0 comments

Fiction

In a small town in Memphis, everything seemed strange, not like any other town. Though the people living there didn't really know why it was so different. Everything seemed just so perfect and everyone was happy. The Adams family had just arrived in this little town to see a concert of one of their favourite artists. The family had two boys named Jack and Liam, and their parents were Hailey and Ben. Something seemed off at the start because they came from Ottawa which was a big town but was hit by a horrible disease. From what they knew from the news there had yet to be a cure for the disease. Knowing that the townies where the Adams had moved in were constantly on edge, worried that they might get whatever weird sickness the Canadians had brought to their small town.

First Jack became sick from the disease, he could barely speak, move or stay awake. Of course, the whole family was concerned, but they decided to leave him home while the rest of them went to the concert, thinking he had just come down with the flu or a cold and just needed a little bit more time to get back on his feet. By the time they arrived home, Jack was in horrible condition and they decided to take him to the hospital. Once they arrived, they were told him was too sick to go home immediately and must stay at the hospital. The rest of the family drove home to Ottawa because they could not afford the hotel room for very long. In Ottawa, they went up to their apartment, but Liam could barely make it up to the apartment showing clear signs of sickness, with the same symptoms as Jacks.

It wasn’t soon after that Jack’s brother Liam got sent over to the hospital. Doctors still had no clue what the boys had and were scrambling to figure it out as Jack's condition got worse and worse. All the families on the block avoided the family as though they were the plague and in more ways then they'd like to admit they were. After à week or so of both the boys being sick, Jack died. It took a toll on the whole family and they mourned for à while. The most peculiar thing though was that the parents were still healthy as ever. As the weeks went on more kids disappeared from the streets and into different hospital beds, sick with whatever the Adams family had brought with them. Liam had passed away too and now just the parents were left hanging around, silently revelling in the misery.

After about à month there was no laughter in their town. All adults mourned the loss of their children except one family. The parents to the Adams boys weren’t all that sad. They were happy. In less than 3 months they were moving again. But one morning a nosey old neighbour peered into the home of the now childless Adams and noticed an odd sight. Two ancient women hunched over à boiling pot making something with a rancid smell. The neighbour didn’t know it but these two old women were the Adams and they were boiling up the next disease for the kids in the neighbouring town. After all witches love the taste of children's bones.

As the Adams are continuing to make the recipe, they laughed and laughed like they were so excited. The neighbours noticed that they were so happy making the soup. They wondered what it was. They could smell it from the outside and it smelled absolutely atrocious as they couldn’t really make decent food proven by the one neighbourhood potluck they had before all the children got sick. One neighbour, the husband, then went over wanting to have a conversation with the Adam’s, hoping that they would stop making their stupid soup as it stank up the whole neighbourhood with what smelled like a dead animal. The wife stayed home and hoping he would have some success but after the sun has went down, her husband never went back. She mourned, mourned and mourned. She was feeling so extremely upset by her husbands disappearance that something snapped within her. Losing her 3 children was terrible but now the loss of her husband had tipped her over the edge.

She tried to gather more people to spy on and turn against the Adams with her but everyone was in so much despair they wouldn’t leave their houses. After a few days, the woman had worked up the courage to go into the Adams house and see if she could find anything suspicious about them. Before leaving she grabbed a kitchen knife to arm herself against anything that could happen while she was there. They were the ones responsible for her whole families death she knew it.

Being as quiet as a mouse, she crept through the wooden door, avoiding the one loose floorboard she noticed and scurried to the room beside “the soup room”. She peered into the room and saw the same two women making their soup again. She stepped into the room and politely asked for the recipe a fake smile plastered on her face, hoping to get close enough and slit their throats for the pain they caused her. The two women glanced at each other, snapped their fingers in unison and the neighbour had this pounding urge to walk to the cauldron and dip her hand in the unpleasant mixture. The heat rose, and she removed her hand from the substance. Her fingers had melted off. the neighbour had absolutely no idea why she was doing these excruciating things to her body but she just kept torturing herself. Eventually, she emerged her whole body in the hot liquid, screaming in absolute agony as she felt her skin burning and het lungs breathing in more and more rancid air. She died later that night. The souls of mourning people made the women stronger. This went on until there was no one left except the witches, cackling and chanting as they got ready for their next massacre.

June 04, 2021 02:48

You must sign up or log in to submit a comment.

0 comments

RBE | Illustrated Short Stories | 2024-06

Bring your short stories to life

Fuse character, story, and conflict with tools in Reedsy Studio. 100% free.