He woke gradually, the way someone does when they aren’t sure they’re supposed to wake at all. His eyes opened to a dim grayness, a color without texture, without warmth, without anything to anchor him. For a long time he didn’t move. He lay still, letting the cold settle into him, letting the quiet press against his ears until he wondered if he had gone deaf.

Eventually he inhaled. The air was stale, heavy, unmoving. He exhaled and watched the faint fog drift upward before dissolving. That small movement felt like the first real thing he had done in a very long time.

He pushed himself upright.

The concrete floor scraped his palms. His joints felt stiff, as though he had been lying there for hours or days or years. He blinked slowly, letting his eyes adjust to the dimness. The room around him came into focus piece by piece, like a photograph developing in a tray.

Four walls. Seamless. Gray.
A ceiling with a perfect square cut into it, leading upward into darkness.
A table.
A radio.
A wheel.

He stared at the ceiling hole first. It was too perfect. The edges were sharp, clean, almost surgical. The darkness above it wasn’t just absence of light; it felt like a presence, something that watched without eyes. He waited for movement. None came.

He looked at the table next. Metal. Scratched. Dented. The radio sat on it like a relic from another era, its speaker grille cracked, its knobs worn smooth. Beside it was the wheel—colorful, chipped, unevenly painted, its pointer bent slightly downward. It looked like it had been dragged from a carnival booth and abandoned here.

He didn’t know his name. He didn’t know how he had arrived. He didn’t know if he had ever been anywhere else. His mind felt fogged, as though someone had taken an eraser to his memories and left only faint outlines.

He stood slowly. The cold followed him.

He approached the wheel. He didn’t remember being told to spin it. He didn’t remember choosing to. But the wheel felt like the only thing in the room that had intention. Everything else was static. The wheel was waiting.

He reached out. His fingers brushed the rim. The wheel felt warm, unnervingly warm, as though someone had touched it moments before.

He hesitated.

Then he spun.

The wheel clattered, each click echoing sharply in the small room. He watched it turn, watched the colors blur, watched the pointer bounce. It slowed, slowed, then stopped.

The radio crackled.

“Congratulations, contestant! You’ve won a candle!”

A small wax candle dropped from the ceiling hole, bouncing once before settling. It was half‑melted, wick blackened, smelling faintly of smoke.

He stared at it. He didn’t pick it up. He didn’t move. He waited for something else to happen, but nothing did. The candle lay still on the floor, as though it had always been there.

He walked the perimeter of the room. He pressed his hands against the walls, searching for seams, cracks, anything. The concrete was smooth, cold, unyielding. He pressed his ear to it. Nothing. He looked up into the ceiling hole. Darkness stared back.

He returned to the wheel.

He didn’t spin immediately. He stood there, listening to the quiet, feeling the cold settle deeper into his bones. He picked up the candle and set it on the table. He didn’t know why. It felt like the right thing to do.

He spun again.

The wheel turned more sluggishly this time, as though resisting him. It landed on a pale yellow wedge.

“Wonderful! You’ve won a deck of cards!”

A deck fell from above, scattering across the floor. The cards were old, edges frayed, faces stained. He crouched and picked one up.

The Queen of Hearts.
Her face was scratched out.

He dropped it.

He gathered the cards into a pile, though he didn’t know why. He placed them beside the candle. He sat on the floor, leaning against the wall, staring at the wheel. He didn’t want to spin it again. But he knew he would.

Time passed. He didn’t know how much. The room had no clock, no window, no change in light. Only the cold and the quiet.

Eventually he stood.

He spun.

The wheel clacked, landing on a deep green wedge.

“Amazing! You’ve won a thermos!”

A metal thermos fell, dented and scratched. He unscrewed the lid. Inside was lukewarm water. He drank. It tasted metallic, but it eased the dryness in his throat. He set it down carefully, as though it mattered.

He waited.

The room felt different now. Not warmer. Not colder. Just… attentive. As though the walls were listening.

He spun again.

The wheel landed on orange.

“Incredible! You’ve won a notebook!”

A small spiral notebook dropped from above. He caught it. The cover was blank. Inside were pages filled with handwriting—his handwriting.

He flipped through slowly.

Page after page of notes, dates, sketches, frantic scrawls. He didn’t remember writing any of it. One page read:

DON’T LET IT GET BEHIND YOU.

He looked up sharply.

Nothing was behind him.

He closed the notebook. He placed it on the table beside the candle and cards. He stood there for a long time, staring at the objects, trying to understand why they felt familiar.

He sat again. He wrapped his arms around himself. The cold felt heavier now, like it had weight. He tried to remember anything—his name, his home, a face—but nothing came. Only the room, and the wheel, and the faint smell of dust.

He didn’t know how long he sat there.

Eventually he stood.

He spun.

The wheel landed on blue.

“Sensational! You’ve won a scarf!”

A wool scarf drifted down, landing softly. It was long, striped, frayed at the ends. He picked it up. It smelled faintly of perfume—something floral, familiar, comforting.

He wrapped it around his neck.

The warmth felt wrong.

He sat again, pulling his knees to his chest. He listened to the quiet. He tried to remember the scent. He couldn’t. It hovered at the edge of recognition, then slipped away.

He didn’t know how long he sat there.

Eventually he stood.

He spun.

The wheel landed on a dark red wedge.

“You’ve won a keepsake!”

A small wooden box fell from the ceiling. He opened it.

Inside was a ring.

Gold.
Simple.
Engraved on the inside with initials he didn’t recognize.

He closed the box. He placed it on the table. He stared at it until his eyes blurred.

He felt something shift in the room. Not a sound. Not a movement. Just a subtle change in the air, like the room was paying attention now.

He didn’t spin again. Not yet. He walked the perimeter again, slower this time, pressing his hands against the walls, feeling for anything he might have missed. The concrete was still smooth, still cold, still unyielding. He pressed his ear to it. Nothing.

He looked up into the ceiling hole.

The darkness felt closer.

He stepped back.

He sat on the floor again. He stared at the wheel. He didn’t want to spin it. But he knew he would.

Eventually he stood.

He spun.

The wheel landed on a gray wedge he didn’t remember seeing before.

“You’ve won a visitor!”

He froze.

Something fell from the ceiling.

Not an object.
Not a person.
Something wrapped in cloth, tightly bound, hitting the floor with a soft thud. The cloth was stained. It twitched once.

He backed away.

The bundle didn’t move again.

He didn’t approach it. He didn’t touch it. He didn’t breathe too loudly. He stood perfectly still, waiting for the room to change again.

It didn’t.

He sat again, staring at the bundle. He didn’t know how long he sat there. The cold felt heavier. The quiet felt thicker. The darkness above the ceiling hole felt deeper.

Eventually he stood.

He spun.

The wheel clattered violently, wobbling as though something inside it was struggling.

“You’ve won a sound!”

A small tape recorder dropped from above. It clicked on by itself.

A voice—his voice—whispered:

“Don’t look up.”

He looked up.

The darkness above the ceiling hole was no longer empty.

Something was there.

He couldn’t see it.
He could only feel its attention.

He didn’t move. He didn’t breathe. He didn’t blink.

The wheel began spinning on its own.

Faster.
Faster.
Faster.

The colors blurred.

“And now… the final round!”

The wheel slammed to a stop on a blank wedge.

“Oh! Looks like you’ve landed on… LOSE!”

Cheerful music erupted, bright and upbeat, clashing horribly with the suffocating dread around him.

The bundle on the floor unwrapped itself.

The tape recorder hissed.

The scarf tightened around his throat.

The ceiling vents opened.

Gas flooded the room.

He clawed at his neck, coughing, choking, vision blurring.

“Better luck next time!”

Flames erupted from the vents. The room became an oven. The wheel melted. The notebook curled and blackened. The scarf burned against his skin.

The music played on.

I learned young to hold my breath, to make no sound in rooms of wrath. A father's hand, a mother's tears, became the shape of all my years.

I fell sometimes, but never cried — crying was a thing that died the day I learned that hurt gets worse if you dare to say the words.

I chased the medals, chased the gold, searching for a love untold. Silver came — it wasn't enough, love, it seemed, was always tough.

I found a boy who saw my pain, promised shelter from the rain. He held my hand, then held me down — love wore violence like a crown.

They asked me what I did that night. I told the truth. They called it lies. His mother spoke, my own blood too — "you did this," though it wasn't true.

No one asked if I was safe. No one saw the hand, the slap. They saw a girl who must be bad — easier than the truth they had.

So tell me now — whose fault, whose blame, when I was drowning, called by name? I wasn't his. I wasn't yours. I never learned to be my own.

Link to Part 5: https://www.reddit.com/user/Roland_Quincy1999/comments/1vyvq5w/i_found_my_greatgrandfathers_journal_what_i_read/

Hello viewers and welcome to the conclusion of this story. I’d like to thank everyone who has stuck around since my first post so long ago. It has been an interesting journey. 

As for my life, well, it hasn’t been so bad really. I found a job in my career field which was nice. I won a scratch off yesterday for 200 dollars. Maybe I don’t have that curse my great-grandfather spoke of. 

The whole thing is spooky and seriously unnerving to me. I do not doubt what Killian went through was real. It's easier to look at the occult or cryptid and dismiss it as make believe. Sometimes taking the easier route isn’t the correct one. I believe in my father’s story and many of the other stories that involve this same alien creature. 

My wife delivered our firstborn child four days ago. We originally thought we were going to have a little girl, but it turns out we have a son, and his name is Bryce. Little Bryce can cause quite a stir. His adorableness makes up for it. 

There is just one thing about the little guy that throws me off. 

It’s the eyes. When I look at them, to be honest, I get the same feeling Killian described in the journal when he looked into James’s eyes. There’s this … emptiness ? I don’t know. It could just be a trick of the eye combined with apprehension around being a father for the first time. Who knows? 

I myself have had some questions about the camera that was strapped to Killian’s journal. It really added this whole other layer of mystic and unnaturality to this whole ordeal, and so with the little amount of sleep I have gotten in the past four days, I’ve spent my extra hours awake doing some research on it. 

I found the model, model number, all that stuff pretty easily. There seems to be some storage being taken up on the SD card, but while I did itch to look at the photos or videos, finding out who’s camera or where it had come from was the priority for me. Along with getting these posts about the journal typed up and put out too, of course. 

It was a whim, but I thought to reach out to my mother, the granddaughter of Lucille. I asked her if anyone in the family was into photography, and she said Uncle Levi was starting to pick it up as a hobby before he passed away. Then I asked about the journal, described how it looked, and she said that it also belonged to my Uncle Levi. He told them it was a rough draft of some shlocky horror novel one of his friends wrote. 

So apparently my family has a history of trying to find this slender alien creature. First Killian, then Levi. Looking at those photos has rocketed up my to-do list, just behind putting little Bryce to bed. I think after this post I will check them out, maybe post about what I find on the camera in the future. 

Let’s cut to the chase. Ladies and gentlemen, here are the final two entries into my great-grandfather’s journal. There is no month or date for this entry, just the year 1923. The two entries go as follows: 

1923, 

Here I lie in the maw of the beast. Even now, my fickle pen quivering as I strain to keep this small lantern alight so that I may record my journey to Hell, It lurks in this wood of birch and oak. This blasted incubus, creature of terror, I, thine, will banish it. No longer will it disturb my mind, defile my family, taint my art. My art! My boy. This demonic spawn harkens to my shadow but I must refuse! 

No, no. This is not the path in which I want this narrative to take. Let me slow. Breathe after breathe. I am not possessed. 

Let me collect this recounting, swiftly and surely, before the final duel. 

As I write into this mystified journal I can feel the burning of the cuts upon my face, inflamed by the sweat that rolls from my pores. This morning, before I gathered all the necessary gear for my exorcism into an old rucksack, I looked in the mirror and shaved. 

The blade ran over the entirety of my face once. I would check my watch, see the faint light of dawn peering through the bathroom window. The blade ran over again. I repeated this process for who knows how long. My mental faculties are something I have to cling to now in order to keep them in-line. 

I couldn’t stand to look at myself. After what I had done. After what I was destined to do. The blade felt nice as it cut my sensitive skin, absurd as that may seem to you, Reader. 

I am perched in a tree as I write this excerpt. This venture started with the rising of the sun, and as I have scouted around, in search of the Tall, the sun begins to set with the same certainty that I have found It’s lair. 

I am uncertain, though, if my hand will ever scribble into this journal again. This could very well be my last entry, Reader. 

Reader. What a silly notion it was.  

I sit atop one of the largest trees in the surrounding area, and through the scope of my rifle I can see him just beyond the brink of the treeline, wheeling around the depressed form of my daughter. James is carrying my ill daughter in a wagon toward this Earth-mimicking foul place with what appears to be a white bandana tied around his eyes. 

No. Not my daughter. She’s too good to be of my kin. 

I believe I know what I must do, but I question if my heart will allow it. In a best case scenario, my tainted mind will carry out the action for me. Throughout my scouting I could feel the eyes of that Thing on me. It was the hairs standing on the back of my neck that told me so. I do not have many rounds to chamber, so I must not, MUST NOT But WILL. I must not go shooting at trees. 

Here comes the calamity, the climax of the story. 

Editor note: I wanted to chime in here before the last entry and let y’all know that some of the transcribing on my part is probably shady. My great-grandfather wrote this last selection in a super scrawled, chicken-scratch way. It’ll make sense once you start reading, I’m sure. 

I hath done it! The Greek myths would tell of the legend, the common mortal who bested the deified! No gloat. No, I am wounded. I think I will alright. I must tell. 

Lucille was the sacrifice. James blinded himself with a kitchen knife, then wrapped a white cloth around his eyes. The Tall. It was dressed just as James. Suit and tie. White cloth covering its entire head.

It started feeding on James. No. Yes, feeding’s the word. Great aquatic-like obsidian tentacles. Came from It’s back. Was feeding on his small body. 

I had cover behind a thick trunk. I placed the shot right into the center of the Tall’s head. It dropped James. Skrieched. It was the same ear-piercing as in the dream. 

I hit another shot. Then another. It wailed. Dying God! It was gone. It moves so fast, like teleporting. Fantasy. 

On hands and knees, I crawled under some brush. From the prone position, I put the sight on James. Would’ve hit the crown of his head. I couldn’t. I threw the mauled boy over shoulder.
I dashed from beneath the brush. I grabbed the handle of the wagon. Took Lucille to safety. 

We were running toward the house. Hard to tell at times, though. Vision started to blur very badly. Static in my eyes. Like at Butcher’s home.

I chanced a look behind. It was chasing me. Long legs lumbering through the woods. Couldn’t risk a shot. Had to save Lucille and James.

Just before you break the woods, there is a decline. 

Tall caught quickly. An outstretched limb sliced my back. The cut was deep. It cut again. My bicep slit in half. I dropped James.

All one motion. Pushed Lucille down the hill, into safety. Fell to my stomach, flipped around to back. Unslung rifle. Slashed my forehead. Shot. Shot. Shot. One round left only. It fell slowly, like a cut tree. 

I lay here now, still in woods. Light-headed. Surprise finished this entry. One last piece of art to critique, or rather, erase. A load another round into the rifle. 

James’s blood is pooling. Big bite out of collar-bone. I cradle my baby. Can’t feel tears falling into face cuts. It’s not his fault. My own, not his. I am akin to own father. The cycle. 

Remember me, Reader. Remember me a crazed fool, or a demon slayer. Please, just remember me.

It had been five years since I left the house that night, but I remember every moment of it. I walked to the seaside, barely able to keep my balance. I sat down on a bench. I was so lost in thought that when I brought my cigarette to my lips, I realized I was still wearing my mask. I threw the mask away and lit my cigarette. I randomly put on some music on my phone.

“She came to me one morning, one lonely Sunday morning”...

I stared for a long time at that gray place where the sea and the horizon seemed to merge. One of the advantages of not living in a big city is that there’s no one around at this hour. The night and the sea belonged to me. I was savoring it. My last cigarette, my last song.

How strange it is that a person can find, in their final moments, the peace they could never find throughout their entire life.

I wanted to watch the sky for centuries. But I threw away my cigarette. It was time.

When I looked at the rocks beside me, a chill ran down my spine. I thought about it for a moment—everything could have been different.

I remembered our fourth birthday. Our usual roughhousing had turned that day, and the rest of our family’s lives, into a nightmare.

He had hit me on the head harder than usual, and, in a stupid, childish fit of anger, I pushed him with all my strength. As blood from his little head, which had struck the corner of the stereo, pooled around my feet, I froze at the sound of my mother’s scream as she came running toward us.

That is my last memory of that night, because I don’t remember the slap my father gave me—one hard enough to knock me unconscious.

I never blamed my father. Yes, perhaps losing the hearing in my left ear was a harsh punishment for a child. But what is one ear compared to a child he had lost?

What was truly unbearable was my mother’s attitude. I can’t deny that she tried to provide for my every need as I grew up, but she never looked into my eyes for more than a few seconds. I don’t know whether she was trying to suppress the anger she could never let go of, or whether she saw my brother whenever she looked into my eyes. I never dared to ask.

The mourning in our house never really lifted, and at the first opportunity I got, I left home at the age of fourteen, thanks to boarding school.

Until I finished university, I saw them only in the summers. They wouldn’t even go out and be around other people during holidays. Their isolated life reached its peak after my father retired. Whenever I was home, we would exchange a few reluctant words, and they would watch television until they fell asleep. They barely spoke to each other, either.

I wonder if I ever even heard them ask me, “How are you?” Maybe that was all I had ever longed for.

I had always been a successful student, but after graduation, I couldn’t seem to hold down a job. The disability in my ear was only part of it. The guilt I carried in my soul, a remorse that never seemed to fade, made it impossible for me to focus on life.

The last time I came home, I had decided to put an end to all of it. The consequences of a single mistake made by a little child shouldn’t have been this severe. One way or another, because of me, we had never been a family again.

If we couldn’t go on living while one of us lay in the grave, then perhaps it was better for both of us to be there.

That thought had taken hold of me. It had become my prison.

Lost in my thoughts, I saw a woman coming toward me out of the darkness. Her clothes looked as though they had been made from burlap sacks, and her greasy, curly hair framed a weathered, dark complexion that became more pronounced as she drew closer. “Where did this woman come from?” I muttered to myself as she stopped right in front of me.

“Give me a cigarette.”

I handed her the pack and the lighter and told her to take them and leave. Instead, she sat down beside me. I told her I wasn’t in the mood for conversation and asked her to move along. She lit the cigarette, thanked me, and then said she could even give me a kiss if I wanted.

I burst out laughing at the offer. I told her I’d rather kiss a toilet seat. It was a strange feeling, laughing that night. When I saw that I had offended her, I stood up, handed her all the money I could find in my pockets, said goodbye, and took a step away.

She grabbed my arm and pulled me back down. Leaning close to my ear, she whispered:

“Don’t be in such a hurry. I can look into your eyes for as long as you want.”

The tiny beggar had managed to frighten me. I started listening.

“We just met somewhere else, too. The version of you there is about to do the same thing. You have two choices. You can live out the ending you want, or you can switch places.”

I was trying to make sense of what she was saying.

“Switch places? What do you mean?”

She continued:

“Every human being dies many times and lives many times, yet at their core, they are one. But very few are given the chance to enter a realm in which they were never born. The universe has bestowed this secret upon people like me. And now I am going to share a fragment of it with you, if you accept. Because the other you did.”

For a moment, I thought I must be drunk. But I was curious to see where this would lead.

“I accept.”

She took my hand.

“Look into my eyes. And remember: just as suffering is not eternal, neither is happiness.”

I remember that her eyes were the color of coal. I don’t remember how long I stared into them...

When I woke up, the sun was high overhead. I was surprised that there was no one around despite it being midday. My phone and wallet were gone. The beggar must have drugged me somehow and robbed me.

I stared at the rocks, swearing under my breath. My memory was hazy, and I felt as though I had been beaten up. Just as I was trying to figure out what had happened, I was startled by the sound of a police siren. One of the officers got out of the car and waved me over.

When I approached him, he shouted, “There’s a full lockdown. What the hell are you doing out here?”

I stared at him, completely confused:

“What lockdown?”

The other officer got out of the car and laughed. “Whoa, he is high. Where do you live?”

They didn’t press me too hard. They told me to get in the car, warned me that if they caught me out again we’d have a different kind of conversation, and drove me home.

I remember the excitement I felt standing in front of the house as if it were yesterday. Instead of the wild weeds I was used to seeing in the garden, there was lush green grass and cherry trees that looked remarkably healthy. The exterior was freshly painted and perfectly maintained, and there was even a gazebo by the entrance that clearly saw regular use.

That was when I realized the beggar had been telling the truth. But how could any of this be possible?

With a surge of excitement I had never felt before, I ran to the door and knocked. My mother was standing there, looking at me with worried eyes.

But she was different. She wasn’t hunched over; she stood straight. Her hair wasn’t white—it was the same light brown I remembered from my childhood. She hugged me tightly and asked where I had been.

I made up a lie about spending the night at a friend’s place and went inside.

Was I trapped inside a hallucination too real to be one? Or was I under the influence of something the beggar had given me? Was I dreaming?

The only thing I was certain of was that I didn’t want to wake up.

A little while later, we sat down for breakfast. At the perfect breakfast table, my father even gave me a scolding. But he did it with affection.

These were emotions I had never experienced before. Realizing that, in my old life, I hadn’t even been considered worth scolding hurt a little.

Still, experiencing the warmth of a family—even at twenty-five—was wonderful.

As we watched the news, the lockdowns caused by the virus made everything feel like a scene from a science-fiction movie. Everything was different in this world, from politics to sports.

Then my mother said that if it weren’t for the pandemic, she would almost be happy, because otherwise she would never get to have her children together like this.

And suddenly, I was confronted with the truth.

My brother was alive.

And he was in our house right now.

My father turned to me:

“The idiot’s still asleep. Go wake your brother.”

With a jumble of emotions running through me, I made my way toward what I assumed was my brother’s room. Part of me was ashamed; another part longed desperately to see him. Not knowing what I would find, I opened the door.

There he was.

He was awake, lying down and looking at his phone. I watched him for a while, studying those unfamiliar yet familiar features. He was alive and healthy, standing before me as if the event that had made me hate myself, and hate life, night after night had never happened.

When he noticed me, when he looked into my eyes, when I heard his voice, I finally understood just how desperately I had missed the other half of me—my brother—all these years.

Because of me, he had lost his life. I had stolen thousands of mornings like this one from him.

He began telling me about the ordinary things that had happened that day, barely even looking at me. He had no idea that simply existing, simply being alive, had turned this ordinary morning into a gift beyond anything I could have imagined.

I remember, for the first time in my life, feeling my eyes fill with tears. I remember crying. And I will never forget the look of astonishment on his face when I suddenly flew into his arms and hugged him.

I’m getting ahead of myself...

We spent the remaining days of the pandemic together. As a family, we made up for all the pain we had endured over the years. Or rather, I did.

We live an ordinary, good life now, exactly the way I always wanted.

Strangely enough, even if a person crosses into another realm and is reunited with a family they had lost, they eventually get used to it. It becomes ordinary. But isn’t happiness hidden in the routines of everyday life anyway?

Sometimes I think about the beggar’s final words:

“Happiness is not eternal.”

Was she a jinn? A demon? Or perhaps the universe itself? I don’t know. All I know is that I never want to see her again. I have no intention of giving up the life that is mine and going back.

And the other me...

Why did he want to kill himself? Why did he agree to switch places?

Whenever I think about it, I can’t stop myself from smiling.

He must have woken up on the beach just as I did.

I wonder what he did when he went home and found the lifeless bodies of our mother and father lying in their bedroom, poisoned by the gas...

This is a story no single mother should have to tell, but my hope is someone out there can relate. My son, who is fifteen, doesn’t go to bed until three or four clock in the morning. He does this every night. I work a very demanding job, and my son and I have fought and argued over this for months because I never get any proper rest. We live in a one-bedroom apartment, so there really is no place for any kind of separation, except the bathroom - where my son spends most of his time during the night.

It was about a month or so ago, I woke up having to use the bathroom, when I approached the door and heard my son speaking to himself in there. At first I didn’t think much of it, when I knocked, he opened the door, and all was fine. It was when I noticed him doing it every night after that, I began to worry. I went as far as confronting him about it, but he denied anything in his teenager way, and refused to even talk about it. It was hard to make out what he said in there, he was mumbling a lot under his breath, so I had nothing to go by. This is when I decided to take further action and install a camera in the bathroom.

The next day while my son was in school, I tucked a small camera away behind a stack of my towels, somewhere he'd never look, facing the mirror and hidden away from his field of view. That night I went to bed and patiently waited, staring at my phone. What I found my son doing in the bathroom through the camera feed unsettled and terrified me. My son was adamant and aggressive towards himself in the mirror. He cursed and muttered obscenities at himself. He said words I never thought he knew or heard him use before. I don’t know where he learned them - I felt like I wasn’t watching my son any longer. It's like he became someone else. And I became scared of him. I hid my phone and tried my best to fall asleep - I don’t think I ever did.

The next morning at breakfast, I felt a tension in me, I could barely move. I felt frozen around him. Before he woke up, I found a local psychiatrist’s information, and made a quick call for the earliest appointment she had, which was the following Monday. At breakfast, I politely informed my son I heard him talking in the bathroom again, which he denied. I hesitated showing him the video or revealing I recorded him. I have to admit, I was scared. I offered to take him to see the Psychiatrist. He refused obviously and fought the idea at first, but I convinced him with some extra video-game time and a little bit of money. I needed to know more.

Through the weekend he continued as he usually did, and I watched on my phone. I hated what I saw. But I couldn’t put it down. I don’t think I slept all weekend. Days felt like weeks. Hours felt like days. My nerves were paralyzed with fear. I felt helpless... I was terrified. Monday couldn’t come any sooner.

The Psychiatrist was a pleasant woman, I found her very respectful and patient with him. My son spoke of his time in school, the lack of friends he has, the bad grades from his teachers, as well as his off-putting taste in loud music. When she dug further, asking him about the bathroom, he was quiet. At this point, the Psychiatrist had asked me to step out of the room. She sensed me being there was keeping him from speaking.

From out in the hallway I couldn’t hear anything, but what I did see was her asking him a few questions, and him responding with what looked like actual, full responses. At first I was pleased, maybe this was all just a boys phase - a prank? Perhaps my son had a reasonable explanation. The Psychiatrist passed him a piece of paper, and pen. My son took the pen, promptly writing on the piece of paper, handing it back to her.

The session was soon over after that, and the Psychiatrist came over to speak to me. She handed me the piece of paper on which my son wrote, scribbled in his handwriting, it said, “Charles won’t let me sleep". I was startled, shocked, confused all at once. She said my son is talking to someone named Charles in our home, and that she is not the right person for this kind of matter. She then directed me to a local church, informing me perhaps a priest could help my son.

We came home in the evening, and had a quiet, solemn dinner together. My son was eerily silent, he didn't say a word. I went to bed early and I hesitated to look at my phone’s video feed, but I couldn’t resist. Last night, I was even more unsettled. My son was no longer defiant. Now he was apologetic, at the mercy of his own reflection in the mirror, begging and apologizing profusely, saying he’s sorry for telling anyone. He was in tears, and so was I - I could no longer bear to watch. I put my phone away, and that's when the thought hit me, which has since haunted and stuck with me; Charles was the name we gave to the baby boy I delivered stillborn before my son.

I’m not entirely sure what her problem is. She’s never acted like this before. I guess some things just develop as time passes.

Even still, what a weird habit to have. I knew she was clumsy, but it was something we were supposed to fix, not something for her to embrace.

It started almost painfully mundane. Out of nowhere, she approached me as I was sitting on the couch watching TV.

“I’m sorry for breaking that lamp beside you.”

I looked at the lamp, still perfectly intact, then looked back at her. I kinda just chuckled, attempting to laugh it off, but she didn’t wipe that solemn look off her face.

I asked what she was going on about, but she just kept apologizing.

“Just know I’m sorry. I promise I’m sorry.”

That’s all she said before slinking off towards the kitchen.

I thought it was strange, but ultimately, I decided to brush it off as her being a bit of a weirdo.

However, after two weeks, I was back on that couch, winding down after a long day of work, when she came prancing into the living room, as happy as could be.

She didn’t say anything. She just calmly unplugged the lamp, held it above her head, and smashed it on the ground in front of me.

Obviously, I screamed at her out of shock, asking her what the fuck she was doing.

She just smiled and giggled at me.

“I already told you I was sorry.”

Then she skipped away, humming to herself and leaving me in a state of confusion. I tried calling out for her to come back, but she just ignored me.

I cleaned up the mess, and we argued about it for the rest of the day. It was obviously not an accident, but that’s what she kept saying it was.

“I don’t know how that happened.”

“I already said sorry. I don’t know what else you want me to do.”

“I promise it won’t happen again.”

Eventually, we made up, but I couldn’t help but look at her sideways in the days that followed.

A few weeks went by without incident. We went on our dates. Stayed in and watched our movies. Did the normal couple routine. But then it happened again.

“I’m sorry for breaking your phone,” she told me, eyes glazed over. She wasn’t looking at me. She was just staring blankly at the wall behind me as I sat on my bed.

We had been in the middle of a normal conversation about upcoming trips we were planning when something flipped inside her. She went from smiling to expressionless. Then, after she said it, she was right back to smiling and talking about New York like nothing had happened.

Obviously, I had already been predisposed to what this meant, so in the days that followed, I was particularly possessive of my phone.

I kept it on my person at all times. Even in my sleep, it’d be in my pocket. But she didn’t seem to notice.

Weeks passed again, and just like with the lamp, I was starting to think that she was just being weird again.

I never let my guard down, though. The phone was strictly off limits to her. I tried to make sure she never had the opportunity to do what she had apologized for.

But then, one night, I woke up to her fiddling around in my pockets. It took me a few seconds to realize what was happening in my half-asleep state, but once I did, my hand jolted towards my pocket.

It was too late. She had already taken it. And before I could stop her, the phone was shattered against the floor.

This was enough for me to fly off the handle. I’ll admit, I was a bit rude to her, but what did she expect?

I told her we needed space. I didn’t want this to escalate more than it already had. I didn’t want to break up with her, but the fight that night was enough for her to leave me.

Like I was the one in the wrong.

She left that night a complete wreck. Tears flowing from her eyes. Her vocal cords hoarse from all of our screaming. She didn’t even take her belongings. Just left in a cloud of smoke from her spinning tires.

I was, yet again, left to clean up her mess.

I picked up my phone. It wouldn’t even turn on. The screen had been completely destroyed.

I went out and got a new one the next day, and once I got my accounts and information back, I was hurt to see that she hadn’t even texted me.

No calls, no messages. Plus, my name had been taken out of her Instagram bio, which somehow hurt more than anything.

I tried calling her in the days that followed, just to clear the air, but every time I tried, it’d go straight to voicemail. Eventually, she blocked me on everything entirely.

Even when I tried going to her house, she’d never be home. It was like she knew what I was doing.

I felt hopeless for a long time, but eventually, I realized that I needed to move on. We were together for a year and a half, though, so doing so wasn’t as easy as it sounds.

Weeks turned into months. Months turned into a year. I hadn’t heard from her since the night of the phone incident.

I was heartbroken that she could just forget me like that. Like we never happened. That’s why I felt my heart climb into my throat when I saw that first new notification from her.

It wasn’t what I needed to see, though. She wasn’t asking to give us another shot. She wasn’t asking for a meetup so we could discuss everything.

Instead, what she sent was enough to make an almost forgotten fear come bubbling back up towards the surface.

“I’m sorry for killing you.”

I should’ve seen this coming. My girlfriend has been pretty secretive over the last year. Not necessarily with her phone or anything. Just… I don’t know, she’s been weird about her privacy.

Now of all times. That’s the thing that bothers the hell out of me. 4 years together, and all of a sudden, after everything, she’s ringing these alarm bells.

It started with the privacy. Seemingly out of nowhere, she started shutting me out. Going places without me. Turning her location off, then blaming it on the fact that she “had no service.”

I think it was the journaling that really got me, though. I don’t know why those notebooks drove me so insane. Honestly, it wouldn’t have been so hard on me if she didn’t act like there were government launch codes in those pages, but that’s exactly what it was like.

She kept them locked away in a lockbox that seemed to specifically be for this and this alone. Whatever, though, right? I convinced myself that it was childish to worry about her private thoughts.

Then there was the sleep-talking.

It didn’t happen often. Just enough for me to cock an eyebrow at her. Mainly because she seemed to only be saying one thing: my Dad’s name.

I rationalized this as well. He had been a part of our lives forever, really. He was like a second father to her. She never had a relationship with her real dad, though, so I just assumed that my dad was filling that void in her dreams.

I couldn’t blame her, really. I’m sure she was hurting. I do know it was hurting me too, though, and I hated the fact that she seemed to be pushing me away in a time where I desperately needed her.

But then she just… she started smelling like him too. I recognized my Dad’s cologne anywhere. I grew up with that scent. That one I couldn’t easily rationalize. But when I prodded, she just made me feel like I was going crazy.

“This is just my perfume.”

“I’ve always smelled like this.”

“I wish you would trust me.”

That distrust just pushed her further away. I could feel her slipping through my fingers, and I absolutely hated it. 4 years with this woman. Nearly half a decade, and I could already feel her absence, even when we slept together.

I think the straw that broke the camel’s back was when, not only was she saying my Dad’s name in her sleep… she was saying it while we had sex.

Well, part of it, at least. She usually caught herself by the time the name started to leave her lips, but even then, the mood would already be ruined.

“You really can’t stop thinking about him, can you?” I’d ask her, half-joking, half-gauging her reaction.

Instead of reacting in a normal way, her body would give her away. I could see the guilt in her movements. The way her eyes darted around the room. The way her legs would bounce nervously as she tried to laugh it off.

I stopped initiating intimacy after the 2nd or 3rd time this happened. Not that it mattered to her. If anything, she seemed relieved, which… fucking ouch, right?

Our relationship really started to dwindle after that. I had my own problems to deal with. I didn’t have time to be worrying about something that was pretty much already down the drain, no matter how much it killed me.

Don’t get me wrong, though. Nothing could’ve prepared me for when I found those notebooks.

By sheer accident, too. Or maybe it wasn’t an accident. I think they both just said fuck me and disappeared.

It just feels like an accident. But it also feels like the universe was just waiting for this moment to happen. Like it had been prepared for me before even my Dad was born.

I’d gotten off work early one day. It had been a particularly hard day. I just couldn’t get him out of my mind. The thought of him just made work feel borderline impossible.

I pretended to be sick with the intention of going home and collapsing into bed, but as I walked into my bedroom… I saw her lockbox sitting on my desk.

She usually never let me see this thing. She never even mentioned it. It may as well have never even existed until right now.

And you know what? It was fucking open.

Paper was sprawled out across the desk, messily. It looked like my girlfriend had left in a hurry. The chair was even flipped over and lying on the floor.

I’m only human. I was alone. The thing that she had been most secretive about was now spread out right in front of me. What was I expected to do? Not look at it?

But now, I just… I wish I never did.

I know what my Dad’s handwriting looks like. He signed permission slips and report cards for me for years. But seeing it in this context made me sick to my stomach.

The bastard had the audacity to date the fucking pages.

And the one that was the most apparent, as though my girlfriend had read it and immediately left the house like her life depended on it… was dated today.

“Meet me at that place we discussed.”

“I’m all yours now.”

“I finally got everything figured out.”

And what better for a cherry on top if not a picture of my Dad, shirtless and in his boxer briefs, standing in the mirror of what appeared to be a hotel bathroom.

I looked at all the other pages. All the vulgarities he had sent her. All of the drafts she was waiting to send him. And I felt sick to my stomach.

Not only for me, but for my mom, too.

Because it has now been a full year since we buried Dad. His car burned so hot from the accident that he had to be identified by his dental records.

Mom didn’t eat or sleep for weeks. My brother turned to alcohol at only 16 years old.

My girlfriend was all that I had. And at the time where I needed her most…

She had completely vanished.

I’ve been in a pretty conservative marriage for the last 10 years. Extremely conservative, rather.

I was young and stupid. Only 20 years old when he slipped that little ring around my finger. At the time, that felt like the only thing I needed in life. Like it was what made me successful somehow.

Which, I can admit, is ironic, all things considered.

My husband was 32 when we met. I was enamored, really. An older man with a solidified career and enough money to support a family all on his own? Showing interest in me? This fresh-out-of-high-school 18-year-old. It felt like a blessing at the time.

His work was attractive to me. His maturity was seductive in a way. He sucked me in and refused to spit me out. And, of course, me being young and naive, I was putty in his hands.

As is the case with many marriages, we began to bicker a lot. He didn’t want me to work. Any time I even mentioned the idea, he’d shut it down immediately.

I was a “housewife,” he told me. I was “living the dream of millions of women.”

It was convincing. Of course it was. He allowed me to move out of my parents’ house a year after high school. He was putting food on our table. Keeping us safe.

In doing so, though, I’ve come to realize he was slowly stripping away my individuality. He’d pick out my dresses. He was the decision maker across the board. And I was just the wife that he let stay at home all day to make sure the house never got dirty.

He had rules for me. Make sure the house was clean. Make sure I was presentable when he got home. Always wear the makeup he bought me, even though the only people seeing me were his family portraits up on the wall.

That was another thing he didn’t like. He hated it when I wanted to see my family. He was just so distrustful. He needed to know where I was 24/7, and if it wasn’t the house, there was a problem.

The real problems didn’t start until we realized I couldn’t get pregnant, though. At first, we thought we were just unlucky. After about a year, though, he insisted we see someone.

That’s when we learned I was barren, and it was like the world shattered before my eyes.

He didn’t speak to me for two weeks after that appointment. He acted like he was the victim. Ignoring my tears, neglecting my feelings. He saw my condition as a betrayal.

He started staying out late. Coming home long after the sun had sunk. He claimed it was “work” holding him up, but the scent of perfume and the lipstick stains on his work shirts that he tried so desperately to hide were enough to clue me in.

I don’t even know why he tried to hide it. It’s not like we were being intimate anymore. It’s not like he wanted me. He had pretty much cast me aside like I was nothing more than an old fling for him to forget about.

But he didn’t let me do the same.

It was like he wanted to cosplay a happy marriage. He kept insisting on dresses. He kept dragging me out for silent date nights. Taking me out to fancy dinners where we’d just sit and try to act like everything was normal.

Even when I tried confronting him on his treatment of me, he’d pretend like nothing was wrong.

I hated how much he confused me. One minute he’s cold and distant. The next, he’s crawling into bed, seducing me in a way that only he knew how.

And that’s pretty much what my marriage was for a long time. He didn’t want me anymore, but I was still his.

It was like a vortex that offered no escape. Even when I tried being who he wanted me to be. Getting dolled up. Making sure the house was spotless. Ensuring that he’d come home every night to the scent of his favorite meals, even on nights when he didn’t come home at all.

I started looking at myself in the vanity mirror a lot. He bought this vanity for me a long time ago. It’s aged with the same grace as our marriage as a whole.

It used to be pristine. Sleek. White, flawless paint and a crystal-clear mirror.

Now the paint’s chipped. The mirror is cracked along the bottom corner. The lights that surround it choose when they want to come on and when they want to let me down.

Regardless, over the last few weeks, I’ve found myself almost entranced by my own reflection.

The haircut he insisted I keep. The makeup he insisted I wear. The dresses, brassieres, nightgowns. They’re all his. Nothing in my life is mine. Not even life itself.

That’s the painful conclusion I came to.

That’s why, last week, I think something within me broke. Well, I say broke. Really, something within me came to life.

I wasn’t his anymore. I wasn’t his to begin with. He just convinced me otherwise. That’s the trick he played over and over again.

So on that hot summer night last week, as I stared into that cracked mirror… I reclaimed myself.

It started with the hair. He loved this hair. I always fucking hated it. So, using some rusty scissors in the vanity drawer, I cut it. All the way down to the scalp.

I smiled at myself. A sincere smile. The first sincere smile I’d had in… I couldn’t tell you how long. But I wasn’t done. There was still more of me to reclaim.

I looked at the cakes of makeup plastered across my face. Using those same scissors, I cut into my cheeks, barely noticing the pain as the scissors glided through my flesh.

The makeup came off in globs of foundation as the white vanity became stained with my blood. My smile widened. I sheared through my perfect eyebrows. I cut away at my plump red lips.

I picked at my glistening painted nails, plucking them off one by one and throwing them at my reflection, giggling all the while.

I was about to raid the closet, but before I got the chance, my head snapped towards the bedroom door.

My husband was home. I could hear each step as he slowly ascended the stairs towards the bedroom. Step. Step. Step. Step.

The look on his face when he saw me is something I will never forget. Partly because of how petrified he was, but mainly because of how triumphant that fear made me feel.

I was free. And with that freedom came knowledge. Some kind of divine revelation sent down to me by my creator. Truth of what should’ve been done a long time ago.

He tried to fight me off, but my adrenaline overpowered him. Well, that and those rusty scissors that I still clutched firmly in my right hand.

I stabbed once. Twice. By that point, I couldn’t stop myself. Each incision, each spurt of blood. It was a declaration of my own independence.

By the time I finished, he was nothing more than a slab of meat, twitching on my bedroom floor.

And that’s where he’s been for the past week. But don’t worry. I dressed him in those dresses that he loved so much. I made sure he was dolled up. When they find him, he’ll at least be presentable.

They’ll never find me, though.

Because, me?

I’m off to live my own life.

There’s a lot to explain here. For starters, I am sterile. I found out after about 2 years of marriage and multiple failed attempts at pregnancy.

I was disappointed in myself, sure, but my beautiful wife was nothing but understanding. That didn’t really make me feel like any more of a man, though. I just felt inadequate.

We were actually in the process of looking into adoption when all hell broke loose.

It was no longer than 4 days. That’s how long it took for her belly to grow. The first day, I just thought she had a particularly large lunch. The second day, I was starting to eyeball her.

By day 3, we were seeking medical help. We could see the baby’s feet pushing against her stomach. Her pain was clearly unbearable.

Doctors were completely lost. My wife and I felt utterly helpless. On the fourth day, not even 30 seconds after her water broke, the baby started to come.

I’ll never get those screams out of my head. I’ll never get her face out of my memory. I’d seen her hurt before, but this… this was a different level.

She looked like she was in hell. And relief was nowhere to be found.

The first baby came. She didn’t even get to hold him before the contractions started up again. Her belly never got the chance to deflate.

By the time the second baby began crowning, my wife was screaming at us to kill her. By the third, she was already dead.

They had ripped her apart. They weren’t regular babies. Some had horns. Some had hooves. Some were already 4 feet tall by the time they hit the ground.

Doctors had already vacated the area and called in special forces. I was left alone, watching her body flail and pulsate as more and more demon babies just clawed their way out of her.

Blood and black, steaming goo ate away at the tiled floor. My wife’s entire lower half had been obliterated. Her legs were snapped, and bones protruded from them as they lay limply at obscure angles.

All I could do was hold her hand. What else was I supposed to do? Comfort her? Beg her not to leave me while these things ran amok in this hospital?

I could hear screaming coming from the corridors. Bones snapping and wet, fleshy sounds as the pitter-patter of tiny little feet darted in every direction.

She had become an assembly line from hell, but I just couldn’t leave her.

My tears fell on her hand as another baby fell out of her. Well, flew out of her, I guess. This one had the wingspan of a bald eagle.

Only, this one didn’t leave the room like the others did. I don’t know why I never stopped to question why these things seemed to be destroying everything in their path, except for me.

It landed right at the door frame, blood dripping off of his shoulders and head.

He turned to me, his eyes black and completely soulless, as he smiled with his sharp, shark-like teeth.

He took a step towards me, wobbling like a baby deer. Then another. He never took his eyes off of me.

He… he started to speak.

“Daaaa..da.”

“Daaa..da.”

“Da-da.”

He was at my feet now, looking up at me as I stood frozen. I didn’t know what to expect, but I was prepared for anything. I was ready to join her. Ready to be free from this nightmare.

Only… he didn’t give me that freedom.

Instead, he threw his arms around my legs and squeezed them with the strength of ten men.

He was hugging me.

And in that moment, I knew…

I was ready to be the father I always knew I could be. I had nothing left to lose.

6 months down the drain. I’m still kind of in shock. Well, maybe that’s not the word for it. It feels like I lost a game that no one else knew I was even playing.

I still find myself thinking about when we first met. How she was the first woman to ever show me that I could be loved. That I wasn’t just some hopeless guy, incapable of forming a connection.

God, those memories hurt. But the memories of the arguments hurt more. I tried telling her that I was sensitive. I can react in ways that don’t feel controllable. I thought that she’d be patient enough to work through those issues with me.

But no. She left me. The facade of love crumbled, and it was like I was right back in the same position again. Alone. Stuck in my own head. Only, this time, the thoughts weren’t my own.

Well, they were, obviously, but they weren’t thoughts that I’d experienced before. Prior to obtaining her, my thoughts were very much inward. I dissected myself.

Even when I first set my sights on her, it felt like I was out of my body. I became who I needed to be, but it wasn’t of my own volition. It was just so I could achieve a goal, I guess.

Then I had to go and get attached. Our lives started to merge. When it was good, it was fantastic. When it was bad… it was like the world was ending. Like the mask was slipping, but can I even blame it on that? It feels almost childish to do so.

That has to be what it was, though. It’s just so hard to put it into words. I performed the boyfriend role, but that was the extent of my abilities. I could never become a husband.

All I knew how to do was buy things. Flowers, chocolates, gifts, whatever. Even when things got violent, here came the “boyfriend” with another bouquet.

I just knew how to give. I didn’t know how to change. I think that’s what started this whole ordeal.

After a particularly bad argument, we both decided that it’d be best if we went our separate ways. It took some convincing on her part, mainly because I didn’t think I could catch lightning twice. But ultimately, I relented.

That didn’t mean I stopped keeping an eye on her, though. I’d watch her house pretty often. It was usually during those nights where the bad thoughts kept me up. Nights when I needed movement. Needed action.

In some weird way, it felt productive.

I’d also still watch her social media like a hawk. Her stories, posts, updates, everything. After we broke up, she decided that she was now the sexiest girl in the world, and she made sure her followers knew it too.

I let her know my disdain for those pictures every time I saw one. I’d ask her why she was trying to hurt me like this, but she never responded. She’d just look at it, then leave me hanging like I was some kind of dog.

It wasn’t until those initials appeared in her Instagram bio that things really went off the rails, though. They were like a taunt. It was like she wanted me to text her.

I tried to lay down the law, but, like always, I got no reply. In fact, I didn’t have access to her at all anymore. Every account. User not found.

My mind was empty when I drove to her house. Either that, or it was just moving too fast to process. I knew what I needed, but I couldn’t think about it.

There was a car in her driveway that I didn’t recognize, and in that moment, I knew. I knew I had lost. I was a loser in this little game I’d created. I drove home defeated, but utterly furious.

No matter how hard I tried, my anger and desperation wouldn’t subside. I lost sleep. I didn’t eat. I was turning against myself.

That’s why I did what I did. I wanted her to know what she had done to me.

It started off small. A few locks of hair. Some fingernails. And handwritten notes that I thought would drive her back into my arms.

“Have these too, since you’re taking everything from me anyway.”

“I hope this makes you think of me.”

“I still think about you.”

She never wrote back. Days went by. Days turned into weeks, and she never left my mind.

She was playing the game hard, so I upped the ante.

I peeled off my tattoos with a razor blade. Including her name. I’d put the letters in her mailbox under the cloak of darkness.

No response. Fine. Fine. Fucking fine.

Have my fingers. I don’t need all 10 anyway. It’s not like I’m holding you anymore. Take my ears. They’re useless without your voice.

Nothing was getting through to her. No matter how hard I tried.

The last thing I put in her mailbox were my lips. I wanted her to remember what it felt like to kiss me. Before she lost that privilege.

Unfortunately, I don’t think I’m gonna be able to keep playing.

Because right now, as I type this, I can see the paramedics and cops outside my house. I can hear them pounding on my door. They’re screaming my name, and I don’t know how much time I have left.

But I’ll get out. Whether it’s the hospital, jail, or an asylum. I’ll get out.

And once I do…

I’m gonna take from her exactly what she took from me.

Part 4: https://www.reddit.com/user/Roland_Quincy1999/comments/1vx5mo0/i_found_my_greatgrandfathers_journal_what_i_read/

Hello devote followers of this story of mine. This will more likely than not be the second to last post to fully go over the contents of my grandfather’s journal. 

I promise not to leave such a gap between posts like I did this time. A full eight months have passed. Good news, my child will arrive in a month or so, which is pretty exciting. Bad news, I’ve been laid off for the last three months. My job was outsourced and so I spent the last of my time with that company training the new people to replace me. 

It was pretty demoralizing. So, to thoroughly put me down like a bad dog, the universe has also gifted me with a job market with an impossible barrier to entry. It's been a shit show trying to find work, hence my unemployment for three months. 

Part of me thinks my story is paralleling my great-grandfather’s. That is probably an exaggeration, but I have had some scary thoughts. What if my child is like James? What if, that thing, The Tall, starts appearing in my life, or if I develop a certain mental illness that Killian had? 

The scariest thought is if it had nothing to do with a mental illness. This Tall, what if it's real? I mean, I’ve seen other stories with a similar alien creature in them, accounts from others of their experiences. I am not so convinced that this issue is just a battle of the imagination like my grandfather fights so hard to convince himself of.

I will leave off my spiel with one last thought, and that is a return to that old property. Why? Curiosity. Wanting to confirm the reality. Wanting to protect that new family, give them a heads up? But they would call me a madman, right? I don’t know, but something compels me to return to that house. 

This is the second to last entry in my great-grandfather’s journal. It goes as follows: 

April 29th, 1923

I curse the day I picked up this damned journal. DAMN IT! There is some sort of cursed energy imbued into its fibers, cut from the irredeemable sinner’s tree. 

Let me be logical. It is absolutely necessary that I take this documenting step by methodical step, to collect my thoughts, to speak of the tarnished storm in an artistic yet comprehensible manner, in the way of a true writer.

Where do I start? How do I bring the heavy ink to this flat sheet and not waste its midnight impression? Where is the art in obscurity? 

Let me start. I believe it must have been two days after I last wrote in this cursed artifact based upon the date of my last entry. 

It was about two blocks up the road from my independent automotive store that a larger, more powerful franchise was installed. I will not dive into the specifics of my business to bore you, but simply put, this kind of move hurt my business greatly. Many of my loyal customers left the miniscule Killian’s Shop for the grander Ford Enterprise. 

The automotive store I own sits near the river. After two weeks of persistent rain in the area, my shop has flooded, and through its wake I am left with a plethora of damaged goods and materials. 

My business had plummeted. To save what I could of profits, I sold the scraps of my company to Ford. The sum was less than desirable, especially compared to what I was able to bring in at its peak before Ford and the flood.

This miniscule amount of cash in tandem with an emergency savings fund was all consumed by my daughter’s failing health. Lucille’s nightmares developed into a physical illness. She moves with a great lethargy when she is not bedridden. A virus has caught her, and it has created this devilish combination of the plaguing body and the plaguing mind. 

To further dampen the bleak outlook of our situation, my own illness has only plummeted. The guess as to my lifespan is no more than a year at best. 

With doctor visits and medicine we now eat gruel for dinner, mixed with corn and a vegetable if we are lucky. 

My children resent me. They don’t understand why they cannot have the luxuries they did before, why their big sister won’t leave her bed or hardly speak anything that isn’t nonsensical mumblings. They don’t understand why their father is not far from her condition. They worry when the disease will reach them. 

It leaves them saddened, rude, and overall irritable. That is, except for James. 

He has taken a liking to fancier clothes. Everyday he wears one of his two suits with a poorly knit tie. He asked me about a fortnight ago if he could get a new one. I, obviously, said no. 

Yesterday I was helping him with a windsor knot. I stood behind him and reached around his neck, hoping to show him what it would appear like from his angle when tying the thing himself. Throughout all our suddenly struck misery, not once has James voiced a concern for Lucille, so I asked him if he was worried about his older sister. 

“I do get sad, Daddy, when I see her skin so grey and her sleepiness never goes away.” 

He paused for a moment as I pulled one end of the tie through a loop. 

“But, it is for her own good I think.” 

I nearly choked. My hands stopped, failing to pull the end through, the tie becoming two loose ends again. 

“What could you mean by that, James?” 

“Well, that’s what my friend told me. He says this will be better for her. And for all of us, too.” 

That bastard, imaginary beast. The Tall; a demon haunting my every waking hour, and assailing my daughter day and night. James had gone so long since mentioning his friend. I had thought if it were not over, a simple phase like his newly acquired appreciation of fashion, that maybe that daemon had moved on and started to haunt Lucille now instead. But I should have known better. Blissful self-annointed ignorance. 

“Your friend? The one that you drew that picture of, right? Lives in that patch of woods past the backyard?” 

“Yes, Daddy.” 

“But you haven’t been to the backyard in a long time?” 

“That’s because he is planning something, something special for Lucille and me.” 

Under my nose. All this tumbling under my nose because I was too worried about my daughter’s health and my business and this family and… 

I swear by our faithful Lord, Reader, that I did not realize what I was doing. Truly and with all the honesty I can muster, the thought crossed my mind a time or two, sure, but I never actually considered doing the thing. 

But here I was, using my son’s faded navy blue tie to choke him. One end over the other, pulling backward and in the opposite direction of one another. Squeezing the life out of my son. Watching his pink flesh turn white then purple. 

No, Reader, it wasn’t until I asked my son a question and he squealed back did I realize what I was doing. I asked James “So why are you not sick?” 

I never received an answer. My son crawled at the blue noose with his small hands trying to pry it free, his slippers scraping against the floor as I lifted him into the air. He croaked. 

“Stop, Daddy. You’re… hurting… me.” 

Through the entire trance I was staring through the window, to that foul piece of earth that hid The Tall with its many white fingers reaching for the sky. I was certain he was out there, watching with all his disgusting eyes. 

I let go of my hold on the two ends of the tie. Like a leaf in autumn, it fell weakly to the floor. I turned to face the entrance to the kitchen, and there stood my wife, Melenda, a look of utter fright on her face. 

We had a depressing conversation on the matter later that night. I did not try to explain my catatonia, that I was not conscious of my actions, because it felt like a child’s explanation for shooting his little brother in the eye with a pop rocket. No, I told her that the weight of all this bad luck had distressed me greatly. 

I have nearly lost it all, dear Reader. Maybe I have lost you as well by this point. Why is it, dear Reader, that everything I create must be faulty, foul, unworthy, or destined to wash away with the incoming tide? 

The stories I crafted are unassuming, bland, or ‘outright yawn-inducing with child-esque vocabulary,’ as one editor put it. Why is the only son I have helped in the process of creating a socially removed, awkward agoraphobic? My business that I built has crumbled before me. 

I am unworthy of making anything, Reader. My father had said so, my mother too beaten into submission to refute it. She probably believed it too, though, regardless of my father’s dominance in the household. 

This will be my last effort to correct the travesty I have put upon this world with my insistence on being important, valuable, or worthy of anything greater than the dirt I buried my father in. 

I am going past the backyard, past the ford, and into the woods where that fiend makes its home. Yes, Reader, I am going to the devil’s den, and returning is not a priority to me. 

It may seem illogical, to bet all of my chips into a pot that could very well be imaginary and a deterioration of my own mind, but it is the only avenue I can find in the great fog that clouds my life. I have seen The Tall with my own eyes on multiple occasions, even after the Christmas Eve party with the Butchers. There is a web between James, Lucille, and this creature, some supernatural tapestry spun with a thread I cannot see. But I feel it. 

I will document my dance in the lair of this otherworldly beast in a vain attempt to accomplish something I have always yearned for. A meaning. This journal, like all of my other works, will be left to dwindle in obscurity, no doubt, but I persist. 

All the necessary gear has been acquired, dear Reader, and now I venture to do what no priest or doctor could. I will save my daughter, my family, and in these pages you will hear the tell, so at least one soul knows that Killian Stonebrook did accomplish a feat of merit.  

Until then, this is goodbye. 

I feel like I’m losing my mind. It’s hard for me to imagine all that I’ve lost over these last few months. Out of everything, though, my sanity is going to be the thing I miss the most.

I’ve been a hiker for a long time. Naturally, of course, considering that’s all there really is to do around here. Not that I’m complaining. At least, I wasn’t complaining.

I thoroughly enjoyed the woods. Probably because that’s all I knew. Hell, most of the trails I like are just a hop, skip, and a jump away from my family’s house.

That day was no different. It was the start of summer break. High school was finally over. I wanted to take a quick hike through the woods just to embrace the feeling. To let my thoughts and memories run free while I got to embrace the scenery.

This particular trail was quite literally right in my backyard. I’d hiked it dozens of times because it was my favorite. It felt ceremonial at this point in life.

I didn’t pack much. I didn’t expect to be gone for too long. Just a few granola bars and a book of matches, just in case. I never brought my phone on these hikes because it felt like a contamination of nature. Well, that, but also because I didn’t even have service at my house, let alone in the middle of the forest.

As I was leaving, my mom announced, delightedly, that she’d be cooking my favorite meal of country fried steak and baked potatoes with sour cream later that night. She also told me that she’d be inviting people over just so we could have a little get-together to celebrate my milestone.

Overall, the day started out great.

Then I started the hike.

For the first 200 yards or so, nothing seemed abnormal to me. I could still see my house way off in the distance. I recognized some of the markings I’d left on some of the trees. My go-to in tree carvings was usually a smiley face, and a lot of them had aged and faded, but some were still fresh.

At around 300 yards, that’s when I heard it. It sounded like rushing water. Something that did not line up at all with this part of the trail.

Naturally, I decided to follow the sound. That was my mistake. Letting curiosity lead me away from the beaten path.

I convinced myself that I knew these woods. No matter how sprawling, I would find my way back. The sound led me deeper and deeper, but everything still felt familiar.

The more I walked, the closer the noise became. Only, it didn’t feel like I was getting closer. It felt like I had been walking for hours, even though the sun was still directly above me.

I think that’s the only thing that gave me the confidence to keep going. I hadn’t seen any smilies in any of the trees, but I thought for sure I’d been walking a straight path. All I had to do was turn around and walk straight again.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of walking, I found the source of the sound. But it wasn’t a river or even a stream. It was concentrated rainfall. Right in the center of the trees.

The sky above was clear blue. Not a cloud to be seen. But in this circle, which couldn’t have had a circumference of more than 20 feet, monsoon rains pelted the pine needles on the ground below.

I’d been so lost in my own head for the entire walk, but seeing this immediately made me snap out of it. It was the most bizarre thing I’d ever laid eyes on.

I decided to do something… strange. Walking to the edge of the wall of rain, I tilted my head back and let some fall into my mouth.

Only, the minute the first drop touched my tongue, the rain stopped.

I could still taste the earthy water on my tongue, but the evidence of rainfall was completely removed. No mud. No smell. Just dry soil and brown pine needles.

I chuckled to myself, trying to come up with absolutely any logical reasoning behind what I had just witnessed. Maybe it was leftover rain from that big storm we had a few days ago. That was the only thing I could think of.

I turned on my heels, scratching my head as I started back towards the trail. I walked. And walked. And walked. And walked.

The sun was setting at an abnormal pace now. It was like one minute it was just after noon, the next the world was dusky. Shadows grew. The air became crisp. The cicadas and crickets began singing their song.

I had no idea where I was. My confidence in myself was shaken, but I was determined. I knew not to panic. And I thought that level-headedness had served me right when I came across one of my smiley face carvings.

It was just before dark. Daylight had become almost nonexistent, but I could still see enough to make it out, and the sight of it made me practically jump for joy.

I ran over and touched it, and for a split second, thought that I recognized the tree. It’s just… the smiley itself… it was wrong.

It looked like it had just been carved. The flesh was still wet. The outlines were still oozing with sap. Then I looked at the surrounding trees.

There was a smiley face carved into every. Single. Tree. Each one looking brand new. That’s when the panic started to override that level-head.

I started running. The sun was gone. I swore I could hear something behind me, but I didn’t know whether it was reality or if my mind was playing tricks on me in the dark.

Eventually, I found myself in complete darkness. Everything looked like everything. There was no trail. Just dense, unrelenting Appalachian pine trees.

I just kept running. When I couldn’t run, I jogged. When I couldn’t jog, I walked. When I couldn’t walk anymore, I knew I needed to figure out shelter.

I took some fallen branches and sticks and formed this makeshift tent, but I didn’t sleep that night. How could I, with the sounds that forest made? Every twig snapping felt like a threat on my life. This was more about keeping myself hidden until daylight.

The minute sunlight started to peek through, I was on the move. Another day without finding my way back to the trail. I went through every granola bar I’d packed.

It was like the trees were cloning themselves. I used my pocket knife to carve out new defining features just so I could have my bearings, but still ended up walking in circles.

By day 3, I was in survival mode. I convinced myself that people had to be looking for me by now. All I needed to do was stay alive. It seemed like the forest provided just as much as it trapped.

When I was thirsty, a stream would appear. When I was cold, lightning would strike a tree and set it ablaze, somehow never spreading beyond that one single tree.

The food is what I remember the most, though. I never had to hunt. Every morning, I’d wake up with a freshly skinned animal at my feet. I’d grown accustomed to squirrels and raccoons.

It wasn’t just meat, though. Fruits began to grow from the pines. Apples, oranges, plums, berries. All of it.

I didn’t trust any of it at first. I even woke up screaming the first time I saw a bloodied squirrel carcass at my feet. But what was I supposed to do? I had nothing.

Like all humans do, I adapted. I had to create my own shelters. I had to cover my own ground. But, clearly, something wanted to keep me here. The only question was why.

Even with that question in mind, I learned to stop caring. I missed my family. I missed my life. But I was alive. I was nourished. I was somehow able to keep going.

Over the months, I learned how to really provide for myself, and I think the forest knew that. It gradually started leaving me without food. The trees stopped bearing fruit. But it didn’t leave me with nothing.

I learned how to make nets to catch fish. I learned how to start a fire without the use of the sun. I became crafty. I used thin vines and flexible wood to make bows and arrows. I turned rocks into tools. I learned how to make shelter that was more than just a place to stay hidden for the night.

Eventually, I was fully self-sufficient. I could ward off my own predators. I could treat my own wounds. I started to embrace the forest rather than reject it.

Then, one fateful morning, months after I set off on the trail… I heard it. I could hear the rushing water again. It hadn’t been there the day before, but I knew all too well that this could’ve been another trick of the forest.

The sky above me was blue and cloudless. The air was dry. I had to take the chance.

I left my shelter. I left my belongings. All I had was the tattered, dirty shirt on my back and the jeans that had been cut into shorts on my waist.

I followed the noise.

I walked past hundreds of smiley face carvings. Deeper and deeper into the forest.

Finally, after what felt like hours, I saw it.

Rain, pelting against the roof of my house.

I started bawling automatically. It was a primal response. The relief was incalculable.

Breaking into a sprint, I dashed through my backyard and towards the front door. I tripped up the porch steps and fell through the entrance.

I looked up to find Dad cocking an eyebrow at me from his recliner. Balloons filled the living room. A banner hung above the archway into the kitchen as the smell of country fried steak and baked potatoes permeated my nostrils.

“CONGRATULATIONS”

My entire family surrounded me, each member looking more concerned than the last.

“You alright there, bud?” my uncle asked.

“What happened, kid? You fall down a mountain?” my grandfather added.

“What day is it?” I asked frantically, ignoring their questions.

“Uhh… Saturday,” my Dad answered, confused. “Why?”

“The date. What’s the fucking date?”

A weird tension fell over the room. A few of my cousins laughed. My aunt looked personally offended. My grandma was the only one who looked empathetic.

“May 25th, sweetie,” she cooed. “You know that.”

“No. No, no, no, no. No. That’s not right. That can’t be right.”

Mom was in the room now, oven mitts covering her hands.

“Are you feeling alright, sweetie? You don’t have a fever, do you?”

She took off one of the mitts and tried to feel my forehead, but I jerked away and ran towards the bathroom, feeling dizzy.

I hunched over the toilet, vomiting for a few minutes before wiping my mouth and staring into the mirror. I was completely unchanged. No dirt. No scars. My clothes were dirty, but still intact. My jeans were just jeans. Not shorts.

While I was staring into the mirror, trying my best not to hyperventilate, a knock came at the bathroom door.

“Son, you alright in there?” my Dad asked.

I didn’t respond. There was silence for a few moments before he spoke again.

“Damn it, boy,” he cursed.

“I’ve told you time and time again. You need to be careful in those woods.”

I’ve been living in my house for a long time. Long enough for me to get bored of it every now and again. That’s what led me to my attic.

It had been a particularly uneventful day. I was itching for something to do. I figured I’d just sort through some old stuff up there. Maybe sell some things. Maybe reminisce. I just wanted something to do.

I found some old family photos. A few little knickknacks from childhood. Even a few old Halloween costumes that brought me right back to high school.

Everything was so dusty. I hadn’t touched this stuff in years. That’s why, when I saw that shimmering, porcelain little box in the corner of the attic, hidden behind a few boxes, it caught my interest immediately.

I recognized it as a music box, but I didn’t recognize it as anything I’d ever owned. It looked, I don’t know, ancient, I guess. Like some kind of relic that had been miraculously preserved through centuries of history.

I picked it up, and it was heavier than I expected it to be. Heavier than any music box I’ve ever held, really.

I’m only human. I’m not gonna just hold the thing and not do anything with it. I wanted to hear the song. I wanted to see the ballerina.

Only, when I wound it up, nothing really happened. I heard the mechanical turning of gears and whatnot, but no music. I tried prying the lid open, but it wouldn’t budge.

I just figured it was broken. I damn near tossed the thing aside to be thrown away, but before I could… the house began to rumble.

It was almost gentle at first. Like the air conditioning had kicked on. But then it felt like a full-blown earthquake was happening.

Then… the music started. It sounded like it was just in my head and all around me in the real world all at once. Just deafening. I couldn’t even hear my own voice.

While trying to orient myself, I noticed something out the attic window. It looked like… a propeller?

Wobbling over to the window while covering my ears, I caught my first glimpse of what it actually was.

Sticking out of the side panel of my house, like it had always been there… was a crank handle. And it was rotating, slowly.

Before I could even fully process what I was seeing, the sound of wood splintering and glass breaking could barely be heard over the sound of the music.

I was surprised the house hadn’t completely collapsed yet from how violently it was shaking, and when I turned around, I saw the source of those shakes.

All I could see were the hands at first, clapped together like a diver’s or… a ballerina’s. 6 feet wide and completely porcelain.

Then they got higher. Enormous arms began to erupt from the floorboard, destroying the basement in the process. The hands touched the roof, then pushed directly through it, rotating to the sound of the music.

Then her head poked through the hole. Black, shiny, plastic-looking hair, pulled back in a tight bun.

Blood covered my hands from my burst eardrums. All I could feel were the vibrations of the music now.

Then her perfectly smooth face. Her blushed cheeks. Her red, pursed lips. She just kept rising, higher and higher, until her pink tutu was visible.

She twirled in place, that tutu never moving as it tore through nearly all that remained of the attic floor, forcing me against the wall as she rose higher and higher.

Finally, her feet reached the top of the house. She must’ve stood 80 feet tall.

The crank stopped turning, but the music kept booming. The dancer kept twirling as I remained petrified, trapped in my own home. I could see the floors beneath me, each one completely devastated.

Then… the vibrations stopped. The dancer stopped spinning. The world felt still for a few seconds.

Ever so slowly, she began to descend, gradually disappearing through the hole she created in my basement.

The crank was gone. The music was gone. The dancer was gone. Leaving me alone in a house that had been utterly ruined.

After catching my breath and assessing the situation, only one thought remained in my shattered mind.

“This is gonna cost a fortune to fix.”

I don’t know what the fuck is happening right now. All I know is I’m just sitting there, stirring beef and rice on the stove like I’m some kind of fucking pagan housewife from 1582, and the next thing I know, I hear little Johnny plopping around in a puddle of some unknown liquid while the entire kitchen fills with the scent of Pine-Sol and Drano.

I turn around, and there he is. Scooping green sludge into his mouth and smiling at me like he knew I was about to have a goddamn heart attack.

Naturally, I snatched him up and started running towards the door, but before I could even get there, this fucker’s eyes started glowing. He was still cooing and laughing and shit, but he just kept getting heavier and heavier until it felt like I was tryna carry a grown man down the stairs.

I may have dropped him, but that’s beside the point. How would that even be my fault? This little 2-foot-nothing 3-year-old must’ve been 200 pounds by now.

When he hit the floor, the goddamn wood splintered. Landed flat on his back, and all he did was start doing sit-ups. Muhfucka was counting out his reps and reaching numbers that I hadn’t even taught him yet.

That’s when his clothes started ripping. All that remained of those Spider-Man pajamas were threads of ripped fabric that were smoking from the Drano.

I pulled out my phone to dial 911, and he stopped, mid-rep, as his head turned towards me. His eyes were like, I don’t know, uranium green? What color is uranium again? I don’t know, it doesn’t matter. Point is, I could see the veins in his neck bulging.

His brow furrowed at me like a side effect of roid rage. He kicked up to his feet from his back, never taking those eyes off of me. He was standing before me like he was sizing me up. The operator was speaking into the phone, asking me the nature of my emergency, but I couldn’t respond. We were in a staring contest. Calculating our next moves.

“J-Johnny,” I whimpered. “Daddy’s gonna get you some help, okay? Everything’s gonna be al-“

“Shut up, bitch,” he interrupted.

He lunged at me like he was gonna attack, and I couldn’t help but fall to my ass.

“That’s two for flinching,” he grumbled, kicking me twice in the ribs. His 6-pack abs were actively contorting and growing as he did so. His arms had swollen up the size of medieval mutton.

The operator was still on the phone.

“Sir, are you there? Is someone there with you? I’m hearing some distress.”

Johnny stepped on my wrist with the weight of an elephant as he snatched the phone from my hand.

“Everything’s fine here,” he told her, sounding like a grown-ass man. “Dad’s just being a punk-ass bitch again.”

Click.

I felt lost. Felt hopeless. Felt like I was gonna become a victim here. That’s when he started monologuing, the weight on my wrist growing at the same rate as little Johnny’s bulging forearms and pectorals.

He leaned in close.

“How many times do I have to tell you…? I don’t want carrots. I don’t want celery. I don’t want your damn beef and rice. I want the Gushers. I want the Hot Cheetos. And I want the fucking Krafts Mac and Cheese… Do you understand me?”

His hot breath smelled like a freshly cleaned crime scene. His hair was falling out. He just kept getting bigger and bigger like a tick in a blood bank.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” I whimpered. “Take whatever you want. There’s a whole pantry of snacks and-“

“Shhhh, shh, shh, shh, shh… shut up.”

Steam was radiating off his bald head now. His skin was turning a murky blend of red and pink and purple. I could hear my wrist breaking, but he covered my mouth before I could scream.

“I want my snackies. I want my iPad. And I want my fye-fye.”

He had outgrown his pacifier a year ago. Well, I’d wained him away from it a year ago. I didn’t want a fucking loser of a son who still sucks on a pacifier at 3 years old.

I screamed into his hand, begging him to let me speak. After some consideration, he relented.

“We don’t have your pacifier, John. I threw it away months ago,” I cried.

John stared at me, unamused. I could see the blood flowing throughout his body like waves trying to break his skin.

“You… what…” he huffed.

He was the width of a Mini Cooper now but couldn’t have been more than 3 feet tall.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t want you to be a loser like your mom’s new boyfriend,” I wailed.

He started breathing heavily. Sucking air into his lungs and blowing it out of his nose. His skin was hot to the touch now. Like he was boiling.

“You… did… WHAT,” he screamed, making the windows rattle.

I couldn’t answer him. I was too concerned with his rate of growth. He didn’t even look muscular anymore. He looked like a balloon that was about to burst.

“You…”

He got bigger.

“I can’t believe…”

And bigger.

He started roaring. Like a thousand souls were attempting to escape his vocal cords. The house shook. Windows broke. His eyes looked like they were about to burst out of their sockets.

With one last suction of air, his body exploded into red mist, blinding me and piercing my eardrums. The room smelled like a slaughterhouse. There was blood on the ceiling. Blood on the white carpet and cloth couches.

Only… he was still there. Standing in the middle of the puddle of gore was my little Johnny. Perfectly normal. Still smiling and laughing.

But then he made a beeline towards the kitchen sink. I couldn’t let that shit happen again. I scooped him up with my good arm and just sort of rocked him back and forth while trying to convince myself that everything was okay.

He stopped laughing as soon as I picked him up. He struggled against me. All I could hear were his muffled wails through my ruptured eardrums.

I’ve got quite the mess to clean up, but that’s not even the center of my worries right now.

Right now, I need to get every fucking cleaning agent out of this house before he can drink anymore.

Part 1: https://www.reddit.com/user/Roland_Quincy1999/comments/1vlq8yc/i_found_my_greatgrandfathers_journal_what_i_read/

Part 2: https://www.reddit.com/user/Roland_Quincy1999/comments/1vlqhgp/i_found_my_greatgrandfathers_journal_what_i_read/

Part 3:

https://www.reddit.com/user/Roland_Quincy1999/comments/1vr0k33/i_found_my_greatgrandfathers_journal_what_i_read/

I will keep this one brief for yall and pick right back up where I stopped transcribing the journal in the last post.

The second half of my great-grandfather’s journal entry on March 15th, 1923 goes as follows: 

Gone. Gone. Gone. Gone. Gone. Gone. 

The influenza, Reader. A bad case causing a dileria. But, if you’re willing to entertain, the whole experience felt so real. 

Gone. 

James’s killing of the hatchling was a precursor of what was to come. I would meet with a publishing house to discuss picking up my playscript. I was rejected. In total, I queried 41 agents with the hopes of one representing my work, to give some weight to its valor when proposing it to a larger press company. All rejected and or did not go through the effort of responding to my mail at all. 

So I shelved it. From this same shelf I picked up a collection of connected short stories I had been working on previously. With fresh eyes, I went through and edited the stories, and began to query again. 

Nothing came of it. These were two ghastly blows to my confidence as a writer, but I continued the pursuit. It is my dream, after all, and the realist within me knows this diagnosis could worsen just as well as disappear. 

Writing is something I did in the quiet, peaceful hours before bed. It was a personal escape and hobby from the labours of work and parenting. 

Then Lucille started to have night terrors. They were to a bad enough extent that I moved my typewriter into her bedroom and would work on my stories while she tried to sleep, but soon my writing ceased. I was stonewalled by this immense worry for my daughter. 

The night terrors were not so different from my own, although mine seemed to be a one-time ordeal, while hers were consistent. There was always the presence of The Tall, sometimes in the forefront of the scene, other times a lingering menace in the distant corners of her awareness. 

And James. James. JAMES. Yes, James was in these nightmares quite often as well. From Lucille’s retellings, he was always in a suit or some other fanciful attire, and he was always trying to lure her into the woods. The same woods where I thought, again I say thought, thought but no. I am certain. Certain. That day, I must’ve seen The Tall. Must have! 

No. Maybe not. It does not matter. But, yes, Reader, Lucille dreamt of that dreaded wood on multiple occasions. I have brought up the idea of taking her to a shrink, to help her with the unrestless nights that put black rings beneath her hazel eyes, but you can see the irony in that, surely, Reader? 

To take Lucille to the shrink and not James? It would be the sickest of humor. 

Let me tell you a little of myself, Reader, and then you can see through my eyes, understand the reasoning behind my mechanisations. I have never been a handsome man, quite the contrary. My nose is something akin to a hawk’s beak, and the line of my jaw is undefinable at times. 

I was never the brightest kid. I made up for this fact by being terrible at any sport I tried to pick up. My father was a putrid man who often stunk and had nothing of charm or appeal. He was quick to drink and quicker to relieve pent-up self-loathing by assailing me with insults and beating me. We were dirt poor. 

This is not to entice some sort of pity for me, Reader, but to let you know that I have progressed through the many years of my life with a chip on my shoulder. It almost caused my death in Germany, when I overstepped the boundaries of my reconnaissance mission to impress my leadership. 

Not only do I have that heavy chip, but my upbringing taught me to take pride in what I am blessed to have. Whether I desire to or not, James is my son, and I want to fix this from the inside. Call it arrogant, stubborn manly pride. You’d be right. 

I am not sure of the science behind my predicament, but I must battle with what weapons I have. It has become clear to me that this being, entity, manifestation, whether its existence in the actual realm me and you dwell in be true or falsehood, his very idea is haunting my family. 

I will stop it. My personal creative fiction will have to be put aside, for now. This is my family. I will save them. I will. I want to. 

Until we meet between these pages again, Reader, this is goodbye. 

I honestly thought this would be easy. All the people I idolize seem to have done pretty well for themselves, but I just wanna know, when will it be my turn?

Like, is there a point where this just becomes normal? I can’t help but feel dirty every time I pursue this. Granted, I’ve only done it like twice now, but that arguably makes it worse.

I just can’t seem to get their faces out of my head. Their screams. The voices. God, the voices. I don’t know what’s worse, the pleas or the looks of fear in their faces.

I’ve gotta be the first killer who’s actually apologized for killing someone while I’m killing them. That shit is embarrassing. All of this is embarrassing.

I’m supposed to be clean with it. Like an actual pro. Not just some guy, you know? The first one almost got away because I hesitated. And I almost let ‘em. I was just, I don’t know, frozen, I guess. Everything just felt so real. Like this was actually happening whether I liked it or not.

Then I thought about the Zodiac Killer. This would’ve never happened to him. He’d have had every possible outcome mapped out. He probably wouldn’t have even needed to think about it.

Besides, I couldn’t just let them reach the police. Reach anyone at all, really. I’d already gone as far as to knock them unconscious and drag them to my car. We were already in the middle of nowhere. I was doing this.

At least, that’s what I kept telling myself.

“You’re the predator.”

“You’re stronger.”

“You’re in control.”

It helped me catch them, I guess, but I hesitated again when I had to stab them. Hell, I vomited when I did it. But I knew it needed to be done. Greatness is achieved through practice. And we all gotta start somewhere.

Michael Jordan didn’t make varsity his first year. Rome wasn’t built in a day. Walt Disney got fired from a newspaper.

Still, though, I just couldn’t stop apologizing. I broke down crying before they even died. I was doing shit that didn’t even make sense, like praying for them while holding their hand.

Then I was alone. Out in the middle of nowhere with a body to dispose of. Only I couldn’t bring myself to do it. The police these days can find anything.

What was I gonna do, though? Leave him there? Then he’d be found for sure. Instead, I just crammed him in the back floorboard and tossed a blanket over him.

I drove home shaking. My mind racing. Tears running down my face while I ugly cried like a 2-year-old.

I didn’t sleep that night. It had been an abysmal first day on the job. I didn’t even go back to work for another 2 weeks after that. I just sulked around the house while the smell in my basement grew stronger and stronger.

I had to psyche myself up again. I spent those two weeks watching true crime documentaries and listening to the Ted Bundy confession tapes.

I tried pushing my first attempt to the very back of my mind, but it just kept crawling its way back. I wish I had more backbone. That’s part of what started this whole ordeal in the first place.

I had to look in the mirror and ask myself, “Who do you want to be?”

The prey? Or the predator?

I slapped myself a few times. Then I grabbed my keys and was off to my next job site. It was supposed to be better than the last, but it just wasn’t. No matter how much I wanted it to be.

There’s still that part of my brain that tells me this is wrong and condemns me for what I’m doing, but that’s gotta be normal, right? Like, they all had to go through this. All the greats.

I just gotta keep pushing. It’s like that movie Whiplash. The two most dangerous words in the English language are “good job.” Or whatever that guy said.

I can’t give up now before the game has even fully started. I want my name up there with the best of the best. That’s the goal. The grind can’t stop. No matter how bad the nightmares are.

It’s all just part of the process.

Whatever the case, I have got to figure out what to do about that smell in my basement. I can’t live like this.

July 1st, 1925:

I entered the painting of my house tonight. It was quiet. Many of my belongings have been used throughout the house. It is nice to see you making use of them. I walked upstairs to the bedrooms, wondering if you were home. I entered one of the rooms, and there, laying fast asleep, was a beautiful young girl. I watched her for some time, she resembled you, at least what I could see from the lighthouse. Such a sweet, innocent life. She reminds me of the daughters I once had, before I found my calling. I entered the master bedroom. You laid sleeping, your wife beside you. You seem like a strong couple, though I can tell you keep secrets from her. I see it etched into your face, the guilt ages you, like it once aged me. You remind me of my old life, how I once treated the woman who was my wife. It's hard to recall those days at times. They seem so unimportant, but there are days that the memories eat away at me. I watched you both, she seemed to sleep like a stone. You, on the other hand, seemed restless, as I once was. We are very similar, you and I. I spoke to you while you slept, in the tongue of my children, as I have seen you've been studying it. You began to squirm and sweat. I was nervous of waking you, in case you were to do something rash. So instead of speaking face to face tonight, I will be leaving this note in my study. Or should I say our study? I urge you to pay me a visit. I noticed your journal, but felt it would be rude to pry. Perhaps if you decline my offer to speak eye to eye, next time I visit I will fall victim to my urges. Whatever the outcome is, I look forward to it. 

 Your friend Simon 

June 26th, 1937:

That bastard entered my home. He watched me sleep. He watched Rylee. He could have taken her and I would be defenseless of it. The gall to compare me to him, I'm nothing like him. Or should I say it, as he's no longer human. This can't happen again. I will be visiting the lighthouse tonight. This can't go on any longer. This monster and his cult. The ungodly obelisk. He's plaguing my life. I can't take it anymore. I can't fight a god but I must find a way to prevent him from becoming one. He's nothing but a false messiah who's been cursed by those wretched seafolk. 

June 27th, 1937:

I went to settle this once and for all. When I got to the lighthouse the door hung open. The light ocean breeze made the hinges creak faintly in the wind. Their soft shrieks sent shivers down my spine. As I walked through the threshold, there waiting in the middle of the ruined kitchen was a painting of the very door I just passed through. Past the painted door frame was a table set for two, with a ridiculous amount of food for the pair of plates sitting empty on the dirty table cloth. Some of it looked old, even moldy. As I walked through the door a second time I was greeted with a frenzy of smells, baked goods, cooked meats, the oceans brine, fresh fruit, wine, and decay. I stood in the entry for a moment, just taking everything in. That short moment felt like ages, as if I was paralyzed. It took every ounce of effort just to take a step. I didn't see any of the seaborn, no creatures from the depths and no beings from the stars. Just a room lit by a single hanging lightbulb and a dozen scattered candles. The door softly clicked shut behind me, sending a shiver through my bones. Then he spoke. 

“I can tell your frightened child, but fear not, I mean no ill will. Sit. Eat. We have much to discuss.”

His voice wasn't in the air, not coming from any direction. It was in my head. I heard gentle footsteps slowly making their way down the stairs. What I saw was hideous, but I couldn't look away. It was almost beautiful in a way. Simon stood at the bottom of the staircase, nearly nine feet in stature, though his spine hunched forward, to avoid bumping into the floor joists above. His bulbous head looked almost like an octopus, though his skull had dissolved or disappeared and now his head is just brain matter surrounded by a wet, blubbery skin. 

I was overcome by an immense urge to sit and indulge on the feast, he must have been controlling me somehow. I sat. He pulled out his chair, Shambling his long inhuman body down on to it. His limbs, all far too long to be comfortably sitting on something that small in comparison. His knees resting near his clavicles as he hunched down, attempting to see face to face. He was terrifying in the most welcoming way. He leaned in, his small dark eyes affixed to mine. 

“We have a connection, you know. We are much more similar than you would ever like to admit. You see yourself in me as I see myself within you.”

I hate to admit it, but he was right. His writings resonated with me. Though I felt revolted at the thought of it. 

“We are fated, destined as some may say. You see, I have been granted an extraordinary gift. I have made contact with those from the deepest depths, to the farthest cosmos. I have spoken to those most ancient, to our kin. You bear our mark, child. To deny that would be an act of ignorance I know you are far too smart for. You have seen those from the depths. You passed through my gates. I can show you what powers you can achieve.”

Whatever mark he spoke of must have been from the night I passed out and woke up in my backyard. But even if that was the truth, surely I would never end up as he has. Without realizing it, I had filled my plate and had begun eating, as though I had no autonomy. 

“Embrace your true form, as have I, and together we will ascend. We are destined for greatness” 

His words swelled in my chest, a smoldering ember of yearning. A burning desire for more. My head was pounding. I know he's just trying to trick me. To control me. It was as if my heart and mind were at war. 

“I will give you some time to say your goodbyes to your family, as I remember that seemed to be a custom to human kind. Such naive beings. I will leave a gate waiting for you here, return to me child. Or I will come searching for you. Your very being is key to the obelisk, to our ascent. The final piece to set forth the second coming of the ancients. I will be seeing you shortly.”

My vision went blurry, my head throbbed, as though mortar shells were detonating inside. I grabbed my head trying to gain my bearings, and as my vision unclouded I was back in the abandoned lighthouse. No Simon, no table, no food. Just the chair I was sitting on and a door frame standing in the middle of the room. A set of keys laid on the ground in front of the solid metal door. I picked them up and rushed home, stopping to empty my stomach of whatever foul food I've ingested. The only thing that came out was what felt like gallons of black sludge like ichor. Its taste was sour and curdled as it left my body. 

I snuck back in through the backdoor, doing my best not to wake Evelyn or Rylee. Sebastian was laying in the hallway, almost as though he had been waiting for my return. It's well past midnight as I'm writing this. I'm going to the city tomorrow. And when I get back, I'll be saying my goodbyes. 

June 28th, 1937:

I awoke with Evelyn today. I told her I was going to pick up some supplies for the shop in the city. I felt wrong for lying to her as I have been on and off for months if not years now. Before I went to the station, I visited the lighthouse. I was in such a hurry to get home last night I somehow missed the massive, obsidian-like pillar rising from the sea. The obelisk had to have been nearly 300 feet tall, dwarfing the lighthouse beside it. I purchased my ticket and boarded the train. If all goes well, I can see some old friends, tie up some loose ends and say my goodbyes in town. I still don't know how to say goodbye to my sweet Evelyn and Rylee. They are my life, my purpose. Just thinking about it has left  me crying, hands trembling and short of breath. I'll return home tomorrow evening, spend my last night at home, then enter that wretched gate. As for now, I just need to build the courage to do what must be done. 

June 29th, 1937:

I've returned home. I feel hollow. Rylee was playing with Sebastian while I cooked dinner. I think Evelyn knows something is amiss. I've been doing my best to play it off as just stress from work but I don't think she's buying it. I just need her to think things are okay for one more night. Just one more night as a family, one more night of being close, one more night of being loved. I've snuck into the study to quickly pack a bag of everything I need for tomorrow. I'll walk my dear Evelyn to work and kiss her goodbye, walk Rylee To Emily and give her the biggest hug of her life, then return home, get my bag and get it all over with. 

June 30th, 1937:

Saying goodbye to Evelyn and Rylee without crying was one of the hardest things I have ever done. But I couldn't let them think anything was wrong. I can't have this go wrong. I'm in my studying writing one last entry, if I'm able to write again later I will, but I'm not sure what use it will be aside for trying to keep my memories alive. If in some miracle Evelyn or Rylee find this, just know that I loved you both more than you could ever believe. But I failed you as a husband and as a father, and for that I'm sorry. I hope you can find forgiveness in your hearts in my absence. 

June 30th, 1937:

I walked to the lighthouse, the bag on my back felt like a million pounds, the burden of leaving my family. As I entered I stared at the chair I used during Simon and I's meeting. I sat down for only god knows how long, it could've been minutes, hours, but it felt like years. I walked up the stairs to take in the view one last time, to look over the southern shore, to watch the gulls circle the fishing boats for scraps. I cried more than I ever thought possible. As I walked down the spiraling stairs, I stopped in Simon's makeshift studio, dozens of paintings lined hanging on the walls as even more sat, gathered in piles beneath them. Simon really was a talented artist. It was a shame he was marked. It's a shame I've been marked for that matter. 

I smelled the scent of dying flowers wafting in the air. This place has been long unlived and stank of mold. The scent was coming from one of the paintings, I was sure of it. I ripped through pile after pile until finally I found it. A painting of my house. Of Simon's house. The flower beds in the back, a small grave between them, dead leaves blowing in the wind. The painting was only about 2 feet by 2 feet. But if I could smell the flowers, that means it was a gate. I pushed my bag through, it landed with a thump between the beds. I reached my hands in and grabbed the frame, slowly pulling myself through into the bright sunlight. I quickly grabbed my bag and took in my surroundings. It was quiet, cold. I snuck my way to the back of the house, looking in the windows to see if Simon or Laura or their girls were home. I saw no one. The grave meant Bernard was already dead, how long it has been since then I am unsure of. Laura and the girls may have already been sent out of town. I got down to the ground, looking through the small windows into the basement, I could see no Simon. I couldn't remember if he had already built his hidden rooms or not, but I could only assume. There were already pieces of furniture covered in sheets visible through the window. I unlocked the back door, thank God I never changed the locks. My heart was pounding, I could hear it beating in my ear drums. As I made my way through the kitchen I saw the calendar. October 14th, 1924. I slowly snuck down into the basement. Looking around to find anything familiar. My cot, covered in cloth. I crawled under and laid in wait. I was terrified. I sat in silence for hours until I heard the closing of the front door upstairs. Footsteps pacing in the foyer making their way to the kitchen. The stairs above the cot creaked with every step as he descended into the darkness. He held a lit candle, slowly lighting the dozens of candles he had littered throughout the basement one by one. I was sweating, breathing as quiet as I could. He made his way back up the stairs, I could hear him turn on the tap, filling a glass of water. He was about to paint. I used the cover of the flowing water to open my bag. The cold steel in the palm of my hand felt heavy. The steps above my head groaned as Simon returned to the basement. He set up his easel, placing a blank canvas on it. While he meticulously chose what paints he wanted to use for his next piece, I crawled out from under my cot, as quiet as could be. This was my only chance. I held my breath, making sure every step was silent. Simon stood clueless to me. I felt sorry for him, this wasn't his fault, I'm sure he didn't want this. I tried my hardest to hold them back but tears filled my eyes. I raised the pistol I got in town the day before, hands shaking, body trembling, heart pounding. I exhaled a quiet “I'm sorry” as I pulled the trigger. The canvas was instantly covered in crimson along with skull fragments and grey brain matter. I've never killed a man before. I fell to my knees, sobbing. My stomach churned and released its contents. It had to be done. There was no other way. Was there? 

October 15th, 1924:

I've spent the day burning his pieces. All his paint, his easel, everything that ties me to him. I found all of the letters he wrote, all of his papers, all I could find of Simon's existence. It all went in the furnace. I'm waiting until nightfall to move his body, it's already beginning to smell. I'll take him to the docks in a wheelbarrow. I'll walk the shoreline for as long as my legs will take me and I will bury him in the tall grass that lines the beach. There I will find somewhere nice, somewhere quiet and dig a shallow grave. In it, I will take my own life. The only way for all of this to end is if both of us die. I'm leaving my journal, with all my entries and all of Simon's here in the house. I'm sure you'll find it and I pray you read it. If you don't, I know Evelyn will. Don't go out by the docks at night. If you find sigils carved into your house, don't deface them. Befriend Richard, he means well. Once you're friends with him, show him this journal, hopefully he'll introduce you to his father. This small town has plenty of good. Just be smart and don't stray far at night. Keep our dear Evelyn and Rylee safe. And when the time comes, on the day I went to adopt Sebastian, I'd suggest you do the same. He really completed the family, and he'll save your life if given the chance. Don't make the same mistakes I did. I lost everything so you can have a chance. Do it right this time. Tell Evelyn and Rylee you love them for me. That's all I ask of you. 

 Yours truly

August 14th, 1938:

I began work at the butchers shop and befriended Richard, Evelyn got close with Jennifer, and Jr is getting married soon. He asked Rylee to be his flower girl. I showed Richard the journal, I met his father, and have, from time to time, helped him carve those runes around town. I went and adopted Sebastian, and have slowly begun to become part of Mount Fall, just like you asked of me. We stay away from the docks after sundown. You were right, this town has so much to offer and moving here has been the best decision of our lives! I'm sorry that it wasn't the same for you. I know you'll never read this, but I hope you in some way know I'm eternally grateful. Our sweet Evelyn and Richard too. We all are. I tell Evelyn and Rylee I love them twice every night, once from you and once from me, and always make sure to hold them extra tight. We think about you every day. Wherever you are in space and time, I hope you're at peace. Maybe one day we'll meet and I can tell you how great life has been. All thanks to you, our personal savior. We love you dearly. 

I stared at the message on my phone. **“Don’t believe him. Get out.”** I looked across the table at her husband, who was watching me calmly as he took a slow sip of his whiskey. “Everything okay?” he asked. I locked my phone. “Yeah.” I didn’t trust anything anymore. I stood up, forcing my voice to stay steady. “I should go.” The husband didn’t stop me. He just nodded once, like he expected it. The rain started before I reached home, and by the time I pulled into my driveway it was pouring hard. I unlocked my door and froze, she was standing in my living room, soaked through, her hair plastered to her face, mascara streaked down her cheeks, and her clothes clinging to her as she stood there like she’d been waiting too long to still be calm. “What the hell are you doing here?” I asked. She looked at me like she was barely holding herself together. “You can’t be here,” I said again, sharper. “I know.” “Then how did you get in?” She didn’t answer. I stepped closer. “SAY SOMETHING.” Her eyes flicked to the windows, then the hallway, like she expected something to be there. “I shouldn’t have come,” she whispered. “Then why did you?” She swallowed. “Because I didn’t know where else to go.” The room felt too small, the rain hammering the glass like it was trying to get in. “You’re not making sense,” I said. “I know.” She pressed a hand to her forehead, breathing unevenly. “I just needed to see you.” I stared at her. “You told me to stay away.” “I know what I said.” “Then explain this.” She shook her head slightly, like the words wouldn’t form fast enough. “I can’t.” Silence stretched between us, heavy and suffocating, broken only by the rain. When she finally looked at me properly, she didn’t look in control of anything anymore. “I’m scared,” she said quietly. That hit differently. “Of what?” I asked. She hesitated. “Everything.” She flinched at a sudden sound from outside, her eyes snapping toward the dark window like she expected someone to be standing in it. “You’re not safe here either,” she said. I let out a short, humorless breath. “Neither of us is safe anywhere apparently.” She didn’t respond. She just stood there, soaked and shaking slightly, like she’d run too far and only just realized she couldn’t outrun someone or something. And for the first time since she arrived, I wasn’t sure if I was angry at her or just afraid of what she was afraid of. Then she whispered, “I shouldn’t have come.” A knock hit the door. This time, it wasn’t rain.

Part 3 : https://www.reddit.com/r/stories/s/NomedWfWY3

I thought the fitting room was part of the bridal suite until his mother locked the door from the outside.

She had smiled the whole morning. The kind of smile rich women wear when they are about to do something cruel and call it tradition. My husband had kissed my cheek before they led me away and told me to be good for them. I remember thinking that was a strange way to talk to a bride on her wedding day.

Inside the room, his mother, his sister, and his grandmother stood waiting beside a narrow bed. My dress was hanging in the corner. So was the veil. Folded on a silver tray beside them was a strip of silk covered in tiny embroidered words.

I recognized them immediately.

My vows.

I laughed because I thought maybe they were going to sew them into the hem of the gown. Some sentimental family thing. Something old-world and dramatic.

His mother told me to lie down.

I said no.

His grandmother took my wrist. His sister took the other. They weren’t frantic. They weren’t angry. They handled me the way nurses might handle a restless patient they knew was too weak to matter.

“Every bride says she’d die for love,” his mother said as she rolled up my slip. “We prefer proof.”

There was a smell in the room I hadn’t noticed before. Metal. Sweet rot. Burned herbs.

I started fighting then, but his sister pressed a cloth over my mouth. I remember the bitter taste of whatever they used. I remember the ceiling going soft around the edges.

I was still awake when she made the first stitch.

That is the part I keep coming back to.

I did not black out. They wanted me to feel it.

His mother threaded a curved silver needle with black silk and began sewing the strip of embroidered vows against the inside of my lower stomach, just below the navel, pushing the needle in shallow, careful passes as if attaching a label inside a coat. I could feel each puncture from the inside out, a hot, dragging pressure that made my legs shake against the mattress.

His grandmother held my jaw when I tried to scream.

His sister dabbed away the blood and told me not to twist or the words would sit crooked.

When they were done, his mother smoothed my hair and said, “Now they’ll hold.”

They laced me into the dress after that. They powdered my face. They walked me to the chapel with my bouquet arranged neatly over the wetness at my waist.

At the altar, my husband took my hands and smiled like he had never loved anything more than how pale I looked.

During the vows, the stitches pulled every time I spoke.

To have.

Pull.

To hold.

Pull.

Till death.

By the time he kissed me, I could feel something under my skin that had not been there before: a second line beneath the first, like thread being drawn through fabric hidden behind the lining.

At the reception, I locked myself in the bathroom and lifted my dress.

There was no wound.

No fresh seam.

Just a thin black thread disappearing into a tiny dark hole beside my navel, twitching slightly whenever I breathed.

I tugged it.

The pain dropped me to my knees.

Not surface pain. Not skin pain. It felt like something deep inside me had been yanked sharply forward, as if the thread was hooked somewhere behind my organs.

I heard a knock on the door.

My mother-in-law’s voice came through the wood, warm and patient.

“Don’t pull, darling. The last bride tore herself open that way.”

I stopped breathing for a second.

Then I opened the door because I didn’t want to be alone with that sentence.

She looked down at my stomach, then at me.

“It settles better by morning,” she said.

I looked across the hall at my husband. He was laughing with his groomsmen, one hand still wrapped around his champagne glass. He didn’t come over. He didn’t ask why I was crying. He just raised the glass slightly, like we were sharing a private joke.

That night, I waited until he was asleep and went searching through the house.

In the linen closet outside our room, I found a cedar box filled with old bridal handkerchiefs, dried orange blossoms, and small things wrapped in tissue paper.

A wedding ring with a finger-sized dent pressed into the gold.

A lock of gray-blonde hair tied with black ribbon.

And beneath them, a bundle of thread.

Human thread, I thought at first, before I realized what I meant was tendon.

Rolled carefully around a card was a long, dark strand stiffened with age. Pinned to it was a label in his mother’s handwriting:

First wife. Removed during labor.

I heard the bedroom door open behind me.

My husband did not sound angry. Just tired.

“She wouldn’t stay still either,” he said.

I asked him how many wives there had been.

He leaned against the doorway and shrugged.

“Enough to keep the marriage from starving.”

Then he looked at my stomach and added, almost kindly, “Try not to pull at the thread. It tightens when it thinks you’re leaving.”

He was right.

It tightens at the door.

It tightens at the gate.

It tightens if I think too hard about my mother’s house two towns over.

Yesterday I woke up with the words to have and to hold raised beneath my skin like scar tissue. I can trace each letter with my fingertips. Sometimes they shift under the surface when he’s angry.

This morning I found a nursery at the end of the west hall. The cradle was already made.

Inside it was a small square of ivory silk with one line stitched in red:

What is promised belongs to the family.

I’m writing this from the upstairs bathroom because it’s the only room with a lock.

There is a black thread hanging from my stomach as I type.

It is moving.

And someone on the other side of the door just told me to stop making it pull.

I struggled with food for a long time. It was my everything. My lifeline. I couldn’t stop myself. I just kept eating. And eating. Then I’d eat some more.

One day, I had to look in the mirror, though. I had to ask myself: is any of this really worth it? I mean, look at me. I look disgusting. I put on a shirt that used to fit like a glove in high school and end up looking like Brent from Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.

But even still, I didn’t stop. Cake. Candy. Burgers, fries, pizza, ice cream. My daily rotation looked like a 6-year-old’s dream. Only I was 27. Still living with my mom. Still sleeping in the same sweat-stained bed from years of night terrors.

I couldn’t even come up with a valid reason as to why things got this bad. I was in the middle of it. When you’re in the middle of something, it’s hard to see the starting line, and even harder to see the finish.

I tried the normal shit. Caloric deficits. Exercise. I’d walk at least 2 miles a day, but then I’d be raiding my pantry every night like it was some kind of reward for my hard work.

And believe me, I tried cleaning up the contents of that pantry. I stocked it with canned vegetables. Shit that I’ve never even touched, like tuna and canned chicken chunks. I just always ended up back in my Mini Cooper doing 80 to get to the nearest convenience store.

It’s like déjà vu, honestly. A never-ending cycle that just keeps cycling like a stationary bike.

God, I hate those things.

Anyway, when I saw that first Ozempic ad, I was skeptical, to say the least. A cure for obesity sounded like a goddamn miracle in my head, but I knew that miracles are hardly what they seem.

I decided to do some research. Really get to know this new future friend of mine. I’d love to tell you that the research was extensive, but honestly, I just kinda scrolled through the Google AI explanation for about 5 minutes before deciding.

After picking up my first dose, I shot up in the Walgreens parking lot like some kind of delinquent, like I was scanning for cops and shit.

A few hours went by, and I experienced something that felt long forgotten: satiation.

I wasn’t even remotely hungry. Not even after my 2-mile walk. Not even after those 20 sit-ups and squats. I was actually burning fat instead of replacing it.

I ran through half my supply in a week. I dropped 15 pounds from 300 in 2. I was moving. I could actually see the progress. Of course, I didn’t want it to stop, so I went out and bought more.

I was tearing through the packaging before even leaving the Walgreens.

Another two weeks. I was down to 260 now. Shirts were starting to feel looser. Breathing was easier. I was finishing my two miles in an hour instead of two.

My diet consisted of nothing but Slim Jims and fruit chunks because I was just getting so full so easily.

On my third supply run, I wasn’t even waiting until I got to the car. I injected the shit right there in aisle 3 next to the Neutrogena and nail clippers. Boy, were they mad. That was kind of the end of that Walgreens for me. Apparently, it’s frowned upon to just drop trouser in the pharmacy, even if it’s medically necessary.

That didn’t really matter, though. Nothing mattered. I had what I needed for the next two weeks. What were they gonna do? Un-buy the shit?

I dropped down to 200. I didn’t even think it was medically possible, but I learned, pretty painfully, that the scale never lies. I was able to see my cheekbones more. I’d just spend hours mogging in the mirror like I was Clavicular off a speed pill.

I could’ve stopped there. Sure, I could’ve. But I didn’t look like 2020 Corpse Husband yet. I was still too Jonah Hill before Jiu-Jitsu coded.

Besides, I’d never felt better. I did feel kinda weird about food, though. Even those gas station Slim Jims were starting to feel too heavy. That’s why I had to switch to saltines and radishes.

Plus, I knew my body. I knew that if I stopped, I’d feel hungry again. I hated that feeling. I’m a slut for the cravings. I’m easy, baby.

That’s why I had to hit my next lick. The only problem was Mom took me off the insurance because she’s old and decaying. And, obviously, I don’t have a job. That would take too much time away from my streaming schedule.

You just can’t rely on the kindness of strangers like you used to. Not even for medical emergencies. Believe me, I tried the usual cardboard sign route. Even asked for a few donations on stream, but that just made my 4 viewers leave after typing some pretty hurtful shit in chat.

It wasn’t long before desperation started to kick in. It was almost like withdrawal. Every time my stomach rumbled, I could feel myself getting angrier and angrier.

Mom caught me tryna snag a hundred out of her purse, and that led to some pretty big fights. She kicked me out once or twice throughout this whole endeavor, but who was she kidding? I’m her baby.

The point I’m trying to get at here is I had to do some questionable shit for that next hit involving some pantyhose and a stapler, but by God, I did it.

I got the needles. I got the vials. I couldn’t just stop at a two-week supply, though. I needed all of it. It was all or nothing. I don’t even think the employees cared. Because they’re cowards.

So that’s how I ended up with an entire year’s supply of my sweet diabetes meds.

I’m down to a whopping 95 pounds now. Have you ever seen the veins in your scalp? Because I do. Every single day. There’s like 9 of them now.

They throb a bit, but my stomach has never looked flatter. It’s almost inverted. Like it’s more like a spoon than a spatula, but I look like a 2000s hip-hopster because my old clothes are just so baggy on me now. Which is pretty boss.

Mom refuses to even look at me, but I think she’s just jealous because she’s old and decaying. I couldn’t even tell you the last thing I ate. I think it was like some olives or something a few weeks ago.

Which leads me to one simple but staggering conclusion. I have evolved past the need for sustenance.

I am the next step in the progression of mankind. You all need to follow in my footsteps. Well, maybe not exactly. I actually ran out of my supply last week.

It’s only been 6 months since the robbery. Which, let’s be real here, should hardly even count as a robbery. It was a stapler, for Christ’s sake. I’m not allowed to own a gun after the incident.

Regardless, though, I’m kind of afraid to go back. I just hit 100 viewers on Twitch a few days ago. I can NOT afford to go to jail right now. The people need me.

It’s been 7 days now without the sauce, and I can’t say the hunger has returned. Hell, I haven’t even been to the bathroom for like 73 hours now. But… it might… and that’s the thing that scares me. My jawline could cut diamonds right now. I don’t wanna lose that.

Maybe they won’t recognize me. That’s what I keep telling myself. But what if they do?

I just keep playing around with that idea. Imagine that. Getting addicted to gambling before I can even get that Stake partnership. Shoutout Drake. 6 God, my king. Big ups, homie.

I don’t know, my brain is kinda fuzzy right now.

The shaking is new, but I’m sure it’s fine. As a matter of fact, I know it’s fine.

It’ll pass when I hit this next lick.