Razorblade Dreams: Horror Stories

by Mark Lukens

  He started the dark footage again. Tyler was screaming and crying on the film, and J.T. heard himself trying to console his little brother in the darkness. He saw the beam of light from his phone stabbing into the blackness, shining around like a crazy lightsaber on screen.

  And then he watched the beam of light leave the circle of protection, disappearing out of the shot. A moment later the lights came on in the dining room and the kitchen. Tyler stood in the circle, crying. J.T. was pretty sure his little brother was going to beg him to edit his crying out of the film.

  Then he watched himself walk to the front door and lock it. As he was locking the door, Tyler bolted out of the shot and onto the couch. Then he watched himself stare down at the bowl of rotten fruit, the empty wine bowl, and the empty bowl of blood.

  The last thing he saw was himself walking towards the camera to retrieve it.

  “That fruit is rotten,” J.T. whispered. “And the blood and wine are gone.”

  Tyler seemed too shocked to say anything for a moment. He stared over at the bowl of rotten fruit and the other two empty bowls like he realized now what had happened, but then he looked back at J.T. “Rewind it.”

  “You can’t really see it on the footage very well,” J.T. told him and stood up from the couch. He handed the camera to Tyler. “Here. Press this button when I tell you to and film me.” He knew Tyler was nearly as proficient with the camera as he was because he’d had Tyler film him so many times before in the short films that he had created.

  “J.T., I don’t know . . .”

  “Come on, Tyler,” J.T. snapped at him. “I need your help. I need you to do this for me.”

  Tyler seemed to sense the importance of this to his brother. He swallowed hard and lifted the camera up to film him. He pressed the button and nodded. “Okay. Go.”

  J.T. looked at the camera for a moment as he stood in the middle of the living room floor. “We’ve just finished the ritual and now we have evidence of what happened.”

  He walked across the living room to the foyer and stood in front of the bowls, gesturing down at them. He knew he had taken plenty of footage of the preparations before they began the ritual. But would anyone who saw this believe this? They would think it was a hoax, a trick he’d played. He wished he wouldn’t have stopped the film; it would’ve been so much better if all of this was on a continuous loop.

  “After we . . . performed the ritual, the fruit in this bowl rotted away in seconds. And the blood and the wine we offered are now gone. The ghost of Mr. Boone has taken the offerings.”

  Tyler moaned from behind the camera, and J.T. scowled at him. He came for the camera and grabbed it from him. Tyler scurried back to the couch.

  J.T. continued filming and continued narrating, getting as much of it on film as he could. He then toured their house with the camcorder, checking each room and turning on all the lights along the way. Tyler followed close behind him, bumping into him a few times.

  “We’ve checked the house,” J.T. said into the camera after coaxing Tyler to shoot the film again for a moment. “No sign of Mr. Boone. He must’ve left.” J.T. shook his head like he was a little dismayed, overacting a little. “Maybe we did something wrong. Maybe the ritual wasn’t perfect. But there’s no disputing the fact that we have captured proof of the supernatural on film.”

  J.T. walked towards the camera. “Cut,” he told Tyler. “We need to get this stuff cleaned up.”

  5.

  “I can’t sleep in my room by myself tonight,” Tyler told his older brother.

  It was one thirty now. Everything was cleaned up. J.T. had cleaned everything up by himself because Tyler still refused to leave the safety of the couch. J.T. had even gone into their bedrooms to get their bedsheets and pillows so they could both sleep on the couches in front of the large flat-screen TV. J.T. had pretended to be upset at having to sleep out in the living room with his little brother, but secretly he didn’t want to sleep in his bedroom by himself either.

  J.T. put a comedy movie on TV while Tyler curled up on the couch underneath his sheet, his head sunk down in two of his pillows.

  It was almost dawn before they fell asleep.

  THE HAUNTING

  1.

  A banging noise woke J.T. and Tyler up.

  J.T. was on his feet in a second, looking around the brightly-lit living room.

  “What was that?” Tyler asked.

  “I don’t know,” J.T. answered, relaxing a little.

  “It’s Mr. Boone,” Tyler whispered.

  “He’s not here anymore,” J.T. said. He had tried to convince Tyler over and over again last night that Mr. Boone hadn’t remained in their house. He couldn’t deny that the ghost or demon or whatever it was had been inside long enough to take the wine and blood and to crush the crucifix, but then J.T. was sure that it had left. At least he was trying to convince himself as much as he was trying to convince his brother. They had done something wrong, he’d told Tyler. They had screwed up a critical part of the ritual, offended it somehow, and Mr. Boone had left.

  But Tyler wasn’t sure of that.

  And J.T. wasn’t, either.

  J.T. checked the house again, inspecting each room, Tyler following closely behind him. No one in the house, nothing fallen over. No sign of where the loud noise had come from. After their search, Tyler made J.T. wait right outside the halfway open door to the hall bathroom while he peed.

  “You all done, you little baby?” J.T. asked when Tyler hurried out of the bathroom.

  Normally Tyler would’ve fought back against the insults, but not today.

  “You want some peanut butter toast?” J.T. asked, deciding not to razz his brother any further.

  “With jelly,” Tyler said and went back to the couch to watch cartoons on the TV.

  J.T. didn’t fuss about making breakfast for them. He could’ve told Tyler to make it himself, but he knew Tyler would threaten to reveal to their mom what they had done, lording this secret over his head for a few days. J.T. would let him get away with it for a while, but after a few days Tyler would be in just as much trouble as he would be for not telling Mom right away.

  The footage from last night ran through J.T.’s mind as he spread peanut butter and jelly on pieces of toast. He couldn’t wait to watch the footage on his laptop and really study the front doorway.

  Had something been there last night before the lights went out? He definitely remembered seeing something there. He could see the dark figure in his mind’s eye perfectly: the tall, slender man with unnaturally long arms, long fingers, glowing red eyes . . . a dark demon at their doorstep, a demon they had summoned and invited into their home.

  He felt a shudder run through him.

  “Come eat this at the table,” J.T. said as he set the plates of toast and glasses of milk on the dining room table. Mom didn’t like them eating in the living room.

  It seemed like Tyler was going to protest, perhaps threaten J.T. with the knowledge he could spill to their mother, but he didn’t. He knew when he was pushing things too far. J.T. could always fight back against Tyler’s threats by not escorting him to the bathroom anymore.

  J.T. had already downloaded the footage onto his laptop this morning from his video camera, and he studied it with the sound turned down as he munched on his toast.

  Tyler watched him, chewing with his mouth open and slurping down his glass of milk. “You don’t see him, do you?”

  J.T. shook his head no, but he stared at the screen. He had it frozen on that moment in the film, and he had it blown up as much as he could without it becoming a distorted mess.

  Was someone there?

  He could just make out the outline of a man.

  2.

  Mom would be home in a few hours. She had already called and told them that she would pick up some dinner on the way . . . burgers and fries. She definitely didn’t want them cooking anything more complicated than toast or something in the microwave while she was gone.

  Ty
ler was happy with fast food, and J.T. did one last check of the house to make sure there wasn’t any evidence of their little experiment left behind. He had taken out the garbage from the kitchen to the big plastic trashcan outside the garage, stuffing the garbage bag deep down inside. He’d thrown away the pieces of the crucifix and coiled up the rope and hid it away in the laundry room.

  At least Tyler wasn’t as scared as he’d been last night—maybe because it was daylight now, or maybe it was because Mom was on her way home. Whatever it was, J.T. was glad.

  3.

  “Mom!” Tyler screamed and crashed into their mother, crunching into one of the fast food bags that she held in her hand.

  “Oh my God,” Mom squealed. “I didn’t realize I was missed so badly.”

  J.T. smiled at his mom. He was glad she was back, too. Things felt normal again now that she was home. Maybe the further they got away from their ritual last night the better. Maybe time would heal these frights.

  “There’s another bag of fries out in the car,” Mom told J.T. over Tyler’s head. “And do you mind getting my bags out of the car? I’m so tired.”

  “Yeah, sure,” J.T. said and hurried out the door.

  It was already dusk outside, the sun disappearing down below the houses along the street, the eastern sky already dark and dotted with the first of the twinkling stars. No moon tonight. It would be so dark out here.

  Dark.

  Bad things came in the dark.

  J.T. pushed those thoughts from his mind as he got the rest of his mom’s bags out of the back seat and then grabbed the other bag of food.

  An hour later they were stuffed with junk food. J.T. had eaten two burgers and a large fries, and then washed it all down with a big glass of soda. Usually their mom didn’t approve of this kind of food, but it was a special occasion tonight . . . she didn’t feel like cooking after her long drive home. She told them all about her meeting; everything had gone well, and she was glad it was over.

  “Anything exciting happen here?” she asked.

  Tyler was silent, his eyes bulging a little like he was about to explode with their secret.

  J.T. shot him a warning glance, and to his surprise Tyler just shook his head and smiled at their mom. “Just watched some TV,” he said. “And J.T. worked on his computer the whole time.”

  “Oh yeah?” Mom asked, turning her attention to J.T. It was like she could tell they were keeping some kind of secret from her.

  “Yeah,” he answered.

  “Working on another film?”

  “Yeah.” Something like that, he almost said, but didn’t. The less he said the better. He smiled, and he felt better. Everything felt better. Normal. He would forget about the footage he’d shot last night, maybe come back to it in a week or so, look at it with a fresh eye, then work on it some more. But right now he just needed some distance from it . . . he needed things to get back to normal again for a little while.

  4.

  Tyler lay in his bed wide awake. He had the lamp on next to his bed. His mom had told him to turn it out earlier, but he had waited until she went to sleep, and then he turned it on again. It was late, two o’clock in the morning, and he couldn’t sleep. He kept hearing noises coming from down the hall.

  He stared at his bedroom door. It was closed. He thought about opening it a little. He even thought about grabbing his sheet and pillow and sneaking out to the living room to watch some TV. He needed something to take his mind off of Mr. Boone.

  Was Mr. Boone outside their house? Was he walking around out there, trying to find his way back in? Or was J.T. wrong, and Mr. Boone had stayed inside their home the whole time, patiently waiting for darkness to come so he could materialize out of the blackness, form into a solid mass and . . .

  Tyler squeezed his eyes shut. He tried to think about something else. Anything else.

  A noise startled him. His eyes popped open. He stared up at the ceiling, at the air duct.

  It was nothing—just the air conditioning coming on, that’s all.

  But the noise sounded different, a squeaking noise, like metal turning inside of metal. He realized what the sound was after the first screw from the metal grate dropped down to the floor. He watched as the other screw twisted itself out of the grate. Then the grate was free and falling to the floor. Long, spider-like fingers stretched out of the rectangle hole in the ceiling now, pushing their way out of the small space.

  Tyler jumped up in bed, ready to run.

  And that’s when the lamp went out, plunging his room into darkness.

  He screamed and lunged for his lamp, trying to turn it back on . . . but it wouldn’t work anymore. He heard the cracks and strains of the ceiling as Mr. Boone pushed himself out of the ceiling, pushing his way into their world.

  5.

  Tyler was screaming.

  J.T. and Mom both rushed into Tyler’s room at the same time. J.T. flipped the light switch up for the overhead light. Tyler was curled up into a ball at the head of his bed, hugging his knees and crying.

  “What’s wrong?” Mom asked as she darted over to him. She sat down on the edge of the bed right next to Tyler.

  J.T. waited at the foot of the bed. His skin prickled with an icy dread as he watched his little brother.

  Tyler didn’t answer for a moment, and his face was shiny with tears.

  “Oh God, Tyler,” Mom said in shock. “You’re crying.”

  Tyler sniffled and wiped at his eyes. He still couldn’t talk.

  “What is it? A nightmare?”

  He nodded, but then shook his head no.

  This is it, J.T. thought. This is where Tyler spills the beans. Their little experiment last night had triggered a nightmare, and now he was going to be grounded from now until Armageddon.

  “Someone was . . . was in here,” Tyler finally whispered.

  Mom let him continue as she brushed his hair back from his forehead.

  “I woke up and . . . and I heard . . . someone in here,” he said, his words coming out in a garbled rush. “And then I looked up at the ceiling, and the grate fell out. He was up there pushing his way out. I saw his fingers, and I heard the ceiling cracking . . .”

  “It was just a bad dream, that’s all,” Mom cooed. She looked up at the ceiling. “See? The grate’s still over the duct.”

  Tyler finally made himself look up at the ceiling. But he didn’t seem appeased at all.

  “No. I saw it. It was real.” He started crying again.

  “It was just a nightmare,” Mom said again.

  Tyler shook his head again. “No. I was awake. I know I was.”

  “You might have thought you were awake,” Mom assured him. “It might have seemed like you were awake, but I’m sure you were sleeping. I’ve had dreams before where I was half awake. Did you know you can be half awake, even have your eyes open, and still be dreaming?”

  Tyler watched his mom like he was considering that possibility. “Can I sleep out in the living room with the TV on?”

  Mom thought it over for a minute.

  “Please. I want J.T. to sleep out there with me, too.”

  Mom turned around and gave J.T. a hard stare and a scowl. “I guess that would be okay.”

  “Yeah, fine with me,” J.T. said.

  “Get your sheets and pillow,” Mom said.

  Tyler jumped up and gathered his sheets and pillows and ran out of his room down the hall to the living room, turning on lights along the way.

  Mom stared at J.T. “Do you know something about all of this?”

  “He just had a nightmare.”

  “Were you guys watching scary movies while I was gone?”

  “No.”

  “Reading him scary stories from the internet? Showing him things that he shouldn’t be seeing?”

  “No, nothing like that,” he lied.

  She stared at him for a long moment, studying him. Finally she nodded. “Okay. I’m going back to bed. I have to go into work for a few hours tomorrow.”
>
  J.T. nodded, and then he went to his room to get his pillow and blanket.

  6.

  Tyler wasn’t much better the next day. He’d slept fitfully and kept J.T. awake much of the night. He looked exhausted, sporting dark circles under his eyes. His skin was pale, and somehow he looked a little thinner.

  “Let’s eat some breakfast,” J.T. told Tyler who stared at the cartoons on the TV like a robot. He just nodded.

  J.T. poured Tyler a bowl of cereal and set it on the dining room table. He whistled at Tyler like a dog. “Here, boy. Come and get it.”

  This usually got a laugh out of Tyler. He usually came running, panting and barking like a dog. But not today.

  He had to admit it to himself: his brother was traumatized . . . and it was his fault.

  “It wasn’t a nightmare,” Tyler said in a low voice.

  J.T. felt his skin crawl. It wasn’t just his brother’s words; it was his voice, the hopelessness in it, the dread. “You saw the air duct in your ceiling. The grate was still there, the screws still tight.”

  “Then he put it back,” Tyler said, his voice even lower, his eyes still on the TV like he wasn’t really watching it, rather replaying the horror he’d seen last night. “He put it back, that’s what he did.”

  J.T. started to protest, but what could he say? Then he thought of an idea. He went into the garage and found two flashlights. He made sure that they had batteries in them and that they worked. He brought them to Tyler and handed them to him. “Keep these with you tonight. The light will protect you. Mr. Boone can’t get you in the light.”

  Tyler took the flashlights but didn’t say anything. He didn’t seem convinced that the light would protect him.

  7.

  Tyler wanted to sleep out in the living room again with the TV on, but Mom made him sleep in his bedroom.