Heavy Breathing

If you’re ever alone and in bed at night, and the only thing that you can hear is yourself breathing heavily, try this: suddenly and randomly stop breathing.

You’ll trip it up. Now you know it’s there. And now it knows too.

Sleep well.

No Refunds

Welcome to Ridgeland Mall!” yelped an obnoxious teenager stationed at the entrance of Ridgeland Mall, Jacob’s hometown mall.

“Sure,” Jacob muttered as he shuffled by the greeter, his head lowered as if to hid his face from everyone.

Jacob was at the mall to get some things for his wife, Rachel. He loathed her, and she loathed him. After ten years of steady decay, their marriage was on the brink of collapse. Jacob endured this excursion to pick up his wife’s medication from Andre’s Apothecary only so that he might see the cute cashier, even if she was years younger than himself.

“Morning, Mr. Woodall,” said Mary, the object of Jacob’s affection. “Is it time for a refill?”

“Yes,” he grumbled. Though it sounded like anger, his voice was truly gruff out of shyness.

“Very well. I’ll be ready in a few moments,” she said as she disappeared into the back room.

Jacob sighed and cast his gaze outward, toward the other shops in the mall, and the various vendor carts that dotted the path to credit card debt.

He caught site of something odd outside the Pharmacy. On a cart was the word, WISHES! in big, bright, bold letters.

“Got it!” said Mary as she came from the back, and rang Jacob up, cutting off his concentration momentarily.

“Um, thank you,” said Jacob as he hastily paid her and left, opting to rush to the ‘Wishes’ cart.

“Good morning, sir,” said an oddly-garbed man who stood behind the stand. “Here at Wishes!, we have the wishes to change the world for the be-.”

“That’s well and good,” said Jacob, almost angrily at the man’s assumption that he cared what his sales pitch was. “Do they work?” he asked, incredulously.

“Of course my good man. I have here the finest wishing apparatuses for sale. This ring,” he said, pulling a ring from a wooden box. The ring was a simple gold band with three like-sized diamonds set in a row. “This ring here will grant you three wishes. After each wish, one of the diamonds will turn to coal. When all three are gone, the ring itself will become coal.”

“Right, whatever, how much does this hoodoo cost?” asked Jacob, so miserable he was considering buying into whatever the strange man was trying to sell him.

The man adjusted his top hat and rolled up the sleeves on his pinstripe suit. “This isn’t anything that just anyone can have. The responsib-.”

“Price, man. I need to change the world!” said Jacob so loud people turned to stare.

“For you, one hundred dollars. Only because I see you wish to change the world. But I mus-.”

“Thanks,” said Jacob, cutting off the man, slapping five twenties on the counter of the stand, and snatching the ring from the man. The strange man shook his head as Jacob hurried away.

“Thank you!” said the door greeter as Jacob exited the mall, then transfixed on his new treasure.

“I wonder how it works,” Jacob asked out loud. “Wonder if I just put it on,” he said, slipping the conveniently-sized ring onto his finger. “I wish my wife was hot,” he said.

With a slight cracking sound, on of the diamonds on this ring turned to coal, just as the man had said.

Jacob could hardly believe himself. He was so happy; he had to avoid speeding home to see his new, hot wife.

However, when he got home, he was instead met with fire trucks around his house, blasting the remains of his home with water.

“What’s going on here?” he shouted as he ran up to a person wheeling a body bag on a stretcher away. “What happened to my house?”

“We responded to a fire alarm here. When we got here, there was a woman, dead and on fire. We barely made it out when the flames touched a pool of liquid and sent the house up in flames,” said a firefighter nearby. “Where were you?” he asked.

“At the mall, getting my wife some pills,” he said, showing the receipt to the man.

“Well, then, you couldn’t have done this. The alarm was set off before you could have made it back here.

Jacob couldn’t believe what he was hearing. His wife was dead. He was sad, but then his sorrow turned to joy, and then joy to scheming. He excused himself to his car and whispered to the ring, “I wish that Mary was madly in love with me.”

Again, one of the diamonds set in the ring crackled and turned into coal.

Deciding he had to go get Mary, he hurried back to the mall. However, when he got there, the mall was surrounded by police.

There, he saw Mary being escorted out of the mall in handcuffs. “Mary!” he shouted.

“Jacob?” she yelled back, then saw him. “Jacob! My love! I did this all for you!” she shouted as she told him how she had killed his wife.

Jacob waited until the police had left to go into the mall and to the ‘Wishes!’ stand.

“You!” yelled Jacob as he pulled the ring from his finger and slammed it onto the counter. “This doesn’t make my wishes come true. It’s horrible. I want my money back!”

The man there shook his head.

“Ok, I see how it’s going to be. This is used. How about this,” Jacob said angrily as he shoved the ring back onto his finger. “I wish for my money back!”

Nothing happened. The man behind the counter chuckled as Jacob twisted his face in confusion.

“Didn’t you read the sign?” the man asked as he pointed below the WISHES! sign.

There, under the bright, bold letters was another piece of paper with bold black letters.

NO REFUNDS.

That Painting

I loathed that painting. It sat on the wall across from our bed. It stared at me all night. Watched me as I slept.

For years it hung there, my wife adamant that all this was in my head. She was steadfast in her belief that it looked good.

I knew better. I could see its eyes. Always looking at me. Those eyes. They assaulted me as I slept.

I know what you’re thinking-that I’m crazy. Well I’m not! That painting was of some woman. But she stared at me. I couldn’t take it! For five years she looked at me. Plotting.

So one night, while she slept, I doused her with gasoline. My wife burned well.
I tossed the painting on the flames, just to show her. She told me I could get rid of it...over her dead body.

Valor Made Real

Remember the scary monster you feared as a kid? Remember how, over the years, you stopped believing in it? Remember how the fear began to fade away?

Be glad you stopped believing in it. Over time, and with the sheer power of belief, some things can manifest as reality.

Too bad, though. You thought about it, didn’t you? That’s all it needed. Be afraid.

Cloak and Dagger

Davis was a normal high school student at Bateman High. He kept decent grades with minimal effort. He even had a girlfriend, Rachel, who was a cheerleader. Davis’s school was in a small, southern town, barely big enough to justify the one red light it already had. Davis, however, lived in a bigger city thirty miles away. However, due to problems with students there, he chose to change schools to the one where his mother taught English.

It was Davis’s senior year, and prom was two weeks away. A student named Lucy had been struggling in his mother’s class, and Davis offered to help tutor her in English and math.

Davis was happy to help a fellow classmate, and the first day of tutoring went well. Lucy thanked Davis for his help, put on her long trench coat, and went out into the crisp autumn air.

However, all the tutoring didn’t stay easy. When Lucy found out he was dating someone the day Rachel walked in and told him the plan for Friday, she began to scheme.

From then on out, tutoring Lucy became an exercise in keeping Davis away from Rachel. Lucy would also follow Davis around at school, stalking him. Rachel could hardly be alone with him for five minutes before she would show up.

So, finally fed up with Lucy’s antics and with prom in two days, Davis told Lucy he could no longer help her.

“You’re stalking me. It’s getting out of hand,” Davis said to Lucy as he walked out of his mother’s room. “I can’t spend time with the woman I love because a certain someone is always there.”

Lucy frowned. “I think I know what you mean,” she said softly as she began to walk home.

The next day at school, everyone whispered as Davis walked by. In his first class, he noticed Rachel wasn’t there, which was unusual for her. Finally, after lunch, his best friend, Shane, pulled him aside.

“Dude, you’re looking awful upbeat. I hate to bust your happy cloud there, but you didn’t hear about Rachel?” he asked, wearing a grim expression.

Davis began to shake. “What are you talking about? She’s going to prom with me still, isn’t she?”

“No, Dave. She’s dead.”

Davis fell to his knees, his hands letting out a cry of agony as they dragged along the painted concrete wall.

“W…what happened?” he barely managed to vocalize.

“Well, word travels fast in this place, but still not everyone is sure. One guy says he saw some guy step out in front of her car, wearing a long coat and a wide-brimmed hat. I’m sure she was coming home from her dance class, but the point is she swerved. Swerved to miss the guy and ran into a tree. I’m sorry, bro,” said Shane solemnly.

Just then, Lucy walked by. “I’m sorry to hear about your friend. Still want someone to go to prom with?” she asked, smiling faintly.

Davis looked up at her and remembered, back to when he first tutored her. She wore a long, black trench coat whenever it was cold. Now, however, she was wearing a different coat. Davis knew what had happened. But now, without that coat, no one would believe him.

“Don’t be sad,” whispered Lucy as she grabbed Davis’s hand. Davis was too shocked to object. “Now that certain someone can’t stop you from being with the one you love.”

Simply Nervous

Charlotte always told herself that whenever she felt someone watching her, that she was simply nervous. She would turn around and there would be nothing, but still the feeling was always enough to send her running to her destination.

One day, when Charlotte was walking down the sidewalk to her subdivision, she got what she termed her “typical paranoid delusion.” It was also then that, in her moment of lapsed concentration, she tripped over something. Despite the fact that she feared stopping, she picked up the object and looked at it. It was a side-view mirror from a car, obviously lost in a wreck. She knew the road there was dangerous.

Then, Charlotte gasped. In the mirror, she saw a figure standing a few feet back. Its face was human, but warped. Its arms were outstretched; the nails of its fingers were long and twisted. Then Charlotte shrieked in horror.

“OBJECTS IN MIRROR ARE CLOSER THAN THEY APPEAR.”

Scratchy Scratchy

As a child, Jeremy heard scratching coming from a section of wall in his bedroom. For years, he imagined such things as the murdered body of his brother clawing at the wall, trying to be found.

His mother, however, believed he was reading too many scary stories before bed. When Jeremy kept complaining she told him that the wallpaper in his room—an old floral print—was there to protect him from the evil spirit.

“So it keeps them out?” Jeremy asked.

“No,” she said with a frown. “It just keeps you safe,” she replied cryptically.

Years later, Jeremy had left for college and one Christmas decided to come back to see his family. That night, he slept in his old bed and was almost asleep when he heard the old, horrible scratching sounds coming from behind the walls.

It was then that an older and braver Jeremy got up, turned on the lights, and ripped the wallpaper from the wall to try to get a better look at things. Once the paper was gone, he spied a small, fist-sized hole in the wall.

Jeremy only meant to pull back a small piece of the wall, but managed to rip a large, child-sized area of wall. There, his eyes were met with rotting wood and scurrying spiders.

Breathing a sigh of relief, he tossed the section of wall to the ground, vowing to get some plaster in the morning and patch the whole thing up. However, something caught his eye that terrified him.

As he looked down upon the back of the wall, he could see dozens of deep grooves that looked like claw marks, most of which seemed to have been burnt into the wall.

Turning around, his eyes were met with a pair of fiery circles, standing where the section of wall once was. The last thing that passed through Jeremy’s mind was the realization that the paper was meant keep the evil spirit in.

Star-Crossed Night

Jake's college's theatre always locked up for Halloween. The legend around the school was that years ago on Halloween, a prop incident caused the deaths of two people: an actress and her stagehand boyfriend, who rushed to try and save her. They say that each Halloween the ghosts relive the play that led to their deaths.

Jake turned to his girlfriend, Sophia and said, “I see the old coots closed up this shack again this year. Silly superstitions. Bah.”

Sophia shook her head. She wished Jake was a little less bold sometimes. “Jake, babe, I’m sure there’s a better reason than just-.”

Jake cut her off. “No, hun. They close it every year out of this crazy belief of ghosts coming and performing. My brother went here years back, and he remembers them doing this every year.”

Sophia sighed. She knew what he was going to suggest they do. She had seen the look on Jake’s face before. It was a look of determination and excitement. This mean adventure and—more often than not—trouble.

“I know what we can do,” he said, grinning as he leaned against the door of the theatre. “There’s a window around back I left cracked and unlocked yesterday while I was snooping around. We can get in through there and prove there are no ghosts in there.”

Knowing she had little in the way of options, Sophia obliged. Around back, true to his word, there was a slightly open window. Below it was a stack of fairly sturdy-looking crates, piled conveniently right to the window’s edge.

Since it was getting dark and people were making plenty of noise around the area, no one took note of the two knocking over a crate or two as they climbed into the window and dropped down onto the floor in a changing room.

The entire theatre, usually bustling with noise of some sort, was eerily silent. The room they were in was clearly the women’s dressing room. There were wigs and dresses strewn about, as if the owners had left in somewhat of a hurry. The truth, however, was far less disturbing: housekeeping didn’t work weekends, and because Halloween fell on a Saturday, they had closed the theatre earlier in the day Friday.

“So, what do these stupid stories say about this place, Soph?” asked Jake as he fiddled with a few things in the room.
“All I really know is that the ghostly performance is supposed to happen at sundown on Halloween.

“The stage, then,” said Jake, grunting as he pulled the heavy dressing room door open. “Ladies first,” he said as he held the door open for Sophia.

As soon as they walking into the main part of the theatre, they both realized something was off. Though it was almost sundown outside, the weather was still on the warm side. However, in their current room, the air was cold and damn.
“Hey, you two,” echoed a female voice from behind them. “You shouldn’t be in here. Don’t you know the stories they tell about this place?”

“And just who are you?” Jake asked mockingly, turning around to face his accuser.

“I’m Tish, and it seems you had the same idea as my friend, Blake. He’s a bit stubborn, so he decided to try for the back entrance.” She stopped for a moment and pointed to the stage. “Ah, there he is now,” she said as a man stepped onto the stage.

“How did you get in, then?” asked Sophia.

“They forgot to lock the front door,” Tish replied with a smile.

“Hey, Tish, get up here,” Blake shouted. “The view is pretty nice from up here.”

Tish ran up the steps leading up the stage as Jake and Sophia made their way closer to the stage. Above them, a stage light could be heard swinging, as if loose.

“Hey,” shouted Sophia. “I wouldn’t be up there. That light looks unstable.” Concerned for them, she walked up the stage. As she did, the light snapped free of its rigging and plummeted towards Tish.

“Look out!” shouted Sophia as she pushed Tish out of the way. The light landed on Sophia, pinning her to the floor.

“SOPHIA!” Jake shouted, stunned by what had happened. He leapt onto the stage and tried to push the light off of her, but there was just enough power left in the light to send a fatal jolt of electricity through him.

As Sophia’s vision darkened, she heard Tish say coldly, “Thanks for taking our places here.”

The Old Hospital

A man, bleeding from a gunshot wound walks into a tall brick building. He screams for help, and two nurses rush out from a pair of swinging doors.

“Relax, sir,” one of them tells him. “We will take care of you right away.”

They lift him onto a stretcher and wheel him down a long hallway, full of typical-looking waiting rooms. However, from the rooms he can hear the sounds of muffled moans and the soft crunching of bones.

“What is going on in here?” he asked, panicking.

“We’re taking you to be taken care of,” a nurse said with a grin.

“The hell you are,” he shouted at he rolled off the stretcher and onto the floor, landing on his wound. “What kind of hospital is this? You’re supposed to heal people in a hospital, not kill them.

He backed up against a room and stole a glance into it. There, in a chair, a man with a rash could be seen being torn apart by hands that protruded from the walls and then pulled into the walls themselves.

“What is this?” he screamed as the nurses surrounded him and pulled out a syringe full of clear liquid. He struggled as they injected it into him.

As his vision began to fade, he muttered, “This is a horrible hospital.”

“Who said anything about this being a hospital?” the nurse asked. “This place just likes eating the weak.”

Must Find Amy

The zombie infection was spreading through John’s town, but that was the least of his worries. He had lost his daughter, Amy, and knew he had to find her.

For two days, he wandered around the town, sneaking past the wandering zombies. However, on the third day, he became desperate, and began to shout, “Amy! Where are you Amy?”

He yelled, not caring if any of the zombies hear him. Suddenly, a survivor stepped out. Excited, John ran toward him, asking if he had seen his daughter.

The man shot him twice in the head, hearing only, “Braaaains.”

Split Ends

In the city of Batesfield, in the Central United States, a serial killer was murdering women by cutting their heads open along their hairline.


As a response to this, the women set aside their pride and shaved their heads.


After a week of no murders, they felt safe.


That was, of course, until the body of a woman was found. Her head was smashed in.

Upward Staring Eyes

Julie missed going outside. Ever since she got sick a month ago, her life seemed like little more than a dream. All day long, the only thing she could do was watch the television stationed on the wall in front of her.


“Sleep well, mom,” Julie said as her mother walked into her room to turn off the television.


Her mother didn’t say anything to her again that night. Instead, she adjusted Julie’s pillow, sighed, and wondered if her daughter would ever come out of her coma.

Writing Home

Dear Mother,

Hello, mother, it’s your son. I miss you and wish you could be here. The future is such a wonderful place. The world is finally safe, and I helped to make it this way.

That’s right. I helped to save the world. I’m sure you remembered when the scientists announced their findings: that the world was collapsing under our own weight. That we had developed too much of the world.

America chose to lead the fight against this problem. After carefully combing through their options, they set up what they termed “Demolition Squads.” I worked for them, getting rid of things that were deemed to weigh too much.

At first, the world was opposed to such drastic measures. However, after the results showed the plan was working, they reluctantly followed suit.

It’s hard living with what I did for almost two years. All the homes I wrecked, the families torn apart. I just remind myself I helped save the planet.

I’m also glad obesity is no longer a problem.

Your son,
David

Wedding Band

I’ve heard the stories. Stories about the bride who plunged into a lake, clutching her new wedding ring.

I’ve heard about the man who found the woman’s corpse, bobbing just below the water’s surface. Heard how he pried the simple gold wedding band from her hands and made his way home.

I’ve heard about how he drowned himself in his bathtub, ring on his finger.

I’ve heard about how the paramedic had to cut his finger off to get the ring off. She had to have the ring. I’ve heard how she then drove her ambulance into the lake.

I’ve heard about this wicked ring. This simple band of gold. Simple, yet hauntingly beautiful. The ring that loves the water, yet drives people to possess it.

I just had to have that ring. Even if I had to pry it off a bloated corpse’s finger.

I’m writing this as a warning to everyone. I’ll continue in a bit. First, I think I’ll go swimming.

It'll Be Okay

She told me that it would be okay, that she was just going out to get some groceries. After all, the storm had knocked out power for several days and most of our food was beginning to spoil anyway.

I remember the fight we had all too well, even though it was over a week ago. By now we should be laughing it up. But we’re not, because I’m still mad at her. I guess it could be said we’re not on speaking terms.

“You hate driving, and refuse to do it!” she said as she hoisted a soggy head of lettuce into the trash can.

“There’s bound to be debris everywhere,” I said, cautiously. Power was still out, so we were fighting by candlelight.

“You just don’t want to be alone in the dark,” she said bitterly.

She was right.

I hated the dark. Feared it ever since I was young. At the time, there was no power in the city, save the supermarket, which could be seen from down the street.

She was always right. I came to hate it. I wished I could be right for once.

“I’m leaving, and when I get back I hope you’re in one piece,” she said as she grabbed her keys and headed for the door.

“B…but,” I stammered.

“It’ll be okay. I’m only going down the street to get some food that won’t rot. I’ll be back,” she said with a faint smile.

I watched her pull out of the driveway and off into the distance, past a house.

I kept hearing her in my head.

“It’ll be okay.”

“I’ll be back.”

It was just my luck.

This time, she was wrong.

Dangerous Game

There is a website on the internet which offers anyone the chance to play a dangerous game. They play to keep their souls in return for infinite knowledge about the internet.

There are, of course rules. Very strict ones. The worst part of losing at this devilish game? You must announce to someone that you lost the game.

Orange Tabby

When I was younger, I lived in a house on the other side of town. I also had a kitten. A pretty, orange, male tabby. In our neighborhood, cats would come up missing. Turns out, a Vietnam war vet was catching the cats and—most likely—eating them. Unfortunately, all our cats were always outdoor cats.

My cat disappeared one day, as had all the family's cat. We had lost about 4 cats by this time. Facing facts, we went and got a new cat, whom we decided would be an inside cat. She was a sweet calico cat. We named her Cricket.

A year or so after getting her, we moved to a new house. It wasn't but a few days in that house that I was sleeping in my room, the window of which faces toward the street. Cricket was in the room, but started hissing at the window.

Curious, I checked out the window and there was an old tabby cat outside. When it saw me, it started to rub against the outside of the window. Cricket slunk over to the corner and hissed constantly.

After a few moments of watching the cat, I went to the front door to see if it had a tag.

When I looked outside, there was nothing. No cat. I've never seen that cat since then, and no one in that neighborhood ever had such a cat.

I'll be damned if it didn't look like my old cat, visiting me one last time.

The Scavenger Hunt

The Scavenger Hunt

John's father handed him a well-worn list at his 18th birthday party. He told him it was a family tradition, that it was time to be a man.

"This list has been passed down through our family for generations," John's father said.

"It's a list of names, though, father," John replied, his face twisting into a confused expression. "In fact, I know one of these people. How can this list be that old?"

"Well, that's what you get for being the son of Death," John's father said coldly.