u/???
longish
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It started with the dogs.
Arthritic dogs, unable to move, lay in vet's offices around the world, needles filled with pentobarbital empty and shaking in the doctor's hands. Dogs with mangled legs dragged themselves alongside the highway. News reports showed video after video. One dog- a German Shepard I think, missing half of his head after being hit by a semi threw himself over and over again against his owners door. The video cut out soon after, but you could see a little girl through the window. She couldn't have been older than five, with curly hair and chubby, tear-streaked cheeks. When the dog saw her he began hurling himself even more fervently and you could see the girls father pull her away from the window and close the curtains. I stopped watching the news after that.
These dogs should have been dead and technically I guess they were. Their hearts stopped beating, their skin rotted around them, but they were still there. They still whimpered and barked. The ones that were able would wag their tails.
Before long, this phenomenon spread to birds, bugs, animals, anything alive. Unfortunately this included humans.
In Mexican culture it is believed that the souls of the deceased will be with us until they are forgotten, after which they will pass on to the afterlife. Turns out they didn't know how right they were.
Being dead is painful. The more lucid ones were able to describe it. The more painful and messy your death is, the more desperate you'll be to move on. So desperate that you'll do whatever it takes to be forgotten.
There are footsteps coming from overhead and a voice calls down, melodic and rough,
"Honey? Baby doll, it's me! You can come upstairs, it's safe, I promise."
I shudder at the sound of my mother's voice.
"I promise I won't hurt you."
There's a pause before an animalistic scream rips through the house.
"Please! Please. It hurts it hurts it hur-"
I plug my ears.
That's not my mother. She isn't my mother.
I saw her. Once. By the time my father turned, the government had given up on finding a cure and instead focused on survival- well their own survival at least.
My father came back from a food run one day and by then he was too far gone. Crescent shape indents were scattered around his face and chunks of flesh hung down like streamers at the worlds most fucked up party. He sobbed and begged for us to kill him, and when he realized we couldn't he begged us to forget him. I stood silent and shaking. Blood caked his fingernails and stretched up his forearms.
Jesus Christ, he did that to himself.
He begged us to forget, but of course we couldn't. It's hard to forget when your father is standing in front of you dead and screaming. Blood leaked from his eyes but there were no tears.
He can't cry anymore.
It was the smallest detail but I couldn't help but notice.
A flash of silver caught my eye.
Mom.
He raised his arm.
The world seemed to go in slow motion while all of reality came crashing down on me.
I tried to look away but it was too late. I had seen what I'd seen and there was no going back. Nevertheless I turned my eyes to the carpet while my mother's blood speckled the carpet like rose petals at a wedding. My mother. The woman who sat on the floor with me and ate ice cream while I cried about a boy who's name I can't even remember. The woman who knew when I faked sick to get out of going to school, but still made me chicken noodle soup anyways.
I turned and ran.
The door was ten feet away. Ten feet. One hundred and twenty inches to freedom, but I got there... and I couldn't do it. I know you're probably screaming at me. I could go out that door and live my life. Nobody knew me. No one would remember me. By the time I was born all of my grandparents had succumbed to some ailment or another. Of course the neighbors must have known that the Petersons had an agoraphobic daughter. News travels fast in a town like ours, but they surely didn't remember me enough to bring me back. Hell, they probably don't even remember my name. I could go outside and be perfectly safe.
My hand trembled as I grasped the doorknob, while my mom rose behind me.
Fuck. I can't do it.
I turned once more and almost ran into what used to be my mom. My father hadn't just killed her- he had broken her. One eye was burst open, and fluid poured out like a red, veiny egg-yolk. Parts of her were gone. The heel off one foot. A toe off the other. A whole section of skin was torn off her back, and through it you could see parts of her spine, shattered into dust. She had been slit through from her neck to her navel and I could almost imagine the heart that had once beat there pounding along to my ragged breaths. She lunged at me but stopped short. Her lower leg had been attached by mere threads and now there was a soft sigh, like the tearing of silk, before it bent to an unnatural angle and she collapsed against a wall, knocking down our meager collection of family photos. I saw something in her eyes. A flicker of the woman she had been just five minutes ago and I snapped out of my trance.
Now here I am sitting in our basement. It smells musty, there's only one light, and if I were a character in a horror movie you'd be screaming for me to get the hell out.
But this isn't a horror movie. There's no ghost to sprinkle holy water on, no serial killer I can just outsmart, and there sure as hell won't be any shitty sequels. The only thing that's real right now are my shaking hands, the footsteps upstairs, and the dead child still in my womb. Even if I had made it outside, how long could I really last with a thing that wanted to kill me growing inside my body.
Eight months. It's been eight months and fourteen days to be exact. God, how stupid was I that I thought I could bring a baby into this world. I was naive and hopeful- and most importantly I wasn't alone. Now I am.
I met a boy once, back when I would still leave the house. He didn't mind waiting until eleven at night to go to the grocery store, because by then it was mostly empty. He was never annoyed by my fears but still, he never once pitied me. We were going to get married. We were going to have a real wedding at a real venue. Therapy was going great and I could mostly manage my anxiety by the time I found out I was pregnant. He was elated and I was absolutely terrified, but I knew that we could do it. Together.
All it took was one phone call for the world to come crashing down on me.
It was a truck driver. He wasn't even drunk. Just fell a little behind schedule and thought he could make it a bit longer before he turned in for the night. He got a slap on the wrist, meanwhile I was shattered by grief. For a while I truly hated him. It festered inside of me like a scab I just kept picking at. It made me a bad person. I turned mean, and reckless. Soon I stopped leaving the house. I quit therapy and stopped trying.
A month after the accident I found out he had hung himself with a bedsheet. The fucked-up part was that I had forgiven him. I was learning to heal and part of healing was forgiveness but it was too little, too late.
My hands are shaking as I type this, but I know this is the last option. I can already feel her waking up, tiny hands pounding on the sides of her temporary home.
I've spread gasoline along the concrete floor of the basement. In five minutes or so I'll light a match. After all, there's nobody to remember me. I can finally have peace.
I know I can't delay this much longer. The movement in my stomach is getting stronger, and the slow, long wail is becoming less muffled. It's time for me to end this.
Mom, dad, I know you won't see this but I love you. One day, you too will move on, and when you do me and my baby girl will be waiting for you.
I think I'll name her Zara. It's Hebrew- or maybe Arabic? I can't remember, but it means 'new beginning'. This isn't the end and I hope you'll understand that. Don't worry- I'm not scared anymore.