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Insomnia: Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror
Insomnia: Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror
Insomnia: Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror
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Insomnia: Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror

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Insomnia (n) - An inability to sleep; a state of agitated wakefulness, often as a result of troubling thoughts.

Includes the following titles:

The Grin - a classic nightmare story extracted straight from the deepest recesses of a man-child's troubled mind.

The Scenario Egg - an investment broker enjoys the spoils of his fast-paced lifestyle until failure, a beautiful woman, and an odd-looking device conspire to make him second guess what is good and right, and what is real and fantasy.

A Thing for Zombies - a dark satire about young love and the steps one might take to win another's affection.

Reached in Error - The lines between technology and the paranormal blur in this tale about a device that allows the living to communicate with the dead.

Raise the Dead - when a mysterious musician applies for an opening in Chris Stephens's high school band, strange things begin to happen, some of them wonderful, some of them horrifying.

The Sacrifices We Make - a child's abduction wakes a drowsy little town from a forgetful stupor.

The Promises We Keep - young lovers make a vow that they never in their wildest dreams ever expected to have to keep.

Approximately 85000 words.

Some material may not be appropriate for readers younger than 14.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateDec 15, 2014
ISBN9781502261922
Insomnia: Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror
Author

Saul Tanpepper

Subscribe for new releases & exclusive deals/giveaways: www.tanpepperwrites.com Saul Tanpepper is the specfic pen name of author Ken J. Howe, a PhD molecular biologist and former Army medic and trauma specialist.  Titles include: The best-selling epic post-apocalyptic zombie series ZPOCALYPTO - A WORLD OF GAMELAND SERIES The best-selling post-apocalyptic horror series BUNKER 12 The international technothriller series THE FLENSE (a BUNKER 12 companion series) The climate disaster survival series SCORCHED EARTH - A CLIMATE COLLAPSE SERIES Short story collections: Shorting the Undead & Other Horrors Insomnia: Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror Visit him at www.tanpepperwrites.com

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    Book preview

    Insomnia - Saul Tanpepper

    Cover.200

    Table of Contents

    Introduction

    THE GRIN

    THE SCENARIO EGG

    A THING FOR ZOMBIES

    REACHED IN ERROR

    RAISE THE DEAD

    THE SACRIFICES WE MAKE

    THE PROMISES WE KEEP

    Copyright Notice

    Acknowledgments

    Publication History

    About the Author

    Excerpts & Other Tanpepper Titles

    INSOMNIA

    Paranormal Tales, Science Fiction, and Horror

    by Saul Tanpepper

    INTRODUCTION

    Insomnia.

    An inability to sleep; a state of agitated wakefulness, often as a result of troubling thoughts.

    The word derives from the Latin roots in (not) + somnus (sleep). Further back, the word has roots from the Proto-Indo-European, in the term swepnos, meaning dream.

    In somnia: engaged in the act of dreaming.

    To sleep, perchance to dream.

    Somnus also refers, in the figurative sense, to death. The ancient Roman god of sleep shared that name; he was a son of Night and brother of Death.

    To dream, perhaps of dying.

    All themes in this collection.

    The Grin is a classic nightmare story extracted straight from the deepest recesses of a man-child’s troubled mind. The monsters don’t reside under his bed or in his closet; they populate his nightmares, and they flee from the light when he wakes. But what happens when those monsters escape the shackles of his dreaming mind? Who then do they terrorize? And how can they be stopped? Perhaps babysitter Cassie Ingersoll has the answer. Perhaps she wished she’d never taken the job in the first place.

    Speaking of monsters turning real, what could be more frightening than a nightmare that torments us while we are awake? In The Sacrifices We Make, a child’s abduction tells the story of every parent’s nightmare in a drowsy little town that seems all too willing to slip back into a forgetful stupor…waking from it only long enough to respond with transient horror when the next abduction occurs. It’s a gruesome, gripping tale that’ll have you wondering what monsters reside in us all.

    In the science fiction tale, The Scenario Egg, an investment broker enjoys the spoils of his fast-paced lifestyle until failure, a beautiful woman, and an odd-looking device conspire to make him second guess what is good and right, and what is real and fantasy. On the night of his thirty-ninth birthday, he wishes the ultimate death—of a world bereft of all humanity—but when he wakes, is he still dreaming? And when he realizes that the real nightmare will return when he wakes, what will he do then? Is it possible to refuse to ever wake, to live within the fantasy of one’s wishes?

    The lines between technology and the paranormal blur when college freshman Ellen Grabowski wonders whether it’s possible to create a device that would allow the living to communicate with the dead. After she places a call to her parents while on her way home from school, she may just find the connection Reached in Error.

    As if the possibility of speaking with the dead weren’t terrifying enough. What if there was a way to bring them back? And if we could, what would the Unliving want with the likes of us? In Raise the Dead, when a mysterious musician applies for an opening in Chris Stephens’s high school band, Ten-Forty, strange things begin to happen, some of them wonderful, some of them horrifying.

    The final two stories deal with young love, of the loss experienced in death, and of the redemption that might be won following it.

    In the dark satire, A Thing for Zombies, seventeen-year-old Kevin Velasco is seriously crushing on his lifelong friend Jamie, but Jamie’s affection is turned elsewhere. So, when an attractive young zombie shows up at the pool where they lifeguard, Kevin desperately tries to distract Jamie, but he only manages to force her into making a heart-breaking confession, leaving Kevin to wonder how far she’s willing to go for the one she wants. And whether he’s willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to get what he wants.

    In the paranormal tale, The Promises We Keep, young lovers Veronica Seldano and Paul Lehane make a vow that they never in their wildest dreams ever expected to have to keep. But after a tragic fire claims the life of one of them, that is exactly what both teenagers must face. Haunted in their sleep, will the living betray the dead? Will the dead allow it to happen?

    Sleep.

    It’s supposed to replenish our mind, body and soul; it’s supposed to restore. Unbroken, untroubled, wonderful sleep. But such a thing is truly a rare beast, elusive, mercurial. Ironic then, isn’t it, that when we dream, we dream of dreamless sleep?

    Whether you find yourself in a restless state of insomnia or in somnia, it is my fervent wish that these tales torment and terrify you till dawn. My gift to you, Dear Reader.

    I’ll see you in your dreams.

    Saul

    San Francisco, CA

    May 2012

    THE GRIN

    At three o’clock in the afternoon on Christmas Eve, the Westside Mall was an absolute madhouse. Frantic, last-minute shoppers clogged the aisles, bumping into one another and glaring at each other, most of them still clutching to the belief that the perfect gift was still to be found on the stores’ now half-empty shelves, as if miracles did exist and happened to be in stock, ideally at seventy-five percent off. Seventeen-year-old Cassie Ingersoll was right in the middle of it all.

    She’d put off her shopping and was now paying the price for it. In years past, she’d always been so much more proactive, finishing her gift-buying a solid week and a half before Christmas, but this year was different. She hadn’t even been sure she was going to do any shopping until that very morning when her mother slipped her credit card into Cassie’s hand and shoved her out the front door with instructions not to return until she’d gotten something for everyone.

    But now it was seven o’clock and she still hadn’t finished, and the mall was closing in an hour.

    It’s not like the people she had to buy for were hard to please or that they numbered in the multitudes. It was just her parents and sister Amy. And, if anything, everyone’s expectations were especially low this year. Her father had been laid-off from his construction job two years before and hadn’t been able to find work, and the bank was two, maybe three, payments from foreclosing on the house. Nobody was expecting a big Christmas.

    Her parents did what they could to minimize the psychological impact on Cassie and Amy. After Thanksgiving, they’d given each of the girls fifty dollars and told them to go shopping. Amy had gone with Grandma three weeks before. The presents were wrapped and had been collecting dust beneath their fake tree ever since. They’d look so small and depressing.

    But Cassie had held onto the money, procrastinating, knowing it could be used for something other than gifts, something they needed. She considered maybe just baking some nice breads and cookies for everyone. But time had gotten away from her and she hadn’t. And so, here she was.

    Despite everything, she’d managed to score some pretty decent stuff at huge discounts: a sweater for her father (seventeen bucks, and you couldn’t even tell it was irregular), and for her kid sister, a ten-dollar pair of white gold and fake sapphire ladybug posts that she’d gotten from the discount rack at the Hallmark Store (Amy had gotten her ears pierced at a slumber party at a friend’s house a month before and Cassie just knew she was going to look adorable in them).

    Then, there was her mom.

    Cassie was planning on getting her a nice scarf—she even had the one picked out. But then she had to go ruin everything by wandering into DiMarco’s Boutique. The prices were too rich for her blood—and her wallet—but she’d gone in anyway. That’s when she saw it hanging all alone on the rack, a perfect replacement for her mother’s old stained and worn-out coat: a solid maroon ski vest lined with a luxurious gray fleece. There was only one left in her size. And maroon was her mom’s favorite color.

    But the hundred-dollar price tag was way more than she could afford. Way more than she could justify, even with her mother’s credit card in her purse. True, her mother had given it to her knowing she might use it, but the last thing she’d told Cassie was, In case of emergencies.

    Leaving Cassie wondering what kind of emergency there could be Christmas shopping.

    She’d been tempted to go ahead and charge the jacket. But how could she justify paying that much for something when they were all cutting back on everything? They were even foregoing the traditional steak dinner (it had gone from being prime rib two years ago) and opting instead for ham this year. She hadn’t told her parents, but she hated ham.

    Cassie sighed. It was too bad about the jacket. And now the scarf she’d planned on buying was gone too, snatched up by some other pathetic and desperate shopper. She had no idea what to get now. It was looking like something baked at the last minute might find its way under the tree this year after all.

    For the umpteenth time in the past month, it seemed, she wished she had a steady job. The Dollar Barn, for example, was always looking for cashiers. She could do that. She could even be a frappista at the Froyo Hut. How hard could that be?

    But her parents kept nixing the idea, saying, Studying and getting good grades is your top priority.

    I need a job.

    School is your job, honey.

    She understood that they didn’t want her to worry, but, really… A part time job would help them out a lot more than the occasional babysitting job, even if it meant sacrificing an A for an A-minus or B-plus. As it was, she was barely able to pay for the gas she put in her car (which she feared she might have to sell, if things got very much worse at home).

    Besides, she wasn’t ten anymore; in less than a month she’d turn eighteen. She was ready to take on more responsibility. Why couldn’t her parents see that?

    Still and all, babysitting was easy work. Most of the kids she tended were usually very well-behaved. Usually. Every once in a while she’d get a total terror for a kid. She had her own secret way of dealing with them, but she avoided using it if she could. The Kit, which she kept in the trunk of her car, was a measure of last resort, reserved only for the worst offenders.

    The credit card burned in her pocket. Leaving the jacket hanging on the rack back at DiMarco’s and walking away had been the hardest thing to do. Well, maybe not the hardest. Resisting all the poor little kittens and puppies in the windows of the pet store she’d stopped in afterward was even harder. She couldn’t help feeling sorry for the little critters, especially around this time of year. She wanted to rescue them all.

    She collapsed in frustration at a table in the food court, exhausted and undecided, her stomach growling with hunger. She’d been craving Chicken McNuggets, but she didn’t have very much cash left in her wallet. She needed to save it for her mom’s gift.

    A young family was sitting at the adjacent table: tired parents, a toddler in a stained onesie and a crabby baby in a stroller. By the looks of the bags stacked around them, it was obvious they’d be having a very merry Christmas. Cassie saw no fewer than four huge bags filled with colorful boxes of toys, plus two additional bags from Crate and Barrel and one from DiMarco’s. Her own pile looked pathetically small. And pathetically…

    Well, it was just plain pathetic.

    The little boy was stuffing French fries into his face by the fistful. His chin and hair were smeared with ketchup. Cassie had to resist the urge to go over and grab a napkin to wipe him clean.

    When her stomach grumbled with such ferocity that it made the boy look up and over at her, she turned away with embarrassment burning her face. And maybe a little jealousy, too.

    With a sigh, she started gathering up the handles of her bags, still undecided about what to do for her mother. She was about to stand up when her phone started to vibrate on the table where she’d set it. It started to slide across, heading for the edge.

    She picked it up. The number on the screen was unlisted.

    The vibrating ended; the call had gone to voice mail. Cassie set the phone down, fingering the buttons thoughtfully. It wasn’t her parents wondering where she was. Anyway, they didn’t expect her back for another hour or so.

    Well, if it was that important, whoever it was would call back.

    The phone began to buzz again.

    Again, the number wasn’t shown. This time she answered.

    Hello? Yes, this is Cass… Yes, I do. Yes, I can. Where? Twenty-one forty-five… When and for how long? Make it twenty. Really? Cool. Is thirty minutes okay?

    She set the phone down, an odd mixture of feelings washing over her: happiness, excitement, worry, sympathy. It was the strangest thing. Here she was, worrying about money and obsessing about that jacket for her mom when, out of the blue, she gets a call for a job. Granted, it was just another babysitting gig, but it sounded like a lot of money. If the man who’d called was being up front with her—and Cassie couldn’t think of a reason why he wouldn’t be—she’d have more than enough to pay for the jacket now. And have some left over. Maybe even enough to buy a nice prime rib for their dinner tomorrow night. They could keep the ham for New Year’s. She wasn’t planning on being home that evening anyway.

    I know it’s last minute and all, the man had told her, but, frankly, I’m desperate. I’ll pay you fifteen dollars an hour to stay overnight. I’ll be back home by eight o’clock tomorrow morning.

    Which meant she wouldn’t be home until midmorning on Christmas Day.

    It would be totally unfair to Amy, she knew. Her sis would be up at the crack of dawn wolfing down her cereal to power up for the morning’s festivities, not that there was going to be much this year. More like a sprint than a marathon this year. She’d almost thought to turn the man down, and in the end though that asking for twenty dollars an hour would discourage him. But he’d agreed to the premium rate.

    Two-hundred and forty dollars, she quickly calculated. The guy really had to be desperate to pay that kind of money.

    But then again, so was she to accept a babysitting job for a complete stranger on Christmas Eve.

    She sure hoped she wouldn’t need The Kit.

    Then came the guilt—not about overcharging the man, but because she remembered she’d promised to spend the evening watching Miracle on 34th Street with Amy and their parents tonight. It was another holiday tradition.

    And to make up for subjecting the kids to such torture, they were planning to watch How the Grinch Stole Christmas afterward—the old cartoon version and not the live-action one with Jim Carrey in it. She shivered at the image in her mind of Carrey’s Grinch, with its hairy, wrinkly green skin and pink eyes and mouth and tongue. She didn’t know why, but that mask and makeup in that flick always freaked her out.

    She shoved the phone into her pocket. Sorry, Mom and Dad, she thought, but it didn’t look like there would be a miracle on 34th Street after all. Not this year. At least not for her.

    She slipped into DiMarco’s on her way out and purchased the jacket, giving the woman her mom’s credit card.

    Would you like it gift wrapped? the clerk asked her.

    Please, Cassie said, her smile widening.

    As she made her way to the parking garage, her initial excitement faded a bit. She realized she hadn’t asked the man how he’d gotten her number. It wasn’t that unusual for a stranger to call her out of the blue like this. Word got around; good babysitters were shared among friends like chocolate chip cookie recipes. But usually the caller would mention how they’d heard of her—Mrs. So-and-So told me about you, or Little Nicholas Derry’s mom said you were good.

    But this man hadn’t said a word about it.

    She had to assume it was one of the families she’d sat for before. Most of them would’ve recommended her very highly.

    After all, she really loved kids.

    † † †

    She called her parents as she walked out to her car and explained where she was going and why and how long she’d be gone. They sounded alternately disappointed and worried, but they didn’t try to dissuade her. She could almost hear what they were thinking: a few more dollars coming in. Any little bit helped.

    Behave yourself, her father warned. Make sure you lock the doors after the parents leave. And, Cassie, no boys.

    Don’t worry, she told him. It was a ridiculous thing for him to suggest, since the only boy she’d ever kissed was way back in the tenth grade. Boys just weren’t interested in her (not that girls were, either, for that matter). But parents will be parents, she thought. I’ll see you in the morning, Dad.

    Love you, honey.

    Love you and Mom, too. G’bye.

    The little white Volkswagen her parents had gotten her for her sixteenth birthday—before the lay-off and the other troubles had begun—struggled to start in the frigid cold. The motor ground out an asthmatic cough, stalled. Wintry air blasted out through the vents, but the controls were broken, stuck in the open position, so she couldn’t do anything about it. At least the heater still worked; it just took it a while to warm up.

    She tried again. Nothing but a faint click this time. Then, all too quickly, the vent wheezed into silence and the dome light above her blinked out.

    After shivering for another couple minutes, she tried again. The engine growled and her headlights sputtered. But it was pretty obvious by then: her battery was dead.

    She couldn’t understand it. She hadn’t left any lights on. She flipped the switches, but everything remained dark. She tried the radio: nothing. Her heart sank.

    There was a knock on her window. A man wearing a heavy parka and leaning over shouted through the glass: Mall security, ma’am. Do you need a jump? He showed her his badge.

    Cassie rolled the window down and told him she wasn’t sure what was wrong, but after the man prompted her to open the hood, he brought his cart over and hooked some wires to her battery.

    Go ahead and give it a try now.

    She turned the key and prayed. This time the engine caught and held.

    Happens a lot this time of year, the man told her, his breath coming out in thick puffs. He unhooked the wires and coiled them up. Merry Christmas, he said, and then he was off.

    Thanks! Cassie shouted after him.

    The whole episode had happened so fast that it was almost like a Christmas miracle. She found herself in high spirits once again. For the first time in a long time, she felt as if everything was actually going her way.

    As the engine warmed, she typed the address of the job into her phone and waited for it to give her directions.

    When the map showed up on the screen, she thought she’d made a mistake. It showed her a destination off of the eastern end of Gallo Highway, a long and lonely stretch of old secondary road that traversed the rural area south of the city. From the mall, Gallo roughly paralleled the new highway, at least until the two roads reached the river. There, the highway veered off and headed north into town. Gallo continued east, spanning the river and venturing on toward the old power plant, where it zigged and zagged through the low hills and forested marshland.

    The house was right in the middle of Alden Wood.

    The fact that there were residences out there surprised her. In fact, she’d always thought the dense woods were National Forestry land. No one else could possibly want it for anything. It was one of those places where a person could get lost and wander around forever and never be found.

    Apparently she was wrong. People actually lived out there.

    Even so, she didn’t favor the idea of going all the way out there.

    Everything’ll be fine, she told herself. She was grateful for the sound of her own voice, grateful to hear the strength in it.

    Her stomach gurgled, but there was no time to stop to pick up something to eat. As it was, she’d be lucky to make it out to the job by eight o’clock.

    She pulled out of the crowded parking lot with its bright lights reflecting off the hood of her car. Shoppers stumbled around all over the place, oblivious to the moving vehicles. Their arms were heavily burdened with overstuffed shopping bags.

    Cassie had to slow for a man standing in the middle of her lane. He wore a bewildered look on his face and was slowly turning around in circles. Cassie gave him a quick honk, which he returned with a glare before scuttling off to one side. Thankfully, the horn didn’t stick like it did sometimes. Despite the man’s impatience, she hoped he’d find his car soon. The temperature was dropping fast, and a frigid wind was starting to blow.

    The line of cars waiting to leave the parking lot was long, and she waited as the drivers in front of her wouldn’t allow her to merge. Exhaust spewed from their tailpipes and blasted into her car. She couldn’t even turn it off.

    By the time she made it onto the main road, the inside of the little car was finally starting to warm up.

    The Southside Mall was a good eleven miles from the center of town and, according to her phone, eight-point-two miles from the address where she was going. Her phone indicated that the quickest way to get there would be the highway, then exiting on Second Street heading south, but she knew that, on this night of all nights, the main road would be stop-and-go traffic, hordes of people leaving town and hordes more coming in.

    She took a right at a promising intersection and waited for her phone to recalculate the route.

    Turn left in…point six…miles.

    She was bummed to find that the new road seemed to be just as crowded as the highway. She inched along, her eyes glancing between the cars in front of her and the clock on her dash.

    It took her nearly ten minutes to get to the light at Gallo, and when she did she was relieved to see that the left turn lane was completely empty and that there was a dedicated turn signal. The arrow was currently red, but at least she’d be able to cut across the on-coming traffic when it came time.

    As she sat idling at the stop light, she thought about the coincidence of the call. Inevitably, she began to ponder questions she’d been avoiding asking herself. She wondered what kind of people would live so far out of town, especially in the thick patch of forest of Alden Wood, where the trees were old and the ground swampy. Rumors about the place passed among the town’s residents. They ranged from the outrageous to the utterly macabre. Some people believed the woods were enchanted, others haunted. The folks around these parts certainly did enjoy their storytelling.

    In the past, Cassie had always shrugged them off as so much hooey. In the past, she’d never had a good reason to venture out there, much less after dark.

    But of all the stories, she’d never heard of anyone actually living out there—well, except for that one ridiculous story about the wolf man, but everyone knew that one was pure fantasy. More than likely what she’d find was some squatter family living out of a trailer. Or a shack.

    Or a drug-runner’s hut.

    Or maybe a murderer’s hideout.

    Stop it! she scolded herself. None of those people would need a babysitter, would they?

    At the other extreme, she supposed it was possible that where she was going might be an old mansion, left over from the days when the area was first settled back in the early eighteen hundreds. Like the old Dunbury place, for example. The first Dunburys had built their house in the middle of what used to be woodland—all part of the same forest that once covered this part of the country. Alden Wood and a few other places were all that was left of it. The old Dunbury house now stood in the center of a town that had grown up around the hill bearing the same name.

    Alden Wood was the largest and thickest patch of trees to remain, and it had remained uncleared simply because the lowland was

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