#mindfuck

When I was young, we were left unattended. My friends and I rode our bikes deep into the fields and returned at our leisure. We rarely played in the same location and often ditched it after a few days. With each new adventure, we drifted further from civilization, and one day, we struck gold, figuratively speaking of course.

July 4th, 2028, the police are at their busiest on a hot Los Angeles summer evening. The station is fully staffed with officers going in and out on calls. All while Gordon sits at the front desk with his eyes going back and forth between his monitor and the front door. He was pretty pissed he had to work a double shift into the morning. Let alone miss the fireworks with his kids.

Everyone has that feeling some time in their life. Some able to explain the phenomenon, and others simply cannot. That unknown feeling of someone, or something, watching you. That experience where either dread or curiosity can get the best of you.

It was just like any other day when I received the call. I had been sketching the horizon for the past hour when my phone began ringing with with an unfamiliar number. I would have ignored it if the call hadn't been from my home town. Fast forward 24 hours later, and I'm sitting in a stark conference room and waiting for a team of doctors to arrive. I would have never imagined myself in this position. Who could? My mind was racing, and I wished that the doctor had given me a clearer explanation…

“She opened her arms. I should have kept mine closed.” It was a sunny day in a new neighborhood, the third one I had moved into that year. I walked slowly, observing the streets. The houses all looked alike, fences lined with rusted gates, stray dogs wandering aimlessly, and children playing and shouting somewhere far off.

I never believed in ghosts because just the very idea of it sounded so stupid and unrealistic. My two friends billy and warren believed in ghosts and they would always force me to go with them into dark, old and large buildings. I also find souls and spirits to be an absurd idea and who ever even invented them clearly was trying to control people. I also find Halloween extremely absurd and stupid but there is the odd occasion I get scared by a horror film or even an urban legend.

Three weeks ago, my husband and I had our first baby. I have been dealing with terrible postpartum depression ever since. The weight of being a parent is unmanageable. And in the numb state of purgatory, I haven't been sleeping. I have started connecting the dots about my young adulthood. And my family. My therapist says this is a phenomenal breakthrough, as I haven't been able to remember much of the last year with my family. So, even though I’m going to sound crazy, I've decided to recount it…

My dad Don may as well have been dead this past year. Hell, you could make the argument he may as well have been dead for nearly the past fifty… ever since his brother Tommy passed away from cancer in 1973.

I live in a small village and nothing rarely exciting ever happens, and its one of those villages where generations pass on traditions to the next generation. I like the area but most of my friends have decided to move towards the big bustling cities where there is noise and excitement. I was just going for a walk on a Sunday morning when I saw a gathering around the park and I knew straight away something had happened. We don’t get much trouble around here and when something does go off it…

He had no idea how he had ended up in these foul depths, but all he knew was that he needed to find a way out before it was too late. The young Dragonnoid had sworn to himself he would never go into the city, so why was he wandering lost in its forsaken bowels?

I needed the job. Without a bachelor's degree, my previous nursing work hadn't paid much, certainly not enough for me and my four-year-old son Julian to get by. So yeah, life as a single Black mother wasn't easy. Especially considering I was only twenty-three.

Feedback "This, too, shall pass." — Persian Proverb . . I woke up lying on the cold floor, my cheek pressed against splinters. No wind. No storm. No voices. Just quiet. Dry, suffocating quiet. Dust drifted in the shafts of pale light like falling ash. My mouth tasted like old rust. I stood slowly, my footfalls creaked loud in the emptiness, and wandered into the bedroom. There, resting on the bed, was my notebook.

In 2007 I had taken a trip to Walt Disney World with my six year old son. It was our first family vacation since my husband had passed way, and so I wanted to make sure this vacation was as memorable and fun as possible for my son. My son's favorite movie at the time was 'Pirates of the Caribbean' and as a result we spent many hours in Fantasy Land. Time after time my son insisted on returning to the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, each time he seemed more eager than the last.

Liber Kiffmet — An Occult Dream Of Sorts Gone Bad With Dope & Weed © Andre Michael Pietroschek (if you must, pronounce Pee-tro-shack), all rights reserved Disclaimer: No warranties! This story idea is fictitious, not real, and was inspired by some episodes of the Frozen Frights podcast. Meanwhile, me going nostalgia-lane on the young adult memories is part of this story's surrealism.

I have 847 hours of field recording across three years of this work. I can tell you the exact timestamp — 2:14:37 AM — when a door opened by itself in a farmhouse outside Carbondale. Baseline decibel reading before it moved, the spike, the return to baseline in 0.4 seconds. Filed, labeled, cross-referenced with humidity readings and structural reports. Probable explanation still listed as HVAC pressure differential, confirm with building superintendent. The superintendent retired in 2019.

No one remembers her name. Her real name anyway. She was a girl once- a regular girl, a good girl- who worked as a harlequin for her family's tiny traveling show. She had a white painted face, with a happy painted red smile. Jolly jinglin' shoes, and bright purple-dyed pigtails that bobbed comically as she capered about on the stage of some, now long-fallen kingdom. She made nobles and peasants alike laugh.

The past is not dead. It is not even past." — William Faulkner • I don't remember who called me about the funeral. I assume it was Aunt Lillian's neighbor, or maybe someone from the church, but the truth is, I picked up the phone, I heard my name, and everything after that is a smear of static and vowels. Now I'm standing on the porch of my great-aunt's house, our family's house surrounded by pines, decay, and a smell I can't name but instinctively hate. The front door is already open.

Last Tuesday, I noticed a new app on my phone called "Follow the Leader." No icon, just a white circle on a black background. Being bored and fourteen, I opened it. It was just a GPS map of my neighborhood with two dots: a blue one for me and a red one about three streets over. A text popped up at the bottom: “The Leader is moving. Keep up.”

I am a single mother of three boys who was recently divorced. James, my eldest son, is twelve years old and has just begun secondary school. He is very smart; loves science and wishes to work as a biologist after he graduates from varsity. Without a doubt, I see him pursuing a career in that area. George, my 10-year-old second oldest son, is a creative little prodigy who enjoys painting and modeling clay sculptures. Lastly, Kevin, my 4-year-old son. Kevin is such a sweetheart! Even though he…

Ever since I dropped out of university the only jobs I ever had was in the security sector and I will be honest I didn’t get my SIA security licence through legal means but knew someone who could get me an SIA licence for a price. I had contacts with all sorts of people within the security sector which is how I got jobs in the first place and in this profession its all about who you know rather than what you know. I bet you don’t feel safe now knowing what the security industry is really like…