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The clouds moved in and the rain pattered against the window. Softly at first, then beating the house with the full force of the fifty mile per hour gale. The shingles began to peel away from the roof, revealing the soaking wet plywood underneath. He watched as the shingles fluttered away in the wind, dancing.
-

She hired me because I could blend in. No one noticed me at the supermarkets, the doctor’s office, the deli—I was invisible to the human brain, a simple blank space.Perfect, she said, and I started right away.Halloween season started in September, but no one really packed the lines at the haunted house attractions until October,
-

“Is there anybody here?” Marissa’s question hung in the air, floating across the rafters of the attic and landing softly somewhere in the dark. Joel looked from Marissa to Mark. All of them had the tips of their fingers on the small wooden triangle, which sat lifeless on the board of numbers and letters. They
-

Cliff clicked the volume knob a few times, the fiddle and banjo amplifying as he turned onto the dirt road. His headlights ran across the pasture as he turned, illuminating the eyeshine of a few whitetail deer grazing among the cows. Barbed wire fences ran along both sides of the road, and cottontails skirted away
-

“Hey, man,” I said into the phone. “What are you up to?” Rick laughed. “What am I always doing? Working. Why?” “You switch careers or something?” Rick paused. “No.” “Huh,” I said, sighing into the phone. “Weird. Well, alright, I’ll let you get back to it.” “What in the hell are you talking about?” Rick
-

It was twenty after midnight. I had my double-barrel shotgun pinned against my chest, the barrel resting on my knee. The front iron was trained in the direction of the door, but drifted aimlessly as I felt my eyes give in. I awoke suddenly, the shotgun clattering onto the tile. I was dreaming. What was
-

“Earl, quiet yourself!” The old preacher stood, arms outstretched over the casket. “Earl now! God is talking!” Earl shook his head and kept his head down, shoveling another heap of dirt into the hole. The preacher, Joe, shook his head and hissed, quietly dissolving into the air. Earl could still hear him grumble as he
-

It was an incredibly still morning. The frost clung to the bark of the trees and the frozen leaves crunched underfoot. Danny stepped gingerly through the trees, clutching his rifle close to his chest. He walked slowly down the rocky bluff, flicking his head around cautiously at any noise he heard in the dark forest.
-

Johnny came through the front door, closing it loudly. He tossed his keys onto the coffee table, but never heard them clatter against the glass tabletop. Instead, he only heard the soft thud of the keys hitting the carpet. Strange, he thought. Johnny walked carefully over to the couch, feeling gently for the coffee table











