Twisted Roads – Twisted Horror Stories by Matthew Tonks

It Was All Scrawled in Crayons

The light folds in on itself several times over, wrapping around, twisting and spiralling through each beam, until finally, it extinguishes itself, leaving the warehouse in a darkness only found behind closed eyes. Heather allows a staggered breath to escape as she clutches Sammy’s hand tightly.

“Hold onto mummy no matter what!” she whispers in a hushed tone.

“But I’m over here, mummy,” her daughter’s voice cries from a few feet away. Heather catches her breath, clutching it in her throat as a wave of dread washes over her. She turns her trembling head toward where her hand should be.

“D-Don’t listen to her, mummy. It’s n-not me,” her daughter whispers beside her, the grip on Heather’s hand tightening. Heather gasps again, sweat cascading over her. She presses her lips together, gasping as she tries to catch her breath, the heat in the warehouse pressing down on her.

“Don’t listen to her, mummy. I’m over here, and I’m scared. P-P lease—MUMMY!” her daughter cries.

“I-I,” Heather stammers, closing her eyes and tilting her head in a half-circle. “I-I,” she mumbles again.

“M-MUMMY!” her daughter’s voice cries from a few feet away, the scream carrying a terror that could put any final girl to shame.

Heather darts a narrow gaze to her side. “W-We have to help her,” she hisses. “W-We have to make sure she’s safe!”

“B-But, mummy, I-I am safe. I’m with you. That isn’t me,” her daughter sobs, her voice trembling.

Heather looks into the darkness in front of her, then back to the darkness beside her, both blacker than pitch.

“Remember the pictures you used to draw? The ones with you, me, and the other little girl? She’s that girl. She’s your sister.”

“I-I have a sister?” she stutters, her grip wavering, and Heather tightens hers.

“Yes,” Heather whispers with a guttural wobble in her voice. “Kind of. It’s hard to explain, but—she needs us.”

“MUMMY!” her daughter screams again, this time further away.

Heather takes a step, and the world around her swings and sways. She hears the thudding of feet—things, people—charging toward her. And then, nothing. Her daughter screams, the one out in the darkness and the one beside her. Heather grabs her throbbing head, clenching her teeth, and takes deep breaths.

“Mummy?” her daughter calls.

“Mummy?” she calls again.

Heather sucks in a deep, stuttered breath as she realises both her hands are clutching her head.

“S-S-Sammy?” she stammers.

“M-Mummy, why d-did you let me go?” Sammy cries.

“S-Sammy! T-take my hand, honey,” Heather says through trembling lips as she reaches out blindly. “T-Take my hand, honey!” she calls out again.

“I-I’m scared, mummy,” one voice whispers from beside her.

“P-P-Please, mummy!” the other voice calls from the opposite side.

Heather reaches out with trembling hands, touching only thin air at first, but eventually, as she feels around like a blind woman, something grasps her hand.

Its grasp is cold and rigid, and her breath catches in her chest. She tries to pull back, but the grip only tightens, the icy touch seeping into her skin, freezing her fingers in place.

“M-Mummy,” Sammy’s voice purrs beside her, low and twisted, weaving from one place to the next. “Y-You should’ve let me be n-nothing—for the minds of children hold the k-key to creation, unbridled, untempered. They see what you refuse to see—they give life to that which was taken—”

Heather’s vision blurs, the darkness somehow thickening, pressing against her. She hears Sammy cry from some distant point in the darkness—“M-Mummy, please help me—please—

The crayon drawings flash before her mind’s eye, the scribbles Sammy had scrawled across walls that Heather had scrubbed off over and over. Two figures, her daughters—no, not daughters—Sammy and something else. And then she remembers—those appointments, the doctors’ warnings, the cries she thought would stop. But there she was, her little angel—so still.

“M-Mummy?” the voice whispers.