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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/Street_Camera_1258 on 2024-11-11 16:29:48+00:00.

Hello again,

Finn slipped into a coma last night. The doctors didn’t see it coming, but I had a feeling it would. My wife won’t leave the hospital and it seems that she will not eat anything. I needed to go back home, and I tried to take our baby girl with me. My wife wanted our daughter with her.

On my way out the local priest Father Milton, a 60-year-old man tried to enter Finn’s room. I tried to get him to leave but my wife insisted. I watched for a moment while he prayed over my son.

I got back home and grabbed my bottle, not knowing what to do. I was scared, tired, and confused. The only thing I knew now was how to tip this bottle and try to forget. That’s what I did. I sat staring at a black screen and started to think about my boy. I even thought about my brother. How they seem so connected, but the strings are invisible. The light taps of rain hitting the window were drowned out by my thoughts.

That’s when a knock on my door echoed through my silent and empty house. The bang made me jump, knocking the bottle on the ground as the liquid sank into my carpet. I sprung up and picked the bottle up, capping it and sliding it under the couch. I wiped my eyes and opened the door.

There he stood in the rain off of our porch, as if he had jumped off at my answer. His black lightweight jacket took a pounding, and his hair was drenched underneath the hood. He looked up at me, his eyes sunken in their holes, black underneath.

“Anthony?”

I don’t like to talk about Anthony, not to anyone it’s just not my place. Because of all that he has been through it’s best for the town to forget. Anthony was why I never looked back at religion, and why he is how he is today. He isn’t the bright kid that would come over and play with Kevin, not anymore. He was now a child in a man’s body, shaken by what happened to him, never to grow to recover. The town turned its back on him, an open secret, that many wanted to forget. Myself being one of them.

“Hi Doug.”

“Come on in here, get out of that rain.”

He shrugged and took a ginger step onto the porch. He was not a small man by any means, but he slouched always. He stood under the awning, looking into my eyes.

“What are you doing here?” I asked.

“I… I am not crazy, Doug. I am just a little confused.”

“Anthony, I don’t know if you have heard but it’s not a good time-”

He cut me off.

“Finn slipped into a coma tonight didn’t he?” His eyes darted to the ground.

I couldn’t even make a sound, everything got caught in my throat, and my mouth dropped.

"How did-

“I know because I saw him last night. In my apartment. Do you mind if we go somewhere?”

I didn’t know what to do.

“Let me get some things.”

He stood under the awning, as I grabbed my wallet and walked out of the house.

“Anthony, where’s your car?”

“I don’t have one.”

Maintaining my sober act, I nodded and walked to mine.

We drove down the road. Both of our eyes looked at Anthony’s old home as we passed by it, it was old and falling apart. He stared longer than I did. 

We decided to go to a bar. The Settler’s Den was pretty empty. I haven’t been here for years, but it seems like Anthony knew the place. We sat ourselves and slid into a small booth in the corner. It took a minute. I looked at Anthony’s hands, they were shaking. I was hoping it was due to the rain and not other things. I ordered a beer, and Anthony ordered two rum and coke’s at once. He downed one right away as he licked his lips, not a drop spilled, nor wasted. I sipped mine.

“You remember what happened back in the day?”

“Anthony I thought we were going to talk about last night. I mean, we don’t need to bring up what happened to you.”

“I know, but you do right?”

I nodded. “I am sorry about that.”

“I didn’t.”

“What?”

“Listen to me when I say this Doug, and don’t judge me until after. But, I didn’t remember. Not for the longest time.”

“What? You probably blocked it out. It was so traumatizing.”

“Yeah, that’s what I have been told my whole life. That it wasn’t my fault, that I wasn’t to blame. But still for years to come everyone looked at me differently, even today. I see the way you look at me when we run into each other at the liquor store. That gnawing feeling, like I am a bad memory of this town that people want to forget, but when they see me this scar reopens. Yet, I don’t know why.”

“Anthony…”

“Why Doug?”

I was completely fazed by his question I had to spit out the truth.

“Anthony you were abused by that priest.”

He just looked at the table.

“You were sick and he came in when you were at your lowest and he took advantage of you. You went up on the stand, you told everyone. He got caught because you were so brave.”

“Father McCleary.” He said softly. You know the last thing that I remember from that time? I walked out of my house that night, to pick up some toys, and I looked down the road the one leading to your house. I saw a person walking down it, walking right towards my home. It took a second but then I saw - it was Kevin. He was wet, each step with a squeak. He came up to me and said that he was sorry. I turned back to my house confused. My mom told me that Kevin was sick. I turned back and he was gone. That happened on the third of October, after that, I remembered nothing."

I looked up at him. October 3rd was the night that Kevin died.

“Anthony, what do you not remember?”

“Doug, none of the time I was sick, nothing after that moment.”

Anthony told me it was all blacked out. He only remembered that when he got out of his illness. That was when he started to remember, a day after that his parents started acting weird. They started to get convinced something happened with that priest.

“I was scared. I mean my parents were telling me what happened to me, they were all that I had. They told me that I was molested, and taken advantage of by this man, and this was when my parents were religious. So I trusted them.”

“Anthony, why are you telling me all of this?”

“Because I went to my house the other day, before the first rainfall. It was like it was calling to me in my dreams. I walked over to it. You know no one has bought it since my issues it just stands there rotting away. The door was of course opened, so I just walked inside.”

“You broke in?”

“I walked up the stairs to my room. It took a lot, even though I couldn’t remember why. It was like the house was pulling me towards it while pushing me away. Heavy steps got me there, and I stepped into it. Where so much took place, and none of it I knew. The air was dead, no wind even through broken windows. I just stood there, ultimately saddened by no gained memory. It was in the end just a room. My bed frame was still there, the mattress taken probably by some homeless man. I walked up to it.”

He took a quick sip of his other drink.

“For some odd reason, I wanted to touch it, and I did. Doug, I am not kidding to you, it was as fast as a flood, all the knowledge all of the memories, all the screaming and pain all compressed into my brain and melted into its halls. I fell onto the floor, as tears just shot out of my eyes already pooling onto my hands. After that night of seeing your brother, that was when I started to see the man in my room.”

I didn’t interrupt. I just stared at Anthony telling me what happened to him.

“Back then I couldn’t recognize him, he was tall and he was smiling. He stood all the way up and waited in the corner of my room. All night just staring at me. I couldn’t move, I barely breathed. It was as if each breath was if I was drowning in the air. For several nights I saw him. But, now it’s easy to know who it was Doug, it was me, literally me today staring at my younger self.”

I shuddered at the thought.

“I was completely bedridden after that. I couldn’t talk to my parents, I couldn’t control my movement. I was a passenger in my own body. I didn’t know what took control, but I could hear them as if they were a million miles away but, still barely whispering in my ear. It was a sharp voice, maybe even a little high-pitched. It was a language I never heard. But, it was terrifying. That was when Father McCleary and Father Milton came to the house.”

“Father Milton the priest who is still at St. Innocent’s?”

He nodded.

“Wait wait what are you saying?”

“It took a little bit of time. This was when I was floating away, I couldn’t hold any control and whoever took it from me was pushing me towards the exit. I was floating into the darkness, no more whispering, no more seeing, all I could hear was one thing and it was growing louder and louder, it was the soft running of water. Maybe a ravine.”

He snapped at me.

“Just like that I woke up and I fell about 10 feet onto my bed. Both of the priests ran to me, throwing a blanket over me, trying to tend. Then a day or two later, my parents were telling me that I was you know that… that I was a victim.”

“Anthony are you saying-”

“I think that this thing plays with memories it makes people forget, or remember wrongly. It burrows its way into your brain and fog up where it left off, so no one knows. Because, my parents witnessed a miracle, but only perceived it as the worst act imaginable. It then made me forget completely until now.”

He was holding back tears.

"I testified against the man who saved my life, and he had to stand there and take it. He died in jail you know? Not so long after I put him in there. Stabbed in the stomach and chest eighteen times. The only person to tr…

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