Seasonal Ghost Story Challenge

[caddyman]

Only a couple of days now until Christmas and time, I think, for the traditional horror or ghost story. Last year, I posted up the challenge to almost universal apathy, other than from a select few, but it's always worth a try.

The challenge, as usual then, is a ghost story in 500 words or less to be posted on LJ in time for Christmas. I shall try and think something up just so no-one thinks I am idling any more than I really am.

Go on.

Have a go.

How hard can it be? Everyone likes a spooky story.

Cross posted to and from my own journal and just_writing.

Comments

A story, more camp than creepy, but I did my best....

[anubisgrrl.livejournal.com]

When we found Potemski, he was shuddering in the corner, his face slick with sweat and spittle.

“The figgy pudding! The FIGGY PUDDING!” he jibbered.

So there it was, no choice now. I tapped on my cell, my fingered suddenly weary, knowing what was to come and what this would all mean. A flipping code DC. No more holiday clear, just ho-ho horror.

I hand signaled the elves to move to the side, away from the glistening doors. Never did like candy canes and sugarplum glass. Damn nuisance, if you ask me. Just asking for vermin, or in this case, something even worse.

I eased open a door with a ski pole. There was little sound, just Potty’s raving and the distant clash-clashing of what was likely a toy monkey. I sighted high, letting off a flare into the darkened workshop beyond.

The chaos was hard to assimilate. Red and green and more red, and not all paint. Broken toys don’t bleed, but broken elves sure as hell do, and were, all over the place in small wet, violent lumps. Some of which twitched, others which sobbed, which meant some of the little bastards were still alive. That would make my job a lot harder.

I scanned for the pudding, but nothing was stirring, not a even a mouse. I shook my head sharply. Damn it, rhyming was not good, not good at all. Something was pushing verse into my mind. I moved forward with care.

At the far end, the splintered remains of a sleigh framed a cascade of shredded paper and ruptured boxes, their contents in sticky ruin. I could tell even from where I was that the residue would be sweet and brown.

A deep-throated plea cut through the scene: “Kill me! For the love of all things jolly, kill me!”

That’s when I saw them. On the ground, wrapped in a wispy embrace, his chin a scar of white amid cherry red and crimson was the big man himself. Still chubby and plump, but not the least bit jolly, I gasped when I saw him, in spite of myself. His pipe was cracked, still held in his teeth, and a presence encircled his head like a wreath. Its visage was broad as it twisted its head, and my stomach grew cold with a feeling of dread. On its head was a circle of candles and fruit, and its robe hung in tatters like an old velvet suit. It spoke not a word, but I knew it at last! It was as I feared, the Ghost of Christmas Past!

“Let the fat man go, you villainous foe!” I commanded, leveling my gun.

It turned with a jerk grabbing its victim’s belly, and with a blood curdling wail cut through it like jelly. I unloaded my gun, and then unloaded some more, until I was sure the ghost was heaving on the floor. One final volley sent the ghost off to hell, then why was I still in this damn rhyming spell?

I moved in closer, my gun at the ready. I felt sick, angry, and kinda heady. Then, what to my wild eyes should appear, but the blasted fig pudding: the source of all fear. More rapid than eagles the pudding it came. I fell to the floor, awash with terror and shame. My gun to right fell right out of reach. I was sure my soul this pudding would leech. I closed tight my eyes and said a quick prayer, then I opened them up and it was no longer there!

“That’s for Ms. Claus, you eldritch wretch!” declared Santa, a discharged jack-in-the box in ruin at his side. How he wired it up with that blade and holy water, I will never know. Before I could recover, he was gone. Damn, if he didn’t die with his finger on his nose, well, what was left of it.

I sent the all clear as I sat up. Around me bits of fruit and ichor sizzled. The smell was indescribable.

So much for happy Christmas to all. More like to all a good fight. Hey, wait a minute….

Have a cliché

[davidt3001.livejournal.com]

Nash carved knickknacks from wood, the kind barrow-boys sold on the fringes of street markets and fairs. He usually obtained odds and ends from lumber yards or carpenters, sometimes pieces he’d found. He made it a rule never to pay much for any of it. One night, he found himself examining a fine eighteen inch square of mahogany, slightly damp on one edge and varnished on one side; on the other wisps of silk clung to upholstery tacks. A local lad had hawked it to him while he was taking a constitutional on the Common, and he’d skipped his usual mild and bitter to get to attend to it.

Nash seldom worked to plan; usually the raw material dictated what he would carve – soldiers at attention from long sticks, Joseph, Shepherds and wise men from wedges; plain, irregular lumps became animals, Mother Mary or Baby Jesus. This evening, he was at a loss. He’d examined for knots and cracks, found neither, sanded away the varnish, then gone cross-eyed staring into the board. He blinked, shook his head and noticed that the grain suggested a face, seen from above, as if he were looking down on someone looking up while climbing a ladder. He took a pencil and sketched what he saw on the wood – he found himself picking out messy hair, wide eyes and an open mouth. He reached for his chisels, deepening the lines, finding that small cracks opened as he carved, at the corners of the mouth and eyes, across the brow.

Nash stopped working when smokers’ coughs outside broke is concentration. He twitched his curtains and noted the throngs shuffling past, resigned in the gloom. It was probably around dawn.

Nash must have slept then, because he awoke in twilight. From the dirty glow above the streets, and the masses flowing the other way, it was dusk. He returned to his carving, adding depth and detail, the suggestion of a formal dress, the tips of fingers, scratching at something. The wood parted easily as he picked out the teeth, young, strong and unworn, the underside of the tongue. He must have missed a spot of varnish – the eyeballs were glossy, the eyes wild. He left them and attended to the background; the grain suggested upholstery; Nash made it plain.

Nash again, slept when the sun rose, woke when it set, and returned to his work again, this time aware that the detail, perspective and depth of this work were exceptional, almost lifelike, he could almost see the tonsils. He took his finest file and narrowest chisel to the back of the throat, and made some small indentations. Then he heard, understood and died.

The screams led Constable Green to Nash. Cowering in his basement flat was a girl – Molly Clarke – who had been believed dead. Her shroud was askew, her funeral dress torn and dirty, and Nash was clutching a board from her coffin. Green hadn't recalled him having white hair.