All I wanted to do was forget a terrible closing shift. During the Summers, I work as a part-time bartender at a popular spot in downtown Cincinnati. For the sake of privacy I won’t give the exact name, but if you’re familiar with the area, you can probably guess where I work.
The night was long, constantly chaotic, and filled with the absolute worst type of drunks. The tips were good though, and after finally getting off around 1:30 am, I was ready to get home and sleep the stress away. Since I was transitioning apartments, I had to stay at my sister’s place until my new lease started. She had a comfy little apartment right in downtown Cincinnati, close to a lot of great parks, bars, restaurants and music venues. A pretty ideal place to crash for a few weeks, and her 4 cats always gave me plenty of cute entertainment.
As I left the bar to get into my car, I instantly felt the hot stickiness of a humid night. The weight of the air sunk my already low mood, and I just desperately wanted to go home, eat an edible, and crash. The drive was short and simple, the city relatively empty of other vehicles, except for the occasional Uber or Lyft taking late-partiers home. Finally I made it to the safe haven of my sister’s apartment, parking my car at a metered spot in front of her apartment. When I got out, I felt something… watching me. I turned my head to the right, there was nothing. Then, I turned to the left, down the block my sister lived on. At the end of the block, I saw a small figure, completely silhouetted. I thought it might’ve been a child, but what would they be doing out at this time of night? Creeped out, I turned away and approached the front door. Almost instantly I noticed something was off as I stared through the small window that was placed above the front door. The foyer lights were off. In fact, the whole building was without light.
Why is that weird? Because these lights were never off. No matter the time, night or day, rain or shine, these lights were on. This building NEVER lost power. It made me uncomfortable at first, I hate the dark, but the building was old and the landlord was lax, so I choked it up to a fluky power outage. I was a little irritated that my sister didn’t give me a heads up beforehand. No worries, I approached the front door, pulled out my copy of the door keys, and slid them into the lock. However, as I unlocked the door, something made me feel…. unsettled. The air got colder, much colder. At first it was a bit of a relief during this humid night, maybe some of the building’s AC spilling out of the door. However, the temperature dropped too low, and the chill penetrated too deeply into my body. The darkness, the harsh chill, and the silence of the night made me feel increasingly unsettled. As a big fan of horror, my overactive imagination became increasingly vivid.
To give you an idea of how this building is laid out, it’s a little different from other complexes you might’ve lived in. It’s a fairly thin building, with three apartments that are stacked directly on top of each other. My sister lived on the very top floor, apartment 3. When you enter the building through the front door, there is the foyer, where the tenant’s mailboxes are. As you go up the first set of stairs, you’ll see apartment 1. Then another set of stairs which leads to a landing, then another which leads to apartment 2. then another landing, another set of stairs, and finally apartment 3. The trudge up never got easier, and in the dark and cold of the building, I knew it was going to be even less pleasant. Oh and of course, I had my heavy duffel bag with me, which contained spare clothes, my laptop and charger, hygiene supplies, and drugs.
As I began my climb up the first set of stairs, my nerves were in check. Yes, it was weird that the lights were off, but shit happens. I was not prepared for what was about to follow. When I trudged up to the final landing before my sister’s apartment door, something strange happened. I heard a soft croak. Maybe it was more like a rattle, but it was low and did not sound human. That startled me, and as I looked back with my phone flashlight, I checked to see if any of her neighbors had stepped out of their apartments. Perhaps it was a creaking door, but that rationalization did not make me feel that much better. As I made my way up the final set of stairs, I saw something that made my heart sink directly into my guts.
I saw the door for apartment 2.
What the fuck? I passed apartment 2 already, I know I did. I thought, “Shit, maybe my brain is more tired than I thought?”. Wishful fucking thinking on my part. I pressed forward, and as I made my way up, the air got colder. Like… freezer cold. Cold enough to where you could see your breath. I felt goose-flesh develop on me, and my legs, arms, eyes, and bag got heavier. The stairway got longer, and the landings were bigger. Finally I made up the next set of stairs. Apartment fucking 1. What the shit? This wasn’t possible, hell it defied any logical thinking I had left in me. I quickly ran out of plausible rationalizations. “Maybe this is a nightmare, I’m actually asleep in bed, and I’m just in a deep… dee-“, I was cut off by a bang at the door. Something on the other side had charged FULL force into the door of the apartment. I jumped back and screamed, a million “WHAT THE FUCKS” streaming through my mind.
After the bang, I heard another croak. Lower, louder, and… meaner this time. It was close, too close, and I couldn’t pinpoint where it came from. Behind me? Below me? The floor up above? From the apartment? Shit this was all too much. I dropped my bag, and booked it up the stairs. Have you ever heard the advice to never run from a dangerous animal? Maybe a bear? A big cat? A rabid dog? Maybe that’s bullshit, or I’m misremembering, but when I started to run, I felt like something was chasing me. You know that feeling you get after you turn off the lights in your basement, and you rush upstairs to outrun whatever creature has just been born from the darkness? I was feeling that type of anxiety times 1,000, because this felt real. Something was CHASING me up those steps, something hidden in deep, thick darkness.
The wooden stairs creaked and moaned under my rushing footsteps, blending in with the harsher and harsher croaks I was hearing. I was sweating bullets, dry heaving, breaking down. God I don’t even know how long I hauled ass up what felt like an infinite amount of staircases, and every time, I never found THE door I needed to. Apartment 1, apartment 2, apartment 1, apartment 2, over and OVER AND OVER. However, each time I made it to the apartment’s landing, something was different. I could only catch it with my phone’s flashlight, which I was still using since I didn’t want to fall and bust my shin in the dark. But each time there’d be a small chair that wasn’t there before, or a portrait that wasn’t supposed to be on the wall. It took me a while to figure it out, but they were pieces of furniture from… my childhood home. We’d moved out of that place years ago, and that shit was supposed to be sitting in a storage garage in Loveland, Ohio, not Cincinnati. My sanity began to slip away.
Another thing started to happen, the creaky, wooden floors and stairs began to get slippery. They were getting more and more coated in a dark, crimson substance. It smelled of copper and iron. Blood… fucking blood. “I’m in hell”, I thought, believing that I had left the plain of reality, and had entered a torture dimension, where croaking demons and furniture from your childhood tormented you. Thankfully I was still wearing my non-slip work shoes, but fuck the sound of blood being splashed under my feet added to my pure terror. It felt as if the croaking entity was biting at my heels, breathing down my neck, that it was about to get me. Then, I heard a voice, once again coming from somewhere in the dark abyss which now surrounded me.
“Come on Ryan, it’s this way, just a little further!”
What the fuck, whose Ryan? Then, a realization dawned on me, that was my voice. Not my voice now, but when I was about… 7 or 8. Young, innocent, pre-pubescent. Then I remembered Ryan, Ryan Holiday. He was an old classmate of mine, lived a few doors down from my old home. He went missing for a couple days in June of 2008 or 2009, it was a big story. They found him though, or what was left of him. Poor kid was mangled, tortured, mutilated. The cops found his body in a creek bed behind some old creep’s farm. If I remember correctly, the guy didn’t have an alibi, and had a history of domestic abuse against his own kids. Open and shut, that son of a bitch was sent up-river. Died about ten years later, suicide. Why the fuck was I hearing my own voice though? Why was I calling out to him?
Ryan and I never got along. I was a bit of a weird kid, very kinetic, loud, socially awkward. Ryan did not like that, he was your typically popular kid, those types that are too good at sports for how young they are. He picked on me, excluded me from recess games, and even went OUT OF HIS WAY to tell me I was not invited to his summer pool party. I had no love for the kid, but nobody deserved what happened to him. But we never hung out, so what’s this noise I’m hearing?
I was running out of gas, the feeling of being chased had not gone away, and I was slowing down. I could feel the blood getting deeper and deeper, slowing my footsteps as I hauled ass past the repeating doors of apartments 1 and 2. They were also getting dirtier, bloodier, and slightly more ajar. I couldn’t see what was inside, but I didn’t want to.
Then, out of nowhere, I made it. I just about ran headfirst into the door, but I somehow stopped myself. Apartment 3, home, safety, an end to this nightmare. It wasn’t going to be that easy, because as I yelped in excitement, my phone died. Darkness, total, darkness. You’ve got to be kidding me. This dark force was right on my heels, and I couldn’t see my keys or the damn lock to get inside. With haste, I grabbed the small set of keys I had from my pocket, and immediately dropped them. With a small splash, I heard them sink into the blood-covered floors. I reached down. feeling my way through the muck for them, and I heard footsteps climb the creaky stairs. Search and searching, I couldn’t see anything, but I could hear the steps getting louder and louder. In fact, it sounded like something was… crawling on all fours, like an animal. Croaking, hungry, angry, and cruel, its prey trapped and cornered.
After what felt like hours, I fished the keys out, and hoped to whatever god there was that I could figure out the correct key. My prayers went unanswered, the first key did not work. Okay, there are only two keys on this ring, fifty/fifty shot right? The second key didn’t work either. Shit… what the fuck? I alternated keys over and over and over, jiggling the door knob, ramming my shoulder into the door to try and get it OPEN. I was weeping, begging, pleading with anything to let this door open. The croaking, the creaking, the noise got louder. Deafening, my ears were overwhelmed, my senses being assaulted by a putrid smell of what I believed to be shit, piss, and blood. Then there was a scream, high pitched, like from a child in pain. It keeled me over, and I fell into the wet and warped floor. My eyes were shut, I knew the end was coming for me. The demon had won, its prey cornered and scared. The croaking was right on top of me, I felt its weight on my side as I wept in the fetal position. Goodbye to my family and friends, Hell claimed another victim to me. Then… it stopped, and the door opened. Slightly, a small creak that sounded like the creature alerted me. The weight was gone, the screaming, the pressure, it had dissipated. I got up, rose to my feet, and wiped some snot and tears from my face. Then I heard another voice.
“Collin, if this isn’t legit, I’m telling EVERYONE at school you’re a liar. And, I won’t invite you to my pool party!” It was Ryan’s voice, and it sounded clear as day.
Something, some kind of force, pulled and pushed me through the door, which from my perspective was just another dark void. When I got to the other side however, I was in a different place entirely. Not my sister’s apartment or building, but woods. Deep, dense woods, and I recognized them. These were the woods near my home, where kids would play during the Summer. Spinning around, I took in my surroundings, and I realized I had been completely teleported. There was no door, no apartment, just me, standing in a small clearing, surrounded by dense forest, right next to a flowing creek. Then, another voice.
“Collin, what did you do, what DID YOU DO??” My mother’s voice, she was chastising me. Why was she so upset? What happened in these woods?
Then I saw us, Ryan and myself, appearing from the trees on the other side of the clearing. I was wearing a blue and white striped polo, with white basketball shorts and blue Nike sneakers. Ryan was in all back, with a red Ohio State cap on, turned backwards.
“Collin we have been hiking for hours, where is this dead body you found?” That was Ryan, and I saw us both, clear as day, approach the creek.
I replied “Don’t worry Ryan, we’re just about there.”
“Good, because I’m sick of-“, he was cut off.
I’d picked up a rock, and hit him over the head with it, knocking him down like a sack of potatoes.
“What, what are you-“. I hit him again. There was fear in his voice, and tears in his eyes. I only saw the back of my head, but I could vision what Ryan was seeing. My face, my young, soft face, with a big toothy grin, beating him with a rock.
He pleaded for his life, begging for me to stop. I didn’t listen. I flipped him over, and grabbed a long stick that was placed right next to where we were. Did… did I place that there in advance? What happened next broke the last strand of sanity I had left within me. The things I did to that boy’s body, the pain I inflicted. This… this wasn’t me. It was nightmarish vision, a distortion, a false memory. With my own eyes, I saw this tiny, 4 foot 9, 85 pound version of me tear this boy to shreds. The sheer violence and violation I saw was crueler than any punishment from hell which I could imagine.
By the end of it, Ryan could barley let out a simple croak. I dragged his body to the creek, and sent it downstream. Down to the old farmer’s house. I saw murderous self wash it’s hands, then walk home.
“WHAT DID YOU DO?” My mother’s voice again.
I was suddenly back in my sister’s apartment, in front of another door, but not like the others. It was stained glass, a beautiful red rose. It was surrounded by a beautiful green meadow. I recognized it as the front door of my old childhood home. The door was unlocked, and I walked in. Standing in the living room was my mother, staring in horror at her blood-covered baby boy. My white stripes turned red, claw marks on my neck and arms. She pleaded and begged with me, “What did you DO?” I didn’t answer. She undressed me, sent me upstairs to my bedroom, and left for the laundry room. I saw myself, only in my underwear, running upstairs, and once again, didn’t see my face. However, I felt it… really remembered. I was smiling, proud of what I’d done. I followed my mother, who threw the clothes in the washer, and went back upstairs to me. She said that she’d take care of it, that her boy must’ve just made a mistake. He didn’t mean to hurt anybody, it was an accident.
“It wasn’t”, I remember thinking.
“Ryan Holiday was a stupid mean bully, he called me names, made my crush laugh at me for what I was wearing, HIT ME IN THE NOSE while we were playing dodge. He made me bleed.” I remembered those thoughts, and my body was filled with a sense of… pride. Ryan Holiday was punished, and mommy was gonna make sure I didn’t get in trouble.
The rest of my memories came flushing back to me, and things and events I misattributed or distorted became clear. Who I thought was my occupational therapist for handwriting, was really a child psychologist. The loneliness I dealt with in middle school wasn’t because I was hyper, it was because the other kids were afraid of me. They felt something, KNEW something was terribly evil about me. I remembered the hushed conversations my parents had when they thought I was sleeping.
“Did Collin murder that boy? We have to tell the authorities!” My father’s voice.
“You are NOT going to take my boy away from me. He made a mistake, but we can fix him. You know Collin, he’s a sweet kid! He just… needs to learn to control his temper. Besides, you’re the one that lets him watch those violent movies, and play those violent video games!”
“Oh so it’s my fault that our SON mutilated a boy’s *******?”
They got divorced not long after that. I haven’t seen my father in 10 years.
I shut my eyes, the reality of my life revealed to me. Years of therapy and psychology allowed me to repress these memories, these feelings and urges. I was.. dangerous, a ticking time bomb. For a long time I felt that I had a good handle on my emotions and temper, but I was a house of cards. The little boy that brutally murdered Ryan Holiday still lived within me, and maybe I couldn’t keep him hidden forever.
My eyes opened. I awoke in a hospital bed in the ICU. Reality, this was reality. My sister and mother were by my side, and they called a nurse in. Apparently, a good Samaritan had found me passed out, foaming at the mouth, just outside of my sister’s front door. It was 9:00 am, and I had been unconscious for several hours. Relief and joy swept through my body. The nightmare was over, I was back in the warm embrace of the people I loved. My tests were normal, no issues found in my brain, heart, kidneys or lungs. The doctors said my incident was a complete medical anomaly, possibly exhaustion. I don’t know all of the stupid medical terms, I was just happy to be alive. They wanted me to spend one more night in the hospital, just to be extra thorough. Fine with me, I needed some quality time to rest and recuperate.
When my family left that evening, I felt a familiar chill come back to me. The fear and anxiety returned, and I felt a presence watching me from the corner. As my eyes wandered to the source of my dread, I heard a faint and similar croak.
“Hello Ryan.”