Short Stories – SimmyDizzle and Friends

Drawn to the Sea: The Book

There is something that you should know; correction, there are many things that you should know. I am, by no means, an authority on what knowledge is required, but, I do know that one something that you should know: Lard Queen is not my actual name.

Yes, consider it a confession, I live a lie on the internet, writing my opinion anonymously and haphazardly. Well now you can hold me to account, because I have a new book for sale that you might be interested in.

I have written a lot about ships on this site (Drawn to the Sea I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII), so it may not come as a surprise that I have written a book about nautical matters. Unlike those posts, this book is focused more on the supernatural, rather than the actual weird on-goings of ships and mariners.

Overall I have a weird relationship with the sea. I am very interested in ships, mariners, and the places where the land and sea meet; but, more than anything, I am interesting the strange and paranormal things that occur on the seas. This strange relationship of mine, I can’t explain it, but in this book, I don’t even try to explain it, I show it.

Anyway, here it is:

“Lee Santos presents five ghostly and spooky tales from Canada’s Atlantic Provinces. In his travels in the area, Lee Santos was awed with the abundance of old wives’ tales, creep stories, strange occurrences, encounters with the paranormal, and other inexplicable happenings.

These five stories span the length and breadth of the region and are among some of the lesser known and less-told stories, tales that are normally too frightening and shocking for a wide audience, but they are brought to the light in this collection by Lee Santos.“
*– Back Cover*

Are these true tales? Maybe you should consider asking yourself if anything is true. Think about, all you know is based on your frail human observations using your frail human senses. Even Descartes had to admit that everything beyond existence relies on believing, and…

*Image Source: desktopbackground.org, but let’s be honest here, Disney now owns the X-Files, so all credit that way. Side note: Dana Scully Disney Princess when?*

The most important fact (that is, for me, who wants to sell books) is where you can get yourself a copy. Like many others, I have laid down any sense of honour or independence and submitted to Amazon for production and distribution (it’s not that bad) for the book. You can it available in the following formats:

– Canada: Physical, Ebook
– United States: Physical, Ebook
– Other Regions: please search on your platform!

Maybe you want to know what the content of the book is like, well, do I have a treat for you. Below is the whole of one of the stories that appears in the book, High Point Lighthouse.

“I want to go to the lighthouse,” said Zoe as she finished chewing on a mouthful of French fries.
“Great! Let’s drive down to the marina, we can get out on my boat in no time,” replied John as he threw into the trash the ketchup-soaked cardboard box that had only recently been full of French fries.
“No,” she paused, half smiling, “I mean, let’s drive to the actual lighthouse. We’ve seen it lots from the boat, but I want to see it close-up,” her half smile turning into a full smile, hoping to convince her boyfriend who went from enthusiastic to dour as she spoke.
“Why do you want to go there?” he asked as he stood up and reached into his pocket for his car keys.
“I don’t know,” she was being honest, “I just want to. Maybe you can take some pictures of me. You know, like those ones you took of me on your boat?”
The offer was compelling enough for John and in moments they were heading away from the chip truck and down the old highway towards the High Point Lighthouse. John liked to listen to political talk radio, even though it just made him angry, but he didn’t seem to be listening as he drove.
“Can we listen to some music?” asked Zoe, “if that’s alright with you?”
“Sure,” said John, his tone was dead, he kept staring straight ahead at the road as he blindly pushed buttons on the car radio until an upbeat pop song filled the car.
The drive was scenic, first passing along the coast, then slightly inland through some farming country before passing through a small stretch of forested land that started on a slight incline. Just a few moments later John turned the car onto the gravel road leading towards the rocky High Point. It never occurred or seemed strange to Zoe that John knew exactly how to get to the lighthouse as if he had been there before.
John rounded a bend in the gravel road and the High Point Lighthouse came into view. After stopping the car in the makeshift parking lot, Zoe and John got out and started heading towards the lighthouse.
“Oh, there is a gate in the fence!” Zoe noted, “Do you think anyone still lives here?”
“They made a gate in the fence after people kept breaking in,” John said in an even monotone, “the lighthouse was automated in the 1960’s and hasn’t had a keeper since.”
“Wow!” exclaimed Zoe, “how do you know so much about this lighthouse?”
John stopped in his tracks and turned to face Zoe directly; she also stopped, a slight look of confusion on her face.
“My grandfather was a fisherman,” said John.
“Oh, just like you!” Zoe replied happily – in all of the time she had been together with John he had barely mentioned his family at all.
“When he met my grandmother he became a lighthouse keeper; here, at High Point so that he could spend more time with her,” John said, his voice and tone still locked in dead evenness.
“Oh, that’s sweet,” Zoe said while clasping her hands together, miming a pose that she saw once on a cheap romance novel.
“After the lighthouse was automated he went back to trawling,” John continued, “and one time when he was returning from a long voyage he saw something peculiar in the light cast from this very lighthouse.”
John’s monotone broke, his voice became more sinister with each word he said; and as his tone grew more grim, Zoe grew more and more frightened by this dark side of her boyfriend that she had never seen before.
“When he reached the pier he immediately came here,” John thrust a pointing finger at the lighthouse behind him, his voice rising in anger, “he found his wife in the arms of another man, she had been cheating on him.”
“Oh God, that’s terrible!” Zoe said, her pulse raced as she felt sorrow and fear as John told his story.
“He, my grandfather,” John’s voice cracked slightly, and tears showed in the corners of his eyes, “he killed them both. Then, then he hanged himself in that very lighthouse…”
“No, it can’t be, you’re telling me a tall tale,” Zoe said as she folded her arms across her chest and unknowingly took a few small steps backwards.
“I think you’ve been cheating on me,” said John, the words dripping off his tongue like a bitter solvent, “I know you’ve been cheating on me!”
“W-What?” yelled Zoe in surprise.
The distant screech of metal grinding on metal could be heard from the lighthouse as the large bulb turned off of its normal pattern. The light, so powerfully bright, cast a shadow behind Zoe, even in the daylight of early afternoon.
“The lighthouse knows,” said John, his tone low, prophetic.
“No!” screamed Zoe as she turned to flee.
Just like his grandfather some 60 years earlier, he seized his lover. She resisted, but the source of his strength was preternatural and he gripped Zoe by the throat and squeezed the life from her.
“I understand,” said John as he let Zoe’s body droop to the ground.
The door unlocked for him as he approached, and inside he found a length of rope next to a sign warning workers that they need to tie off when performing periodic maintenance on the automatic lighting system. Like his forebear before him, John was found hanging from the neck.

Did you like it? Buy it! Did you hate it? Buy it and then burn it!*
– Canada: Physical, Ebook
– United States: Physical, Ebook
– Other Regions: please search on your platform!

^{*Not recommended for the ebook version.}
^{All other images copyright 2020 Lee Santos
All text copyright 2020 Lee Santos}

u ɐ ɓ ɐ ǝ ɹ

Try as you might, you cannot escape. The entity that pursues you is not of this world.

The entity is not a person, not a creature, not something that like us that drags its physical form across the ground; no, your pursuer is otherworldly, other-dimensional. As it travels directly through the ether of existence, you have no chance to escape, but the unknown fate that it promises has delivered you into a rabid paranoiac state and you constantly, desperately, try to evade its merciless chase.

Do whatever you feel you must, but know that soon your eldritch nemesis, Reagan, will have you.

Soon you will be Reagan.

Soon Reagan is all.

Reagan as always been.

R E A G A N

The cursed life.

Trevor woke up one morning, covered in blood and human excrement. His arms trembles, as if he had used them all night; yet they were numb. Beating a man to death with your bare hands will do that to you. Terrifying thoughts found their way into his mind as he clambered to his feet, looking around at his strange surroundings. Nothing he could see was familiar. Trevor was lost, and for some odd reason, had a familiar metallic taste in his mouth.

This was not the first time Trevor awoke like this. Ever since he was a young man he has had waking dreams of murder and depravity. Each time more real than the last, each time, a new body, a new life ended. Trevor could not for the life of him, figure out where he was though, this time it was far more confusing than any time before.

Scrambling around the rooms of the building he awoke in, the realization came in, he was not near his home, nor was he near his own country. Snow and wind blew around outside the cold, damp house. Being from California, this was entirely not what was expected. Never had the nightmares been so destructive to his life, sure they had made him take a life, but never had they taken him so far from home.

Over a loud speaker down the road, a voice came through, the accent was familiar, but the words were entirely not what he expected to ever hear. “Есть злоумышленник, тело найдено, все в поисках!” The words repeated themselves, what did they mean, what was going on? Trevor had no idea, the last thing he remembers was being at the bar with his friends.

The Infected City: Chapter 3

“Glimpse of time without the morning grind

forever flustered as we fight the sands of time

never lost, always found

as the winds gust dust from the ground.

Silence is simply unheard in a city so large

except on this morning sound is completely

unfound.”

The poem in Jack’s head, never before had he heard so he thought it was great. “Its wonderful what a night of sleep brings. But why is it so quiet, where are the cars, the gunshots, ambulances. What happened on this night that is now giving me this terrible fright.”, He thought to himself. As he stood from the slumber and peered over the edge of the building, empty streets as far as the eyes could see. No sound, no wind, no vehicles moved, no people in the open. “I must still be sleeping, but it seems so real”, he pondered. After all, this was the first time he had slept the whole night through in many of years. In fact, the first time he slept longer than 10 minutes in well, he couldn’t remember how long it had been.

“Guess I’m meant to enjoy this dream a little longer, I guess I have no complaints about that.”, he muttered aloud. Laughing to himself he felt the sudden urge to feed, it had been a long time since he had his world famous chunky milk and old cereal. “Nobody will mind if I help myself to the store goods, after all, this is just a dream.” Jack climbed down the ladder back into the store and started to pillage the shelves, shovelling food into his mouth that he hasn’t had in ages, he simply couldn’t afford to snack like this. Eating chocolate bars, chips, marshmallow filled snack cakes.

The satisfying sense of being full overwhelmed him, it was a feeling he had never dreamed of before, and something that he knew wasn’t something he could dream of. He was full, and he was very much awake. “Guess I’m never coming back here”, he chortled to himself as the realization that he just ate a month’s worth of pay that he cannot afford. “I guess I should try the phone again.”, as he picked up the phone a large crash against the security window plating bellowed out. Startled Jack screamed, “Who’s there!?” but nobody responded.

Jack slowly creeped up to the window and looked out. Before him was a man, tall, roughly 6 feet tall, a whole inch taller than Jack. Wearing jeans and a torn white shirt. His flesh tone tainted black, and crusty dried on blood from an apparent neck wound streamed down his body.

“I don’t know what you are doing, but stop, this isn’t halloween!”

Silence…

“I’m serious, go away, we are closed! No power means no entrance!”

The man’s hands scratching against the glass, and steel security shield. His fingers pouring black sludge from where the security shield sliced into his flesh. “Seriously man! Go away! What are you on, drugs?”, screamed Jack. “I cannot go out there, this guy is crazy, he’s getting all cut up, god only knows what he will do to me.”, he thought to himself.

“RRRRRAAWWLLL”, bellowed the man outside Jareds Gas and Go. “RRRAWWL”. As he continued to drag his flesh along the steel security sheet, his flesh tearing off with each passing stroke, bearing bone and black sludge like blood. Jack knew something was off, “Shouldn’t his blood be red?”, he said out loud, as if it would make this situation seem less insane, less surreal, less horrifying. Standing in an almost daze like state, Jack stared at the man intensely, trying to figure out just what was going on. It was almost as if it was a scene from one of the horror novels Jack enjoyed reading.

“Okay, I cannot stay here forever, sure there’s food and drink but eventually they will come back here, and I’ll have to pay for it all. God.. I have to get out of here, and past that drugged up man. Is he on PCP? I’ve heard Meth addicts do this type of stuff. But his blood, his blood is black, its like sludge.”, Jack said aloud, as if trying to convince himself of what he had to do. “I’m going to get the baseball bat from the manager’s office, I can at least defend myself if that crackhead comes at me.” he thought as he raced to the manager’s office.

As he opened the office door all Jack could hear was the shattering of glass from the front room. “Oh my god”, he thought as he grabbed the baseball bat. Gripping the base of the baseball bat tight, and curling it up and readying it to swing, he slowly crept back around the corner. The security shield completely torn to shreds. Strips of flesh dangling from the one secure metal shield that protected this small shop. “Come out you bastard.”, Jack called into the room.

“RRRRAWWWLL”, bellowed the man as he rose to his feet, ankle broken, bone protruding from the skin, cracking and splitting with every step towards Jack. “What the hell are you on man? Don’t make me do this!”, Jack warned the man as he neared. Another laboured step, followed by another as Jack slowly backed away, the man couldn’t catch him with his leg like that, but Jack knew it best to stay face to face with this man. “Anyone who can walk on a break that bad is either on some serious drugs, or is dead and just doesn’t know it yet. So tell me man, what are you on?”, Jack warned one final time.

With a quick swipe, Jack barely moved out of the way in time, his face close to scratched by the gnarly bone hand of this man. Jack had to make a choice, and unfortunately, this man was making it for him. Jack cocked his arms back, holding the baseball bat tight, and with his eyes clenched shut, swung. THWACK, the disgusting sound rang out throughout the room as the baseball back crashed into the man head. Splitting it in half. Black oozing puss poured out of the man’s head all over the floor. And his lifeless body hit the ground, bones snapping and bursting through the skin as he hit the ground.

“That’s not normal.”

“That’s not Normal.”

“THAT’S NOT NORMAL”

Jack couldn’t control the feelings that rushed through him, what he saw wasn’t normal. What was this horrific thing in front of him. Surely it was a man once, but now what was it. The insides of people isn’t black putrid scrambled goop like what this man was. “I have to get out of here.” Jack quickly grabbed a bag from behind the counter, stashed up every ounce of food and drink he could from the shelves and ran out through the hole in the security sheet.

As Jack entered the sunlight after his ordeal, he kept a vigilant eye out for anything odd as he quickly and quietly made his way towards his apartment. As he crept along, it became apparent to him that something awful occurred overnight. Windows of buildings were smashed in, copious amounts of blood smeared the streets. Entrails were all over the place. Gun shells coated the ground in some areas, while others, bodies still covered the ground, some convulsing from the wounds, others foaming at the mouth. The depths of outright wrongness of what could be seen made stop briefly and threw up. Seeing the insides of people on their outside had that effect on him.

The Infected City: Chapter 2

24 hours before the brown out. “GUS! GET IN HERE QUICK!”, a diresome shriek echoed throughout the house. Gus still freshly back from his bus route and tired from his shift slowly got out of his recliner. “I mean, what could Darla be yelling about?” His wife was always the panicked type. And well, Gus was kind of a slob. Overweight, wearing his mustard stained work shirt still. As he rose he looked around the room, the pictures of his family hanging on the wall. His boy Ellys’s trophies sitting on the fireplace mantle. Glinting a new. Ellys cleaned his trophies every day with pride.

Gus walked up the stairs, his wife yelling more and more panicked with each passing step, and every breath. As he reached the top of the stairs he looked for her, panning his head from the left to the right, his bedroom, the entrance to the bathroom, Ellys’s room, and Ellys, convulsing on the ground, white foam pouring from his mouth. Gus was no longer unmotivated as he rushed to the aid of his wife Darla and their son Ellys. His body was cold, to the touch, Gus couldn’t feel any heat on his body at all. And a distant look in his son’s eyes were one he had never seen before. Quickly he reached for his cell phone and called 911.

“This is 911 dispatch what is your emergency”

“It’s my son! He’s pale, foaming at the mouth, and freezing cold to the touch”

“Sir, please don’t panic, give us your address and we will dispatch immediately.”

“Yeah, its 33 Haven Street, just east of Perth Avenue, please help!”

“Sir, the ambulance has been dispatched, can you please tell me any other symptoms?”

“Yeah, his eyes are glazed over and he isn’t responding”

“Oh my god, he’s bleeding from his ears now, please god help. HELP!!”

“Sir the ambulance is on route, try and stay calm.”

The ambulance arrived 7 heart stopping minutes later, Gus shaking himself with fear, his son, his one and only son, the reason he got up every day. Unlike his wife, his cheating wife. He lacked care for her anymore, the only feelings he felt were shame, shame that he was with her. Shame that he couldn’t bring himself to divorce her. Shame that she chose to humiliate him, and all he could do, was suffer her mistake. His son was the only reason he let himself live. And now fear of losing his son, gripped his every fiber of his being. “What happened. What happened”, Gus muttered. “What Happened to my son! What did you do to him you bitch!”, he yelled at Darla.

“I didn’t do anything you bastard!”

“Oh yeah! Then why is our son in the ambulance?”

“I don’t know what happened to him, one minute he was fine, the next, shaking!”

“I don’t believe you, if you did something, I will…. I will….”

Tears pouring from his eyes he climbed into the back of the ambulance and closed to doors before Darla could climb in. “Stupid bitch.”, he spoke softly as he brushed his sons soft hair with his hand. “It’ll be Okay Ellys. It’ll be okay.”. The ambulance drove quickly and on its way to the General Hospital, passing Jareds Gas and Go, Gus couldn’t help think about his bus route, and how he couldn’t afford to miss a day, and how he couldn’t let down his passengers. The people who he grew to know as his ‘morning’ family. Jack and the rest who seemed to genuinely care for him. It was a glib way to look at his life, but outside of his son, his job was all he had in the world.

“Is he going to be okay? Is my boy going to live?”, he asked the EMT.

“I don’t know sir, but we will do our best!”, he replied, monitoring Elly’s Vitals.

“Thank you, I.. I just don’t know what I would do without him.”, Gus responded slowly.

The rest of the ride to the hospital was uneventful, Ellys’s vitals were low, but okay. He stopped foaming at the mouth but the look in his eyes, they remained distant and wrong. The blood from his ears long since crusted and turned a putrid black colour. This was not right, there was something definitely not right. The EMT’s transferred Ellys from the gurney to the hospital bed and rushed him through the ER where doctors were already waiting to inspect the boy, it had been a quiet night. Very few had visited the ER that night.

“Hi my name is Dr. O’Reilly, I’m going to look over your boy.”

“I’m Gus.. His dad, is he going to be okay?”

“I don’t know yet, but we will find out.”

Silence ensued while Dr O’Reilly looked in his eyes with a flashlight.

“We have to move this boy now”, he said abruptly.

“Whats going on?”

“Something is drastically wrong, the blood in his eyes are coagulated.”

“What does that mean?”

“I don’t know, I have never seen anything like this, we need to investig…”

He stopped as Ellys clamped his teeth down on his arms, blood pouring out of the doctor’s arm and all over Ellys’s face as Ellys ripped and tore at his fleshy arm. A sadistic look befell the face of Ellys and a horrific screech screeched out as the doctor screamed in agony.

“My Arm… My Arm! He bit me! NURSE!”

“Oh my god! Ellys what did you do?”

“RRRRRAAWWWLL”

“Ellys, whats wrong? Tell daddy!”

“NURSE!!!”

“RRRRRAAWWWLL”

“NURSE!!!”

As nurses rushed into the room they attempted to restrain Ellys to the bed. His flesh tone pale with dark patches, his veins distended from the skin and black, and the screams, the horrific screams Ellys bellowed, none alive had ever made before. Once he was secured to the bed, the nurses quickly tended to the doctor’s arm, which was gaping wide open, flesh ripped away muscle torn, and pouring blood over the floor. The doctor, face sunken from lost of blood, collapsed.

The nurses rushed to put the doctor in his own bed, and without hesitation another doctor was there patching up the wound. But the damage was already too far gone. Within moments, the doctor’s eyes fell dark from blood loss. Soon after his body turned cold, and then started to convulse as putrid black bile poured from his mouth. Then still, no more movement, no more sound.

“Oh my god.. Oh my god, Ellys, what did you do? You killed him.”, cried Gus.

“Sir, you should leave, we need to get your son secured.”

“What do you mean secured?”, Gus responded angrily.

“RRRRRAAWWWLL”

“He is a danger to himself, and others, did you see what he just did?”

“Yeah I saw it, I. I am terrified.”

“Just go, leave and let us do our work.”

Gus looked over his son one last time, afraid to get near him as his Mouth was still full of the flesh of Dr O’Reilly, and the look, the horrific look, no words could describe it, nor the fear Gus felt for his one and only son. Getting as close as fear would allow him, he whispered, “Son, if you can hear me, it’s daddy, I love you, please, come back to us. Don’t let whatever this is win. Don’t let it take you. I will be back after work. I’m sorry I have to go, We cannot afford the medical bills from this, I don’t know what I am going to do. But we will make it through. We will make it… Daddy promises.” With one final look at his son, Gus winced and walked away, the hurt in his heart over having to leave his son there, nearly unbearable.

Gus slowly walked outside, and waited at the bus stop for the bus to arrive, he knew he was only going to have a short while before work. With a quick look at the sky, he knew he was going to head straight to work, as the morning light began shining through the tall buildings. “How will I make it through this day. How will I forget what I saw. How… How can I make it through this day knowing what I know..” he thought to himself. “Killed. He killed him. One bite. He tore so much flesh. My god the blood, the flesh torn. That scream.”

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