The Nightmare Man

by J.H. Markert

The scarecrow was the height of a man. Straw hat. Face stitched from burlap, with coat buttons for the eyes, nose, and mouth.

Through the haze of blow flies, five sack-like cocoons hung from the center rafter in a neat row, like something out of a sci-fi movie. Like something about to hatch.

Her voice was more urgent now, her breath smelling of the mint she’d popped after throwing up. “Dad?” He looked at her. She never called him that anymore. Not since, as a child, when she’d told him she wished he wasn’t. He brought himself back to the moment with a heavy exhale.

Ben’s name was bigger than the title. He and Amanda had joked about it happening one day—it meant he’d made it, really made it—but now that the letters of his name dwarfed what was below, he missed the days when the title and story held more sway than the man who’d written it.

“Your book came out last week. The Petersons were killed almost three weeks ago.”

Cornstalks swayed in the distance, eerie and silent under starless black.

“Sometimes teens need to get burned before they realize for themselves that fire is hot.”

The best characters were the ones who changed the most throughout the story.

His grandfather had handed him a book, and then strictly went over the rules, of which there were three. Open the book when prompted. Close it precisely when told. And there will be no wavering, Benjamin.

Men who’d done enough wrong in their lives to at least understand the concept of doing better.

Not all that much actual talking went down when they played anymore—not the verbal kind, at least—as they’d long past mastered the art of communicating without it. Sometimes, their facial expressions said more than words could.

I need pills to stay awake and pills to put me to sleep, and I’m not so sure they make the best dancing partners.

They’re so blue, and lurid. Like paint yet to dry.

In the hollow. Deep down in the hollow.

We’d ask where nightmares came from. The Nightmare Man plants them deep down in the hollow.

I’m a writer. I get to be everything wrapped into one.

“I sewed it closed so that I could no longer eat them, Detective. The Nightmare Man always made me eat them.”

“That I think Devon is still alive.” Ben pointed toward the list on the tower wall. “And he’s been murdering ever since he disappeared.”

“You were born of fear, so fear you shall become,”