Horror Fan Fiction / Original Stories Fan Fiction ❯ Bright Pessimism ❯ Chapter 3

Kay had asked Kristopher to come out on the back porch after everyone else had gone to bed. They had both been in a haste to tuck Kristopher's younger siblings in bed, and Debra did not stay up long, which was typical for a woman her age.

Kristopher, after changing from his swimsuit into jeans and a t-shirt, crept out onto the wooden porch. Kay, who already stood out on the porch, wore her blue-and-white pajamas. She turned and instructed him to close the door and come over to the railing.

"Look," she told him, pointing to a tree branch where the woods began.

Kristopher strained his eyes to see a row of bats sitting on the tree branch. He cocked an eyebrow, looking back at Kay.

"What are you trying to prove anyway?" he asked.

"There's been this urban legend going around my circle of friends for about a year," she remarked. "My best friend has a brother who had a friend–"

"I can tell you this is already fake," Kristopher grumbled.

"Anyway, the friend was about your age. He actually lived along this same stretch of woods. He went out on his porch one night and got attacked by bats like you did. The next few nights he went outside and saw these bats perching on tree branches."

"Um, yeah?" Kristopher rolled his eyes. "Aren't bats common around here?"

"I haven't seen them before. Anyhow, the guy went out into the woods one night with a group of friends to smoke some weed. He wandered away from the group for some reason–I know this because as I said, he was my best friend's brother's friend–and he disappeared."

"What would you expect?" Kristopher spat. "How could any pothead find his way home after smoking weed?"

"That's not the point of the story. A few days later, he was found naked on his back porch dead. An autopsy showed his blood was gone, and there was just one bite mark in his neck."

A long, dramatic silence followed.

"So you're telling me that because I fucked up by going outside last night, I'm going to end up dying in some dramatic The da Vinci Code-esque way?"

"If you wander out into the woods," Kay cautioned.

"This sounds like some gay children's story," he retorted. "It's like an apple a day keeps the doctor away."

"That was real, too," Kay muttered. "Kids centuries ago didn't wanna see those creepy doctors in masks."

"You know what I mean, dammit." Kristopher puffed up his cheeks. "And how could so many bats only leave one bite mark, by the way?"

"They serve a vampire," Kay droned in a voice that she must have thought belonged in a scary movie.

"Vampires are bullshit. I mean, impersonating a vampire is cool, but they're not real. I had pop-in fangs at one time like everybody else, but that doesn't mean we victimized random people possibly with or without AIDS."

"Will you still think that when he gets you?"

"Who gets me?"

"The vampire!"

"Yes. And I'll tell him to his face and possibly even make him cry. The asshole probably has AIDS anyway."

"You're not one to talk about crying, you know."

"Shut up."

"But hey, try telling the bats that you don't believe in vampies." Kay grinned.

Kristopher reflected her grin with a small smile before he shouted, "Hey, bats! Vampires are bullshit!"

He and Kay heard the flapping of wings and turned around. More bats had been sitting along the edge of the roof, unbeknownst to them. Kristopher's heart suddenly raced, and he gripped onto Kay's wrist.

"I'm going to have a panic attack," he gasped. "Really. There're too many of them."

"Okay, let's slowly go inside," Kay whispered in his ear.

They slowly shuffled across the porch to the glass door. Some bats swooped down in front of them, and Kristopher closed his eyes tightly. Though he hoped this would soothe his nerves, he became more nervous since he could not see. Fortunately, the bats did not swarm them as Kay led Kristopher back into the living room and closed the door behind them.

Kristopher opened his eyes and glanced back at the glass door. Some bats had perched on the wooden railing, and more were perching there every second. He pulled the curtain over the door so the bats could not see in.

"So, if vampires are bullshit," Kay ridiculed, "then how come you got nervous when the bats were closer?"

"Because those things are creepy in a stalker-like fashion." Kristopher shivered as he sat down on the couch.

Kay sat down beside him, leaning into him. "I guess so." She curled her lip. "I'm wondering something."

"Yeah?"

"Are you a virgin?"

Kristopher puffed, "Of course. Remember, I was home-schooled and went to a co-op. All the kids there were creeps, and I was the outcast. …Are you?"

"Pff," Kay rejoined. "I've been home-schooled all my life. And the 'co-op' I go to has teens that act like they're five. Like they know what the word 'virgin' means anyway."

Kristopher laughed under his breath. "…So why do you ask?"

"Because you're hot. It seems you wouldn't be."

He gritted his front teeth while looking down at the carpet. "Isn't that incestuous for you to say that?"

"Who really cares?" Kay kissed his ear.

Kristopher pushed her away and stood up. "No. I don't think that's cool. Don't think of me like that."

"Okay. Good night, Kris."

Kay stood up and walked past him. Kristopher flustered as he slipped into his own room. He sat down on the bed next to Mattie.

"Are you awake?" he questioned quietly.

Mattie glanced up at him with droopy eyes, grasping his Nightmare-Generator next to him. Kristopher gently picked him up and cradled him in his arms. He then walked out into the living room and set Mattie down on his feet.

"Are you ready for a surprise?" Kristopher cooed, kneeling beside him.

Mattie yawned.

"Okay!"

Kristopher pulled back the curtain from in front of the sliding door. The bats had flocked to the porch railing, and they now sat there, staring almost lifelessly back at the two boys. Mattie stared, understandably confused, as he pressed his face against the glass door, holding his new toy close to his small torso.

"Bats!" Kristopher pointed to them. "See?"

"Bats," Mattie repeated, leaving his mouth agape.

"They're amazing, aren't they?" Kristopher hugged his brother to his side. "But now we have to go beddy-bye, okay?"

Mattie looked up at him with smiling eyes. "Yes, Krissy."




Kristopher had awakened the next morning already mad at the world. He could not explain the reasons for this though. He thought he had had a pretty good night; he had not broken down and hysterically sobbed the entire night.

He vented in the notebook that Debra had gotten him, which took until lunch. After lunch, he settled down with his siblings and Kay to watch a continuous loop of Spongebob Squarepants while his aunt scoured the streets for job applications, which he requested that she do. Kristopher felt better being near his brother and sister, who seemed to also be feeling well.

When Debra finally came home with the job applications for him, Kristopher felt close to snapping. He restrained himself, however, for he reminded himself that he needed a job because he would not be able to access his entire portion of his parents' savings until he was twenty-one. He sat down at the kitchen table filling out applications, and it took him until dinner time to complete them.

However mundane Kristopher's day may seem, it was about to change completely.

After dinner, his mother's scrapbook came to mind. Kristopher went into his room, opened his backpack, and took out the hefty book. The scrapbook was the only thing he had left of either of his parents' other than a handful of family portraits and wedding pictures, and he cherished it so.

Kristopher cradled it in his arms as he walked into the living room. Dusk was quickly falling, and Debra and Kay had taken out his siblings to enjoy the last bit of the light. Kristopher opened the scrapbook as he paced the backyard. He loved the scrapbook because it had been a progress in work since the day he was born. He had been lulled by the old photographs just in the first few pages–he was so empowered he thought he could survive this.

"Krissy!" Mattie called, tugging on Kristopher's black jeans. "Play."

"I don't want to, Mattie." Kristopher flipped a page in the book.

"Play!" Mattie kicked at his older brother's steel-toe boots angrily. "Play!"

"Not now, Mattie. We'll play tomorrow." Kristopher turned away from him.

"Play!" the little boy cried.

Kristopher shut the scrapbook and spun around to Mattie. "I don't fucking want to!" he yelled as he slapped his brother across the face.

"Kristopher!" Debra scolded as she stood up from a chair on the deck.

Kristopher scowled as he hugged the scrapbook to his chest. Mattie cried as the aunt stomped over to them. Both Kay and Selena, who were only a few feet away, were frozen in place.

"Kristopher, go to bed," Debra commanded.

"You're not the boss of me!" he argued as tears poured forth.

"Kris, go to bed! You need to cool off," Debra told him, grabbing his arm.

"Don't touch me!" Kristopher wrenched away from her. "No one understands me–not even God does! I'm sick of being dragged around day-to-day! I hate everyone and I hate this life! If it were my choice, I'd be dead instead of my parents!"

"Kris, don't say that," Kay gasped.

Kristopher glanced around at each of them. Mattie blubbered into Debra's leg while his aunt and Kay looked close to tears. Selena silently cried as she stared at him with her gray eyes.

"You all would be much better off without me anyway," he continued as he backed away.

"Kristopher, no!" Selena sobbed. "You said you'd be there–"

"I don't want to be there anymore!" Kristopher growled. "I'm sick of being there for you two because neither of you are really there for me!"

"Krissy, stop it!" Mattie screamed.

"No, I can't stop it!" Kristopher glared down at him. "In fact, I won't even be here at all!"

Kristopher spun around and sprinted for the woods. Debra shouted at him to stop as she held back Mattie, who screamed endlessly. Selena watched him lifelessly as Kay chased after him until he raced into the dark woods.

"Kristopher, come back!" Kay called. "Don't you remember that story I told you?!"

"Krissy, no!" Mattie wept.

Kristopher ran, clutching the scrapbook, and his family's voices soon faded away. In the back of his mind he was scared of fleeing into the forest when dusk was just now falling, but he kept on running for the sake of running. The night hastily shadowed him from anyone's view, and he eventually slowed down when he ran out of stamina.

Kristopher, however, continued walking as he silently cried into the book. He could barely see ahead of him, and the fact that there was almost always a tree in front of him made it a bad scenario. The night was warm but not uplifting, and he could hardly see the stars dotting the sky through the tops of the trees.

The woods itself was intimidating. He would be walking along when he would find a large tree top hanging upside down, only kept up by a few branches on other trees. There would also be the haphazard ditches, which he occasionally fell into, though he was fortunate that the ones he fell into were not creeks. He also unluckily met vines, briars, and poison oak, which he could not identify due to the fact that these were his first encounters.

Kristopher sat down on a rotting log and wiped his eyes. He was desperately lost, and he wanted to be home with Mattie and Selena. He already regretted his harsh words to them; not quite so deep down in his shallow heart, he always wanted to be there for them.

He stood up and tried to figure out from which way he had traveled. Every direction looked the same, especially in the dark. Kristopher began traveling in no particular way, hoping he could at least just get out of the extensive woods.

As Kristopher walked, he heard a hellish screech. He turned around, not quite expecting to see the colony of bats swarming toward him. He shrieked madly as he ran from them, though their screeching squelched his own.

Kristopher unknowingly stepped on what seemed to be a net, and before he knew it, the net, enclosing him, connected to a rope that pulled it with him trapped inside up into a tree. He kicked furiously at the snare, screaming, as he held the scrapbook close to him. The ground was far away, and he was scared of what might happen to him while he was ensnared.

Kristopher was close to a panic attack when something told him that everything would be okay if he just went to sleep. His mind was forced to believe it somehow, and he somehow felt at peace, even though the bats began roosting on the net. He yawned, and even though he willed them to not, his pale-blue eyes shut on their own.