Do you remember when... (#004-#006)
Tales of fear, plucked from your memories. Yes, *yours*.
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This week I’m continuing the series of micro-fiction pulled straight from your memories. Don’t forget to vote on which ones you remember!
Last week’s memories are here.
#004: Do you remember when you had a wobbly tooth?
It only moved a little at first. Just a miniscule movement when you nudged it with your tongue. You knew you shouldn't force it, but you pressed your finger against it, seeing how far it would shift. After a week or-so, you pushed it with your tongue and it made a tiny sucking 'pop' as it came away from your gum. You shuddered as air rushed into a part of your body that had previously been sealed away.
It moved more over the next day, wiggling looser and looser. You'd flick it backwards and forwards, making it dangle on an ever-thinning strand of your pink flesh. It tasted like coins, metallic and scary, but you couldn't stop playing with it.
While eating, you chewed and something crunched. You searched your half-masticated food, tongue seeking the familiar smoothness, its metal-tang hidden among the other flavours. You found it. In the palm of your hand, it was longer than you expected, the root having been half-buried in your head. You swallowed carefully, consciously, and your tongue immediately went to the wet, firm socket. Flecks of food had already gathered where the tooth had been. You tried to push them out, but they stuck there, just going deeper.
A couple of months before, you'd found a sandwich that had been left in the school locker room. It still had the basic sandwich shape, but green and blue patches had spread over it, seeping and furry, consuming it.
In the depths of the socket, your tongue tries frantically to release a fragment of food. How long before it goes green, and seeps, and furs, and consumes? How long before that spreads through your jaw and your mouth? It would take you over from the inside, so if you opened your mouth there would only be a moist rotting cavern within.
You rinsed your mouth, and you got rid of all the food. Your tongue eventually stopped always checking that gap, and instead it probed the other teeth, waiting for the tell-tale shifting that foretold another loss.
#005 :Do you remember when you heard music from an ice cream truck?
You loved the soft-whip ice cream cone, with a flake. Dashing to your room, you emptied your penny jar, counting them as fast as you could.
Coins in hand, you flew down the stairs, feet whirring and leaping down the last three steps. "I'm getting ice cream!" you shouted as you ran outside, not waiting for a response or approval.
The van was at the end of the street, on the other side, and the queue was almost gone, so you sprinted into the road.
Which is when the car hit you.
It didn't hurt at first, when your head smashed the windscreen, just above the bonnet. Your legs didn't burn and scream for that first second. The coins flew from your fist, but the sound of them landing was lost under the screeching brakes and tinkling glass.
Your arms flapped uselessly around your body as you spun from the front of the car, rolling onto the road. A piece of grit got stuck in your eye but, when you tried to move your hand to remove it, your hand didn't respond. Then someone poured lava through every part of you, burning your nerves, so hot it moved beyond pain into a kaleidoscope of dancing, spiky shapes that flooded your senses.
Blood rolled across your face and leaked between your lips. Trying to speak brought out no sound. You thought if you could name all the dancing shapes then maybe this would make sense.
And then you heard the tune of the ice-cream truck, playing backwards. It came closer and closer. So close it must be reversing through the car that had hit you. It passed straight over you, the shadow blanking out the shapes, casting you in complete darkness.
Do you remember when you heard music from an ice cream truck? You grabbed the coins from your room, dashed outside, and, just as you were about to sprinting across the road, something told you 'wait' and a car sped right by. It could have hit you, and that would've been your end.
Do you love a horror fan who would enjoy these stories?
#006 :Do you remember the night you were the last person in school?
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