The Man with the Brown Paper Bags
The man is tall, with short black hair. He wears a thin dark tan coat and he rarely shows any expression on his face. He walks down my street every day carrying a brown paper bag. He walks at a slightly fast pace down the street, looking straight ahead, rarely looking elsewhere. He walks to the Shrouded House. He is, apparently, the son of the 'Crazy Lady' who lives there.
Over the years, me and/or my friends have tried to talk to him. We would set up blockades on the sidewalk, which he would just walk around to avoid. He would ignore all greetings or questions and just keep walking. I've only been able to get his attention twice. The first time when I was quite little. The second time was yesterday.
I'll tell you about the first time, well, first. I was maybe four years old. I was playing in the front yard when the man went past. Curiosity took ahold of me and led me to follow the man down the street, pestering him with questions. Once he got to the Shrouded House, he didn't walk in the front door. Instead, he walked down the driveway to the backyard. I followed him. He stepped cautiously down the driveway, glancing into the windows of the house. Once we got to the back of the house, the man stopped abruptly. I bumped into him and looked past to see what had caused him to stop so suddenly.
It was his mother, though I did not know that then. She was in the grass on her hands and knees, sniffing the ground. She was digging a hole in the ground with her hands. Her fingers were shriveled and claw-like. She then pulled a worm out of the hole and stuffed it into her mouth ravenously. Licking her lips, she gave a quiet, wheezing, laugh. After doing so, she looked up and her scraggly grey hair parted to reveal her wizened face. She stared at me with piercing grey eyes and her mouth curled into a smile. She maintained eye contact for what seemed like ages, though it was only a couple seconds, filling me with dread when I did not even know what dread was.
I closed my eyes for a second to relieve myself of her awful gaze. When I opened them, she was directly in front of me, with her horrific bloody teeth bared in a grin. I let out a shriek and she grabbed my hand and used one of her fingernails to cut my palm. Naturally, I did not protest when the man picked me up and carried me to the front of the house. He put me down and, in a low but extremely kind voice, apologised and bid me to run along home. I complied.
Yesterday was the second time. I was sitting on my porch, reading, when the man passed by the house. I debated what to do for a moment and eventually slid a bookmark into the book and set it down on the bench. I stood up and walked swiftly off of the porch, across the yard. I ran down the sidewalk to catch up to him. I hesitantly followed him for a couple seconds and then tapped him on the shoulder. The man flinched, dropping the bag. I started to apologise when I noticed what had come out of the bag. It was a pile of meat, interspersed with what looked like parts of a rabbit. He bent down and shovelled the meat back into the bag with haste. He glanced at his watch and then looked at me with a horrified expression. He then ran down the street as fast as he could.
I stared at him in disbelief for a few moments and then returned to my house. I went inside due to mosquitoes. I tried to continue reading but I was just too disturbed and distracted. After an hour or so, I went back outside and walked down the street towards the Shrouded house. From the sidewalk, I looked into the front picture window. The living room was empty. I crept forward into the yard and peered into the window from right in front of it. After a couple seconds, the woman hobbled into view, looking more decrepit than she had before. I took a step backward and started to turn away when the woman turned her head and was at the window in a flash. She bared her teeth at me. They were bloody and I saw what looked like black hair stuck between her teeth. She lifted her hands and ran them down the window, leaving bloody streaks. I stumbled backwards for a moment, then regained my footing and ran home as fast as my feet could carry me.
The man walks down the street every day at the same time.
Except he didn't walk by today.
Posted Sep 4, 2016, 1:05 AM UTC · edited