My Horror Stories:

The Spooky Graveyard:

It was a dull and cold afternoon in October and it had rained all day long, it had only stopped raining when the priest had told the final prayer and people started to leave the funeral. The funeral had finished.
Harvey had seen his grandfather for the final time yesterday and not after that, his death had been so unsuspected, that it had stunned everyone in his family including himself and his brother.
Harvey's grandfather Harold had always been healthy he had been hiking and jogging every day and was always travelling on vacations that involved climbing mountains and doing any thrill-seeking activity that made his heart pump quicker.
Yesterday he had appeared perfectly fine when Harvey and his brother Jacob had visited, they had sat in the sitting room next to the blazing fireplace, and ate roasted chestnuts with hot cocoa while their grandfather Harold told them a story about his most recent vacation going snowboarding in Russia and how much joy he had had.
He had looked so joyful, good and ordinary not like a person who was going to die the very next day but then again nobody could ever predict anything in life especially not when it came to who would live and who would die.
Harvey and his brother knew their grandfather would die he was almost a hundred years old, he had lived a long life through the war, seen things, felt things and witnessed history that not many people would be able to live so long to tell.
As crazy as it was Harvey didn't want his grandfather to die but then again nobody wanted anyone they loved to die but he had thought Harold would live to see his one hundred birthday it was only a month away and Harvey and Jacob were planning to surprise him by buying him a vintage Rolls Royce, his grandfather's favourite classic car.
They would have to return the car now and the other expensive gifts they had purchased only they hoped the shopkeepers would be understanding and not question them or ask them how they were coping.
He hated being asked how he was feeling and pretending to be normal when he was upset and he didn't want to speak about this to anyone he wanted to move on, he didn't hate Harold but he heard from family members that he was a racist man and had done some controversial things in his life.
Harvey didn't know how much of it was true and when he had asked his father he didn't tell him either strangely enough. He had been relatively quiet, his face had gone pale almost as if he knew but didn't want to admit it out loud.
He slowly walked with his parents past the other graves to get to the car, his parents didn't slow down and were waiting next to the car.
He had gone past Harold's grave and turned to look over one last time when he saw a guy in a Black hoodie, Black jeans, and sneakers standing next to a tree not far from his grandfather's grave. He couldn't see the guy's face as it was too far away but he looked young possibly a teenager not much older than him and his brother Jacob.
"Did you see that creepy guy?" Harvey asked his brother Jacob.
Jacob turned around to look but saw nothing except for the trees and trees other graves, he turned back and gave Harvey a questioning look.
"No," Jacob replied. "There's nobody there."
"Really?" Harvey asked. "I saw somebody a minute ago, a guy in all Black staring at me from behind a tree."
"That's strange it could be somebody Granddad knew."
"He wasn't at the funeral though and he looked like a teenager," Harvey noted thinking that it was strange since he hadn't seen him at the funeral and he had met everyone including his grandfather's friends from the war and people he had worked with and they had all expressed their sorrows and the usual "I'm sorry for your loss," "he was a great man" "how are you coping?" Things that people usually said.
He also wondered how the guy would even know his grandfather since he seemed different and not even old enough he looked more like a robber or some lowlife thug than somebody Harold would associate with.
As well-travelled and experienced as his grandfather as he was also a classist and didn't like anybody who was "below him" he never gave to charity or didn't seem to form what Harvey and Jacob had seen.
They both loved their grandfather but the old man had some irredeemable qualities that would shock today's society to the core.
In a way Harvey was glad his grandfather was resting peacefully and not in their lives he had never really been close to him as he was the youngest, his grandfather preferred his brother Jacob who was three years older than him, he had even made it specifically clear when he would buy birthday gifts and said that he thought Jacob was better and that he and a great future ahead of him, the same hadn't been said about him.
Harold hated him he had called him useless and weak because he was the quietest in his family and didn't like showing off their wealth like most of the family did.
Harvey was glad he didn't have to deal with it anymore, he was sad but he knew at some point later on in his life he would move on and forget about it, news in Twilight City came fast and went away just as fast as it came, people almost always moved on from it. Little did he know that this news wasn't going anyway as he had no idea what was going to happen.
The next day at breakfast Harvey hardly felt like eating, his oatmeal porridge that had once been served warm and fresh by the butler was instead now cold and lumpy and the more he looked at the pale Beige colour with the fruit bits inside it the more unappetising and gross it looked.
He couldn't eat and he was puzzled as to how anyone else could eat or even felt like doing anything after his grandfather Harold had only gone yesterday, especially his father, did he not miss his dad? Or even care enough?
His father had always been cold and emotionally unavailable when it came to feelings he and his brother Jacob had been discouraged in expressing themselves as it wasn't a "very manly thing" to do but when it came to family his father and grandad had always been close despite the toxic masculinity and old fashioned ideals they both shared.
"Why aren't you eating?" His mother questioned Harvey finally noticing that he hadn't eaten his breakfast.
'Isn't it obvious?' Harvey thought to himself. He was upset about his grandfather and wondered why nobody else had spoken a word about it after the funeral was over, they had quietly gone home, ate dinner, and retreated to their bedrooms without speaking a word.
Jacob hadn't spoken either or didn't seem to show any sign of emotion, his porridge bowl sat empty and he fiddled with his mobile phone while slowly sipping Orange juice with his other hand nearly spilling it.
"I'm just not that hungry," Harvey replied quietly not looking up from his porridge bowl.
"I know this is tough for you and you miss him," his father finally spoke after a while. "But there's nothing we can do about it."
Harvey didn't reply, he didn't know what to say. He knew there was nothing they could do but at least talking about it or even showing one sign of emotion would have been better than not saying anything at all.
"We all miss him," his mother chimed in reaching over the table to pat him on his shoulder.
"Well then why didn't you say anything at the funeral about it?" Harvey exploded. For some reason, he felt an inexplicable amount of rage inside his body that he had been holding in until he couldn't hold it any longer and control himself.
He rarely got angry and loathed hurting people's feelings but he could never pretend he didn't care he wasn't good at faking it like other people could and he wished his family was more real at times.
It now occurred to him how much he had been hurting on the inside as he had had time to process what had happened yesterday as the lay in bed the night before going over the eventful and unfortunate day, what he had said, though, felt, all the things that people had told him about his grandfather and the memories they had shared and long speeches everyone had given about him.
As much as he hated to admit it he felt sorrow and bitter grief towards Harold and he missed him although his grandfather hated him and they were never even close, to begin with, but if he was still alive today Harvey had to wonder how his life would have continued.
His parents and brother looked at him in shock but without giving anyone a chance to speak or even react he quickly kept up from the chair ignoring his abandoned bowl of porridge and ran up the stairs into his bedroom where he locked the door and started crying.
Downstairs he could hear the faint voices of his parents talking about him, except for his brother Jacob because he never got involved in family matters and it didn't concern him either.
"What's wrong with him?" "Do you think we should talk to him?" "He's taking it hard," he could hear his mother and father asking questions and talking about him.
He cursed them under his breath they would never understand and they never did either, anytime something bad happened he would always be blamed for it and his brother would escape scot-free without having to deal with any of the consequences.
He thought it was so unfair and now his parents were probably going to hire a "therapist" which was the last thing he needed.
Talking to somebody else about his problems and the so-called "therapist" would probably write everything down and give useless suggestions to him like "talk about it" and "move on" those weren't the things he wanted to hear, he couldn't move on even if he wanted to and he didn't want to talk about it with a stranger either and even if they could relate or something similar had happened to him he didn't want to hear their unwanted opinions.
He was about to lie down on his bed when he suddenly heard a tapping sound at his window, thinking it was probably a tree branch since there was an oak tree right outside which he and Jacob used to climb when they were kids he ignored the sound.
He turned away from the window and was about to put his headphones into his ears when he heard the tapping sound again, it was louder this time and more urgent as if somebody was tapping on the window hard with their hands.
He thought somebody couldn't do that since the window was too high up and the tree branches were too thin for anybody to sit on and too far to be able to reach over to the window.
Even if anybody had tried to sit on the thin branches they would break and the unfortunate person would end up falling to his or her death.
Nevertheless, he decided to investigate the tapping noise anyway and climbed off his bed and walked over to the window and looked outside at first he didn't see a thing but when he looked closer to the tree he could have sworn the guy dressed in all Black that he had seen at Harold's funeral was sitting on a branch staring at him through a Black mask.
He wondered how the guy was even balancing and had managed to find out where he lived and what he was doing in their garden inside the tree and most shockingly hadn't slipped or fallen off the tree.
He opened the window and decided to question the guy.
"Hey," he shouted to the masked guy in the tree. "What are you doing in my garden? How did you follow me home?"
He was angry and also scared at the same time that some creepy stranger had decided to follow him and could harm his family or even steal something valuable from them. He also wondered how he had gotten past security and thought he would have to complain to his parents that the security guards they had hired weren't even doing a good job.
The guy didn't respond and ignored him, either he hadn't heard or didn't care enough to respond. Harvey shouted at him to leave and used a few strong choice words he wouldn't dare to utter in front of his parents before slamming the window shut and going over to unlock his bedroom door.
He twisted the key but the bedroom door remained closed, Harvey tried again, he twisted in different directions but the door still wouldn't budge open. It was as if somebody had locked it from the outside too and he wondered who would do that.
He grabbed a wet wipe to wipe the key and door down in case it was dirty or something was stuck but the key still didn't work and was still stuck.
Tired of his attempts Harvey grabbed his mobile phone and decided to call Jacob for help. His brother always had his phone on him and was never seen without it.
He searched through his contacts until he found Jacob's name and pressed the dial button the phone rang and rang but Jacob didn't pick up. Harvey decided to leave him a text telling him that he was stuck in the bedroom.
He knew his brother and family would probably laugh about this for days that he was stuck in his bedroom and that they would all share the memory with other people including friends and guests.
'Let them make fun of me I don't care. I just want to escape,' Harvey thought to himself. He sat down on his bed trying to think of what to do when he heard the tapping sound again and suddenly a rock came hurling towards his window and the glass broke and shattered pieces of glass were on the thickly carpeted floor all around him.
Harvey gasped in shock as he saw the figure from the tree jump an impossible leap into his bedroom. He stepped over the broken glass as he made his way toward Harvey.
Scared, Harvey backed towards the wall right next to his door like a scared animal being cornered by a predator who was about to attack and eat its prey.
"Don't hurt me please," He pleaded to the masked figure who stared at him blankly with cold beady Black eyes glinting from the hidden depths of his mask.
The guy reached over towards Harvey and grabbed his arm dragging him towards the broken window which was now open. The old October air drafted into the room and he shivered wishing that this wasn't happening to him. He could smell the faint scent of a delicious pumpkin pie being baked from somebody's home. He usually loved this time of year and all things related to Halloween but at this moment in time, he wasn't enjoying the season at all.
The man pushed him towards the open window.
"No, wait!" Harvey screamed as his body awkwardly hung half out of the window while his legs while still inside his room. "I'm going to die, I can't jump that far," he said looking down towards the grass to signal the extreme height distance. The guy paid no attention to his pleas and together they both jumped out of the window.
Somehow they luckily by pure fate managed to land on the oak tree but just as soon as they had landed the thin tree branch snapped and they started to fall and fall onto the ground. Harvey closed his ears and forced himself not to look towards the ground, he was deathly afraid of heights. If he hadn't managed to have survived the landing he was sure he wouldn't have made it.
'What is happening right now? This is so crazy,' he thought to himself as panic and fearful thoughts swirled around his mind. He wondered what his parents and brother would think? They would wonder where he had gone to since people usually didn't hang out outside especially not when Halloween was so close by. Everyone knew better than to go outside around this time, when the moon rose in the sky and the bats flew by all so silent and dangerous, the scary creatures which nobody wanted to see would come out.
He looked at the silent and dead street around him, not one person or even an animal was wandering outside, the streetlights shone a dim Orange colour but it was still very dark outside. A few birds scattered around landing in the trees to sleep for the night but everything else was quiet.
He was outside while everybody else was safe in the homes not having to worry about the creatures that came out, they were all protected from them, the creatures wouldn't be going after them since their doors were locked and windows closed. Even his own family was probably doing something.
'They probably haven't even noticed I'm gone,' Harvey realised bitterly. The guy got up from the ground and dragged Harvey onto his feet and forced him to start walking.
They walked for nearly half an hour and Harvey was starting to feel tired and dizzy. He wasn't used to so much exercise, his brother Jacob was more the sporty and athletic type in their family. He and his father would play football in the Spring and Summer and he had even signed up for the local football club enterprise that he would be going to in College next year.
They walked until they reached the entrance to the graveyard. The Black iron gates stood closed before them, but they weren't locked. With one hand the masked guy pushed the gate and it clanged open with a sharp and squeaky sound.
He walked into the graveyard and signalled for Harvey to enter and follow him.