Small Town

Growing up in a small village (yes, a legit village, I'm not fucking around when I say it's small) it's not uncommon for your teenage after school activities to end in amusing terror seeing as the most available options include bonfires, dark forests, or thick corn fields and variations thereof. However, there was one activity that was unique to my house, which naturally increased my social standing within the teenage community, the same activity happened to lead to one of the scariest experiences of my entire life. this activity I sarcastically dubbed "ghost hunting".

See, my house stood at the base of a hill on an empty dirt road surrounded by wood and field. If you walked up the hill a ways you would find a very old family cemetery, lined with trees and rotting farm fence, nestled between the corn. We always had a good laugh, or self induced scare, trudging up the road and into the cemetery. To be honest, I'd usually have a bit of fun by spooking the others or tampering with whatever recording device we were using to "contact the dead".

Some unusual things had happened while we were there but I've always been pretty level headed and was never afraid of the cemetery. Of course, I'd always play it up around my friends. Making these stories the talk of bonfires and luring more people, and occasional high school crushes, over to see the cemetery for themselves. This all came to an abrupt stop one night and I've never been back in the many years sense.

The last night I ever entered the gates started like all the others, three friends and I planned to go up the hill but this time we were bringing a first timer. On the dark walk up the dirt we regaled him with tales of our previous trips. By the time we got to the graves he was, admittedly, more than a little unsettled. Like myself, the three other friends were now "ghost hunting" veterans at this point, simply enjoying introducing another person to the game, hardly believing any of it themselves. However, all of our nerves were suddenly set on edge when the new member of our group began to frantically pray before entering the gates. I can't explain what it was about him suddenly starting to chant, I assume it just happened to be the one thing that could create a creepy enough mood for me to feel instant fear. I can say that it prickled my skin, I felt a sense of foreboding, like suddenly we weren't just playing a game in a lot of grass and what was happening at this moment was wrong. I'm also going to take a moment to say that I know this experience is taking a turn for the supernatural, personally I am a skeptic and I believe what I saw in the graveyard was real flesh and blood, you may have a different opinion.

I could tell the prayer had the same effect on the other three as it did myself, for the first time I felt hesitant to enter the gates, someone suggested we link arms and after feeling the tightness in my gut I agreed readily. With each of our arms linked we created a small circle, to my left I was gripping arms with the new comer, Bryan, slightly emboldened after his prayer. To my right was David, a friend I grew up with from childhood, I remember being glad to find myself next to him as he was one of the most fearless people I knew, he was with me on many of these escapades and had one time even lead me out of a darkened forest after being lost for hours on end. Behind me, out of my line of sight, were the two other female friends, watching our backs. Together, we made our way inside of the dark cemetery, the only light coming from the moon and the slight glow from the village center miles away, but for once we were hesitant to explore.

We stood still, eyes flickering around the bright limestone graves, we were not inside for long before a horrible smell reached us. It had appeared a few times before at the cemetery, I had assumed it was from a small creek in the field, but this time it was so strong and so putrid that I had trouble believing such a strong smell could carry the mile to the graves. I was taking a back, growing up in the country I know the smell of rotting animal and this was much worse-suddenly, David squeezed my arm within his. I looked over at him, he was staring straight ahead with eyes wide, I spun my head forward expecting to see an animal, a coyote or possibly a cougar, but all I saw was the dark.

My eyes darted behind the white stones, the only discernible shape was visible as a thick darkness where I knew a small tree was planted in the middle of the right corner of the cemetery.

"What's wrong?" I said

"There is. Something. Over there." David said very slowly, his voice audibly tight with fear, head still unmoving.

This sent chills through my body, David was very rarely afraid, never falling for the shit I had pulled in the past. My eyes searched the darkness further, I realized I could feel Bryan physically begin to shake, looking at him he also had his eyes trained straight ahead. Real fear rushed over me. What'd they see? It had to be the darkened shape of the tree, I thought, it's like when you stare at an object in the dark too long and as your eyes tire the object begins to move.

"It's just a tree!" I hissed "There's a tree in that corner."

I expected a sigh of relief, instead David whispered "No. No, there isn't."

My eyes were draw to the black mass of the tree, I couldn't make out limbs or trunk only a tall black shape in the night, there was a tree there. I grew up half a mile from this cemetery, I knew there was a tree but at I stared the darkness seemed to shift, I reminded myself it was an illusion caused by my eyes but still I could not look away. "It's a tree." I felt myself begin to shake, really shake, with fear. I've never felt such an overwhelming sense of wrongness then I did in that moment. Paralyzed with fear, I remember being suddenly distracted by the two girls behind me, they were chatting quietly, completely unaware of the palpable terror behind them. I felt like I should inform them, get their attention and have them prove to David and Bryan that they were stupidly afraid of the shape of a tree. I looked to my right to get their attention but in seconds my eyes flew back to the shape, my heart so close to my throat I felt like being sick, when I turned I had seen the opposite corner of the cemetery and in the middle of it was a tree.

The tree. The tree that I had been so sure was in front of us.

I stared hard at the dark, more concentrated then I had ever been, still the shape in the darkness seemed to move but I was no longer convinced it was a trick of my eyes. The three of us stood for what genuinely felt like an hour, I can't say how long it really was, with pure terror pulsing between us. My eyes canvassed the shape, I knew my mind was just trying to make sense of the dark, they began to read the shape as a thing. The darkness shifted to occasionally make out shoulders and a torso. But it was so dark, the thing hadn't come closer, I told myself that darkness is really all it could be. My eyes followed the torso down to where it ended at a, mid-calf height, white gravestone, using this as an anchor point to gauge the thing behind it.

Just as I started to calm, staring at the shape which seem to have no depth behind the gravestone just as no substance darkness would, my world was flipped as I watched as a shape was revealed.

A leg. A leg rushed forward from the darkness and I could see it clearly as it lifted, the foot and calf dropping in front of the white gravestone, unmistakably marring the visible surface of the stone. All three of us saw him at once, in a second my eyes flew upwards from the leg to the large man, his features and clothing still darkened, rushing forward menacingly over the gravestones. You know when, in writing, authors mention their characters "falling over" others or themselves to escape obstacles? I couldn't describe it better. All three of us at once, overcome with fear and a feeling of impending malice, physically threw ourselves backwards. We frantically ran, dragging the two girls behind us who were still completely oblivious to what had transpired, through the gates and into the dirt. I've never run faster, I can't even explain how much courage it took for me to just look back to see if we were followed by the man.

By the time we were in front of my house I had tears stinging my eyes and could not manage to catch my breath. I've never been so overwhelmed by the sense of impending harm as I was in that moment. Bryan couldn't, or wouldn't, speak. It seemed the worst for him, he was shaking so violently. David managed to give some kind of explanation to the girls, I remember him saying "Something was going to hurt us." Then we went our separate ways, the girls disappointed and confused left together.

We never got together again. In the next few years people asked, those who didn't know, if we could have a bonfire and go to old cemetery. I never explained, nobody would believe it anyway, they'd just think it was one of the stories we used to tell. I just told them "It's not safe." and I genuinely don't think it is.

TL;DR I went into an old cemetery one too many times. Sometimes your eyes aren't just playing tricks

Oh my god, I can't believe it's almost 6:30am where I am, I've written a god damn novel about this experience, and I'm completely fucking terrified all over again. I don't even want to comment now to spare you people the inhuman longness but it's all written and I feel totally obligated. Really fucking sorry about this!

#Unexplained/Paranormal #Area/Cemetery #Visual/Shadow