Brian down the Hall

            Brian woke up with a stinging pain in his head, he opened his eyes and saw white lights in his vision.

            It was a cloudy day in August, the weather switched from hot to cold on a whim. On Monday it was blazing hot outside and on Tuesday it was raining, humid and warm. Brian woke up on a Wednesday. The sky was cloudy, a cool breeze blew in through the small space opened in Brian’s bedroom window. The thin sheet used as a curtain danced on the breeze as the sun shone through the white sheet. Brian dragged his hand over his face in an attempt to wake up. Brian would rub his face in the morning to feel more awake, he always thought this was because it made blood rush to his face and hopefully his brain.

            Brian stood up from his mattress on the floor, then stumbled as another shooting pain went through his head. His bed was covered in a cheap white sheet, similar to his window. He had one pillow and a small blanket to cover with. His studio apartment was a large empty space with sparse furniture and white sheets covering the three windows he had.

            Brian walked over to a small end table near his bed. The table was pressed up against the wall and directly under a window. On the blue end table was a glass pipe, a lighter, a metal railroad spike and a white coffee cup stained with coffee with the words “Rocker Cat” on it, below the words was a cat with a blue Mohawk.

            Brian opened his window a little wider, picked up his glass pipe and lit it. He inhaled deeply, held his breath then slowly exhaled. Thick smoke was expelled out through his mouth and nose. He felt his nerves ease and the pains he woke up with began calm. The sharp pain in his head continued though. He picked up the long sharp spike a delicately placed it against the right side of his head at the base of his skull and jammed the spike upward into his head. With a loud squish and crunch the pain finally was gone.

            Brian woke up on the floor with a smile on his face and a railroad spike sticking from the base of his skull. He stood up, rubbed his face again and picked up his “Rocker cat” coffee mug from the end table. He went to the kitchen with his cup, washed it out and made a fresh pot of coffee.

            While he went through his morning routine of washing up, making coffee and drinking coffee, the spike in his skull did not fall out, his head didn’t bleed and from the expression Brian’s face, the spike in his head wasn’t an unpleasant sensation. Brian had a series of scars around the insertion point of the spike, showing that he did this on a regular basis.

            Once he was dressed and had his coffee and other drugs, he stepped out of his front door into his apartment building’s main hallway. The hallway was old fashioned and looked like it was from the nineteen twenties. He was on the third floor and casually walked down each flight of stairs, passing rows of other apartments on his way.

            Finally Brian reached the exit to his building, opened the door and stepped out into the wonderful city of Hallows End. It was the modern age for monsters and the Halloween city of Hallows End had grown from a small settlement of creatures to a city of every kind of creature and misfit that the outside world was afraid of or disgusted with. Needless to say, Hallows End had some humans as well, politicians, lawyers and bureaucrats were all welcome. These humans had to follow the same rules as the monsters of the city and would be banished if they hurt fellow citizens.

            Brian wasn’t human though he had human friends. Brian was a wendigo, an evil creature born from human greed, cannibalism and taboo actions. So he had a lot going for him. He was humanoid, with two arms, two legs, he wore pants and a t-shirt, had paper white skin, deep sunken in eyes, sharp teeth hidden under thin pale lips, a shaggy head of white hair with a stripe of blue dyed in it and a railroad spike sticking out of his head.

 Brian the Wedigo tried his best to fit in with humans and other monsters but it was difficult to not kill and violate every living creature in the area, so he had to take medicine given to calm monsters and on top of that Brian was fond of smoking herbs that he found in the Dark Forest.

            Since Brian had rapid healing and damage to the brain didn’t kill him like it would to other creatures, he found that jamming a spike through his head was the only thing that would cure his migraines, it also helped calm his aggressive behavior.

            Humans only thought about monsters being acceptable on Halloween or when they visited Hallows End in October. The truth that no one really thought about was, monsters that exist on Halloween don’t just vanish after October ends, some do, but most don’t, monsters still have to go on with their lives or afterlives the rest of the year, trying their best to get by and resist the urge to eat children.

Ghosts of the past

Brian lived in a one bedroom flat. He had a cat named Archimedes. But Brian usually just called his cat “Meow face”. Brian sat back in his armchair and watched television. His apartment was almost devoid of furniture, all except the TV, armchair, fridge and a mattress on the floor that he used as a bed. “Come here meow face” Brian said as he patted his lap. Archimedes purred and trotted over. The cat jumped up into Brian’s lap and instantly fell asleep. “Good meow face” He said softly as he patted his cat on the head.

Brian felt so relaxed that he began to drift off to sleep. His breathing slowed and he closed his eyes. He was so comfortable and Archimedes purring was very soothing. Just as he was about to drift off to sleep he heard loud banging noise come from his closet. Brian jumped and so did Archimedes. The two walked carefully toward the closet. No further sounds were heard. Brian leaned in and slowly opened his closet. His pulse raced as the door slowly opened. He looked inside and didn’t see anything unusual. Just his coats and a bowling ball he had been meaning to use one day. Then another loud bang was heard from the closet door. Brian jumped and then looked at the door itself. The closet was open, but something was banging on the door. “Whose there?” Brian asked. Archimedes looked up at Brian. Maybe to say “Are you talking to a door?” or maybe the cat was simply a cat and looked up because he heard his master speak.

Brian could hear whispers coming from inside the door, or rather on the other side of the door. As if the closet door was still closed. Which it wasn’t. Brian closed the door and now stared in amazement and shock an opened glowing door. The closet door could open a closet or it could open a floating door into another world. Brian put his hand through the new opened door. When he pulled his hand out a light flashed and transparent people began walking into Brian’s apartment. From the corner of his eye he could almost recognize their faces. They all looked like people he knew. Brian’s peripheral vision picked up all sorts of details on these transparent figures. Clothes, faces, hair color, skin color, it was all slightly transparent but still very vivid, but every time he looked right at them they would lack any features at all.

“Who are you?” Brian asked. A few of the figures tried to answer but they spoke only in whispers. “who are you?” Brian asked again. One the figures walked over and touched Brian’s head. Brian had a sudden flashback to playing softball as a kid. His team lost and on top of that he hurt his leg. His coach came up and comforted Brian. The mild injury and lost game didn’t seem so important because of how supportive the coach was and eventually seeing how supportive his parents were.

Brian snapped out of it but now suddenly saw that one of the figures was his coach. When looked at head on, the coach figure didn’t loose his features. “Are you all ghosts? I thought you were still alive, Coach!” Brian said. The coach smiled “We are memories, ghosts of your past. You have to sort your memories out kid, you bottle too much up,” Said the kindly coach.

Brian nodded. It was true, he bottled up a lot of his emotions and even tried to bury his most unpleasant memories. But he wondered if he was having some kind of mental break down. His memories glided around the room. Some of them seemed to be commenting on his lack of furniture. Brian knew that it was probably one of his old girlfriends. Then he got a flashback from thinking about the girl. “Your not going to buy THAT are you?” Asked Susie. The flashback ended abruptly. Brian looked annoyed now. “There is a reason I was trying to forget most of you!” He shouted. “Except you coach, not sure why I forgot about that one time you helped me” Brian quickly added, as if the coach was a real person with real feelings. “Everyone out!” He shouted. The figures swirled up in the air and Brian began having flashbacks one after another. His memories were becoming unorganized. Old Jobs, past relationships, dead pets and dead relatives, all of these memories came swirling back.

Brian’s head spun and he fell to the floor. His life had been a long path of twists and turns, some good and some bad, but when he tried to stuff the bad away and try not to think the bad memories it eventually built up. “So what if my ex-girlfriend was a bitch. That was her personality. I don’t need to beat myself up over the break up.” Brian muttered to himself as his memories flashed before his eyes. “I didn’t know unscrewing pieces of grandma’s wheel chair would be dangerous. I was five! I was FIVE!!!” Brian shouted, as guilt tried to grip at his every memory. “That’s enough!” He finally shouted and then stood up. He was ready to yell and scream at those annoying transparent figures, but they had all disappeared. Brian looked over and noticed the door was gone too. Then he looked down and noticed he was still in his chair. He assumed it was a dream and he had just woken up abruptly “What a crazy dream” Brian told Archimedes, who responded with a long yawn.

Though it was a brief event, it affected Brian. He remembered so much of his past, both good and bad. The good memories made him feel a little happier and his mistakes made him a little wiser. He started to try and learn from his mistakes instead of tormenting himself with guilt and obsessing over what could have been different. Though Brian dismissed the event as a dream, it still stuck with him. the rest of his life was a little better because of the lesson he learned. Meanwhile, Archimedes didn’t learn any lessons, but instead was just always content and was happy for the rest of his life, because he was a cat.