I found it discarded in a gutter downtown on my way home from a late night at work. It was a VHS tape and the only label on it had the word “Black”. Morbid curiosity prompted me to pocket it and take it with me to my flat.
I was expecting some weird shit, a bootleg recording, or homemade porn. Or maybe it would be a more substandard, less exciting footage. Either way, I told myself it wouldn’t hurt to just take a sly peek. If it did turn out to be hardcore illegal or shady material, I’d just dump back in that gutter like the person before me.
When I arrived home, I started rummaging for the place where I kept my hoarded old electronics I’d never quite gotten around to throwing away. I retrieved what I was looking for amidst the dusty, cobweb-ridden storage shelves: a VHS player. I hoped it would still work after nearly two decades of abandonment.
I blew away the thick layer of dust on it, then wiped it down with a wet rag, before hooking it up into the outlet with the TV. I pressed the power button and waited with bated breath, muttering a silent prayer under my breath. Finally, with a hoarse whir, the ancient piece of hardware powered to life.
I heated myself a bowl of Chinese noodles, set it down on the counter, then popped the tape into the player. The last thing I saw as the tape disappeared inside was that label with the one word “Black”. I wondered what it meant, and I guessed I was about to find out.
I quickly picked up the steaming bowl and settled back down with it onto my couch, waiting for the tape to automatically be played.
I spent the first seconds waiting in anticipation until the seconds dragged to minutes, with nothing. The screen was just black. I cocked my head to the side and wondered if maybe the VCR player really wasn’t working as I thought. At one point I contemplated taking the tape out and putting it back in again, but just as I was about to hop up from my seat to do so, I noticed something strange.
There was a cold breeze in the room that wasn’t there before.
I looked around, but all my shifting eyes found were the closed curtains of my living room. I stood up and went to lift the curtains to check. As expected, the windows were well shut.
I turned slowly to look back at the TV, with my eyebrows knotted together.
I stepped closer slightly, wondering if my mind was tricking me. Somehow the source of the cold draft seemed to emanate from there.
There was something else that was different about the glass of the TV screen that I couldn’t quite place but made me feel uneasy. I squinted to try to notice what was off about it but I still couldn’t tell.
While waiting there, wondering what was wrong with the television, I suddenly felt the faint breeze grow into a rugged gust that blew from the screen until it turned into a forceful, frigid gale that howled violently through the room. Goosebumps erupted all over my shivering skin.
I felt my body being tugged against its will despite trying to stand my ground. I realized the screen was sucking me inwards with the powerful gale, and I was losing to it. Before I knew it, my feet were swept away from the ground, and I was flying feet-first into the screen in a whirl. I braced myself for some sort of impact with the glass but blanched in the split second when my feet went through the space where the screen should’ve been. Just before my entire body passed through the dark gap, I lurched my arms out and they made a desperate grab at the sides of the TV frame.
In those last few seconds with my grip held, tears began falling from my eyes, and my brain scrambled to try to understand what was happening around me.
Something flashed in my mind then—the awful realization of what the ominous, telling label with the word “Black” could’ve meant. This was a passage to some sort of void black hole, like some sort of forbidden window I had opened.
As it all dawned on me, the ravaging wind tore my anchored grip from the TV frame, and I found myself helplessly tumbling away, floating further and further from the screen filled with the light of my living room.
It’s been nearly an hour now, and I don’t see the light anymore. It’s only pitch-black darkness all around me as I continue to float through this seemingly endless space. It’s so cold here.
I don’t know if my message will reach you. My phone signal is dying out and my battery is soon about to follow. My address is >![REDACTED]!<. I hope someone believes my story. If someone out there can see this, please send for help.