The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!
She’s under the stairs. In the cellar. Glaring at me through the slats.
No one believes me. No one else sees her.
It started a year ago. Just glimpses at first. Her eyes, her hair, the side of her face for a moment in the darkness. I would descend or climb the stairs and I’d see a flash of something below me. A trick of the light I told myself. Until she refused to go away, until more and more of her became visible. Until her fingers reached between the slats to grab at me.
She waits for me, always lurking under the stairs.
Day by day it gets worse. I hear her voice now. Moaning, whispering my name.
I know what my friends and family think. That I’m crazy. They’ve told me to see a therapist.
Therapy won’t help. She is real.
I know she’s there. That’s where I buried her.
Fiction © Copyright A.F. Stewart
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com
More from A.F. Stewart:
Abandoned: 13 Tales of Impulse, Betrayal, Surrender, & Withdrawal
To act with abandon, in any sense of the word, is human. Whether it’s the sudden, strong urge to do something, either good or bad, or the act of betraying someone you love, we make choices that forever change our lives. Do you give into something or someone completely, or withdraw wholly into yourself? These thirteen stories run the gamut of emotions and express horror as you’ve never imagined it.
The story of a woman alone at the end of the world and the small lifeline she hopes will prove humanity still exists challenges the search for anything left behind after the death of a child. What if you hid a secret you’d thought no one else knew? Would its revelation spark the monster hiding within? A downward spiral into madness juxtaposes the ultimate, but impossible, (re)birth. Would you choose the frigid winds of winter over the warmth and safety of your lover’s arms?
Abandon hope, all who enter here…
Be sure to check out the other fantastic events and peeps participating in
Women in Horror Month 10
WomenInHorrorMonth.com
Spreading the Writer's Word 
Fantastic piece. The end is a nice bit of terror packaged up like a punch and it delivers.