We made a huge mistake.
We just thought it would be a fun idea, I promise. Me and my roommate Nolan – we like collecting random, weird stuff. Nolan likes thrifting and dumpster diving; I like building stuff in the garage or collecting weird trinkets. If you had asked me a week ago what the worst thing we’d ever found when looking through the garbage was, I would have told you that it was a bag of dog shit.
That was until we found these… things.
It was a few days ago, and me and Nolan were cruising through some local alleys in my car, looking for treasure. We had found a few small things, some cool old plates, a busted painting, a nice wooden side-table, a good haul more or less. We were driving behind a strip mall, passing some dumpsters, when Nolan grabbed me by the shoulder.
“Dude look!” He said, pointing to a dumpster just ahead of us, where a set of white feet were poking up from the top. I immediately pulled the car over and parked it in front of the dumpster – we got out, hopped up on the ledge of the dumpster, and peered inside.
“Mannequins, sick.” I grinned.
“Think we can fit them?” Nolan asked, looking at me.
“We’ll make ‘em fit – here, you fish them out I’ll go make space.” I said, as I stepped down and popped the trunk of the car. I moved the few things we had found so far into the trunk, and pointed out that the mannequins could be stacked horizontally in the backseat.
There were three of them – definitely not brand new, but not too bad for a dumpster find. A few scuffs and scratches here and there, but it wouldn’t be a problem. This was a good enough find to make us return home satisfied with our catch, which we did. We unloaded and stacked everything in the garage, and brushed off our new treasure – the mannequins.
“What should we do with them?” Nolan asked. We both pondered for a moment.
“You know what we be hilarious?” I started. “What if we put speakers in them and made them say creepy shit to scare people.”
“That’s genius.” Nolan smiled, nodding his head.
We spent the next hour or two cutting holes in the backs of the mannequins’ heads and taping some small Bluetooth speakers into them – we found an app that would let us broadcast our voices from our phones directly to the speakers, so we spent the rest of the afternoon playing around with that until we got bored. We sent a few pictures and videos of them off to our friends, who all thought that we were crazy. Our other two roommates weren’t thrilled at the idea of the weird speaking mannequins being part of the household, but we waved them off and told them they’d get used to it.
I wish we’d listened to them.
It was the next morning, as I was having a cup of coffee and browsing Instagram at the kitchen table that Nolan came into the kitchen, laughing as soon as he saw me.
“You got me good with that one last night.” He said.
“Huh?”
“The mannequin you put outside my bedroom door – real spooky.”
“Wasn’t me.” I said. “Must have been Amy or Sunny.” (Our other roommates)
“Yeah sure whatever, I’m gonna’ get you back though just you wait.” Nolan said with a dismissive wave of his hand, as he took a cup of coffee for himself and went back upstairs.
That day passed as any Saturday would, mostly doing nothing, a bit of cleaning around the house. Later in the evening we invited a couple friends over so that we could crack open a few beers and have a fire in the backyard. We showed off our mannequins, and everyone hated them except for me and Nolan. We didn’t really care though, but we put them back inside so that they wouldn’t bother people too much.
“Going to the bathroom, anyone need anything?” I asked, standing up from the fire. One or two people wanted beers, so I nodded and went inside. The bathroom door was slightly ajar and the lights were off, so I figured nobody was in there.
I pushed the bathroom door open and gasped, jumping back suddenly as I saw one of the mannequins standing in the middle of the bathroom.
“Boo.” Came a voice from the speaker in its head.
“Oh, fuck off.” I said, as my fright turned into laughter. I picked up the mannequin and carried it to the living room.
“Put me down! Put me downnnnnnnn.” The mannequin cried as I carried it. “Unhand me Ryllan!”
“Shut it Nolan.” I said as I propped the mannequin in the corner of the living room.
I went back outside with the requested beers and flipped Nolan off as I stepped down the deck stairs. He laughed and waved me off. We spent the rest of the night drinking and laughing, the fire was turning into coals and most of our friends had left by about two in the morning. I finished my final beer and told everyone goodnight as I chucked the can on our pile of empties.
I stumbled back inside and pushed my bedroom door open. I was too drunk to be scared this time, so I merely chuckled to see all three mannequins lined up on the far side of my bed. One of them had it’s arm extended, the hand gesturing to the bed.
“Sleepy time.” Said one of the mannequins.
I sighed and moved all of them back out to the living room, wondering if rescuing these things was going to be more of a hassle than it was worth. I went back to my room and closed my door, and crawled into bed, falling asleep to the peaceful hum of the air conditioning.
I woke up late and rolled over to check my phone. I scrolled through a few Instagram notifications, checked the news on reddit, and then almost had a heart attack when I got out of bed to make my way to the bathroom.
“Rise and shine!” Said the mannequin standing at the foot of my bed. The faces of the mannequins we had found were the blank, smooth kind without detailing, but Nolan had evidently drawn a smiley face in sharpie on this one.
I reached over to my nightstand, and angrily threw a copy of game of thrones at the mannequin, which hit it square in the chest and sent it toppling over backwards to the ground.
“Ouchie.” It said from the floor.
I threw on a bathrobe and left the room. I showered and generally went about my Sunday. When I returned to my room to get dressed, the stupid mannequin was still sprawled on the floor with the stupid smile on it’s face. I grabbed it by the arm and dragged it to the living room, where I propped it up with the other mannequins, which now also had smiley faces drawn on their blank, smooth heads.
Sunny worked late that day, and Nolan and Amy were out doing… something, so I had the house to myself. After I spent most of the day reading and playing some video games, I decided I would finish off the last few beers left in the case from yesterday. I grabbed one out of the fridge, took a cigarette from my pack, and stepped out onto the back deck.
“Okay fuck these things.” I said, as I saw the three mannequins were stood in a circle around the fire pit in the back yard, holding empty beer cans in their hands. I set my beer down, walked back inside, and picked up the baseball bat I kept next to my bed. I walked back outside, lit my cigarette, and preceded to knock the head of the closest mannequin clean off – the white head sailing across the back yard.
“Home run!” said one of the mannequins behind me, after which I immediately turned and slashed it across the torso with the bat. I laid into the mannequins, caving in the chests, knocking the heads off, and bashed the limbs apart. I picked up the remnants of the mannequins, and carried them into the alley where I dropped it all next to the garbage.
“From garbage you came and to garbage you shall return.” I said to the mannequin parts and flicked my cigarette onto the pile.
“How the fuck did Nolan do that…?” I said to myself as I walked back into the backyard. I smoked another cigarette on the deck, chugged my beer, grabbed another, and went back to my computer to play some more games.
About an hour elapsed, when the nicotine started to call to me again and I went back to the deck for another cigarette. I couldn’t tell if I wanted to cry, scream, run, or rage as I stepped outside and saw all three mannequins standing around the fire pit again. Their heads were all turned to face me, and where before they had smiley faces, all three now had frowning faces drawn on in sharpie. The worst part was, they all had duct-tape wrapped around themselves – reattaching arms, heads, patching holes, and holding them together where I had smashed them apart.
I stood in stunned silence, blinking… pinching myself, hoping I was dreaming for a good minute. I felt afraid to even take my eyes off these stupid things, so, staring straight at them, I put the cigarette to my lips and lit it, puffing out the initial cloud of smoke.
“Ouchie.” Said one of the mannequins, breaking our staring contest. I immediately strode down the stairs, yanking the garage door open and grabbing the jerry can of gasoline that I kept for my lawnmower. I went back into the yard, snapped each of the mannequins in half, threw them in the fire pit, doused them all in gas, and threw my cigarette onto the pile.
The entire thing went up in a great rush of smoke, and the heat flashed against me so suddenly I stumbled back from the firepit. I angrily flipped off the burning pile, and sat on one of our deck chairs, silently, angrily watching the fire burn.
I knew on the inside that Nolan was probably watching me from somewhere in secret, laughing his ass off at my reaction to these stupid dumpster mannequins – but I didn’t care, I hated them at this point, and I didn’t give a shit if I looked like an idiot.
Once the fire had burned itself out, all that was left were a few charred pieces that evidently weren’t made of anything meltable, and a pile of molten, black… something? Plastic maybe? I don’t know what they make mannequins out of.
I angrily made my way back inside the house, heading for my office. I was walking by the living room when I heard it.
“Hot.”
I stopped dead, too afraid to look. I slowly turned my head, and in the darkness of the living room, I saw three, still, humanoid, shapes. They were charred black, with whisps of smoke rising off of them to the ceiling. I felt my legs go weak and my heart start racing.
I ran back to bedroom and slammed the door. I threw everything on the top of my dresser to the floor and pitched the whole thing on it’s side against my door. I sat down on the floor of my room and started to write this.
Please, someone, please just tell me how he managed to do it. I know that mannequins cant come to life. It’s impossible! I know it is! How did Nolan do it, why did he do it? Why? I keep yelling through the door, begging, pleading, just. Wanting. To know. How. He. Did. It.
They’re not real, it’s a joke, it has to be a joke. Please, you guys are the ones who know about supernatural, creepy things. I need to know what’s happening, I need to know this isn’t real. I’m dreaming… hallucinating… it HAS to be that, but I’ve never had a dream like this before.
They’re right outside the door, I know it, because all they’re saying now, over and over… is…
“Sleepy time.”
Please, somebody help me.