Author: T.M. Camp
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forearms
Napping this afternoon on the couch, I dream… …we’re sitting at the dining room table, my wife and I. I hear someone call “Tom” from the back hallway. I turn to see something there, down at the bottom of the steps — small and pale, almost like a child. “Don’t look!” my wife says just…
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switch
Sitting in my office this afternoon, working. A few moments ago I heard the distinctive sound of the light switch in the back hallway snapping on. A few moments later I heard it snap off. My wife and youngest daughter are napping upstairs. Before I heard the light switch, it was quiet and peaceful. No…
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bathtime again
Downstairs, I run a bath for my daughter. I kneel down to check the water. When I rise, the old woman is standing in the doorway. She is hunched over, watching me. “Fuck.” And then she’s gone.
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in the bathtub
“What’s a haunted house?” My daughter is four years old and, a few days before Halloween, she’s decided to start asking questions. I wring out the washcloth, buying time. We don’t talk about these kinds of things around her. She has a couple of picture books, but… “What honey?” “What’s a haunted house?” “Well .…
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a fall
When I get home after work, my youngest daughter meets me at the door. I’m late and phoned ahead to say they should start dinner without me. A plate of half-eaten food waits at my wife’s place at the same able. But she is nowhere to be seen. “Mama went upstairs,” our daughter tells me.…
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hard knocks
My daughter an I are in my office when my wife calls from the TV room. I hear her but it doesn’t register until she calls again, a rising note of alarm in her voice. “What’s wrong?” She is pale, intense. I can’t tell if she’s angry or something else. “I just heard…” She stops,…
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almost
…as we’re passing through the room, I stop and take note of our surroundings: The concrete walls of the service tunnel, the exposed pipes . . . it’s all so familiar. Then I have it. In a flash of recognition, I turn to my companions — he is tall and dark skinned, she is waif-like…
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shimmer
“There was something in the back hallway,” my wife tells me over dinner. “I saw it right before we were leaving.” “What did you see?” She thinks for a moment. “It was a blur in the air, almost shimmering. Just a movement…” Gooseflesh on my arms, the back of my neck. “That’s interesting you say…
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on the way to bed
Conversation with my four-year-old daughter… “Time to sleep, sleep and dream.” “I don’t always remember my dreams.” “That’s okay. They remember you.” I think this might be the best thing I have ever said or ever will say.
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passing by
In the upstairs bathroom, I stand and wait for my youngest daughter to finish. My back is to the door. Given my history, that’s uncommon. As I help her down off the toilet, I catch a glimpse of someone passing behind me — walking through the hallway just beyond the door. I assume it’s my…
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morning visitation
…and as I open the door leading from my office to the front of the house, I see a pale shape, not much more than the impression of a white dress moving through the light coming in the windows. It flows from right to left. I stop. I blink. It is gone.
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beginning of the end
…and my wife’s face contorts in pain, her brow furrowed. I ask her what’s wrong but, before she can answer, a wave of distortion ripples through the air like a mirage. “Something’s happened.” I look out the window and see a mushroom cloud rising in the distance. The television fills in the rest of the…
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stench again
That smell again. A warm, yellow smell of rotting fish. My youngest daughter and I are in the back hallway when it drifts past. It almost seems to stop and turn back, encircling us for a moment. I look down and see that my daughter has wrinkled her nose. After a moment, the stench dissipates.…
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a sad girl
…lying in bed this morning, I woke to the sound of the bedroom door opening. I hear my wife slowly close the door behind her. I hear her footsteps on the floorboards, approaching my side of the bed. I cannot move, cannot open my eyes. I feel a fingertip on my arm, just inside the…
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doppelgänger
…and as I walk back into my office, I see — or I think I see — a man standing to one side and looking through my filing cabinet. It is me, myself. I am the one standing there, dressed in the same clothes I am wearing today. I blink. He is gone. I am…
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bath time
“Will you check the tub in a minute?” My wife comes into the room, a little cross. We are getting our daughter ready for bed. “What’s wrong?” “There was almost no water in the tub and it was cold.” “Really?” She repeats this again. Unspoken is the rebuke — or, perhaps, the fear — that…
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ghost weather
Early summer afternoon. Overcast skies. Waiting for storms. The house is gray. Quiet. Pale light from outside, dim within. The air still, dead. Every room feels empty and full at the same time. An unseen crowd gathers. Something around every corner. Watchful. Waiting. Patient.
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the walking men
Three or four times now, while I’ve been walking in the neighborhood with my youngest daughter, I’ve seen a man wearing a long black overcoat and a fedora. Three times now. Three different men. One of them is quite young, perhaps in his early twenties, with scraggly facial hair and glasses. Another is older, around…
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“Hey Dad?”
Walking through the office I hear — or I think I hear — my son’s voice, very distinct and clear, call to me. I look back down the hallway but, of course, no one is there.