As part of a Tommy Boy production. Tales is a podcast created to bring
short stories to life. These stories will be brought to you by a number
of authors and narrated by yours truly, with some help from other Amazing Boys,
actors and actresses. So bunker in, start that fire, hold your
loved one clothes, and enjoy. We are Story Times. I found this
note nailed onto a tree on my front lawn. I really don't know how
to describe it. I'll just let you read it yourself. I saw you
today. It was your birthday. You didn't see me. You hardly ever
do these days. Your skin looked so nice and healthy, and your eyes
they were the most beautiful I'd ever seen them. You've grown so much.
I remember how different you used to look when you were younger. I remember
the day I first met you. It was four years ago. I was
sitting at my desk, head down, listening to the teacher rattle off names
for attendance. The teacher called out a name I didn't recognize, and a
stranger's voice answered behind me. Was there a new student. The teacher didn't
pause for a second, just continued calling out name after name. I turned
my head to where the voice had come from. I saw you, a
pale thing, so thin, your eyes so red, at a seat that
should have been empty. I saw the fireflies flying around you, flickering,
dozens of them, never straying far from you. I saw them going through
you and coming out through your skin, like you were amiss to them.
Can you believe I thought you were a ghost? No one else seemed to
acknowledge the new stranger sitting at the back of the class class at the class
Hour after hour passed as I waited for something to happen, for someone to
notice you, for you to leave, for you to let out a ghoulish
scream and clare at me, like in the horror story. I was certain
I was in But nothing happened. Teachers came and went, my classmates laughed
and slept, and you just sat there. The bell rang for recess.
The other kids ran to their mondanities for the day, leaving me and you
together in the empty classroom. You stood up and pulled a chair from the
desk next to you, making it face your desk. You turned your head
to me and spoke, well, you're slow today, Come on, ask
me your questions. I don't know why I didn't run away screaming at that
moment. Probably would have turned out better for me in the long run,
but let's not speculate. I guess at that point in my life, I
was pretty bloody lonely. I figured there was only a fifty fifty chance that
you would eat me, and the other fifty was that someone wanted to talk
with me. Kid priorities don't make sense to me either these days, so
I went along with the flow. I walked over to your desk, sat
down on a chair you pulled for me, and asked you my question.
What were you? You told me you didn't know. You said that once
you were a child, just like me, with parents and friends. You
used to go to the same schools as me. Then one day, one
ordinary day, when you were ten, you just woke up and you were
like this, covered in fireflies, and no one could remember you the moment.
They concentrate on anything else, no one, not even your parents.
You told me of how I'd noticed you every day, how I think of
you until recess, every day I'd come to you every day, how we
would talk every day, how we would meet for the first time every day
for the last three years about how I'd forgotten the instance I walked out of
the room, how everyone would forget you, how the fireflies would make them,
how for the last three years you'd been alone. Your story was very
hard to believe, so I didn't. I asked what reality prank show I
was on. You looked well, unimpressed, and asked me to continue telling
my story. I was caught off guard by a non sequitor. You said,
last time I was here, I was telling you a story, a
horror story about a haunted house. As you detailed the story, goosebumps prickled
my skin. It was a short story I'd been making up in my head,
a story I hadn't told anyone yet at that moment, A million reactions
were and to me, all simultaneously adequate and inadequate. But the only thing
that seemed proper was to finish the story for you, so I did.
Halfway through, you interrupted me to ask if my mother had recovered from her
sickness. Yet I had to shake my head a bit of shame with the
fact that I shared this private matter to a stranger. The story ended a
few minutes before recess. My next class was in another room. You told
me to go. Your steadiness took me aback. You seemed so accepted of
your fate, like you'd already gotten used to the idea of being forgotten forever.
I was a kid. Back then, I wasn't a particularly smart kid,
and I was probably on the onset of a crush, So you can't
excuse what I did next as an example of my childhood stupidity. I grabbed
my scissors, pressed it against my arms skin, and dug in as a
drew blood, pushed it forwards till the cut formed the shape I wanted.
Letter by letter, I carved your name unto my arm, just so you
know, I don't regret that. Don't get me wrong. Kid power might
have made me do it, but it's sure as hell didn't make the pain
go away. It was one of the most painful experiences of my life.
But even then, as a kid, I thought it was happening to you
was unfair. I remember how your eyes looked when you saw that, the
confusion, How strange it was for you that anyone would want to remember.
I remember that looked so clearly. When I woke up the next day and
saw your name on my arm, I remembered you. I didn't forget that
day. For the first time we had a conversation that wasn't so one sided.
You said no one had ever done anything like that before, and suggested
I might have a mental illness. I won't deny it. That drew a
little blood As we talked. A creepy thought came into my head. Did
you prefer it? When I didn't remember that night? I was staying up
on my bed, staring at your name on my arm, wondering if I
should cover it up so I couldn't see it and give you back your privacy.
When I heard a crash, I looked up to see my bedroom window
shattered and a dirty rock on my floor. I looked out my cracked window
to see a dark figure on my lawn. You were outside, yelling about
how we should hang out. It took me a while to get used to
how bad you were. I talking to people years without practice made you quite
a bit rusty. That was all right. We had a lot of time
for the next two years. We spent most of our free time together.
Most of the time we talked. You tell me an aspect of your life
and how you lived. You still stayed in your old house. Your parents
never noticed the food that had gone missing, never noticed the extra room,
or that you'd stolen the extra keys. One night, I confided in you
that I was beginning to think you were a part of my imagination fight club
style. After all, what could you do to me that I couldn't do
to myself. You spend the next month or so trying to leave bite marks
on my ear or neck to prove a point. I still have a few
scars on my ears, so I guess you did. Looking back, I
could see the warning signs. Even then. Your skin seemed to get worse
and worse, paler and paler, and you'd rub your eyes raw. It
was in winter. We had our wake up call. The morning began like
any other. I woke up, brushed my teeth, and started searching for
clothes to wear. It was the winter warning, and my room was dark,
so I didn't see your name on my arm. The cold sent shivers
through my body, and I pulled out a long sleeve jacket. A small
voice rang in my head. Don't you usually roll your sleeves up? Yeah?
And why did I? That was annoying. I finished tidying up and
headed to school on the school bus. I felt oddly content, like something
I've been worrying about had just disappeared. I walked up the schoolstairs, down
the hall, through my classroom door, and sat down at my desk.
The same feeling of a burden forgotten hounded my mind. What was I forgetting?
When recess came, I just sat at my desk while my classmates ran
out. It felt like a ritual, but I didn't know what for.
I was contemplating just walking out to join them when I heard it. Hey
Tales listeners, it's me. Sorry to interrupt the story, but real quick,
if you're listening, press the poise button after I'm done saying what I'm
saying, and please follow, like and leave a review for the podcast.
Once again, this really helps the podcast out and getting seen more. It's
not as fast as pressing that heart button on TikTok, but Spotify and Apple
Podcast both gives you the option to leave a review. Thanks, and now
back to your story. It was something smaller in the wind, like a
whisper, but it came over and over incessant. It sounded like my name.
I knew this was strange, that this was worth my attention, but
I felt oddly calm. Everything would be all right, Everything would be fine,
just ignored. I sat there at my desk, my mind a war
zone between two conflict and contradictory voices. When I felt the force tugging all
my sleeves. The moment I noticed this, my jacket sleeve tore open.
I saw your name on my arm, and then your hand that had ripped
my jacket open. You'd been yelling at me for over twenty minutes. I
think that was the moment we realized how on edge our friendship really was,
one accident away from complete erasure. We spent most of the next year in
the town library to get a trying to find out where the fly flies were.
It wasn't really a problem for me because of my mother's treatment. My
family couldn't afford to go on any trips, and our house didn't have headen
anymore, so I was happy to spend my time with you. Trying to
find information was a puzzle in and of itself. After all, how would
I read about people I couldn't remember? And how would you find out who
was special when no one could even remember enough about them to record them.
We found our old family trees and records individually. We'd write down the name
of everyone in a book on two lists, and then we would compare the
names I had remember to write down, but you had would become the focus.
They were the names who were under curse of the fireflies. We compiled
a list of suspicious books, books we thought could help us because they were
written by or were about the people we were searching for. I read the
books with a list of names, side by side, reading it again for
every page of the book. You scoured the internet on the library computers,
on the lookout for articles about the people. Our search would lead us to
the first glimpse we got of what would really happening to you. It was
late at night when you found a picture. I was a bit drowsy at
that time and almost about to noddle off when I heard a sharp intake of
breadth. I turned to see you standing a point at the screen. I
didn't see anything, well, anything noteworthy On the screen was a picture of
a clearance somewhere in the woods. You held up your piece of paper where
you'd mark out two names, Susie Applebee Reagan thirteen, Terry Applebee Reagan twelve
siblings for a moment I saw the paper and the screen side by side,
side by side, and then I saw them, two figures emerging from the
words towards the camera. They were almost humanoid, with the exception of their
limbs, which stretched to nightmarish proportions. Their blank white skin was that of
pure albino and looked more like tree bark than anything you expected to find on
a mammal. A cloud of fireflies surrounded a duo. The shorter one look
emanciated. I could see their rib cages around which their eyes god their eyes
so small, so red. The taller one, with his white hair,
didn't look alive anymore. They were little more than skin wrapped around on a
skeleton. Fireflies swarmed out of their empty eye sockets. Both reached for the
cameraman. I looked at the article surrounded a picture. It was a blog
posted by a hiker twenty years after the last mention of the two kids.
The picture was a mystery to the cameraman as well. He'd been wanting to
go to the woods pictured for a while now, but he never actually remembered
going there. The picture had just appeared on his camera one day out of
the blue. For a moment I looked at your face, your thin,
pale face with those red, veiny eyes. Would that be you? When
my scar faded, just a walking horror eye glimpse, Then forget. We
worked through our reading list at a much faster pace starting from that moment.
Maybe we should have gone slower. At least every book, every website we've
let untouched promise hope, the book that we've finished and tossed a side promised
nothing but the clearing the woods as one's future, And we toss aside a
lot of books. I believe I tore through three fourths of my reading list
before I stumble across the journal. Oh my god, that horrible, horrible
journal. The journal used to belong to a mental patient named Joey He who
claimed to be a serial killer. He was locked up in an asylum when
the police discovered his supposed victims never existed. He was diagnosed with a need
for attention and shoved away. They should have executed him. They should have
fried him until his flesh melted and his hair burned. In a journal,
he talked about how he carried out his killings. He knew things bizarre and
disturbing things No one else knew. He knew of strange creatures that live in
the woods. One of them his favorites were the fireflies. I'm not going
to tell you how he summoned these things. I trust you, I trust
you more than anyone. But a thing like this belongs to the ground more
than it ever will be to the human mind. In the end, it's
sufficient to know that these things were not fireflies. Joey would start his ritual
by taking a kid, any kid, anyone he pleased. He would take
them at any time, in the dead of the night from their own homes
or in broad daylight from their front yards. It didn't matter if he was
seen. He'd take them to his house and dragged them inside. Usually an
amber alert came up at that point, he didn't care. Like I said,
it wouldn't matter. Soon he dragged them to a special room in his
house. Here the fireflies would come and latch onto them. Now nobody was
searching for the kids. Not the police, not the parents, nobody.
From then on he would do whatever he wanted to the kids. He'll get
bored of them after a day or two, after a child had broken.
At that point, he disposed of them. Hack saw kitchen knife. Anything
would work. He detailed a large pit of bodies he kept in the woods,
swarming with bugs. One day, I guess he got bored of that
too, so he went right to the police station and turned himself in.
Not on account of guilt, no, no, no, he just wanted
someone to know about the stuff he was doing. Sick bastard. Oh,
don't get the wrong idea. He never stopped killing kids. The asylum doors
didn't stop him from doing what he liked. It just made him improvise.
He made a new way. He modified the flies so they could survive without
a host, just in a dormant state. When a child, he specified
the age, would approach the swarm and would latch on and begin its effect.
Over the years, a child would warp horribly into the things we saw
in the woods. I wish I could hate him in peace. I wish
I could say the world owed him nothing, But that wouldn't be true.
He detailed a way out. On a final page. There was an exact
explanation on how to get rid of the fireflies. You must have seen something
in my face, because at that moment you asked if I had found anything.
I said no, and closed the book. A few minutes later,
you shut down the computer. You picked up the last book and went through
it yourself. When you reached the end cover, you tossed it aside.
I asked what we should do now. You said it was all right.
I could go home. We'll talk about it in the morning. I stood
up and walked past the shelves of book I headed for the library entrance,
but stopped right outside the door and waited and waiting until I heard the sniffling
sounds. I snugged back to our table, where you were quietly sobbing.
You had your head in your hands. I sat back down as you raised
your eyes to me. You said, you which you never met me,
how happy you were when you had nothing to lose. How I ruined your
life. You never really got in better at talking to people. That was
the worst love confession I'd ever heard. I remember how we kissed that night.
I remember how your hands gripped my hair. I remembered that kiss.
I wish it could have been just a kiss. I'm sorry I ruined that
moment. When my arms were around you, I was close enough to steal
a firefly without you noticing. I remember holding a firefly in my hand.
I remember how we struggle until it didn't until it was part of me.
The fireflies shifted, They came over to me and left you. I remembered
a familiar look in your eyes, the confusion. I never wanted to see
that confusion in your eyes again. You deserve to be loved, and you
deserved to know that I wasn't really living anyway. You reached for me.
I pulled away as the last light of condition faded from your eyes, and
then you were staring at a stranger, walking away into a crowd of strangers.
That was a year ago. You've gotten so much better since then.
You have so many friends now, so many people at your birthday party.
You also look so much healthier. I haven't been as fortunate. My skin's
gotten a lot paler, and my eyes hurt all the time. I couldn't
go to school like you did all those years. I haven't wasted my time,
though. I found Joey's pit, the bodies, there were so many
bodies. There's a grave for those children now without me, my mom could
afford her surgery. She looked so happy. Just yesterday I saw her playing
with my baby brother. I saw you crying. Yesterday you were with your
friends laughing. For a brief moment your eyes met mine, and then they
were so wet. I think I'm going away for good. I think you're
not going to be happy if I stick around. I'm so happy I met
you, even if you don't remember me. Sometimes I go through depressive episodes.
I feel so looey, even with my friends. I don't know what's
going through my head during these times, and sometimes I'd end up in a
bathtub, a knife in my hands and my wrist bleeding. Until now I
thought I was cutting my wrist. I wasn't the cuts their letters, I've
been carving a name unto my arm. This episode of Tales was written and
edited by author Minister of Aisles and narrated by de Medicine. If you like
this podcast, please hit that follow button and give the podcast a review.
Remember, if you want your short story on the podcast, you can email
me or hit me up on my social media. You can find that information
in a listener's note. Also in a listeners note are the links to the
author's websites where you can further support and or read some more of their amazing
stories. As always, thank you for your support, and to those who
have continued to listen. I am a smoiled podcast, and so every listen,
follow review matters, and so I appreciate it. Remember, we are
the storytellers.