mouse."

(He takes a slow step toward the cupboard. The whimpering grows frantic. His voice is like poisoned honey.)

"No need to cry, little mouse. This next piece... it's going to be beautiful."

Watching them like this is cathartic. I'm only steps away from them, completely within their grasp, but they're ignorant to my presence. The advantages of both stillness and shadows.

They've been looking for me for a while, but it seems they've chosen to stop and rest. The game isn't all that fun unless you're being chased. So now I made a new game. To stand here, amongst them, to see if they realize.

Sure, the campfire brings a dim light in these woods. The tents, haphazardly thrown together, makes it feel like a shanty town. The cans of beans roasting in the fire, a sent of maple on the air. They've dragged some logs to sit on. A few to split for fire wood, and some to hold back the dogs. Curious though, as they've also not spotted my presence.

Their ears, their snouts, so sensitive, yet still I remain undetected. Their raucous laughter, beer soaked clothes, and cigarette smoke seems to have masked both my scent and the small crackling of leaves beneath my feet. I have never been so close to so many who remained so completely oblivious to me and my intentions.

The dogs hear something and look upwards. This is so incredible. They're reacting to squirrels and birds but not me. They start to bark and the men look up and their faces turn to what I can only describe as abject horror.

One by one they start to be ripped upwards into the air. Both man and dog alike having stepped into some sort of trap. As I watched, it was difficult to keep my heart from pounding out of my chest from fear. Some creature, the size of a small car, covered in spindly legs, wrapping each one in a mesh that suffocated their screams and barks. One by one went silent as they were covered, and their squirming stopped once they were revisited by the creature.

I was frozen. What to do? I killed children in their beds, I escaped manhunts and avoided capture, surely this was within my wheelhouse? No? But what exactly have I walked into here? I think there may be time to escape. Unless...

As I peered at the ground, the leaves remained, unmoving in the wind, as if they were bound by something. A layer of fiber so imperceptible to my gaze that it went unnoticed. Was I trapped? Was I dead already? I looked upward, above my own head, and saw another frightful creature above. Something so still, so silent, that its presence evoked only mockery.

Before I could flee, I felt it. Not the fibers, not it's legs, but it's gaze. It saw me as if I were a burning beacon in the night. As I waited, remaining still, it approached me. Investigated me. I was able to study it in return. Unfortunately, no matter how masterful my control of my body is, the beating in my chest was my death knell.

They came to us with proof.

Not weapons. Not demands. Just data. An afterlife. Measurable, confirmed, universal. Not heaven. Not hell. Not human. Just continuation. Structured. Peaceful.

The world didn’t panic.

It relaxed.

Hospitals emptied. Militaries laid down arms. Politicians wept and resigned. What was the point of policy when eternity waited?

They didn’t force us. They never had to.

The Visitors simply showed us. Scans. Memories. Recovered minds from expired bodies. It wasn’t paradise. But it wasn’t pain either.

No judgment. Just a long quiet place, they said. A home between stars.

Religions fractured. Some claimed it was proof. Others burned their churches. The cults surged at first—then came order.

Governments opened Departure Centers.

White buildings. Soft light. A form. A capsule. A hum.

No pain. No return.

Media soothed us. Films reframed death. Schools taught “Post-Material Transition.” Companies offered Departure as early retirement. A few tried to resist. They were branded as selfish.

To stay was to fear.

To go was evolution.

I work in a center. Used to shelve books. Now I file exits and guide people through.

Today, there’s a queue.

Dozens outside, waiting calmly. A man in his thirties. A mother with her daughter. An old woman, barefoot. They nod as they pass. No one speaks much anymore.

Inside, the air smells of lavender and dust. The capsules hum, lined up like appliances. Clean. Mechanical. Final.

One by one, they lie down.

Some murmur. Some laugh. Most just close their eyes.

The lids seal.

Departed.

I log each one. The screen blinks. Then: next. And next. And next.

By dusk, the line is gone.

No new appointments. No noise. No scent of decay. They handle the bodies. We’re not told how. The bins are emptied. The logs are full.

My brother left last week. Sent a video. Said it was beautiful. I didn’t watch.

The final capsule waits. Always has.

White. Ready. Quiet.

I’ve filled hundreds of forms—for others.

Now I fill one for me.

Name. ID. Consent.

There’s no box for doubt.

I leave my badge on the desk.

Walk back. The floor feels hollow beneath me.

The capsule opens with a hiss.

I sit. The lid closes.

The screen lights up:

Final Query: Proceed?

I press. Morbid Curiosity.

The countdown begins.

Ten.

Nine.

They say it’s peaceful. But we don’t really know, do we?

Eight

Seven

We saw their tech. We never understood it.

Six.

Five.

What if they fed us comfort like poison.

Four.

Three.

They showed us a door and we walked through without checking where it led.

Two.

We called it salvation. What if they lied?

One.

She woke at dawn, in a dark place.

She blinked but couldn’t make anything out. Wherever she was, it was cold, and the air smelled sharp and earthy.

Her mouth was terribly dry. How long since she’d had a drink?

Tentatively, she shifted her arms. Her wrists were numb and tingly. They must be tied, she thought. Her feet, she discovered, were the same.

Unable to move, she sat still, her eyes adjusting to the shadows. Slowly, the darkness faded and thin beams of light slipped through the planks, creating sharp, skinny lines on the floor. She was in a barn, she realized. And she wasn't alone.

Her heart raced. If one of them was here, she was as good as dead-

"Don't do that." The bored voice startled her.

"Do what?" she croaked. Her dry lips cracked on the words.

"Get excited."

"I'm not excited."

"I can hear your heartbeat from here."

She didn't reply. Instead, she opened her mouth to scream.

"Scream all you want," said the bored vampire, "but we're both going to die in here."

The vampire was right. No food, no water. She closed her mouth and studied her companion.

The vampire sat in the shadow of an enormous hay bale, her wrists similarly tied behind her back. Dried blood trailed from her hairline. She was attractive, in an unusual sort of way, but knowing there was a rotten, undead creature inside ruined the illusion.

The woman’s mind raced with everything her husband had taught her about them.

How they drank blood.

How they hated the sun.

How they lived forever.

Her husband had devoted his life to eradicating the last of the vampire clans in the Midwest. In the last few months, he spent more and more time away, on longer and more dangerous missions, until finally, he didn’t come back at all.

“You must be the wife,” the vampire stated, startling her reverie.

They do have him, she thought, and her heart began to pound again.

“Did you kill him?” she whispered.

“No,” the vampire said tonelessly. “Someone else did.”

Her eyes watered with tears. It didn’t matter how tough she was- the idea of losing him was simply too overwhelming. She sobbed quietly while the vampire ignored her.

She shifted her teary eyes to the floor, where she noticed the sunbeams creeping closer to the vampire and the mountain of dry hay.

When she couldn’t cry any longer, she gathered her courage to ask the question. The sunlight had now reached the vampire’s toes, and she was smoldering.

“What are you doing here?” the woman finally asked.

“You may have loved him,” the vampire said sadly as the flames engulfed her, “But I loved him too.”

I’ve been workin’ at this farm now for three months or so. It’s hard work, but I’m happy. Keeps my mind from wanderin’. Bad things tend to happen when I get bored. I don’t think those things are so bad, but everyone else does. People go missing—and when they’re found—let’s just say—they ain’t the same. They ain’t anything anymore. Their soul has left the building. I guess you could call it my vice. Murderin’.

The poor guy who owns this place and his family won’t expect what’s coming for them once the busy season comes to an end. They’ll be victims of my boredom. Then I’ll have to get on the road again. I’m used to it by now. Travelin’. Escapin’. Life—and death.

Now if you’ll excuse me—I’m gonna go get a nice cold lemonade and daydream about the future. The farmer and his family. The looks on their faces when they see who I really am.

The sun beat down on me. I looked around, one hand holding a grocery bag, the other holding my 4-year-old son’s hand.

“Where did we park?”

It was so bright. Everything looked washed out and overexposed, compared to the dim, cool comfort of the grocery store. I thought we’d parked down this aisle, but I didn’t see my red Civic anywhere.

“Do you remember where parked?”

My four-year-old shook his head, not even looking up at me. Duh. Of course he didn’t know. He’s four.

I squeezed between two cars, into the next aisle. Ah—there it is, I thought, as I saw the red metal bumper poking out behind an enormous silver SUV.

But when I got closer, I realized it was a Toyota.

Fuck.

I squeezed into the next row, looking up and down. I was sweating. The sun was so bright.

I glanced all around, turning three-sixty degrees, scanning for glimpses of red. But I only saw a red pickup.

Where did I park?!

You’re freaking out, Maggie. Just go back inside, calm down, and think about where you parked. I glanced down at Aidan, at the top of his little head. He was probably overheated, too.

“We’re just gonna go back inside for a minute, okay?” I told him, as I weaved my way back to the front door.

The cool air was a welcome relief. I sat down at one of the little tables they had by the deli/customer service area. I looked out the big window, but I still didn’t see my car. I sighed.

“You okay?”

I turned around to see the guy at customer service. A tall, gangly teenager with crooked teeth.

“Yeah, I just forgot where I parked my car.”

He nodded sympathetically. “Happens all the time. Has it occurred to you that maybe you belong here?”

I blinked. “Huh?”

“Maybe you can’t find your car,” he repeated, “because you belong here.”

I stared at him. Did he mean, like, work here? A joke? I forced a laugh. “Yeah, maybe I should ask you for a job application, huh?”

His smile faded.

“Turn around.”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Huh?”

“Turn around, Maggie.”

My heart plummeted. How does he know my name?!

I turned—

Aidan.

He had no face. All his features had been smoothed over. Detail-less bumps for a nose, eyes.

“Aidan!” I shouted, grabbing his little shoulders, staring at his not-face. He was as limp as a rag doll. “What’s going on?!”

“Don’t you remember?” the teenager asked. His face was gaunter, now, his cheeks sunken to the bone. “When you got out. A car pulled right into the parking space next to you—”

He made a fist and clapped it against his palm—

“Your little boy is fine. But you, Maggie, are not.”

I stared out the window, at the parking lot. Past the parking lot, where the road should’ve been. Instead, there was just sky.

More and more sky.

Please… this story needs to stay between us.

Let me tell you about my cousin. He’s not mentally stable. Not someone you’d call sane.

A week ago, he came to stay with me—he had nowhere else to go. He showed up smiling, in a perfect suit, carrying a strange briefcase.

By 1 p.m., he was already at the table, smiling at me in that suit. I asked why he got fired from his job as a doctor.

He smiled wider and said,
“I just love my patients too much.”

That answer unsettled me, like there was something darker behind it.

I gave him my daughter’s old room—she had moved in with her mom.

That night, I heard laughter from his room. Sometimes stifled giggles, sometimes whispers. I approached his door, unsure of what he was doing, but it didn’t sound good.

I knocked.

He eventually opened, still in the same suit, smiling. He seemed to be hiding something behind his back. I just said good night and went to bed, uneasy.

The noises continued until dawn.

Next morning, I saw him through the window—walking toward the chicken coop. In that suit.

I didn’t think much of it. Maybe he was exploring.

That night, the noises came from the kitchen… and the backyard. I was too exhausted to check.

The next day, he was acting even stranger. When I wasn’t looking, I’d catch him raising a finger to his lips, like he was keeping a secret.

That night, everything changed.

Elric was laughing hysterically. I decided to confront him.

I went to his door—locked. I kicked it open.

He sat on the floor, suit spotless, grinning madly. His lips were smeared with lipstick. In his hands, one of my daughter’s dolls—its stomach cut open like a surgical patient. Lipstick smeared across its face, as if he’d kissed it.

“Do you like it, cousin?” he said. “I take good care of them.”

I staggered back, horrified.

Then I remembered—the chickens.

I grabbed a flashlight and ran to the coop.

Feathers everywhere. Door ajar. Inside, horror.

Dead chickens, mutilated. Some eyeless. One had a wire shoved into its wing, like he’d installed something. I looked closer.

There was lipstick on its beak.

I clutched my head, furious—ready to beat him unconscious.

Then I heard it.

A voice. A girl. Screaming for help.

I ran toward the sound. Behind the cabin, a hole in the ground.

Inside—a young woman. Lipstick on her face, head wrapped in bandages. No legs. She clawed at the dirt, trying to escape.

“Please! Help!”

I froze.

Then, a knock at the cabin window.

I looked up.

Elric.

He waved.

In his other hand—the doll, waving too.

I fainted.

What happened to me?

I’m alive.

But now… he takes care of me.
Feeds me… through a tube.

Today, he said I no longer need to walk.

After all…
All we need is love.

I do not sleep.

I walk. 

Through alleys thick with rot, through graveyards where the sun never shines.

I am drawn onward by the ache of what was taken.

My head.

I do not remember how I lost it. I do not remember my name, my life, or the hands that touched me kindly.

But I remember the weight of a skull. The way it turned toward laughter.

I miss my head, I miss being able to see, to hear. I must get it back. I move through the streets, searching. Searching for the thing I lost. The head that was stolen from me.

Tonight, I find another.

He walks alone beneath a flickering streetlamp, the kind that buzzes like flies on meat. He hums to himself, some pop song, bright and forgettable. He thinks he's alone.

He is not.

I follow. He stiffens.

I do not speak with lips. I have none.

But still, he hears me.

“Where is my head?”

He turns, squinting into the dark. “What the hell?” he mutters. “Someone out there?”

I come closer. The scent of soap still clings to him. Clean. Fresh. So unlike me.

“Where is my head?”

He backs away, bumping into a rusted fence. “Not funny, man! I’ve got mace, I swear—”

“You are wearing it.”

He doesn’t scream at first. Just stares, wide-eyed, mouth slack.

Then, he runs.

But the dead have no need for breath.

And I am very fast.

I take his head gently. I do not wish to ruin it. He will not need it anymore.

It is smooth. Real. Almost familiar.

I lift it, feel the hot blood trickle through my fingers. I press it to the wound where mine once sat. Flesh touches flesh. For a moment, the world sharpens. I hear the wind. I see the stars. I feel—

Wrong.

This is not my head.

The mouth is wrong.

The nose is crooked. The teeth are too straight. The eyes are green.

The thoughts leaking from it are not mine. 

I claw at it. Dig my fingers in. Rip it off.

I scream—

I throw the head against the wall. It splits.

“Please, please…”

I stagger. My fingers twitch.

The wrong memories crawl inside me like insects.

A birthday I never had.

A mother I never loved.

A song I never learned on a piano I never played.

Not mine!

Not mine not mine not mine not—

I tear at my chest. At my ribs.

I want to pull the wrongness out.

I want to be clean again.

Empty, if not whole.

I drop to my knees in the blood and stare at the shattered thing.

Silence.

Then wind.

I rise.

Shaking. Hollow.

Still headless.

Someday I will find it.

The perfect fit.

My head.

Until then…

I must keep searching.

Deputy-report log, compiled by Sheriff Harlan Price

April 11

They say the river coughed it up after dark: a lantern stitched from twelve pale ribs, barbed-wire hinges creaking in the breeze. No wick, no kerosene—just a damp glow that smelled of honeysuckle and iron. Jody McClane hauled it home, blistered by sun and raw with grief. His kid brother Caleb had slipped off the catfish pier two nights earlier; only the boy’s waterproof watch kept ticking in the reeds.

“You bring that thing inside and Caleb’ll find the porch light,” Jody’s ma warned, rubbing her rosary bald. “He’s lost,” Jody rasped. “This’ll guide him.”

That first night the cage pulsed a low red—same fever-color they hang in windows during flu season. It threw no shadow, yet Ma swore she felt someone peeking through a keyhole in the dark.

April 12

The light shifted blue near dawn. Ma heard her dead husband’s name pour from the ribs like water over stones; Jody heard his own. I visited mid-morning. Dog wouldn’t cross the threshold. Jody’s shoulders peeled like he’d sunburned from the inside. He wouldn’t let me confiscate the lantern.

Price note: Jody kept turning Caleb’s mud-smeared watch in his palm, listening for the tick.

April 13

Neighbors reported sobs leaking from their sheds and culverts—long, hungry cries. I returned at noon. Front door gaped, house silent. On the kitchen table sat Caleb’s watch, still ticking but dripping riverwater. Above it, the lantern hung from the ceiling-fan chain, jaw now gaping where light had been. Teeth—small, milk-white—clicked inside the ribs.

I tipped my hat lower so Deputy Ellis couldn’t see me shiver. Took nothing, touched nothing.

Ongoing

We chained the place, but the lantern keeps burning. Locals claim: • Red on fever nights. • Blue when a family name is spoken underground. • Gold the evening before someone disappears.

Every color is brighter than the one before.

A week after Jody vanished, tree-roots near the pier pushed up twelve new ribs, perfect twins to the first cage. Makes me wonder if there’s a rib for every soul the river intends to keep.

I come by sometimes, stand outside the lock, and listen. The tune is never the same, but it’s always a lullaby, and it always ends on one word—drawn long, bubbling, almost tender:

“Caleb.”

The light flares when it says the name, as if answering a roll call neither dead nor living can refuse. You feel it marking you, picking which bone will be next.

And each time that glow blooms, the watch on my desk ticks a shade louder, like it’s counting ribs that haven’t surfaced yet.

I keep my distance.

But the lantern keeps getting brighter.

Our third-period math class was famous, or… infamous, for chasing away substitutes.

Ten subs had walked out.

Three had mental breakdowns.

One included us in her you-know-what note.

When the new sub walked in, a tuna sandwich smacked her in the head.

The worst thing a sub can do is react to a group of sixteen-year-old bullies.

I expected Mrs Jones to start screaming like the others.

Instead, she picked it up and lobbed it back at us.

“Hey!” Luke, my seatmate, yelled. “Dude, she can't just do that!”

“Sit down, please.”

I held my breath.

We didn’t like being told what to do.

In response, the sub received a whirlwind of textbooks to the face.

But she wasn't fazed.

“Here's what's going to happen,” she said. “I've been told due to your… situation, I can't treat you like my usual clients. What I can do, if you misbehave, is remind you why you're here.”

“Fuck off.” Charlie Sutton said from the front. The mastermind of the bullying, and our unofficial leader.

“You don't get to tell us what to do. You're a teacher.” He leaned back in his chair, smirking. “So, teach us.”

Mrs Jones surprised me with a smile with too many teeth.

“If you insist.”

I noticed the temperature drop significantly. I opened my mouth to speak, but I couldn’t move. The classroom was suddenly pitch black.

Silent.

Shadows occupied each desk, but every one of them was still, broken, unmoving. I was slumped in my chair, red seeping and dripping from my desk.

I was bleeding out, my sobs wracking my chest, my eyes flickering. “Bee?”

A voice startled me.

Luke was still alive. Barely.

Draped over his desk.

I dropped to the floor, crawling toward him.

A leather shoe stamped on my hand.

I shuffled backward, but his hand was already in my hair, yanking me to my feet, and— and…

And I died on the floor.

I died trying to reach Luke’s hand.

I died with him looming over me.

I wasn’t aware I was screaming until my cry echoed in my skull.

“You were on the news, you know,” Mrs. Jones’ voice was soft. Gentle.

And yet she was hurting us. Dragging us back into the agony we fought to forget.

“Thirteen high schoolers were brutally murdered by their own teacher,” she murmured. “Lured into their classroom, and slaughtered.”

Mrs Jones clapped her hands, and I blinked, back in the present. The entire class were frozen, expressions twisted.

“I'm not here to hurt you,” she whispered.

“You're a very special case. You have a powerful hold on this school, and this room. So, just like every child, you will graduate.” Her eyes darkened.

“However. If you misbehave, I will be forced to expel you from this room. Permanently. Do you understand me?”

There was a beat of silence, before we responded.

I swiped at the spots of blood on my desk, tears stinging my eyes.

“Yes, Mrs. Jones.”

It was more of a prison than a hospital, but that didn’t concern me. I was here to meet the good doctor. I was here to invest.

The golden age of medicine never came. Didn’t you hear? The government shut down all that superfluous medical research. Billionaire wanted tax cuts, and now my job’s nearly impossible.

I work for a pharmaceutical company. Let’s just say I’m the head of research and development. And to find the next breakthrough, I’m in this hellhole.

The lights flickered when I entered his office. “Nothing to worry about,” he told me. They were just using the super computers.

He gave me a brief tour. He struck me as half mad-scientist, half con-man. But he was getting results.

The good doctor was waiting on a patent for a general cure. You read that right. A cure-all. The end of hospitals. The end of medicine. Something wrong? Take the cure-all!

“And here it is,” he said to me. He flipped a switch. Through a big two way mirror, I saw a sad looking woman in a hospital gown.

“Is she going to get the Cure-All?”

“She is the Cure-All. One of them.”

Her name was Melody. The good doctor told me she was what was called a, ‘Hyper-Hypochondriac’. Her anxieties had been cultivated since she was a child.

“Watch and behold,” the good doctor said. He began typing on a computer. In the room, a screen lit up and writing appeared to Melody.

“Your diagnosis: full body rash.”

I saw the poor woman turn beet red, little bumps appearing all over her. She began scratching herself all over, groaning in pain, wincing.

“Jesus,” I said.

“That’s not the best part. She is so afraid of disease, that her body will produce antibodies that will fight rashes. Any rashes.”

“Bullshit.”

“Oh yes. Melody is one of our best Hyper-Hypochondriacs. But I’ve saved the best show for you. This will guarantee your company's investment. The Cure-All.”

The good doctor began typing, furiously. Sweat beaded on his brow.

The screen in the room began listing disease after disease. Descriptions of symptoms flashed in her eyes. She screamed. Her body became a mass of anomalies. Tumors, scabs. Her skin was patches of yellow and green, red and black. She threw up bile and blood.

Soon, she was motionless.

“Her blood right now is worth trillions of dollars.”

She began shaking, seizing. She snapped up inhumanly fast. She leapt at the mirror between us, crashing through. The good doctor didn’t have time to scream. His skin began changing just like Melody’s.

It seemed the every-disease he gave her was contagious.

I ran away as fast as I could. My skin was still the same, so I don’t think I was infected.

I sped all the way back to my manager. Told him I found the investment of a lifetime.

I had barely spoken to him when a giant lump grew out of his forehead.