Dream Dark Stories

Tag: fiction

  • Day One Hundred & Eighty-Three, July 1st, 2024

    Hi-ho and hello.

    So…I’ve decided that each day will share a form of art on the daily from day one of July to the 18th and likely be sporadic afterword depending on the reception and feedback. We’ll see.

    Short Story

    By: M. R. Vega

    Melinda woke to silence.

    An utterly stagnant and dreary silence with an utter stench lingering that immediately brought on a wretching in her throat. Her body convulsed and shot upright from the still placid home of huddled sheets and piled serapes dropping from her coughing, thrashing chest and shoulders. She grabs for the water on her night stand, fumbling and knocking it onto a stack of old manuscripts, coughs with another thrashing and irritably clenches at her fists while stomping to the bathroom with the now empty cup.

    She flips the light on and is stupefied, lambasted by the horror that’s staring back at her. It couldn’t be, she thought, it can’t be, she told herself. Muttering in an incoherent clicking and gurgling of what was her mouth.

    Melinda Josie Tronlin had happened to find herself staring back at what was but an alien. It’s head near bulbous, Melinda’s eyes now the size of tea plates, slits for a nose and strange suction like appendages that continued to get stuck to what had become her. She put her arms on the counter, holding her shaking body up, sobbing in odd whelping barks. She shook and shook her head, clenched her eyes shut praying this was something else, something of a nightmare, of a horror in a mind that must be breaking. This couldn’t be, she thought. But then, she was a student, and a pensive one, she halted her quivering and convulsing, shaking body. She needed to be still.

    To listen and sense what she could. There was an odd sensation on her legs that now looked more like cricket legs, e melded chicken, cricket hybrid with small, pretty feathers draped down on the sides. She bent over to feel. It tickled and felt as though she would cough if she didn’t stop touching the feathers. She stood up quickly and looked at her chest and arms, her arms and hands more tentacle and smooth muscle like, she thought of falic things and shook through, trying to shake them back to her strong toned self. The body she’d worked so hard to have after her asshole husband cheated. Dragging his d*** through every open hole of the town.

    And she’d worked her self near dead these last four years, for what? She stomped her hoof like feet down and grunted angrily at the mirror angrily tapping what she assumed were nails on the tile. She could smell herself, it was repulsing, a filth that sunk into the mouth or the slit and hooks that had become her mouth. She chittered, is this my laugh? She thought for a moment and heard a heavy thumping and creaking motion in the living room.

    She slowly opened the bathroom door enough that she could peer down the staircase to see if Jason was heading upstairs. She heard the faucet of the kitchen sink and took the opportunity to run to her room. She closed it, locked it and found an empty corner of her closet and crouched till she heard nothing but the hum of the A/C kicking on.

    She hesitated at the door, unsure of everything at the moment but knew her gun crazed twat of a man would likely shoot her. How can she…the front door closed loudly and she heard his crumby truck door creak open and sighed, perhaps it was click, or clucking but she was relieved for a moment until she burst out the into the hallway and realized there were cameras everywhere, his paranoid ass had cameras at every door. She took a gasp her a deafening rapport and fell silently, heavily to the floor with a sickening folding thud and stilled.

    Fin

  • A Scream Pt:1


    A Scream Pt:1 by: M. R. Vega


    The roads were busy, the heat lingered atop the pavement and the fair was starting with a flurry of the city’s energy. Its enthralling, reverberating, and tenacious emotion lay just shy beneath the skin of Pueblo. The incessant chatter and hollers could be heard echoing off the slabs of pavement around the fairgrounds. It was a rejoicing time for the youth, an inpatient length of noise and mess for the elders while it coaxed the restless and weary keeping their minds deterred from work or off of the monotonous schemes of clock in-clock out. After all, it was a mimic of the same, reminding everyone of last year, the year before, and before…

    Angela Sykes was on her weekly mission for her boys while she slowly yearned for a ticket to anywhere else. She scrounged up the change of the kiddos left in the jeans, thrown on the counter, and shook the couches and loveseat to their little divets she made them, allowing all the loose change that was inevitably going to be there to fall to the floor with a clang and chime. Along with the school’s fair tickets given every year, she had acquired enough to pay for two ride bands and maybe a basket of fries for them to share. It’d likely go to something like candy or a cheap lemonade but that was up to the boys. They were finally old enough that she could drop them off at the gate and come hours later to pick ’em up and shuttle ‘em back to the shanty house she and her old folks still managed to own.

    Aside from the one drawer of her own with old clothes and perhaps a dish set or two, that run-down house was the only thing her parents and her owned, the lease on the car was late on payments, likely to get seized before the fair was packed up and she knew it was either the car or food enough to feed the family. It was bad enough that the two boys were nearing adulthood and lacked control when they ate. Like locusts, they consumed most of what was bought for the week before Wednesday had come around. Luckily they started part-time jobs in a week, and to say she was proud was an understatement, knowing how hard it was to even get an interview in this town, she could clap and holler a ‘yippee’ if she knew it wouldn’t make them blush and deny her the gratitude a mom deserves.

    After cleaning up the muck and dust from finding all the loose change, taking it to the nearest Coinstar machine, and cashing it out, she had an hour to herself before having to pick the boys up from Pitts Middle School. She rinsed off her dust-covered face, embarrassed realizing that she walked into the Soopers store like that, and dabbed at her face with a dry rag. Being 29, she was starting to see the years hang on the corners of her eyes and damned her Abuela for the lazy eye she managed to get as it apparently skipped her mom and decided she was beautiful enough still, makeup could wait for a rainy day. She’d rather use up the last of her mascara, foundation, and highlight for work. Maybe she’d be able to stretch it out the next week and treat herself to the E.L.F line they had at Walmart. She rolled her eyes, scoffing at the idea and knowing, likely her boys would need something more important, at least for them. 45 minutes left and she ran to the closet of the room her parents and she shared, reaching up to a nook that saved an old and drying joint, now all she needed was a lighter and prayed her dada still had one in the silverware drawer in the kitchen.

    Luckily, the red Bic was still there, still moderately full and she went out to the patio to sit and bask in the sun for the next ten minutes, knowing she’d need to pull up to the school earlier than later if she didn’t want mouth and drama from her two boys.

    She closed her eyes, pursed her lips to the dry paper, flicked at the lighter, and took a long drag. It eased her senses, or clouded them, she had met a point in life now where either or, was better than nothing and shrugged it off while she exhaled slowly and stared out past the yard and waved at an old man walking his aging dog. The man ignored the gentle wave and hurried his steps, nearly choking the dog trying to get out of eyeshot. She snickered and smiled, knowing how the people were these days, she shrugged it away while taking a second and last drag until maybe tonight after the boys were in bed. She hid the remainder of the joint on the corner of the porch banister, put an old rock atop it afterward ran inside to grab her shoes.

    She grabbed the money from her small Coinstar stop and the fair tickets for her kids, got the keys and her purse, locked up the house then jumped in the car. The school was minutes away so she took her backing up seriously, not wanting to muck up the car. She had already messed up the backend bumper once or twice before and didn’t want an extra, exorbitant fee hitting her later. While backing up though Angela, knowing the radio wasn’t on yet heard a muffled scream. It was almost blood-curdling, however, she figured it came from a neighbour watching a film with the windows open. Still backing up and turning the wheel to steer her towards the school she heard it again. The fair was too far away for that to be it, she peered about the neighborhood, didn’t see anything amiss, and shrugged it away…

  • The Blue Chair Pt. 1

    The Blue Chair Pt. One by: M. R. Vega


    The t.v still rings with that familiar hum we’ve all come to know. A warning of the impending shutdown at the bottom of the screen eludes the remaining minutes before its screen shares nothing till another person comes to stare at the box the next day. The souls within the house are tired and restless and Jacob stares at the dog. An ailing pet of fifteen years now, if not longer, can’t but help to stink and rumble unknowingly. Jacob grimaces at the smell that wafts slowly to his nose and he gazes to his right to see his wife scrunch her nose unconsciously as she’s already in her dream realm parkouring over stairs and saving humanity or their son from dire darkness. His dreams never mimic such dramatics. He’d be so lucky.

    However, the tales of the night’s endeavours always bring a smile when they ready themselves the next day. If asked what he dreamed, he grimaces and states nothing per usual, and leaves it there. He grabs the lunches, packs the car, kisses both their child and wife goodbye before moseying on back to the office, day after day to punch in policies, daydream silently, and hate the decisions that have brought him pounding in number after number, coaxing angry clients to a cool zen mood while he clenches at his teeth with a smile.

    To Dream… : Dream by Wombo

    The remote life, in comparison to his usual nightmare, keeps his soul regulated. Keeps his demeanor casual and more coagulated than he cares to admit, however, his wife would say otherwise as she feels the heat radiate from his body in the night once they find themselves in bed later than planned each night. What she doesn’t know or neglects to inquire about is what it is that truly digs within her husband. A couple of years now and he’s not had a night’s rest that hasn’t been interrupted by his bladder needing draining, his legs needing movement, or the nuanced repetition of reading yet another chapter of another book. If only he’d open his mouth if only he’d mention the shit that tramples his dreams or drowns his thoughts giving him foresight. A thing he never asked for, though, knowing him, the wife wouldn’t be amiss to think he’d had wished to have a power of a similar type as a kid.

    Jacob the angered man still glaring at his dog starts to cry, it’s subtle, almost ignored even by him until the treading tear tickles at his nose and he wipes the moistness away. Matter of fact is, this dog, the ailing pet, is dying. It’ll be quick, the heart will stop, and her body will give a last shudder in an attempt to wake one last time. Her brain will have clicked off, her eyes will flutter, her oversized torso will give one last heave of hot breath, and slowly but surely the stink of her already rotting body will begin to deteriorate. Jacob will phone his wife in a day or two that Emily is no longer, but still can’t think of the proper way to drop such a heavy note while she teaches her students about important figures of Black History Month. This is the dream of the last month, just like the one a couple months back of the grandmother saying goodbye for the last time and him not knowing what to say or how to tell her the love she brought will never be matched. How the drive for the week after and the coming funeral won’t amount to the silent grief his wife feels quietly unanswered because that’s how she is and just to be held will be all she wishes for and like usual he’ll be there but still will never know how truly lost she is now. These are the nightmares he feels and sees, these are the silent missiles he carries throughout the days and he mentions little if ever at all.

    He’s learned painfully that mentioning anything of the preordained only sullies the truth and takes fate out of it’s motion. Atop that he’s found that making certain strides, and the little nuances within those of his dreams can tell him if it’s this life or a life of another plain that will soon be lost. How can one determine where and when it’s right to warn if even Jacob can’t tell, will never be able to tell or truly know when it’ll happen?

    But then again…there goes Emily, whimpering, grappling at the last of her life and this he’s certain will be her last night. So it goes.