A Little Silver Book of Streetwise Stories by Brian Keene

Author:Brian Keene
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: horror short stories
Publisher: Crossroad Press
Published: 2020-09-17T00:00:00+00:00

Take Me to the River

I’m so fucking thirsty. Just can’t seem to get enough water, which is funny, considering what’s happened. Kelly said it was magic; that was the only explanation for the weather. Black magic. Maybe he was right. I mean, talk about a shitty forecast! Today, chance of rain one hundred percent with showers overnight and into tomorrow; more of the same for the rest of the week, the month—for your entire fucking life.

I saw bits and pieces on the news, but not much. The power went out pretty quick in these parts. But what I did see was horrifying. Cities flooded and people drowning, and then the cities were gone, buried beneath the waves, all within a matter of a week. Hell, entire countries got swallowed up. I’m living in the middle of Ohio and it’s beachfront property now.

Yeah, a storm that powerful, and the fact that it hasn’t stopped yet—that’s got to be magic, I guess. Kelly knew what time it was.

Of course, Kelly also dropped acid every goddamn day, so maybe he didn’t know.

I don’t know, you know?

It itches, this white stuff that’s growing on me. Itches so bad it burns. But when I try to scratch it, something happens. The stuff does something weird. Not sure how to describe it. Calming, maybe? The fungus whispers in my brain, speaking to me.

Soft … soft …

That’s what it whispers. The words are wet. Cool. Soothing. They sound like my voice, but I know it’s not me that’s thinking it. It’s the fungus. It looks like bleached peach fuzz.

I noticed it growing on me two days ago, right after Kelly died. God, I don’t want to think about that. Something thing that looked like a cross between a human and a Great White shark came bit him in half. One minute, we were shooting birds, and the next, something jumped out of the water and Kelly’s lower half was standing next to me, gray and purple guts spilling out over his legs. His upper half was gone, and the thing that did it splashed back into the water. I caught a glimpse of its eyes before it vanished beneath the waves. They weren’t black, like a shark’s. They looked human. Intelligent.

I was splattered with Kelly’s blood. Screaming, I watched his lower half totter forward. The choppy surf tossed his legs and guts around. A seagull darted down from the sky and flew away with a strand of Kelly hanging from its beak. I’m not sure what. His intestine, maybe? It looked like a purple and red worm. I ran back inside, ripped off my clothes, and washed up. And that’s when I noticed it the fungus. There was a small patch sprouting between my toes. The White Fuzz. That’s what we’d heard other survivors call it. It’s like a case of athlete’s foot from hell.

I’d seen it before I got it myself. The shit began sprouting up all over town about two weeks after the rains started. After everything went to hell.

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