16-Aug-2019
Finally, I got to write a horror!
Although, maybe I should have gone with my circus idea…
“They say little kids used to play in this park.” Flickering light from the fire pit they’d made in the sand cast ghostly shadows on Luke’s face as he talked. “People used to come here from all around to have fun.” Luke paused. “Until that night.”
Marci let out a squeal and jumped. Her date laughed. Marci slapped him. “Cut it out!”
“Just messing with you.”
Luke gave them a dark stare.
“Sorry.” Marci settled back down, moving closer to her date.
“You need me to put my arm around you?” my date, Jack, asked.
I sent him a withering glare. “You do and I’ll toss you in the fire.” He’d told me we were going to the park to play little kid games. What he’d failed to add was that they boys were bringing us here, to the old Rocket Park.
Jack chuckled and scooted closer to me. I wanted to move away, but didn’t. In truth, the old park with its rusted play toys that moaned in the wind and the knowledge that a bunch of kids had died here was freaking me out a little bit. So was the fact that we’d get arrested if the police found us.
Luke leaned forward and spoke in a low voice. “The neighborhood was having a party. Everyone came. The adults gathered under the bowery, and the kids played in the rocket.”
I glanced at what was left of the bowery. The roof had collapsed a few years before, and only a table or two had escaped the wrath of the elements. Like the swings, the merry-go-round, the skeletal rocket and the monkey bars, they had all succumbed to rust and ruin.
“No one noticed the sky getting dark. Little by little. No one noticed the shifting in the nearby trees, or the air as it cooled.”
A breeze licked the skin of my arms. A shiver ran up my spine. I couldn’t see much but black past the light of the fire, but it felt like something was watching us.
So help me, if Luke had some of his other buddies out there ready to scare us I would catch them and kick them until I felt better.
“By the time they knew something was wrong, it was too late.”
Jack scooted closer to me, and I could have sworn that despite the fire, the air chilled around us.
Marci let out a little whine. “Don’t tell us any more, Luke.”
Another guy joined her. “Yeah, man, let’s just roast marshmallows and get out of here.”
“Forget marshmallows, let’s just go.”
I took a breath. At least I wasn’t the only one feeling weird about being here.
Luke leaned over the fire until the light flickered on his face and make him look like something out of a horror movie. “You can’t start the story and not finish it. You guys know that. If you leave without getting to the end, the kids will follow you home and haunt you forever.”
Jack snorted—or tried too. It came out more like a surprised cough. “But we don’t believe in ghosts, right?”
That was one of those things our parents told us that we were supposed to simply take their word for it. Like so many other things.
“Do you want to chance it?” Luke asked.
Jack was shaking beside me. “Yeah, I do.”
I sighed and took his hand. We’d only been on a few dates, but I kind of liked the guy. I certainly didn’t want him to bolt and leave me with these idiots. “Come on, let him finish his silly story and then we can go.”
Jack’s eyes went wide, and he stared at me.
Marci giggled.
Jack didn’t look convinced, but he squeezed my hand and mostly stopped shaking.
Luke glanced around again before speaking in his low voice. “Something came up out of the ground that day. Something horrible. It burst out of the sand and grabbed the nearest kids. Each one got sucked into the ground, never to be seen again.”
The wind got stronger, rustling the trees around us. The squeak of rusted metal on metal sounded from the remains of the playground.
Jack’s fingers tightened around mine.
I scooted closer to him.
“The other kids ran, but anyone who didn’t get off of the sand in time, got taken.”
Everyone looked to my right at the remains of the playground. Our fire pit sat twenty feet away from it, but suddenly it didn’t feel like enough space.
“The adults ran to save them, but anyone who set foot on the sand got pulled underneath.” Luke paused. “Some got ripped in half trying to get back out.”
Someone dry heaved.
A leftover chain for the swings clanged against a pole. A strong wind slammed against us, and the fire wavered.
I’m not sure when Jack had put his arm around me, but I didn’t mind.
Luke pointed toward what was left of the rocket. “Anyone who got sand on them died a few days later. None of the kids were ever seen again, and those that survived have all ended up in mental institutions.” He shifted. “It’s said that if you tell the story here, at night, that you will have good fortune. But if you don’t make it to the end, you’re cursed.”
Another blast of wind hit us. Marci yelled. “Is that the end of the story?”
Luke nodded.
“That’s a stupid story,” Jack muttered as he stood.
I stood with him. “Yeah, let’s go.”
Before I could take a step, Jack screamed.
I caught a glimpse of something dark and long as it wrapped itself around Jack’s middle and jerked him away from me. “No!” I reached for him, but missed as he was dragged across the weeds and into the sand pit.
Everyone screamed.
Everyone but Luke, who nodded. “Blood to appease the beast. We are safe.”
