fiction
Horror fiction that delivers on its promise to scare, startle, frighten and unsettle. These stories are fake, but the shivers down your spine won't be.
Roses
My roses were blooming again. I'd always tried to take special care of them. They were my prized possessions and the only thing that seemed to bring me any peace or joy while I was stuck in the degenerate hole. And they had the audacity to call it a neighborhood. Don't get me wrong. It actually used to be quite a peaceful neighborhood to live in. That was until those monsters moved in across the street.
By Mina Ramey6 years ago in Horror
Hair of the Dog (Pt. 5)
Just like that, my romance with the night was over. A wave of adrenalized fear swept me up the steps and past him into the lobby. My teeth clacked and shivers wracked me. Whatever warm fuzziness our drinking binge had afforded me was gone. Nick handed me a beach towel and crossed the room to crouch at the fireplace. We had stacked some of the dry wood from the porch in it earlier, and now he stuffed it with crisped leaves and old newspaper from the litter in the room and set a flame to it. Sweetish smoke rose and infused the air, then the welcome crackle of burning oak. The fire leaped; we stretched our hands out to it.
By Liz Zimmers6 years ago in Horror
Hair of the Dog (Part 4)
I emerged into the hot fog of beer, grease, and cheap aftershave that defined Friday night at MeeMaw’s, and for a moment, I was sure the storm had arrived to knock out the electricity. The place was dim, lit by flickering candles, and strings of blinking white and blue Christmas lights festooned along the dirty junction of the walls and acoustic tile ceiling. The juke crooned out a slow country ballad in the requisite twang at full volume, and couples thronged the dance floor, swaying and groping in the summer gloom.
By Liz Zimmers6 years ago in Horror
Hair of the Dog (Pt. 3)
MeeMaw’s Tavern gleamed in the hazy twilight, the flaws in its weather-bitten white paint smoothed away by storm light and the romantic flush of neon beer signs. A low building, it appeared to rise from the depths of a colossal pothole. The dirt lot, jammed with pick-up trucks, funneled toward the crooked concrete slab of its porch where a single caged bulb flickered over the screen door. We parked under the boughs of an elderly oak, far enough away to be beyond the reach of the light, but close enough to feel the tremble in the chassis from the rocking juke inside the tavern. Lynyrd Skynyrd’s "Whiskey Rock-A-Roller" spilled out on a buzz of laughter and raucous conversation. We climbed from the Jeep into the electric air. Above us, a growl of thunder competed with the tavern din, a ponderous sound like that of a piano rolling across a marble floor, and heat lightning cracked the indigo sky.
By Liz Zimmers6 years ago in Horror
Hair of the Dog (Pt. 2)
Inside, the cabin was dim and musty. Crumbling stacks of newspapers covered every surface. The kitchen counter held a collection of dented coffee cans, some bent and shedding rust. An ancient glass coffee pot sat on a stove burner, burbling like a tar pit. I’d seen the propane tank by the side of the house. There was no electricity or running water. A hand pump rose beside the vast enameled sink. Maudie fished two chipped mugs from the depths of the sink and gave each a rub on her apron. She set them beside the stove and turned to wave a long finger at Nick.
By Liz Zimmers6 years ago in Horror
She
She always dressed in faded black jeans with the knees torn out and sleeveless T-shirts emblazoned across the chest with the logos of famous rock bands (who inevitably, mother said, seemed to have the word ‘death’ in their names). Basically, She was a good girl, who did all of the things that good little girls in her land did, like worrying about problem-things. Indeed, on the day that our story takes place, She was very embroiled in a problem-thing. She had just come from a lecture about a problem-thing that was altogether new to her and was having quite a struggle wrapping her thoughts around it. New words were all floating around in her mind, like a bunch of little problem things that she could not make into the very big problem thing that the lecture had actually been about. It was all very confusing, but she was sure that if she concentrated real, real hard, she eventually would understand. And concentrate real hard, she did! Why, she was concentrating so very hard on the problem-thing that when she got home she ran in the front door and right through the living room, moving so fast and thinking so hard that she didn't even notice her family waving at her from their very favorite spots in front of the television. She just ran into her bedroom, slammed the door shut, put on her favorite CD, The Dead Lovers In Potato Crates, pulled out a cigarette, lit up with her unicorn lighter and started smoking furiously—like she always did when things needed thinking about.
By John Ridgway6 years ago in Horror
Dear Diary
I creep down the page, one foot after the other sliding to the next line of text, feeling my way with my bare toes. The light around me is dim and creamy, the glow of the night-reading lamp beside her bed. I look up and out and there it is like a hazy moon. I see it through the tall window on the landing of the staircase of words, casting its radiance into the house that is written around me. There is carpet under my feet, a runner of intricate weave and convoluted design—the subtle subtext of her entries, the story within her story, and the sprawling arabesques of her handwriting. I could pull them up, those inky loops, and hang myself with them. Would she see the swaying shadow of my body on her wall?
By Liz Zimmers6 years ago in Horror
