Emaciated Man

Some of this is too cryptic for me, the beginning and ending especially, but I really love all the references to the familiar stuff of ordinary life: the wind dancer, the Doritos, stuff like that. Against the backdrop of this ordinary stuff, the horror of the slurping creature ( love the root beer float sound effects) stands out all the more clearly.

If I could give this story two thumbs up instead of one, I would. I can't believe the other person gave it a no. This is easily the best-written story I've read on here yet. Your style is unique, sharp, and visceral; your use of metaphor, brevity of language, and ability to pick exactly the right words made every moment of this punch through the page (or, as it were, screen).

I love the shifts in narrative, from the sharp, quick, and witty omniscient narrator in the present tense, to the third-person, past-tense, character-driven bits. The boys' dialogue was absolutely perfect. I got a great sense of who they weren, and they really sounded like actual boys (they also had some hilarious line, like "fuck your backpack with a used dildo." That cracked me up).

And to contradict the person above me, I liked how cryptic the creature was. I love the mystery surrounding it all--the snippets we get of what it looks like, the sounds of it feeding. The mystery is creepier than seeing it in full light, as in the old movies where the thing in the shadows, in your imagination, is creepier than the cheap monster costume.

Definitely my favorite story here. Are you published? Because I'd love to read stories like this one in horror mags. When I tell people to come on here to read mine, I'm going to also direct them to yours (which, embarrassingly, puts my silly tale to shame).

Great work!

Really cool! It reminded me of Charles Burns' Black Hole in parts.