Author’s Note: These short stories were originally posted on my website two years ago. Since my plans for this week’s article fell through, I’m reposting them on TandemShock for your perusal. Please “enjoy” them.

The Bedeviled Box

Johnny was a small child of perhaps 5 or 6 years. Late one Halloween night, confined in his house due to the strict religious beliefs of his parents, Johnny ventured up into the attic. Though his father had always warned him not to disturb the things up there, Johnny rifled through the old boxes and chests until he found a small wooden box with a hand crank jutting out of the side. With nothing better to do, he sat the box upon his lap and began to turn the crank. As he did so, music emanated from the toy, and, finally, a clown popped out.

Johnny stuffed the clown back inside and began to turn the crank again. After the tune had been completed, the clown popped out again. Johnny stuffed it back in and repeated the process a few more times.

Already, Johnny was on his sixth attempt. Thunder roared across the sky outside as rain pattered against the roof, though none of this phased young Johnny. He turned the crank over and over, when suddenly, a ghost popped out!

The Cursed Cake

It was Mike’s birthday, and, as it just so happened to fall on Halloween, his friends decided to throw a costume party for him, as they did each year. And, as was tradition, they picked a particular location that was known for being haunted – Pikeman’s Pass, a tunnel beneath a railway in a dark and heavily-wooded area, where it was said that three children and a duck had long ago been murdered in cold blood. The party was to begin at sundown.

Mike’s closest friends worked hard to set up all of the tables and decorations and refreshments. Then, all of the guests filtered in. Everyone wore their most sexual, ironic, or ironically sexual costume – a naughty nurse, a Santa Claus, a shirtless Waldo. Nobody seemed to notice the faint, ghastly sobbing emanating from within the tunnel.

When Mike arrived, the party really kicked in. After some drinking and mingling, Mike’s friends brought out the big surprise that they had in store for him – a massive, pumpkin-shaped cake. Mike drew close, but the cake began to shift and rumble… And then a scantily-clad woman jumped out of the cake! And then a ghost popped out!!!

The Harrowing Haunting

Suzan lived alone in an old apartment that she rented for peanuts down in the shady part of the city. She told her friends that she didn’t mind the stale, dim environment, or the trains that ran so frequently past her building, or the fact that there was no air conditioning, which forced her to leave some windows open for ventilation despite the rank smells of the slum, or even the numerous accounts that the place was haunted by vengeful spirits. Secretly, though, she did mind it all, and she planned to move away as soon as she could nail down a job with a bigger paycheck.

Suzan was trying to keep her chin up until the happenings began to happen. Doors that she had shut would later be mysteriously ajar. A jar that she had shut would later be mysteriously a cup. Nightmares pervaded her sleep and tormented her with increasingly terrible and grotesque visions.

Late one Halloween night, while lying in her bed, Suzan was stirred by a loud slam. When she got up to investigate, she discovered a strange masked man in her living room! He assaulted Suzan with a large butcher knife, but she narrowly escaped. He chased her around the apartment as she threw furniture and assorted objects at her assailant in an attempt to slow him, but still he closed in. Pressed up against a wall, Suzan watched in terror as the masked man bolted forward, knife at the ready. Then, thinking quickly at the last minute, she dodged to the side, and the man tumbled through an open window!

The mysterious assassin plummeted two stories down, his body breaking on impact with the pavement. The butcher knife followed suit, spinning lightly before impaling him straight through the ribs. Then, he died… And then his ghost popped out!

h/t: Header image by Alexas_Fotos