By YungSeti aka Adam Abdur-Rahman
The ringing chime of my doorbell pierced the fog of sleep, carried through the otherwise silent
house with an echo that stirred eerie thoughts in my partially dreaming mind.
I almost slept through it when –
**THUD. THUD. THUD.**
The unmistakable sound of knocking, three urgent raps against my door, forced away the last of
my haze of sleep.
“Lucy?” I muttered, voice hoarse with sleep, waving lazily to bat my girlfriend awake.
My hand met nothing but the air, falling into the empty bed beside me, sparking a sudden rush
of confusion that immediately gave way to recollection. She’d left for a business trip on the other
side of the country that morning, and wouldn’t be back for another day or so.
I was alone.
I rose reluctantly, doing my best to rub the feeling of sandpaper from beneath my eyelids as I
peered with bleary vision at my nightstand.
*3:13*, the old clock on my nightstand read, its letters coming into view as my vision adjusted.
*Who the fuck would be here at this time?*
I had never received a visitor so late since we’d moved in, and I felt a wisps of unease wafting
through the fog of fatigue. .
*You’re a big girl, Melissa. You can handle late-night visitors without your wife.* I told myself,
doing my best to keep the instinctive rush of anxiety at bay. I still felt somewhat new here,
having only move to the small town of Cold Lake, Illinois a year prior, and while I enjoyed the
small-town life, I didn’t feel quite as familiar yet.
Still, who the *hell* would be here at this time?
I scored my memory of the night before, my mind still groggy from the few hours of sleep I’d
managed, until all at once it clicked. I’d fallen asleep the night prior doing my usual social media
surfing, trying to stay awake while waiting for the pizza I’d ordered myself for dinner that night. I
realized I must have drifted off at some point. At least two hours had passed from what I could
recall, and I realized at some point I must have drifted off to sleep.
I blinked, confusion blooming.
I’d ordered around 9 PM at the latest. Had they been knocking there for a while? No, I wouldn’t
have slept through that, and if anything they’d have just left my food to freeze on my porch.
I sat up. The room was dark, the errant rays of moonlight and the glow from the nearest street
lamp seeping in through the closed shutters only just preventing total blindness.
**THUD. THUD. THUD.**
The knocking again, thunderous in the silence of the night, followed by the chime of the
doorbell.
I searched the sheets for my phone, finding it under my pillow, my hand moving somewhat
blindly until the notification popped up on the screen.
**Movement front door.**
When we moved in, my wife had insisted that we install one of those doorbell security camera
systems to connect to our phones after seeing one too many internet videos of home invasions,
and I didn’t disagree. On nights like this, when her job required she be out of town for days at a
time, I found it a particular comfort to be able to see who was at our door without having to
actually greet them.
Another set of knocking made me jump.
The final strands of sleep had been tugged from my mind, and a cloud began to mass in my
chest. From somewhere outside, one of our neighbor’s dogs began to bark, filling me with a
familiar sense of anxiety about being a nuisance.
I couldn’t imagine a logical reason why the food I’d ordered at nine something the night before
would be arriving now, nor why the driver would make such a disruption so late at night. A
creeping sense of disquiet began to take root.
Rather than physically answer the door, I elected to check the doorbell camera.
There was something heavy in the air, a strange surrealness that clung to everything like a fog,
giving it an awful dream-like feeling. My fingers raced across the screen unlocking my phone
and opening the app. Something about having such an unexpected clamor wake my mind from
the borders of sleep at such an odd hour made everything feel strangely dream-like.
Anxious anticipation twisted knots in my stomach as the live camera loaded, each spin of the
gray swirl at the center seemingly making the nauseating sensation of butterflies in my stomach
multiply. Finally, it loaded. The video sparking to life on my screen.
“Oh.” I breathed.
My heart dropped in response, a deep pit forming in my chest. I felt an icy chill raise
goosebumps along my skin in immediate response to the *person* I saw on the camera.
On the front stoop of our house, stood a man, something immediately unsettling in his
appearance.
He was tall, nearly towering out of frame despite leaning forward to meet the camera. The top
half of his head was hidden beneath the brim of the dirty baseball cap he wore, filthy blond hair
thick with grease sticking out from the sides, the fading logo emblazoned on the front of it at the
center of the camera – in bold lettering atop a cartoonish illustration of a pizza.
**’Joh y’s Pizza’**
It read, some of the text covered in dark stains, and I instantly recognized the name of the pizza
place I’d ordered from hours before, Johnny’s Pizza, a local place that had become a favorite of
ours.
What I could see of his skin appeared *sickly*…almost translucent, even in the gray-green tint
of the camera’s night vision, and…*stretched*, as though his face it didn’t quite fit the head it
was on.
His thin lips were pulled back into a small, cracked grin stretched across his thin lips never once
wavering as he stood swaying lightly on ungainly legs like stilts.
I tried to shake the reaction. Surely the poor man must suffer from some condition, perhaps he’d
been burned. A part of me felt awful for the initial response, yet no matter how hard I tried, I
couldn’t shake the alarm bells his appearance set off.
A name tag hung pinned to his shirt, reading “**Hi, my name is – Phillip**”.
He stood, arms stretched forward, one clutching a red canvas delivery bag, like the kind I’d seen
plenty of times before – though far dirtier than usual, covered in unidentifiable dark blotches,
bulging out as though it had been stuffed to the brim, the other remained pressed against my
front door off frame.
Everything about him was alarming, that smile making my skin crawl. He looked young, but his
skin seemed dry and stretched as though he’d gone through some sort of horribly botched
surgery and everything had been pulled back.
**THUD. THUD. THUD.**
Another few thunderous knocks broke the eerie silence setting the neighbors dog into another
brief frenzy.
I was fully awake now, primal discomfort gnawing at my nerves as I racked my mind for an idea
of what to do. I was awful in emergency situations, and while there was technically no
emergency yet, my mind was already entering panic mode.
Yet another ring nearly made me jump from my skin, sustained this time, as the man held the
button down for almost a minute, the urgency of his attempts increasing.
“Hello?”
I spoke into my phone before I could think better of it, voice shaking despite my best attempts.
As ridiculous as it is in hindsight, my immediate focus ceasing the clamor before it woke the
neighbors. Had I been thinking clearly, perhaps I’d have seen the benefit in that and considered
against alerting the strange man to my presence.
His head tweaked to the right just a bit adopting an odd tilt, the grin stretching slightly. The skin
around his mouth seemed to…rip at points, painful red cuts appearing from the cracked skin.
“*Hel – lo,*” he spoke, an unusual crackle of distortion in the audio accompanying his words. His
voice… it sounded *wrong*, hollow and raw as if from disuse.
I shuddered, an icy chill traveling through my bones raising goosebumps along my skin.
His speech was jilted and unusual, as though he were simply repeating something he’d heard
before in an unfamiliar tongue.
“*I – h-ha – ve de – livery*.” he almost hissed the words, raising the bag out for the camera to
see. I could see it leaking, liquid which was indiscernible on camera, dripped from the bottom of
the filthy canvas bag.
The grin wavered slightly as he spoke, the corners of his mouth twitching as though he were
struggling not not to smile outright.
My heart and mind raced in unison. My resolve buckling under the growing sense of disquiet.
Perhaps I was being crazy, the late hour and fact that I was alone making my mind run with
paranoia, but something about how late he was arriving, paired with his strange appearance
and even stranger behavior…I didn’t want whatever he’d brought me, especially not directly
from him.
Not to mention that *bag*. The more I looked at it the less it looked like it held the singular
cheese pizza I’d ordered, clearly full to the brim with something that was leaking profusely.
“I don’t need it anymore, thanks. I made that order a couple of hours ago,” I did my best to
inject confidence in my tone that I didn’t feel.
“It’s paid for already and I included a tip so, you can just take it, sorry for the trouble.”
He tilted his head more, as though he were trying to mimic an owl, his grin stretching into a
full-blown smile now, making visible two rows of abnormally large teeth, seemingly covered in
rot and cavity by the dark splotches visible on the camera.
“*No…no, I’m sorry for the* ***trouble****,*” his tone was odd and uneven as if he were just
repeating the words he’d heard back at me, that voice like gravel dripping with malevolent
humor.
“*I have delivery. C – come get delivery.*”
My breath caught in my throat for a moment, as a cold spasm of fear washed over me at that.
“I don’t want it,” I spoke through gritted teeth to stop the shaking of my voice from being heard.
“If you have to drop it off for policy or whatever, then leave it and go. Please.”.
“*Y – you have to op – en the door*. *Come get your delivery.* ” his voice came odd and warbled,
sounding for a moment as though he were mocking my words. He
An idea emerged amidst the panic, a last-ditch effort at avoiding having to go to the door.
I checked the camera, finding the man standing there, closer than before, his crooked smile all
that was visible of his face now, a row of unusually long, wide teeth stained with what seemed
like cavities filling his mouth. I took some security in the fact that he hadn’t moved from the door,
at least there I could keep an eye on him.
Opening the phone again, I scrolled through the calls of the night prior, redialing the number for
Johnny’s Pizza.
The call was answered after a few rings.
“Johnny’s Pizza, John speaking, how can I help you?” An older man spoke into the phone,
weariness woven into his tone.
“Yes, hi, I’d -” I paused, not quite sure of what to say for a moment.
*Fuck it.* I thought.
I told him everything, all about his employees unusual behavior, and the odd feeling I was
getting from him, apologizing in the off chance that he was suffering from some ailment.
“Is – is there something wrong with him?” I finally asked.
He paused for several moments, and I could hear the clacking of a keyboard on the other end.
“One medium cheese, at…9:13, that’s you?”
“Yes,” I responded quickly.
The man started ringing the doorbell again.
“And he just got there? Hm..” the man coughed, flicking a lighter on the other end.
“It’s – it’s Phillip, right?” he asked, sounding incredulous.
I thought back to the name tag.
“Yes, yes it is.”
“That – that don’t sound like Phillip. Little guy is squeaky clean, one of the most dependable
employees I’ve had in a while, only one not hopped up on some garbage on the late nights.”
*Little guy*? That was far from the word I’d used to describe the towering scarecrow of a man on
my front porch.
Still, he sounded genuinely worried, and I couldn’t tell whether his words should quell or
intensify my fears.
“I’ve been trying to reach the little guy for a while now. Just figured he’d gone awol on me, not
uncommon with the work ethic of this generation but, it seemed odd for him. And you’re saying
he arrived just recently?”
“Yeah, a little after three a.m. I – I think he may be on something, his skin looks sickly and his
hair looks covered in sweat or grease or something and – .”
“Oh – oh lord,” John interrupted, the sudden shift in his tone made my heart drop, fear palpable
in his voice.
“His eyes, what do his eyes look like? Does he blink?”
My stomach twisted into cold knots at the question. I wracked my mind for an answer, and –
realizing I had none – quickly moved the phone from my ear, opening the camera app.
Sudden coils of shock and horror seized in my chest.
The man stood mere inches from the camera, his face filling the screen to horrific effect. His
*eyes*, I could feel the urge to hyperventilate taking hold my heart racing painfully.
“Jesus Christ, there’s something wrong with them,” I spoke frantically, as I watched the
unblinking nightmare of a face.
“They’re small and dark, there’s nothing, no white – nothing.”
They were like those of a shark, two small points amongst the canvas of papery skin, obsidian
black and oddly far apart.
Despite the lack of iris’, I could somehow feel his gaze burned through the screen, that smile,
though unchanged, suddenly somehow far more menacing.
Dread was beginning to overwhelm me wholly, that face breeding such visceral feelings of
horror the likes of which I’d only known in nightmare.
“I’m sorry ma’am, I truly am. But I can’t help you, dear lord, you shouldn’t have called here.”
“What? What the fuck do you mean he’s your employee? What’s going on I need-”
“I’m sorry, dear lord I truly am,” he interrupted, his tone firm, and apologetic, but tinged with a
level of fear that seemed almost equal to my own.
I could feel the questions piling up, the dam ready to burst.
“But I can’t help you, I may be in grave danger now just talking to you…who knows with those
*things*.”
“What are you talking about? Please, you’re kind of freaking me out more, what things?”
“I’ve owned this business for a long time, lived in this town even longer, heard a lot of strange
things, seen a few that have aged me faster. ”
I wanted to dismiss his words as some small-town superstitious garbage, but the stark
seriousness with which he spoke made it clear to me that he was very serious.
“I’m sorry ma’am but, that thing at your door? *It ain’t Phillip anymore*, and I can’t help you.
Please don’t call here again, I’m sure it’s already listening, lord help us both if it is, I’m truly
sorry, and good luck.”
With that, the call ended with a chime. I sat there for several long moments, feeling almost like I
was falling. My hand shook, the phone still beside my face, eyes locked on the ground ahead,
mind racing with strange, and terrifying thoughts, utterly shellshocked.
I wasn’t sure what I’d expected but that wasn’t it. The call had left me shaken in a way I can’t
quite express, the idea that I wasn’t dealing with someone but some*thing* petrified me.
*It ain’t Phillip anymore?* What did that mean? Was he on some fucked up drug or was it
something worse? Whatever the case any doubts I’d had about whether or not he may be
violent vanished at the horror in the man’s voice.
Another ring, long and sustained as though he was holding down the bell, pierced the silence
that fell between the fits of knocking.
A cold mass of dread settled in my gut. I opened the security camera.
The skin seemed to… pulse and contort at points, as though there were some unheard of
muscles spasming wildly beneath.
The man, that *thing*, grit its teeth from side to side, and I could see just how impossibly large
they were, as though meant for the mouth of a creature three times his size, a mouthful of
massive dull incisors grinding back and forth.
Finally, he spoke, and I almost felt as though I may pass out, the panic reaching a fever pitch.
“*I – I’m in grave – grave danger, – you shouldn’t ha-ve called*.”
It was as though two voices came from one body at first, his dry, inhuman tone mixing with a
voice at first like some eerie parody of the man I’d just spoken to, quickly improving with each
syllable, clunky at first, but by the end, it was almost indistinguishable.
The only audible difference was the sheer maliciousness dripping from every word.
“This isn’t happening,” I muttered to myself in vain, the impossibility of what I was hearing hitting
like a physical blow.
How could he have known I was calling someone? That aside, his voice…that was more than a
mere impression, he had spoken with the man’s exact voice. The increasingly unavoidable
realization that my night had somehow drifted into the realm of paranormal made my stomach
turn. I felt as though I might vomit.
“*Op – en door, or, I c – come inside.*”
Had I not been operating on survival mode, I may have thought against another call, given how
the last unfolded, but at that moment I felt almost cornered, and getting help was my only
concern.
I opened the phone again, pausing for several moments considering whether to call my wife or
the police, another series of raucous knocking making the decision for me.
I dialed 911, getting the number ready but making sure not to call, switching back to the security
app.
Fear betrayed the confidence I tried to portray, my voice shaking despite my effort.
“Listen, the police are coming, I’ve already called them. Just take your shit and go you fucking
creep.”
He laughed. A callous and unearthly sound that twisted my stomach into a heavy knot of dread,
dripping with malevolent glee at my remark. His body quaked with his shrieking laughter, as
though what I’d said had brought unbridled joy. In an instant, his head snapped into the upright
position with a sickening *pop*.
I felt ill. The skin moved like there was something beneath it, as though he were smiling or
frowning beneath it as it clung to his face.
I shuddered at the uncanniness of it, something about his face triggering a primal unease. Was
he wearing a *mask*? No, it couldn’t be, I could tell that was human skin as pale and lifeless as
it may seem.
“*No,*” it cackled in that dry voice, “*No – one is coming. I have de -livery.*”
The blood in my veins froze. I switched back to the phone screen, clicking the call button and
switching it to the speaker.
The passing of every second was marked by the pounding of my heartbeat in my head as I
waited for the phone to ring.
Seconds passed with nothing but silence on the other end, and I could feel a sense of panic that
was almost suffocating starting to arise before I heard a sudden click on the other end followed
by a voice.
“Hello?” The dispatcher calmly.
Relief flooded through me like cool water over a burn at the sound of the woman’s voice on the
other end, though I felt an odd tweak of confusion at the casual nature of her answer.
“Y -Yes hi, I’d like to report a,” I searched for the proper term. “A disturbance?” I spoke
somewhat unsure.
The line buzzed with a crackle of electronic interference.
“There’s a man at my door, I think he’s a pizza guy, and he’s been banging and knocking and
ringing for a while now. I ordered it last night and I told him to leave it at the door because
something just seems off about this guy. But he won’t leave until I come to the door and -”
I paused, realizing I was beginning to ramble from the panic. I composed myself and did my
best to detail the events of the night leading up to my call.
“I *see* ma’am, this sounds *very* serious,” she interjected. She sounded humorous,
almost…mocking? Her tone was a far cry from the firm seriousness I’d come to expect from
television shows and movies.
Was she really not taking this seriously? I felt a flash of anger amidst the fear. Nothing I’d told
her was at all far-fetched, and I truly wasn’t in a mood for convincing, I just wanted help on the
way immediately.
“Is there anyone else in the house with you, ma’am?” her overly cheerful voice carried a robotic
tint, the call’s connection seemingly poor.
“No, I’m alone.”
“I see.” She said, and something in the way she spoke raised my hackles, an exaggerated
exuberance in every word as though she were talking to a child.
“Well, perhaps you ought to answer the door ma’am. I’m sure he’ll leave once he’s completed
his delivery.” She said, laughing casually before finishing.
“We’ve all got jobs to do after all.”
It was like being struck by a physical blow, my mind reeled at the response. I opened my mouth
but found myself at a loss for a moment, taken aback by the unexpected response. I stared at
the phone as though it would provide me with a physical answer, and for the first time since the
call had started, the phone came to life with the movement.
As I saw the words on the screen, my heart plummeted and I could feel my blood turn to ice.
**Call Failed.**
The words sat on the white screen above the number 911, my head spinning as I saw them.
“Ma’am?” the friendly voice of the dispatcher came from over the phone, suddenly seeming far
more sinister than before.
My hand shook uncontrollably, worsening the more I tried to stop it, as confusion gave way to
cold, mind-numbing dread.
“You should answer the door. He has a delivery, and he’s not going to leave until you’ve
accepted it.” She spoke, and that overly sweet voice dripped with a sinister venom, and as I
listened I realized I could hear something else behind it, another voice, familiar though I’d only
heard it for the first time that night.
She spoke in unison, her saccharine tone blended with the raspy voice in an awful union.
“It could be much worse for you if you don’t.”
The threat was punctuated by more pounding at the door, this time without end. The clamorous
knocking combined with the audible thud of my own heart, the sheer horror of what I was
experiencing only compounded.
It was like a waking nightmare, each passing event more inexplicable than the last until
eventually, I knew I was undeniably dealing with something out of the ordinary. I’d never really
thought too much about the supernatural one way or the other before.
I didn’t dismiss all the stories I’d heard, but I couldn’t quite say I believed them either, but I as I
sat on my bed, my mind racing with questions like a babbling brook, I knew now that whatever
was at my door was something inhuman.
I could think of few other options, and the fact that, inevitably, I’d have to confront that man,
that…*thing* at my door crashed over me in tidal waves. The thought of calling Lucy came
across my mind, but I dismissed it immediately. I refused to hear it speaking in her voice, I knew
it would push me over the edge of panic, long past the point of rational thought. I may have
been already.
I rose from the bed, darting to the closet and rifling through clothes until I found what I was
looking for. Tucked into a corner, hidden behind one of the still packed boxes, was my wife’s gun
safe. It had been among her insisted security measures now that we were living in our own
house, and I was thankful for it now.
I racked my mind for the code, the incessant banging l returning like some awful chime
somehow raising the already suffocating tension with each passing second. I punched in a few
options, and on the third, it clicked open and I removed the familiar handgun and the
accompanying clip.
Using it was a last resort, I had never trained with it as much as Lucy, for whom weekend trips to
the range had become something of a leisure activity, and was only partially confident I could hit
anything with it but it was better than nothing.
Still, the thought of using it somehow filled me with a more familiar sort of discomfort. Its weight
was uncomfortable in my hand, the idea that I was holding something capable of destroying life
with just the twitch of a finger was…well, I had to not think about that.
I held it as I remembered Lucy demonstrating, finger lengthwise along the side of the weapon,
away from the trigger, keeping it at my side.
Mustering what little resolve I had left, bolstered slightly by the firm sensation of the metal in my
hand, I opened the door to my bedroom.
The darkness of the rest of the house made its halls seem like ominous corridors, pierced only
by the faint glow of a lamp in the corner of the living room the floor below. Our home suddenly
felt very unfamiliar, the air heavy and foreboding. It took everything I had to push forward
towards the stairs. Every groan of the old floorboards beneath the carpet under my weight,
making me cringe at the thought that he could hear me.
I took each of the twelve steps with a tense carefulness, each step bringing me closer to the first
floor, closer to the door just around the corner and the awful man behind it. The anxiety had
reached a fever pitch, my heart racing so fast I began to wonder if it was truly possible to have a
fear-induced heart attack at my age, a storm brewing in the dark cloud hanging over me.
A chill traveled through me as my foot met the cool marble beneath, the temperature in the air
dropping noticeably as I stepped from the stairs and into the foyer, and for a horrifying moment,
my mind flashed the horrifying possibility that there was a window open somewhere, but as I
approached the front door I quickly realized that wasn’t the case. The air near the front door
hung heavy with an icy chill, noticeably colder than the rest of the house.
The three small windows at the side of the door were stained of some black ichor, the vague
shapes of handprints and finger smudges streaking it randomly.
Three spaced-out knocks rang out with an eerie finality as soon as the door was in my sight,
sending a nauseating sensation rippling through me. My stomach was twisted into
uncomfortable knots, dread reaching its boiling point with every step closer to the door.
Every limb felt weak, the shaking in my arms and legs beyond my control, and I prayed I didn’t
fire by accident. I almost felt ready to collapse as I reached the door, pressing myself against it
for balance, nearly stumbling away at the unnatural cold of it.
*Tap. Tap. Tap.*
Three quick taps against the glass of the window above the door, the final tapering off into a
grating scratch, made me jump, and press myself against the door.
My breath caught in my throat, as I looked up through the window a good seven feet from the
ground, catching sight of the man’s pale hand sliding slowly down the center. Unless he was
standing on something, which I doubted, his arm had reached far past what should have been
possible for any human, let alone what I’d seen on the camera.
I suppose I shouldn’t have needed any more confirmation that whatever I was dealing with…
wasn’t fully human, but somehow that drove it home.
I pulled back the barrel of the gun, mimicking what I could recall seeing Lucy do, and swallowed
firmly against the rising nausea in my gut. The click of the lock as I turned it, made my heart
plummet, my chest filling with both an icy horror and a conflicting surge of adrenaline. Before I
could convince myself otherwise, I tightened my grip on the weapon, and I opened the door.
I spun from around the door, raising the gun to meet the thing on my porch with shaking hands
and squinted eyes, bleary from nervous tears.
My heart burned with searing adrenaline, the sound of its frantic beating heavy in my ears, and
my stomach flipped my mind as prepared as I could be to see that figure looming over me, that
awful grinning face inches from my own.
But there was nothing. I stood there for a few tense moments, gun raised, staring out at our
street of the silent subdivision, nothing but a few parked cars and trees moving in the cool
breeze in my sight.
I remained there for a few moments as the panic slowly waned, giving way to an intoxicating mix
of hope cut with a bit of suspicion. Was he gone? The thought was like a candle in a room that
had been blanketed for far too long in darkness, a ray of hope. I had to be sure.
My every muscle felt tight with anxious anticipation as I stepped out and onto the porch, greeted
immediately by a wet plop, and a waft of some awful scent. It didn’t take a genius to identify it,
the reek of blood and feces, the fetid stench of death. I looked down to see my white slipper
now stained a deep red, my foot at the center of a pile of dark, coagulating liquid that had
pooled over the welcome mat likely from whatever the contents of the bag were.
“Fuck,” I spat retching slightly as I kicked my foot in a vain attempt to rid it of the awful mix. Eyes
watering and stomach bubbling, I stepped out and over the puddle, making sure to avoid it as I
scanned my front lawn.
There was no sign of the strange man, or whatever he’d come to deliver.
Slowly but surely, the cool rush of hope began to trickle through me, as silence seemed to
reclaim the night.
*click.click.CLICK.*
Icy dread rolled through me, making my skin crawl as I heard three fleshy pops ring out from
behind me. From inside the house.
For a brief moment I agonized over what to do, turning slowly to face the person or creature in
my home ready at any moment for the attack.
It stood barely five feet away, partially concealed by the darkness of the house, but enough of it
visible for me to realize how much of its horrific appearance the camera had failed to fully
impart. It’s head hung to the side at an impossible angle, the smile stretching across it inhuman,
a thin gray mouth lined with razor sharp teeth grinned visibly beneath what appeared to be a
human mask.
No..not a mask, *skin*. It clicked immediately.
He was wearing poor Phillip’s skin..
His head was massive, swollen and malformed, and where there should have been a nose the
skin hung loosely as if whatever was beneath were flat. It held the delivery bag in one of its
arms, which extended far longer than it should have, opening it to reveal the contents within.
I couldn’t help myself, the violent churn of my stomach hardly gave me enough warning as I saw
why the bag was leaking so much, and vomit spewed forth. Once, then twice.
From within the bag, I could make out the tangle of broken limbs, difficult to identify at first, as
the skin had seemingly been entirely degloved, but when my eyes fell on the face staring back
at me, red, angry flesh exposed, I knew immediately that I was seeing the horrific remains of the
original driver.
He – *it* took a long, deep breath, the skin over the center of his face shuddering as the sound
broke the silence, head tilting back, with a long, *euphoric* shudder.
It stepped forward, on legs long and ungainly, extending far past the jeans it must have taken
from Phillip, stalking forward.
“What do you want? What the fuck do you want? Why me?” I’d reached a tipping point, fear
giving way to sheer exhaustion.
I was tired of this, a regular night had been turned into a fucking horror movie and I wanted
answers from the thing responsible, even if it killed me.
“*I want – I want to…do my job, please just leave me alone, oh GOD!*”
It started, speaking with that same hoarse, inhumane croak – but quickly it morphed into the
voice of a young man, pleading, desperate and raw with a horror I’d never heard before, but
very much felt.
It took me only a few moments to realize what was happening.
It was mocking me. I wasn’t going to get an answer, in fact, I doubted it even had one besides
the fact that Phillip had somehow caught its attention, and since he’d been en route to my
house, I’d become next for its sick designs.
It’s long arms seemed to retract, sliding across the floor with a faint hiss long, dark claws that
seemed fit for some sort of predatory animal protruded through the skin of it’s hand, which I
quickly realized had also been taken from Phillip, worn like a tattered glove.
The chill of the metal from the gun at my waist brought it back to my attention, and before I
realized my hand was slowly moving towards my hip.
My breathing felt ragged and uneven with every painful throb of my heart.
It’s head tilted further, the thin smile on the mottled gray skin beneath its nightmarish mask
widening, as it’s muscles tensed with awful intent.
I burned an image of Lucy into my mind, knowing if these were to be my final moments I wanted
to be as close to spending it with her as possible. My hand went for the gun.
The air was pierced by a cry something like that of an infant, but deep and distorted, raising
every hair along my back and sent my stomach into freefall as my hand closed around the
handle.
Furious hope surged through me with the weight of weapon in my grip as I pulled it from my
waistband, doused immediately by a tidal wave of sheer dread as I saw it.
It was on me in seconds, crossing the room and over me at blinding speed. Panic guided my
every action, as I turned and pointed the gun, firing in the same instant, no time to aim.
My ears rang from the explosive sound, momentarily disoriented before I felt a sharp pain
exploding through my arm, icy fingers covered in claws the size of my thumb digging into my
forearm.
I missed. It had caught me in time, forcing my arm up and making me shoot off towards the
ceiling uselessly. A spray of drywall burst forth as the bullet ripped through.
It tightened its grip and it took all I had not to scream with the excruciating pain. My arm was
surely broken, the thought was fleeting, the realization that I was surely going to die far more
pressing.
It yanked me closer, its face mere inches from my own an overwhelming reek of decay wafting
from its mucous-covered skin. It made a long guttural clicking from its throat as it *smelled* me,
those beady eyes shining with malice.
“*A – lways taste the best when you’re afraid.”* It spoke.
I shut my eyes, unwilling to see whatever was happening next, bracing myself for what was to
come. Sharp pain radiated out from the bottom of my jaw as I felt its claw pierce my skin with an
almost surgical carefulness, slowly sliding beneath.
It was going to take my face. Just as it had the poor driver. I felt a scream rising in my throat.
The ringing in my ears grew louder, and I wondered if the shot hadn’t caused permanent
damage, not like it would matter for long. I felt it’s sticky breath on my face, rancid with smell of
blood and rot, it’s finger sliding beneath my skin, blood down my neck. The ringing grew louder
as I waited for the burst of pain, louder and…*nearer*. I realized with the first surge of real hope
I’d felt that night, it was the sound of approaching sirens.
As I opened my eyes I could see the distant glow of flashing red and blue from somewhere
nearby.
Its gaze snapped up in the direction of the approaching sound, and it hissed, frustrated fury
palpable. From what I could tell, the sirens were coming from the opening of the subdivision,
barely a minute from my house.
It’s grip tightened as it drew me closer, whispering a final message in my ear.
“*See you again..*”
As two squad cars rounded the bend into our cul de sac, it tossed me aside and into the wall
with force, and I hit the ground with thud landing in the ever growing puddle of liquid spreading
from Phillips body.
It shot me a final glance, shuddering with something unreadable before it threw itself over the
side of the porch, disappearing into the darkness and into the trees of the small forest behind
the house.
By the time I gathered myself, stumbling back to my feet and onto the front lawn, waving
frantically and screaming until my throat hurt as the flashing red and blue lights filled the night.
My mind was in a state of blind panic, any worries of causing a disturbance long in the rearview
at that point, solely focused on getting around other people and away from whatever I’d just
encountered.
A few of the more brave of my curious neighbors had begun streaming out their front doors,
watching the commotion I was making with concern and interest, others peering from cracks in
the curtains.
I wondered to myself if anyone had been watching before, if anyone had seen that thing besides
me but dismissed the thought as officers began questioning me. Apparently they’d been called
by a neighbor who’d reported a noise disturbance from all the knocking, so when a follow up call
came about shots fired, they were already nearby.
The police were far less helpful than I’d hoped, though at that point the mere fact that I was alive
and not shoved into a foot long pizza bag was cause enough for celebration. They’d searched
the house and found nothing, and upon searching the doorbell camera, found the footage had
somehow been wiped. The EMTs cared for my injuries, asking questions as to how I’d attained
the strange wound under my jaw as though something had been inserted in, and I wasn’t sure
how to answer.
I told my story top the officers who’s reactions ranged from skepticism as the most common, to
an almost knowing sort of look that seemed to pass between a few of the older guys. As we
wrapped up I placed a call to my wife. She was still asleep, so I left a voicemail explaining the
situation, and reminding her how much I utterly adored her given how close I’d come to never
being able to say it again.
I spent the rest of that night at a local motel, taking a much needed shower and didn’t sleep very
much at all, not even returning home until Lucy’s trip had ended.
Things progressed as normally as one could expect in the weeks afterwards. The police weren’t
much help the few times I’d gone to them for updates, and I quickly began to suspect that they
may be hiding something, that there may be something more to what I experienced.
That’s sort of why I’m writing this. I’ve been doing my best to move on from that night, as
ridiculous as that might seem. It’s strange how quickly you can begin to rationalize the irrational
once the moment has passed, and since moving out wasn’t an option given the money we’d just
put into the home, I had no option but to cope. Things were fine, normal, and I’d been content to
try and leave the event a nightmare, until yesterday morning.
Last night I heard news that made my stomach drop. It echoed from the T.V. in the living room
as I prepared my dinner, finding ordering out quite unappealing since my experience, when a
name caught my attention.
“Thanks Hal, our next story comes from the small-town of Cold Lake, Illinois where tragedy
appears to have struck a local pizzeria. Johnny’s Pizza has been a long time fixture of the town,
it’s owner, John Mclennon, was something of Cold Lake royalty. Well, reports from law
enforcement tell us here at CLPN that our towns “King of Pizza” was found dead in his pizzeria
last night.”
My heart dropped, as did the cooking utensils in my hand as I quickly made my way to the living
room.
“Initial reports indicate he was found, and I do warn our sensitive viewers now before I continue,
flayed but just barely alive, police say he’d been somehow shoved into one of the pizza ovens.
He would pass away from trauma related injuries hours later at the hospital. As of right now, the
CLPD has now suspects. Now here’s Tammy with the weather -“
My head seemed to spin, nausea rising in my while my mind reeled as from the murky depths of
memory, the man’s words from our call echoed.
“I’m sure it’s already listening, lord help us both if it is.”
“I may be in grave danger now just talking to you”
That’s why I’m writing this now. I don’t really know what else to do with my guilt, but perhaps
give someone the warning I never had.
If the pizza arrives after 3:00 AM, don’t answer. Ask them to leave it if you must, but do not
answer the door and for the love of god don’t call *anyone*.
That’s it for now, I apologize for the rushed ending, but I’d like to hurry and get this posted. The
security camera system on the door is still down, and Lucy’s at work, and I can’t be sure but I
think I just heard a knock at the door.
