Hello, my name is Mason Schneider, and I am one lucky ass motherfucker.
Well, no, a story can't just stay at that, right? No…there has to be conflict! Drama! Suspense! The whole world has to come to an area of juicy, exciting conflict where there are questions answered, revelations unveiled – will the hero finally get the girl? Will the hero's best friend succumb to the forces of evil?
To be honest, I really, really hate reality TV shows that stop right before the conclusion. No, seriously. Like, can you not? It's not like I'm going to think about it for the rest of the week or something, and be disappointed by the conclusion since it'll probably be much simpler than my over-thought conclusion.
Oh, right. My story.
Alright, well…I'm a guy from Boston, but I moved around a lot with my parents. And before you ask, no, my father wasn't military. In my life, I had moved from Boston where I was born, to Seattle where I lived until I was five, to New York – the land of opportunity, as they call it. I don't particularly hate it here…I mean, Seattle isn't necessarily the quietest place either. It's just that it's very cold…especially in October.
You see, in New York, it tends to snow in the fall. You might be thinking, "What, Mason? Noooo, that's impossible!" But I am not kidding when I say that New York doesn't give a shit about the four seasons. No, really, it DOESN'T give a shit about the four seasons. How I know that is going to be explained later, because from that point, things get pretty weird.
But let's start at the beginning.
The school bus bumped across the cobblestone road that lead the school I went to. The vibrations woke me up and my eyes squinted as the golden rays of the newly risen sun shot into my eyes. The sound of the kids in the seats behind me and the seats in front of me gossiping and talking was the thing that took me out of my stupor.
The bus driver parked by the front and was pretty early. I was kind of thankful for that, seeing as how I don't eat breakfast at home unless it was a weekend. It was usually because of the short amount of time I have to get up in the morning. You see, for some reason, the bus driver tells us to get there super early, and she gets to the bus stop at the same amount of time, but we always end up coming early. A lot of the people that ride the bus with me questioned her about it, but she says…what is it? "Yo' ass is actin' too grown, now sit yo ass down before I write a referral"? Yeah…that's about it.
The doors to the bus opened, and all the students inside – including me – rushed out with a total lack of order. This is how it usually went; never thought people would be so eager to go to school. I got out near the end of the line, that way there'd be no rush or I wouldn't get caught up in case some idiot forgot to tie his shoes and tripped. Yes, that legitimately happens – it happened last year, in fact. I never facepalmed so hard in my life.
I silently walked the cobblestone road to my school's front doors. As I walked through, I was greeted with the silence of a mostly empty school. Students that walked and lived close to the school tiredly leaned against the walls, speaking to others if their friend was there or if they simply wanted to meet new people. Being tired myself, I sluggishly made my way through the security at the front door. They checked my backpack, made me go through a metal detector, and finally, asked if I had a baby mama and if she was dating someone else (seriously, I'm not kidding). I answered "no", of course. Nobody would want to be my baby mama if I put a gun to their head and asked, "Is you is, or is you ain't my lady?"
First thing was first. When I got past security, I went straight to the bathroom. It's not that I had to go to the bathroom and all, but it was because I was a little superstitious. If you ask me, it's good to be a little superstitious. After all, nobody wants to have a bad day, right?
I splashed water into my face twice as my routine always was. I looked into my blue eyes in the dirty bathroom mirror. My curly, dirty blonde hair was short, hanging just above my eyebrows. My black-framed glasses hid the radiance of my blue eyes, making them seem dull. I had the same face as when I was a little kid – triangular nose, proportionate lips and dimples on both of my cheeks when I smiled.
As far as my appearance went, I think I looked average. I definitely wasn't Quasimodo or anything. But when I see other guys – tall and muscular, it sort of discourages me. Courage wasn't my thing either…I was a pretty shy guy. Maybe that was the reason not many people spoke to me. Either way, I quit trying to date anyone until college, so high school romance wasn't any of my concern.
After I dried off my face, my friend Tyler was nice enough to sneak up behind me – as I was drying my face – and give me a creepy smile once I dropped the paper towel. I jumped, turning straight around but laughing once I realized it was him. That was Tyler for ya.
"Tyler, what the hell?" I laughed, giving him the complicated handshake we came up with. It involved shaking each other's hands, switching to the other hand, and then doing both. After that, we'd high five up high, then down low, followed by hooking our pointer, pinky, and middle fingers together and shaking again.
"What? They say assrape is easier in the morning." Tyler said. I knew he was joking, of course, that was Tyler's sense of humor.
I chuckled. "Might be true. When'd you get here?"
"Few minutes ago. Want to get breakfast – assuming you hadn't eaten at home?"
"Yeah, okay. Breakfast…let's get breakfast."
Call me crazy, but…I really liked the cafeteria breakfast. Now, mind you, it was nothing like the quasi-sentient slop we got for lunch. No, the breakfast was pretty legit. We were served things like pancakes, cereal, or waffles. It made me wonder if the reason for the horrible lunch was the teachers not giving a fuck about what they serve at that point, so they end up giving us what seems to be 4th grade lab experiments with a little salt on it. Whatever image you currently have in your head is probably accurate as to the crap we get on daily.
Tyler and I sat at our usual table, which was by the large, wooden gate that separated the cafeteria from the main hall. As usual, Tyler and I spoke about things going on outside of school. As much of a joking type of guy Tyler was, he had pretty solid ideas for the future.
"So, what do you want to be when you get outta here?" I asked, taking a sip of the orange juice on my tray. Cardboard flavor…my favorite.
"Well," Tyler began, "I want to be an engineer…but first I have to find my mother a guy to take care of her so I can get out and live my life."
I nodded. "What's up with your mother?"
Tyler's face darkened a little. "She…has a few issues. I'll leave it at that. I don't want CPS on my ass or anything."
I understood what he meant, somewhat. I knew that organization like CPS could end up doing more harm than good in a situation. What if you don't want to be apart from your mother? Tyler's story made me think a little.
"So, those murders that have been going on…heard about them?" Tyler asked, his voice snapping me out of thought.
"Huh? Murders…? Oh! No…I hadn't. What's up with them?"
"Well…" Tyler leaned in, ominously as if what he was saying was going to be a ground-breaking secret. "You know the abandoned neighborhood? What was it called…Westhaven street? Well, the police have apparently been investigating weird things happening there."
"Weird things?" I arched an eyebrow. "What kind of weird things?"
"The real creepypasta type stuff. Y'know, bodies being found, mangled beyond recognition; people just…disappearing after they go into there. It's really freaky." Tyler replied.
"So what? People just disappear?"
He nodded.
"Weird…what do you think it is, Ty?"
"Well, I think it's some ghost or something." He was silent for a long while, and I just looked at him with a quizzical expression.
"A ghost? Really, man?"
"No. But I do think it's pretty weird. Maybe someone let Magilla Gorilla out from the zoo and gave him rabies. Either way, the good ol' NYPD can't discern the weapon used…or the causes of death, for that matter."
I thought about it for a second. Just what could do damage like that without there being an obvious cause of death? I determined that I'd have to be extra careful taking walks. After all, the abandoned neighborhood mentioned was a few blocks from my house. I wouldn't want to get caught up in it, becoming one of the lost people who went into the neighborhood and never came back.
"Huh…I'll be careful to never go to Westhaven street then." I decided.
Class was pretty boring. I'd like to tell you about how exciting it was, that I'd talked to a lot of people, but I mostly kept to myself in all honesty. Other classes were simply lectures and writing notes – the usual for high school. Other classes gave us easy tests that I was able to pass without a problem. It's not like I was an academic genius or anything; the classes I've gotten this year were pretty easy.
When class was over, I walked down the main hall with my friend Tyler. We exchanged inappropriate and "controversial" jokes. That's what I loved about Tyler, he was never afraid to say anything at any given time. He always made me laugh with his completely outlandish way of thinking.
Getting on the bus was orderly, contrasting to the hustle of the morning. But I guess that's mostly because of the fact that I'm last on the bus at the end of the day. I took the back seat instead of the very middle, which I took in the mornings.
The ride back home was quiet. Well, as quiet as a bus ride can be. Most of the people in the bus spoke relief about how it was Friday, and the kids in the front spoke to the bus driver about Church or something. I simply leaned my head against the wall, taking off my glasses and putting them in my book bag so they were safe. I didn't really need to wear my glasses to see, it's just that I've gotten used to wearing them, so I'd wear them often.
My home was in a more suburban area of New York. The school was a little far away, but I was still in its zone because apparently there weren't any closer by schools. I found that weird and unbelievable, but I didn't question it because I had my friend Tyler at George Washington High. And hey, I hated switching schools. Every time I switched schools, I had this weird week of awkwardness before anyone spoke to me.
I opened my front door with my house key. When I got inside, my mom , Valarie Schneider, was there, speaking on the phone as usual. Everyone said I looked a lot like my mom, and I have to say that I can see it. We both had the same nose and smile, but her hair was black in contrast to my dirty blonde.
"Hey, mom, I'm home." I called out to her. My mother glanced at me and held up a finger as if to say "one second".
I shrugged and walked upstairs. I was used to my parents not paying much attention to me at this point. Hey, I was a teenager. And I'd be out of the house in just a year. It's not that I viewed my parents as a means to an end or anything of the sort, it's just that there wasn't much communication going on. They didn't know about my social issues or my views on life.
When I got upstairs, I shut myself in my room as usual, surfing the web with my cellphone for…useless crap. Every once in a while, I came across a cool science article or a TVTropes entry and read it, but I mostly just laughed at stupidly cheesy pictures.
A few minutes later, my mom knocked on my door. I got up from my lounging position on my bed and opened it for her, and I was met with her blue eyes meeting mine.
"Sorry, honey. I was talking to your grandma – we're going to visit her for thanksgiving." She gave me that kind, motherly smile that I'd always recognize. Even though I was distant from my parents, my mom was still the nicest person in the world. She allowed me freedom and everything, as long as my grades were good. And hey, I think that was a pretty good deal.
"Oh, nah, it's fine. We're going to grandma's house for thanksgiving? Awesome." I responded.
"Yeah. Hey, how was school?"
"Boring. I took a test in Chemistry and World History – both of those were easy. And in Trigonometry we just wrote notes. Gym we ran…" That was what my usual day consisted of.
"Ah, I see. Well, I'll be downstairs if you need me. Dinner will be ready in a little while."
I nodded. "Alright, mom. Thanks."
I went downstairs when I smelled dinner. Homemade mashed potatoes and pork chops…my favorite. My dad was home by the time it was ready, which was around the time it was getting dark. I looked less like my dad than I did my mom – he had my curly dirty blonde hair, but that was about it. His nose was straight, and his face ridden with wrinkles and worry lines from his stressful job as a detective.
I had to admit, I looked up to my dad. I wanted to be a detective just like him. I'd often ask about the things he had to do on the job, and he'd give me these crazy stories about the murder cases. But now thinking back on what Tyler told me, it made me wonder why he never told me about the Westhaven Street murders…maybe he wasn't put on the case?
Either way, I decided to bring it up.
"So, dad…do you know anything about the Westhaven murders?"
My father's face darkened, and he seemed to have tensed. I could see from his body language that this was a sore subject. But he spoke anyway.
"We…don't know. Which is why I don't want to see you anywhere near that neighborhood, alright? Too risky." My father's tone was stern.
"..Alright, just askin'. Geez…"
"I'm serious, Mason. Don't. Go. Near. Westhaven." My father seemed to have punctuated that last sentence for emphasis.
"C'mon, Harry…" My mom began, handing us our plates of food. "He was just asking. Mason is curious! It's common for his age."
My father sighed, but he didn't respond. Either way, he was acting pretty weird about it…I mean, any time there was a case nearby, he'd still tell me all the same.
But from his response…one thing was for certain: I was going to Westhaven.
A funny thing about sneaking out is that I've never done it before, but it was easier than I thought. At approximately three o'clock, when my parents were asleep, my phone alarm vibrated in my hand and I got up. Fishing in my closet for dark clothes, I took out a pair of black pants with a long-sleeved black shirt and a black beanie.
I took my keys and tiptoed downstairs and to the front door. Carefully unlocking it, I slowly and quietly stepped out and closed the door behind me just as silently. Walking down the wooden steps of my porch, I was greeted with…
Strings. A lot of strings. Threads that came from my body, going in seemingly every direction. Front, back, sideways…the directions were limitless.
Now, I'd like to say it stopped getting weird from there, but as soon as I took my first step, the whole landscape appeared to change. The suburban landscape became vast, beautiful, and seemingly limitless. The hedges and grass grew long and wild, seeming pregnant with wonder and surrealism. The cityscape in the distance became exaggerated and vast, skyscrapers seemed to reach up to the sky, and the whole cityscape seemed forever moving as if alive.
Out of the clear, dark blue night sky came a hurricane out of random. It's strong winds blew things over, destroying them, and even knocking me back a little. But in the same amount of time, a large heat wave completely cooled the hurricane-frosted area. And in the minute after that, there was a blizzard. Then a tornado. Then a heatwave.
The weather was fickle as fuck.
"….What the hell?"
The sun rose and fell, and the time went from a beautiful, haunting nighttime to a bright, sunny day. Time went by quickly. I noticed things aging and breaking down quickly, then getting rebuilt several times over. This change was constant…this place was a place of change.
I made my way through the beautiful chaos, a hand over my face to guard from the rain, the blizzards, and the random earthquakes that shook below my feet. I walked past strange-looking folk. Every one of them seemed to be inhumanly tall and thin, with gray skin and black eyes, but beautiful beyond measure.
'Well,' I thought. 'This is the mindfuck of the century.'
I walked to one of the tall folk, looking up to his eyes, but it was hard due to the inconsistently strong winds. I asked the most obvious question.
"…What is this place?"
The being, previously staring into space, slowly turned his eyes down to me.
"I am of the sun and the moon. Of the hour and the minute. And I, at this very moment, stand on what is the world as it relates to you. Change is important. Remember that, young man." And then he disappeared. So, being the simple-minded guy I was, I sort of stood there a moment to think about what the actual fuck he just said, but I eventually decided to keep moving on.
I seemed to be moving at inconsistent speeds. One minute, I'm walking normally, then the next I'm walking slowly, then the next I'm walking really quickly, as if time had sped up.
And then I came across another street, one that was frozen with the snow, but the heat was blazing. At this point, I had stopped trying to figure out where I was. I'd just gone with the flow…maybe this was just some kind of dream. My actual alarm would wake me up any minute now..
I walked up to a woman…I think. It was hard to tell, because this being seemed to age by the seconds. One second, she was a little girl, then the other she was an attractive woman, and then the other, she was a shriveled up lady.
I don't know why, but I asked her a question too. "…Where the hell am I?"
Hell. That word whispered through the air, and suddenly the landscape changed completely. The blue sky turned dark, and fire burst from the windows of every house. I dove for cover as a volcano randomly appeared behind me, slowly oozing out lava. The streets went red, and thunderstorms clouded the sky.
"…What the—"
"Words are power, Mason. Especially in this realm." The woman began, inexplicably right in front of me despite being in the range of the volcano a few seconds ago. I looked up at her, wondering how she knew my name.
"What?"
"Time is a whole. Months, days, weeks…they're merely pieces of a transcendent whole. A string in the tapestry. Remember that…young man."
And then the landscape changed back to the old cityscape. I got up and looked around cautiously before going ahead. At this point, I heard something calling to me…sweetly and alluringly, I heard something whisper my name. I kept pushing forward…I had to know where that voice was from.
"Mason…" The voice called out. The blizzards grew thicker and thicker, and my already soaked clothes became cold, making me shiver violently. I didn't know how I'd survive this cold…but of course, powerful tornadoes swept the land, destroying the constantly decaying and rebuilding landscape, and everything merely rebuilt again.
I eventually came to this area where it was night time. Above, stars filled the sky and a beautiful crescent moon cast silver light upon all that was below it. Huge, silver water fountains lined the marble road as I slowly made my way through. And that's when I saw what was ahead…what called to me, lured me to its domain.
Ahead was a tower…made completely of brambles. The moon shone off its silvery thorns, creating a sort of…mystical feel to it. I felt a warm, alien presence that could best be described as otherworldly. I heard singing in the background…as around the tower, but nowhere near it, time went on inconsistently. But not here…no, this was where I was supposed to be. My journey was over.
Walking to the tower, I opened the wooden door and went inside.
Inside there were a series of round chambers, each spiraling upwards in order from largest to smallest. Things only got weirder from there, because I seemingly left my body and watched myself go through the chambers. Each chamber had familiar features…features from my past, in fact. I saw one that had my first room…then the next one had a scene of my very first day in school. These fond memories filled me with nostalgia…but I pressed on ahead.
At the very top of the tower, the upward spiral ended. On the wall, there was a large stack of papers that said, "Your name here".
I was in my body again, and I knew exactly what to do. Digging into my pocket, I took out a marker that was always there apparently. And from there, I wrote my name.
Mason Schneider
A blinding light filled the tower, and I fell down on the disappearing landscape. I fell down into the darkness, below…
And quickly, I woke up, back to my senses. I looked around and saw that I was wearing my black clothes…I just wasn't in front of my house. I was holding a marker to the plaque of a statue – a statue of Abraham Lincon.
I up from my kneeling position and looked at the green street sign ahead.
It was a dirty, faded sign, but I could read it all too clear: Westhaven Street.
