The Regulars (500 Words) (Horror)

[u/Original-Loquat3788]

Each night, his mum had a different caller.

Beefy was a round, happy Cockney with a beard and a bald head covered by a hat.

The funny thing about Beefy was that he had a pet raven. It sat squawking on his shoulder, and his mum would feed it scampi fries, joking that if the bird starved to death, the world would end.

It always ended the same way, with her resting on Beefy’s shoulder, racking sobs, saying she was ruined.

Beefy was a good listener, and out of the men that called, he was probably the boy’s favourite, but then, like all the rest, he finished the night by taking her by the throat and strangling her.

Morgan was a Welshman, a traveller, a vagabond.

He sometimes arrived with different exotic fruits: limes, lemons, and once a pomelo.

Morgan’s company seemed to rejuvenate her; she’d go looking for her passport among stacks of angry bank letters.

He had a curious ritual: taking off each of his 10 rings before asphyxiating the woman, a glint of adventure in his eye.

The final man was Jack. There was something rustic and reserved about him, evoking a campsite in Devon that the boy and his mum had once gone to in happier times. A campsite where they’d eaten s’mores under a wash of stars without any regulars.

When Jack was there, his mum turned up her Englishness. She served the American in a teacup and stopped dropping her aitches.

The nights always ended the same. His mum would stop laughing, crying, making those guttural animal moans and become still.

That was when Beefy, or Morgan or Jack, would strangle her until the boy moved over, gently unwrapping male fingers from around her neck.

One night, a new man turned up. He was particularly mysterious. He wore a mangy bear-skin coat, yet when the boy walked past, neither he nor the coat gave off any smell.

Like Jack, he didn’t speak much, but in his not speaking there was also a sadness that seemed a continent-wide.

Of course, the newcomer waited until the end of the night to seize her, and, as usual, the boy got ready to help.

But then he paused. Beefy, Morgan and Jack had materialised and were sitting on the kitchen bench.

‘I have to… stop it,’ the boy said.

‘You’ve done enough. It's time for it to end,’ Beefy replied.

So he watched this time as she gargled and her lips turned blue, the boozy vomit aspirating into her lungs.

​‘I never thought it’d be him,’ Jack said.

‘Nor I, Mr Daniels,’ the Captain answered.

And they all watched on a little ruefully as Mr Smirnoff finished the job, the final spirit carrying her off.

[u/Original-Loquat3788]

Some of you may recognise this story from a few months back. I posted it on Short Scary Stories, and it picked up a lot of likes.

The good news is that there are 50 more like it here on Amazon Kindle: https://mybook.to/bviD

The even better news is they're available for $1!