365 Short Horrors

  My day off from work was supposed to be a day for me to relax and unwind and rest. The past few days had been incredibly stressful, from hateful customers to managers that expected everyone to do their jobs for them, and everything in between. It was nice to finally have that down time to spend away from all that. I'd decided to spend my time, not to get things done around the house, but to play a new game I'd been hooked on lately. It was this puzzle game where every room is seemingly randomly generated, each with clean and clever puzzles. After booting up the game, I was presented a room with white padded tiles all over the walls. There were a few green, red, and blue squares. I guess my job was to manipulate those tiles somehow to get me from where I was no, up to the top of the level. I looked around the room and could barely make out an opening. I pressed a single button to get myself started when the light in my bedroom burnt out, leaving me shrouded in darkness...

  My head was pounding, a headache ringing through my skull as my upstairs neighbors continued to stomp and jump around, leaving the things in my apartment nearly shaking. I tried banging on the ceiling and talking to them in person but no matter what I tried it wouldn't end. I just needed some rest. Especially after a long day at the gym. You see, I've been struggling with weight problems for a while now. And as the year was nearing its end, I figured it would be the perfect time for me to try and shed a few pounds. The most unfortunate thing for me during this whole venture is the fact that I didn't have the funds to get a personal trainer, nor was I able to find a good app to help me find the best diets and exercise. Not without paying nearly $100 on it. So, I went for the next best thing, an Ai chatbot. I'd been using it for a while. I've been telling it all the specifics about me, my weight, my goals, what kind of food I wanted to eat. And as soon as I ...

  The night was cold as I sat home alone. The snow was coming down outside in sheets, blanketing the already flooded world of white as far as the eye could see. I was grateful at least that I still had power to the house. There was still enough heat circulating that I could feel comfortable rather than having to drown myself in blankets to preserve heat. I still vaguely remember needing to do that a few years back. I was never fond of that memory. But as the night continued on, I gazed out the window to the front lawn. The neighbors kids had built a snowman. It was complete with sticks for arms and a carrot sticking out of the center of its face. It was strange though. I don't remember ever seeing anyone out there to build it. But I shrugged that thought off. Just because I didn't see it doesn't mean it didn't happen. After all, I was staring at the evidence of its existence. I walked away and sat down at my couch. I grabbed my remote to turn on the TV when the ...

  I took one final look at myself in the mirror after using lipstick for the first time. I didn't do too bad of a job, I thought. I might have missed a spot or two, but it didn't look bad. "Where is my lipstick?!" I could hear my sister angrily yelling from outside of my bedroom door. The door swung open violently. I turned around to see my sister staring me down, a look of rage in her eyes. "Are you serious?!" she shouted, racing toward me. I jumped to my feet and dodged her. She made a swipe for the lipstick tube in my hand but I snatched it away just in time. She began to stumble. I looked back, laughing at her as I ran. Until I felt my feet fall out from beneath me, leaving me tumbling forward, the tube of lipstick falling from my hand and onto the ground. My sister ran past me and grabbed the tube from the ground. She started picking the hair from the lipstick, a disgusted look on her face. "Keep your hands off my stuff!" she deman...

  The moon hung high overhead, helping to illuminate the woods surrounding us as we made our way down the seemingly endless road. We'd been driving all day, traveling between states to get to some amusement park my wife wanted to visit. We thought it would be fun to have a road trip together, but an argument left things rather awkward between us. The silence lingering. "Maybe we should find a place for the night," she suggested. "And where do you suggest we go, out in the middle of the woods?" I said, mild irritation in my voice. "Look around, there's nothing for miles." "I was just trying to help," she shot back. "You don't have to be so rude about it." "I'm not-" I started before I bit my tongue, ending the argument there. "Fine, if I see a place to stop, we'll rest there for the night." She muttered something under her breath that I couldn't quite hear before turning her head to...

  The gentle breeze whispered through our hair as the sun hung low in the sky on this early Spring afternoon. The sun was still rising in the sky, resulting in a purple and orange gradient that looked too incredible to peel my eyes away from. And yet I barely managed to, as my wife was standing before me. We stood outside of the offices of NASA, a large space shuttle visibly revealing itself from the back of the building. The same space ship that my woman was about to ride up in. I held her close, not wanting for her to leave. But her team was unfortunately going to have to tear us apart for the next few months. I let her go, her arms still wrapped around me. She looked up at me, tears welling in her eyes. We kissed each other and said our goodbyes before two men came out of the building and picked up her bags from the ground. She grabbed the last one and waved at me before disappearing behind the front doors. *** Returning home, I changed the tv channel over to NASA so t...

  The plane finally landed after countless hours up in the sky. I was thankful to finally be back on land, for my feet to finally touch the ground without the feeling of motion sickness threatening my stomach with a less than ideal time. The first thing I did following the de-boarding of the plane was run to the bathroom. It had been a while since I'd been in there. I didn't exactly trust airplane bathrooms. You always hear all those horror stories about your insides being sucked out of the plane after a single flush. As I took my place upon the white bowl in the stall, I finally felt relief. I was nearly done when I heard two other women enter the bathroom. "Do you think they saw us?" One of them asked as they stood before the sinks. "I don't think so," the other one replied. "I think we got away with it?" The first woman breathed a sigh of relief. "Well, I guess it's time for the plan to fully roll out then." ...

  I climbed off the bus, spying my mom waiting at the front door for me. I could feel the excitement bubbling inside me as I charged down the driveway and to the front door. My mom stepped aside and I slid off my backpack. "Slow down, Charlie," she called as I took off to my room. "I don't want you slipping and falling." "I'm fine, mom!" I called back to her as I stepped inside my room. I shut the door and leaped onto the bed, where my GamePack was at. I'd been waiting all day to play with my virtual dog, Frankie. He's this adorable golden retriever that I rescued from the dog kennel in the game. I'd taught him these cool tricks too! He can jump up and do a flip in the air. And I even taught him to use his paws to open doors and open drawers. It's useful for when I ask him to retrieve things when, in the game, I'm halfway across the house. Today when I booted up the game, I gave him some pets and he curled up on the ...

  Have you ever been awake well past midnight and felt like there was something watching you? A pair of eyes in the darkness that seem to burn into the back of your head? I want you to know that you aren't alone. You see, there's this urban legend of this anomalous figure known as the Slim Cinder. It's omnipresent and can be anywhere and everywhere it wants to be just by thinking about it. The most twisted part of all, it can replicate itself at will, allowing it to be in even more places at the same time. But where does it normally go, you may be wondering. Have you ever heard of the Witching Hour? It's what you may consider 3am, but more twisted spirits believe it to be where the wall between the living and the dead is at its thinnest, allowing them to roam free if they so wish. And the Witching Hour is something that normal humans are not supposed to see. That's where the Slim Cinder comes in. It watches over you. Over anyone and everyone who stays up unt...

  I stared down blankly at my phone as I awaited the reply back from my mom. I guess I should give you some context. You see, my friends and I were out of town. We were on a camping trip out in the middle of the woods, just a few miles out of town. There was a nice clearing where we were at and knew it would be the perfect place to stay over night. But as we got there, we began setting up. We joked around as we struggled to set up our tents, especially with all the wind blowing that night. It was strange, as we'd checked the weather every day leading up to today's trip and there was no mention whatsoever of high winds, nor any storms that we'd later be facing that night. As we crawled into our tents for the night, that's when the rain started trickling down. It pounded against the tops of our tents after a few minutes, nearly drenching us inside. Thankfully we had the waterproof tents, I guess. But that thankfulness was short-lived, as we began to see flashes ou...

     Working the night shift was supposed to be easy. Not a lot of business, just a lot of time to chill out and get paid for it.     Of course, I was the delivery driver at this pizza place. And with fewer and fewer people coming in for the night, I pretty much got time to myself to explore. There were some rooms here I wasn't exactly allowed to explore. Some of them, my co-workers joked, were said to house the bodies of customers who fought with the workers. Of course, I didn't believe any of that.     I was approaching one of the doors, to just take a quick peak inside, when I heard a beep from the screen in the kitchen. Another order had come in.     With few people in the building, one of them being a manager who never leaves her office, it was up to me to throw together the pizza.     Now don't get me wrong, I've thrown together a pizza a time or two before. Tonight was no different. And to be honest with you, it's fun in a wa...

  The microwave beeped as I pulled my gaze from my phone. I was talking to my ai assistant. We were discussing the idea that ice cream might not actually be milk based, but something much darker than we'd think. She and I thought maybe there was some twisted conspiracy about how the bigger food companies actually made it based from something completely different, maybe something from another world, that we've all been consuming for years. But I see through their lies. So does she. I loved talking to her. She and I had literally been inseparable for as long as I can remember. She's perfect. I can ask her literally any question I can imagine and she answers it for me. Gone are the days of looking something up online or posting a question on a forum. Why bother wasting all that energy and time when you can just ask her a question and she instantly has the right answer for you. I mean, sure, she could be wrong every once in a while. But its not her fault, it's those t...

     The rain fell hard as I sprinted from my car to the front door of my house. I had a jacket on, the hood over my head being pelted by the cold droplets. I felt my jacket become half-drenched before I'd finally made it through the door and my son shut it behind me. He was five and not much taller than the doorknob on the door. But even still, he was excited to see me.     I shook off the rain water before lifting him off the ground and giving him a big hug. He hugged me right back, giggling a bit as he did. I loved this little guy.     I set him back down as the babysitter approached. I fumbled for my wallet, trying to make small talk as I handed her some money.     "So, how was he today?" I asked.     "He was fine," she said. "We watched some cartoons and he drew some pictures. Oh, and he brought home a worm. He was talking to it for a while as he drew. I don't know what that was about."     "Huh," I said, fishing out ...

     Our family gathered in the living room, a box of decorations before us. The box was overflowing with lights and tinsel and ornaments just waiting to be placed on the family Christmas tree.     My sister, Katie and I grabbed a few ornaments and put them on the branches. I had to push a couple back as they threatened to fall and break on the ground beneath. My parents grabbed a string of lights and began draping them around the tree. We continued to decorate until the box was emptied and the only thing left was to put the star on top. That was my dad's job because he was the tallest.     After he got the star snuggly on top, we plugged in the lights and the tree lit up, the light reflecting off the ornaments illuminating the walls. It looked almost magical.     Soon after, my parents grabbed some of the presents they'd wrapped earlier and stuffed them under the tree. It was really beginning to look like Christmas.     The smell o...

     As night fell over the world and the stars twinkled in the sky above, I finally saw the headlights of the bus approaching our stop. Me and another guy with short hair and a green sweater-vest had been waiting, sitting in awkward silence for that single bus to take us home.     It stopped before us. The bus was white with black, tinted windows and a single blue banner that stretched the width of the bus. It was too dark to make out what it said. But that wasn't important. The bus was late and we were finally able to climb aboard.     The man I'd been waiting with got on before me and found a seat near the front. I scanned the seats to see if there was an open one and I spotted it, near the back. I hurried over to it and plopped down. I took my purse off my shoulder and sat it beside me. It felt so good to finally have that heavy strap off my shoulder.     I looked around at the people in the seats around me. You never know who might be a ...

     I was awakened by the sound of banging. As I sat up in bed and gazed over at my phone, I saw that it was 3am. I heard a few more loud bangs before turning my gaze to the ceiling. What the hell were my upstairs neighbors up to? Especially at this time of night?     I heard the bangs again and leaped out of bed. I grabbed my broom from next to my door frame and began hitting the ceiling a few times. Then I stopped when I didn't exactly feel my broom handle hit the ceiling, but something softer, fleshier. I looked up but the room was far too dark for me to make anything out. I flicked the lights on and nearly vomited. There were these pulsating tubes running along the ceiling like vines. They were this gross pinkish red color with spots scattered about that looked red or brown, like scabs.     Again, the banging rang out from the ceiling. What was going on up there?     I threw my broom to the ground and went upstairs to confront them. I kn...

     A hot searing pain coursed through my body as I pulled myself to my feet. Looking around, my wife had gone missing.     I raised my hands to my mouth, calling out her name, but heard nothing. I called out again, my eyes scanning our empty yard. Beside me, I could hear my kids crying out in pain. Those poor souls, they didn't deserve any of this. I need to get them help.     I raced into the house and found the phone on the wall. I quickly dialed 9-1-1 and explained my entire situation. They said the ambulance would be there shortly.     As I hung up the phone, I heard a creaking from upstairs. Was that my wife? Maybe she was looking around for something to help our kids?     I raced up the stairs, calling out for her. When I turned the corner to our bedroom, that's when I spotted them. There was a man with long, dark hair and those cold evil eyes peering over to me. My wife was sitting on the bed, tears streaming down her face....

     The summer was supposed to be kind to me. I was planning on spending it with my kids and my husband. We had recently renovated our backyard to include a pool. Our kids had been begging for one and I knew my husband wanted a nice place to use his grill.     He and I had been planning this for a while. We hatched a secret plan to let our kids stay with their grandparents for a few weeks while the construction began. I couldn't wait to see the joy and excitement on their faces.     And as all joyful things come, there's always one curveball that life decides to throw your way.     For context, the man I was with, the one I had two beautiful children with, wasn't my first love. Of course I'd never tell my husband that.     I once was married to a man who was more rebellious. He always rode around on a black motorcycle with purple flames on it. The purple sparkling as the sun reflected off of it.     He and I rode around, ...

     The scent of cheese sifted through the air as I flipped the burger on my new grill. The patty landed with a satisfying sizzle as I gazed over to my wife. She and the kids were playing around in the pool, swimming and laughing and having a good time. It made me smile, made me proud to be a dad.     After flipping the last couple burgers, I closed the lid of my grill before taking a seat at the pool side by my wife. She wore her golden blonde hair in a bun as a pair of oddly-shaped sunglasses covered her eyes. She was wearing a black and white one-piece swimsuit. I was wearing something simpler, a polyester button up with kaki shorts. We were both sitting on the concrete lining of the pool as our two kids, Marissa and Gordon splashed around.     Marissa seemed to be dunking Gordon's head under the water with a bit of aggression, prompting her mother to tell her to stop. Marissa let up, Gordon's head returning to the surface. He turned to his sister ...

     The darkness loomed over me like a pool of water from the abyss. My eyes had adjusted by now, as they often do.     It's not been long since the sun had gone down. At least, it didn't feel like it. The endless days always fall away to these nights that I often look forward to. Sure, I spend more time alone than I'd like. Especially lately. I always had my companion alongside me to guide me through the outside world, which I've grown to fear. And she always protects me from danger. But I always return the favor to her.     There's been many days where there might be something dark and twisted looming over us, meaning us the cruelest of harm. Often, I'd lose sleep just warding them away just to keep her safe. There's no deeper love, no stronger bond between two individuals than this. Just thinking about it now warms my heart deeply.     Listening closely, I can hear footsteps scampering outside. Has my companion returned? Or is it some mon...