Goodnight - a creepypasta excerpt reimagined
[ Author here, dunno if this is allowed, but I thought why not share something to break my writer's block after being inspired to start writing horror stories again. I apologise to the mods if it is not allowed, but otherwise, enjoy :) ]
I woke up to a scream from across the house. A shrill, high pitched squeal no father should have to hear. My body moved faster than my mind, ripping the covers off and leaping to my feet. The dull thuds of barefoot steps to carpet timed with my thundering heartbeat, and I howled my son's name at the top of my lungs. My voice just barely piercing the pleas and cries growing ever closer with each running step.
I turned a sharp corner down the hallway, almost tripping over myself as I beelined for my son's bedroom door. I tried the handle. It wouldn't budge. I tried over and over, almost tearing the damn thing off as I threw my entire body into the door. Then, all at once, the screaming and crying stopped. I didn't realise it until I paused to breathe, but there it was.
Pure, uninterrupted silence.
With my mind racing as to what had happened on the other side, I sucked in a deep breath of air, and charged at the door with all might. Finally, the door gave way, snapping off its hinges and gravity carrying me to the floor. When my head shot up, the warmth of the world was ripped from me all at once.
There, before me, was the open window letting in a faint breeze that caused the translucent curtains to flow back and forth in the moonlight. My son- or at what was left of him- laid in his bed twitching like a decapitated snake. His face was torn apart. His cheeks were hollowed out and an eye had been popped out and left dangling by its optic nerve. His throat was cut so deeply I could see the bone peaking out from beneath the slabs of red meat still gushing thick crimson liquid.
But it was his torso and chest that were the worst for me.
Entrails haphazardly tossed about like bloody party streamers, lungs now shrivelled bags covered with cuts, and I could still see the handle of a knife sticking out of his sternum. His arms, wrists and hands were littered with stab wounds. I realised then his last moments were spent fruitlessly fighting for his short, short life.
With tears streaming down my face, I approached my boy's little body and tried not to vomit at the smell of his bowels and bladder finally giving away. Truely, I didn't know what to do other than sob into my hands and fall to my knees.
"I'm sorry," I whimpered helplessly. "I-"
A loud creak from behind me snapped be back to reality. It was only now I had become aware of a sensation crawling up my spine. Like something was watching me.
As my eyes looked towards the edge of my son's bed, I noticed a long twisting line of red slink across the carpet of his bedroom and towards the slightly cracked opening of his closet. My breath hitched as I slowly found my feet, not breaking eye contact with the closet door. I backed away slowly while I absentmindedly trying to find something to defend myself.
Then I heard it.
A long wheeze of a sigh that carried a hint of satisfaction coming from the closet. I briefly looked over to the knife still stuck within my son's chest, and my entire being froze when I saw the source of this chaos when my gaze returned to the closet.
It looked like a man. I think? I first saw dark eyes peak from the shadows of the closet. The deep set bags beneath them and moonlight gave a disturbing sheen to the shark-like stare. The pale, uneven and seemingly burnt complexion of skin was flecked with fresh blood. Then there was the mouth, if you could call it that. The cheeks had been messily slit open to mimic a contorted smile which almost stretched ear to ear. The gnashing teeth between what remained of its lips parted, and a sharp, raspy voice spoke.
"He's asleep now... Don't wake him."
A slender, bloody finger crept from the darkness and pressed beneath its nose and drew a line of red down to its chin.
"You mother-" my teary shout barely left my throat when the thing in his closet came at me.
It lunged at me so fast I barely had time to react. It pinned me and straddled my chest while trying to use its bare hands to tear me apart like an animal. Fingernails lashed at my skin as I tried to defend myself, but eventually it pinned my arms above my head and used its teeth to devour parts of my face. I couldn't tell if it was enjoying my cries for help, or if it was just annoyed by the sound. But either way, my last words were pleas for mercy before I felt a shoulder dislocate, wrists snap, and a free bloody hand grabbed my jaw. My mouth was forced open and tongue pinched. A wheezed laughter that now rests within my very psyche filled the air, and those gnarled teeth bit out my tongue. The greedy chatter of that my tongue being eaten was the last thing I recall before I feel unconscious.
Now, I write this from a hospital bed, 5 months after the night I lost my sweet baby boy. Most of my face is still wrapped and I am eating out of a tube in my throat. And every time I close my eyes, all I see is that thing's face covered with mine and my son's blood, and its smile...