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the roamer

I was about 5. You see, our neighborhood is near a really gorgeous forest and my childhood home lies especially close to it, to the point where it's hard to tell where my backyard ends and the trees begin.

One day, I was playing alone outside when suddenly I became overwhelmed with a gross smell, similar to how people describe a rotting corpse to smell like but 100 times worse. As I tried to make sense out of it, I saw a man standing close by. He looked like a grown-up and he seemed strangely familiar, but I knew I didn’t know him. Yet, I found his face was recognizable somehow, felt I was acquainted with it.

He was slightly taller than my dad and he was very skinny. His eyes were of different colors, but his most remarkable feature was his right hand, where one of his fingers sported a strange looking ring with a lone bell hanging from it that tinkled every time the joint moved. He smiled in a way that seemed extremely friendly and the smell started to fade away, but I thought my new friend was hungry , so I entered my house and told my parents about him and how I thought he was hungry. My dad looked out the window and caught him waving at me. Ring, ring ring, his bell rung every time he moved his hand. My dad tried to call the police, but as soon as he touched the phone, my “friend” ran away. I was warned about “stranger danger” and told that if I ever saw the man again, I should run without looking back, stay home and tell my parents where the stranger was instead of being with him.

A few years later, when I was 13 years old, I was very much the explorer type, I liked going through forests and exploring open areas like parks, and as such, some days after my birthday I decided to explore the forest near my house. I mean, it was only a matter of time before it happened, so I took my flashlight, some snacks, a tent, my phone along with a power bank, some water, and told my parents I was going to the forest for a few days and then I was officially off.

I started to pick my way into the forest, walking along a path in a straight line. My father said he loved coming here as a kid, enough that he knew it like the back of his hand. He said it was beautiful. I kept walking and hearing the leaves get crushed under my feet with every step, and thought he was right--the forest was beautiful. The trees covered the sky and I kept going forward, taking pictures and trying to take it all in for I don’t know how long until I got to a lake. It was beautiful too, with calm and steady water and the sun made it glimmer in random places, but then I heard something that shook me out of the reverie.

It was a bell.

At first I thought some child visiting the area must've dropped a toy and it was now going downstream so I figure I'd ignore it, but then I looked at how calm the water was and how loud the noises had been and found it impossible for the noise source to be so. Slightly concerned, I thought that maybe a house pet had gotten lost or escaped and started looking for it. The closer I seemed to get to the noise, the stronger a rotten, vile smell started to get. It smelled like a corpse but 100 times worse. I kept walking and the smell kept growing more and more intense. I wanted to get away from both the smell and the sound, but one of them kept calling for me and pulling me toward them somehow, and it wasn't until I looked down and saw a raccoon--not alive, but shredded, with bite marks all over its body and viscera thrown all over the ground-- and the bell noise started getting even louder and louder, so loud that my senses kicked back in. I started to run and run, away from the sounds and without looking back, but I couldn’t find my house. I kept walking straight forward when I was coming here, right?

I just kept running for 10 minutes, 20 minutes, 50 minutes, and my legs just couldn’t anymore when I noticed I couldn’t hear the bell anymore or smell the racoon’s corpse. I didn't get to feel relief, however, as I found I was lost. When I stated running, I'd panicked because I couldn't find my way home, so I took random turns. I was going to call my dad, but my phone was completely dead, so i decided to set up my tent and lock it before I plugged in my phone to charge it and go to sleep.

I had a really strange dream. I dreamt of… nothing. I saw an empty void of nothingness and all I could hear was the bell growing louder and louder every GODDAMN second and the smell getting more and more intense.

I woke up in a cold sweat and saw that my phone was charged, but it still seemed to be nighttime. I checked the time on my phone; it was 3 in the morning. I picked up the tent and called my dad, telling him everything. He described the path I needed to take so I would find him when I noticed it again: a bell starting to ring and a smell crawling up my nose. I couldn't take it, so I ran and I ran, I didn’t stop running. Then I looked up at the trees, and saw blood dripping down the leaves. The racoon's corpse fell, hitting branches and getting tangled in the trees, so I ran faster, taking the path my dad told me to, but somehow, the bell’s tinkling sounded just as loud as the last time, it didn’t seem to fade, instead slowly started getting louder, as if something was getting closer to me. I tried to run faster, jumping over anything blocking my way, and after a while I got to the last turn my dad told me to take. Now I just needed to run straight ahead but then, from the bushes, I saw a light. I could hear tires and the hectic flow of cars, I HEARD TRAFFIC, so I kept running and didn’t want to look back, but I did…

and that’s when I saw what I wish I hadn't. It looked like a lanky man, almost 3 meters tall and very skinny, then I shone my flashlight at it and I saw it in it’s full horrifying awe. Its face was strangely familiar to me, but I knew I didn’t know him. Its eyes were empty, black marbles of nothingness, and its mouth seemed to smile, but there was something off about it. It seemed to have a scar that went all the way to its ears on both sides of its mouth. I took in the rest of it; its clothes seemed ripped and faded, like they were at least a few decades old, and its hands didn’t have fingers, instead it had long claws that cut through all the bushes it brushed past. His right hand had some sort of ring, one that held a bell that rung every time he moved, and when I pointed the flashlight back up and looked it in the eye, its mouth scars started ripping open, revealing rows upon rows of jagged, needle-like teeth which were covered in blood and viscera. After seeing this, I couldn't scream. I ran, faster than I'd ever done in my life, but I kept hearing the bell’s horrible, haunting sounds behind me. My backpack got ripped open by a large hand, but I didn’t even care anymore.

I kept running and eventually saw my dad. I jumped into his arms, however, my foot was slashed, leaving a big and ugly wound and destroying my shoes, I screamed in pain and horror, thinking that this was the end, but then, the creature ran into hiding and my dad called the police because of what I told him over the phone. They arrived some minutes later, taking me to the hospital as I passed out from blood loss. But i'll never forget the drowsy vision before I lost consciousness in the ambulance, I saw the thing coming out of its hiding spot and looking at me with its dark empty eyes, and friendly waving at me. Ring, RING, RING.

Dec. 28, 2020, 2:54 p.m. 1 Report Embed Follow story
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To be continued... New chapter Every 30 days.

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