Haunted MTL Original – Demon Tree – Chris Saunders
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Published
5 years agoon
By
Shane M.“Demon Tree” by Chris Saunders
It had been years since Taylor had done this walk, and boy was he starting to feel it. He must have covered five or six miles so far, following the narrow, winding path leading from Wood Forge up into the sprawling, picturesque hills flanking the tiny village. Right now, the path was skirting an impenetrable-looking forest thick with lush vegetation.
What a way to blow the cobwebs off and get some exercise. Apart from a solitary dog walker an hour earlier, he hadn’t seen another soul all day. The path wasn’t exactly made for cars or bicycles, and was so over grown in places it was difficult to even walk on. Even so, it felt good to be out in the sunshine, doing something active. He spent far too much time cooped up in the office. It wasn’t healthy.
He just wished he’d brought something to drink. A cold beer would be spectacular right now. Though if he’d carried it with him all this way it would no longer be cold, obviously. Unless he’d carried a refrigerator too.
Then he remembered something. Wasn’t there a pub somewhere around here? Perched high on the mountain, just over the brow? One of those old, traditional country places with whitewashed walls, picnic tables outside and a horseshoe above the door. It was called the Halfway House. Logic suggested because it got its name because it was situated half way between two villages, but a more romantic idea would be that because it was so high up, it was half way to heaven. That in itself was ironic, because when he was a kid he and his friends used to try to frighten each other with tales of devil worshippers who, it was rumoured, used to come up to these mountains to perform their satanic rituals away from prying eyes.
The sun blazed down on to the bare skin of his forearms, and he felt his calves tighten more with each step. He’d worn loose-fitting knee-length shorts and an old pair of trainers for comfort, but had neglected to put on any socks. Now he regretted it. His blisters had burst long ago to expose the raw, reddened skin beneath, and his feet were now wet with a mixture of pus, sweat and blood, which only made his trainers rub more.
He could just turn back and go back home, of course. But he was too stubborn for that. He’d come this far, and persuaded himself that a cold beer or two was the goal. He’d push on for another mile or so and reassess things then. He wasn’t too proud to find the nearest main road and call himself an Uber.
There was a rickety wooden sign ahead, standing on the side of the trail. When Taylor drew near, he saw that it was pointing at a right angle marking a public footpath leading off the main trail and disappearing into the thick forest. Except it wasn’t much of a footpath. It was so neglected that it was barely even visible beyond the first few feet. The forest looked wild and intimidating, in complete contrast to the wide open spaces the mountain afforded. It would be easy to get lost in there, but he assumed the footpath would be marked.
He stopped to catch his breath. It was decision time.
Should he stay on the main path? Or take his chances on the shortcut?
Shortcut to where? That was the all-important question.
It had to lead somewhere. Every path did. And he’d been treading this one for hours without so much as a glimpse of a country pub. Or even a shop. How much worse could this new option be?
If things got out of hand he could always retrace his steps.
That settled it. With half his brain still arguing the toss, Taylor found himself venturing off the main path into the forest. Within moments, the atmosphere changed. He felt cocooned, and was incredibly glad to get out of the sun. This path was steeper, and a lot harder on the legs, but he was still under the impression that he was making good ground.
Deeper and deeper into the forest he went, sometimes using the trunks of conveniently-placed trees or overhanging branches to help haul himself along, the wood blessedly cool to the touch. Occasionally, a small animal would rustle in the undergrowth causing him to stop in his tracks, but he never saw so much of a glimpse.
In his mind’s eye he saw himself bursting out of the forest and back into the sunshine, right in front of the Halfway House. Its doors would be wide open, and the inviting smell of brewed hops and barley would carry over on the breeze. There would be newspapers inside, and ham rolls, and the TV would be set to one of the sports channels. Bliss.
The reality, however, was very different. The forest was becoming more and more dense, the light finding it increasingly hard to penetrate the canopy. All around him, shadows slithered and squirmed. Taylor stopped for a moment to get his bearings, breathing hard. He looked down at his feet for the path.
It was gone.
How the fuck did that happen?
He glanced behind him, hoping to see some remnant.
There was nothing.
What should he do?
He swallowed hard as a knot of panic began to squirm in his chest. Then he forced out a chuckle which, in the oppressive surroundings, sounded more like a death rattle. The noise seemed to hang in the air far longer than it should have, causing Taylor to look around anxiously.
Something was terribly amiss.
Then he noticed the smell. Sickly and thick, it seemed to swirl around him. Something nearby was dead and rotting. Probably one of those small furry animals that populated the undergrowth; a field mouse or a vole, maybe.
No, judging by the stench, it was something bigger than that. A rabbit or a squirrel? Maybe even a fox or a sheep?
Taylor’s mind flashed back to the time when a group of kids at his primary school had stumbled across the body of a homeless man who’d sought shelter in the grounds over the summer holidays and ended up dying there. By the time the body was discovered it was a putrefying mess, and probably smelled a lot like this.
He knew he should just carry on walking. Nothing good could come from standing around in the middle of a dark forest looking for an animal carcass. There would be germs and bacteria and all sorts kicking around.
What if it wasn’t an animal carcass?
What if it was the body of another homeless person?
One thing Taylor could do without was stumbling across a fucking corpse on his afternoon walk.
But he didn’t know which way to go. Which way was out. The forest wasn’t exactly huge. Assuming he went in a straight line, if he walked in any direction long enough he was certain to emerge in an hour or two. He just didn’t want to spend the rest of the afternoon trudging through dense vegetation.
But that stink!
That was when he saw it. Right in front of him. How he hadn’t spotted it earlier was a mystery. It just kind of blended in with the leaves and foliage.
It was an animal carcass, impaled on a sharp branch just below eye level. It looked like a squirrel, and it had obviously been there a while. A few days, maybe. Its blood-stained fur was balding in patches, and the skin had been peeled back to expose desiccated flesh and a tiny white rib cage. Tiny flies swarmed around it in clouds.
As Taylor leaned closer, top lip curling in disgust, he noticed movement. Beneath the flap of skin, a handful of tiny, pale maggots squirmed merrily.
“That’s fucking disgusting,” he said aloud, putting a hand over his mouth and backing away.
Then he stopped, and a deep frown creased his face. Something troubled him. Something above and beyond finding a dead animal crawling with maggots impaled on a tree branch.
How did it get there?
It surely didn’t put itself in that position, and no other animal could have done it, predator or otherwise. It was unnatural. That meant, only another person could have carried out the deed. Which, in turn, begged the question, ‘Why?’
Kids messing around, maybe. Though they would have to be a pretty sick bunch to think killing small, defenceless animals and impaling them on trees was a fun thing to do.
As Taylor tossed things around in his head, something else caught his eye. Markings on the tree trunk, just underneath the sharpened branch. A series of intricate shapes and symbols carved into the bark. They made no sense to Taylor, but were immaculately done. Someone had obviously spent a lot of time and effort here.
Could there be some correlation between the carvings and the dead animal?
Who was he trying to fool? Of course there was. It was far too much of a coincidence otherwise. Then, another piece of the jigsaw slipped into place.
The devil worshippers.
Maybe it wasn’t just a rumour.
Taylor’s heart was now thudding in his chest so strongly he could hear it, and beads of sweat were running freely down his face.
What the fuck had he stumbled across?
It was almost a surprise when he realized he didn’t care. It wasn’t his business, nor his problem.
With a dismissive snort, he made to walk off. As he moved he happened to glance above him, and what he saw rooted him to the spot.
It was a pair of eyes.
Partially obscured, they blazed red, glaring down at him from above.
It had to be some kind of optical illusion. A of trick of the light.
Didn’t it?
A chilly, light breeze rustled the leaves around him bringing goose bumps out on the exposed skin of his arms and legs and an unnatural hush fell over the forest. The atmosphere felt somehow oppressive, almost as if he were trapped underground.
There was a man, or some kind of creature up a tree looking at him.
Could it be possible?
It had to be possible, it was happening.
It was happening right now.
Taylor shifted his position slightly, trying to create more of an angle that would enable him to see exactly what he was faced with. The man thing didn’t move, but no matter what he did, Taylor couldn’t seem to connect the dots. Whatever he was looking at remained hidden.
His senses heightened, he became aware of a foreign sound. A sound so low that had he been walking, it would easily have been obscured by his footfalls. It was the sound of air being drawn in, and then slowly expelled.
Breathing.
It was fucking breathing.
This revelation was enough for Taylor and, eyes still glued to the glowing red orbs, he started backing away. He no longer cared which direction he should go in; he just wanted to be somewhere else. Anywhere else.
For a fraction of a second, the pair of eyes disappeared. There was the whoosh of displaced air, and suddenly the creature was standing before him.
The unnatural eyes weren’t the worst of it.
The thing towered over him, standing at least seven feet tall. It looked like a giant moth/human hybrid, complete with a huge set of demonic, leathery wings folded behind it. It was covered head to foot in grey or black fur, which had thinned in places to reveal skin so dry it looked more like scales.
It was certainly more monster than it was man. Despite the pointed horns on each side of its head, it’s wickedly elongated face was its most human feature. The oversized red eyes still blazed, above a long, conical nose and a black-lipped mouth from which an enormous set of sharpened fangs glistening with saliva protruded.
Confronted with such a horror, Taylor’s legs gave out and he slumped to his knees as if praying to some kind of monstrous deity. He was now directly in line with the thing’s sinewy bare legs, the ripped and torn parchment-like skin studded with those coarse black hairs. Something almost disembodied flicked the air, as if tasting it. Then, the appendage lingered, snake-like.
It was a tail. A fucking tail.
Most terrifyingly of all, Taylor realized that the joint of the creature’s knee was all wrong. It was bending the wrong way, and was reminiscent of a goat standing on its hind legs right down to the hooves where its feet should be.
Hooves.
No. It wasn’t possible.
As he scrambled away on his hind quarters, Taylor thought of the strange markings etched into the tree, the dead animal that, come to think of it, looked like it had been sacrificed, the myriad stories of devil worshippers at work on these mountains, and how all these things fit together.
They’d conjured something up. Some kind of entity. Something demonic and inhuman, yet irrefutably alive.
And here.
In one smooth motion, Taylor leapt to his feet, turned away from the looming creature, and charged through the masses of undergrowth and vegetation. He tried to take the path of least resistance, but moving at speed made it impossible. It was all he could do to avoid running headlong into a tree and knocking himself unconscious.
Roots and vines seemed to grip his feet as if trying to trip him up, and within moments both of his legs were lacerated and bleeding, cut to ribbons by the thorn bushes he trampled through.
But he couldn’t stop. The creature was right behind him. Close. He could hear the noise it made as it crashed through the forest in pursuit. Taylor had no idea what it would do if it caught up with him, but those fangs provided a clue. He had to get away. Far away.
A white-hot flash stung his cheek as he felt the wrath of a stray branch. Taylor screamed aloud in an explosion of pain, fury and frustration. He wanted to look behind him to see how far behind the creature was, but fear prevented him. He imagined turning to see it reaching out a long, clawed hand and gripping his neck. That would be the end.
He was convinced he could hear its ragged breath as it drew ever nearer, eating up the ground between them on its muscular goat’s legs.
Finding his way blocked by a sprawling oak too wide to easily get around, Taylor stopped abruptly then set off again in another direction, praying the manoeuvre wouldn’t prove too costly.
On and on he went, the forest around him blurring into a collage of greens and browns. More than once he tripped and stumbled, just managing to right himself before crashing to the ground.
His breathing was coming in harsh gasps, every exhalation accompanied by a mournful whimper. He was how hopelessly lost, and had reduced his objective to simply surviving, a task made even more difficult in the face of a torrent of vile, defeatist thoughts which pervaded his mind.
If he died here, how long would it be before his body was discovered?
And by the time the demon-thing and the litany of wildlife finished with him, would there be enough left to bury?
A seemingly solid wall of green stood in front of him. There was no circumnavigating it. Something told Taylor he needed to smash right through it to have any chance of getting away unscathed. He put his head down, raised one arm to shield his face, and took a running leap. He was airborne.
There was resistance. Branches and thorns grasped at him like despairing hands and he was sure he felt the creature claw his trailing leg. From just behind him came a chilling, inhuman howl. Something like the cry of a wolf, but throaty and monotone. It was a sound borne of pure frustration.
Then Taylor hit the ground with a thud, and rolled onto his side. He looked skywards and, rather than a canopy of leaves, was surprised to see clouds moving lazily across a blue sky.
He had escaped.
Instinctively, he looked back at the forest, half expecting the creature to follow him out. If it came for him now, it would be over fast. He was too cut up and exhausted to run any more.
But something told him it wouldn’t come. Not now. This wasn’t its domain. It belonged in the permanent twilight world of the forest, not out here in the open air.
Looking around, Taylor realised that he was but a few yards away from a road. Not a mere path, an actual road. Not a hundred yards away he could make out the whitewashed walls of a building set against the mountainous backdrop and instinctively knew it was the Halfway House. Stumbling across it this way was almost serendipitous.
As he rose gingerly to his feet, he brushed himself off and inspected his wounds. His arms and lower legs were covered in scratches and bruises, and his face still stung from its collision with the low-hanging branch, but the injuries would heal. What would perhaps take longer to recover was his mind. He knew it would never allow him to forget the sight of the creature. It would probably haunt his subconscious for the rest of his life.
He knew right now the creature was just beyond the tree line, watching. He could feel its eyes on him. Extending his right arm Taylor flipped his middle finger, then turned and head toward the pub.
THE END
Christian Saunders, who writes fiction as C.M. Saunders, is a freelance journalist and editor from South Wales. His work has appeared in over 80 magazines, ezines and anthologies worldwide including The Literary Hatchet, Feverish Fiction, Fantastic Horror, Flash Bang Mysteries, Morpheus Tales and Crimson Streets, and he has held desk positions at several leading UK magazines ranging from Staff Writer to Associate Editor. His books have been both traditionally and independently published, the latest release being a collection of short fiction entitled X: Omnibus.
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Original Creations
Food Prep with Baba Yaga, Nail Polish Art Fig from Jennifer Weigel
Published
3 days agoon
February 9, 2025I must just want to keep breathing those fumes – call me Doctor Orin Scrivello DDS… Anyway, here’s another porcelain figurine repaint with nail polish accents. This time we’ll join Baba Yaga herself as she embarks on a food prep journey – I hear she’s making pie! This time I’m only going to post one figurine because I want to get the down low on all the dirty details. And just what sort of food prep does that entail? Let’s find out…
Yeah it’s a boring chore but necessary. Cause you can’t eat without food, and you can’t have food without food prep.
Are you up to the task? Because heads will roll. In fact, one’s trying to get away now.
A dull blade is nobody’s friend, so make sure to keep all your knives sharpened for the task at hand.
One down, a dozen or so more to go!
Feel free to check out more of Jennifer Weigel’s work here on Haunted MTL or here on her website.
Original Creations
Familiar Faces – A Chilling Tale of Predatory Transformation by Tinamarie Cox
Published
5 days agoon
February 6, 2025By
Jim PhoenixFamiliar Faces
By Tinamarie Cox
For the past three months, Maggie had planted herself on the same bench in the northwestern quadrant of Central Park at six a.m. every morning. Placed beside her were always a brown paper bag and a paper coffee cup, both clean and empty. She did not require food and drink in the same manner as humans but needed to keep up appearances and maintain the illusion. Sitting here like this, Maggie appeared to be like any other New Yorker enjoying the cooler hours of the early summer mornings and a deli-bought breakfast.
As the joggers on the Great Hill Track passed by, Maggie studied their skin. She looked each perspiring body up and down carefully, determining collagen levels and the elasticity of their dermal layers. There was a wide range in age, but younger was preferred. She favored flesh in its prime and in good health. The better condition of the hide meant the tissues would last longer. More time for enjoyment and less time spent hunting.
Maggie, the name that had belonged to the skin she was currently in, had given her a long and pleasurable five years. But her stolen flesh had begun to pucker as of late, thinning and loosening, and starting to droop on its harsh frame. It was time for a change in coverings. Maggie’s delicate apricot coating was nearly spent.
New York City was the perfect place to acquire new skins. Becoming someone new and blending in was effortless in the twenty-first century. There were millions of hosts to choose from and all in different colors. The variety drew her, and the ease of attaining a human casing kept her lingering. A hundred years of stalking and acquisition in this city, and she hadn’t felt any exigency to leave it. One person missing out of millions was a drop of water in Earth’s ocean. She drew no suspicions.
Time had only made the process simpler for Maggie.
Naturally, her skills improved as she moved from body to body. She had made mistakes in the beginning. Been too violent with the first few when she should have been more clever. She hadn’t expected such a mess. Hadn’t known there was so much blood and viscera inside a human body.
But she had been so eager to try. So excited to keep going. To test her limits. Go beyond what she had once thought she was capable of.
Practice made perfect. Switching bodies became seamless.
And there were other factors, too, that allowed Maggie an inconspicuous lifestyle. Population growth was major, inevitable with the humans’ devotion to sexual pleasure. Humans seemed challenged when it came to controlling their desires, much less their reproductive abilities. She felt it was the greatest disadvantage of the species. To be so tightly bound to sex and rearing the inevitable offspring.
She couldn’t consider using a human during their infancy or adolescent years. Children were too helpless. Despite the soft suppleness of their skin, being commanded by another adult was unappealing. Maggie was fully grown and had left her nest ages ago.
The way society chose to isolate itself behind its technology also benefited Maggie. Whatever flashed on their handheld screens determined the next fad and the newest trend, which consumed their attention. It seemed humans could not be without their electronic devices, as if they were an extension of themselves. An enthusiastically consumed distraction from the realities of the drudgery of the human world.
Maggie had spent the last several weeks on her perch in Central Park keeping up to date on the latest social interests by watching TikTok videos on her cell phone. Many of the clips were centered around humorous topics, which she hated to admit she found entertaining. And some of the video creators poured their life stories and struggles into the camera for the whole world to see. Maggie liked these videos best. She adopted the histories and backgrounds of the TikTok users for the real-life conversations she participated in.
With the recorded stories committed to memory, she could stir up feelings of pity, compassion, or even lust in her listener. Their emotional responses made her feel more human. Continued the deception. Ultimately, it distracted her conversation partner from asking other, more troublesome questions. Like why the alcohol they were drinking wasn’t making her tipsy.
Maggie toggled between the app and observed the passing joggers. She stealthily snapped pictures of potential skin donors for later deliberation. She had noted their schedules and made her friendly face visible during their routines. She looked up, met their gaze, smiled, and angled her head cordially. Every few minutes, she reached into the paper bag standing upright by her lap and brought an empty fist to her mouth, pretending to eat breakfast and drink coffee.
Some mornings, she’d daydream about the first days in a fresh costume, how silky and soft the flesh was. She liked to run fingers along the new skin, feel how well it hugged the bones. The sensation made the human lungs feel heavy, the heart race, and the mouth water.
No part of her donor went to waste.
Once fitted into a new disguise and acclimated to its nervous system, the previous host served as a first meal. Consciousness didn’t return to the shell. The brain was ruined by her invading connectors and the gray matter disintegrated with the disentanglement. Like pulling a weed out of the ground after it had infiltrated and rooted deep into a garden bed.
The defunct flesh made an exponential shift into the decomposition process after being evacuated. Technically, the carcass had started decaying the moment it was put on. Be it delayed or negligible so long as the body’s systems remained minimally active.
The putrid smell that accompanied a rotting body drew attention. Evidence caused questions and investigation. And even this creature had to eat sometimes. Of all the mammals, the taste of human was second to none. Without a doubt, human surpassed in flavor compared to her littermates.
On other observation days, Maggie thought about the instances when young, hormone-driven bodies ensnared her in conversation with the single goal of engaging in mating rituals. She found these human practices amusing, not sharing the same desire or need for such companionship.
Coupled bodies pounding genital areas, sharing fluids, and flesh becoming hot and sticky from the exertion was overall, unappealing. However, Maggie learned the importance and the rules of these games during her adventures among the humans. Though, she did not gain the same level of satisfaction from sexual acts.
Her top priority was to remain innocuous. She paid no favor to a particular gender. Or lack thereof. She appreciated the modern sense of fluidity between sexes. The notions of male and female and fulfilling sexual needs had changed greatly in the last hundred years she had spent amidst people. She had learned that bodies fit together in multiple ways. And Maggie knew how to please any partner no matter the skin she wore.
She had gotten better at determining if a mate would become too attached and return to her with more serious intentions. Relationships complicated her lifestyle. Partners asked too many questions and wanted to be involved with everything. She could not explain to a human how slowly rotting, sagging flesh walked amongst the population. Being solitary and independent was required.
Maggie preferred to migrate across the boroughs only when necessary, like when she adopted a new disguise. Previous acquaintances noticed the change. Memories and personality were lost when she implanted herself. But after a few hours of investigating the old life, she knew who needed a goodbye to be satisfied. And which places not to haunt. These lessons had been learned the hard way at the beginning.
It wasn’t difficult to find a new apartment when she needed one. Some neighbors were nosier than others. Maggie didn’t have much on hand to pack and move. She kept enough belongings to make an apartment look lived in. And the keepsakes she was genuinely fond of remained in a storage unit.
She learned to save certain items after discovering antique shops. Some humans were willing to pay puzzling sums of money for old things that no longer served anything more than an aesthetic purpose. A lengthy existence inhabiting many lives had allowed her to accumulate a monetary cushion.
As the freshness of Maggie’s skin wore out, she felt like antiquity. Something shabby and spent, and only admired as what it used to be. The lingering memory of something gone and nearly forgotten. A word on the tip of your tongue. She didn’t like to feel as though she was fading.
Each morning, she studied the creases deepening on her hands and around her eyes. She pulled at the lines circling her throat. It took more effort to keep her mouth from frowning. She found her reflection off-putting. It hadn’t surprised Maggie why flirtations and pleasure seekers had decreased over the last several weeks. Her body looked disgusting.
Humans were shallow creatures. Wrinkling and dulling skin combined with thinning and lifeless hair was unattractive and deterred their mating drive. And it was this decrease in attention that brought Maggie a sense of urgency to find replacement tissue. She had grown to enjoy being noticed for her beauty and sexual appeal. But adamantly denied she possessed human vanity. She just wanted to feel good about herself. There wasn’t much else to her drive.
Beautiful skin made Maggie feel powerful.
Maggie was eyeing male flesh for this hunt. The last twenty years had been spent in female coverings. Before that, her costumes were alternated between the sexes. When IT first began acquiring human skins in New York City, it had sought males exclusively. Back in those early days, you had to be male to do what you wanted. No one questioned a man’s late hours or odd habits. A hundred years ago– when IT had still been something crawling and slithering and observing the human species in the shadows– it seemed a woman was more of a thing than a person. And IT had been tired of being a thing.
Before IT was Maggie, there was Ananda, and before her was Shyla. She only remembered Molly because of how short a time her skin had lasted, a mere year. She had judged Molly’s skin all wrong, or rather, it had deceived her. A century of lives and dozens of names had blended together in parts. What IT had originally been called escaped its memory. The point was to experience life, not remember the vehicle.
Christopher passed her bench for a fourth time that morning. Maggie gave her next potential covering a small smile. He had finally taken notice of her earlier in the week, stealing brief glances at her during each of his eight daily laps around the loop. He looked young enough for her predilection, and in satisfactory health.
She loved the way his tanned epidermis stretched over his pronounced cheekbones. How taut it was across his firm abdominal cavity. And how the flesh around his defined biceps glistened with perspiration in the morning sunlight. He was a fine human specimen. She was fairly certain Christopher was the one.
Her hearts synced into a quick rhythm with her sudden excitement. She fidgeted on the bench as she envisioned slipping into new skin. Shedding this expired hull and feeling the brief freedom from a body’s weight. Severing the aged links that bound her to a moribund marionette. She licked her lips as she thought about making a satisfying meal out of this faithful body she was currently in.
Maggie wanted to wear the Christopher costume as soon as possible. She imagined the strength in his well-maintained and robust body. What the ripples in his muscles must feel like when his feet pounded against the asphalt during his run. How easily she would be able to command adoration with his coy smile. The way lovers would worship the powerful way she’d use his hips.
Decision finalized, Maggie hid her phone away in the back pocket of her shorts. She put the unused coffee cup in the empty brown bag and crumpled them together for the trash can. The wait for Christopher to make his next lap was almost too long. She leaned forward on her bench, staring down the jogging path. Eyes only for him as others passed her by.
When Christopher returned to view, Maggie grinned and angled her head at him. She shifted on her perch, impatient for him to meet her gaze. When their eyes locked, Maggie felt her nerve endings pulse and the human heart lurch. This level of anticipation was better than sex. The barbs holding her inside Maggie tingled.
It was time to seize the moment.
She gave him a little wave with a shaky hand. Then, she patted the place on the bench beside her that was vacated by the fake breakfast.
Christopher slowed his pace, his interest engaged, and paused his morning jogging routine through Central Park to speak to a familiar face. He sat beside Maggie, his mouth open and catching his breath, and rested his arm along the top of the bench.
“Finished your breakfast fast today?” He stretched his long legs out in front of him and Maggie traced them with her eyes.
“I have a confession to make,” she began, flapping her eyelashes at him.
“Do tell.”
He leaned in closer and she could smell the salty trails of sweat dripping down his perfect skin and mixing with his pheromones. He was easily hooked. His scent made her mouth water. Made her buzz inside Maggie. He was a fine choice.
“I was too nervous to eat it this morning. I was hoping to meet you more formally today.” Maggie pressed her pink lips into a crooked smile and raised one of her shoulders aiming to convey shyness in her flirtation.
She formulated a new plan. The details arrived like lightning in her head. She’d do things a little differently this time. She’d play all her cards right and take him to bed first. Part of her ached to feel him inside this body before putting him on. She didn’t understand where the urge had come from, but she decided to obey it.
What was the point of living if not for a few indulgences here and there? Experiment once in a while? Evolve the methods? A hundred years of slipping from body to body needed to stay interesting.
She wasn’t becoming more human.
IT could never be human.
“Well,” he held out his hand to her, “I’m Christopher. It’s nice to meet you…?”
“You can call me Maggie,” she answered and accepted his handshake. His skin felt better than she imagined. A wave of delight coursed through her. A wide grin crept across her face.
Christopher was hers for the taking.
Predator and prey were united at last.
Original Creations
Womb, Revisited: a Graveside Poem by Jennifer Weigel
Published
1 week agoon
February 2, 2025Here’s a graveside pantoum poem from Jennifer Weigel…
The earth enfolds me in her embrace.
I can smell the dirt and water and decay.
This homecoming is a welcome change.
I am wholly surrounded by teeming life.
I can smell the dirt and water and decay.
All smells of mold, mushrooms, and musk.
I am wholly surrounded by teeming life.
Microscopic organisms abound all around.
All smells of mold, mushrooms, and musk.
This is both comforting and disconcerting.
Microscopic organisms abound all around.
I am becoming one with their still energy.
This is both comforting and disconcerting.
For it is the natural progression of things.
I am becoming one with their still energy.
Here within my grave, I shall rot away.
For it is the natural progression of things.
This homecoming is a welcome change.
Here within my grave, I shall rot away.
The earth enfolds me in her embrace.
Ok so that graveside poem was maybe a little more in than out, but whatever. We all go back to the Earth Mother eventually… 😉
Here are a couple more posts of graveside photography: Part 1 and Part 2… and another poem + photo combo. And feel free to check out more of Jennifer Weigel’s work here on Haunted MTL or here on her website.
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My Best Friend’s Exorcism: Experience the 80’s, demons and all.
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