False Prophets & Dead Gods

 I didn’t plan it. Not really. I told myself I had, stuffed granola bars and an old hoodie into my school bag like I was preparing for some noble quest. But all it took was one fight—just one more screaming match with my mom—and I was out the door before she could even finish cursing me out. It was getting dark when I reached the edge of the woods behind the old quarry. I knew the trails well enough in daylight. I knew where the kids went to sneak cigarettes, where the creek split into two, and where the trees got so thick you could pretend the rest of the world didn’t exist. But that was daytime. Now, everything looked wrong. Bigger. Quieter. Like the trees were holding their breath. I didn’t stop walking. I couldn’t. If I stopped, I’d start thinking about how my phone was dead, how I didn’t even have a flashlight, how I didn’t have anywhere else to go. I wasn’t scared, though. Not really. Not yet. I was angry. Angry enough to sleep in the dirt if it meant I didn’t have to hear he...

 After the basement, I didn’t sleep for two days. Every time I closed my eyes, I felt the name pressing behind them—trying to get in. Or trying to get out. I couldn’t say it. Couldn’t even remember it. But I knew it had teeth. The name lived in the dark, in the mold along the basement walls, in the dirt clinging to the soles of my boots. It whispered through the radiators, the wind, and the creak of old bones in the walls. I started hearing things. Not voices, not exactly. Just... repetitions. Footsteps upstairs when I was downstairs. A knock at the door, but no one outside. A scratching sound in the ceiling, like a mouse—except the pipes bent toward it. Like they were listening. Something was changing. On the third night, I blacked out. I was in the kitchen, making coffee, when the world skipped like a scratched record. One second I was pouring water into the machine. The next—I was standing on Cross Hill. Barefoot. Middle of the night. No phone. No coat. Just me and the crosses a...

 I woke to the sound of trumpets. Not music, exactly—something lower, older. Like a brass section buried beneath centuries of Earth, playing through waterlogged lungs. It wasn’t a song so much as a summons, and every dog in the county howled at once, a shrill chorus rising with the dawn mist. I sat up in bed, bare feet touching cold floorboards, and listened. The sound vibrated through the walls, not loud but deep like it was stitched into the wood and the bones beneath it. I could also hear the church bell ringing, but it sounded distant, almost polite compared to the thunder just beyond the sky. They said the Rapture would come like a thief in the night, but… this was a parade. By the time I made it out onto the porch, half the town was already gathered in the street, dressed in their Sunday best, even though it was Thursday. Old Pastor Elijah stood before the chapel, arms spread wide, head tilted to the clouds. His white robe fluttered around him like it had a mind of its own, c...

 They say the field behind St. Agnes listens. I used to laugh at that when I was young, like everyone else who left town and never returned. Thought it was just the kind of tale old women wove into their quilting bees and Wednesday prayer circles. But standing here now—knees in the cracked dirt, the air heavy with heat, and whispering corn stalks—I can’t quite remember why I ever stopped believing. It hasn’t changed. Same rusted fence. Same wooden sign, burned with the words “Speak True.” Same scarecrow with a burlap face and stitched-on smile, arms out like it’s begging for a hug or a crucifixion. I lower my head and whisper. “I want her back,” I say. “Please.” The corn doesn’t rustle. The wind doesn’t blow. But I feel it—like the field inhales. And something deep in the earth… agrees. --- Her name was Anna. My wife. Dead seven months this week. Cancer got her fast—like the good ones always go. I tried to bargain with God then, too. Promised Him everything. Sobriety. Church. The s...

 I don’t remember moving to Hollow Pines. No cross-country drive, no half-empty moving boxes, no new job excitement or nervous breakdowns over IKEA furniture assembly. Just one day, I was here—with a job, an apartment, a few friends, and a very judgmental cat named Chairman Meow. Everyone acts like I’ve always lived here. Emily waves at me from across the street like we’ve been besties since third grade. The guy at the bakery gives me “my usual” every morning, even though I’ve never actually ordered anything. And Greg?—well, Greg? once brought in a Tupperware full of something that may or may not have been live crickets and called it “an old family recipe,” so I try not to ask too many questions there. I’ve got a key to my apartment. My name’s on the lease. There’s even a photo on the fridge of me and a group of strangers posing in front of the Hollow Pines town sign like we just survived summer camp together. I don’t remember any of their names. Or taking the photo. But I look hap...

 I returned to Ashwood in March when the ground was frozen solid, and the sky hung low like wet wool. The town hadn’t changed much—peeling paint, shuttered windows, the same rust-bitten water tower with “JESUS SAVES” barely legible beneath a graffiti dick someone never bothered to scrub off. They said winter ends in March here, but they lied. It just shifts shape. The snow melts into mud, and the mud freezes into hard, bitter ruts that crack your tires and your bones. March isn’t spring. It’s a funeral the world refuses to attend. I didn’t return to Ashwood out of fondness. No one fondly remembers Ashwood unless they're carrying a burden. I came back because my mother had passed away, and the responsibility of clearing out the house, a duty I couldn't escape, fell on me. No siblings. No caring cousins. Just me, Ruth Harper, the solitary branch on a withered family tree. The Harper house, a looming presence at the edge of town, past the grain elevator and the burned-down dairy, ...