Till the Fall: A Slender Man Tale

It wasn’t long till fate trapped me. I ran. I hid. I did everything I could till I was eighteen. Au revoir hometown, hello college. I went as far away as possible. Not because my family was awful, they were generally decent people. They just wouldn’t listen. Part of me thinks that they willingly plugged their ears to ignore my screams. Screams that came from nightmares, and sometimes not.

I had escaped all that, leaving myself empty of fear. Fear it fed on. Fear I fed on. Now, like an 80’s horror flick, I’m back where it all began. Fuck. Well, what did I expect? I was the last one left. If it didn’t get us back then, it got us years later, one by one.

Perhaps I should give you some background: 1991. The year I turned ten. It was September when I blew out candles, received gifts, and ate cake till I threw up. Turning ten was like turning 16. Now that I was in the double digits I was allowed to do things I could not before. Namely, play in the town woods with my friends. Of course I felt like a bad ass, leaving a few friends from my fourth grade class behind to play with the older kids, the “tweens”. We would climb trees, skip rocks into the small stream, and hit each other with sticks.

There were five of us when it came. We were playing freeze tag, and because I was the fastest, I almost tagged everyone. It was Dylan against me, and Dylan was too far away to take the risk of un-freezing our friends. John Stevens, frozen in place, was the closest to it when it came. We all became frozen when serpentine horn-like arms snaked around his small body and almost gently impaled him on a newly naked tree branch.

Luke Taylor was next, and as soon as it was picked up in the same fashion as John, Dylan, Matt and I bolted. We ran as fast as we could, clearing the forest and running back to Dylan’s house. We clung to his father in desperation, none of us believing what we wanted to spill from our mouths. We stood there exhausted and scared and mute until Matt broke the silence.

“It has them.” He whispered through sobs. “It killed them.”

Dylan’s father, baffled by our uncharacteristic actions, asked Matt to continue. He stood there dumb founded, his body near shaking. He turned to me and asked for me to continue Matt’s story.

“We were playing. Just freeze tag. And John and Luke were frozen as me and Dylan were running and…,” My voice started to trail off. “This thing came. It came and it killed John, and then it killed Luke. All we could do was run.”

Dylan’s dad was incredulous of course, and decided to check it out. We begged him not to, and through our hollering he decided to call the police to investigate the woods.

It was all over the news after that. Most blamed it on a serial killer. The police said that the monster was a way for our “little hysterical minds” to cope. All three of us knew this was bullshit. It was just a way for them to not face the truth behind the situation, especially since there wasn’t any way for a serial killer to impale John and Luke’s bodies on to the top branches without a ladder.

We buried it in the back of our mind after that. Dylan and I remained best friends, but Matt decided to distance himself from, well, everybody. 4 years later he was found dead. The night terrors were too much for him, and he killed himself. At least that’s what the police report said.

Dylan and I also had the nightmares. Most of the time we had the same one, watching ourselves sleep as a tall, thin, oddly-shapen thing comes in our bedroom. Of course we woke up in time to not see anything so horrible. We were never comfortable sleeping. Not till we left for college.

We decided to go as far away as possible. Living in the middle of Pennsylvania, we decided to journey west. Both Dylan and I were accepted to University of Puget Sound, a small liberal arts school in Tacoma, WA. Our nightmares stopped, and we began to live our lives fully. I was never much of a partier, but attended the same parties as Dylan when asked. He was known for getting shit-faced since the first semester we attended, yet still maintained a 3.5 GPA. We were settling in quite nicely in our new surroundings. It wasn’t until junior year everything fucked up.

Dylan got more wasted than I had ever seen him. I opted to drive him home because I didn’t drink that much. As we were driving down a heavily wooded part of town, Dylan demanded we stop. I assumed he needed to throw up, or piss, or both. Instead he walked straight into the forest. I didn’t think twice about it until he was screaming “Hey!” to the dark nothings.

“What the fuck are you doing, ass hat?” I asked him angrily.

“What do you think I’m doing, dick…scarf?” Dylan replied. “Do you even know what day it is? It’s September 26th. 7 days after your birthday.”

“Your point?” I asked, getting nervous by the minute.

“It’s the anniversary of John and Luke’s death. I’m going to try to see if that spider man will come and try to get me too.” He said to me. “Hey Daddy long legs, what are you going to do? Fist me with a tentacle? Come and fuck with me I dare you!” Dylan was ever the belligerent drunk.

“Dylan, this isn’t funny. Come on, man, come back to the car.” I tried persuading him. No use.

“Come on you fucker!” Dylan screamed. “I’ll give you 20 dollars if you show yourself right now.”

I was about to make an attempt at persuading him again, but I was distracted by the fast crackle of leaves coming near us.

“Oh fuck.” Dylan screamed and ran like a girl, only to be tackled down to the leaf and dirt covered ground.

“Come down, you dumb ass.” I retorted. The offender had been a chocolate lab, now panting and nuzzling Dylan’s face.

‘Just a dog.” Dylan muttered. He pet the pup and got up from the ground and proceeded to brush himself off. “What was I thinking? Fucking stupid.” He slurred. We started walking back almost immediately.

“Do you hear that?” Dylan stuttered.

“It’s just a dog, Dylan. Cool it.”

“Yeah you’re ri-“He cut off. I looked at him, curious as to why he didn’t finish his sentence.

“It’s okay to say it, Dylan. Repeat after me. ‘You’re right.’” I joked. It was only then did I notice his eyes. Wider and more crazed then ever. I turned to see what he was staring at.

It was a sight I long forgotten, but could never forget once I saw it again. There it stood, black suit, pale skin, and tall. So tall it was unrealistic. Like a child draws their father and mother comparative to themselves. We tried to bolt from it again, but stood still, like dummies frozen until their human master’s moved them where they needed to be. As soon as one of the tentacles snapped out and ringed Dylan’s neck, I was startled. Like being woken up. My body jolted back to life, and fight or flight kicked in. I decided I would not lose my last childhood friend to this. I tried pushing the thin thing away from my friend, but it did not move, didn’t even hit me back. It just focused on killing my friend.

As soon as Dylan’s body went limp, I ran. I got in my car without looking back, and found the police station. I told them the whole thing, yet again, they were incredulous. They asked me how much I had been drinking. They asked me if I was on narcotics. Anything to avoid the fact that a dead body laid in the middle of the woods. I was a suspect for a while, but for sudden reasons, they dropped charges. I dropped out of college, and lived out of a van for a year, going from job to job, avoiding real life, and forests, for as long as possible.

Soon, I became too broke to live in a van. I called my mom to ask for some help, but all she sent me was a ticket. A ticket back to Pennsylvania, and apparently a job there at my father’s office, if I cleaned up. At first I avoided it, but soon became desperate. I moved back in late August. I cleaned up like my mother asked, and started working at my father’s office, and started functioning normal again.

Now the nightmares are back. I stay in my bedroom, but my dream is becoming real. I can see his shadow outside my window. About time, old friend.
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By sydneeisanelf @ MONOLITH

Slenderman

After waking up with a jolt, the girl laid in bed a few seconds longer. Reaching over to switch on her bedside lamp, she tried to remember exactly what had stolen her sweet slumber away. When she couldn’t, the brunette swung her legs over the side of the bed and heaved herself up. Checking the time on her phone, she snorted when she saw it was midnight- the witching hour. Knowing that sleep would only evade her, she left her bedroom for the kitchen, a good cup of coffee on her mind.
As she passed by her front door, a chill spread like liquid fire down her spine. It’s only winter, she told herself, focusing again on the coffee plan. Measuring out scoops, water, and preparing her cup kept her occupied, but as the dark liquid boiled, she had nothing left to keep her mind from wandering off. The chill returned and she couldn’t help but glance behind her to the front door. It stood there innocently enough, just like always. The dead bolt was still in place and she could see nothing amiss with it. Turning back to her coffee, she did her best to forget about the feeling.
With her cup in hand, she started back towards her bedroom. As she walked by the front door, she decided that a quick glance out of the peep hole would help calm her restless mind. The chill worsened with each step she took towards the door and further away from the safety and warmth of her blankets. She pressed her empty hand against the cold, metal door and took a deep breath before leading her eye to the peep hole.
At first, she could only see an inky blackness and somehow seemed to swirl in itself. When she blinked in surprise, the void melted away. She wished it hadn’t. In it’s place, there stood what she could only guess was once a man. The limbs were long and inhumanly awkward, with bulky joints branching off into several arms, not unlike the branches of a tree. The creature was drapped in a black suit, somehow manking the thing more nightmarish to her. The icing on the proverbial cake, however, was what passed as the hellish thing’s face. It was as though her mind blurred the ghastly visage to spare itself further shock and horror.
She shoved herself away from the door with the hand still pressed against it. The scalding mug of coffee fell, the liquid burning her bare legs as she fell backwards and tried to crawl away from the door. She knew, somehow, that her mind hadn’t been playing tricks on her. As she crab walked away from the door, she watched as tendrels as black as the void she first saw snake around through the cracks. The girl was trapped between the instinct to flee and the gut feeling to not turn her back on the door. When the door jolted, the urge to flee overcame her and she slipped in the burning liquid as she tried to make it back to her room.
She knew deep down that she was trapping herself in a corner, but she had to get away from the door. The girl was halfway down the hallway when she heard the previously locked door creak open. She screamed and slipped into a wall, cracking her chin on it and stunning her.
After that, there was only blackness.
–
“Nicole?” a warm, male voice snapped the woman out of her trance. As she turned around, she was met by one of her sister’s doctor’s. She nodded, not sure if she should say anything, or even if she could find her voice if she did have something to say. That morning, she had gotten an urgent phone call from the hospital, saying that her sister, Lindsay, was there. Before they had even let her see her, the doctor’s had pulled her off to the side and insisted that they talk to her about what might have happened. Phrases like ’self-inflected’ and ‘assault’ had been thrown around and Nicole felt her mind reel.
She still hadn’t fully understood what they had been saying until she saw Lindsay with her own eyes. Her little sister had a bandage wrapped around her head, covering both of her ears as well as her eyes. They said it was to keep her now deadened eyes from drying out and to try to keep infection out of the wounds Lindsay had made to her ears. The doctors had guessed that either she or someone else had jammed a pencil into them to keep her off balance or to deafen herself against something. There was the mix of first and second degree burns on her hands, legs, and feet, from what was assumed to be the coffee her neighbors found slipped all over the entry to her apartment.
As Nicole walked into her sister’s hospital room the first time, she thought she had spied the silhouette of a man in the window. That, she knew, was impossible. Her sister’s room was on the third story of the hospital.

A Mother's Love

One afternoon, a couple was traveling on by car when at a far distance they saw a woman in the middle of the road, waving frantically.
The wife told her husband to keep on driving because it might be too dangerous, but the husband decided to pass by slowly so he wouldn’t stay with the doubt on his mind of what might have happened and the chances of anyone being hurt. As they got closer, they noticed a woman with cuts and bruises on her face as well as on her arms. They then decide to stop and see if they could be of any help.
The cut and bruised woman was begging for help telling them that she had been in a car accident and that her husband and son, a new born baby, were still inside the car which was in a deep ditch. She told them that the husband was already dead but that her baby seemed to still be alive.
The husband that was traveling decided to get down and try to rescue the baby and he asked the hurt woman to stay with his wife inside the their car. When he got down he noticed two people in the front seats of the car but he didn’t pay any importance to it and took out the baby quickly and got up to take the baby to it’s mother. When he got up, he didn’t see the mother anywhere so he asked his wife where she had gone. She told him that the woman followed him back to the crashed car.
When the husband went back to look for her, he noticed that clearly the couple in the front seats were dead, one of whom was unmistakeably the woman who had flagged them down.

Candy

"Mom," said the little girl, rubbing her eyes and standing in the doorway to her mother's room.

"Mom, the Easter Bunny is eating my candy," she said.

"Nonsense, baby," the woman replied. "The Easter Bunny gives out candy, he doesn't eat it..."

The woman lightly shook her covers and continued to speak, halfway into her pillow and halfway to her daughter, "Go back to sleep, baby..."

"But, mom," the girl said. "The Easter Bunny is eating candy!" She now spoke in a more serious tone, almost as if she were going to cry.

Her mother sat up and opened her arms. "Baby, I just told you. The Easter Bunny doesn't eat candy, he hands it out to little children. Besides, it's not even Easter yet. Go back to sleep," she said in her kindest voice.

"Okay, mom," the child sighed as she turned to walk out the room.

The woman smiled and thought, 'Crazy kid with her lively imagination,' and went back to sleep on a whim.

Out in the hallway, the little girl stood for a while staring at the Easter Bunny eating her candy. She then sighed. "Mommy said I should go back to bed."

The Easter Bunny smiled. "Good idea, child. Turn around and don't look back."

He flicked a shiny metal pendant at the child. She picked it up and cried as she saw what it was: it was a dog tag and it read 'Candy.'