Indecision: an Original Story by Jennifer Weigel
I was in a convenience mart when it began, standing at a pastry case looking at the donuts, trying to decide whether I wanted a cake doughnut with sprinkles or a glazed doughnut with chocolate icing. What I really wanted was a maple-glazed with bacon, but that was apparently too much of a culinary delicacy to ask of a simple gas station convenience mart such as this.
The fluorescent lights flickered in that static greenish way that they do when the ballast is going off. Nothing unusual. Then the loudspeaker hummed and crackled as if someone breathed too close to a microphone somewhere in the back and amplified a bit of spittle or a fleck of dust. The sound jarred me from pondering the doughnut case, and I looked up at a speaker in the ceiling.
It quieted briefly before it buzzed again.
Still, it wasnât anything out of the ordinary. Just a regular convenience mart with its typical display of overpriced donuts, shipped in too early in the morning and having sat there for half the day until they were now well-past stale⊠The loudspeaker continued to hum and crackle intermittently.
I finally decided on the cake doughnut with sprinkles, poured a cup of coffee the consistency of motor oil into a to-go Styrofoam cup, snapped a lid on it (literally and figuratively), and checked out at the counter. The lights flickered again. The woman behind the register, who looked as though she hadnât slept in years, mumbled âhave-a-nice-dayâ as I paid with my Master chip card and left. At least, I think thatâs what she said. The words fell out of her mouth like too many marbles all at once, slurred together.
They didnât make sense.
The sky was overcast. I made my way to my car. The buzzing hum and crackle followed me. â There outside must a speaker be too,â I muttered to myself. My voice echoed in my head, but talking Yodaesque gibberish with the words disordered and falling out of place and time.
The car was where I left it, second from the right facing the front of the convenience mart, aimed at the building from which the droning hum emanated. I didnât remember parking there but then again I didnât remember parking⊠Mine was the only car in the lot so there werenât any other choices to be made or directions to pursue. Thank goodness. I felt a faint flicker of light dance through my periphery, but it was too fast to focus on. Must be a storm coming inâŠ
I shook it off, unlocked the car with the beep-boop key fob, and got in. I sat down in the driverâs seat, placed my coffee in the middle cup-holder, and shut the door behind me. I opened the bag and looked at the doughnut. Blast it, I had thought Iâd gotten one with sprinkles. But wait – there were sprinkles. They flickered at me as if coming into and out of being. They were too difficult to focus on, white, yellow and orange, too similar to the cake color of the doughnut. They became more white-noise static, further drowning out my ability to focus.
I could no longer see the doughnut for the sprinkles.
The car radio buzzed at me with the same crackly hum of the loudspeaker. But the car wasnât on. Thatâs when it hit me. The… car⊠wasnât⊠on⊠A faint flicker lit up the edge of my vision again, and the din of the static grew louder and closer. The car⊠still⊠wasnât on⊠The doughnut-sprinkles flickered at me like points of light on a TV screen un-tuned to snow.
I tossed the bag with the doughnut in the passenger seat. I wasnât in the mood to sit and eat it. Not now. Something was very wrong. The hairs on the backs of my arms prickled as they rose. But why? I opened the door as if to go back in, but changed my mind. What was I going to look for there? The confusion and uncertainty wouldnât be any clearer. It wasnât as if buying a chocolate iced doughnut would change anything. Or would it? That didnât make any sense.
None of it made any sense.
I sat still and looked out over the dashboard at the building. The static grew louder. Everything was snow now. The doughnut-sprinkles, the bag, the passenger seat, the coffee, the dashboard, the car, the convenience mart⊠Even my own hand was flickering as I extended it out in front of me. The buzzing crackling hum had taken the shape of light as well as sound, and it was everywhere.
My surroundings seemed to flatten as they grew more and more disjointed, the flicker setting in like an old movie reel zoetrope. It was as if everything I saw was just a painting or a photograph, a stage prop and not a true-to-life experience. The scenery around me rippled like a plastic tarp over a swimming pool or a clear carnival bag bulging with water needed to sustain the goldfish within it, with me being the goldfish.
I noticed it faintly at first.
There was a crack or a fold in the space-time continuum⊠No, it was a small gash⊠It seemed to almost float in the midst of my vision. It followed wherever I turned. I was trapped underneath and within the tent of my reality, watching it bulge and flicker above and around me as the tear grew wider, threatening to burst and spill everything through me. My heart fluttered but I was frozen to the spot, unable to move.
The tarp of my consciousness ripped open in a sweeping encompassing motion and gave way completely. My surroundings pulsed into themselves before they swelled and broke loose. The convenience store, the car, the dashboard⊠all flew past me like a million star-points of light and shadow and flowed away. I was enveloped in light. A quiet solace engulfed me as I was bathed in the bright white curtain, feeling cold and warm at the same time, distant and wholly present.
Slowly, fuzzy shapes emerged from the light.
Murmured talking began to take form around me, as well as a rhythmic beeping coming into focus. âItâs going to be okay,â one of the softly silhouetted shapes spoke as it grew clearer and formed itself into a doctor in a white lab coat. âYou had a minor stroke and have been in a coma for a few days. Youâre going to pull through.â
I looked around. The room was sterile and white with a sickly blue-green-gray partition preventing me from seeing the other side. A series of plastic looking machines with all sorts of knobs, buttons, and switches beeped and lit up beside me. The doctor held one of those hand flashlights towards me to look into my eyes. She spoke but seemed very far away.
As the light flashed in my eyes, a buzzing hum began to emerge, quietly at first. The rhythmic beeping of the machines receded and gave way to the static drone. It grew louder and louder as I became attuned to the constant flicker of fluorescent lights. The humming sound grew, emanating from everywhere and burying itself behind my eyes to pulse through my being. The fluorescence soon began to engulf everything and the room flickered to steady snow.
Everything went fuzzy again, lost to the flickering fluorescent din.
A crackling loudspeaker jars me out of my reverie, amplifying dust, or spittle.
I look up at the speaker above me, standing in front of a convenience mart doughnut case. An underwhelming array of stale mid-day donuts scattered on trays calls for my consideration⊠do I want a cake doughnut with sprinkles or a glazed doughnut with chocolate icing?
And feel free to check out more of Jennifer Weigelâs work here on Haunted MTL or here on her website.
What if ours weren’t the only reality? What if the past paths converged, if those moments that led to our current circumstances got tangled together with their alternates and we found ourselves caught up in the threads?
Marla returned home after the funeral and wake. She drew the key in the lock and opened the door slowly, the looming dread of coming back to an empty house finally sinking in. Everyone else had gone home with their loved ones. They had all said, “goodbye,” and moved along.
Her daughter Misty and son-in-law Joel had caught a flight to Springfield so he could be at work the next day for the big meeting. Her brother Darcy was on his way back to Montreal. Emmett and Ruth were at home next door, probably washing dishes from the big meal they had helped to provide afterward, seeing as their kitchen light was on. Marla remembered there being food but couldn’t recall what exactly as she hadn’t felt like eating. Sandwiches probably… she’d have to thank them later.
Marla had felt supported up until she turned the key in the lock after the services, but then the realization sank deep in her throat like acid reflux, hanging heavy on her heart – everyone else had other lives to return to except for her. She sighed and stepped through the threshold onto the outdated beige linoleum tile and the braided rag rug that stretched across it. She closed the door behind herself and sighed again. She wiped her shoes reflexively on the mat before just kicking them off to land in a haphazard heap in the entryway.
The still silence of the house enveloped her, its oppressive emptiness palpable – she could feel it on her skin, taste it on her tongue. It was bitter. She sighed and walked purposefully to the living room, the large rust-orange sofa waiting to greet her. She flopped into its empty embrace, dropping her purse at her side as she did so.
A familiar, husky voice greeted her from deeper within the large, empty house. “Where have you been?”
Marla looked up and glanced around. Her husband Frank was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, drying a bowl. Marla gasped, her hand shooting to her mouth. Her clutched appendage took on a life of its own, slowly relinquishing itself of her gaping jaw and extending a first finger to point at the specter.
“Frank?” she spoke hesitantly.
“Yeah,” the man replied, holding the now-dry bowl nestled in the faded blue-and-white-checkered kitchen towel in both hands. “Who else would you expect?”
“But you’re dead,” Marla spat, the words falling limply from her mouth of their own accord.
The 66-year old man looked around confusedly and turned to face Marla, his silver hair sparkling in the light from the kitchen, illuminated from behind like a halo. “What are you talking about? I’m just here washing up after lunch. You were gone so I made myself some soup. Where have you been?”
“No, I just got home from your funeral,” Marla spoke quietly. “You are dead. After the boating accident… You drowned. I went along to the hospital – they pronounced you dead on arrival.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Frank said. “What boating accident?”
“The sailboat… You were going to take me out,” Marla coughed, her brown eyes glossed over with tears.
“We don’t own a sailboat,” Frank said bluntly. “Sure, I’d thought about it – it seems like a cool retirement hobby – but it’s just too expensive. We’ve talked about this, we can’t afford it.”
Marla glanced out the bay window towards the driveway where the small sailboat sat on its trailer, its orange hull reminiscent of the Florida citrus industry, and also of the life jacket Frank should have been wearing when he’d been pulled under. Marla cringed and turned back toward the kitchen. She sighed and spoke again, “But the boat’s out front. The guys at the marina helped to bring it back… after you… drowned.”
Frank had retreated to the kitchen to put away the bowl. Marla followed. She stood in the doorway and studied the man intently. He was unmistakably her husband, there was no denying it even despite her having just witnessed his waxen lifeless body in the coffin at the wake before the burial, though this Frank was a slight bit more overweight than she remembered.
“Well, that’s not possible. Because I’m still here,” Frank grumbled. He turned to face her, his blue eyes edged with worry. “There now, it was probably just a dream. You knew I wanted a boat and your anxiety just formulated the worst-case scenario…”
“See for yourself,” Marla said, her voice lilting with every syllable.
Frank strode into the living room and stared out the bay window. The driveway was vacant save for some bits of Spanish moss strewn over the concrete from the neighboring live oak tree. He turned towards his wife.
“But there’s no boat,” he sighed. “You must have had a bad dream. Did you fall asleep in the car in the garage again?” Concern was written all over his face, deepening every crease and wrinkle. “Is that where you were? The garage?”
Marla glanced again at the boat, plain as day, and turned to face Frank. Her voice grew stubborn. “It’s right here. How can you miss it?” she said, pointing at the orange behemoth.
“Honey, there’s nothing there,” Frank exclaimed, exasperation creeping into his voice.
Marla huffed and strode to the entryway, gathering her shoes from where they waited in their haphazard heap alongside the braided rag run on the worn linoleum floor. She marched out the door as Frank took vigil in its open frame, still staring at her. She stomped out to the boat and slapped her hand on the fiberglass surface with a resounding smack. The boat was warm to the touch, having baked in the Florida sun. She turned back towards the front door.
“See!” she bellowed.
The door stood open, empty. No one was there, watching. Marla sighed again and walked back inside. The vacant house once again enveloped her in its oppressive emptiness. Frank was nowhere to be found.
So I guess it’s goodbye for now. Feel free to check out more of Jennifer Weigelâs work here on Haunted MTL or here on her website.
Today on Nightmarish Nature we’re gonna revisit The Blob and jiggle our way to terror. Why? ‘Cause we’re just jellies – looking at those gelatinous denizens of the deep, as well as some snot-like land-bound monstrosities, and wishing we could ooze on down for some snoozy booze schmoozing action. Or something.
Honestly, I don’t know what exactly it is that jellyfish and slime molds do but whatever it is they do it well, which is why they’re still around despite being among the more ancient organism templates still in common use.
Jellyfish are on the rise.
Yeah, yeah, some species like moon jellies will hang out in huge blooms near the surface feeding, but that’s not what I meant. Jellyfish populations are up. They’re honing in on the open over-fished ocean and making themselves at home. Again.
And, although this makes the sea turtles happy since jellies are a favorite food staple of theirs, not much else is excited about the development. Except for those fish that like to hide out inside of their bells, assuming they don’t accidentally get eaten hanging out in there. But that’s a risk you gotta take when you’re trying to escape predation by surrounding yourself in a bubble of danger that itself wants to eat you. Be eaten or be eaten. Oh, wait…
So what makes jellies so scary?
Jellyfish pack some mighty venom. Despite obvious differences in mobility, they are related to anemones and corals. But not the Man o’ War which looks similar but is actually a community of microorganisms that function together as a whole, not one creature. Not that it matters when you’re on the wrong end of a nematocyst, really. Because regardless what it’s attached to, that stings.
Box jellies are among the most venomous creatures in the world and can move of their own accord rather than just drifting about like many smaller jellyfish do. And even if they aren’t deadly, the venom from many jellyfish species will cause blisters and lesions that can take a long time to heal. So even if they do resemble free-floating plastic grocery bags, you’d do best to steer clear. Because those are some dangerous curves.
But what does this have to do with slime molds?
Absolutely nothing. I honestly don’t know enough about jellyfish or slime molds to devote the whole of a Nightmarish Nature segment to either, so they had to share. Essentially, this bit is what happened when I decided to toast a bagel before coming up with something to write about and spent a tad too much time in contemplation of my breakfast. I guess we’re lucky I didn’t have any cream cheese or clotted cream…
Oh, and also thinking about gelatinous cubes and oozes in the role-playing game sense – because those sort of seem like a weird hybrid between jellies and slime molds, as does The Blob. Any of those amoeba influenced creatures are horrific by their very nature – they don’t even need to be souped up, just ask anyone who’s had dysentery.
And one of the most interesting thing about slime molds is that they can take the shortest path to food even when confronted with very complex barriers. They are maze masterminds and would give the Minotaur more than a run for his money, especially if he had or was food. They have even proven capable of determining the most efficient paths for water lines or railways in metropolitan regions, which is kind of crazy when you really think about it. Check it out in Scientific American here. So, if we assume that this is essentially the model upon which The Blob was built, then it’s kind of a miracle anything got away. And slime molds are coming under closer scrutiny and study as alternative means of creating computer components are being explored.
Jellies are the Wave of the Future.
We are learning that there may be a myriad of uses for jellyfish from foodstuffs to cosmetic products as we rethink how we interact with them. They are even proving useful in cleaning up plastic pollution. I don’t know how I feel about the foodstuff angle for all that they’ve been a part of various recipes for a long time. From what I’ve seen of the jellyfish cookbook recipes, they just don’t look that appealing. But then again I hate boba with a passion, so I’m probably not the best candidate to consider the possibility.
So it seems that jellies are kind of the wave of the future as we find that they can help solve our problems. That’s pretty impressive for some brainless millions of years old critter condiments. Past – present – perpetuity! Who knows what else we’d have found if evolution hadn’t cleaned out the fridge every so often?
Feel free to check out more Nightmarish Nature here.
Continuing our junkyard dawg werewolf story from the previous St. Patrickâs Days⊠though technically he’s more of a wolfwere but wolfwhatever. Anyway, here are Part 1 from 2022, Part 2 from 2023 and Part 3 from 2024 if you want to catch up.
Yeah I donât know how you managed to find me after all this time. We havenât been the easiest to track down, Monty and I, and we like it that way. Though actually, youâve managed to find me every St. Patrickâs Day since 2022 despite me being someplace else every single time. Itâs a little disconcerting, like Iâm starting to wonder if I was microchipped way back in the day in 2021 when I was out lollygagging around and blacked out behind that taco hutâŠ
Anyway as Iâd mentioned before, that Scratchers was a winner. And Iâd already moved in with Monty come last St. Patrickâs Day. Hell, heâd already begun the process of cashing in the Scratchers, and what a process that was. It made my head spin, like too many squirrels chirping at you from three different trees at once. We did get the money eventually though.
Since I saw you last, we were kicked out of Montyâs crap apartment and had gone to live with his parents while we sorted things out. Thank goodness that was short-lived; his mother is a nosy one for sure, and Monty didnât want to let on he was sitting on a gold mine as he knew theyâd want a cut even though they had it made already. She did make a mean brisket though, and it sure beat living with Sal. Just sayin.
Anyway, we finally got a better beater car and headed west. I was livinâ the dream.  We were seeing the country, driving out along old Route 66, for the most part. At least until our car broke down just outside of Roswell near the mountains and we decided to just shack it up there. (Boy, Monty sure can pick âem. Itâs like he has radar for bad cars. Calling them lemons would be generous. At least itâs not high maintenance women who wonât toss you table scraps or let you up on the sofa.)
We found ourselves the perfect little cabin in the woods. And it turns out we were in the heart of Bigfoot Country, depending on who you ask. I wouldnât know, Iâve never seen one. But it seems that Monty was all into all of those supernatural things: aliens, Bigfoot, even werewolves. And finding out his instincts on me were legit only added fuel to that fire. So now he sees himself as some sort of paranormal investigator.
Whatever. I keep telling him this werewolf gig isnât all that itâs cracked up to be, and it doesnât work like in the movies. I wasnât bitten, and I generally donât bite unless provoked. He says technically Iâm a wolfwere, to which I just reply âWhere?â and smile. Whatever. Itâs the little things I guess. I just wish everything didnât come out as a bark most of the time, though Montyâs gotten pretty good at interpretingâŠÂ As long as he doesnât get the government involved, and considering his take on the government himself that would seem to be a long stretch. We both prefer the down low.
So here we are, still livinâ the dream. There arenât all that many rabbits out here but itâs quiet and the locals donât seem to notice me all that much. And Monty can run around and make like heâs gonna have some kind of sighting of Bigfoot or aliens or the like. As long as the pantryâs stocked itâs no hair off my back. Sure, there are scads of tourists, but they can be fun to mess around with, especially at that time of the month if I happen to catch them out and about.
Speaking of tourists, I even ran into that misspent youth from way back in 2021 at the convenience store; I spotted him at the Quickie Mart along the highway here. I guess he and his girlfriend were apparently on walkabout (or car-about) perhaps making their way to California or something. He even bought me another cookie. Small world. But we all knew that alreadyâŠ
If you enjoyed this werewolf wolfwere wolfwhatever saga, feel free to check out more of Jennifer Weigelâs work here on Haunted MTL or here on her website.