WEEK 376
As Alan went slowly down the basement steps, he wondered if...


...he would ever be able to turn this eyesore into a fashionable, two bedroom apartment. It had been a year ago that Alan had spotted the Victorian house for sale. Once Gloria, his wife, had been taken in by its charm she had to own it. The renovations had taken months to transform the neglected house into one of the most admired properties of Sliver Springs. Their life at that moment was perfect, the kids were off at college, Alan was a successful lawyer, Gloria was a top Designer in New York City. Then one sunny, fateful day in June the phone call came that would destroy a lifetime of bliss. Gloria's mother was coming in a month to live with them, for the rest of her days. It was Alan's responsibility to provide living quarters for his mother-in-law, the basement offered the square footage needed for an apartment.

by Ranae Cherry, Shrewsbury, PA

...it was still alive.

It had been breathing, albeit laboriously, two hours ago, but it seemed not to have the strength to do anything but stare at him with eyes clouded with suffering.

Imagining that he heard a faint noise, Alan stopped his descent, straining to hear more. The glowing 60 watt bulb at the base of the stairs, did not offer enough light to be able to see the dark recesses beyond the limits of its restricted glow. Hearing nothing further, he took one more step before his feet were yanked from beneath him, causing him to topple, head first, to the basement's concrete floor. Lying there, stunned and in pain, his eyes could not fully focus on the form materializing from the shadows behind the stairs. His hearing however, was not impaired, and utter horror filled his being, as the gutteral words found their way to his ears: "Not dead yet, just hungry."

by Stewart Lindsay, Buffalo, NY

...all the horror movies going through his mind at lightning speed were based on some event in reality.

A muscular man wearing a grey jumpsuit and a hockey mask swung the amazingly sharp ax at an unsuspecting teenager who was distracted by pre-marital sexual activity. A scarred man wearing a Christmas-like sweater peeled flesh away from a boy's arm with his razor blade fingernails. A brain dead imbecile cocked his head sideways and walked into a burning building to strangle a woman. A leprechaun and a stuffed doll both stabbed the same victim with sharp kitchen knives.

Alan flipped the switch on and was relieved to see his friends sitting around a card table. He pulled up a chair, took his cards into hand. He looked at the worst dealt hand in the history of poker.

"Somebody cheated this hand," Alan said. "Jason? Freddy? Michael, was it you? Chucky? Leprechaun? Are you guys messing with me?"

His friends didn't reply with words. Instead, they picked their weapon of choice and stood. They were going to teach Alan not to accuse them of cheating just because he was holding two Aces and two eights, also known as the "dead man's hand."

by Donald Stidham, Cleveland, TN

...he was going nuts. There seemed no rational explanation, but he knew he was hearing it. At first, it had been so faint and so randomly timed, he thought it must have been his imagination. But lately, it was nearly every other night, and it had become loud enough to wake him from a slumber. The sounds of the dissonant calliope-driven waltz peppered with the soft, bell-like timbre of the celeste had almost seemed to spring from his dreams. Alan had experienced peculiar dreams of carnival scenes for years during his childhood, but had all but forgotten them until this music seemed to begin coming from his basement. As he ascended the stairs his jaw went agape. He had walked into a familiar dreamscape...his carnival. He realized the music had slowed and all present were looking in his direction. As the scene seemed to shift and distort and darken, Alan began to panic, he turned to go up the stairs, but they were no longer there, and Alan knew he would not be waking up this time....

by Tomas M. Villarreal, Elmhurst, IL