B.R. Black

Thriller and Horror writer

Tag: amwritinghorror

  • The Fall

    The Fall

    The strike was clean and smooth, but only later was she grateful. At first, she believed her last vision would be of her own horrific face reflected back at her. She roared at the cruelty of the act. Her vision continued, even as the sight tumbled before her. Her anger turned toward horror at the realization that after the severing, she persisted.

    She’d felt the serpents stiffen when the boy struck, and she knew that her monstrous reign was at an end. No more would she feel the soft licks at her cheeks, hear the susurration of their calls, her constant companions these long years now silent, unmoving. More like her victims than herself.

    The burnt blue sky spun around and as her head found its center of gravity. Her vision righted itself, giving her a clear view of her shoulders and breasts, still shivering at the shock. Black ichor flowed from her open neck, and she marveled at the shimmering indigo that seemed to glow from within. Whether being born from gods or ravaged by them, she mourned that this luminous wonder had been hidden deep within her. The world had only been allowed her ugliness, and as her vision passed over her belly, she hoped her vengeance would not be forgotten.

    The boy screamed in the background, long and drawn out as if spreading itself across millennia. Her head continued to fall in between drops of time, a slow wave as if Poseidon himself had halted the moon. As she passed before her swollen belly, she saw the flutter of the god’s gifts inside her, a hoof pushing against the underside of her skin. Something else poked and thrusted from behind her navel. She felt her head roll back, shifting her vision to the blackened azure of Zeus’ sky. 

    She only caught a glimpse of the golden blade that released her children from their womb turned tomb. The soft touch of feathers, not unlike her serpents’ kiss, brushed her cheek, before flying off toward the stars. Her head rolled still and the boy’s drawn out scream finally came to an end. 

    At the last, she saw him clearly, without the cataract of death obscuring her sight. He was beautiful, with dark hair against fair skin, the aura of triumph glowing from within. Sweat beaded on his arms as he held the mirror shield high. His sword arm hung low, too heavy for someone so young. Her mortal soul fell instantly in love just as her serpents curled toward her scalp, impotent and cold.

    The moment collapsed as she hit the marble floor. Light and sound returned to their normal pitch and all the world sprang to life as she consumed her final vision. Torches burst aflame and the walls seemed to dance in the reflected light. Had the world always been so lovely, she wondered near the end? Had she?

    The boy approached slowly, and she marveled at a face untouched by her curse. Medusa shuddered in the memories of her body as he reached into the thatch of serpents and lifted her head. He looked into her eyes as lovers do, eager and unafraid.

    The Fall - horror short by B.R. Black
  • quiet

    quiet

    You ever in a place where it’s so quiet you hear something you ought not to.

    That’s me now, sitting outside my store, just trying to have a cigarette before we open. It’s mid-January and there’s a nice thick blanket of snow on the ground. I had to shovel my way to the door and I’m pretty mad about that. We pay Donny to do it and Donny’s probably still asleep. He never remembers that we open at 6. He wishes we opened at 10. When he shows up, I’m going to put all the snow back and make him shovel it again.

    The only reason I mention the snow is because it makes the world quiet. Cold, for sure, but there’s a fuzziness to the air, like it’s all made of cotton. Cotton in your head, cotton in your ears, but it don’t make all things quiet. It makes some things louder. Things you ought not to hear.

    I take a last drag of my cigarette out and try to not hear it. I think I have time to put away the milk order before I open up, but then again, I can always open late. Even our customers sometimes run on Donny time.

    I hear it again and it’s not a sound that my brain wants to wrap itself around. I could describe it, but then I would have to say I hear it and letting anyone know that I am near this sound is the last thing I want to do. Hearing that means taking responsibility and I would rather just pinch out the last of my cigarette and head inside. 

    It feels close, but sound carries in the winter. Should I look around the corner? No way. 

    I’m not even going to lift my head up in a sign that I’m awake. Going to walk into this store like a zombie and bar the door shut behind me. Don’t care if Donny decides to show. Donny can stay outside with the snow and the shovel and that sound.

    I trip in my rush to get inside and knock over the shovel, which I don’t care about now, I don’t care about anything but shutting the door on that sound. But the shovel’s handle wedged itself in between the door and the jamb and of course I can’t get the door shut because getting the door shut would mean getting back to my life before that sound and there’s no hope of that now. But if I can just push the bottom of the shovel away with my boot then maybe. 

    Yes. Got it. Yes. Thank god! Slam.

    The only thing I can hear now is my heartbeat and the hum of the cooler. Those are things I need to hear. Those are the only things I need to hear. 

    The front of the store’s got tall plate glass windows. I peek out from the back room but can’t see anything out front. There’s enough light on in the store to make seeing into the early morning impossible. I wish this door between the workroom and the store had a lock. Wish it had a knob. Wish it had a damn gun.

    I think I can head into the cooler, then further into the freezer and then into the far back room that none of us really knew was there until last week when Wendy found it. There was nothing in it then and that made it creepier. 

    The cooler door is pretty big, but unlockable, for obvious reasons. Here we keep the milk and the soda and various refrigerated foods we sell. There’s a walkway between the stock for sale and the stock for stocking. The door makes a deep thump when it closes behind me. I look back and then I look out between a couple of half-gallons of 2%. I can see through the store into the parking lot. The sun is starting to rise, and I figure I have about 15 minutes before I have to open. When Donny shows up late, he usually beats on the front door until I open it, but he’s not there now. I wouldn’t mind seeing his stupid face right now. Dammit Donny.

    The hum is louder here. The unit vents are outside and cool the fresh air. It’s not terrible in here, particularly since it’s cold outside. I like to hang out here in the summer. But this morning, I have to keep going. 

    The freezer is smaller in length than the cooler and has fewer items. We keep the ice cream here and the frozen entrees lonely people buy on occasion. That happens less now that the pizza place opened up. I peek out of here too, but can only see the bread aisle and half of the cashier counter. I can’t hear any knocking. 

    I can’t hear anything right now. 

    The humming has stopped. The humming should never stop. The humming means frozen things stay frozen. I remember hearing the freezer door close behind me. Didn’t I?

    Even my heartbeat is muffled now. 

    Suddenly the humming starts again and I wonder if there’s a cycle it goes through and I just haven’t been here when it happens. Either way, I think about that noise and I think I’m gonna head one step farther in. I’m gonna sit in that back room and calm the heck down. Wendy hides her vodka in there now and that’s just what I need. 

    You would think a room that hidden would be musty, but it’s the ventilation, understand. The ventilation is good here. The door sticks a little, but I can get it open. I’m pretty strong.

    The ventilation, that’s why I heard the noise, the one I wanted to ignore, the one I came here to hide from. What made it, well, it’s in here and I’m in here with it. And it’s a nightmare hunched over something slumped on two stacked milk crates. 

    It’s not looking for Wendy’s vodka. It’s feeding and feeding real good.

    Dammit Donny, the one day you’re early.

    quiet a horror short by B.R. Black

  • The struggle to write consistently

    Something I’ve talked about before is my issues with consistency. Mainly, I will have long stretches where I will distance myself from a story and then, whether pressure, guilt, or a newly ignited desire to finish the piece rises up in my gut, I come back to the keyboard and go, “where they heck was I now?”

    I’ve had this with each Season of Wound. What started out in 2021 as an experiment to see if I could consistently write and publish a horror serial on the at-then-new Kindle Vella platform quickly ended when I discovered, no, I cannot consistently write and publish a horror serial.

    Or anything at all.

    My whole life has been a push and pull between half-finished works and new ideas and, from the sheer amount of reading I’ve done about other writers’ processes, this isn’t’ unusual. When I was finally diagnosed with ADHD, this seemed to be a feature and not (necessarily) a personality flaw. So, in the year since my diagnosis and treatment, what have I learned?

    Not much? I still struggle with shiny object syndrome, object impermanence, and distraction. BUT I have realized that if I start – literally just start writing a sentence, the rest will come. It may be slow, sloggy, weird, and not quite what I want to say, but it does come.

    I also am starting to understand what my triggers are and doing better at avoided them (particular voices or sounds).

    My goal for the second half of this year is not a writing goal, but a working goal. I aim to strengthen whatever skills I need to work fully remote (my day job lends itself to this), to make the effort twice a day to start that sentence, and – most importantly – work on being able to come back to the page immediately after a distraction.

    I know what I’ve tried before, systems, apps, web sites, etc. But this time I’m going to try bull-headed determination. RAWR!

    Do you have a secret sauce to being consistent in anything? I’d love some advice!

    *swish* (⊃｡•́‿•̀｡)⊃━⭑･ﾟﾟ･*:༅｡.｡༅:*ﾟ:*:✼✿

    Banner by B.R. Black | Background image by Markus Spiske from Pixabay