My dad and I were always more like friends them a parent and child relationship. He called me ‘bro’ and ‘kid’, and we always had a fun time when hanging out. We would play video games, go bowling, laser tag, all the fun stuff one would do with their friends. One tradition we always had was going to get donuts from a local, family owned donut store. He would get a bagel and I would get a strawberry donut with sprinkles on top, with a carton of orange juice. We would do this every Sunday. One Sunday, when I was 5 years old, 23 years to the day, I was wearing a big sun hat. I had just gotten it, and was wearing it due to the sun being overbearing hot and bright. We walked in the shop around 9 A.M, and they were unusually empty. Just one other man. “I like your shoes” my dad said to him jokingly, as they were wearing the exact same pair. “Like your pants” the man replied. They were wearing the same pants too.
The man ordered a bagel and a cup of coffee and sat down to read the paper. My dad and I went up to order our usual. Same guy ran the registry. 5 days a week, and looking back, he must’ve been in his late 70’s. After the shop shut down last summer due to the pandemic, I’ve seen the guy walking around town occasionally. Anyways, I go to their fridge to grab a carton of orange juice. I notice the man finishing up and thought nothing of it. My dad is deep in conversation, and when I call out to him for us to leave, he tells me to head to the car. I turn towards the door, looking down at my shoes, and my peripheral vision blocked by my over-sized sun hat.
My dad jogs to catch up to me before I cross the street. “Sorry, we hadn’t talked in forever, thought we should just catch up, you know?” My dad said. “But you talked last Sunday?” I hadn’t seen my dads face, only his shoes and pants. “Yeah buddy it just feels like it’s been a while, weeks feel long nowadays.” “Hey! What the hell are you doing with my kid?” My dads sprints over and tackles the man from the store who was pretending to be my dad. “Let’s go, kid” my dad says as he picks me up and sprints for the car. Suddenly I hear a squelch, and my dad drops to the floor.
I hadn’t realized at the time, but the man had stabbed my dad. “Let’s, go kid, everything’s all good now” “okay thanks, dad.” We get to our car and start driving. “You can let go of my hand now dad” I said, as he was still holding my hand tight. “I don’t want to let you go. Ever” he replied. I looked up to see my dads face, only to see a pair of eyes that did not belong to my dads. Bloodshot, like he had just huffed on the greenest grass in all the lane. His head turned at an unnatural angle to look me dead in the eyes, all while blasting down the road at 120 mph. Looking back, I have no idea how he didn’t crash, or how we weren’t pulled over. Somehow, I didn’t realize this wasn’t my dad. Or my car. “Okay dad” I said. When we got home, I didn’t even bother to look up. I still feel stupid because this house wasn’t even mine. “Let’s go to the basement, kid. Wanna have fun?” “Of course dad, can we play Mario?” “Of course we can.” I sit down on the couch. It looked just like the one from my own house, coincidentally. This next part traumatized me for the rest of my life, so be warned as you proceed.
The man who I thought was my father walked down stairs, fully unclothed. I didn’t even bother to look, but reminiscing I could tell by the noise it made when walked down each step. “Take off that damn hat” he yelled. My dad never yelled at me. “Mom says we shouldn’t curse, or yell, or be mad. Why are you breaking the rules?” “I’m sorry kid. Let’s play Mario, huh?” He ripped off my hat to reveal his fully naked body. His skin was shriveled despite his face looking mid 30’s. His eyes were still bloodshot as ever, and his ‘thing’ had bumps all over it. “Dad?” I was so confused as to what was happening. “Don’t you get it, I’m not your dad” I remember those words vividly. They play in my ears for hours on end everyday. Fortunately my little kid eyes watched enough horror movies to use my brain and run, never turning back.
I ran up the stairs, but the main crawled on all fours and grabbed my foot, dragging me down, making me hit my face on the steps. He growled, the threw up blood on my leg. I tried again. This time he jumped on top of me, then proceeding to drag me down the stairs using his teeth. I started crying. He started crying. The difference was mine was tears of water, his were tears of blood. He took some on his pointer finger, trying to force it between my lips. “Join me” he growled. Before he could force it into my body, the door of the basement broke down, and policemen rushed into the room. He attacked them and was shot in the head, his brains splattering all over my face. Everything after that was a blur. The man had stabbed my dads stomach, but he survived. He called the cops, gave a license plate, and they tracked him down.
My dad died in the hospital 3 days later due to an infection. My mom was committed to a psych ward. I was in an out of foster care. No therapy, no talking about what happened. It traumatized me. One thing I never told anyone is that a little bit of blood got in my mouth when he was shot. Turns out nothing happened. I didn’t become like him. At I thought so. But now my eyes are getting bloodshot, and I have the urge to kill something, or eat someone, and now I realize I have to shoot myself before that happens. I don’t know why it’s happening now after 23 years. Maybe it’s just the trauma making me crazy, but I just needed to make this post to get this off my chest before I die tonight.