#the spooky-cute backpack made me feel so anxious looking at it it made me want to throw up lmao

[isan0rt]

Me, loading Dreamlight Valley: phew, the Halloween event is over, I shall no longer be menaced by the Nightmare Before Christmas aesthetic items in the star path, that aesthetic has irrationally terrified me for 30 years.

Dreamlight Valley: surprise! In addition to the holiday star path, we're out of early access and there's a big update and new villager and world!!

Me: :D

Dreamlight Valley: it's Jack Skellington and Halloweentown!!

Me: 🙃

[hauntednightmarekitty]

The monsters within (2/2)

Word count: 3,558

Trigger/content warnings: hallucinations, gaslighting, demons, possession, homophobia, swearing, kissing, horror, scars, self-harm

That morning before I even stopped at my locker I went to find Taylor. He was behind the school; sat at a picnic table. He had headphones on and looked like he was trying to block the world out. 

I walked up to him and slammed my hands on the table, getting his attention. He pulled off his headphones as he cut me with a cold glare, not willing to make the first move. 

"Where did you go last night? You made my sister think I'm crazy." I said. 

"My parents don't exactly allow me to leave the house when I do, so I hid when I heard someone coming." 

"You disappeared in seconds." 

"I'm fast." He shrugged, ready to put his headphones back on. 

"My sister wasn't going to tell your parents that you were out." 

"I didn't know that. You have a stick up your ass, so it'd make sense for her to as well." 

"I do not have a stick up my ass." 

"I beg to differ." 

The bell rang and Taylor motioned towards the school. 

Without another word I turned to the school and left him at his table. 

I didn't see Lillith that day until after school when she caught me leaving the building. She fell into step next to me; curiosity graced her flawless features. 

"Where were you this morning?" She asked. 

"I was dealing with some business." 

"Ooo, spooky. Do tell." She leaned forward in a desperate attempt to catch my eye and I rewarded her action with a small smile. 

"There was a boy," Lillith's face fell the second those words left my mouth. "Don't worry, Lillie, I'm not into him. I just had to talk to him about something that transpired last night. It was nothing too big though." 

"What trans… trans… happened- what happened last night that you had to talk about with him?" 

"We crossed paths on our evening walks and he randomly disappeared." 

"You go for walks?" 

"Yeah, sometimes I have nightmares and going for a walk helps calm my mind." 

"You can always call me if you have a nightmare." 

"Father doesn't allow us to have cell phones." 

"Wait," she stopped and put a hand out to stop me as well, "so you don't have a phone." 

"No, I don't." 

"Then how do you talk to your friends?" 

"We're currently talking." 

"No, like when you're not face to face." 

"I don't. I don't have any friends." 

"I'm your friend!" Why does she insist on pitying you? 

"I don't need your pity." 

"It's not pity. I legit think you're cool." Now she lies to you. 

"Whatever, my father is here." 

"Ok, I'll see you tomorrow morning then!" She skipped off towards her mom's car and I was left with her words ringing through my head. 

The morning of Halloween Mr. Poe was even more active than normal. With everything happening he was stressed out and was, in turn, stressing me out as well. 

What if Lillith is just pranking you. What if Lillith thinks you're stupid. You're just going to make a fool of yourself. You suck anyway. It makes no sense why anybody would want to be your friend. Lillith hates you she hates- 

"Luna?" Lillith touched my shoulder and I jumped away from her, suddenly remembering where I am. Standing in front of my locker. "Are you ok?" 

"Yeah, I'm fine. Just some nerves about tonight. I don't go out often." 

"Don't worry about it. My mom is going to pick us up after school then we're gonna stop at my house to get ready." 

"That sounds acceptable." 

"Cool! Do you have a costume?" 

"A costume? For what?" 

"For Halloween, silly. You're supposed to dress up in a costume. It's really fun!" 

"I'm sorry, I've never celebrated before. I don't know the customs."

"I probably have something you can dress up as. I already have ideas." 

The bell rang causing Lillie to give me a curt smile then turn away with a wave. She didn't want me to make her late to class since I still haven't deposited my backpack in my locker. 

Lillith was right on time after school. She made it to my locker before even I did. She wants to get this over with. I took a moment to appreciate her. Her dark hair was pulled away from her face with clips, her colorful platform sneakers were scuffed at the toes, and her sweater was slightly oversized and made her look tiny. She looked over at me and waved, a smile stretching across her amazing face. 

"Are you ready to get this party started?" She asked when I made it into earshot. 

"We're going to a party?" I opened my locker to grab my things, to not make Lillie wait any longer than necessary. 

"Well, not really. You could consider the Halloween festival to be a party though." 

Lillith hooked her arm in mine and led me out to her mom's car. Her mom was a very talkative lady who asked me questions about my family until Lillith finally told her to lay off. Lillie had me pressed against her side the whole time and if I'm honest with myself I'd admit that I didn't hate it. Homosexuality is a sin, my little moon child. 

Once we got to Lillie's room she sat me down in a chair and stood behind me. She toyed with my hair, a smile played across her features. 

"You should tie this up, your eyes are beautiful." She said. 

"Why don't you do that then." 

She hummed approvingly then grabbed a hair tie off of her dresser and tied my hair back into a low pony. She spun me in her desk chair so I was facing her and she tilted her head. After a moment of regarding me, she reached over my shoulder and grabbed a black berrett off of her desk which she clipped my bangs out of my face with. 

Her face was inches from mine, her brown eyes looking into my own. She leaned in, her lips nearly brushing mine. Quick push her away! You can't let this succubus put you under her spell. 

I pushed her away from me before her lips could hit mine and she looked away, slightly frazzled. She made the quick decision to pretend that what just happened didn't happen and she walked to her closet to get something. 

"I have the perfect idea for your costume." She said. 

"What's your idea?" 

"Well, you're all black preppy goth look gave me the idea of-" She pulled cat ears out of her closet and placed them on my head, "cat girl! You look so cute!" 

"I look promiscuous." 

"I'll pretend that I know what that means and move on." 

"I look like a slut." 

"Oh, I don't think you look like a slut. You look cute." 

"Of course you would find it cute." 

"Stop being pissy, storm cloud." She kissed the top of my head then went back to her closet to change. She's gonna turn you into a homosexual. If you don't stop talking to her now you'll go to hell too. You don't want that. You don't want to be a sinner. 

"Do you like my costume?" 

I looked over to where Lillie was standing. She was wearing a red riding hood outfit complete with the dress and cloak. Her hair was flowing loosely around her shoulders and her lipgloss shined in the light. 

"Yeah, it looks good on you." Suppress the thoughts. Suppress the thoughts. Suppress the- 

"We could head over to the festival. It takes place in the park which is just a few minutes walk from my house." 

Lillie took my hand for the second time that night. She led me to the park talking up the festival the whole time. By the time we got there, I expected it to take place in a castle. 

She led me around the different booths and we bought candy and sweets galore.

 After a while, Lillith started dragging me towards the haunted house. In my gut, I knew it was a bad idea, but I didn't want to disappoint Lillie, so I sucked it up and went in with her. 

Jump scares have never been my forte, I get lost in my head and the jump scares become amplified because I wasn't expecting them. Not to mention this haunted house looked horrifying. 

We got to the front rather quickly and Lillie led me in, her hand gripping mine. The house immediately gave off an eerie feeling that set me on edge. 

Nothing happened in the first room but the second that we stepped into the second room a ghost jumped out of the wall at us, which caused both me and Lillie to scream. However, Lillie quickly recovered and laughed at herself while I remained in an anxious state. I could still feel the eyes of the ghost on me.

 I looked up from the floor and locked eyes with multiple shadowy figures that were slowly pressing closer. Lillie tugged on my hand to get me to keep moving, but I couldn't. My legs felt like jelly and I didn't want to move towards the shadows. 

She pulled on my hand more eagerly and when I looked up I saw blood dripping down the walls. Someone with a ski mask and chainsaw came towards us and I knew this was it. This was the moment that I died. 

I braced myself for death, but it never came. Instead, I felt Lillie's lips close to my ear. 

"Hun, can you walk? There's an emergency exit over there that we can take." 

I nodded weakly and managed to stumble out of the house, but the second that I hit the grass I was on my knees dry heaving. 

"What was that in there?" Lillie asked.

"You tried to kill me is what happened." I wiped my hand on my sleeve; the adrenaline started to ebb a little. 

"You weren't going to die, it was just a haunted house." 

"Exactly! There was a ghost and shadow creatures and blood and a man with a chainsaw, I thought I was going to die." 

"Luna, there weren't shadow creatures or blood, and the man with the chainsaw was just an actor. He pointed out the exit." 

"What do you mean?" 

"Do you see things that aren't there? I didn't see half of the stuff that you did." She's gaslighting you. You saw that stuff. 

"Don't tell me what's real and what isn't real when you can't even handle your own emotions and thoughts." 

"I can handle my emotions." 

"Tell that to the scars on your arms." 

"I'm working on that." She hugged herself defensively and turned away. "How do you know about that anyway." 

"You decided to try to cut yourself behind the school after being bullied." 

"You saw that?" Hurt cut across her features. 

"I may have witnessed that. It wasn't my place to intervene." 

"I thought we were friends." 

"We're not friends! You just decide to tag along with me no matter what I say and you badger me into going to things like this then put me through traumatic experiences for your enjoyment!" 

"I do not do that." 

"No, you're right. You just feel useless, so you use me to feel needed. The fact that I'm friendless is something that you think you can fix. Have you ever thought that maybe I like it that way?" 

She turned fully away this time. "I don't need to deal with this kind of harassment." 

"Yeah, just run away." I continued to yell up at her from my spot on the ground. 

She gave me one last hurt look before walking away. 

A few days later, at school, Lillith came up to me with an apologetic look on her face. 

"Luna," she said, "I'm sorry about how things went down between us. If you're ok with it I'd like to stay over. I'm sure a lot of what you said is true, so I'd like to work towards a mutually beneficial relationship between us." 

"Did you consult a dictionary for that speech?" I didn't look at her. I couldn't look at her. If I looked at her I'd let her come back. Good girl. 

"What? No." 

"Well, that was big words for someone like you. You can't even understand the fact that I don't want your friendship." 

"I thought that you were just against the one-sided friendship."

"I'm against friendship with you at all. You're a sorrowful excuse for a human being and I don't want to deal with it." 

"I'm over here trying to apologize and instead you just insult me?" 

"If you'd leave you wouldn't be insulted." 

Her eyes darkened and she finally turned to leave, casting me one last glance before finally leaving. 

I finished putting my stuff away and when I turned to walk to class I saw Taylor standing right next to me. 

"Taylor!" I squeaked. 

"Sorry, Luna." He backed away from me, a smile on his face. "Did Lillith leave you?" 

"She's a terrible person that I didn't want to be involved with." 

"You're better off without her anyway." 

"Thanks, I guess." 

"She was just holding you back anyway. Making you feel things that you shouldn't." 

"What do you mean?" 

"You had a major crush on her. You're better without her because now you don't-" 

"Why do you think I have a crush on her?" 

"It's obvious." 

"No, it's not." 

"To me it is." 

"Whatever, I'm going to class." 

"See you later then!" 

Days went by and Lillith finally respected my wishes and left me alone. Meanwhile, Mr. Poe was getting more and more aggressive and yelled at me more and more. He called me a failure and an idiot and every insult under the sun. 

One day though, a good week after Lillith had stopped talking to me, Mr. Poe was being especially terrible during lunch. 

You're a failure, nobody would want to be your friend even if you let them. You'll live alone your whole life. You're not even worth the air that you breathe. Just shut up and be the doormat that you know you should be. 

Taylor walked in at that moment, sitting next to me and giving a small wave to Mr. Poe. 

"Hey, Luna. What're you two talking about?" 

How Luna will never amount to anything. 

"You're probably not wrong." 

"Aren't you supposed to defend me?" I asked. 

"But he's not wrong." 

You should listen to this one, he seems good. 

"You'll make a good trophy wife someday, but you're not smart enough to do much else."

"You don't know that. You barely know me." 

"I know you better than you think." 

"You don't know me! You wouldn't know it! You don't know me." 

Taylor slowly walked towards me, which caused me to cower in the corner. 

"You're useless." Useless, Luna, useless. 

"I'm not useless!" USELESS "I'M NOT, DON'T CALL ME USELESS!" My hands went over my head as I tried to protect myself from their insults. But they just both broke into cackles. 

"Luna?" Lillith was crouched in front of me and I was suddenly unsure of how long she's been trying to get my attention. "Who are you talking to?" 

"Mr. Poe and Taylor. They're in the room. Do you not see them? They're in the room." 

"Hey, Luna." Lillith grabbed my cheeks, and she forced me to look up at her. "Don't listen to them. They aren't real." 

"You don't know what's real!" I cried as I pulled my knees closer. Are you going to let her trick you?

"Nobody else can see Taylor or Mr. Poe, they're hallucinations. Nobody is in here with you but me." She ran her thumb under my eyes and dried my tears. 

"Why should I believe you?" She's lying to you. She wants to hurt you. 

"Because I care about you and don't want to see you in pain. And I know how it feels to struggle with mental illness and not get help. It sucks and I don't want you to go through that." 

"Why would you care about me? I've been so mean to you." She doesn't care.

"Because I see how much you're struggling and I understand how hard it can be. I want to help, but I can only help if you let me." 

"How do I fix it then?" You can't fix me. I am you whether you want to admit it or not. 

"Are you going to let her get rid of me!" Taylor screamed at me from the opposite corner. 

I cowered away from him as I covered my ears and Lillith scooted closer. 

"First," she said, her voice oddly soothing. "You need to get out of your environment. That house is awful and terrible for you. Second, you need to get on some meds and don't expect the first one to work. Third, you need to talk to someone." 

"That's a lot…" Taylor was progressively getting closer and Mr. Poe was whispering in the back of my mind. 

"Let's start on step one then. You have enough bruises and scars to easily get emancipated from your parents. I say start with that and I'll convince my parents to let you stay with us." 

"Why would they want me?" 

"Because you're a sweet girl when you let yourself be and you're struggling so hard. I doubt they'd let you go through this on your own or leave you with your abusive parents." 

"They aren't-" 

"Don't defend them. That's not how you punish your kids. My parents barely even yell at me." 

"Ok, that… that does sound nice." 

"Good. Then tomorrow after school we're going to start the process of getting you emancipated." She held out her pinky to me, tears in her eyes. "I promise I will not leave you at any point. I'll be with you every step of your recovery." 

I hooked my pinky with hers, and I finally felt sure about something in my life. 

16 months later

Lillith pov

Luna had been living with us for almost a year and a half. Shortly after she moved out of her parents' house she started setting a therapist and was diagnosed with schizophrenia rather quickly. 

She got on some meds, but we still struggled for a while. There were days when she really couldn't tell her hallucinations for reality and she got super paranoid. She'd hear voices a lot and they usually weren't telling her great things. However, after some trial and error, we got her on some meds that work well for her. She sleeps better now and she's even more affectionate towards me now that she's not super paranoid about me hating her or wanting to hurt her. 

It's still taking a lot of effort from all of us to work through the trauma that her parents left her with, but I feel like we're making progress. 

She no longer believes in the religion that she was brought up in. Her therapist said that it's to be expected since she was suffocated by it for so long. I find it to be a step in the right direction because she's not letting her parents dictate her life anymore. 

She turns eighteen today and her big wish was to stay home and watch movies with me. So, I decided to make us a pillow nest on my bed and get her favorite movies ready to stream. I had gotten my mom to help me distract Luna while I set everything up and so far it was going great. 

I turned off the lights to prepare for her arrival and the fairy lights that I have set up in my room twinkled beautifully. I heard Luna's voice down the hall and I climbed into the blanket nest to prepare for her arrival. 

She walked in and immediately caught my eyes. She inhaled sharply and looked around the room. "Lillith," she said, breathily, "what is all of this?" 

"You said that you wanted to stay in and watch movies, so I created a blanket nest. I thought that we could cuddle and stream your favorite movies. How does that sound?" 

"That sounds wonderful." She climbed into the blanket nest before she cuddled into my side. I watched her pull a blanket over our laps then lay her head on my shoulder. 

I passed her the laptop and she turned on Coroline. It was a movie that she discovered when she first moved in and couldn't stop watching after that. 

Right before the opening credits started rolling she pecked my lips, a faint blush dusted her cheeks. "Thanks for everything that you've done. I don't know where I'd be right now if it weren't for you." 

"Probably dead in a ditch." 

Her laugh was like music to my ears. "You're probably right."

"You do know I love you, right?" 

"You show me every day." 

I pulled her closer to my side, as I buried my face in her hair to hide my tears. She'd never kissed me before. I suspected that she liked me and I liked her, but I didn't want to push her by making the first move. 

Something inside me told me that everything was finally going to be okay. 

[ogaforogaalskling]

😺👻👼🏻

😺 Cute and spoopy or gore?

Hnnnnh this is a difficult one! I like both!! 🥺 I feel a bit odd saying I like gore, but ehhhh.. I don’t really have to give an explanation, do I?

👻 Do you believe in ghosts?

Yes! Yes I do! Or at the very least, I do believe that there are remnants of people that are left behind, and end up as the phenoma we experience.

👼 - Have you ever had any paranormal or supernatural experiences?

I used to think I had a bunch of experiences as a kid (I loved anything paranormal or extraterrestrial), but I grew out of it.

But come round 2019, I started hanging out with some peeps I had only interacted with in the work environment. One of the peeps had a lot of wacky claims and they took me under their wing and taught me about Wicca (the town I lived in had quite a tight-knit Wiccan community) and a bunch of esoteric stuff.

Now, as a teen, I had a great interest in Wicca and related topics, but my parents were very harsh on me because of it, and eventually got me out of the phase, but now as a new young ‘adult’, I had the freedom to choose, and of course I decided to delve into it again.

Now, CV (abbreviation for obvious purposes) was more than happy to teach me, and so we went on. I started spending a lot of time at their place, especially after I got into a bit of a heavy drinking phase (hey, we all deal with stuff differently), and it didn’t take very long for weird stuff to start happening.

CV claimed that the house they stayed in, which belonged to his uncle and aunt and their two children, was haunted. The spirit of a man who died protecting his family, and a little girl, whose story I sadly don’t remember (I don’t feel right trusting my memory with her story). Now, I called bullshit at the back of my head, but being the sucker I am for spooky stuff, I played along. The things I experienced weren’t terrible, but I’m still spooked out when I think about it.

The first experience was a small one, we were just sitting and talking when the light just suddenly switched off (and no, it wasn’t loadshedding). It just went off. We didn’t even hear the light switch being clicked. Often when we hung out, we watched stuff through a laptop connected to a television, and there would be times when the tv would just switch off.

I once brought my little brother, T, with, after an afternoon of ice skating at the mall, and I wanted to show him Black Books because he had never seen it before. Well, we couldn’t, because the tv didn’t want to work. It would not switch on. Him being a JW at the time was super freaked out (he had his own experience shortly after, but I’ll add that as a bonus). He didn’t stay to hang out for too long after this. That afternoon, CV and I wanted to play games, and bam!, the tv worked.

CV always told me that it was the man coming to say hi, but I didn’t really like the way he did it..

As for the little girl, well.. CV’s aunt’s youngest daughter was about 2 - 3 years old. I’d often hear them talk about ‘sussa’ (an endearing form of ‘suster’ in Afrikaans, meaning sister), and I always shrugged it off, not caring much of it, assuming they were probably talking about her. One night we were chilling like normal, and I was looking after her, and by now I was used to things being a bit weird in the house. I had her on my lap while we watched the boys play some forest survival game on the ps4, and suddenly she just jumped up and out of the door. CV told me to leave her, that she would be back in a moment, and she was.

She ran back in with her school backpack and got herself up onto CV’s bed and started to pack things out, and made sounds that children make when they play with another kid their age. I know kids sometimes have imaginary friends and often play on their own like this, but man.. it didn’t feel right. I asked CV what the heck was going on and they just casually told me, ‘oh, it’s just sussa. They play often.’

I was freaked, like, a child playing with a ghost child? What the hell? Nope! I don’t like the concept at all, at least not the real life type of the scenario.

They once took me to the neighbourhood ‘ghost’ house, which was an abandoned house in the middle of this lovely area, it had nothing at all. It was a literal shell of a house - just the concrete standing. We went in the bright of day, which is probably why this place didn’t spook me as much, but CV just brushed it off by telling me that the spirit there was hiding because I was there.

CV and I only hung out for about three months before I moved across the country, but I don’t think I’d ever forget the stuff that I experienced. It was minor, but it was really freaky when in the moment.

As for the case with T, we worked together for about a year in a bookshop. I remember there being an entire week where he was more anxious and panicky than usual, and when I asked him why, he said something in his peripheral vision was following him, a ‘shadow’ man who disappeared whenever he turned around. As I mentioned earlier, he was a JW at the time, so it wasn’t very like him to talk about stuff like this, but it was very concerning. That week I had caught him up on a ladder in the fiction section, just standing dead still on the top step, facing slightly away from the shelves, as if he was trying to look at something behind him without looking like he was trying to see whatever it was. I don’t know why, but my heart hurts thinking back on this specific memory. I can’t imagine what he must have felt having to go through that, whether there really was something there, or if he was just so much stress that he started hallucinating this thing.

I’m remembering so many more things I’ve experienced over the past two years regarding the paranormal, I might have to make a part two to this post! Gosh! I don’t know how I sound to everyone else posting this sort of thing, but yeah!