Tree house eureka springs

[Narration by Home Studio Horror]
*
I spend all of my daylight hours scared and alone in this musty old cellar.
It’s woeful, and I bet it smelled this bad even before everything around here turned to crap. Great. My second sentence and I’ve already resorted to swearing. When I decided I’d start this diary (five minutes ago when I got a tiny sliver of signal) I thought it would be my poetic and deeply-moving goodbye to the world. Maybe I’d write about love and loss, or maybe the splendour of nature. Then, when all is done and dusted, I’d have left something to be remembered by. As well as my corpse, of course.
This was a bad idea.
*
Okay, I’m an idiot. There’s nothing else I can do down here. I’ve rooted through every cardboard box a hundred times, organised and reorganised my supplies, I’ve even built a fort. So, I’m back. Hello. Again. God, this diary is going badly.
But there’s just enough light coming through the boards I nailed over the cellar’s tiny window to type by. So I may as well type. Stops me staring up at the window just waiting for a shadow to pass by.
Maybe I'll just write and not hit Submit. Right, where to start? Well, my name is – actually, I think I’m going to refer to myself as ‘X’. That sounds mysterious. If you’re reading this and want to know my real name, I still carry my purse. My railcard is in there and, if you really want to know who I am, go find me and fish it out. I won’t bite...
So, my name is X. I live in a little English village in the middle of nowhere. Before all this happened, I had a mum, a dad, a sister and there was a boy I liked, his name was Jonah.
*
I couldn’t think of anything else to write so I waited until I came back from my rounds. That’s the stupid name I have for when I go outside at night scrounging for stuff. Drinks are the hardest. I only trust bottles or cans, or did, and I was running out of places to search for them. But I guess that doesn’t matter now.
My leg is doing alright actually; didn’t hold me up at all. I saw Jonah too. He’s looked better, I have to say. It’s strange because this is only the second time I’ve seen him since we came here. Maybe his ears were burning.
Anyway, I found some tinned pineapple in a creepy old caravan I hadn’t searched yet. Had to bust the door open with Old Trusty – which I thought might attract some unwanted attention – but it was fine. I’m actually eating the pineapple right now, tastes good. I also found a radio in there. I already have three down here, but none of them work. Not that the caravan radio works either, all you get is static. It’s just nice to collect something. You know, to have a hobby.
*
I can tell the sun is rising. I managed to sleep for a couple of hours, but I woke up after a bad dream. I know some people can remember their dreams, but I never do. I wake up and grasp at them, but I never manage a hold before they fade away. It’s like trying to pinch the corner of a wisp of smoke; the harder you try, the quicker it fades to nothing. I’m just left with a sensation, a kind of imprint which sums up the most intense part of the dream.
And a cold sweat. That’s new.
*
I’ve been through the box of photo albums I found at the back of the cellar again. I’ve looked through them a few times now, but I always notice something new.
There’s a photo of this little girl playing with a pretend guitar. I can tell it’s pretend because it doesn’t have strings, only brightly-coloured plastic dials. Kind of like My First Guitar Hero or something. The girl has dark hair and she looks a tiny bit like my sister did a million years ago. I don’t have a picture of my sister. I suppose I could go and get one from my old house, but it’s right in the middle of the village. I’m lucky I wasn’t torn to shreds the last time I went back. So, what I’ve done is put this girl’s photo in my back pocket as a substitute.
I guess I should probably write something about my real sister now. But I don’t think that’s a good idea just yet.
*
Daylight is starting to fade and I’m getting ready to go out on my rounds. I always take my satchel with me, packed with useful objects. I have Old Trusty (a crowbar) which sticks out of the top for easy access, a small toolbox, a pair of heavy-duty gloves (there’s a good story about how I got those, I might write that one down later) and a hammer. I carry a penknife I found down here in my pocket, my purse and phone, and a torch in my hand.
I don’t like to use the torch because its battery is running out and there’s always the chance it might attract them. I probably shouldn’t have used it last night when I got back. Maybe I’m starting to enjoy this writing malarkey? I need to be careful with luxuries.
*
Okay, that could have gone better.
Picture the scene: I’m using Old Trusty to try and lever a kitchen window open, when one of them just walks right through the garden hedge. Seriously, straight through it. It’s not the mightiest of hedges but, still, it just appeared like it was walking through one of those Japanese paper walls. My satchel was on the ground, but I legged it anyway. I’m not stupid. I know I can go back for it tomorrow. I felt strangely naked without it on the way back here though.
Like I said before, I need to be careful with the torch so I think I’ll try and get some sleep now.
*
I slept pretty well last night; no nightmares or cold sweats. Maybe a midnight chase was just what I needed to blow away the cobwebs.
I actually woke up wondering about you. If you’re reading this, who are you? If you’re like me, living through this village nightmare, how have you managed to go this long without being killed or whatever? Maybe you’re Army or some such. Maybe you’re just some kid who’s played so many videogames that surviving all of this was already second nature to you. Or maybe you’re like me; living on borrowed time and searching for a good place to die. Maybe Future Me was brave enough to tap Submit on my diary and you're currently reading this on your phone or computer.
Here’s an idea. Maybe you can carry on this diary from wherever I left it at. God, I really hope this isn’t my last entry, although I suppose any entry might be. If you do carry the diary forwards, and I'm a corpse, maybe it will become cursed. Spooky.
*
I’ve been preparing for my next excursion.
If I know I’m going somewhere I’ll likely run into an ugly, I like to take extra precautions. And I want my satchel back. It was a present from my dad, and I know it cost him a lot of money.
So, I’m taking a pair of shears from the shelf of old tools down here. That way, if I lose Old Trusty, I’ll have a backup weapon.
If you are local, I wonder how you like to kill them? Pretty morbid question I know, but everyone around here seems to have their preferred method. The last villager I saw alive carried a pair of mini cricket bats and seemed to have bludgeoning down to an art form. He never saw me though, I was watching from a grove of trees as he killed his way along the main road near the village.
That was before I decided to stay inside during the daylight hours. We can at least see a little bit at night; ambient light and everything. They can’t though. I’ve seen them, they bump into things. It’s pretty funny to be honest. If they hear a noise, they walk in the direction of the sound, never trying to avoid any object in their path. They either bash said object out of the way, or, like that hedge, blunder right through it. Obviously bigger things stop them dead (ha!) though. If that happens, they sort of shuffle backwards and then try again a few times. Eventually – and I’ve seen this too – they just give up and stand there, waiting for something else to attract their attention.
That’s not how it works in the daytime though.
*
I think it’s about an hour before the sun sets so it’s nearly time to head out. I’m going to change my bandage. One minute.
Okay, it didn’t look that bad really. The original scratch wasn’t too deep and now the wound seems to be doing that scabbing thing I remember from normal injuries. It just doesn’t smell very good. A bit like when you walk past a bin that needs emptying.
Anyway, I’ve applied more antiseptic and redressed it. Time to go.
*
That was fun. I’m glad I had those shears with me.
I got my satchel back you’ll be happy to know. And I got inside that house I’d been trying to break into as well. More through necessity than choice in the end, but I’m pleased I did. I found more batteries! That means I can justify writing at night a bit more. In fact, the people who used to live there (I think the husband owned the local garage) were pretty well kitted out. There were a lot of tins in their cupboards, and they’d even left a shotgun. It wasn’t loaded though.
Not that I need a shotgun. I didn’t tell you this before, but I have my grandpa’s old service revolver. He always told me and my sister that it was decommissioned, but my dad apparently knew otherwise. I keep it tucked into the back of my jeans at all times. It had three bullets, one of them is gone, so only two left.
I’ll only be needing the one of course.
*
Morning. I’m feeling pretty low today. I think concentrating on getting my satchel back took my mind off things, but now I feel pretty deflated.
Surely that’s understandable? The village I knew and loved has been replaced with this sodding hell. I miss my family, my friends, TV and hot dinners and Instagram. Before all of this I was a pretty positive person. Sure, I had a bit of trouble getting up in the morning, but, once I was up, that was it. I’d meet the day’s challenges head on, try to enjoy myself as much as I could. Not today though.
Maybe if I write about Jonah I’ll cheer up. Not Jonah as he is now of course, Jonah when he was all smooth-skinned, curly-haired and bright-eyed. Now he’s like the anti-Jonah or something. His face looks like it lost a fight with an angry lobster. No, wait, I’m supposed to be writing about Jonah version one here.
He’s one of those people that I can’t remember meeting. My family has always lived around here and so there are lots of people who have just always been, if you get me. I always thought we would drunkenly get it together at a party – that’s what I’d usually do if there was a boy I liked. Classy.
*
I’ve perked up a bit. Out of sheer frustration I went upstairs (naughty, I know) and looked out of a window. Sure, I saw an ugly, wandering aimlessly as they always do, but I saw that the trees are starting to turn too. That means it’s nearly autumn, and I love autumn!
My sister and I always used to go out and kick leaves at each other in the autumn. I don’t know if it was because of her low centre of gravity, but my sister was amazing at it. She could somehow whip up a blazing whirlwind of golden-yellow and fire-red, surrounding us both in a leaf storm that I couldn’t help but flail my arms madly at. Then we’d both fall backwards into the leaves laughing, me wondering how on earth what had happened was possible. She was that good.
God, I let her down in the end.
*
I think I’ll stay away from the house with the shotgun tonight. It usually takes a day or two for a group of uglies to disperse once they’re all riled up. I could use the rest of that tinned food I suppose, but I’ve got plenty to be getting on with for now.
Instead, I think I’ll swing by another farmhouse I was scoping out before I decided to turn nocturnal. I never met the people who used to live there, but I remember Mum telling me they liked their privacy. I’m sure they wouldn’t mind me visiting now though.
Also, there’s a woodland between here and there and I might be able to find some leaves to kick about a bit. I think that would make me feel close to my sister again.
I’ll check back in later.
*
I’m still alive, but only just.
I made it through the woods just fine (only the odd leaf on the forest floor at the moment though, sadly), the trouble started at the farmhouse. I couldn’t get in – the doors and windows were barricaded – so I tried one of the outbuildings. Locked. It had a cat flap though.
My first instinct was to leave it, but then I wondered if there might be something useful inside. Lord knows what thinking about it now. I lifted the cat flap with one hand and shone the torch beam through with my other. That’s when an ugly dived at my pinkies. Luckily, it misjudged its leap and got a mouthful of plastic cat flap instead. As for me, I fell backwards onto my bum.
Next, the damn thing started bashing on the door from the inside. I don’t think it could ever have got out, but the noise attracted more uglies from out of nowhere. I only just managed to outmanoeuvre them and hightail it back into the woods.
That’s not the worst of it though. On the way back my leg started to hurt. A lot.
*
I woke up this morning and I’m walking with a limp. It’s funny, Dad had a limp when he and Mum died. He was nailing planks of wood across our windows and doors because there was no signal (as per bloody usual) and we thought that what was happening here was probably happening everywhere. It's only recently that I realised this was an isolated, local outbreak. Anyway, Dad dropped the hammer onto his toe, he always was useless at DIY. I think it was only a couple of hours after that when he and Mum were taken.
It was like a wave of death. No, not like, that’s exactly what it was. A hoard of uglies swept through the village, probably originating from the secret research facility in the woods we're not supposed to know about. My sister and I wouldn’t have had a prayer if Mum and Dad hadn’t charged down the first few that got into our house. They gave us just enough time to escape, to run away and leave them to die. My sister was screaming all the way and I had to drag her like she was four again.
She wouldn’t speak to me for a few days after that. I didn’t blame her, I hated myself too. But I would have hated myself even more if I hadn’t done what I did next. On my own, I snuck back into our house with the crowbar I found here. Then I dispatched my parents. I can’t bring myself to type it any other way. It wasn’t like in the movies, I didn’t pound their skulls into mush whilst sobbing, ‘Why?’ over and over again. I just found them, or what was left of them, forced the crowbar through each of their eye sockets, and came straight back here.
Then came the crying.
*
I haven’t told you about the heavy-duty gloves yet, have I?
After I got back from our old house, my sister started speaking to me again. A shared, day-long cry will do that for sisters. Once we felt up to it, we decided to explore the parts of the farmhouse we hadn’t searched yet. All the bedrooms were empty, only a few belongings flung about the place (I suspect the previous tenants left in a hurry). The problem came when we investigated the attic. Once we’d opened the ceiling panel in the upstairs hallway, once we’d pulled the compact staircase down, I went up. My sister stood at the top of the hatchway shining the torch beam over my shoulder. And that’s when it touched me. Terrified, I fell to my left, screaming as the thing came crashing down on top of me. I was yelling things like, ‘Shoot it!’ and, ‘Run!’ but my sister was just laughing her head off. I soon realised that my attacker was in fact a shop-window mannequin.
I think the people who previously lived here must have been arty (or into some seriously freaky stuff) because the mannequin was dressed in scarves, bandannas, ties, watches – loads of things. The rest of the attic was pretty empty but at least we got the mannequin’s gloves.
*
I’m not feeling good at the moment. I’ve got a sore throat and I’ve coughed up blood a couple of times. My leg pain is getting worse too.
I don’t think I’ll go out tonight. I have enough tins left and one of them is a Full English In A Can. Sounds pretty disgusting, but intriguing at the same time. I’ve been saving it for near the end. A sort of consolation prize.
*
There are two mattresses down here. Obviously one is mine, and the other one was my sister’s. After she died, I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of it. I don’t have a photo of her, only Guitar Girl’s. Her bed is the only thing of hers I have left. And she didn’t even sleep in it that many times.
*
The tinned Full English was vile! You’ve got to laugh though, what else can you do?
*
I’m crying as I write this. Tears of sorrow, shame and regret.
It happened as we were searching a cottage just off of the main road. We’d used Old Trusty to get inside, and I’d rushed straight into the kitchen to find the food. We’d run out more than a day before and I was famished. My sister followed me into the kitchen, a wide grin on her pretty little face because I was sitting there with an open can of beans. Then one of them came at her from behind. I must have walked right past it on my stupid way to the cupboards. It bit into her neck and blood gushed over the tiles in a torrent. As she yelled out in agony, I leapt up and implanted the crowbar right into the thing’s skull. It crumpled to the floor, but the damage was done.
‘Don’t let me lose myself.’ That was the last thing my sister whispered to me before she passed out. Her wound was much more severe than mine is, and much closer to the brain. That seems to make it quicker. I took grandpa’s revolver from behind my back and blew her brains out.
I buried her in the back garden.
*
After my sister died I went kind of crazy. I took Old Trusty out across the fields and pulverised every ugly I could find. I don’t even remember it that well, it was just, find, kill, find, kill…
We’d only been going out in daylight before then but, in my anger, I carried on through the nights. That’s how I learned about their inability to evade in darkness. Eventually, though, one got me. I found three munching on a dead cow and ran straight at them. Took out the first two easily enough, but the third managed to scratch my leg with a bloody fingernail just before I clobbered it into oblivion. Once I realised its nail had broken the skin, it was like a switch had been flicked inside me. That’s it, I’m dead too. I lost my bloodlust and came back here.
*
If none of this had happened, I think my sister would have eventually gone into medicine. I was doing okay at College but she was top of her class at school. And she had a really kind nature too. She’d never squish any bugs that got trapped in our house; she’d get a glass, scoop the little critter up and seal it inside with a book. Then she’d take it outside and release it, even if it was a wasp.
*
I’ve decided that here’s not the place. I'll hit Submit and then I’m going to do it in those woods I wrote about; consider this diary as my Note. I’ll be able to find a nice spot to sit and look at the trees, some place that's calm and peaceful. I’m going to leave the picture of Guitar Girl in this cellar, she belongs in this house. The tree leaves will remind me of my sister more than any photo ever could anyway.
I guess all that’s left to say is thank you for listening.
I know it’s possible that no one will ever read this, but that’s not really the point is it?
Love,
X

I vaguely feel like the book was a large hardcover picture book with a midnight blue cover. I’ve searched everywhere for this book and I have no idea what it’s called. I want to buy it for my kids to read helppppp! Please!

https://minimalfreaks.co/2023/06/va-smniva-series-02-spring-compilation-smniva02/
GENRE Minimal / Deep Tech, Deep House

1. Red Effects – My Year (Original Mix) 05:34 128bpm Eb
2. Sweano – Unauthorized Pathway (Original Mix) 05:54 65bpm Cm
3. Malle, Leon the Lover – Give It To Me (Original Mix) 06:03 128bpm Bm
4. Kenneth Hill – Oxidation (Original Mix) 06:34 129bpm Dbm
5. Jodium – Knowing You (Original Mix) 05:07 128bpm A

This story is true about what my husband experienced one summer in the mid 90’s while working as a grounds keeper at a camp for kids.
It was the early 90’s and at the time my husband, Eddie (just passed his 19th birthday) hadn’t yet decided whether or not he wanted to go to college. He had recently lost touch with most of his high school friends and as such, didn’t have much planned for the summer. So, when the offer to be a live-in grounds keeper at a children’s day camp came his way, Eddie was happy to take the opportunity. He lived in a rural area of Ontario so the camp, surrounded by trees and having it’s own small lake, was both secluded enough to have peace and quiet, but not so far away that he couldn’t manage a trip home on the off days.
While the seclusion wasn’t geographically extreme, once everyone left on Friday afternoons – all the children gone, the day staff back home to their families – the place was actually really eerie. This was magnified by the fact that at the time, Eddie didn’t have a car, and the only phone was about a 20 minute walk from his tiny cabin at the back of the property along a dark dirt path. This meant that most evenings and weekends were spent next to a camp fire or inside the cabin with the door locked listening to loud music and having a few drinks.
Usually, the property was really quiet and it would actually get boring out there with no one to talk to and nothing to do. Eddie once told me that he would pass time by canoeing around the tiny lake (which was more like a large pond) and catching every turtle he could find. He would place them in the bottom of the canoe( with some water and lily-pads so they were comfortable) then once he caught every one he could find, he would canoe to different parts of the lake and put them back one-by-one. So, obviously, there wasn’t much going on in the area.
It was one quiet night however, where despite how peaceful it seemed, there was definitely something evil happening out in those trees and fields.
The night started like any other. It was a warm Saturday in Ontario which meant that the bugs were biting and you could drown in the humidity. It was getting toward the end of the summer and Eddie had gotten into the weekly routine - cleaning and fixing things around the camp during the week days then wandering around the property on the weekends. This Saturday had started off no different that the others. Eddie had done a quick security sweep of the area in the morning to make sure nothing was amiss, then spent the afternoon paddling around the lake catching turtles. A few hours before sundown, Eddie was back at his cabin and had built a nice campfire. He always made sure to start the fire before dark.
On this Saturday Eddie had spent the evening cooking a meal over the fire and reading his favorite Stephen King novel The Stand. He had listened to the weather forecast on the little cabin radio earlier that morning and was aware there was a chance of some nasty thunderstorms that night. He was keeping a close eye on the wind and the clouds as night rolled in, knowing that even this far north, the heat and humidity was known to give rise to fearsome tornadoes every few years.
Not long after he finished his meal, the sky turned dark and the wind began to pick up. Eddie doused his fire and was starting to pack up his book and his dishes when he heard something moving through the brush. He stopped and listened for a moment. The rustling continued, but figuring it was a racoon or a deer, Eddie went about his business – more concerned with the approaching storm.
Once in the cabin, Eddie locked the door and felt a little more secure. He turned on the single, un-shaded light bulb that hung above the sink. The rickety cabin wasn’t much, it had no bathroom and no stove, just a mini fridge, sink, a hot plate, and musty bed. As rickety as it was, it still had a lock on the door and the only window was too small for a person to fit through without a struggle.
Soon, Eddie was getting settled back in with his book. It wasn’t long before the rustling sound he had heard outside returned, but this time it sounded like something was brushing up again the outside wall of the cabin. Still thinking it was just an animal, Eddie tried to keep his attention on his book. The curtains on the window were closed, so he couldn’t see outside, but he knew it was dark and thought he heard the distant rumbling of thunder. The rustling and brushing sound was right outside his door now. He wasn’t sure, but he thought he had heard the handle jiggle.
Suddenly the rustling turned to a crashing and it sounded like two or three people were running away from the cabin. This startled Eddie causing him to drop his book.
“Maybe that wasn’t just a deer after all”. Eddie thought out loud. He stood up and hesitated.
What was he going to do?
Part of his job was to watch out for trespassers and notify them that they had to leave if he found any. Usually this was an easy job. He was only run into this a couple times and both occasion it was a group of local kids taking a nighttime swim in the pond. Usually, he scared them more than they scared him.
Thinking this was probably the case – the local kids having found his cabin and decided to play a bit of a prank on him- Eddie grabbed his keys and his flashlight and headed for the door.
He could hear the wind howling and the rain starting to tap on the roof. Not quite a downpour yet.
He took a deep breath and opened was about to open the door when he heard a gentle tapping on the window. This was obviously not rain.
The hairs on his arms stood at attention. His blood ran cold even in the stuffy and sweltering heat of late July. He was frozen with his hand on the door knob. Not even breathing. Something in his stomach was telling his to remain completely still and whatever he did to NOT OPEN THE DOOR.
After a few minutes, the tapping hadn’t returned. The rain was coming down harder now and Eddie began to breath again. He let go of the door knob and immediately turn off the light. He quietly got under the covers, not even bothering to take off his shoes or put back the large, metal flash light, in case whatever it was that was out there came back. Eventually he fell asleep.
The next morning Eddie awoke and felt no sign of the eerie presence from the night before. He got up and immediately noticed that the storm had passed and the morning sun was shining through the curtains. Groggy and a bit shaken, Eddie splashed some water on his face and began to rummage through the fridge for something to eat.
He was just debating whether he wanted to cook his eggs and bacon over the fire or if the firewood was too damp when there were a loud knock at the door. Eddie jumped and almost soiled his pants. No one had even shown up unannounced way out here on a Saturday.
“Eddie, it’s Jim, your mom’s friend from work. Are you in there?”
Eddie recognized the voice. His mom worked in dispatch for the local police department. Eddie, being a bit of a trouble maker in a small town, knew the members of the force both from family BBQ’s and from his own personal run-ins.
Eddie let out a breath and relaxed a bit, but then it hit him – Why was Jim out here so early on a Saturday?
Thinking something might be wrong at home, Eddie rushed to the door and unlocked it.
“Hey Jim, is everything okay? Why are you out here?”
“Morning Eddie, everything is fine, but your mom sent me to pick you up and bring you home this morning.” Jim looked around the cabin. He was in his uniform and Eddie could make out his cruiser a few yards away. Eddie noticed Jim was subconsciously fingering his weapon.
“I think you’re mistaken Jim. I’m not supposed to be going home until next weekend and Mom said that she was going to come out to pick me up.” Eddie took a step back and watched Jim’s face as he surveyed the tiny cabin.
“I know that was the original plan, Eddie, but we all think it’s best that you get your things and come with me.” Jim stood in the door with the face of a man who was not to be questioned. The hair’s on Eddie’s arms stood up and he had no choice but to agree and begin to pack up his belongings.
As they packed the car, Eddie could have sworn he was a set of shoe prints that made a trail around his cabin.
After driving in silence for a few minutes Jim casually began asking Eddie what he had been up to last night.
“Did you go out at all or just stay by the fire?” Jim asked, his eyes watching Eddie through the rearview mirror.
“I was by the fire, but they went in side when it started to rain. That storm was starting, so I didn’t want to be caught out in it.”
“It must get a bit creepy out there all alone during a storm”, Jim said. That’s when Eddie remembered the tapping at the window and the strange rustling sounds.
“Actually, it’s usually fine, but last night I got a bit of a scare. Just as the storm was starting, I think an animal or something was walking around my site. Probably a coyote or a fox that smelled my supper.” Eddie’s eyes locked with Jim’s.
“Did you see anything?” Jim asked.
“No. At first I thought it was some of the local kids that I had kicked out of the lake a couple weeks ago. Thought maybe they were playing a bit of a prank on me in return, but the rain was starting to pick up, so I decided to stay in the cabin and pretend I didn’t notice.” Not wanted to sound like a wimp in front of one of his mom’s coworkers in the force, Eddie lied about the chills he had experienced.
“That’s probably for the better.” Jim said. “They usually go away if you ignore them”.
The rest of the ride was silent. Eddie drifted to sleep for a little while and when he awoke they were pulling into the driveway of his parents house. His mom was standing on the front steps when they got there.
“Eddie!” His mom called as he was getting out of the car. “Come inside, I have coffee and breakfast ready”.
“Thanks mom, just let me get my things from the trunk.”
“Just leave them for now. Jim is going to join us for breakfast. You can get your things after we talk.” His mom turned and disappeared into the house. A little confused, but hungry from having missed his morning meal, Eddie shrugged and walked toward the house. Jim locked the car and followed close behind.
Eddie sat at the kitchen table and was greeted with a plate of hot pancakes with bacon and a fresh cup of coffee. Eddie began to eat but noticed that Jim and his mom were only drinking coffee.
After a couple minutes of pleasantries Eddie was starting to get annoyed.
“Why did you pick me up early mom? And if you’re home, why did you send Jim out to get me? Mom, what’s going on!?”.
“Eddie,” his mother said his nice calmly yet firmly in the way only a mother can, as she rested her hand on this arm. He stopped and looked at her. What she said next still gives my husband a pit in his stomach to this day.
“Three people were found dead within a mile of that camp early this morning, just as the storm was clearing.” The words sounded distant in Eddie’s ears.
“What do you mean? Like a car accident?” Eddie was confused but starting to get nervous.
“A man was found dead at the bottom of a radio tower a half mile up to road. We don’t know how he got in there, but it looks like he tried to climb it and fell off.”
Eddie’s eyes widened.
“About a half a mile in the other direction, a young man and woman, about your age Eddie, were found dead. The woman was in the house and the man was found in the back yard. They were both stabbed to death. We found no evidence of a break in.” Jim told this part of the story. He watched Eddie to gauge his reaction.
Suddenly Eddie’s pancakes didn’t taste to good any more and he felt a knot build in his stomach.
“So, you came to get me because you were afraid I might be dead too.” Eddie said this slowly and looked at both his mother and officer Jim.
“Did you hear or see anything strange last night, Eddie?” His mother tightened to grip on his arm and looked into his eyes. He glanced at officer Jim who gave an emotionless stare back.
“Yeah. I was telling Jim that I heard what I thought was an animal rummaging around by the fire after I went to bed. It didn’t go away and I thought it might be some of the local kids. I was going to check it out, but the rain was heavy and I thought they would go away if I stayed inside and ignored them.”
“Thank god you did.” Eddie’s mom hugged him and tried her best to hold back tears. Eddie hugged his mom back. His breath shallow from the shock.
Had he almost been one of the victims of this murder? Had the murderer tried to hide out at the camp after brutally slaying the young couple up the road? If Eddie hadn’t gone inside when he did, would he have been murdered while he sat by his fire?
Eddie’s thought were spinning so fast that he didn’t even notice Jim get up and leave. It was a half hour later when his mother calmed down enough for Eddie to realize that Jim had driven off with his things.
“Mom, you need to call Jim, my things are in his car!”
“I’ll call the station and let them know”. Eddie’s mom didn’t seem surprised that Jim had left without saying goodbye. She just went to the phone and called the station.
“Hi Gale, it’s Penny. Eddie was wondering when Jim will be back with his bags.” At the time, Eddie didn’t notice that his mother hadn’t had to explain the situation to her coworkers in dispatch. Wouldn’t they be wondering why Jim had Eddie’s bags in the car?
Jim eventually came back on his way home after his shift. He dropped Eddie’s stuff off, gave him a squeeze on the shoulder, and said “take care of yourself, kid. It was smart of you not to open that door last night.”
It wasn’t until looking back on the incident 5 years later that Eddie realized Jim had come to pick him up for two reasons. Either, after receiving the call about the three deaths, they were all afraid that Eddie, out there alone in the food with no way to call for help, mate the same fate as the poor souls who lost their lives during that storm, OR, Eddie himself had been the one who had stabbed a young man and his wife to death in their own home before murdering a third victim near a radio tower in the field adjacent to the camp.
Eddie isn’t certain, but when he counts the story, he seems to remember when he got his bags back they weren’t packed in the same way he had left them. He is convinced that his mother and the officers thought that we had been the perpetrator of the terrible crimes committed that stormy July night in southwestern Ontario.
They never did end up finding the killer.

She has no idea what she’s talking about in her most recent Disney World video. i’m a disney vacation club member and go twice a year. She called Na’Vi River Journey the “way of passage ride”… is she talking about Flight of Passage? Still the wrong ride from what she filmed. She also mentioned how Ellecee didn’t want to ride Space Mountain so she stayed with Kass instead 🤦🏼‍♀️ Space Mountain isn’t even in Animal Kingdom. Also they are such the type to eat at places like Pizzafari and Rainforest Cafe when there are SO MANY AMAZING RESTAURANTS in the park like Nomad Lounge, Yak & Yeti, Tiffins, Tusker House, Flame Tree BBQ, and more!! Stupid stupid stupid.

In this game I remember that you had to reach a isolated island full of secrets after you archeologist aunt(?) dies. I remember that there were 4 holy Mary statues that represented the 4 seasons and if you gave them a gem they would change the world to the according season. The order to fill them was (I think) spring winter fall and lastly summer. I remember the hardest puzzle was a circle of golden snakes that had to be rotated to form a code. The start was in front of the spring statue and right after there were 3 path, left one lead to a pond, middle one to a tree house and right I really can’t remember maybe some medieval riuns(?). The ending was in a lab under the start and I remember being a small isolated island who was unlocked by walking on a trail of stones just above the water and a puzzle in which you had to break some vase(?). I played it a lot during my childhood and I’d love to play it again. Thank in advance for the help

My DE started about 18 months ago. Having never had anything close to this before I had no clue what was happening. Very bad itching on hands spread to face, ears, and torso as It got worse. Many sleepless nights trying to make it through the itching. Some lotion from a friend helped me get through this first event. One of the items was a steroid creme and wool wax creme. They had been through something similar. This same thing occurred about a month later with worse symptoms. Similar method of treating it helped but not as much as before. This continued pretty much constant though varying degrees for a couple months. This led me to see a dermatologist who diagnosed it quickly as Dyshidrosis Eczema. They prescribed Clobetasol (100$ a tube!). But it didn't really do much. By this point I was using Wool Wax creme to help with the dry hands. It did help with the dry skin during the "calming down" stage of DE. I returned to tbt dermatologist to seek more help but got no suggestions that would lead to why this happeneded. Again another event with this a few months later in the Fall. This latest through December. When it reoccurred by this spring I finally called an allergy doctor. The 62 pin test showed no surprises for me. Trees, grass, weeds, mold, dust all were positive. But this couldn't be it. Allergies with those had always bothered me but the symptoms had changed. So we did the patch test. The one result from that which caught my eye was a contact allergy to cobalt which can be found in some supplements. This caused me to look at a nature made multi vitamin that has vitamin B12 in it. The vitamin B12 is as Cyanocobalamin which has cobalt dichloride. Now it isn't cobalt chloride which is what the paper from the doctor says can be one variant that is a contact allergy for me. After a phone conversation with them I have decided to stop taking it and see if it returns or not. I didn't think of the supplements as a source of this problem and probably wouldn't have gotten here this fast without the patch test.
Hopefully my experience helps some others in some way. And I am not one to go to the doctor all the time. It took this extremely wierd thing for me to go to this extent. You never know what it could be.

So I’ve been trying to remember the title of this book for the longest time. This was a zombie book. It started out with the guy escaping prison with other survivors. He was fixing a car to use for an escape and got bitten by a zombie. The group leaves him because they assume that he will succumb to the infection. They leave him with a gun and a couple of rounds. He ends up finding an rv which is supposed to be the place that he will die. But before he can shoot himself he passes out do to the fever. A few days later he wakes up and realizes he’s not a zombie. Then he walks into the woods and finds out the group that left him got destroyed. He then finds a tree house with a giant in it who is also super smart and they share a couple beers and try to survive together until a group of humans discover them and force them to run away. They become pretty much inseparable after this. Sorry for my vague recollection of how this went but I hope someone can tell me the title of this book.

A heavy mist settled on the cemetery, just as it always had when we were children. Thwack! I ran straight into another headstone and fell into the mud, breathless. Scrambling to my feet, I looked behind me, hoping that whatever was chasing me had gone off somewhere else.
It was a mistake to come back to Endeavor for my 25 year reunion. I swore I’d never step foot in this town again, with its three block main street where everyone was either a drunk, an abuser, or a holier-than-the saints-themselves wannabe street preacher, or some combination of all of the above.
How the hell do I get out of this cemetery?
I’d gotten drunk, but not so drunk that I shouldn’t have been able to find my way out, even in this heavy mist. It descended as soon as we kicked over Mr. Grantz’ headstone, that old, blustering asshole. He deserved some sort of retribution after the shit he put kids through for decades in this town. He was Mister Evangelical himself, somehow granted the right to stuff his convoluted ideologies on us in the place of an actual science education.
After we turned a bit tipsy Derrick, Anne, Roger, and I decided to leave the bar that was hosting the reunion to stagger out to the cemetery one last time — pay homage to our old midnight refuge. What better way to relive our inglorious days?
Damn! I hit my knee on another headstone. I just wanted out, an escape from this hellhole. “I’ll go home and never bother this place again!” I shouted into the mist.
Derrick played football — still as skinny and probably at least half as fast as that knobby-elbowed teenager who was practically chased out of town for not scoring a winning touchdown to get us to state. Anne was the girl we were all in love with. She stayed in town and teaches history, or I'm sure as much actual history as she can get away with uttering aloud. Roger couldn’t do anything right, but could still get away with anything by his smile.
On June nights like this we’d always go hang out late at night drinking non-age-appropriate beverages at the Endeavor cemetery. It was about a half-mile walk on the train tracks from “town.” We’d all sneak out with our flashlights and walk there, sometimes solo, sometimes in pairs, and even then it sort of creeped me out to go it alone, walking on that path of lonesome steel between the walls of tall grass that swayed in the wind.
My alcohol tolerance had gone way down since I grew up and life stopped being about partying. Otherwise I would have been way too inhibited to let those old friends pry me back to the cemetery. Whose idea was this? It was Roger's ideas wasn't it?
The only good idea he had in his entire life is that we needed to get out of Endeavor.
Was I running in circles or something? I limped in a direction I believed had to be the way out. Tipsy, sure, but there’s no way I was drunk enough that I couldn’t find my way out of a small town cemetery.
In high school Roger has been spared, but the rest of us had been Mr. Grantz’ personal classroom punching bags, all because our families didn’t go to church, or didn’t go enough for Mr. Grantz’ liking. My heathen mother even had the gall to speak the word “evolution” in public once, so as far as the church folk were concerned (meaning nearly everyone) my family needed to be chased out of town.
Congratulations. Endeavor wasn't a paradise. It was a graveyard of aspiration.
So yeah, we stomped to the cemetery in the delirium of getting drunk together one last time in Endeavor after spending half our lives away from each other.
Derrick is the one who stumbled onto Mr. Grantz’ headstone. “Whoa!? That psychopath finally died. Hallelujah!” he yelled.
“Derrick!” Anne said, “I know you had your differences but that’s no reason to celebrate his passing. He was a human being.” She must have made her peace with the people of this town years ago. The rest of us did our real growing up once we got outside.
“Differences? Do you remember when I missed that touchdown, how it was because my family was unclean? He was the one who kept telling people we needed to go back to the old ways and they should burn me on a pyre for it. It was one bad play against a team of kids who were twice our size.” Derrick caught the wind in his throat, “It would be hard for me to mourn someone who wanted to kill a kid over a touchdown.”
“I gotta piss,” Roger said, smirking.
“No,” Anne said.
“See, even Roger wants to get this guy, and he wasn’t even one of Mr. Grantz’ targets.”
As they argued I swayed in the wind getting angrier and angrier remembering that old blowhard. Once, when I was having trouble sleeping, I fell to sleep on my desk in the middle of his science class, and he dropped a bowling ball on my desk to wake me up and “teach me a lesson.” It slid off the desk and landed on my foot breaking some small bones that never healed well and still bother me to this day.
“Let’s tip it over,” I said.
They all looked at me wide eyed, then grins spread over Derrick and Roger’s faces, devious in the moonlight.
“Hell yeah!” they agreed.
“You’re all going to hell for this,” Anne said, trying to stop them. But we were all already kicking at the marble headstone, trying to get it to budge from the Earth. My foot throbbed in that old familiar way, but this was worth it.
“Are you being serious, Anne? Are you a believer now? Don’t tell me this town got to you,” Derrick said.
“‘Got to me?’If that’s what you call growing up and getting over my youthful rebellious phase, then yes. Earl Grantz was a town hero. He only wanted the best for the people here and I can’t just let you desecrate his grave.”
Roger blocked Anne from stopping us while Derrick and I kept kicking the headstone. Hard and heavy, the thing didn’t want to budge. I got on its level and tried pushing it with my shoulder while Derrick kept kicking it.
After a minute I fell to the ground to rest.
Anne looked at me, “If you’re having a heart attack you deserve it. You don’t even know what will happen if you manage to knock that thing down. You don’t know what they’ll do.”
“Oh come on, I’m going to be out of this town for the rest of my life in about six hours. There’s nothing the community of Endeavor will be able to do to me ever again.”
“We’ll see about that,” she said.
I got back up and resumed kicking with Derrick who hadn’t stopped for a second. In fact, it was like he was getting stronger and stronger, maybe remembering more of Mr. Granz’ vitriolic outbursts. I could still see the old man with his white beard and loud, sharp face barrelling down at me for any perceived sleight.
“It’s starting to give,” Derrick said.
Then all at once, with one last kick the headstone cracked at its base and thudded over into the damp grass.
“Whoa, we did it.” Derrick took a step back.
We all stood there for a moment, struck by a kind of awe. That old man who had made things so hard for us in high school, he was really dead. He was dead in the ground and could never yell at us or throw bowling balls at us or set the entire town against us ever again. He was being eaten by worms. A sad meal. We’d survived him and this town.
I guess Anne was struck by a different kind of awe. Probably she was surprised at the audacity of her old friends, drunk and stupid in the cemetery. Whatever her feelings were, by the time I turned to look for her she’d already disappeared into the night.
We had a good laugh, the three of us, reunited for this taste of revenge. The headstone lay there in the barely tended grass and I thought of how pointless his attacks on us had been, the harassment, the ostracization, the constant preaching and withholding of an actual education — we were all doing fine to spite him. Derrick worked as head of sales at a sportswear company, I was the top non-profit tax whiz in my city, Roger had one of those vague program manager positions at an even more vague start-up gone big, and we all had families waiting for us at home. "Here lies a failure in life and death" is what the headstone should have read.
That’s when we heard it, a placeless whispering descended onto the cemetery.
It was as if the wind was made of barely audible voices, speaking in rolling anger that went on and on. And with it a dark mist fell on us.
“What the —” Roger said.
“It’s just the mist playing tricks on us, an auditory illusion,” Derrick said.
But up the back of my spine a tingling sensation had already started to warn me that something insidious was happening. Even when we were children, we’d joked about how the mist in the cemetery felt unnatural, but now it came on twice as quickly and it was twice as thick. I could barely see the others. “We should start making it back to our cars," I said.
"I don't remember the fog ever being this bad," Derrick said.
"We had actual flashlights with us. That might have made a difference," I offered. We only had the flashlights on our phones, and as the moments passed the mist deepened until they were nearly useless.
"Climate change," Roger said.
"Don't tell that one to Mr. Grantz," I said.
Laughing, Derrick stumbled on a small divet in the ground, rolling onto his back. I think he saw something then. I can’t say for sure, but as I looked down at him, my mind still blurred by the alcohol, I saw a serious fear drawn over his eyes, stifling his laughter. For a moment his lip quivered before he let out a scream that was swallowed by the thick country air. A column of mist poured into his mouth. It might have been the shock, but I thought in the mist I saw a torrent of pale hands forcing their way down his throat.
Derrick’s body convulsed. He shook harder and harder until the attack ceased and he sank, limp, into the ground.
“Help!” Roger screamed as he was pulled into the mist by something I couldn’t see.
I didn’t wait a moment longer. I didn’t try to stay and help my friends or check to see if Derrick was still alive. I bolted. Whatever that was in the mist, if I could put some distance between myself and it, maybe I could get out of this cemetery, follow the traintracks back to town, get back into my Honda Civic and drive away from this godforsaken town.
The mumbling whispers grew louder behind me, but I didn’t dare look. I’d give anything just to make it out of this cemetery. This was a stupid night. I never should have come back, but I wasn’t going to let this drunken mistake leave my children to grow up without a father.
Sorry Derrick, I thought. Sorry Roger. And, what in the hell happened to Anne? What was it she said, we didn’t know what they’ll do? Is that what’s happening now?
I ran until my lungs burned, bumping into headstones left and right. This place wasn’t a labyrinth. How was it that I hadn’t gotten out of it by now? The cemetery couldn’t be bigger than a couple few city blocks. Hardly anyone lived in Endeavor to begin with. It didn’t take much space to house their dead. How many of these people have been completely forgotten to time by now? How many of them were succeeded only by children like me, children who they chased out of town. How many of them had bigoted, evil hearts like Mr. Grantz?
My knee smacked on something hard, another headstone, and I cried out. I could hardly move anymore from all the bruises I’d just taken. But I limp-ran in desperation, my hurt leg skidding on the ground. The mist was close behind me. I could feel it wet on the back of my neck, but I knew I only needed to make it a little further.
An exposed tree root caught my foot and I tumbled to the ground, my head knocking against something hard. I frantically crawled back toward my feet but I kept falling back down. I wasn’t seeing straight. Why is this happening to me? I swore I’d never come back.
It was Anne that reached out to us all. She’d wanted to bring the old gang back together for the reunion. Over half the class had stayed in town after graduation, but the rest of us had left Endeavor, and from what I gathered none of us spared a look back. Why didn’t we ever think of how that would have felt for Anne? She didn’t have the same agency as the rest of us. Heck, her parents had threatened to pull her from school and homeschool her in their traditional way. Of course she ended up like this. We were her lifeline.
Damn it!
Every time I tried to get up I twisted some other muscle and collapsed back to the ground. I’d never put my body through something like this before, especially after the age of forty. I’d already been dreading the day-long hangover I saw in my future as we left the bar, but at this rate I’d be lucky to be able to walk — that is, if I even got out of this cemetery alive.
Anne had gone to the trouble of mailing us each nice, handwritten letters on stationary inviting us to the reunion. She wanted everyone to get together. It was incredibly thoughtful of her. Apparently she’d worked with all the others to make sure everyone else who’d abandoned Endeavor had an invitation. Of course, not everyone came, but most of the class made it.
We met at Freddy’s, an old country dive we’d never been able to get into before. In Endeavor everybody knows everybody, so there’s no sneaking into bars with a fake id.
I’d been in city dives, but Freddy’s was something else. It reminded me more of a barn where bats would live in the rafters than a bar — a big open space with tables strung about here and there, a pool table near the corner, dust counting the years on the floor. Just my guess, but I don’t think the owner knows what the flooring is made of, that’s how often it looked like it’d been cleaned. Still, it was nice coming back and seeing this part of Endeavor we’d always wondered about.
The folks that stayed in town welcomed us back in, but it was obvious there was a sort of familiarity and camaraderie among them that the rest of us would never have again — the kind of camaraderie that comes from spending forty years with the same small group of people, of having small town secrets and knowing all the things in a human life that can go unsaid.
It was Anne’s idea to go to the cemetery, wasn’t it?
She could tell we were all a bit uncomfortable and wanted to catch up more privately. As always, she was the sensitive person who could tell what we were all feeling and gave us direction. There was a time when I was young when I thought I’d grow up to marry her — funny to think of it now, that I pictured my life in Endeavor, of scraping out an existence in this place that now seemed so desolate, an isolated island away from everything that truly mattered to me. I’m sure Derrick and Roger felt like that too. Did Anne think about us like that? In her imagination, had she pictured the future with each of us, trying us on like coats, only to be abandoned in the end.
The mist had gotten so deep I couldn’t see where I was going, though I’d slowed to a crawl. My hand felt something cold and hard on the ground. I pulled myself close and I saw the inscription, “Here lies Earl Grantz.” After all that running I was back at Mr. Grantz’ headstone where I’d started.
I lifted myself to my feet and noticed two long shapes beside me on the ground. Derrick and Roger. My heart dropped. Something had dragged them back.
A cold hand grabbed onto my hair and pulled my head back. The mist poured into my open mouth like a thousand frozen beads of pain. I tried to scream, but it kept pouring into me as I collapsed to the damp dirt on my already bruised and skinned knees. Stop! Please, I can’t take any more! I wanted to beg. It kept going until I lost consciousness.
I awakened to the sun already high in the sky, my whole body throbbing with pain. Derrick was nudging me with his foot.
“Good,” he gasped, “we’re all alive then.”
“What? What just happened?” I asked.
He stood above me with Roger. Alive. Somehow after the events of last night we’d made it to the morning in the land of the living. I didn’t orphan my kids.
“I saw the mist get you, both of you. I ran, but I couldn’t escape the cemetery,” I said.
“All I know is that I’m getting out of here and I’m not looking back,” Roger said.
“I’m with ya.” Derrick helped me up to my feet.
Neither of them was as outwardly hurt as I knew I was. I could feel every scrape and bruise down to my bones, not to mention the hangover. “What about Anne?” I asked.
“No sign of her.”
Before we limped back to town I pulled out my cellphone to see the worried messages from my wife. She assumed I’d only gotten drunk and let my phone die. I sent her a selfie of my swollen face and said that last night hadn’t gone as planned, but I was on my way home — desperate to get out of godforsaken Endeavor — and would explain everything to her. How could I explain this? I can’t even explain it to myself.
I told the others about the events of last night after I’d lost them, and they nodded, listening. None of us had anything resembling a logical explanation.
My phone dinged with a message. “I’m glad you’re safe! I was so worried. But are you using some sort of filter? Your eyes are green in this picture.”

So my landlord hired tree trimmers and I just went to go pick up groceries and noticed they have tools against my hitch mount and bike tire and there’s a chainsaw under my bike. I bought my bike brand new 2 weeks ago so I’m pretty pissed but might be over reacting. Is this normal? My yard is huge so there’s really no reason to put tools there. They have 4 vehicles in my yard and space for plenty more. I move my car to the street and I moved my bike there because it’s in-between the cellar and the house and by no trees at all so I thought it would be safe. Not bike related but they also had a tree laying on my dogs pool which I moved and they blocked the front door which they saw me leave from with tree limbs when I came back from groceries and they were just having lunch.

We're talking about the same level as the Magic Tree House books, for reference. I'm looking for a book written from the perspective of a real person. Not just facts about the person's life, but something written either in the first person ("I...") or historical fiction about a real person so that it makes you feel like you're living their life instead of just reading some information about it.
Any suggestions?

Hey! I’m 21M studying Economics. I have a budget of around 700-900 and I’m looking for preferably a lease that will last until next year. Also would prefer to have my own bathroom. Any offers Appreciated!

Y’all tree near two story house is being used by squirrel to jump on my roof. Looking to get it cut down.
Anyone got a person who is reasonably priced and good?

Getting ready to renovate my front yard and am looking for ideas. What yard trees do you all like? Preferably something flowery in spring and with a lengthy “orange” period on fall. And NO RED MAPLES!!!