Don’t sit too close to the television or your eyes will turn square. If you eat your bread crusts your hair will turn curly. If you go near the cemetery after dark the Man with the Thisic will get you. Old wives’ tales we’ve all heard before.
Well the last one, the one about the man with the Thisic is probably unique to me. My names Allen and I live in a small rural Australian town, not quite in the middle of the country but in that general direction. What is the man with the Thisic? A tale that has been around our town since at least before my parents were born. Everyone knew about the man with the Thisic. Rumour has it that a long time ago a young girl by the name of Rosemary Dutton went down to the river by the cemetery one night and was never heard from again. Further to the rumour is that the Police were unable to solve the crime. From this small bit of information, you’re probably wondering how the Man with the Thisic story unfolded. Allegedly, and I say allegedly with more then just the slightest trace of sarcasm, the day after the girl went missing her parents received a letter containing just 6 words.
“Thanks, the man with the Thisic”
As to whether there was a girl named Rosemary Dutton who used to live here and went missing, I couldn’t tell you. But what I can tell you for certain is it just a stupid story that adults told their children. My personal belief is that because the area down near the river past the cemetery was secluded and was probably a good place for teen parties, away from prying adult eyes. Mind you, in all my teenage years living here I had never once heard of anyone planning a party, or even going in that direction after dark so while I sit here and tell you with absolutely certainty I don’t believe a word of it, it seemingly works.
“Allan” yelled my mum from down the hall, “Greg’s at the front door”.
Greg would be my best friend since we were 7. It was Friday and we had plans. I was a cool dude, man. No staying home for me on Friday night.
“Yeah thanks mum, coming. We’re staying at Rohan’s house tonight so I’ll be home in the morning”
“Alright be safe”
I grabbed my backpack and ran down the hall and out the front door where Greg was waiting. We bumped fists and started walking down the street. “We gotta stop by Squirt’s house and grab him on the way. His mum won’t let him walk over the Rohan’s on his own” Greg smiled at me. I met his eyes as I looked back.
“Not the Man with the Thisic” we both exclaimed together and grabbed each other laughing.
“Oh man” I said, “One day we’ll figure out where that came from”
Squirt got his name way back in the third grade after eating some suspicious chicken soup his mum had packed him for lunch. Needless to say since then he never went anywhere without a second pair of underpants stashed away from him. After getting to his house and reassuring his mum we’d be at Rohan’s well before dark and we’d stay away from the cemetery on the way there he was finally allowed to head of with us. We trekked the long way around town to stay true to our word and avoid the cemetery and when we got to Rohan’s door he opened it barley more then a crack. “Sorry guys, tonight’s a bad night” I was about to ask what was wrong when I heard it. His dad screaming in the background asking who was at the door. I really felt for Rohan at times like these.
“Just come with us mate then. We’ll go stay the night at my place. Get you out of here” I said.
He looked me right in the eyes and I could tell he wanted to say yes.
“You know I can’t mate. I can’t leave mum here with him on her own. Someone has to protect her”. I knew that would be his answer before he spoke, and while my heart broke for him I couldn’t help but admire him. He shut the door and went back to the yelling. Rohan’s dad was a drunk. An angry drunk at that. If dad had been drinking Rohan never left the house. Never left his mother alone with him. Judging by the bruises we’d seen over the years, it seemed as though he’d put himself in the way of Dad’s fists to protect mum.
“We really should do something” Greg spat out.
“Yeah” Squirts agreed.
“One day” I murmured as we walked back down the path.
We all wanted to of course. But his dad was an copper and was now the council ranger in town and every time someone raised concerns the Police would just say “Dave’s fine. Probably drinks too much but wouldn’t hurt a fly”
Wouldn’t hurt a fly my ass. “Come on” I said, “Let’s go back to mine. Mum will probably let us cook a frozen pizza and we’ll see if we can speedrun Mario Wonder”.
“You know” started Greg, “We could go all the way back around, or we could…” He trailed off looking at Squirts. I knew exactly what he was getting at but Squirts was a little slow on the uptake.
“If you’ve got a quicker way of getting us home I’m all for it” yelled Squirts. Clearly frozen pizza was to his liking.
“All we gotta do Squirts is cut through the cemetery”. The look of fear that crossed Squirts eyes at the mention of the cemetery would have been comical if not for the fact I knew it was absolutely real. I had a feeling Squirts Mum might have added a few spicy details to the story just to try and keep him by her side.
“Get fucked. No way. Uh uh. I’m not going anywhere near there. I don’t feel like dying tonight”.
“Oh come one Squirts, it’s a fucking bullshit story. Everyone knows it”
“Yeah well how come no one goes there after dark then. Look the suns almost gone. Let’s just go the normal way and be done with it”.
To avoid the two of them getting into a punch up I decided to play mediator. “Look Squirts, it’s completely up to you. If you want to go the long way we will” I could see the relief on his face spreading already, “But the story is bullshit. We all know it. And if we cut through the cemetery we’ll be eating pizza before we’d even get home if we went the long way” The look on Squirts face showed that he really was keen for that pizza. “I’m pretty sure there’s even a BBQ Chicken one in there”.
Squirts looked back and fourth between Greg and I. You could tell there was an internal battle going on in his head. Death or BBQ chicken? It was a question I’m sure we’d all asked ourselves at least once in our lives.
“Alright fine. I know the story is fake but I thought you two believed it and I didn’t want you to have to admit you were scared”
Greg laughed and put his arm around Squirts. “Sure ya did Squirts, sure ya did”. Off we set headed towards the cemetery. In my rough estimation it would be dark before we got there and while I’d never admit it, in that moment there was a chance this group could have Squirts x 2. I know I said I didn’t believe it, but that was back when I was in the safety of my own room. And it was still daylight then as well! Logic would state that the story was rubbish, but did that really mean we should put it to the test. I was about to say something when I caught myself. I’d never hear the end of it, and not just from these two because they’d sure tell anyone who’d listen that I was a firm believer in the Man with the Thisic.
We got to the gates of the cemetery. If we walked directly through until the end, followed the fence down to the corner where the river narrowed, we could walk through ankle deep water and we’d be directly behind the street my house was on. There really was nothing to it.
“Well” said Greg, “After living in the same town as him for all our lives, I think it’s about time we go meet the Man with the Thisic”. He laughed and walked through the gates as confident as could be. I smiled at Squirts and offered an encouraging nod.
“Come on” I said, “Let’s go”
The sun was gone but there was enough light that the tombstones cast long shadows across the gravel as we walked, but the shadows were disappearing far too quick for my liking. “Fuck hang on, I’ve got a rock stuck in my shoe”. I turned and waited for Squirts watching him take his shoe off and shake a small pebble out. When it finally came free and hit the ground he yelled in triumph and put his shoe back on. I told him to hurry up and turned back towards Greg. Except Greg wasn’t in front of me. When I turned around to watch Squirts Greg was no more then two metres in front of me. I’d had my back to him for maybe 15 seconds. Maybe. Squirts walked into my back.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he asked.
“Shut the fuck up. Be quiet”
Squirts realised Greg was no longer in front of us. He latched onto my arm. “I knew it. I fucking knew it. The man with th…”
“Shut the fuck up” I hissed at him. “Shut the fuck up and don’t move”. I looked around. I couldn’t see much at all. I listened as hard as I could. Directly to my right I thought I heard a small twig snap. I focused as hard as I could. Beyond the outline of a tombstone I could see the shape of a tree in the background. There were no leaves on the branches. It was dead. Like everything else in here. This was creepy as fuck.
It happened in an instant. There was a blood curdling scream, Squirts fell backwards and I screamed like a 12 year old girl. “THE MAN WITH THE THISIC IS HERE FOR YOUR BRAINS” Greg leapt from the nearest tombstone and grabbed the front of my shirt. He nearly couldn’t breath he was laughing so hard. Squirts was almost crying.
“You absolute fuckwit” I yelled at Greg, and to save a little face, “You nearly scared Squirts to death. I knew you were there”
“You called?”
This voice made the three of us stop. This voice did not belong to any of us. This voice was not right. This voice was…
I turned around and there stood the most gruesome thing I had seen in my life. It was in the shape of a person, as in it roughly looked like a human. But there was no skin. Instead there were blood and muscle and connective tissue. It wore a really old pin striped suit, with a jacket but with no shirt. The head was bald, but the eyes…
“I am the Man with the Thisic, and here you are with me” It spoke in almost a sing song voice. “You knew the story, you knew the warning, and now your families go into mourning”
As it said this, correction, as it sung this, it’s eyes rolled back into it’s head so only the whites were showing. I barely had time to do anything when one of it’s arm reached up to the sky. Only when it reached as high as it could, the arm began to extend. Upwards at first, then it moved forwards until it was above us, like some weird fucking godforsaken skill tester. It’s arm shot down towards Squirts, the hand open the fingers extended and it enveloped Squirts head. A sickening sound followed as the hand closed as if Squirts head hadn’t been there. Only the sound along with parts of Squirts skull, brain and blood hitting me and Greg proved that it definitely was there. The hand retracted back towards it’s face and it’s mouth began to open, only it looked like the whole head was opening as if the mouth was a hinge and the hand went straight in and deposited what was left of Squirt’s head. It smacked it’s lip like it had just tasted a nice medium rare and the eyes came back to the front of it’s head.
“The Man with the Thisic” it sang in it’s fucking sick sing song voice, “That’s who I am. You were told not to come here, now I’m going to wash you down with an ice cold beer”.
Something in me finally broke and I ran. I ran as fast as I could. From the footsteps behind me I could hear that Greg was running as well. We couldn’t be that far from the fence. Through the fence, across the river, jump the Robertson’s back fence and then we could be on my street.
Then there was a little sing song voice “The Man with the Thisic is coming, there’s really no point in running”.
The path broke off and I veered in the direction where I knew we could get across the river. I got to the fence first and almost cleared it in one jump. I pulled myself over the fence and turned as Greg jumped into it. “Hurry the fuck up” I screamed. Greg looked at me with absolute terror in his eyes. Just as he was about to pull his leg over the top the hand came down over his head. I heard the same sickening noise. I didn’t watch this time. I turned and kept running, feeling the spray of Greg’s blood on my back. Over the Robertson’s fence, through their side gate, out onto the street. I sprinted four houses down crossed the road and up to my front door. Thankfully Mum never locked the door. I opened and shut it behind me, sliding down the door as I did. I could hear the TV from the lounge room.
“Is that you Allan? I thought you were staying at Rohan’s?”.
“Yeah I’m not feeling the best” I yelled back trying to sound as normal as possible. “I’m just going to go to bed”
“Okay Honey, come get me if you need anything”.
I walked into my room and shut the door. Was this some kind of sick joke that Greg and Squirts were playing on me. Surely it had to be. I tried ringing both there phones but no luck. I sent them both a message telling them it was very funny but it didn’t fool me. I looked out my bedroom window and could see nothing in the street. After a long shower I had managed to convince myself that they had played a prank on me and was mad at them both for ruining the night. Now I was stuck at home on my own.
I fell asleep sometime around midnight and had a fitful nights sleep, filled with dreams of big hands and tombstones.
I woke the next morning and still felt resentment towards them both. I got up to go to the bathroom and that’s when I saw it. An envelope was just inside my bedroom door, as if it had been slid under it. In simple, neat handwriting it said, “Allan”. I looked at it closely. I looked around the room as if waiting for the hidden camera to pop out. When that didn’t happen I slowly walked over and picked it up. Hands trembling I opened and read it;
“Thanks, the Man with the Thisic.
Ps. I’ll be waiting for you”