Page 1 of Don’t Watch Alone

I’ve never seen a real dead body before tonight.

Having no experience, I’ve never smelled real death, only the cleaned-up version on TV or the masked odor within a casket.

But now I’ve seen more than I ever wanted to, more than I can explain, more than I’ll ever be able to forget.

And I know deep down inside, in the pounding behind my eyes, the way my fingers keep shaking as if wanting to let something go that if I live through this night, I’ll carry every fucking second of it for the rest of my miserable life.

Something snarls loudly, and it yanks me out of my chaotic thoughts.

As if alive and hungry, the sound oozes out of the darkness.

My breath hitches, filled with copper, mildew, and a detectable fear.

My sweaty hand stuck to the freezer door’s cold metal behind me.

My legs are useless, my body frozen, caught between fighting and failing, as everything floods back to me.

That freezer. The moment it opened. The face staring out.

When it was unsealed, the light exposed pale skin and wide, glassy eyes that seemed eternally unblinking, and something in me broke.

I think I held my breath for a second. I feel like my brain malfunctioned.

One second I’m holding popcorn from the movie like some kind of idiot security blanket, and the next I’m face-to-face with a frozen stiff dead body in the fetal position like she was attempting to curl up and die tinier, believing it would ease her pain.

Her parted lips suggested a scream before or during death, a moment that has embedded into my mind and created echoes I never actually heard.

The movie. It’s crazy to think we were watching a movie just a short time ago.

Tony’s arm was around me, his warm chest pressed to me, his breath tickling my hair, and we were laughing—genuinely laughing—because the scares were obviously cheap, predictable, and the sound effects were almost laughable.

I remember how safe and secure I felt with him that night, regardless of the horror movie playing.

The scariest thing at the time was whether we would have time to go to a party after or if we’d just end up going to bed early.

But then that fucking feeling started. You know the one.

That feeling of unease, like your stomach drops and the air shifts, making everything feel.

.. off. I ignored it. I told myself it was the movie, or maybe my unease acting up again.

I should’ve said something—I should’ve told Tony, begged him to skip the movie, told him I felt sick, told him anything, but I didn’t.

I just pressed closer to him and told myself to stop being so paranoid.

And Andy warned me. He fucking warned me.

Told me again this afternoon at the mall not to go to the movies and that something terrible was going to happen tonight. “Don’t go,” were the very words he said, and I can’t forget them. “I can’t explain it, but something awful’s going to happen. ”

Andy has been stalking me for a while, but this didn’t feel like an obsession; it felt more like he was concerned for me. My heart told me something was going to go wrong, but I brushed it off when my friends laughed at me. They disregarded it all as pure superstition.

So we went. Like fucking idiots, we went.

Tony’s car rattled down the street with us crammed inside, all loud voices and jokes and plans for the night. The moon was very bright. The air is still. The movie theater is already full when we got there.

And then when the movie was over, that’s when Tony decided he needed to go to the restroom before we left. He said he’d be right back. Just a minute. That’s all.

But he never came back.

And at first, we all just waited; laughed it off like he was fucking around, like this was just another one of his stupid jokes—but time went on and on until I had a stomach ache that I couldn’t ignore.

Something was wrong .

No, Tony was gone.

I should’ve stayed home. God, I knew I should’ve stayed the hell home. I felt it in my chest before we even left; that tightness like a warning. But I pushed it down, swallowed it like it didn’t mean anything, and now I’m paying for it in blood.

Because someone—something—came for me. Big hands, rough skin, fingers digging in like they wanted to break bone. There was no scream. No chance of fighting. Just the dark swallowing me whole before I even understood what was happening.

Now I’m here. Wherever here is. And my skin’s sticky with blood that isn’t mine. It’s drying in patches along my arms and neck. I don’t know how much of it came from them… or if it all did.

I’ve never seen death up close before tonight. Not like this. Not with their bodies twisted at angles no human should bend. Not with their mouths still open like they were mid-sentence when the lights went out.

I’ve seen too many now. Too fucking many. I remember the sounds—the wet ones. The last gasps. The way their eyes didn’t look at anything anymore. Just stared. Through me. Past me.

This place… tonight… feels like hell forgot to turn the lights back on. And I’m stuck here. No doors. No mercy. Just the kind of silence that makes your ears ring and your thoughts scream louder to occupy it.

If I make it out…

No, when I crawl out of this nightmare still breathing, it won’t be the kind of survival people cheer for. It’ll be the kind that sticks in your mind forever. The kind that keeps you awake every night, sweating and trembling, choking on screams that don’t belong to you.

There’s no healing after something like this. Just time and guilt, feeding each other repeatedly until you wish they’d both just shut the fuck up.

And maybe Andy was right. Maybe this was always coming.

Maybe I was meant to be punished.

Or maybe this is the punishment.

And it’s already begun.