The Woman in the Green Dress

I never listened to the stories that my grandmother always told me about whenever I walked alone at night. Even though I was now in college, my grandmother called me on the phone, insisting that I should believe the stories, and not take them as make-believe bullshit.

Her words, not mine.

One of the stories that pissed me off was the one about a young woman wearing a green dress. She looked human, but she was secretly a monster that liked to eat bad people. It scared the crap out of me when I was a kid, and I expected her to pop out at me one day as I did my first bad thing.

So, my childhood was filled with nothing but nightmares.

I was in my college dorm, fuming a bit as I was going over math homework. I didn’t understand why I had to take these stupid courses on the side, since I was majoring in creative writing.

I guess people are somewhat right when it comes to college, they find ways of taking money from the students in any way that they can. My roommate, Catherine, who was now a person I could call a friend, was banging a drumstick against her leg, going along with the music beat coming from her headphones.

She was staring off into space, no longer doing her homework. We were in the same math class, and I could tell from her computer screen that she hasn’t done shit like I have. As if she read my mind, she looked over her shoulder, lifting up one of the headphones earpieces.

“I can’t focus, Mara.”

“Me either,” I sighed.

“This shit is too hard. How the fuck does our professor think we can get everything done before class on Monday? It’s like she assumes we are all super smart or something.”

“Isn’t she a new professor here at the college? I heard from the other students that they are scared of failing her class.”

Catherine smirked.

“Maybe she will get kicked out of the college for struggling to get her students to pass. And then we could get a free A.”

I shrugged. Catherine rolled her eyes at the ceiling, and then she spun around on her chair.

“Do you want to go get snacks or something? Maybe we could watch a movie. Cause I don’t see us getting any of this done tonight.”

“Sure. That sounds like a good idea.”

Catherine’s phone rang as I shut off my laptop. She picked up the phone and groaned.

“Oh man. It’s my dad. I don’t want to ignore him either. He barely got out of work, and he won’t have time to call me back after this. He’s got a busy day tomorrow.”

“I’ll go to the store. Text me what you want. And pay me back!”

Catherine mouthed thank you to me as she answered the phone. She spoke to her dad, as she quickly texted me what she wanted. I threw on a sweater, and I left the dorm. I zipped up the sweater once I stepped outside. I wasn’t expecting it to be this cold, I always underestimated the weather.

It was ten at night, and the college was empty. There were barely any kids walking about, as I made my way to the store. It was located far away, almost off campus. Nothing bad ever happened here, our college was located in the rich end of the city, so it was pretty safe for the most part.

We got our occasional thief here and there, but it wasn’t a big deal. I walked to the store, and purchased what I needed. Then I left the store, walking back to the dorm. I was on my phone, sending a quick text to Catherine, before I felt something tap my shoulder.

I screamed, whirling around to find a tall girl standing behind me.

“What the hell?”

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!,” the girl chirped.

The girl was beautiful. She had a pretty face, blonde hair, and she wore a green dress with green high heels.

“Oh. Oh, fuck. Sorry I screamed like that. You shouldn’t sneak up on people like that.”

The girl smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry. I was walking on my own just now, and I was wondering if you wanted some company. Anything bad can happen to a girl who walks alone.”

“Yeah…that’s true. Where do you live?”

The girl had her hands behind her back, looking down, her face scrunched up, as if she was thinking for a minute.

“I’m new here. So, I’m staying at the one where the new students go.”

“You mean the Riverland dorm? That’s where I’m staying.”

The girl nodded. “That’s the one.”

“I guess we can go together then. Where did you come from? A party or something?,” I asked the girl as we started to make our way to the dorm.

The girl hummed a tune to herself. “Yeah. It was boring, and I wanted to leave.”

“Oh. In the middle of the night?”

“Yes. I know it’s stupid to go alone, but I wanted to get away. There was a stranger who got too touchy. Those are the scary ones who deserve to suffer a horrible death.”

With that said, the girl started humming to herself again. I waited an uncomfortable amount of time to see if she would suddenly start laughing in my face over her dark joke, but she never did. I sort of started trailing ahead of her, wanting to be as far away as possible.

I thought of the old story of the woman in the green dress, but I got rid of that image right away. The girl could be high for all I know, so maybe I was being a jerk. It was my grandmother’s fault why I was feeling this way.

A random person was walking ahead of us, his hands in his pockets. I knew it was a guy, judging by his stance. At some point, the guy turned back to look at us. He gave me a smile, but I ignored it. We were still pretty far from the dorm, so I wanted to get back to my roommate and sit down to watch a movie.

The guy slowed down, and started walking towards us. He gave me a big smile.

“Hey there. Where are ya’ll headed?”

“Nowhere,” I quickly replied. I grabbed the girl’s arm, wanting to get away from him. The guy caught up to us again.

“Aww, don’t be like that. I’m asking you a question, that’s all.”

The girl let out a small laugh, and became silent again. At this point, I wasn’t sure who to be afraid of more. I thought about bolting to the dorm on my own, but that would make me a monster for leaving her behind with this guy. I tightened my hold on the girl’s arm, letting her know I wanted to get the fuck away from this asshole.

The girl maintained the same pace, continuing to hum that same tone. There was no question she was on something, and I needed to get her away from this bastard. The guy let out a whistle, and I felt dread start to build up within my chest.

“You’re so pretty, girl. What’s your name? Maybe you both could hang at my place.”

“Listen, man. We don’t have time. We are heading back to the dorm. We’re exhausted; we just came from a party.”

“Why did you buy snacks then? Unless you’re going to continue staying up late?”

“Dude, take a fucking hint and leave us alone.”

Something sharp touched my neck, and I flinched when I felt a prick on my skin. The guy was holding a switchblade to my throat.

“You shouldn’t talk to me that way. I’m asking if we could hang out. I’m parked not that far from here. Maybe we could all hang out together somewhere.”

It took everything in me not to scream and risk getting my throat cut. The girl continued to hum, immediately aggravating this monster.

“Will you quit that fucking humming, you dumb bit-’’

The guy was shoved to the ground. It took me a second to realize that the girl had used one hand to push him away from me. I looked at the girl, trying to process what the hell I just saw. The girl had a big smile on her face. The guy slowly started to get back up.

“You bitch! How did you -’’

Me and the asshole both froze when the girl lifted up her green dress.

Then we both screamed at the same time.

There was nothing but darkness underneath the dress. A black void. But then two huge eyeballs appeared from the void. The eyes blinked once, and slowly a nightmarish creature stretched out toward the guy. It was a sort of pale, skinless snake, slithering out from the darkness.

The snake opened its mouth, revealing the eyes. They were inside of the mouth. It latched onto the guy, swallowing him whole. The guy was kicking his eyes back and forth, as he slid all the way inside of the snake. I could see the outline of his writhing body within the inside of the pale beast.

The snake then slid back into the blackness, along with the guy. The girl let the dress fall back into place. I fell back on my ass, not noticing the pain that shot up my body when I hit the ground. The snacks inside of my bag tumbled out, spreading all over the grass.

The girl stood there for a bit, staring at the knife that was left behind from the thing that had eaten him. The girl picked up the knife, and then she turned to look at me. That same big grin was on her face.

She waved at me, and placed the knife on her tongue. It was that of a snake. The tongue pulled the knife into her throat, and she gulped it down. She giggled, and ran away, humming to herself.

I watched her go, and then everything went black.

When I awoke, I was surrounded by several police officers. I was found by a random student, and they had called the police. Catherine stayed with me afterwards, and they asked me tons of questions. Someone had seen a random guy on the campus, walking around at night.

He was currently missing.

I thought it was all a dream. Simply a horrible nightmare.

Until I came home during the holidays.

My grandmother mentioned the story of the woman in the green dress. She leaned over to get closer to me, to whisper something in my ear.

“I sometimes hear her humming outside my bedroom window. She never forgets those she saved.”

I ran away from her and locked myself in the bedroom for the night.

I sobbed into my pillow, ignoring the humming coming from outside of my window.

Thank you for reading!

Emy Quinn