I loved Grams to death. As a boy of nine, nothing was better than sitting in her kitchen eating her homemade apple pie, warm from the oven, with a giant scoop of vanilla ice cream on it.
As much as I loved Grams, I hated her cellar. I hated it from the ratty-ass wooden door that was tucked in the corner next to her old wheezy fridge to the dirt floor at the bottom of the creaky steps.
There was something down there. My mother rolled her eyes. My dad said to grow up. Gram just said it was a cellar and the only thing down there was jars, full and empty.
I spent two weeks at Grams the next year, my tenth summer. We ate warm pie and played cards and picked apples.
Picking apples meant canning apples. Which meant getting jars, from the cellar.
Grams could tell I wasn't keen on the idea, but she just shooed me along with the assurance nothing was down there except the jars.
It was the sixth trip that was the "charm", I was feeling cocky by then. There wasn't anything down here. I was just a kid last year when I thought that.
Just as I was thumbing my nose at that silly nine year old, I felt a cold hand on my arm. I spun around to my worst fear.
A face red as flame with long jagged teeth framing a forked tongue. I tried to inhale enough breath to form a shriek, but choked on my fear. The monster gripped my arm tighter and began to pull me closer.
I was going to die in Grams cellar.
I heard a sound like a bell being rung. The thing let go of my arm, and simply melted away.
And there stood Grams, an iron skillet in her hand.
"C'mon, boy," she said, "I told you, there's nothin' here but jars, and the apples are waitin'."
YOU ARE READING
Whispers From the Dark
FantasíaA collection of short tales inspired by various writing group prompts. Most live on my blog http://www.elsetimeandotherwhen.Blogspot.com Some have been reworked. Some are previously unpublished. I'll add them randomly, one at a time.
