ok but...THEN WHO WAS PHONE
Great Job continue pleaseBHW - CreepyPasta - NoSleep
Hey BHW'ers,
As most of you are aware, I have a Kindle Publishing Journey going on in the Journey section. So while in the midst of it, I had a discussion on various styles of writing with a few fellow members.
I disclosed my desire to start an BHW Original CreepyPasta/NoSleep thread, where members could read Horror stories published by members, critique it, share their own and basically have a good time.
@alwaysinvisible instigated me to go ahead with the thread and so here we are. This was also, inspired by the awesome http://www.blackhatworld.com/seo/whatever-happened-to-martin-small.861688/ thread by @Sherbert Hoover
I wrote this story last night and it is what we call a mellow story. It won't scare the shit out of you at all. It's similar to being a diary entry with an unexplainable conclusion. It's an overnight write-up, so please be gentle. Also, needless to say, this is pure fiction and any resemblance to any person living, dead or in a coma is purely coincidental.
If the thread picks up, I'll dare to write some of the more instigating content. I also welcome other users to post their story in the thread. The only request being, that the story should be an original copy. It can be cross-posted from other resources, provided you are the OP elsewhere too.
So here we go - my first entry.
11:11
I have never been much of a writer. Yes, I excelled in schools in my Grammar lessons. But mostly because I have a tendency to ramble on for pages once I pick up the pen & my English teacher wasn’t one bright individual.
I was never going to relate this incident. Heck, I told myself I’d take it to my grave. But for the past two weeks, this has been upsetting me and so today as I sit here killing time, I decided to share it with you guys. People whom I’ve never met face to face, to see what you think.
About me? I am Michael, a normal catholic guy staying in Mumbai, India. I work as a software developer and my employer has me working with a US client for the past three years. This means, I need to work on American times. An average citizens night is my work hours. But I get the day to myself and the pay is great, so I don’t complain.
Now being the chief programmer on the client’s project, I have an immense workload. And since everything happens online, my employer is perfectly happy with me working from home.
I moved to the city of Mumbai from hometown Mohali, five years ago. I live alone in a plush 3 BHK in one of the most posh areas of Mumbai. I used to have a roommate until 2 years ago. But he left saying the commute to and from his work was too long.
It didn’t bother me much. I was able to afford a maid who cleaned the house and the kitchen, had a laundry boy on call, the local hotel delivered good food and beer. So as you can already see, there was no need for me to get out of the house.
I was always an introvert & have never had many friends. So socializing was something I didn’t do much.
The only thing I used to leave the house for was to get cigarettes. At first it was once a week, as a 20 pack lasted me all week. Then it became once every two days and finally it became a daily habit. I would burn through a 20 pack in 20 hours.
Coming to the story, this one Saturday evening as I was coming back from one of my rare commutes to work, I received a text message from my bank stating that my salary had been credited. I noticed that it was lesser than what I usually receive, so I called up my boss. That very same evening, I was also on the verge of running out of cigarettes and so was supposed to buy myself a pack. However, the long argument with my boss over my supposed “leaves” made me forget and by the time I reached home well past 10 PM, I had 3 smokes left.
I was tired from all the traveling and decided to just have dinner, smoke a cigarette and catch some sleep. But fate had a different plan for me. Once I was done with dinner, I received a “Hey!” on Facebook from a familiar face. It was a girl from my hometown, Riya, who had also moved to Mumbai 2 days ago.
She was a pretty woman and I had a massive crush on her right from my childhood. When she completed her college, she was placed in a retail firm’s office in Mumbai. I was the only one before her to have had a Mumbai placement and so her parents and my parents ensured that we were in touch.
She said that she hadn’t messaged me earlier since she had been busy getting settled in her new home, which she shared with a roommate.
She told me everything about her past, her first relationship, how moving to the big city had always been her dream, how she had a bit of a crush on me when we were in school together.
That last line really caught me off-guard.
She then revealed that she also had a much bigger offer from a merchandising firm in New Delhi, but she didn’t accept it, nor did she tell her parents about it, since she wanted to be in Mumbai and see me.
Needless to say, I had butterflies in my stomach. I was smiling so big my jaw had begun hurting. One part of me still couldn’t believe that a girl had moved to a city, a 1000 miles away from her parents just to be with me.
And then before I knew it, the texting had stopped and we were talking to each other on the phone. Her voice reminded me of the cherubs dangling from heaven. Needless to say, I knew at that very moment that my life had changed.
We talked till 3 in the morning, before we both decided it was time to hit the sack. She said that the Mumbai air didn’t seem to suit her, as she was having difficulty breathing. I promised to take her to the beach the following day, so she’d feel better.
I was still reeling with the thought of being with the girl I had loved since I was 6 year old.
Her place wasn’t far from where I lived. And I decided to meet up with her the following day, which happened to be a Sunday. We decided to get some breakfast, do some shopping and that I would show her around the city and take her to the beach, of course.
--
Now coming back to the cigarettes. You’d remember that all I had left were 3 of them. It was 3 in the morning and I had finished them a few hours ago already. Sleep evaded me and so I needed one to function. After all I was an addict, wasn’t I?
I rummaged through my belongings to see if I had one remaining, but I was out of luck. I decided to go out and get some. I knew of a vendor at the corner of my street who resided right behind his shop. And if you knocked on the window after the shop was closed, he’d sell you whatever you wanted, with a markup, of course.
Needless to say, I was scared out of my wits to be going out in the wee hours. I didn’t have a bike or a car; I had to walk down the whole two blocks to reach his shop. Soon the longing for a cigarette had over come any apprehension I had been having. I gathered my wits and decided to make the walk.
As I got out the main gate for my apartment complex, I decided to make a run for it. I sprinted across the two blocks and made way to the Cigarette vendor’s house. I knocked on the window and as expected, I had my pack of Classic Milds in a few minutes. I decided to wait until I reached home, before lighting up.
As I got back on the street, I heard a slew of sirens coming up from behind me. My immediate response was to duck behind one of the cars and hope that no one saw me. I was having the best night of my life and didn’t want a confrontation with the law enforcement to ruin it.
As the cars passed me, I saw two police vehicles followed by an ambulance. One of the cops saw me ducking inanely behind a car that barely hid me under the well-lit street, but he seemed too preoccupied to stop or even bother.
The way back to my apartment passed through the main street, and as I walked on the sidewalk, I was in full view of any vehicle passing by. I was aware of this and this had made me very very conscious. There was only one thing left to do and that was to run like I had never run before, hoping that no other LE officers or no-gooders pass by. And that’s what I did, I made a run for it and stopped only once I was safely inside the compound of my apartment complex.
I got into the lift, reached my home and lit up. That first drag hit me so good, I almost collapsed in ecstasy. Seriously, anything tastes better when you’ve longed for it. And I mean anything.
--
Anyways, so back to my story. The clock had struck 5 and I decided to call it a night soon after that, since I had to wake up early, clean up and go meet Riya.
I woke up at around 10 in the morning. Went through my daily morning routine and picked up my phone. It was dead. That’s when I noticed; I had forgotten to flip on the switch for the phone’s charger. I cursed myself under my breath, but remembered that I also kept a spare portable charger with me. I took it out, plugged it in and left to meet the woman of my dreams.
As I reached the address she had given me, I noticed a large crowd. Thinking something must’ve gone wrong; I carefully waded through the sea of people standing underneath the building. A few steps later, I saw two police vans standing right outside the entrance. I even saw the cop who had seen me earlier in the morning, ducked behind a car. He looked up from the paper he was holding and glanced at me. I froze for a second, thinking maybe he had recognized me. But he seemed more interested in the paper in his hand. I heaved a sigh of relief and made my way to the inside of the building. A burly constable stopped me while at the entrance and asked me for my identity and the reason why I wanted to go inside.
I introduced myself and said that I had a friend who stayed on the seventh floor. And that I was supposed to meet her today.
As I said this, a young woman who had been sulking on the side suddenly sprang up to me.
“You’re Michael! Riya talked so much about you. But…” and she trailed off into a fresh new stream of tears.
I could feel my heart sinking a little bit. Just as I was trying to recollect my thoughts, the paper-bearing cop walked up to me.
“Mr. Michael?”
“Yes sir!”
“Please come with me!”
“May I ask what this is about?”
“Please, just come with me and I’ll explain.”
I walked with him to the corner of my building, where an ambulance was parked. He took me to the rear of the vehicles and opened the doors. Inside it, lay a body covered in white sheet.
“How did you know Ms. Riya?”
“Umm! We studied in Mohali together. I moved here 5 years ago and she had just moved in a couple days ago, starting a new job. Her parents wanted her to be in touch with someone who knew the city and was familiar with them, so they put us in touch.”
As I said these words, I sense a sudden surge in my anxiety. I could feel an impending panic attack on its way.
“Please! Just tell me what in the world is going on.”
As if on cue, without saying a word, he slowly pulled the sheet from the body, unveiling a face.
The panic attack had arrived. As I saw that beautiful face that a few hours earlier I wanted to hold and kiss and caress, now lying lifeless in a state of rigor, I could feel the world around me darkening. And before I knew it, I hit the ground with a thud. I had blacked out.
--
I opened my eyes to see water being splashed on my face by the same burly constable who had earlier prevented me from entering the building.
I saw the earlier cop come by again and decided to finally get a sense of what the fuck was going on.
I tried to get up on my feet to assert some authority, but my feet gave way and I fell back on the chair.
“Easy there! Please stay seated sir.”
“Would anyone please tell me what is going on here?” I shrieked.
“We don’t have all the information here, yet. But apparently, there was a break in last night on the seventh floor of the building. The thieves somehow broke the main latch on the door and got in. Ms. Riya was alone in the house at that time, and apparently raised an alarm. So we can assume, that in a frenzy the thieves strangled her with a belt lying around the house, while they attempted to escape.”
“…”
He continued, “The screaming alarmed the neighbors and two of the three thieves were caught and detained. They are in our custody at the moment. The third one managed to escape.”
The burly guy offered me some water. As I gulped I could think of nothing else but my world shattering around me. I saw that the ambulance was nowhere to be seen.
As if sensing my uneasiness, he went on ”We were waiting for someone to identify the body. We talked to her parents and they’re already on their way along with, I guess, your parents. They informed us about you and I had to check your story before getting you to identify the body.”
I could sense beads of tears forming on my eyes. In a span of 12 hours, my whole life had turned around twice. I found a girl who was interested me, and now she was dead.
“Were you two very close?”
I didn’t know what to say, so I chose to ignore that question.
“When and how did this happen?”
The cop lifted up the sheets of paper in his hand again and began reading.
“The coroner’s report states that the time of death was between 11 and 11.30 last night. The cause of death is fracture-dislocation of cervical vertebrae owing to the victim being strangled by the perpetrator”
He then handed over those sheets to another policeman standing next to him. And then resumed…
“We also have CCTV footage that shows the perps entering the building’s lobby at around 10.56 in the night. We again have them leaving the victim’s house at 11.12 PM when the other neighbor’s caught up with them.”
I felt a huge lump forming in my throat as my eyes began swelling up all over again. This was when something struck me. I fumbled around for my phone that I was holding before fainting. The burly constable held it out for me.
I noticed that the portable charger had given it enough juice for me to be able to switch it on. And I did.
As the phone switched on, I saw several missed calls from my parents and a bunch of unknown numbers, which I assumed, were Riya’s parents. I then went to my Facebook messenger and saw my conversation with Riya, it was all still there.
I furiously scrolled all the way to the top. Right to her first message…
It read “Hey!” and the timestamp said “Saturday 11.11 PM”
@BlogPro Do you, by chance, participate in NaNoWriMo?
2014 was my first attempt. I failed miserably since I stopped at 5k words. Almost gave up on being a story-teller. Fortunately, I didn't.
2015 was my second attempt. But I could only get upto 24k words, since it coincided with a largish marketing campaign we had going for a client that took up all my time. Partly, also because I hit a major writer's block around the middle of the month. It wasn't until March this year that I finally managed to finish the book, had to introduce a couple of sub-plots to make sense of the main story frame. It sits at 110k words right now. Still unpublished, though.
2016 is going to be my third, best and most honest attempt yet. I am actually pumped to be participating this time. I have a free flow of ideas at the moment. And if I can keep this momentum till November, hitting 50k for the NaNoWriMo shouldn't be hard.
What about you? Have you participated?
Every year since 2010 I think. My account may be older than that.
I never finish either, although I always finish CampNaNo. I think last year was the first year I actually finished NaNo within November. I was so excited. And then I was just...not.
Didn't stop me from doing it again. Ste told me I should be happy that I even wrote a novel. A lot of people can't even write a sentence.
Which is true.
Anyway I usually do it with my sister. It'd be nice if we had enough participants on the forum. We could get a little support group going.
Is it just me or is the human race armed with religion, poisoned by prejudice, and absolutely frantic with hatred and fear, galloping pell-mell back to the Dark Ages? Who on Earth is hurt by a little girl going to school or a child being gay?
Revenge isn't a passion. It's a disease that eats at your mind and poisons your soul.
You know the problem with drawing lines in the sand? With a breath of air, they disappear.
“Every cause has more than one affect. Say what you will about Frederick, but someone was willing to burn the world down to protect the one person they care about. That’s a man I understand
You may not like me. You may not understand how or why I do what I do, but I’m here because you want answers to questions you haven’t even thought of yet.
We become who we are. You can’t judge a book by its cover, but you can by its first few chapters and most certainly by its last.
There is nothing that can take the pain away, but eventually you will find a way to live with it. There will be nightmares, and everyday when you wake up, it will be the first thing you think of, until one day, it will be the second thing.
"People say youth is wasted on the young. I disagree. I believe wisdom is wasted on the old. All you can do is part with it
Allies today, enemies tomorrow - the world is a complex place, further complicated by man’s fickle nature.
To stand at the helm of your destiny. I want that. One more time
They say two things will survive a nuclear holocaust. Cockroaches and Twinkies. You’re a little of both
Donald Ressler: We are not going to live through this
Reddington: I think we will
Donald Ressler: How?
Reddington: Have you ever sailed across an ocean, Donald…
Donald Ressler: No.
Reddington: …on a sailboat, surrounded by sea with no land in sight, without even the possibility of sighting land for days to come? To stand at the helm of your destiny. I want that, one more time. I want to be in the Piazza del Campo in Siena. To feel the surge as 10 racehorses go thundering by. I want another meal in Paris, at L’Ambroisie, at the Place des Vosges. I want another bottle of wine. And then another. I want the warmth of a woman and a cool set of sheets. One more night of jazz at the Vanguard. I want to stand on the summits and smoke Cubans and feel the sun on my face for as long as I can. Walk on the Wall again. Climb the Tower. Ride the River. Stare at the Frescos. I want to sit in the garden and read one more good book. Most of all I want to sleep. I want to sleep like I slept when I was a boy. Give me that, just one time. That’s why I won’t allow that punk out there to get the best of me, let alone the last of me.
Odysseus spent a decade at war. But his biggest battle was finding his way home.
Elizabeth Keen:[/b] I don't know what happened. I used to consider myself lucky. I had a husband I loved, a job I always wanted. I was the kind of person good things happen to.
Reddington: Have you ever heard of Mugs Kalinowski? Lovely guy. Ugliest man I ever laid eyes on. That's why everyone called him Mugs. Except his dear mother. She was an art professor at Bard. Lovingly referred to him as Picasso.
Elizabeth Keen: That's kind of sweet, actually.
Reddington: Well, it was an apt nickname. His face was all over the place. But perhaps as a result of that nickname, Mugs grew up with a great appreciation for art. He fenced some of the most extravagant pieces in the world. He only had one rule. Out of respect for dear mom, he'd never lift a Picasso. Felt it was bad luck. Then one day, he got a tip from a source about a piece sitting in a huge loft in Soho. So one evening, Mugs shimmied up the drain pipe, broke in, and lo and behold, there hung on the wall, Les Femmes D'Alger. A spectacular Picasso. One of a series of 15 and astronomically valuable.
Elizabeth Keen: Did he take it?
Reddington: No. And Mugs was convinced that was the single biggest stroke of bad luck he'd ever suffered. Well, what he didn't know was the source who'd given him the tip was working with the feds. The painting had a tracking device on it. Sometimes, bad luck is the best luck you'll ever have.
I'm a sin eater. I absorb the misdeeds of others, darkening my soul to keep theirs pure. That is what I'm capable of
That was a first draft. I typically hate reading shit I wrote. That one wasn't bad. I think I'm going to expand on it, toss in some experiences from my actual school days, and maybe try to self-publish. Here goes nothing.
That's actually how one of my friends died about 15 years ago. Except he was on a motorcycle doing almost 100 and he hit a pole.
Edit: Also had an ex commit suicide like this. He was driving 100+ in some rain and ran right into a tree.
I always kind of wondered what it's like being in a crash like that. Guess that's kind of morbid too.
Hi Sherbert,
I've sent you a PM detailing the reasons why I should manage the Instagram account. It's not too long, and I was hoping you could consider me for the role.
Damn, that sucks
A kid I went to high school with was taking his she-friend to senior prom and took a back road. That road was popular in the backwoods where I grew up because if you hit the curve just right at a good speed you would go airborne. I never did it, but knew a lot of people who did and said it was quite the rush.
This all happened nine years ago, damn I'm aging fast. I took this super hot junior girl to the same prom. Literally the hottest girl in school by far. I thought so. So many others thought so. This girls is now my wife, but that's besides the pointThis kid I mentioned in the previous paragraph took the girl the long way to prom via the back road. From what I hear, he mis-steered at the jump and slammed sideways into a large tree at the curve. Hit hard on the passenger side.
He was banged up but managed to crawl from the crash and drag the girl out. This was January 2008, so it was pretty cold. She died in his arms on the side of the road before the ambulances could show up.
My wife was pretty torn up. We had been dating for about two months, and she had broken up with her previous boyfriend six months before that to be with this same guy, but he wasn't as into it as she was. She would have been the passenger in that car that day had he been interested.
It was a pretty big scandal for a while. He had to go to a very public trial for vehicular manslaughter and had to do hundreds of hours of community service and lost his license for a long-ass time. We were buds in middle school before high school caused us to drift apart, so every now and then when I would see him picking up trash on the side of the road I would pick him up and bring him home.
The girl who died still has a Facebook account. I just checked it out for the first time in a good seven years. People still post typical can't-believe-it's-been-so-long posts, less and less every year. The guy just got married a few months back. I hope he can someday get over it all. My wife hasn't talked about him since high school graduation.
That was a first draft. I typically hate reading shit I wrote. That one wasn't bad. I think I'm going to expand on it, toss in some experiences from my actual school days, and maybe try to self-publish. Here goes nothing.
That YOLO thing is just stupid IMO. You only live once, so shouldn't you try to live as long as you can? I understand enjoying life, and even doing something thrilling, but there's a difference between that and a complete disregard for your own life. Like that guy who shot himself in the face. That's just nuts.
I'll post my next piece of fiction either tonight or tomorrow.
Exactly. I've never understood the whole concept. And I know several teenagers who don't either. They're perfectly happy living like normal people. Going on an adventurous trip once in a while is fine. But some people...
I knew a guy who decided to finish 2 bottles of whisky as a challenge while at a party at one of my neighbor's house. He barely finished the second and we had to rush him to the emergency room to get the idiot's stomach pumped. I wasn't even invited to the party, but they came rushing for me since no one at the party was in the condition to drive. Who the fuck does that?
Apparently they do.
Hope none of those people bred. We don't need more of them in the gene pool.