OFF-CUTS!

Another Ghost Story

         We grew up together, Christie and I, and as youngsters, we crafted a world beyond our realities. Ghosts, vampires, cultists, monsters, every immature nightmare we could think of made its way into our loose narrative. We didn’t write them down, but whenever we got together, we’d recite fantastic tales we hadn’t lived.

         Back then, she and I laughed off these stories as nothing more than a fun activity between friends, but our friend, Gerald, took everything to heart. He believed these monsters and madmen skulked around our boring suburban neighborhood and menaced us. We liked Gerald. His fear amused us and fueled the scare-factor of our stories. After high school, Christie and I kept in touch, but Gerald disappeared, and we almost forgot about him.

         Late last night, Christie called me for the first time in months. I woke up and answered. She screamed, “GERALD!” Before I could reply, she hung up. Half-asleep, I tried to call her back, but a robot told me her number was disconnected. Disheartened, tired, afraid, and stressed, I sent her a short message and fell back asleep.

         When I woke this morning, I thought the call a lucid nightmare, but I checked my phone, and it showed the records. I tried to call Christie again, but got the same robotic message, “this number is not in service.” After a brief worrisome moment, I remembered our last conversation. She called me at three in the morning and rambled on about our old ghost stories. I knew she'd been drinking from the moment I answered, and so spent the better part of the morning reminiscing.

         The sight of the lumped sheet for my final anatomy exam reminds me of that conversation months ago. In a long-winded tale, filled with drunken tangents, Christie spoke of a dream she had the night prior.

         She lied on a cold slab and stared at a blinding light that seemed obscured. A shadow passed over her, but Christie couldn’t move. Its fingers curled beneath the obscuring fabric covering her and reefed back what she figured was a sheet. She said its face looked like mine, but paler.

         I wore a horrified expression, and a moment later, a fierce inhuman beast dropped through the ceiling and tore through my abdomen. The sound of flesh ripping and screams echoed throughout the room. Bloodstains splashed against the off-white plaster and stained the light an ominous red. Its wretched breath washed over her as it pressed itself against her naked cheek. The creature bared its face before she awoke, and she near cried when she told me it almost looked like Gerald.

         Every little noise, every fluorescent hum, every muted footstep causes me to jolt as I feel hell may too awaken soon.