Write something spooky. It can be a made-up story, something that happened to you, dialogue, an urban legend re-told, anything. Experiment with tone, mood and atmosphere to create a sense of the scary. I’m not thinking gory here, but rather something less overt, more subtle; a story, description, poem, tidbit that uses description to convey a feeling of foreboding and spookiness.
I wake up lying in the street. Quite literally in the gutter. I wait for the world to coalesce beyond the gray mist that surrounds me. High above, a gaslight flickers. Night, then. It is not my eyes that have betrayed me. I am betrayed by the sun and this damnable fog.
How long I have lain here? Long enough to warm the cobblestone beneath my cheek. The stale mouth, the throbbing temples and the stench of alcohol permeating my skin tell me I have again succumbed to my baser urges. She will leave me if she finds out. But wait. Has she not already? Is that not that the very reason I find myself in such a state? Someone told her I was drinking. After I promised. But it was a lie, a vicious slander and I told her as much. She thought me false. And so I drank. How long ago now? Hours? Weeks?
I try to push myself upright, but a searing pain catches my breath and stops me short. Now on all fours, I reach around gingerly to finger a rib. Broken, I fear. How? And what is this on my hands? Blood? It is on my hands, the sleeves of my jacket. . . soaking into my shirt cuffs! Mine? Slowly I shift my weight to the curb and check for further injury. A small gash above one eyebrow. Nothing to account for all. . . this. . . blood.
What have I done?
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