A Penny Down the Well: A Short Story Collection of Horrifying Events Read Online Free PDF

back to the
sink. He leaned down and grasped both of her wrists with his gauzed
hands. Jared dragged her to the thumping beat of Matt’s music. The
date was over. Jared didn’t care. He dragged Emily across the
stained floor until he reached the cabinets below the sink. Jared
opened the cabinets and was hit by the harsh smell of the bleach
that he soaked the rag in. Jared leaned down to Emily and looked
her over. Blood trickled down the right side of her bruised head.
Jared’s lips neared the wound and he whispered. “I loved you.” He
pulled away. Jared shoved Emily’s head beneath the sink, where the
diamond necklace caught the dim light of the kitchen for the last
time. He pulled the rag out of the pipe, uncorking it. A foul must
filled the space.
    Jared left her there, with
her head stuffed beneath the kitchen sink. He walked into his
bedroom, turned off the light, locked his door and went to sleep.
He slept to a serenade of crunching.

    RETURN TO THE TABLE OF
CONTENTS

Their Last Ride
     
    “ You can get anything on
the internet these days, can’t you?” Clint Baxter browsed the
classified ads in amusement.
    “ Almost anything.” Kaylie
replied, sitting in the seat beside him at the local library, a
place the two of them, long-time friends, came to visit and enjoy
mindless browsing of the world wide web, a marvel yet after having
been available for such a long time. So was the way of a medium of
endless possibilities, both good and bad, moral and immoral, but
always full of something fresh and new, or unavoidably
provocative.
    Clint clicked on the link
that said simply said “cars.” He saw a wide array of used vehicles,
from classics to modern muscle, smart and inefficient. He sighed,
glancing the way of Kaylie, who was already snooping the screen he
was navigating.
    “ A car? Seriously? You
don’t even have a job, Clint. Speaking of which, when you do intend
to get on that? You know...” She pointed to a link on her screen.
It read in blue “job listings.”
    “ My car is such a piece of
shit. Maybe I can get approved for a cheap car-loan or something.
No point in getting a job if I can’t guarantee I’ll make it there
every day.” His mouth hung open as he looked at vehicles far out of
his price-range.
    Kaylie shook her head, and
though she agreed with his rationale, it was important to have an
income if one had a loan. She went back to her own browsing,
settling for the “missed connections” link on the page and said,
softly, “I wonder if anyone is longing for me after a seeing me at
a stoplight or chewing on my morning bagel.” And it made her laugh.
Still, the postings were amusing.
    Clint browsed to a Chevy
Nova in a metallic, mustard yellow. He’d always wanted a sexy car,
one that even he’d openly admit to using as a method of
compensating for his simplicity. Clint was a thin man, the kind of
thin person that couldn’t put a pound on if he ate one-half of a
burger stand. In high school, he would eat jars of peanut butter
until he couldn’t move or was sick, because all of the
weight-lifters on the football team assured him that it would help
him put on weight. All of Clint’s attempts were in vain. He didn’t
gain a pound; in fact he lost weight because of how often it made
him sick. Clint thought an old, shiny muscle car would add muscle
to him, impress women and make him a ladies man all in one shot. Of
course, at almost twenty grand, Clint was going to remain without
muscle for the time being. It was then that he came across a
strange ad.
    “ 1976 Cadillac Hearse.
You’ve got to be kidding.” He laughed, slapping at Kaylie to catch
her attention. Kaylie tore herself away from a particularly creepy
(likely fake) “missed connection” involving a man that said he saw
a woman through her window. Kaylie looked over the ad.
    “ Um. Creepy?” She said,
lifting a thin brow.
    “ Yeah. I wonder how many
dead people were pulled around in that thing.” And Clint went on
reading