Out There Screaming: An Anthology of New Black Horror

by Jordan Peele

The billboards aren’t supposed to be placed so close to residential areas—light pollution or something—but here it is, big as day. Same one Carl saw in the dream: a lurid red background with stark black words etching out Jesus Is Watching. Jesus better keep his little bitch mouth shut.

She didn’t understand the reason he needed to go, and he hadn’t tried to explain it to her. The going was good only if he had no plans of coming back. The leaving was the point.

When the single attempt to secure “a live one” ended with half a ward in body bags, the agency adopted a nonnegotiable “How About We Just Shoot Them” policy.

He’d never done anything like that before, but people often never do things right before they always do them.

Andrew never had any ambition other than to have everything he wanted, despite never really excelling at, or working hard for, anything. Luckily for men like him, the world has been configured to accommodate that ambition.

My sister was a fool in the particular way that only someone who was too smart to be such a fool could be a fool.

Why did everyone else get the joy, the connection, when I had just the emptiness?