Reloaded: Gravestones

A few days ago, I received an e-mail from someone I had never met. I was having my butler (Yes, butler. Blow me.) read my inbox to me as I busied myself with a book across the room. He told me that it did not appear to be a spam message or something with a virus, so I asked him to open it. It was a long one, telling quite a story about a monster who kills with fear, but only those who look at it.

Apparently it comes to your bedside on three consecutive nights, on the first to merely trying to rouse you by placing a claw on your chest, but on the third night screaming at you to wake up. The message stated that its victims had all been found with no determinable cause of death, just that they were completely frozen with wide eyes and a horrified expression. At the end of the letter, the writer explained that the demon, monster, ghost, whatever it is, can be delayed by telling people about it; hence the email.

I chuckled.

Now, I had received my fair share of chain letters, but this one piqued my interest. What was this person on about? They didn't appear to be selling anything or playing on people superstitions, so I guess they were simply trying to frighten as many people as they could, just for shits and giggles. I had Fredrick (my butler) delete the email and shut down the computer. This person had failed to scare me, and whether they knew it or not, I was amused. I knew there was no such thing as monsters, especially one that had to obey such a silly rule as this one.

I was wrong.

Two days later, my parents found Fredrick in his quarters, stiff as a board with eyes wider than Tara Reid's mantrap. The paramedics couldn't find anything; they said he must have had a heart attack in his sleep or merely died of old age. But I knew differently. It had come for him. It had taken my butler's life by force. It was real and now it was coming for me. Strangely, though, I wasn't afraid. I didn't spend the rest of that day in a mortified stupor, twitching in my room like a beaten dog. No, I was perfectly calm.

There was a reason for that.

That night it came for me. I heard my bedroom door swing open. I felt the sudden breeze and change in the room temperature. I kept my eyes closed as if it mattered. I could sense it slowly advancing across my bedroom floor toward my bed. My acute hearing could almost detect the sound of the carpet fibers bending under its weight. I felt it reach across my form to press on my chest. Without hesitation, I sat up and 'looked' this thing right what I assumed was its face.

It was the most awkward pause you can imagine.

"Why... why aren't you dead...?", I heard it say with a raspy, yet somehow gurgling voice. "Because...", I said confidently, "... I still haven't seen you, I haven't seen anything in my entire life." I felt the creature take a step back in shock, which I found ironic; scaring the monster who kills with fear. "That isn't right! It's not fair!", it said. "It's just as fair as taking away a friendly old butler, or anyone for that matter.".

I felt him... her... it... whatever look at the floor, trying to cope with being denied. He lost it. Suddenly, it was stomping around my room, throwing books and other things to the floor in a fit of rage. Finally, he threw himself through my window and made it into the night. I felt my way over to the broken window and leaned out to yell after him.

"YOU MAD, BRO?"