There is a legend that few people know about. If you stand in front of the mirror, in the dark, with a single candle lit, and issue the call, “Here piggy, piggy, piggy.” The big man will appear. When the pig man appears, you must remain absolutely still, or the pig man will devour you in minutes.
This was the story told to me by my older brother who claimed he’d done this and survived. I was ten years old at the time. I can’t say that I believed him, and yet, I can’t say, fully, that I didn’t. It was a really hard story to believe but then, there were stranger stories that turned out to be the absolute truth.
At first, I thought my brother was just joking with me as he did from time to time when he wasn’t being a total jerk. You know how big brothers can be. Still, when he told the story, in greater detail than what I’ve given you, I was hooked and wanted to hear more. It wasn’t really any different than the old bloody mary legend. I guess you can say it was an update.
It was the summer of 2008. My brother Jack and I were lying in our beds one night, talking about urban legends and whatnot. The conversation had gone on for hours. In the middle of summer, with no school in the morning, there was really nothing to do. TV was boring, and there was no good music on the radio. So we lay there, each in our beds, staring at the ceiling, talking about urban legends. I was having the time of my life that night because it was one of the few nights when my brother was a human being instead of the usual dickhead.
That’s when he told me about the pigman. It wasn’t so much the story itself, when he told it to me, but the way he told it. Everything he said about it was so genuine, I couldn’t tell if it was true or not.
“Do you know what the scariest thing ever to do is?” Jack asked.
“What is it?” I returned.
“The pigman.” answered Jack.
“The pigman. Really?” I asked sarcastically.
“Yeah, dude, it’s really like a demon, but he looks like half man, half pig.” he explained.
“So what you’re supposed to do is stand in front of a mirror, and the lights need to be off and the room needs to be as dark as possible.” he said. “You have to stand in front of the mirror, and say, ‘here piggy, piggy, piggy’. Like three times. Then after the third time, the pig man will appear. You might see him, or just hear him, but you have to remain absolutely still or he’ll attack and eat you.”
I listened attentively as he went on about how the game is played. The whole time I was getting a little nervous and excited. I was intrigued. I wanted to play so badly. I wanted to see if it was true.
“So when can I do it?” I asked.
“Do what?” he asked.
I was surprised at the question, “What do you mean, do what? You know, play the game!”
“No, you’re not playing anything but your Nintendo game,” he responded.
“Awe, that’s not fair. You get me all excited about it, then you say we can’t play!” I screamed.
“Shh! Keep it down, you little shit. You’re gonna wake Mom and Dad.” Jack yelled back at me.
“I want to play,” I pressed.
“The only reason I told you that story is because neither of us can sleep and I figured it would be a good way to pass the time until we got sleepy.” he explained.
He sighed and then turned over putting his back toward me. I then turned over and began staring out the window, still thinking about the story he just filled my head with. Then in the last moment before he fell asleep I said, “You know, now that you told me that story, how do you expect me to sleep now?”
“Just try to go to sleep. It’s getting late,” he answered frustrated.
“There’s no school tomorrow. It’s summer. Remember?” I responded snidely.
“Just go to sleep, idiot,” was his response.
After that, Jack didn’t respond to anything else I tried to say. The next thing I heard from him was, “Zzzzzz!”
I waited about thirty minutes to pass, listening to his snoring and still thinking about the pigman. When I was sure he was good and asleep, to the point where my moving around wouldn’t wake him up.
I rolled, slowly, from my bed, being sure to take my flashlight with me. The one I keep under my pillow in case real monsters come at night. They don’t like flashlights because the light hurts their skin. I figured it would come in handy because I could use it against the pigman if and when he comes.
So, armed with my trusty flashlight, I walked over to the mirror that stood erect from the dresser, on the other side of the room. The room was so dark, it was very hard to even see myself in the mirror. I stood in front of it, either way, breathing heavily and nervously. Then I realized I didn’t have a candle.
I set my flashlight down on the dresser and felt my way over to the door. Why I didn’t use my light to see, I have no idea. I was just a kid, though. I felt the cold door knob as I finally made my way closer to the door. I slowly gave it a turn, trying to be as quiet and subtle as possible so I didn’t wake anyone. The door drifted open a crack and creaked the loudest creaking sound ever. Funny how it never did that before. Either that or I never noticed it before.
As the door became open enough for me to slide through without getting my clothes caught on the catch or knob or anything, I proceeded down the hall, down the stairs, and on to the kitchen.
“There should be some candles in the utility drawer,” I thought to myself.
If you’re wondering what the utility drawer is, that’s the drawer everyone has in their house, usually in the kitchen. It has all the useful odds and ends that seemingly don’t have a place anywhere else, or are just put there for the convenience of locating when needed. I know that was a mouthful but I felt it needed an explanation.
When I got there I rooted around for about five minutes and could not find one candle. I decided to spend another 2 minutes still looking in case I missed it. Then finally, “Eureka!” I found three little birthday candles that were left over from my last birthday cake.
“I guess these will have to do.” I thought to myself. I also found a lighter. “Handy!” I thought.
Now Jack said I only needed one candle, but I grabbed all three, just because, and I stuffed the lighter into my pocket. Then I headed back to the bedroom, ready to meet the pig man. I was going to settle this once and for all, whether or not this thing really existed. Best of all was going to be able to throw the whole thing back in Jack’s face that he’s a liar.
I reached the top of the stairs, and the last leg of my journey involved me making it to the room, and getting things started. Something inside me said, “Don’t do it.”
At that moment, I was frozen and couldn’t move any further. I was starting to doubt myself. Thinking, “maybe this is something I shouldn’t be doing.” I stood there at the top of the stairs, staring at the bedroom door down the hall, terrified. “Maybe I should wait until Jack can do it with me,” I thought.
“Nah, I’m doing it!” I decided. I knew that if I didn’t do this then, and wait for Jack, it would never happen. So I got myself together, took a deep breath, and I marched down the hallway straight to my bedroom.
Inside the room, shrouded in darkness, I slowly crept over toward the dresser, remembering that was where I left my flashlight. I laid the candles on the top of the dresser next to the flashlight. I took the lighter from my pocket and set it beside the candles.
I was nervous and excited. I was going to find out the truth about the pigman. I rubbed my sweaty palms against my pant legs to dry them. Then I took up a single candle and the lighter. I flicked at the lighter which had very little fuel and was hard to light. I flicked it repeatedly until my thumb was sore. Finally, in my last attempt before giving up, there appeared a flame. It was small and blue. I knew I needed to hurry and light the candle before the damn thing ran out of gas. I held the candle to the lighter’s flame, and soon the tiny blue flame became a larger orange flame. The candle was lit and I was ready to play the game.
With both my hands cupped around the candle, I looked up at the mirror. The light of the candle scarcely illuminated my face. I took a deep breath. Then I began.
“Here piggy piggy piggy,” I sounded in a whisper.
“Here piggy piggy piggy,” I muttered again.
“Here piggy piggy piggy,” I uttered a third and final time.
I waited for what seemed like an eternity, but there was nothing but the sound of Jack snoring in his bed. At first, I thought maybe I had done something wrong. I replayed the story in my head and went over every detail that Jack explained to me. I didn’t recall anything that I could have missed. Then there was the sound of something moving around in the room. My heart nearly jumped out of my chest. The noise seemed to move from one part of the room to another. I couldn’t see anything.
Terrified, I started to call out to see if I got a response. “Hey….” I sputtered, but then, realized the rules of the game. I couldn’t make a sound. In that moment of realization, there was suddenly a hot, foul breath in my face. There was a sound of heavy breathing. I thought I was gonna crap my pants. The breathing got heavier and mixed with the breathing sound was a low crescendo growl, rising from under the initial sound and becoming more pronounced. I was paralyzed with fear at this point. My fingers fumbled to find the switch on my flashlight. I thought,”if I could just get this thing to turn on, I’ll get him to go away.”
The growling sound became more intense. I and my fear rose as well. I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes. I knew I was going to die. I wanted to call out to Jack, but then the pig man would devour me for sure. I wanted to call out to my parents but the same fate was hanging over my head. Still fumbling with the switch on my flashlight, I thought, “Fuck! What the hell is going on with this?”
Then finally my finger was directly on the button. I gave it a quick hard squeeze. Then there came the light. The pig man began to give a loud but fading squeal. One that indicated that he was running away. “He was afraid of the light,” I thought. I didn’t see him run away because after being in the dark for so long, the appearance of the light blinded me as well.
When the effects of the light wore off, it was like I was waking from a dream. I opened my eyes to see my brother Jack, and my Mom and Dad standing over me with concerned looks on their faces.
“Are you okay?” Jack asked.
“Yeah, I’m fine, why?” I answered. Then snapping to and becoming more coherent, I exclaimed, “I did it!”
“Did what?” asked my mom.
“I beat him. The pigman.” I responded.
Between the three of them, there was a long pause and they each looked confused.
One by one I looked them each in the face asking, “What? What’s going on?” Jack responded by saying, “I don’t know, but you woke us all up. You were screaming your head off, here on the floor. Did you have a nightmare?”
“No!” I answered. “I was not having a nightmare. I was awake, ” I continued.
Jack stood up and then stood over me, folding his arms. He looked at both our parents and then back at me. He sarcastically spoke back, saying, “Yeah, sure, you were awake on the floor with your eyes closed.”
“Honey, I think you were just dreaming,” Mom said. She bent down and put her hand on my shoulder and tried explaining to me that it was a dream. “There is no such thing as the pigman.” she proclaimed. “Where did you hear of such a thing?”
“Jack told me about it.” I answered, shamefully and angrily. I felt like an idiot to believe a thing like that. I was mad at Jack, too, for telling it to me.
My Mom gave Jack a look of disgust while he stood there trying to look innocent.
“You put this idea in his head, you fix it!” she scolded.
“What? I was just trying to entertain him.” Jack defended.
“He’s your younger brother.” she replied, “of course he’s going to believe you. Either way, you deal with calming him down and making sure he doesn’t have any more nightmares!” Mom barked, rubbing her eyes tiredly. “I’m going back to bed.” Then she left the room and closed the door heavily.
“You little shit, you got me in trouble.” Jack yelled.
“What, I told you I wanted to play.” I responded.
Jack clenched his teeth together and started bellowing at me through them, “You weren’t supposed to tell mom about it. Just go to sleep.”