Spook Post Two

Elyse’s Purpose

I am hoping that the complete 360 my writing has taken for October has not thrown you for a whirlwind. Not only did I want to get into the spooky spirit, but I wanted to display the duality of man, to show my readers that although there is a bright light that shines through me, there are also deep, possibly scary innards. Both of those sides of me I believe are valid and that balance of emotion is what makes me human. It was so fun to share Spook Post One and show that side of myself. I am a huge believer in balance and my only wish for these spook posts is that my readers are also able to find that balance within themselves as well. Life is beautiful, mysterious, magical, terrifying, and all of those things that make life worth living. I find it extremely important to take hold of every emotion (not to let it take hold of you) and to feel them all, let them all flow through you. That is what I think the human experience is.

For this week, I have for you one of my favorite stories I have ever written. It is absolutely grotesque, dealing with themes of psychosis and the supernatural. I am so excited to share this with you, but as always, I do have to warn you. Similar to Pomegranate’s Forest, Elyse’s Purpose deals with heavy themes that may not be suitable for all. Proceed with caution, I’m not joking! Though these halloween stories are dark, it does not mean there is a lack of light in the world, take notice in that. There is goodness in the world all around you. If you feel too heavy, find something beautiful to lift you up. Ground yourself in the knowledge that the world will always balance itself out.

It took me such a long time to find this story, and I was afraid I had lost it in my documents forever, but I found it! I wrote this story in my senior year of highschool for my creative writing class. The assignment was to write in a way that mimiced one of our favorite authors. Of course I didn’t have a favorite author at the time, but I still wanted to come off as cool. As any teenager wanting to sound edgy would do for an assignmennt like this, I mimiced my “favorite author” Stephen King. Without further adieu, I present to you, Elyse’s Purpose:

⚠️ Content Warning: This story contains graphic descriptions of self-harm, body horror, gore, death, delusional episodes, and mental illness. Reader discretion is advised. If at any point you feel uncomfortable, please take a break or skip this story. The full trigger list can be found at the bottom of the blog post.

As the warmth of the sun hit her face, she scrunched her nose and opened up her eyes. Her dark globes settled on the room, and she saw that it was unfamiliar. It was also a bathroom. A bathroom drowned with unrecognizable bloody faces. She laid her eyes on the sink that was leaking murky brown water.

Disgusted with her surroundings, she’d decided it was time to leave. She tried to lift her body but was unsuccessful. She was lying in the bathtub. Unable to move anything except her legs, she grazed her toe across the blood-stained faucet. A part of her knew that she should be in deep pain, but the hum of the flickering fluorescent light held her in a trance. She couldn’t fully understand the danger that she was in. The hum quickly turned into an obnoxious buzz. Her stomach was turning, and she suddenly realized that it was hard to breathe. She looked down into the bathtub and tried to assess her situation.

She had been cut open. Her fragile insides were now exposed to the heavy elements of the room. Her eyes widened as she began to touch her fragile organs. Almost everything was cut open and bleeding out. Her body felt empty.

All of a sudden, Elyse could feel everything. She knew she was in pain before but now that pain consumed all of her thoughts. The buzzing of the light got louder and louder until the bulb finally burst. Glass fell onto the faces of the blood ridden strangers, as Elyse screamed in agony. She finally realized how much pain she was in. As her screaming died down Elyse choked on her final emotions.

The strangers awoke from their slumber murmuring and moaning, glass piercing through their skin. They were upset to be woken up in such a crude way. They all laid their eyes on the source of all the noise and watched as Elyse struggled on her last breath of air.

Never remembering where she was, how she got there, or even where her clothes were, Elyse died in the bathroom with the leaky brown water. “You weren’t supposed to wake up,” a meek voice from next to the toilet whispered. “You weren’t supposed to see.”

Three days earlier

“I’ve been on this Earth for 22 years, and I have yet to experience any indication that I have any purpose.” Elyse stared her stuffed rabbit in the eye awaiting a response. The rabbit, whose face was illuminated by the warm lamp on the tableside, stared blankly back at her, not knowing how to respond because, alas, it was stuffed. Elyse fell to her knees, pleading to her toy the way a child would pray to god. “I’m stuck in this world Ruby Rabbit. I have nothing to do here. I am so lonely. Help me Ruby. Why won’t you tell me what to do? Why are you staring so coldly at me?” She sat Ruby on the bed facing her, so that Ruby could feel the screams coming from Elyse’s throat.

Elyse had always been moments away from insanity. She had lived in solitude on her grandmother’s farm for the past six years. Her grandmother, though kind, couldn’t take the grim ramblings that came from Elyse’s descent. Nana Ophelia hung eerily in the basement, never really able to leave the fate she had decided for herself. Elyse wouldn’t allow her. With a lifetimes worth of canned foods and not a neighbor in sight, Elyse never had to leave her home, and no one ever came looking.

Ruby Rabbit fell to his side and rested comfortably on Elyse’s gray silk sheets. The lifeless rabbit’s eyes stared at the blank yellow wall. The wall that Elyse would stare at every night, letting her wild thoughts run free. It was all she had. Ruby stared at that wall ,knowing that all of the eyes that touched it could feel the terrors of Elyse’s mind.

Elyse crawled onto her bed and held onto Ruby tight. So tight that if Ruby were alive he’d be paralyzed. “We’re gonna leave the farm tommorrow Ruby. We’re gonna go and find what my life is supposed to be about. Whatever my purpose is, I know for sure it’s not on this farm.” Elyse squeezed tighter as she whispered into Ruby’s long ragged ears: “And I’m gonna find someone who’ll give me a response.” She stopped squeezing the rabbit and looked down at him, awaiting a response. Again, Ruby just stared at her.

Two days earlier

It was 91 degrees outside and Elyse had forgotten how hot Oregon summers could be. The sweat beading at her forehead and the faint feeling in her bones made her realize that it may be a bit too warm for her gloves and winter coat. “Maybe I shouldn’t leave the farm, Ruby.” Tears began to coat her eyes in the bitterness of fear. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do out here.”

“You need to go that way.” Ruby looked up at her and pointed towards the heavy woods. “Your purpose is in the woods, Elyse.” Ruby spoke with a gleeful rhythm with which Elyse was unfamiliar. She looked down at her stuffed rabbit, who finally said something. Finally, change. For the first time, Elyse felt her life going in the right direction. She removed her gloves, and stripped away her heavy coat, and started her way into the dark.

As Elyse walked towards the woods, she had her first conversation with Ruby.
“When you go into the woods, you’ll find what you’re looking for.”
“Deep in the dark is your purpose!”
“Finally, you’ve escaped the wretched yellow wall!”

Everything Ruby was a breath of fresh air. The further Elyse went into the woods, the happier she felt. A warm hug from the setting sun lured her further into the woods. The vines on the willow trees above the slow stream teased Elyse as they rubbed against her head. “Dance with us, Elyse, come dance with us!” The trees whispered. Her walk soon became a joyful prance. She moved deeper into the thick trees and followed what the world was telling her. “Take off your shoes Elyse, feel us on your toes?” the grass hummed from underneath her feet. The more Elyse listened to her rabbit and the forest, the further away from her past she felt. This new change opened her eyes to all of the possibilities the world had to offer. She took off her shoes and socks and continued dancing through the woods, the moon being her only source of light. “Elyse you can’t feel me with your clothes hugging your body in that way.” The wind wanted Elyse to know how the air in the forest felt. She took off all of her clothes and went deeper into her forest, leaving everything except Ruby behind.

One day earlier

Many miles and many hours into the forest, Elyse’s stomach began to growl. She hadn’t eaten anything since she left her farm. She also couldn’t quite remember what the farm looked like. It didn’t matter to her though; she was on an important journey. She continued into the forest.

“Aren’t you hungry?” Ruby pointed to Elyse’s roaring stomach. “I am but I have somewhere important to be.” Elyse looked up at the morning sun, knowing that if she just kept going, everything would be ok. “I KNOW WHAT YOU CAN EAT! I KNOW WHAT YOU CAN EAT AND YOU DON’T EVEN HAVE TO STOP YOUR JOURNEY!” Ruby said as he jumped up and down as a proper rabbit would do. He started running towards a small house in the woods. “Ruby, you’re running too fast!” Elyse ran after her little rabbit for what felt like forever. They finally stopped, and she got a chance to catch her breath. “Elyse, you’ve got to go in there and find a knife. Elyse I know what you can eat, but we need to get a knife from there.” The rabbit stopped in front of the house, which was much bigger up close. All of the windows were boarded up, and all the life around it was long gone.“Ruby I don’t know where you’re taking me, but I am starving. I’ll eat anything.” She slowly approached the door and turned the handle. The door was unlocked, as if it were waiting for her.

Elyse walked into the house and was greeted by a tall figure. He had big black eyes and big yellow teeth. “What are you doing in my home?” the figure said, looking at the gaunt naked woman before him. Elyse looked at him with frightened eyes and then looked down at her rabbit. “Ruby, what do I need a knife for?”

“Elyse, listen to me carefully. You’ll never find your purpose if you don’t ever get to know yourself. Elyse, take the knife, go upstairs to the bathtub, cut your stomach open, and eat.” For the first time since they started talking, Ruby Rabbit smiled.

 Elyse looked up at the tall figure before her and said with tear-filled eyes: “Sir, I need a knife so that I can eat.”
“How did you find my home?” “My rabbit found it.”
The man smiled in the same manner as Ruby. “Then you must get a knife so that you can eat, but, save some for us.” The man moved his arm around the room to reveal all of the sitting strangers.

Elyse, always doing what she’s told, went to the kitchen and got a knife. She then went up the stairs of the dark house. As she walked up the stairs, she heard multiple footsteps behind her. She wasn’t alarmed, though, for all she knew, this was a part of her quest. She lay down in the bathtub and began her last meal. The footsteps came into the bathroom and watched as Elyse devoured her food. The strangers crowded around her and took part in this fleshy meal. She cried, tears of joy, because she knew that she was on her way to find her purpose.

“Stephen King writes horror stories that intrigue the reader with detailed descriptions of the surroundings. I tried to mimic his descriptive nature in the first part of the story to intrigue the reader into mine. I wrote a horror story in the way that I think he would. My story is very mysterious like most of his works. There is a surprise ending which is something that I added on myself though.” Little high school me wrote as the inspiration of my story. I of course edited the story for clarity purposes but was overall very terrified of “Elyse’s Purpose.” I am very proud of little Alyssa for producing something so disgustingly descriptive, that really doesn’t make any sense at all.

As always, thank you for reading my blog! I appreciate you all so much. Check out some old stories or artworks you’ve written, and don’t forget to Stay Alive and Be All Over!

Trigger Warnings:

• Self-harm and suicidal imagery
• Graphic violence and gore
• Body mutilation
• Cannibalism
• Psychological horror
• Death and dying
• Isolation, loneliness, and mental illness themes
• Delusions / hallucinations