MicroHorror

Six months ago, I was a graphic artist. I had a job with a firm downtown that paid me fairly well, an apartment only four blocks away in a pretty cool area, and I had lots of friends. Six months ago, I could walk out my door and within six blocks I had five favorite bars and I knew pretty much all the regulars. Every Friday I would go to one of these bars with my workmates and meet up with my friends and we would stay till after closing. Sometimes we would all go back to my apartment and commit all sorts of debauchery in the name of Fun. I had my bad habits and I was okay with them because I was happy. I had a pretty good life all told.

Six months ago I was walking home from one of my favorite bars and was passing an alley when a weird sound caught my attention. It was a gross, wet, nasty sound that made me think twice about stopping, but for some reason I didn’t listen to my inner voice telling me to run. I looked into the ally and saw a dark figure hunched over. I watched for a minute and tried to see what it was doing when it turned and faced me. It was a pale, dead face with a red smear down its chin. It looked at me with luminescent eyes and I felt it pull on my mind. I felt myself walking forward without realizing what I was doing and I started to panic. But even with fear urging me to fight, I had no control over my body. The face became clear as I approached and it was grinning with sharp teeth and gray skin. The figure stood up and as it did so, I felt my heart leap. This “person” towered over me by at least two feet. It held out a long, spindly hand… a claw really, with nails like talons, and against my will I held out my own. It’s grasp was like the grip of death, cold and clammy but strong like a vice. It pulled me forward and I was wrapped in darkness.

When I awoke, I was hit with a wave of fetid stench like feces and decay. I was lying in a dumpster next to two dead bodies. My head swam and I wanted to vomit but I was also hungry, very hungry. I pushed the top of the dumpster open and peered out when I felt a searing pain on my extended arm. I withdrew and the lid slammed shut over my head. In the dim light I could see blisters forming on my arm like a third-degree burn.

I used my other hand to open the lid again and as sunlight flashed on my face I felt the pain again and I screamed and fell back into the garbage. I touched my forehead and could feel blisters forming there too. My mind raced to figure out what was going on when it hit me. I felt along my neck when lo and behold, there they were, just under my jaw line, right at my carotid artery: two punctures. I had to wait for dusk.

Of course I eventually made it back home but that was six months ago. Now it’s 5:30 AM and I’m sitting on the roof of my building watching the sky grow lighter. It’s been so long since I actually watched a sunrise. I’ve done some sinful things in my life but all harmless enough. In the last six months however, I’ve done some things I don’t wish to remember. I’ve killed some people. Some were my friends. I tried to pretend nothing was different, but who was I fooling? I quit my job and I’ve had time to see a lawyer and get my affairs in order. I left everything to my mother. It won’t be long before the sun is up.