Horror Stories of 1,000 Words or Less
For the month of February 2026, these are the stories that entertain us most
* Picnic by Kate Jiggins
* Nightmaria by E.J. Schaefer
* The Agonies of the Oblations by Wren Yohe
* Dog Bones by Kamran Connelly
* Drowning Man Bridge by Travis Koll
* Humans Below by Aza Smith
* Recipe for a Friend by Autumn Charette
* The Legacy by Terrye Turpin
* On the Job by James Clar
* Coat Hanger by Mandy Schmiedlin
* Petomane of the World by Derek McMillan
* 118 Willow Street by P.J. Smith
* An Eye for an Eye by Jim Harrington
* Lesson Learned by Mike Rusetsky
* The Rehearsal by John Pitts
* Manchester Resurrection Services by LaVern McCarthy
* Retro Lust by Stephen R. Hunt
* The Screaming Game by Lesley Warren
* Traffic Stop by Bill Cox
* Lost and Found by B.K. Barton
* Crimson Devotion by Fiona Verity
* Signare by Madeleine D'Este
Picnic by Kate Jiggins
The woman on the bench closes the hardback book she’s reading, using her finger as a bookmark. A warm breeze ruffles her brown hair, and she tucks a loose lock behind her ear. The air movement from behind has carried her boy’s scent the other direction, and she feels momentarily nervous. Scanning the jungle gym, it takes her only a few seconds to spot him.
“Ben!” she calls, and when he looks over, “Five more minutes! Wrap it up!” She watches him a moment longer, her eyes shining with love, a smile playing at the corners of her mouth. The day is sunny, unseasonably warm for March in Pennsylvania, and she’s glad she’s brought both of them out for some fresh air.
Five minutes pass, and finishing her chapter, she closes The Awakening, using the front leaf of the slipcover to mark her place. “All right, Benny, let’s go! Daddy will be home from work before long,” she announces, standing and tucking her book into the floral bag beside her on the bench. She reaches her arms up to the sky in a stretch. Really, such a beautiful day.
Slowly, Ben lumbers toward her, smacking his jaws and swallowing audibly. Mulch trails behind him, caught by his belly and tail.
“Something caught in your throat, Benny?” the woman asks, and there is love in her voice. “You know you always get indigestion when you eat too fast.”
A man approaches from the opposite side of the jungle gym and begins to scream just as she turns alongside the crocodile, and they start walking home.
“Lovely day for a picnic,” she remarks. “Don’t you think, Ben?” He grunts his agreement as they make their way through the park.
Kate Jiggins grew up in Pennsylvania and graduated from George Washington University at the turn of the century. She currently lives in the Philadelphia suburbs with her husband, children, and myriad pets (no crocodiles). You can find her on Instagram at @katejig.
Nightmaria by E.J. Schaefer
I found a portal last winter, in the forest just behind my house. The lake had frozen over, leaving a smooth, glassy layer for all the kids to skate on. In a quiet corner, I found a circle of obsidian ice that appeared to have something beneath it. Another world. Then someone, or something, reached up and pulled me in.
Flecks of frost clung to my lashes as I opened my eyes. My body felt sluggish as numbness had already begun to set in. The wind felt sharp and unforgiving as I stood up, struggling to maintain my balance. My stomach sank when I recognized the landscape, or a warped version of it. Dark, crystallized trees. Charcoal snow. The once crisp scent of cedar and pine in the air now smelled like death. I’d woken up in a nightmare.
Crimson streaks painted the ice around me, and that’s when I saw them. The reindeer. No, the monsters. Their sharp antlers held severed human heads. I was paralyzed as my brain struggled to process the frightening image. My lungs felt raw because I couldn’t stop screaming. Jolts of terror spasmed through me as I skated away, delirious from the icy air, hoping that a version of my home existed in this world. One did.
A nightmarish form of my mother waited for me at the back door, wearing a grin on her mangled, discolored face that still haunts me. A twisted version of my father stood by the fireplace, pushing the logs around. The holes where his eyes should’ve been bled down peeling grey cheeks as he welcomed me home. Our Christmas tree was adorned with gleaming rib bones, plucked out eyeballs, and a string of glossy intestines that wrapped around it like garland. My mother handed me a mug, made from the skull of a small animal. Maggots floated in the hot, fragrant liquid, which I refused to drink to her dismay.
Through the front window, I saw laughing children throwing blood-soaked snowballs at each other, gleefully enjoying the carnage. I wondered where the blood was coming from, then saw a snowman with a limp human arm stuck into its side. Scarlet streaks oozed down into piles of pink slush.
I raced back to the forest in a dreamlike daze, desperate to find a way out. Then, I saw my dark reflection, swirling beneath the lake’s surface like a phantom. I pounded the ice until my fists bled, until the lake cracked open and swallowed me. The scent of evergreen let me know I’d made it back, somehow. The ice has since melted, but I find myself still having nightmares about that day. Part of me wonders if I’m still trapped there, and this is all just a dream.
E.J. Schaefer’s short story “The Funhouse” was published in Paranormal Ghostwatch Zine earlier this year and two additional short stories, “Adverse Reactions” and “Uninvited Guests” were published in separate anthologies by Alien Buddha. Her short pieces “The Riley House” & “My Father’s Secret” were read on the Creepy Podcast, and most recently her flash piece “The House Next Door” appeared in Volume 18 of Dark Descent webzine.
The Agonies of the Oblations by Wren Yohe
Was it a miracle or a curse that these humid caves had an abundance of water? The complete darkness was overwhelming in its totality. The constant drip-drip-drip-drip of mineral-laden water echoed in twisting, labyrinthine caves, while other caves carried the deafening roar from an underground river.
He wandered in the darkness, hungry. By Gods, was he hungry. Without light, he did not know how long he had been in these accursed caves. His schedule was wake, wander, drink, wander, sleep, and then wake again. After thirty or so long sleeps, he gave up counting. He’d been there long enough that his stomach had stopped rumbling. Long enough that his body stopped producing solid waste. Long enough that any food, no matter how rotten, would be desirable.
Supposedly, there were two others sealed into the labyrinth as he had been, though the musty caves were large enough that they had not crossed paths. All three were precious Sacrifices to the Dark Gods. The Darkness hungered as he did, and it would be sated. This was the fate of the Sacrificed, willing or not. He had not been willing.
He stumbled through the blackness when suddenly his foot touched something soft and yielding. Flesh. He heard a soft groan among the pitter-patter of dripping stalactites—a fellow Sacrifice. Only one thought crossed the forefront of his mind.
Slowly, he crouched down and felt the ground before him. His hands ran over the warm body of his Sacrificial peer. He found their arm and lifted their hand. With tenderness, he pressed that soft hand to his face; their fingertips brushed against his lips. He opened his mouth and bit off a finger.
Hot, sour, and savory blood coated his tongue. The tender flesh contrasted with the crunch of bone between his teeth.
Screams filled the stale, wet air. Not his. But the fallen Sacrifice was too weak to fight back in any meaningful way. He put a knee between the shoulder blades of his victim. They squirmed pitifully underneath. It mattered not.
He ate and ate. The meaty chew of sinew was addicting and flavorful, and he took bite after bite after bite till his stomach felt full to bursting. At some point, the screaming stopped, but he did not notice.
He wept. Not because of the terrible lengths he'd gone through to eat… but because this was the most delicious meal he'd ever had.
Wren Yohe is an aspiring artist and horror writer based in Atlanta. Their obsession with the macabre started at a young age when the 1999 movie The Mummy ruined their fixation on Egypt with that scarab scene. You know the one. There is nothing they enjoy more than being disturbed and unsettled, something they hope to share with their readers. https://substack.com/@wrenyohe
Dog Bones by Kamran Connelly
Inside the pine-clad walls of St Theresa’s crematorium, gathered in the pews, were the friends and family of the man in the box at the front of the room. Mr. Charles Harper was on the phone with one of his daughters when, mid-conversation, his speech slurred, and his words wobbled as his mind erased itself in real time. He never got to say goodbye to the chosen daughter on that fateful last call, or to tell her he needed a plumber for the blocked toilet. Mr. Harper, who sired many children to many mothers, had three generations of his DNA amidst the pews. The front row was filled with his past lovers and sows, all of them beautiful, all of them blonde, and all of them now old. The second row was his children, and they’re partners, six daughters and three sons. Behind them, the grandchildren, two of them, in their early twenties, with great-grandchildren.
As a short, rotund lady, dressed in black with one block of white at her throat, read aloud the extensive eulogy compiled by the vast family, the kids murmured amongst themselves.
Leon, a seven-year-old grandchild, asked his older cousin, who sat next to him, “Are we going to bury granddad today? Is that why he’s in the coffee box?”
Hugo, the fifteen-year-old cousin, corrected him. “Coffin. Not Coffee. That’s what that box is called. And we aren’t burying granddad; we’re going to burn him into ash.”
Reality fractured inside little Leon’s mind as he tried to comprehend the disturbing revelation.
“What do you mean burn him? Like a bonfire?” he quizzed the cousin.
“Yeah, kind of. This isn’t a graveyard, Leon, it’s a crematorium. That’s why there weren’t any headstones. They don’t bury anyone here. That’s what the big chimney is for, because they burn people here instead,” Hugo said.
Little Leon turned to another older cousin a few knees down the pew.
“Archer, Hugo said that we are going to burn granddad. Is that true?” he asked Archer, who was seventeen and knew everything Leon asked him.
“Yes. But it’s what granddad wanted, so it’s ok,” he assured the little guy, who was clearly traumatised by the thought. “It’s better than being buried; when you scatter someone’s ashes, they fly away and can go anywhere they want.”
“Like an angel?” Leon asked, his face full of hope.
“Yes, just like an angel,” Archer said, quelling his anxiety.
Leon sat back, content that burning granddad would turn him into an ash angel.
“They have to burn the body for three hours, they told us at school that the fire has to be hotter than any other fire,” Hugo whispered, desperate to find a way to pull his leg.
“More hot than a barbecue?” Leon asked, taking the bait.
“Way more! Like a million degrees. But it still doesn’t get hot enough to burn the heel bones.”
“What’s a heel bone?”
Hugo crossed his left leg over his right knee and pointed to his heel.
“This bit. It’s the only part they can’t burn,” Hugo said, reigniting the fire of confusion in his little cousin’s brain.
Uncle Albert leaned forward from the pew behind, “Pack it in, you lot,” he whispered, “Stop talking, it's disrespectful.”
Order and silence returned to the kid’s pew. Backs straightened and lips sealed.
Little Leon quietly sat for the rest of the service, staring at his own little feet that couldn’t quite reach the floor from the pine bench, wondering what happened to the heels.
***
At the end of the service, the family gathered outside in the flower garden and placed the vast array of colourful wreaths around the plaque with the name Charles Harper. The kids ran in the grassy area around the garden as the adults huddled in small pockets of conversation and tearful remembrance. An old man in his seventies, not a part of the Harper family, noticed a child hovering near the adults, with a perturbed look about his face.
“Are you ok?” the old man asked.
Little Leon nodded his head unconvincingly.
“Are you one of Charles’s grandchildren?”
Leon nodded again.
“I’m Bob. I was in the army with your grandpa when we were young men. He was a hell of a man and funny. He never missed a chance to have a laugh; he was the barracks prankster,” Bob said and smiled in reminiscence.
“What do they do with the heels?” Leon asked boldly.
“The heels? What do you mean?”
“Hugo said when they turn people into ash, the fire doesn’t burn their heels,” he said and pointed to his heel in case Bob didn’t know what he meant.
“Well, I believe that’s right, young man,” Bob replied, as he bent down to little Leon’s level.
“Where do they go then?” Leon asked again.
Bob took a moment and spun the question around his mischievous mind. Then gave an answer that his late brother in arms would have approved.
“They turn them into dog bones.”
Horror took charge of little Leon’s mind as it recalled the familiar image of his family pooch Cora, gnawing on a roast bone. One that he himself had selected for her, from a huge pile of pre-packaged bones that looked like heels.
***
Later that night, at home, while the adults drank in solemn memory, Leon crept around the house and garden, still in his formal funeral attire, followed closely by a German shepherd named Cora. She watched anxiously as he gathered up the half-chewed bones that she had purposely scattered around the property. He dug a hole, buried them, and placed a sign on top that read, FOR THE ASH ANGELS.
The morning after, he came down to find the family gathered in the garden.
“What is it?” Mom asked.
“Looks like ash. But where’d it all come from?” Dad asked.
Leon pushed his way to the front. The hole was empty. And the sign read, THANKS.
Kam’s short story BLOOD BANK due to be released by Baynam Books and DEATH BED INC accepted by Twisted Dreams Press, is published online at The Horror Tree, Trembling with Fear, WitCraft, and T. Saunders publishing for his works of fiction. Has poetry featured in three anthologies, a novella featured in the Paul Cave Prize for literature. And is shopping around his debut novel, The Extinction Process.
Drowning Man Bridge by Travis Koll
The Drenched Woman: the phantom in the story he’d heard since childhood, not that he’d ever believed it. He saw her standing there in the middle of the bridge, dressed in a soaking gown, glowing full moon white. Like so many others in the past, Jacob swerved and smashed through the guardrail and plunged fifty feet into the freezing river. A deafening impact of twisting metal and shattering glass. Fortunately, despite the pain burning through his ribs and shoulder, he stayed conscious and managed to force open the door before his truck sank. However, he was now treading water a whole football field from shore in either direction, both the sky above and the river below black, cold, endless.
But not empty, at least not the water. Bottom-bound branches, dead and thorny, stabbed at his kicking legs and feet. And weeds and vines, stretching up from the dark, tangled around his ankles. He struggled to shove them away, losing a boot, losing his strength to the pain and cold. Coughing and fighting for breath, he yanked the phone from his pocket, hoping it might somehow still be working. Just a few minutes of power, miraculous as that would be, was all he needed. Of course, the phone was dead, waterlogged, and it soon slipped from his wet fingers into the abyss, taking with it the recent “Fuk u, asshole” text from his ex and any chance of calling for help.
And then something else touched his socked foot. A hand with slender fingers, somehow colder than the river itself.
Jacob hollered and jerked away his leg. No one. Nothing. He couldn’t see anything nearby beneath the undulating water and tried to reassure himself that it hadn’t been a hand at all. A weird branch. Maybe a weed. The hallucinations of an exhausted and pain-muddled mind.
But then he felt it again. More forceful this time. A hand grabbing at his ankle, fingernails clawing into his skin.
Panicking, Jacob kicked and splashed and swam away with everything he could muster. Adrenaline kept him swimming far beyond what his ribs and shoulder would’ve allowed in any other situation, but he still ended up a good distance from the bank when his body finally gave out. Panting, shivering, he bobbed in the water, barely keeping his head above the surface, eyes studying any suspicious ripple or reflection.
A woman’s face. Pale and gaunt and glowering up at him. It appeared beneath the surface and vanished before his mind could fully register what he was seeing.
Then a whisper— “Come down.”
Something yanked Jacob under. Not one hand but a dozen. Tugging at his jeans, tearing at his shirt, scratching at his other boot. He screamed, bubbles roaring from his mouth, arms fighting to escape. Shadows surrounded him: some resembling people, others just blobs of deep and menacing darkness. One, however, floated closer. No longer a shadow but the same woman he’d seen standing on the bridge, now decayed and hollow-eyed.
Jacob froze. Still dressed in a white and flowing gown, the woman drew yet nearer, her stringy hair floating behind her. Slowly, her jaw dropped open, and from every direction arose a woman’s terrified, gurgling cries. Desperate prayers and calls for help.
Finally, Jacob wrestled free, scrambled back up, and gasped when he at last reached the surface. Flailing, terror completely overtaking any pain or exhaustion, he raced for the shore, certain the woman and shadows were right behind him. Atop the bridge, a man shone a flashlight down at him, asked him if he was okay, but Jacob didn’t stop to answer. Not until he reached the riverbank. Not until he was sure whatever he’d seen wasn’t about to pull him back under.
When he, at last, made it to the embankment, Jacob crawled out of the water and ensured no part of him—not even a toe—was still touching it. Lungs heaving, he collapsed and dug his fingers into the soft sand.
“Hey, you okay?” the man on the bridge again shouted, his voice barely audible given the distance.
Groaning, Jacob sat up, clothes tattered, and waved. “I’m fine, but could use a hand. Maybe your phone?”
“Sure. But what about her? She okay, too?”
He forced himself up, squinting to see the man better. “Sorry, what?”
“The woman with you. She hurt at all?”
Jacob turned, chest tightening. The Drenched Woman stood before him, sallow skin hanging from her skull, hands immediately seizing him by the shirt. No matter how hard he fought or how loud he screamed, this time she didn’t let go. Instead, she hauled him back into the water, dragged him under, pulled him deep.
Soon, the water fell still and silent.
Over the next several years, locals renamed the crossing Drowning Man Bridge, mostly because of how often people heard a man’s gurgling voice crying out for help from the water—that and the drivers who saw him standing in the road, barefoot and in tattered, soaking clothes.
Humans Below by Aza Smith
A rat fled the cat and wondered, “What scares a cat?”
He had seen humans walk up to the many cats that hunted him in the alleys above, and they all fled at the sight of them. The rat decided he wanted to be a human too.
Opportunity struck when he found one. He smelled of sweat, alcohol, old garbage, and something foul in the needle in his arm. Other rats crawled over his unconscious body, looking for anything edible. The rat was the only one who was there for the human.
The rat’s skin stretched to accommodate, displacing his insides to give room for the new, human bones that contorted his shape. It hurt. The human wasn’t happy either, yelling and clawing and desperate to get away, but now wasn’t the time for squeamishness. It’s a “first-come, first-served” world.
The rat tried to walk on all fours, but humans didn’t walk that way. He felt his tiny rat bones snap against the elbows of his new human legs. The rat – now Ratman, rat made human – soldiered through the pain as he felt his rodent muscles chafe against his unfamiliar gait. He saw his new face reflected in a pool where sunlight peeked through, and marveled at what he had become between drops of red leaking from his fur.
Now to test his theory.
He found a small tabby. Its eyes became slits at the sight of him. The cat’s hissing worried Ratman, but it bristled and crept back against the wall. Ratman realized it was looking to get away. He was able to grab the cat by its neck with his human hands. His grip broke its neck, and victory seasoned the meat.
Emboldened by his success, Ratman climbed out from a storm drain into the street.
“Me person,” he tried to say, unaccustomed to his new larynx and incisors. His fellow humans ran, horrified.
Ratman didn’t understand. He was a human now, and they were humans. They should be glad to see another human. He returned to the sewers, where the pipes and garbage were now so small. He saw all his former kin scurrying over one another. He saw how afraid they all were, and while he felt big, he also felt lonely.
One of his claws reached down and grabbed one of the rats. It bit him on his thumb, and he winced.
Ratman saw a small girl jumping rope alone at a city playground and thought her perfect. He bit her neck to silence her screaming, dragged her body down the drain, and fitted the rat over her.
Hours later, a New Human was born.
It was smaller than Ratman. It tried to take its first steps. SNAP. It lost its balance and fell face down. The half-human teeth in its mouth came loose all at once and were spat onto the concrete.
“Hurting.”
New Human curled into itself, drowning in agony with every breath it took, but Ratman was certain they would adapt. As will the other humans he planned to make. There were so many rats in the sewers. Ratman was confident that once there were enough like him, the humans above would learn to tolerate them.
Weeks go by. People above vanish one after the other. The sewer workers were plentiful, as were the vagrants, junkies, runaways, and urban explorers. Some attract search parties and calls for back-up, which only increases their stock.
More sewer-dwelling humans crowd through the canals. Not all survive, their bodies giving out, but Ratman continues his work. Some learn to make other rats into humans just as Ratman did for them. Others lumbered aimlessly, their minds stalled in their liminal state, but Ratman was confident they would learn in time.
He taught them. He taught them how to walk, how to talk, and how to exchange one thing for another. Stalls and processions built from cardboard and plastic. His humans below would trade food and possessions, as the humans above did. One traded a box of empty bottles for a half-eaten dog, only to give it back in exchange for the empty bottles. Practice makes perfect.
Thousands of rats lived in the sewers, and eventually, the humans born from their kind outgrew the caverns of their home. Ratman believed it was time. His kingdom had formed, and now was the time to lead his kingdom into the light. Rats abhorred the light, but humans above thrived there, and humans below will too.
He led his procession to the processing plant. He will meet the humans above, and the humans below will dwell among them.
And both shall be grateful.
Aza Smith is a horror/humorist writer from Dallas, TX with a Bachelor's in Fine Arts that he has no use for. He has published stories in Flash Fiction Magazine, Flash Phantoms, The Molotov Cocktail, and Curious Curls Publishing ever since he started writing short stories fo' reelz in January 2024. His biggest dream is to see his work adapted into overfunded AI-generated blockbuster cashgrabs made only to sell children's toys.
Recipe for a Friend by Autumn Charette
.jpg)
I remember the first time I learned the recipe for a friend. It was decades and decades ago, when I was a small child visiting my great-grandmother in her cozy little log cabin in the Swiss Alps. There wasn’t a paved road that led up to her home, so my parents had to hire a horse-drawn carriage from the nearest town. The journey was long, bumpy, and cold, but I’ve already written about that specific part of the trip in my recipe for the perfect scrambled egg, so I won’t go back into the details here.
Anyway, by the time we reached the cabin, I was shaking and shivering from the cold. Too bad great-grandma didn’t have my recipe for scrumptious hot chocolate mug cakes! Those would have warmed me right up! Unfortunately, she didn’t, so I ended up getting sick, which is when great-grandma taught me the secret family recipe for a friend. The first step is to gather the right ingredients. Some of the things on the list are substitutable, as long as the texture is simil-
-----SKIP TO RECIPE-----
Recipe for a friend
Prep time: varies, at least 15 minutes
Cook time: varies, at least 15 minutes
Yields: 1 friend
Ingredients:
-
1 nasty stomach bug or flu
-
1 bottle (20 ounces) of sports drink like Gatorade or Pedialyte
-
1 bottle (20 ounces) ginger ale
-
1/2 a sleeve of Saltines (approximately 18 crackers)
-
An irresponsibly large burrito (exact size may vary. If you aren’t sure if the burrito is irresponsibly large, it should be bigger)
-
1-3 doses of cold medicine
-
2 doses max strength Tums
-
Cough drops to taste
-
Optional: a fruit cup, dark chocolate, peanut butter, anything for a fun color
Directions:
-
When gathering your ingredients, it is important to reject any offers of help from the people on your phone. They aren’t real friends like the one you’re about to make.
-
After you’ve gathered the ingredients, you should isolate yourself as thoroughly as possible. The people in your life will likely not understand the intricacies of creating a friend and will probably find the process “upsetting” or “gross.”
-
Once you’re properly isolated, take the sports drink, ginger ale, saltines, burrito, and any optional ingredients and start consuming them as quickly as possible. You don’t have to finish everything, but make sure to get as much down as you can.
-
Next, start taking the various medicines. You should probably only take a single dose of each at a time, but it’s up to your discretion.
-
Once the foods, beverages, and medicines are combined in your stomach, I recommend lying on the floor and groaning in pain for a while to let them properly integrate. This step is essential for creating a proper friend, so give it as much time as it takes. You’ll know you’re ready for the next step when a growing, insufferable nausea starts welling up inside you. This will likely be the worst you’ve felt the whole time you’re sick. This is good; this is what you’re looking for to birth a friend with the perfect texture.
-
Make your way to the nearest toilet or, if no toilet is available, the largest plastic bowl you own. Proceed to heave and retch until there is nothing left in your gut and you’re wracked with spasms of dry heaving and coughing. Do not let the acidic burn of the bile stop you. Do not be concerned with the large, bloody chunks mixed into your friend. Those are important components. Do your best not to spill any friend during this part of the process. It would be a shame for such hard work to go to waste.
-
After you regain your composure, anywhere from 5 to 35 minutes on average, heave yourself back to the bowl to inspect your new friend. If you let the ingredients blend long enough, you should have a pulsing mass of multicolored tendrils sitting in your bowl.
-
Now, for the most important step: extracting your friend. Some people say you should wear gloves for this step, but those people are fools. What’s the point of creating such a perfect friend if you aren’t going to caress them with your bare hands? Really get in there, scoop up as much as you can, and revel in the slippery texture as your new friend dances between your hands, up your arms, over your chest. You have created them, and now they seek a new home.
-
Allow them back inside.
Autumn Charette (she/they) is a queer and trans author from Maine who dabbles in many genres but most enjoys writing science fiction and short horror. She received her MA in English from the University of Maine, and she currently attends the Stonecoast MFA. Her work has been published in Flash Phantoms.
The Legacy by Terrye Turpin
I follow my grandfather into the East Texas forest, stepping silently on the cushion of fragrant pine needles. The moon hides her face behind a curtain of clouds.
Grandfather lifts his gold pocket watch into a sliver of light. “It’s time, Mary,” he says.
At thirteen, this will be my first hunt, my first kill. I tremble under the weight of this legacy, determined to show that a girl can be a hunter too.
At the deer stand, I place a hand on the ladder, ready to climb to the wooden tower, but Grandfather shakes his head. There are tracks beneath the stand, leading down a narrow trail crowded with grasping brush. Overhead, an owl screeches a warning.
At the edge of a clearing, we pause. Voices carry from the woods. Men. We are not alone in the forest. Grandfather says, “I’ll circle. Wait here until I get back.”
The trees close in with his absence. A howl sounds, and something nearby answers with its own mournful cry. The hairs on my arms rise. I whisper, “Grandfather?”
Shouts and gunfire answer me. Forgetting my fear, I race across the clearing. On the other side, I come upon two men, hunters, crouched over the body of a large gray wolf. Grandfather’s pocket watch, the face shattered, lies beside the animal.
“Jesus, girl!” one of the men exclaims, “Where’d you come from?” He stands and nudges his companion. Their eyes light with excitement, as though they expect to collect another trophy.
Sobbing, I drop to my knees and shake the wolf. His eyes open. A growl rumbles from his chest. As he rises, I turn to the hunters and bare my teeth and claws to the full moon. I am ready for this, my first kill.
Terrye is a native Texan who enjoys writing stories set in her home state and other strange places. When she’s not writing, she enjoys exploring antique, junk, and thrift stores for bargains and inspiration. She’s had stories published online in Tales From the Moonlit Path, Creepy Pasta Stories, and Drew Blood’s Dark Tales. Find her at https://terryeturpin.com/.
On the Job by James Clar
I killed three more last night. They came from the old graveyard just down the road.
I always know when they’re coming. The night tightens like a noose being drawn slowly and deliberately. Sounds flatten. Smells sharpen. The wind dies. It’s as if the world itself is holding its breath so it can listen. I wake before they reach the fence, heart hammering, muscles coiled. Whatever sleep I get lately is fractured. Yet I rise from it like something dragged from murky water.
They never arrive together. They separate themselves from the stones and the crooked markers, emerging one by one. Some move low, scraping, while others sway upright. They remind me of something taken apart, hastily reassembled, and sent back out unfinished. Their balance may be wrong, but their intent is nevertheless unmistakable. They follow a path they remember but no longer understand.
I’ve become convinced that they’re after the children.
They linger at the edges of the yard, testing the air, drawn by warmth and breath and the soft, fragile noises that come from inside the house. Fingers too stiff, too patient, trail along the siding. Something scratches once, lightly, at the foundation, then stops, listening. I caught one standing beneath the nursery window, its head tilted, its mouth opening and closing grotesquely without sound. I didn’t hesitate. I never do. After all, it’s my job.
Whatever’s calling them here, I can’t keep this pace up much longer.
There’s nothing clean about the work. It’s close, frantic, wet. When I strike, there’s a moment of resistance followed by a collapse that feels more like relief than pain. They smell of soaked earth, of mildew and old rain, of things buried without ceremony. When they come apart, it’s not blood so much as remnant: clotted dirt, scraps of fabric, the sour-sweet stench of long confinement. They make a sound when they’re finished. It’s not a scream. It’s more akin to a pleading breath trapped in what once was a throat. It crawls under my skin and makes it twitch.
I haul what’s left away from the house and out past the swing set … into the woods, to places where little feet don’t dare roam.
By morning, I’m a wreck. My body shakes with exhaustion. My mouth tastes like rust and rot. No amount of scrubbing gets rid of the smell; it clings, settles, announces my presence. I know they sense it. I know I carry the night with me back toward the house.
The family is beginning to get annoyed. I worry about what they might do.
“Buster stinks again this morning, honey,” I heard as I came up the back steps, hunger gnawing at me until it hurt.
“There must be a dead animal around here, something he keeps getting into.”
“Well, don’t let him into the house! I’ll give him another bath. Maybe we should put him on his chain tonight or lock him in the shed?”
Not a good idea.
James C. Clar is a writer and retired teacher. Most recently his short fiction has appeared in Bright Flash Literary Review, Spank the Carp, Flash Digest, The Blotter Magazine, the Magazine of Literary Fantasy, Sudden Flash Magazine, Antipodean SF and 365 Tomorrows. He divides his time between the wilds of Upstate New York and the more congenial climes of Honolulu, Hawaii.
Coat Hanger by Mandy Schmiedlin
She sat at the kitchen table in her bathrobe, smoking a cigarette. Still half asleep, she barely registered the noise coming from behind her. It was almost a squeaking sound, tiny but shrill. “Damned rats,” she muttered as she stubbed her cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray. Shuffling across the kitchen in her house shoes, she leaned over and pulled open the cabinets, staring past the detergent and Ajax into the dark corners. She found nothing. The noise had stopped.
But later that day, while taking out the trash, she heard a faint thud. She froze, trash bag in hand, and cocked her head. After a moment, she heard it again and dropped the trash bag. “Alright, you bastard,” she said, opening the cabinet again. She held her breath, listening. THUD. Louder this time, coming from the pipes. She went to the garage and got the rat poison and a jar of pesticide for good measure, and emptied both down the drain. There was a series of loud startled shrieks as she slowly backed away, her heart pounding. Then there was silence.
Nothing else happened for a week. Then a slow, rotting stench began to permeate the house. When she couldn’t stand it anymore, she got a bottle of Drano from underneath the sink and ran the hot water for a minute, pouring the contents down. When the sink started to clog, she grabbed the plunger with frustration and worked it for a while. Making no progress, she turned off the water and waited, arms crossed. Thinking of nothing else left, she went into her closet and unbent a coat hanger, gingerly poking it down the drain, hoping to flush the damned thing out. Shoving it way down into the pipe, she met some resistance, but nothing else. Giving up, she removed it and let it clatter onto the floor.
All was quiet for five minutes. “Well, guess you should finally cough up the money for a plumber to get this dead crap out,” she said to herself. No sooner had she spoken the words than there was a third thud and a vicious scream. Louder… THUD! THUD! THUD! Faster and faster. The shrieks were deafening as she peered over the edge of the silver basin into the drain.
That’s when she saw it, wriggling its head out of the opening, and she noticed it didn’t have any hair. It was pink, raw, and bloody. Then there was a tiny arm, with little fingers arching out of the hole. She heard noises, little mewling sounds as if it was trying to speak. She stood horrified, covering her mouth, as the head finally popped out and looked up at her, blinking with horrible, deformed eyes and a garish smile. “Mother,” it said.
Mandy Schmiedlin is a short story/flash fiction writer and former mortician living in Texas. She is interested in all things horror and macabre. This is her first published story.
Petomane of the World by Derek McMillan
My cousin, Charley O’Mahoney, could fart for Ireland. If it were an Olympic sport, he would have been up on the podium, not in second or third place; he would be in the top spot, with the audience at a respectful distance.
Of course, it isn’t an Olympic sport, but Charley did win the 1972 Petomane of the World championship for artistic use of flatulence, held at the Dirty Badger in Dublin. The pub was an old coaching inn, and the event was held in the open air.
Charley was photographed by the local press holding the trophy, a variation on Rodin known locally as “The Stinker.”
Sadly, the trophy was stolen in a random robbery in the 1970s. Even more sadly, Charlie died peacefully in his sleep in 2025. His funeral was a big event, and the family booked Clontarf Castle. Charlie’s fellow flatulists formed a separate group in the bar as we all acquainted ourselves with Guinness.
That night, I was awakened in my room. There was something in the air. It was something so distinctive I had to open the window. With the first light of dawn, I could see cousin Charley’s trophy had mysteriously appeared on the mantelpiece.
Spooky.
Derek McMillan is a writer in Durrington in the UK. His editor is his wife, Angela. He has written for print and online publications in the UK, USA, Australia and Canada. His latest book is an audio-book with the cheerful title, "Murder from Beyond the Grave" which is available on eBay. He also publishes a blog for flash fiction with the help of over 100 contributors, http://worthingflash.blogspot.com
118 Willow Street by P.J. Smith
Police are still investigating the disappearance of 18-year-old Haley and her dog…
“It’s always the bad shit,” he scoffs, “why don’t they cover something good for once?” He flips the radio station. “The world ain’t always bad!” Suddenly, a small, dark figure bolts out from the brush into the road and is greeted by Pete’s Toyota Tacoma. He cringes through the rear view as it writhes off onto the side of Willow Street.
The mangled cat’s tag reads, Karma, and underneath, 118 Willow St.
“116…” he counts, “bet they won’t cover this. Brave young man whacks dumbass cat with sexy truck – 117 – but does right thing an’ brings its fucktard carcass back to owner,” he mocks, as he veers into a winding, unkempt driveway. It slithers down to an odd little triangular house with thick vines that seem to crawl over small circular windows. “118,” he reads above the door.
Knock, knock, knock.
A moment passes, and the splintered door clicks open, and through a narrow crack, he spots one wide, yellow eye with a pointed pupil resembling that of a cat peering through the darkness.
“Yes?” The creaky voice asks.
“Hi… I – I’m Pete. I’m not sure how to tell you this, but your cat…” he turns and gestures toward his truck, “Karma –” but as he turns back to face the door, a thick, iridescent cloud of grays and purples suffocates his vision. A dull thud echoes through his bones as something hot and wet drowns his ear.
His eyes flicker to find a frail, sagging, naked, old woman grimacing through rotted teeth and clumps of gray hair, dragging him by the legs as her nails bury into him like paper cuts.
“Ung…” He calls out, trying to grip the blood-matted gravel around him, reaching out toward his truck.
“Tasty,” the woman licks her lips, “mmm, tasty!” And there is Karma, staring blankly at him, on the hood of his truck, as his body drags through the threshold and into darkness.
P.J. Smith writes to highlight aspects of reality and the human experience. Through the written word, abstract concepts of the world and current history seeps through, logging vital accounts of life. Some of his work can be seen in Northridge Review and Bending Genres. He continues to write horror and psychological thrillers in his cozy apartment above a foggy San Francisco lake.
An Eye for an Eye by Jim Harrington
"Hey, mister. Does that plant eat people?”
The man's face went from puzzling to smiling as he turned and saw the girl standing just inside the greenhouse door.
“You part of the school tour?” the man asked.
“No, I'm by myself.” She crossed her arms. “Well, does it?”
The man straightened and said, “What a silly question. There are no man-eating plants.” He wiped a soiled handkerchief across his brow and put it in the pocket of his bib overalls. He didn't wear a shirt.
“Too bad.” The girl's eyes stayed on the man. He remained still, as if planted in potting soil, unable to move.
The man looked the girl up and down. She couldn't be more than nine or ten. Her pink dress had a dark red circular stain on the front that could be blood. Dark, unwashed hair hung limp on her shoulders. Her purple eyes made him nervous. When she stepped forward, he backed away.
“Now, stay back, Missy. There are sharp tools and prickly plants in here. I wouldn't want you to trip and get hurt.”
“Oh, you can't hurt me. Not again.” She continued forward—slowly. He looked to see how close he was to the back door.
“What the hell is going on?” The man picked up a clawed tool, just in case. “Who are you?”
“I'm not surprised you don't remember me. You were drunk, or high on drugs, or both when we last met.” She cocked her head to one side. “You didn't have a beard then.” She rolled her head to the other side. Her focus returned to the accident. “It was three months ago, a rainy July evening. You were driving when you shouldn't have been, and you swerved into our lane and killed my dad and me. Remember yet?”
“You're mistaken,” he said, his voice soft and unsteady.
“No. You did it.”
The man wanted to run away, but still couldn't move.
“My mom still cries every night. I don't like seeing her sad. She tells everyone she's fine, but she isn't.”
“But . . . you're dead. You said so.” The man's hands shook, as bile crept into his throat.
“Yeah, so you can't kill me again. But I can make your life miserable—and that's what I plan to do. Make it as miserable as my mom's is.” Her expression was anything but childlike. “Or worse.”
The man pushed the back door open, ran out, slammed the door shut, and propped a shovel against it. He looked inside. The girl was gone. Still, he heard her say, “That won't help you.”
He felt urine trickle down his leg.
Jim Harrington lives in Huntersville, NC, with his wife and two dogs. His stories have appeared in Flash Fiction Magazine, Flash Phantoms, The Yard, Free Flash Fiction, Short-Story.me, Ariel Chart, CommuterLit, Fewer Than 500, and others. More of his works can be found at https://jpharrington.blogspot.com.
Lesson Learned by Mike Rusetsky
I don’t remember which came first, the urban legend or my violent activity streak. All I know is the news media has christened me “The Ankle Slicer.”
Those fools.
It’s not like I get off on watching my victims bleed out. My craft consists of teaching them a lesson on the hardest and most practical subject: sure footing in life is never guaranteed, and your legs could be cut out from under you at any moment. Whether they live or die from my brief lectures is irrelevant.
Now that we’re on the topic, “The Bloodletter” would be a more apt nickname... Or “The Educator,” if they knew anything about my ideology. But of course, I wouldn’t dream of contacting the media to offer notes. I’ll stick to the shadows, thank you. That is where I do my best work.
Regardless, it’s not like they’d ever catch me. I’m extra careful not to leave a pattern that they could use to trace me. The trick is to always randomize my routine. I never use the same knife twice or revisit an old crime scene. My one indulgence is that the slicing has to be done in public. I duck beneath one of those hulking mom-vans my countrymen love so much, and then it’s only a matter of time.
When the unsuspecting driver returns to their car, I spring forth. My blade flashes from the undercarriage, and their Achilles tendon opens up like a zipper.
Lesson learned.
* * *
Tonight, I’m hiding underneath a pickup truck parked by a concert venue. It’s a sea of cars out here, must be thousands of them. A grin crosses my lips as I lie in the dusty, confined space. I’ll be eating well tonight!
It never crossed my mind to check which artist is playing tonight’s concert. I had more important items to attend to, such as sharpening this blade to a fine edge. The rod of discipline: my teaching tool.
The music’s booming echoes begin to die down, signaling the end of the final encore. It won’t be long now. I’m buzzing with eagerness. And here they come! A sonic vista of footfalls and excited chatter floods the parking lot. The class is in session!
I lick my parched lips, the anticipation building. Someone in jeans is approaching my hiding spot under the truck...
Taste my KNIFE!!
Wait. Why didn’t it work? Did I miss my target? I spy a different set of legs and stab anew.
Slice to MEAT you!!
Really, nothing? No squishy tendons or spraying blood? Not even a pained “Ouch!” to reward my efforts?
But how can this be?!
Wait a damn minute... Are they all wearing... cowboy boots?
Well, this is embarrassing.
As if I needed another reason to hate country music.
* * *
Oh no... They’ve surrounded the truck.
It seems I’ve been discovered.
Don’t reach down here! I’m just a shadow. Hands off, you brutes! Uneducated idiots… Ouch, easy with that!
Okay, folks. Let’s all keep calm. Nobody’s been hurt.
Um... That’s a lot of firearms. Why would you bring a gun to a knife fight?
Mike Rusetsky is a Ukrainian-American author of horror and speculative fiction. He started as a playwright, with his original one-act production Angel of Death earning critical praise. His recent story publications include anthologies by Outsider Publishing, Black Hare Press, Inkd Publishing, Storm Dragon Publishing, and the periodicals Tales from the Crosstimbers, Sometimes Hilarious Horror. and Trollbreath Magazine. mikerusetsky.com
The Rehearsal by John Pitts
The hallway mirror was a family heirloom; a heavy slab of silvered glass framed in tarnished gilt that had hung in the same spot for three generations. Marcus had grown up seeing his face in its depths—first as a child standing on tiptoe, then as a teenager knotting his first tie, and now, at forty-two, pausing before work and noticing the small inconsistencies that crept into his reflection.
Lately, everything has taken a little longer. Buttons. Names. The half-second gap between deciding to move and actually moving. He blamed age, distraction, the quiet accumulation of ordinary erosion.
It happened on a Tuesday. He blinked, quick and dry from staring at his phone, and the reflection followed a fraction of a second later. Not lazily. Carefully. The mirrored eyelids closed and opened with a smoothness his own lacked, as though refining the motion rather than copying it.
Marcus held still, watching his eyes in the glass. They stared back with an attentiveness that unsettled him, like someone waiting for instruction.
“Coffee,” he told the empty hallway.
By Thursday, the delay had deepened. He lifted his hand to smooth his hair and felt the familiar brush of skin against scalp, but in the mirror his hand was still rising, tracing the arc with almost studied precision. When he lowered his arm, the reflection lingered, finishing the motion with an elegance he didn’t recognize as his own.
The reflected version of him had better posture. Straighter shoulders. A steadier gaze. Marcus found himself adjusting unconsciously, trying to match the image in the glass, then stopping when he realized what he was doing.
Once, the reflection finished first.
His hand dropped, and in the mirror, the fingers were already descending, completing the gesture before Marcus had fully decided to let go. The moment passed quickly, but it left a faint pressure behind his eyes, like the afterimage of a bright light.
The fear that settled in him wasn’t sharp. It was a slow, creeping awareness. He began to pass the mirror with his eyes lowered, though he could still feel it there, holding his outline, rehearsing him in quiet increments.
On Saturday, he brought a chair into the hallway and sat in front of the glass. He didn’t test it. He didn’t exaggerate movements. He simply watched.
Two men in identical cardigans sat across from each other, separated by glass and a thinning agreement about who was leading and who was following.
Marcus smiled, not because he felt like it, but because smiling had always been easy, a reflex that once arrived before thought. His own face complied.
In the mirror, the other man’s mouth lifted more slowly—but when it finished, the smile was cleaner. More certain. It settled into place as if it intended to stay there.
One second passed. Then another.
Marcus let his smile fade.
The reflection did not.
It held the expression, studying it, as though memorizing the shape of it, the tension in the cheeks, the slight asymmetry Marcus had never noticed before.
He suddenly became aware of other small discrepancies. The hallway behind the reflection was dimmer. The grandfather clock in the glass trailed the one ticking behind him by several minutes. Dust drifted through the mirrored air in slower, looping currents, suspended in a time that felt padded and deliberate.
He raised his hand and pressed his fingers to the glass.
In the reflection, his hand was still moving, patient and unhurried, approaching the same point. Marcus waited, a quiet tremor running through his arm. When the reflected fingertips finally met his own, there was no cold barrier he could feel.
Only a faint, rhythmic pulse.
It wasn’t his heartbeat.
It was steadier. Calibrated. Like a metronome finding the correct tempo.
Marcus pulled his hand away.
The reflection lingered a fraction longer, completing the withdrawal with care.
For a moment, neither of them moved.
Then the pressure reversed.
Marcus tried to pull back. His body did not answer.
The hallway tilted. Light folded. The mirror swallowed the space between them without sound or resistance, and Marcus felt himself sliding into the padded slowness behind the glass—into the place where movements waited to be permitted.
From inside the mirror, Marcus watched the other man step back into the hallway, testing the weight of his feet, the balance of his shoulders. The man lifted Marcus’s hand—his hand—and turned it slowly, as if confirming a successful calibration.
The mirror settled.
Marcus remained where motion arrived late.
John Pitts writes genre-blending fiction that explores the uneasy spaces between memory, time, and identity. His work often leans toward quiet psychological horror and uncanny moments grounded in everyday life. When he’s not writing, he enjoys spending time with family and playing blues guitar.
Manchester Resurrection Services by LaVern McCarthy
The ad in the morning newspaper stated: Do you wish to live again after death has claimed you? Do you long to reunite with your loved ones and be with them for many more years? If so, we have the perfect program for you. Let Manchester Resurrection Services Inc. handle all your needs. Call: 840-451-9933. Operators are waiting to give you more information and sign you up.
Hmm, Lester thought, as he sipped his coffee. That sounds like an interesting way to extend my life. I think I'll investigate that. His wife, Joan, appeared, rubbing sleep from her eyes. Her hair was in curlers, her robe was ratty, and without makeup, she looked terrible. She poured a cup of coffee from the pot and sat at the kitchen table across from Lester. He took another drink of coffee.
"Listen to this, babe," he said. “We may be brought back to life someday after we die. Would you like that?"
"Not especially," Joan answered. "I have enough trouble in the life I have."
Lester shook the paper to see the ad better. "I, for one, think it's a good idea. I think I'll give them a call.”
Joan rolled her eyes. "Suit yourself, but I think it's a bunch of hooey."
When Lester called the following Monday, he was sent an envelope explaining the art of cryonics. The body would be kept at a very low temperature until enough research had been done to bring it back to life.
Lester was so excited about the prospect of resurrection. He cashed in his life insurance policy to pay for the services. He wouldn't need it. Perhaps he could be brought back to life over and over again, living virtually forever. The thought made him smile.
Unfortunately for Lester, he died of a heart attack the next year. Per contract with the local funeral home and Manchester Resurrection Services, Lester was taken to the former for cleansing, etc., before his body was installed in the cryonic capsule. Afterward, he lay there for several years.
One day, a breakthrough was discovered, and a way was found to bring Lester and other trusting souls like him back to life. Joan was informed and promptly went to the site where Lester was being stored. It took several hours to bring Lester up to a decent temperature, but the life-giving process was successful, and he was promptly wheeled in on a gurney to the room where Joan waited.
However, it wasn't long before Joan hysterically ran from the room and into the director's office. Her eyes were wild when she cried that Lester would not stop screaming. The director was startled, as there had already been several others brought back, and this had not happened.
The director assured Joan that he would get to the bottom of the problem at once. Joan was forced to leave Lester at Manchester since she could not bear to hear his unending screams. His records were pored over by management, and three days later, Joan was informed that she should come to the office for an explanation.
When she arrived, she could hear Lester's non-stop, muffled screams coming from another room.
"Please tell me what went wrong," she begged the director. He shuffled the paperwork he held before he replied, "My dear, I'm afraid a mistake was made when your husband was taken to the funeral home before he was brought here."
"What mistake?"
"Instead of being cleaned up, having his nails clipped, being shaved, etc., for storage in our state-of-the-art CoronaVac, he was embalmed!
LaVern Spencer McCarthy, a Texas native, has published eight books of poetry and four books of short stories plus three journals. Her poems have been published in Visions International, Poetry Society of Texas Book of The Year, Open Skies Quarterly, National Federation of State Poetry Society's Encore, Austin Poetry Society's Austin's Best Poets, A Texas Garden of Verses as well as numerous state anthologies and newspaper columns. Her poem, October’s Agenda was nominated for the Pushcart Award in 2023.
Retro Lust by Stephen R. Hunt
I Have a Condition
I peered down the hole, and there was the priest, crammed in, gnawing on an apple, silvery flecks of stone dust on his black cassock. He looked up, straight at me; eyes glazed with fear.
He didn’t actually look at me, because five hundred years ago the hole would have been sealed, and I was four hundred and fifty-five years away from being born.
The National Trust tour guide was a real enthusiast, started waxing lyrical.
“Just imagine the scene, Madam,” he said. “The priests may have had to spend days confined in that tiny space to escape being detected by the priest hunters.”
“Did they have anything to eat?” asked David.
“Well, it depends, Sir. If taken by surprise, they would probably only have time to grab an apple or something.” He stood next to me, following my gaze as I watched the priest adjust his position, squirming to find comfort.
“Are you starting to build a picture, Madam?”
“Yeah, pretty much,” I said.
David’s silky afro skin softened into those wonderful contours as he smiled, sensing that I’d seen exactly what the chap had been talking about. At that point, the priest vanished. He lasted about as long as the other people I see.
My husband, David, was born in Liberia, loves all the historical type of stuff; fell in love with British culture. He drags me around all the stately homes and medieval places. I can take it or leave it. Seen one, you’ve seen them all.
Some people might think seeing images of people from the past is a gift, but I think of it more as a condition. It’s not something I talk about to many people, for obvious reasons. David knows all about it. We’ve been married for fifteen years, and it’s taken about ten of those for him to fully get his head around it.
Over time, I’ve learned to control my reactions when I see things. Years ago, it was different. Like the time twenty years ago when I viewed the house we now live in. My previous partner and I went into the bathroom, and there was a woman sitting on the toilet, chuffing on a cigarette. Delightful. The estate agent lady clocked the disgust on my face and giggled. “Believe it or not,” she said, “avocado is actually coming back into fashion.”
That bathroom suite was changed first job.
I’ve seen some pretty weird and random stuff over the years. I’ve seen a man from the bronze age scratching his backside on a beach in Dorset, at our local cinema that was built in the 1920’s, a women started tap dancing in front of the screen when I was trying to watch Queen in the Bohemian Rhapsody film, and sometimes I see this little kid, a boy, always piddling in the corner of our garden.
Anyway, you get the picture. As strange as it all might seem, it’s mostly pretty uninspiring stuff, although seeing that priest was quite interesting. David keeps asking me how medieval he looked. I told him he just looked scared and grubby to me.
Despite having my ‘condition,’ fifteen years of marriage have been pretty idyllic for David and me. Passions have faded slightly, but we still have our moments, and I know it’s a cliché, but we really are best friends. All that changed when I found Charlie in our bed.
He lay on his back, those demon eyes that minutes earlier had mesmerised me were frozen open in trauma, his torso still glistening with sweat, and a summer bed sheet sheathing his legs and sated manhood. The blood behind his head was still blooming on the white pillow. I remembered the rapture of the scene I’d been entwined in moments before I committed my act of depravity. Snakes of lust and guilt raced through my insides, tangling themselves in violent conflict, dizzying me as I gazed down on him. I sat on the bed and reached for Charlie’s thigh, before he vanished back into the past, leaving me clutching and staring at the crisp quilt cover I’d just fitted.
David entered the bedroom with an armful of clothes. He placed them on the bed. “Admiring your handiwork?” he said.
“Something like that,” I replied, unable to face him.
His hand alighted on my shoulder, exerting gentle strength. “Sally?.....what is it?”
As the tears flooded my eyes, I knew then that I would be leaving David. As I said, I have a condition.
Stephen R. Hunt is a fifty-nine year old injection moulding technician from Burton-upon-Trent in the heart of England. He has a self published novel on Amazon, and has written several short stories. He writes for fun and a creative outlet and because strange ideas just seem to turn up in his head. His stories all have a speculative, sci-fi or horror aspect, where he tries to create an otherworldly atmosphere. He has previously been published in Flash Phantoms and has a short story published in ELA Literary magazine on their website.
The Screaming Game by Lesley Warren
“You go first.”
Brushing my hair back like it was instinct, not affectation, I swaggered up to the campfire.
“AWOO!”
My werewolf howl shot straight up like a rocket and plummeted down, smouldering into the undergrowth. It came out higher-pitched than I’d intended, bordering on sissy, but it was loud enough, at least.
“Nice one, Philboy,” said Amy with the braces, handing me my beer. The others didn’t even break conversation, just kept up their low-level joshing, a fat blunt in constant rotation. I snatched it from Gary’s protesting mouth and took a drag, the sweetish fug thick in the back of my throat. Someone across the circle - I couldn’t make out who - was doing little jerky movements with their wrists, spastic puppy paws, fingers curled into claws. My eyes began to water. Must’ve been the smoke; I didn’t get to do it much. That kind of stuff was always harder to hide as an only child. I had to resort to other people’s garden sheds, parties in their damp and stinking basements. My parents would’ve kicked my ass into the next county if they’d caught me at it.
It was Skinny Andy’s turn next. He was up like a shot, just a little too keen. Laura’s lip started curling in derision, heavy on the gloss. She turned her golden head and said something in Hannah’s ear. The two of them started shaking with silent laughter. Andy’s face, a minefield of acne pits and pustules just waiting to go nuclear, was disconcerted. Still, he cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed into the black sky.
It came out like a giant belch, reverberating around the clearing. I could’ve sworn a few birds went scattering. The stunned silence was shattered almost immediately by cries of awe and shouts of “You da MAN, Andy!” Fat Andy clapped him so hard on the back he turned luminous highlighter pink, but he was grinning. I grinned too, pushing down the sourness in my gut. That was the problem with going first. You never knew how high to set the bar. Go all out straight off the bat, and you’d look a fool, a try-hard loser. Aim too low, and the entire game just loses all its meaning. It was hard to strike the right balance.
After a while, the guys started pestering the girls, who normally didn’t play.
“I’m not going to make an animal of myself,” Laura sneered, tossing a silky curtain of hair over her shoulder. Hannah, who always did everything Laura did, agreed. She started plaiting her own hair, making goo-goo eyes at Steve through the flames.
But then they got on Sonia’s case. To be honest, I hadn’t even realised she was there. I didn’t really get why she’d come; it wasn’t like she fit in with our group, or indeed any group. She had this weird way of becoming invisible, just kind of melting into the backdrop, more of a spirit than a living entity. Even when you were talking to her, it was like you could see right through her, addressing the wall behind her head.
“I don’t know how to do it,” she was saying, hands up and fingers splayed. “Please, I’m serious. I don’t want to do it.”
I think that was the most any of us had ever heard her say in one go. She wasn’t objectively hot like Laura, who’d been a bottle-blonde, C-cup since our first day of high school, but there was a little-girl doe-like cuteness about her I’d never noticed before: all big eyes and quivering lower lip. Sam had her by the shoulders; the tension pulled her sensible jacket tight against her body, revealing an hourglass I’d never known was under there.
Taking his cue, massive Gary grabbed her by the elbows and started steering her towards the centre of the circle, the two of them lurching in a weird, mismatched quickstep. Sonia struggled in his grip, but she was no match for the rugby team captain. She might as well have been trying to run through a brick wall. The other idiots were cheering Gary on now, starting a slow clap that grew faster and faster, louder and louder.
“Push her in the fire!” someone yelled.
Sonia had stopped fighting by now. Real tears were beading on her bottom lashes now, sparkling in the firelight.
A knot formed in my stomach. I was all for pushing the girls a little out of their comfort zone - they were too prudish for their own good most of the time and loved it when they “accidentally” had some harmless fun - but the unspoken rule was you never made them cry.
At the same instant, I licked my dry lips and said, “Hey.” Sonia screamed.
It was the sensation, not the sound, that hit like a sonic boom. The earth shook.
My bones rattled against each other, everything vibrating with that weird, visceral aftershock you get when an ambulance comes speeding past, the Doppler wail of its siren all dizzy making and somehow just plain wrong.
We flung ourselves to the ground, unable to see, but the soil juddered under our palms like a struck gong.
“Stop!” I yelled, unable to even hear myself through the din in my head. “Sonia, stop!”
As suddenly as the aural assault had begun, it ceased. I forced myself upright, rolled onto my knees, shaky and sick. My ears felt wet; I dabbed them gingerly. My hand came back red. The copse reverberated with silence now, a shocking absence of sound, unnerving.
Sonia knelt before me, placed her hand on mine. I stared down at the painted nubs of her fingernails, chewed down to the quick. Her dark eyes were unfocused, but her lips curved into an unmistakable smile, afraid no longer.
I tried to speak, but she silenced me with a look.
Sudden recognition bloomed in her expression as she looked through my eyes to whatever lay behind and beyond my own self.
“Welcome,” she said.
A translator by trade, Lesley lives to write creatively. A 2024 Dream Foundry Writing Contest Finalist and two-time 2025 Pushcart Prize nominee, her previous publishing credits include Seaside Gothic, Artwife Mag and Manor of Frights. Lesley's work draws on themes of identity and "otherness".
Traffic Stop by Bill Cox
Glenda didn’t mind working the midnight shift on Highway 222 on her own. It got her away from the drunken craziness of town on a Friday night, with its petty disputes and depressing domestic violence. Out here, it was just her, her vehicle, and the tarmac, although the tarmac had its own brand of crazies as well.
Glenda had hoped that joining the Sheriff’s Department would mark a change for her, a break from the dismal certainties of her life so far. She’d been brought up to be self-reliant, not through the loving attention of her parents, but because of its absence. Both her mother and father had started out as high-functioning alcoholics, but with each empty bottle, that function faded away. As her childhood grew increasingly chaotic, her father had tried to bring order to the chaos with his fists. Both she and her mother had suffered at his hands. Glenda left home when she was fifteen. Her mother kept her wedding vows, til death us do part, but it was her father’s violence that saw to that.
She had a variety of menial jobs after leaving home, but, although free of her father’s tyranny and anger, she’d found that there was an infinite supply of men ready to take on his role. From bosses who thought being groped was part of her terms and conditions, to boyfriends who settled arguments physically, she’d had enough of being subject to authority figures. So she decided to become one.
Unfortunately, the Sheriff’s Department proved no different from the rest of society. She had the badge, but found that the respect of the men around her still eluded her. So, better to work the highway on her own than be subject to the leers and crude jokes of her supposed colleagues.
The sound of an approaching vehicle broke her reverie. A Toyota Camry sped past her parking spot in the layby, well over the speed limit. The engine of her patrol car, a six-litre V8 Dodge Charger, roared into life. Glenda took off after the Camry, her Charger’s blue lights illuminating the forested verges of Highway 222.
She was soon directly behind the Camry. For a moment, she sensed hesitation from the driver in front, but then the Camry slowed, and both vehicles came to a halt, pulling off the road and onto the grassy verge.
Glenda got out of her vehicle and walked to the Camry driver’s window. She could see that the guy was sweating like crazy, with a borderline panic-stricken look on his face.
“Out of the vehicle, please, sir,” Glenda ordered.
The guy got out, reluctantly. He kept eyeing the service weapon on her belt. She put her hand on it to dissuade him from doing anything stupid.
Suddenly, the guy broke down in tears.
“Please! You’ve got to let me go. She’s after me!”
He seemed genuinely desperate, but there was no sign of any pursuing vehicle. Possibly the guy was suffering from some drug-induced paranoia? Then Glenda inexplicably felt her hackles rise. She whirled round, noticed a flicker of movement above the trees a hundred yards back.
The guy ran.
Glenda cursed, annoyed at being caught out. Though she could hold her own in a fight, even take a punch or two, the one thing she knew she wasn’t was a runner. So she immediately reached for her Taser, took a quick bead on the back of the guy, and fired.
Her aim was good, and the Taser stopped him in his tracks. Truth to tell, he didn’t look particularly athletic either, but his race was run anyway, courtesy of the 100,000 volts coursing down the Taser’s wires.
“Shouldn’t have run, buddy,” she said, as she grabbed his wrists and applied the cuffs.
“I wasn’t running from you,” he gasped. He was looking past her.
She turned, instinct making her reach for her sidearm, but it was already too late. A woman was impossibly standing right behind her.
Glenda had the briefest of moments to register the woman’s gaunt, pale features before the woman backhanded her twenty feet through the air. Glenda landed on her left side, ribs breaking with distinct cracks like pistol shots. She wanted to cry out in pain, but her jaw was severely dislocated, almost hanging off her face. Only a low grunt came out.
She heard the man scream as the woman bent down over him. It started shrill, then faded into a wet gurgling. Glenda thought about her sidearm, but she couldn’t move; the pain was too much. Instead, she found herself looking up at the stars. She felt the earth tremble as the woman approached, saw her towering over her. The woman knelt down beside her in a fluid motion. There was something feral but also something smooth and balletic in her movements. The woman sniffed her, then paused, as if considering.
“So much anger in you,” she muttered, in a voice deep as a pit, “but no strength to do anything about it!”
She leaned over Glenda, improbably long incisors glistening in the moonlight. The woman laughed.
“Well, then, my gift to you!”
The fangs sank into Glenda’s jugular, a small pain barely noticeable against the symphony of agony that was the rest of her body. She felt the life leave her flesh then, but she also felt something else enter it; something wild, something powerful, something of the darkest corners of the night.
Glenda lay dead on the roadside verge long after the woman had drunk her fill and left. To her surprise, her body seemed to knit itself back together, the pain vanishing, replaced by the first intimation of a thirst that needed slaking.
Glenda got to her feet.
She felt an unholy power, an unbeatable strength, flowing through her.
A thought entered her head. Her life as prey was over.
She wondered who to kill first.
Bill Cox lives in Aberdeen, Scotland with his partner Hilary and their daughter Catherine. Writing was a childhood sweetheart that he lost contact with after he left school, only to rekindle the romance in his fourth decade. He writes poetry and short fiction and his work can be found in various places, if you look hard enough.
Lost and Found by B.K. Barton
The taillights of the bus that was Mike’s only way home turned the corner and disappeared from sight. He threw his hair net to the ground and untied his apron as he began the long journey home. A clutch of orange maple leaves was caught in a chilly gust that carried them down the sidewalk. He followed them as they danced and swayed across the street and into the bushes. He was locked onto their rhythmic dance; he was entranced in their complex simplicity. It took a moment for it to register in his mind as the leaves tumbled down the sidewalk.
Two black eyeholes stared at him through the thinning branches. A snarl permanently etched on its face; sharpened yellow teeth on full display. Mike’s heart nearly leapt out of his chest as he approached. Someone must’ve left it here, surely, they’ll come back for it. He poked the cheek with his index finger; the latex was of very high quality, not like something from the drugstore. He picked it up and examined it in the fading evening light. A sickly-sweet stench wafted on the breeze that turned Mike’s nose. He scanned the empty sidewalk up and down both ends of the street, and when no one was around, he slipped the mask into the pocket of his apron.
The wind howled its frigid tune as the last rays of sunlight softened and faded over the horizon. Mike sat at his kitchen table, the mask was propped against an empty chair, as if it were a person invited for a meal. The fact that it was Halloween had nearly slipped his mind until the doorbell rang. He drained the last lukewarm swallow from his beer can, stared at the mask for a moment, shrugged, and slipped it over his head.
Something about it seems wrong, as if he had been ignoring a silent alarm screaming at him to leave the damned thing alone, but what was one night? He would scare some kids and return it on his way to work in the morning. It even made Mike jump at the end of the six-pack he forgot he left it on between trick-or-treaters, and when he turned on the bathroom light, he thought he was under attack.
The final visitor was a young man dressed as a yellow video game ninja. He turned the bowl upside down, letting the last few pieces fall into the kid’s pillowcase. The strange feeling arose in the pit of his stomach, so he held one hand over his brow to block the obnoxious glow of the porch light as he scanned the neighborhood. He assumed it was a group of older kids up to no good, but he couldn’t shake the sense that he was being watched; even studied.
Mike removed the mask and washed the sweat and reddish-brown paint residue from his face and hair. He tossed the mask on the dresser and went to sleep.
A gentle thud on his window pulled him from his restless slumber. Mike peeled his head from his pillow and decided it would be better to ignore it and just clean the egg off the house in the morning. No sooner had he closed his eyes than another tap on the glass, softer and higher-pitched than an egg flung by a disgruntled thirteen-year-old. This time, Mike sat up and scanned the empty bedroom. In the dim light, he could barely make out the features of the mask. Its pale tone, the hooked nose, and the prominent brow.
Another tap on the window drew his attention. Peeking around the corner of the glass was a figure. It was tall and thin; its head was bright red and glistened in the moonlight. It watched Mike through lidless eyes. It pressed its forehead against the glass, leaving a red smear in its wake. The exposed muscles along its mouth drew taut in a morbid smile.
“You found it. I’m coming in.” And the figure vanished from sight.
B.K. Barton is a horror author from Texas. His work can be found on Amazon, KU, and has contributed to multiple anthologies. When not writing he can be found playing MTG or wandering the wasteland. You can find him on instagram at https://www.instagram.com/bk.barton
Crimson Devotion by Fiona Verity
The first time she cut herself for him, it was an accident.
A careless slice while preparing strawberries, in the first year of their courtship. Crimson welled, thick and warm, gathering at the tip of her finger before dripping onto the counter.
He stared at it as if it were the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.
“You’re bleeding,” he said.
She laughed. “It’s nothing.”
He took her hand gently, reverently, and lifted her finger to his mouth. His lips brushed the wound. When he pulled away, his eyes were bright, unfocused.
“I don’t want any of you to go to waste.”
That was when she knew she loved him.
###
On Valentine’s Day, the apartment glowed under candlelight. Red wax ran down ivory candles, pooling like spilled blood across the table. Roses lay scattered across the floor, their petals bruised and darkened where she had crushed them beneath her bare feet.
She wore his favorite white silk dress, stained and clinging to her like a second skin.
The table was set for two: crystal goblets, polished silverware, a careful symmetry that made her hands tremble with anticipation. She placed his gifts on his side of the table with a delighted clap.
A box of chocolates molded into anatomical hearts.
A bouquet of roses, thorns intact, bound with ribbon.
A silver platter, its contents hidden beneath a polished dome.
She pressed her palm to her chest, tracing the place where her heart beat fast and eager.
One day, she thought. One day, it would be his.
The air smelled of sugar and iron.
She lit the final candle just as she heard his key in the lock.
###
He entered quietly, as if stepping into a chapel. The door closed behind him with a soft, deliberate click.
His gaze travelled over the room, the candles, the roses, the stains on the floor.
“You did all this for me?”
She smiled. “For us.”
He crossed the room and kissed her, slowly and reverently, tasting the copper on her lips. His hands shook as they framed her face.
“I’ve never felt so loved.”
“You’re trembling,” she said.
She took his hand and led him to the table. “Sit. I made you something.”
He obeyed.
She offered the chocolates first.
He smiled as he bit into one—and then froze.
Inside, dark and glossy, was her blood.
“Is this—?”
“Mine,” she said softly. “Every one.”
His pupils dilated. He swallowed.
Then he ate another.
And another.
She watched the way his throat worked, the way his lips shone. She had practiced this moment in the mirror, whispering the words until they felt inevitable.
###
“Are you ready for the next course, my darling?”
She lifted the dome from the platter.
A heart rested on the silver beneath.
Not candy.
Not a sculpture.
A human heart, still faintly warm.
His mouth opened, but no sound came.
She knelt before him and placed it carefully in his hands.
“I wanted to give you mine,” she said, “but I still need it. So, I found another. They didn’t need it anymore.”
Tears slid down his cheeks.
“No one has ever loved me like this.”
She kissed him again, slow and lingering. When she pulled away, her teeth were stained red.
“Happy Valentine’s Day.”
He laughed, a broken, beautiful sound, and pressed the heart to his mouth.
“Next year,” he said. “I’ll give you mine.”
###
Later, the candles burned low. The roses lay crushed and blackened.
She carried the heart into the kitchen. He followed, watching with reverence as she wrapped it carefully, layer by layer, sealing it with practiced hands. Salt, herbs, a ritual refined in secret.
She placed it in the freezer beside the strawberries.
“For next year,” she said.
He leaned against the counter, devotion written across his face, copper still clinging to his lips.
“Will you teach me,” he asked quietly, “how to love you properly?”
She smiled, resting her forehead against his.
“I’ve been waiting for you to take the next step.”
Her hands moved lightly over him, thoughtful and deliberate, already choosing where she would begin, a careful mapping for what was yet to come.
Fiona Verity is a horror and flash fiction writer whose work has appeared in Spillwords (winning Publication of the Month for Reverend Rupert’s Obsession), Fifty Word Stories, and Tales from the Moonlit Path. She has also won numerous writing contests, exploring themes of obsession, intimacy, and the uncanny.
Signare by Madeleine D'Este
I guide the plumber into my studio flat. “Over here.”
The morning is gloomy, and my kitchen light is on. A weird yellow bulb, which appeared in my letterbox last week. I didn’t read the pamphlet, most likely some council environmental initiative, but I like the way the curious amber glow softens everything. Disguising the chipped bench top, the stained carpet, and the battered fridge, older than me.
The plumber grunts. Chunky calved with early onset baldness, steel-caps, and shorts, despite the Melbourne winter; he yanks open the cupboard under the sink and gets to work on the s-bend. Back at my postage-stamp-sized table, I bash out a few emails while he whistles tunelessly and drops tools onto the linoleum with a thud.
Fifteen minutes later, the plumber groans up to standing. “All done.”
I get up to take a look. “That was quick.”
He turns on the tap to show the water flowing freely down the plughole, and as he reaches out, I glimpse a tattoo on his forearm. A word in faint spidery writing, a delicate font like an antiquarian book or a medieval manuscript. A lifelong stickybeak, I lean closer, squinting to read the script.
“Perry,” I say aloud.
The plumber flinches as if I'd slapped him.
“What?” He barks.
“Your tattoo.” I point at his arm.
“I dunno what you’re talking about,” he spits and rolls down his sleeve, hiding the word away. I go to argue, but close my mouth. Perry could be dead, and today might be their birthday. Who knows what tragedy this plumber has lived through?
He packs up his tools with a pit bull scowl and clumps for the door.
“Thanks for coming.” I chase him, but he doesn’t look back, slamming the door shut.
I grimace at my faux pas until my laptop pings with a meeting reminder.
Over Cab-Sav and a chickpea curry, I tell the story of the grumpy plumber to Kiaan. Our third date. He has olive skin and works in logistics, whatever that is, and I’m wearing my crimson lacy underwear. We end up on the couch, tongues intertwined, hearts thumping like sub-woofers. I straddle him and tear off his shirt, my lips parting as I run my fingertips over his smooth chest. He moans, eyelids closed, head tipped back, his beautiful throat exposed.
My brow furrows. Something makes me stop. There’s writing on his skin. A tattoo, but in the same copperplate style as the plumber's. I look closer. Again. It's a name.
“Mina?” I blurt.
His eyes burst open, his expression like thunder. “What?” He growls.
“Mina,” I repeat. Less confidently.
He gets up suddenly, knocking me to the ground.
“Hey!” I say from the carpet, rubbing my knee.
“What the fuck!” He grabs his shirt. “Have you been stalking me?”
“No, I just...” I point at his chest. The word is clear. On his pectoral, over his heart. “Your tattoo.”
“I don’t have any fucking tattoos.”
“But there...” My mouth falls open.
“This is not cool, Jess. Not cool at all.” He snatches his keys and phone from the table.
“Where are you going?”
“I'm done here.” He holds out a stop-sign hand. “I’ve got no time for crazy bitches. Don’t contact me again.”
The front door slams for the second time today, and I sit alone on the floor.
“It was there,” I tell Blair the following night at my little dining table under the yellow light. “Right on his chest.”
“And it happened twice?”
“Maybe I need to get my eyes tested.”
Blair rips the ring-pull on a can of sour.
“Another guy down the gurgler.” My cheeks puff out as my shoulders droop. “I can’t face Bumble again.”
“You should take a break, Jess, honey,” Blair says.
“But I liked Kiaan.” I scrape my fingers against my scalp. “I don’t understand.”
“Men.” Blair shrugs, then slips off their denim jacket. As I take a slurp of cider, I notice something on their left bicep.
“Did you get...” I clamp my lips shut. The same font. Same scrawly writing. Just like the plumber and Kiaan.
“Get what?”
“Um...a haircut,” I flounder, and Blair, my oldest friend, looks at me with dubious hazel eyes.
“No,” they sneer.
My heart batters against my ribcage.
The name on Blair's arm is Jess.
Madeleine D'Este is an award-nominated, Melbourne-based writer of dark mysteries. Her YA horror novel, The Flower and The Serpent, received an Australasian Shadow Awards nomination for Best Horror Novel 2019 and her gothic novella, Radcliffe, received an Aurealis Award nomination for Best Horror Novella 2023.