Reddit Collection (Fresh-Short #9) by DeYtH Banger (ebook reader with highlight function .txt) 📕

My moral compass is demented.

 by cryofr0zen

 

 

These past few weeks have been some of the most stressful ones of my life. Maybe that’s why I’m finally starting to see him.

I christened him Mortimer after it was apparent that he wasn’t going to go anywhere anytime soon. I began seeing him at least three times a day. At first, Mortimer wasn’t anything. He was a shapeless slither of shadow, no dimensions or form.

I’d find him sitting in chairs, standing in doorways or holding objects in his matter. Whenever I saw him, my senses would go limp. My muscles would stiffen, and then I’d lose sense in them altogether. For the first time in months, I felt bliss. My eyelids would shut, and, for a few precious seconds, I would feel as if nothing mattered anymore. I wasn’t Edward, I wasn’t human, I wasn’t even alive. Just a tiny ball of pure nirvana, for just a few moments.

Then it was over, and I would find myself doing whatever Mortimer had been doing. Sitting in the same chair, standing in the same doorway or holding the same thing that had been in his shadowy grasp a few moments ago. The first time I did this, I was startled. Then it became my sole escape. Every time I let myself drift into Mortimer’s perpetual ecstasy, it lasted a few moments longer. I found that, if I put my mind to it, I could resist the temporary neurological shutdown my brain underwent, but I rarely, if ever, did.

I had a job as well. I spent most of the day typing up reports and spreadsheets, making sure the company didn’t go out of budget on the various expenditures it engaged in.

A motion at the corner of my eye caught my attention. Ricky, one of my co-workers, was walking towards the men’s room. As he entered the bathroom, I noticed Mortimer at the door as well. I felt my grasp on reality fade away, and I welcomed it with open arms.

When I re-entered the material world, I was sitting at my computer as if I hadn’t gone anywhere. The report was finished. It was closing time.

As I left the office, Mortimer was sitting in the driver seat of the car, at the opposite end of the parking lot. I let myself go again, and found myself immediately in the driver’s seat, the buzz of bliss still tangible at the back of my head.

I had noticed something, before I evaporated into my ethereal state. Mortimer was no longer a shapeless shadow. He had taken form. A diminutive figure with thin appendages and a rotund belly, his skin hairless, except for a few thorny growths, and slick with fluid. That detail nagged me the whole drive home, dissipating the euphoric tingle the jolted down my spine.

The next morning was Saturday. I woke up eagerly, not for the holiday but for the chance to experience utter bliss once more. I looked out of the window. Mortimer glanced up with his wet, scarred face, not at my eyes, but into my chest, straight through to my heart. He was seated in the car. What felt to me like moments later, I was in his place.

I drove along aimlessly, until I encountered, by chance, my parent’s large luxury home. Father had died a couple years back, but he died a rich businessman, and Mother, with the money, hired a world-leading architect to design her a house right in the richest part of the city. Yet not one cent of that money had seen by my empty bank account.

Mother, unlike what she did with her son, didn’t spare any expense on security. A network of CCTV cameras and four guards, each of whom took twelve hour shifts in pairs to cover the entire day. They knew me and let me visit any time I wanted, but I never found any reason to. Mother had always tried to get me out of her life, and, like always, she had succeeded. It was fine by me.

But this time, Mortimer was standing at the gate. That was the first time I ever felt confused before drifting off. I was even more bewildered when I woke up back in my car, the only thing that had changed being the time of day and the position of the guards.

The whole drive back to the house, I was on edge. What had I done at Mother’s place?

Sunday morning came around, and that day I learned everything.

When I looked up from my tear-sodden palms, Mortimer was squatting in front of me.

“Why?” A simple question.

You’re wondering why I came into your life all of a sudden? Made you do all these horrible, horrible things? He laughed, a dry, throaty laugh. I am you, child. I am what tells you right from wrong, this hideous creature in front of you that your heart has forged.

With that, he lifted a slender finger and tapped my chest. It felt as if a dam had burst inside my mind.

All the viscera of a repressed personality flowed into the labyrinthine maze of my mind. Judgements, thoughts and emotion that justified my actions, made them rational, rid me of my sorrow.

And with that, Mortimer disappeared from my life.

Before I ever knew Mortimer, my fiancée used to hate me. She hated the fact that we lived in almost poverty, that there was no funding to back her insane and extravagant fashion sense. She only stuck with me like a pile of crap that won’t flush because no other man would sink that low, and also because she held onto the sliver of hope that one day, my mother would bite the dust, and then, me.

Now, she said she loved me. She wanted to get married. Plates no longer crashed against the side of my head. Scratch marks never wound their way down the length of my arm. But it wasn’t genuine.

She loved me because of what happened today.

My boss called to tell me that I’d earned the promotion I’d been dreaming about for months. It didn’t make a difference though, because the offices were set to close down due to the fact that Ricky Geralds, my competitor for the promotion, had been found dead in the men’s room.

But that wouldn’t matter, because my mother’s solicitor had called me as well. Mother had died suddenly due to unknown circumstances, and I was to inherit what was left of Father’s fortune, which was still substantial enough for me to live a comfortable life.

We were sleeping. Or at least, my fiancée was. She caressed my torso with her hands. Curled up close to me. That was fine.

It just made it easier, was the thought that crossed my mind as I slowly pulled the steak knife out of the pillowcase.

 

 

There's Nothing Left

 I’ve always been a creature of habit, and few observations ever elude my mind. That’s why I can recall any event down to the smallest insignificant detail, but recently my memories haven’t matched up with reality.
On any given weekday, I’ll return from work. My keys will be in my left inner coat pocket. I’ll open the door, retrieve the mail from the assortment of mailboxes on the left side of the entrance. My apartment number is seven, just like the mailbox.

 

 

Following this, I’ll travel up the stairs to the first floor, eleven steps; I always start with my left and end with my left. At least I thought so, because a few days ago I tripped. Not because I’m clumsy, but because on that day, I ended the staircase with my right foot.
Of course, I doubted myself, but it was enough to recheck the amount of steps in the staircase, and sure enough, one was missing. At this point I could’ve talked to my neighbours, but they weren’t the detail oriented kind, so I let it slide.
It was a minor change, one I quickly adapted to. At least until I lost my wristwatch. The prior night I put it on my nightstand, and the following morning it was simply gone. It wasn’t impossible that I misplaced it, but I had a firm memory of placing it on the nightstand.
Everything escalated today. I woke up, took a shower, shaved, brushed my teeth, cut my nails on all nine fingers…

 

Nine fingers, one of them had disappeared, with no trace, just healthy skin covering the barren knuckle.

 

Not knowing who to call, I turned to my mother. My voice trembled as I explained what had happened. She went quiet for a few seconds, before responding with worry in her words. She told me I was born with only nine fingers.

I hung up. It was dark. I sat down trying to remember, had I simply forgotten? Was there something wrong with my mind? Only after minutes did I realise I was sitting in the dark, but it was daytime. My apartment didn’t have any windows anymore.

Panic set in, this wasn’t in my head, they don’t even make windowless apartments. I tried to escape, but there was no door to flee through. I was trapped in a nicely decorated brick box that was my apartment.
I called the police, they claimed my address didn’t exist.

 

After they hung up, I would’ve called someone else, if my telephone wasn’t already gone.
My computer is all that exists, and I am trying to write this story with the stumps that were once my hands. Only one middle finger left; a perfect “fuck you,” to myself.

 

I’ll have to post while my computer still exists, but think about this:
Have you lost anything recently, such as your favourite mug, maybe a blue pen? Something that just disappeared without a trace. That’s how it started for me too.
Credit: Scott Saxon

Dispatch

 

If you are an avid driver, then there's nothing worse than when that little arrow on your dashboard hits "E." It isn't until you realize this that your vehicle begins to cough and sputter. Despite stepping on the