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| Fiction: Boogieman |
Posted by
Dolorosa on Saturday, December 07, 2002 - 04:25 AM PST
Stretch those long black fingers, stretch them just enough to crack. One step, to just behind the door. A whisper of a breath…the slightest inhalation, almost not even there, and smile my dear boy…smile that jackknife grin, smile it dark and smile it proud.
Open that closet door, a hairsbreadth at first, just an echo of a true opening. Just enough for the moonlight to shine on bear-trap teeth, yellow like cat’s eyes, jagged like broken glass. Ah yes…there it is, that sweet sound of held breath. You can always tell when a child is just pretending. I know he feels me, I know he smells me…that strange familiar scent. I know, and so too does he…but he tries to push it away, tries to pretend me away.
I linger, within the domain of Janus. Just within the threshold. It’s a strange place to be, neither on one side of a door or the other…a nothing place, but that place, ah my dear…that’s the place I call home.
There’s a fine art to scaring the shit out of children, and I…I am the finest of artists, I excel not at fear, and not at horror…but of that middle line, that hideous phantom emotion…terror.
Laying there on his bed so stiff, so unyielding, so wrought with chill. Eyes shut tight, lips pressed thin. He knows I am…there is no denying, but oh how the sweet child tries…how valiantly he tries to slay the dragon, with the blade of disbelief. To no avail my pet, to no avail. The young have not the shield of disbelief yet fully forged for them, and that…that is their truest and most delectable weakness.
Dare to look little boy, dare to look…surely there is nothing standing in your closet…so close. No man in a black coat, no man with fingers as long as your arm…no man with a too-wide crocodile smile, with broke-button eyes.
Aaah yes…that’s it. Wide eyes, a sudden flip of the heart, that is my appetizer, the beginning delicacy to start my full hunger. I am, little boy, oh yes…yes indeed, I am.
A hoarse whisper of a scream, climbing it’s way up his clenched and fear-choked throat. Like a sand-paper maggot, squirming, like a half-dead cat, writhing. Ten thousand spiders suddenly sprung to life over vulnerable and sensitive flesh…a sudden desire to release his bowels. Pupils so large they could swallow the sun…unable to look away. I have you trapped my prey, oh do I have you…Like a velvet fly, caught in a web of bad dreams and unclean touches. I am every fear without name, every creak in the floorboard, every flicker in the mirror. I am, and I am coming for you.
A powerful and desperate croak of a cry…forcing it, hating it for being too quiet…and then…ah! Exultation! My standing ovation! My oscar, my emmy…my adoring applause. A scream is born, a beautiful, bouncing, bed-wetting little baby scream. Rising, ululating, singing it’s clarion call. Oh scream beautiful child, scream as if your life depended on it…let it call your defenders, your steadfast guardians.
Like always, I wait, savor and taste that sound…and measure the sleep of the others, those filthy others in this home. I feel them wake, and I feel them hear. I know them then…I know what lay in their fetid little fleshy hearts, those decaying, worm-riddled sacs of clot-soaked meat. I hear them, wishing the boy would just shut up…the whining, cowardly, costly, worthless, unwanted, accidental, retarded, little fuck. Oh how he screams to them, begs them to come to him and save him from this terrible thing…this thing that not even the bravest of children dare to dream of. But he doesn’t hear what I do, he doesn’t realize they ignore him.
And then I smell it…the unclean touch upon him. Dried seed near half-healed bruises, seed so similar to his own private scent. I can taste the blood and sorrow in his mouth…amongst other such things. I know what they do to him, I know what he has done to him. I know.
They do not come, and the savoring is over. I move to my repast…like an owl falls over a mouse, as a carrion crow over a molding corpse. I fall, on this wretch of a boy…on this tragic, suffering nothing. I take him, my jackknife grin never fading, I take him in a way his parents never could. I take him, and I make him.
With him within me, I return to my home…the world between the doors. With him I stalk away…and when I’ve finally filled myself for the night, I take him, I stand him…and I hand him his long black coat.
I teach him the jackknife grin…and give him his hands, and send him on his way.
We are a hungry people…and there are oh so many to feed on these final nights.
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Average Rating : 5.0
Total ratings : 1
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| Boogieman | Login/Create an account | 17 Comments |
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Re: Boogieman
by schmitty on Dec 07, 2002 - 07:46 AM
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reminds me of being a child....
laying in bed scared to death of opening
my eyes.
great story...
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Re: Boogieman
by Anonymous-Coward on Dec 07, 2002 - 11:17 AM
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Scoot over King, Dolorosa is here.
"...the whining, cowardly, costly, worthless, unwanted, accidental, retarded, little fuck.".....um,
gotta girlfiend? (does toe-circles in sand) O;)
That is pretty funny. I don't hate kids or anything ...but, whenever someone asks if I have/want kids, I usually refer them to the memorable Alien I, stomach-ripping scene. Plus anyone heard of OVERPOPULATION? Not in my town.
Back to topic: The Boogieman is probably one of the firsts previews of horror & fear that a child is introduced to (in America, anyway...we've got nothing on some other places).
For some reason, parents, even well-meaning ones,
choose the Boogieman to introduce their child to the sense of fear. (I consider fear a sort of sixth sense.) They usually do it as a threat: "if you don't clean up your room, the Boogieman will visit you tonight". Seems passive enough to an adult, but Jesus! It scared the hell out of me.
Your rendition was well written & on the money! I'll have to sleep with my dolly and my casper nightlight tonight.
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Re: Boogieman
by IamSquid (undisclosedgettheaddressfrommeepersonally)
on Dec 07, 2002 - 03:56 PM
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Well I'm not into kids BUT I'm sure if I could fit into a closet or beneath a bed a kid would be a hearty appitizer! I also don't have that kind of patience when I'm out of water.... Props on the horror, though, brother!
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Re: Boogieman
by Merry_Widow on Dec 07, 2002 - 05:32 PM
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Why don't you tell me these kinds of stories at bedtime anymore? *pout pout*
Good job, my little lima bean.
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Re: Boogieman
by bettie_x (strangersangel@hotmail.com)
on Dec 08, 2002 - 10:08 PM
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Bro, I gotta hand it to you, that was one of the best short horror stories I"ve read in a long ass time....and I read a LOT.
I would seriously consider submitting it to an all call for short stories for a horror compilation book...or start one of your own.
I gotta tell you man, that story is every fucking boogeyman I've ever had under my bed, in my closet, or in the drain that I've ever encountered.
Serious pats on the back for that!
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Re: Boogieman
by Meranda_Jade (Meranda@mymind.com)
on Dec 09, 2002 - 08:57 AM
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Dolo, you're NEVER allowed to tell stories to my kids!! I finally got them all convinced that there weren't any monsters that would sneak into their rooms at night, and then they saw Monsters, Inc. and the damn screaming in the middle of the night nightmares began. I have to make sure the closet is shut every night, and they have stuffed animals who will fight off the monsters for them. A drink of water is the magic potion that makes them invincible to monsters too... or at least calms them down enough to go back to sleep. Have you ever noticed that first shriek upon waking with a nightmare sounds a bit surprised and affronted? As if they can't believe they saw something that horrible in their heads... Whenever I hear that, it yanks me out of the bed, and I'm halfway down the hall before I even wake up, then it's hug, "No, it's ok, it's all right, it was just a dream... wanna drink of water?" hug again, get water, get the stuffed purple bunny with the magic anti-monster aura, stumble back to bed.
Great story, it will probably be giving me the creepies for a while.. you have the most interesting, sick, fascinating mind I've ever seen...
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Re: Boogieman
by Psychopixi on Dec 10, 2002 - 08:59 AM
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I loved this story, you're a damn talented writer! The description of the guy kinda made me think of Johnny the Homicidal Maniac crossed with the pumpkin guy called Jack from, uh, the film about how he hated x-mas.
Anyway, you're a brilliant writer and I really hope you write some more soon!! *puppy-dawg eyes*
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Re: Boogieman
by Isolde (maskedpoetus@yahoo.com)
on Dec 11, 2002 - 04:30 PM
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On the first reading it seems like the typical monster-in-the closet story that all children hear and believe at their young, tender ages...
...But on second reading the story turns ultimately more sinister and darker. Not of the monsters taking the child away, the common fear, but making yet another monster... a whole new night terror.
It made the skin on my arms crawl.
...good work.
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*shudder*
by Monolycus on Dec 23, 2002 - 05:10 PM
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I was very, very disturbed by this, Dolo. I have long believed that most monsters are manufactured rather than born and you did a great job invoking that for me. I really need to read more of the fiction that floats around here... there are some very talented people on board!
~Monolycus.
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