The Novella Life of Illuscia Nester Himawari

It was night and two guys in classic car traveled down a lonely stretch of I-95 in Pennsylvania. The one in the passenger seat had a pensive look about him. The driver reached down to fiddle with the radio. They slowly pulled ahead of me. Squinting through the darkness and the bug-dotted windshield of my eight year old Isuzu I observed a blue bumper sticker with the words in white “Hilary ‘08” on it. “God damn it. I hate those guys.” Gabe looked at me inquiringly, still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. “You mean guys who look like they’ve been pulled out of some teen drama on basic cable?” “Huh? No. Guys who leave bumper stickers up from previous elections. For fuck’s sake Hilary didn’t even win the primary.” “Where are we anyway?” Gabe stretched out until his hands touched the car roof. Admittedly that wasn’t that much of a stretch, he was one of those shaggy looking wiry fellows. “Just out of Jersey. You think you can help me stay awake? The Blush Twins back there aren’t much of a ...

Earlier this week, on Sunday night, I had a dream in which I knew I was asleep. I was stood outside of my house in torrential rain at night and thought I needed to get inside in order to wake up. I approached the front door and placed my knuckles onto the door-window ready to knock. I knew that my next action would bring me one step closer to consciousness. The moment I knocked on the door, the thudding sound of the knock was so loud, so frightening and so real that it woke me from my sleep. BANG BANG BANG I jumped up immediately and listened out for a further knock at the door. I was roasting hot, sweating profusely and my heart was beating so hard, I don’t think I would have been able to tell the difference between a knock at the door and my thudding heart beat. After I came to my senses and realised that the possibility of the door knocking at the exact moment of dreaming it is incredibly low, I fell back to sleep. Monday, the very following night, I had the same dream. Right back o...

I was born in Mexico, my father was a goat farmer, and my mother used to weave baskets so that we could have at least two meals per day. We were very poor, and me and my siblings had the misfortune of being born in extreme weather, my oldest brother was born on the coldest day of winter, my elder sister in a spring deluge, and I was born in the thick of summer, and despite the fact that the 80's had brought advances in the standard of living for the world’s citizens, it seemed to have forgotten us, in our tiny two bedroom cabin. So when my father heard about the H1-B Visa program through my uncle, he eagerly signed up. Every spring, he would go to work as a laborer on a pepper and tobacco farm in Texas. The work was hard, but the pay was good, and he was always home in time for Christmas, so he didn’t complain. He was saving up money so that we could emigrate to the United States, and so he worked from 1988 until 1991, saving what he could. He made sure not a penny was wasted, on t...

Sean’s house was covered from head to toe in family photographs. Some from family retreats to Ireland, others showing lost family relatives. Most of these photographs would include Sean in them, so it was only natural that he would look at them from time to time. However, one day he noticed something rather strange about the pictures: His mother seemed to have a red face in all of the photos. Rather shocked by this, he immediately ran downstairs to ask if anyone had done something to the pictures. They all answered no; even his mother, whom was quite worried. Later that day Sean’s mother went to the hospital due to horrific 3rd degree burns caused by a grill catching fire for an unknown reason. Sean’s father decided to stay at the hospital that night and thought it best to send Sean home with his big brother Thomas and little sister Maria. As Sean walked into the house he caught glance of the family photograph in which he noticed the change to his mother’s face, and found that Maria wa...

Kuchisake-Onna is the legend of a Japanese woman, mutilated by her jealous samurai husband who murdered her for infidelity scarring her horribly and leaving her repulsive. Her jealous Ghost still haunts places in Japan, usually on foggy nights, wearing a surgical mask when she will approach people and ask shyly: “Watashi kirei?” (Am i beautiful?) The person usually responds, yes. She then pulls down her mask to reveal an ear to ear grin, cut by her jealous husband to mar her for her life. “Even like this?” she will persist. If you answer no. She will take a pair of scissors, and cut the same gruesome smile into your own face. If you answer yes, she will disappear, and the second you go home will reappear at your door and finish the job. The only way of confusing Kuchisake-Onna is to say: You are average, which will confuse this mysterious Onryo. Or to present her with hard amber candy, or say ‘Pomade’ six times will shall make her flee. She has been seen from the 1970′s til...

In Beantown, Nebraska, a town with a population of just over 200, there lives a man named Jack Black. Not THE Jack Black, of course, but just a guy named Jack Black. At 10:06 PM on January 4th of 2014, Mr. Black’s phone will ring. Upon picking up the receiver, Jack will suddenly be able to comprehend the TRUE definition of infinity, and for a split second will be able to truly understand how long an eternity is. The massive strain on the collective conscience of existence that this paradox will create will actually cause the fabric of space-time to collapse on itself, creating a NEW universe identical to ours, but starting at the beginning of time. This universe will proceed to exist until the exact moment in time that humans would identify as 10:06 PM on January 4th, 2014 C.E., at which point an alternate Jack Black will pick up his alternate phone, thus comprehending infinity and starting the whole process over again.

10:30 PM. Late in the Summer Season. It’s storming outside. My favorite time of year and my favorite kind of weather. Whenever it storms I just have to smile. Storms are beautiful, or at least I used to think so. Almost all the lights in the apartment were off, and I’m just talking to some friends over AIM. Then suddenly it became very very cold. As if the storm from outside was creeping thru the door. I just figure there was a temperature drop because of the storm, so I toss on a sweatshirt. After about 30 minutes or so I’m still freezing cold. I start to get this feeling. It’s a feeling we all have felt before. The feeling that someone is staring at you. The feeling that this someone is not very far away. The feeling that if you turn your head the slightest bit, you would see them. I shrug this feeling off because I am an extremely paranoid person and I get this feeling all the time. I continue to converse with my friends, I even mentioned this sensation that I currently had...

Hello. I am Mr. Welldone. I watched the copulation which conceived you and I screamed in horror. I saw you birthed like a hatched parasite, hairless and gagging, and I grit my teeth in hatred, sliding them over each other again and again and again and again and again until they were flat and smooth. I will watch you wither and grow old, as your body congeals and the weight of your years pulls your flesh from your body and I will grin and snicker, laugh and laugh. I will see your desiccated corpse pumped full of superficial chemicals, interred into the dirt to feed the eyeless, subterranean creatures of the earth and I will howl because I know where you are going. I know where you are going. I know the secrets of this earth, as I knew the secrets of the one before it. I will bring about the End, and you cannot stop me. You read these tales and you do not know that with each you read, with each you create and recreate, with each you retell, with each you claim ownership of, y...

Ever wandered alone on the streets at the dead of night? Well, if you encounter a wizened figure in tattered robes and a hood, and you just can’t seem to make out his face no matter which way you look at it, pay your respects. This man is in fact Death himself. He only appears to sole travelers at the stroke of 3:33am, so most go their entire lives without ever seeing him “in the flesh”, so to speak. If you’re brave enough to speak to him, he may take out an hourglass from his robe. The hourglass represents how much longer you have left to live. If there is plenty of sand in the upper glass, it means you still have a long time left to go before inevitability claims you. But if he takes out an hourglass that contains black flowing sand, then run as fast and as far as you can to the one you love before he finds you. And he will find you.

You’re just sitting there, trying to fan yourself off from the heat as you wait for you mother to come back from inside the shop. By chance, perhaps, you glance over to your left where another car is parked, empty and probably even more sweltering than your own. You roll up the windows and turn the key your mom left in case it got too hot. As the whoosh of cool air hit you in the face, you hear a strange sound, almost a knock on your window. You don’t look, thinking it impossible, because there was nobody there a second ago. But soon, there is a movement out of the corner of your eye. You whip your head around, but there is nothing. All you can see if the interior of the car next to you, and a few odd buildings, all closed for the day. You chalk it up to the heat, one of those wisps you see on hot blacktop on days like today. You move to change the radio station when you see it again, almost a face, sitting in the back of the car next to you. But as soon as you turn to see...