The Fishing Hamlet

He was the only one left in his tiny fishing village that was still human. He had been away, over at one of the much larger, more prosperous towns scattered across the countryside, attempting to sell his meager catch of some herring and a few small cod, and by the time he returned home the next day, at dawn, everyone in the tiny fishing village had disappeared. 

The dozen little homes built around the small inlet were still, lifeless. The shutters were all fastened. The fishing boats were still tied to the docks, and despite the light dusting of snow on the ground, no smoke rose from any the chimneys. 

He had entered his home in a daze. His wife and child were gone. There were no signs of violence. 

He had checked the rest of the houses. All the same. Nothing out of place. It's as if everyone had just walked into the ocean. 

He had fallen asleep that night, somehow. When he awoke, there was a piece of paper on his chest. It read: "Sell the fish. Return with the money." It was in his wife's handwriting. 

He stepped outside and his horse was waiting there, hitched to the wagon. In the back of the wagon was a large crate. He looked inside, and there, packed in snow, was a massive bluefin tuna. 

Not knowing what else to do, he did as he was instructed, and went to nearest town. 

That single fish sold for more than he usually made in a year. He brought all the money back, and left it on the kitchen table. 

And so it went. Every morning, he would awaken to find valuable and exotic fish packed neatly in his wagon, and he would sell them and return with the money. Every night, he was coming back with wealth beyond his wildest dreams, but he only felt the numb confusion and terror one feels only in nightmares. 

The notes, still in his wife's handwriting, would occasionally instruct other things.

He purchased land, and over time, built a grand estate on it. The agents who came to update him on the progress were baffled by this rough, sullen man in simple clothes who lived in a weathered cottage being the one in charge of and financing such a grand project. 

He had tried to leave, once. He had awoken at dawn, and ridden his horse until it collapsed from exhaustion, and then he ran and ran until his legs gave out. He fell asleep under a little copse of trees. 

When he awoke, he was back in the fishing hsmlet, in his own bed, There was another note. It read: "No."

Last I heard, the man was still working to maintain and expand that incredible mansion that he'll never actually see. And that's just one of the ways vampires make their money. Perhaps you're working for one, too. There may be no way to know for sure, anymore. You could try running away, if there's still anywhere left to run to. 

The End

Note: I was literally falling asleep at the end at I threw on this ending so that I would be furious enough to change it later. It was either this ending or "it was all a dream" but even I'm not that cruel. 

Lurking

I keep seeing something in the dark. Something tall, and thin, that has arms at long they almost touch the ground. It usually walks, slowly, gingerly stepping over houses, lurching across the barren orchards and fields. Sometimes it drops to all fours, its head bent down to the ground like it's following the scent of prey. 

I don't think it has eyes. 

I don't think it needs them. 

No one else seems to have seen it, and I'm not stupid enough to bring it up. If I have lost my mind, why is it only this one thing? I can still do my boring office job, and my friends and family haven't said anything, other than some gentle teasing when I want to get home early; that I'm getting too old. 

I tried driving away, once. After hours of driving, just before dawn, there it was, loping towards me from the opposite direction. I broke down and wept. Finally I turned around and went home. 

What's been nagging me lately is why it has never done anything to me. It lurks, it stalks, it won't leave me alone, but it only ever watches. 

What if it's keeping something away? Protecting me from something even more horrifying. Or maybe I'm just bait, and it's waiting for something else. 

I'm going to find out. I'll go out into the fields tonight, alone, unarmed, and I'll wait. 

This torment demands an ending. 

THE END

Binary Blues

I had a quarter-tank of gas, more than enough to get me through the week. The night was cooler than it had been in weeks; finally felt a little like October. I sighed. I didn't want to get gas now, and I sure as hell won't want to get gas later. When nothing you do matters, then you are truly free. I grabbed my keys and put on my lobster sandals. 

The mutts wanted to come along, so I let them in the backseat of the car and rolled down the windows. The autoplay on the stereo connected to my phone and started playing dark jazz; the kind of music that sounds like it's punching you in the gut while it smothers you with a pillow. 

I don't remember selecting that music. 

The intersection is down to one lane, but it's late and not busy. In the orange streetlights, I see a man and a woman sitting on the sidewalk and chatting, their bags scattered around them. They seem resigned but not unhappy. It's dark and I can't be sure. There is a god of pain, I think, and they must have eluded him today. I can't be sure. It's late and dark. 

I remember the terror of uncertainty. I think I liked it. 

I tell myself that now, but I can't be sure. Whatever it is I'm doing now feels like mimicry. A pantomime of solitude. 

Moving slowly, like a shark, just fast enough to live, but not fast enough to get anywhere.

The gas station attendant is nowhere to be seen. I use the self-fill station. As I press the buttons on the keypad, it beeps at me and adds zeros and ones and zeros and ones in a repeating pattern. Some binary message, probably. But I don't know binary, so I ignore it. 

My tank is full, and my car says I can now go 500 miles, if I drive conservatively. I feel a little better. 

the pig men were becoming a real problem

The hybrids had escaped from the lab and were eating all the crops and generally wreaking havoc. They were only 33.3 percent human, to get around the 29th Amendment to the US Constitution, that had decreed a minimum threshold of 40 percent DNA of human origin was enough to grant human rights. (And yes, we know how genes work and that we share DNA with many creatures, all living things are made up of the same basic building blocks, but this specifically refers to the source, not just the sequence.). 

They were more like pig centaurs, I guess, but without a clear delineation between the pig part and the human part. Imagine a regular pig; now stretch out just the neck, up and out like a horse's, but about twice as long. More like a llama. Then give it the oval shape of a human head, but much larger, with small, deep-set eyes, a pig snout, triangular ears, and bristles poking out all over. Many of the males will grow tusks. 

And right underneath the head, jutting out from under the chin, are a pair of small arms and hands. They look like someone stuck the arms of a five-year-old kid on them as a joke. They have five fingers, but no fingernails. 

It's the most unsettling thing about them. They are mostly active at night, but sometimes during the day you can see them resting under a shade tree, eyes closed, with those little arms folded underneath. 

Or the way they drink water by dipping their whole heads just above the surface of the river or pond and the little hands will scoop up the water and they'll slurp it up. 

Once, as I stood on my porch with the sun setting behind me, I saw one shading its eyes with its hands as it crept up to the edge of my vegetable garden. 

It's hard to keep them out. With those damn hands, they can open gates and latches. Even doorknobs. 

Someone really outta do something about those pig-men.

the end? 

Not really because this was/is a draft, one of many where I start jotting stuff down, and it's not even what I would call a story because nothing happens. Describing odd stuff is not a story. There are threads there, at least. There are definitely lots of opportunities for creepy hand things. Picking their teeth. Digging. Greeting each other by touching each other's faces. Or maybe face-holding. Pigs are omnivores and will eat any meat they can get so it seems natural that eventually these pig-men will try to eat someone. We'll see. 

Need Nothing

He was trying to get to bed early tonight. He'd felt off all week, and knew that it usually meant he hadn't been getting enough sleep. He wasn't tired yet, so he put on some instrumental music and stared at the wall. Off-white, knockdown-textured drywall. He would imagine shapes in the ridges and plateaus of the paint. A skyscraper. The head of a horse. A clawed hand reaching down. 

He closed his eyes and tried to sleep. Except... He could still see the wall. He opened and closed his eyes again. Still, the wall was there. He pressed his fingertips against his closed eyelids. 

He was wondering if he was dreaming when the clawed hand he has seen in the texture of the paint began peeling itself away from the wall towards him. 

Towards his face. Towards his eyes. 

He froze in terror. 

A searing pain, and then he saw nothing. 

The End

Author's Note: This was going to be about the mental strain of not being able to close your eyes and enjoy peaceful darkness once in a while but I quickly realized that being able to see clearly at all times is kind of a superpower and would become a whole thing and I didn't want to deal with the logistics of that right now. Goodnight!

*Note to self: it's twenty minutes later but why you don't you have him only see the image of the last thing he saw clearly? That could work. 

A Time Machine

You can travel to the past, if you really want to, but no one is there anymore. It's just an empty shell, a scaffolding holding nothing up anymore. In a past life, we met for the last time and hugged until we cried. I went back, once, and saw the tear drops on the ground and our footprints in the dust. 

You can go forward, too, but nobody is there yet. You can see amazing new places, cities and mountains and towns and architecture that means nothing to you, nothing to anyone, not yet. 

If I were trying to warn you against it, I would say "Time is like a river, and you can only step into a moment once" or something quasi-profound like that. 

But I'm not going to stop you. You've already gone, and I've already gone, but we didn't go at the same time. And we missed each other again. 

And I can go as many times as I like, for as long as I like, just hoping. But time moves on without us, unwavering, resolute. It will take longer and longer to get back to the present. Until one day, when you just won't make it. 

This isn't a warning. You've already done it. You already know this. 

Because you're the one who told me this. I read the message you left, written in the dust. 

The End

Author's Note: I was thinking about a story about a werewolf but then this happened. Goodnight!

Care To Go Around Again?

Shit. I'm finishing my second glass of Macallan 12 year single malt scotch when I realize that its September 30th. Nothing special about today, except that it usually means tomorrow is October 1st. That's the day I have a problem with. 

Exactly a dozen Octobers ago, I got a doppelganger. A double, almost an exact duplicate. I don't know how it happened. I was torn, I guess, wanting to be in two places at once. Then, I was. Staring directly at myself, like looking into a mirror. I had attacked him immediately. He had hesitated, I remember, which makes me suspect that even then, we weren't exactly the same. 

Other Me got in a lucky kick to my knee and I fell, and he ran. 

Haven't seen him since. 

But I know that he's still out there. I also know, somehow, that I'm completely safe for eleven months out of the year, but every October, for those 31 days, he gets a chance to destroy me. 

It's been so long now, and I haven't seen him at all. 

I stretch half-heartedly. I've been exercising, mostly. Partly. I'm ready for another physical fight anyway. My knee still bothers me, but I've got a brace for it. 

It's getting late, and I'm drowsy. He wouldn't attack right at midnight. That is, we wouldn't. It's too obvious. Plus, the dogs would bark. The dogs are the reason I don't just put booby traps all over the place. Also because, statistically, your booby traps are more likely to harm you than the actual intruder. Most major accidents happen in the home anyway. 

I hope we get to talk a little before we do battle. I have so many questions. Presumably, we have now had the chance to learn from double the amount of mistakes, so why not share that hard-earned wisdom with whoever wins? 

Whomever wins?

I'll also have to thank him, I suppose. These 13 years have been a lot of things, including a huge pain in my ass, but they haven't been boring. 

And I've got a good feeling about this October. 

The End? 

Well it begins. I'm going to attempt to write something fictional and spooky (or at least autobiographical and horror-adjacent) every day this month. Since I don't do NaNoWriMo. This one isn't that. Spooky, I mean. This isn't really writing; this is merely swirling the water a bit, as they say. 

I don't know, I don't like doppelgangers. We might be friends and I guess clothes shopping would be fun because we could share a closet. Still, imagine the pointless arguments. Everyone around us would probably kill us first. 

Goodnight!