by Shaw, Matt
FROM THE SAME AUTHOR
Love Life
The Vampire’s Treaty
(The Peter Chronicles)
Happy Ever After
G.S.O.H Essential
A Fresh Start
PETER
All Good Things
9 Months Book One
9 Months Book Two
9 Months Book Three
Non-Fiction titles
im fine
Still Fine
PlentyOfFreaks
Wasting Stamps
Self-publishing: Releasing your book to the digital market
Collections
Scribblings From a Dark Place
9 Months Trilogy
Happy Ever After Trilogy
Reviews, Critics & Mystery Shopping
The Story Collection: Volume One
The Story Collection: Volume Two
Novellas
Smile
The Dead Don’t Knock
Writer’s Block
Buried
The Last Stop
The Chosen Routes
A Christmas to Remember (YOU choose the story)
Romance is Dead
The Breakdown
The Cabin
The 8th
The Cabin II: Asylum
The Missing Years of Thomas Pritchard
Consumed
Picture Books
I Hate Fruit & Veg
It’s fair to say I’m a busy author! If you want to keep up to date with my work why not join me on my author page - mattshawpublications
© Matt Shaw
The right of Matt Shaw to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any format without written consent from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for insertion in a magazine, newspaper or broadcast.
The characters, and story, in this book are purely fictitious. Any likeness to person, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
WITH THANKS TO:
Elena Helfrecht of Apokryphia Art
For the awesome job she did with the cover design and photography.
You can see more of her work at:
http://apokryphiaart.deviantart.com
http://apokryphiaart.jimbo.com
Or look her up on Facebook!
Author’s Notes
I’ve always enjoyed horror movies. I’m not sure why, really, considering the rest of my family don’t really rate them that highly. If anything, they go out of their way to avoid them. I guess, if I had to give it a reason, it’s because there’s some faulty wiring going on somewhere deep within my little brain.
The problem is, lately, people seem to be leaning more towards horror films which rely on gore as opposed to genuine scares. Now, although I don’t mind gore (unlike my brother who faints at the slightest hint of blood), I do prefer my horror to play more on my imagination with creepy imagery and things you don’t see as opposed to in your face blood and guts. However, going by what some people have said on my author page (facebook search ‘mattshawpublications’ will take you there) it appears there is a place for gore in horror.
By writing “The Cabin” and “The Cabin II: Asylum” I gave people the horror stories which scare you by playing with your mind as opposed to overloading your senses with blood and guts. The book came out with people raving and a number of five star reviews being awarded to it so I felt as though I had done my job well.
I didn’t, though, give anything to the people who enjoy ‘blood and guts’ with their horror and that’s where ‘Consumed’ comes in. This is my nod to the classic horrors I grew up with: “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”, “Braindead”, “The Last House on the Left” and “I Spit On Your Grave” to name but a few.
I won’t lie, I had great fun writing this piece but I do still prefer my horror with genuine frights as opposed to shocks and moments of disgust. I only hope it goes some way to satisfy the more bloodthirsty of my readers.
Enjoy! BUT...I warn you now. The sole purpose of this book was to shock and disgust the most extreme of gore-hunters whilst all the time giving them my usual entertaining storytelling style.
You’ve been warned.
Matt Shaw
TOMORROW
Her dark hair, stuck to her pretty but pale face, was matted with dried blood from where they had hit her earlier; not hard enough to kill her but hard enough to ensure she stopped running and screaming from them.
Her eyes opened as she slowly regained consciousness and fear set in almost immediately as she realised she was bound, naked, to a dining room table. The blow hadn’t robbed her of the memories of landing on the table - her bruised and battered body aching all over. She managed to fight her first reaction - to scream out in pain and alarm - she knew screaming wouldn’t do any good; it would only let them know she was awake.
She needed time to figure out an escape.
She fought the pain in the side of her head, throbbing from the earlier blow, and started to struggle against the restraints. A dazed look down to her ankles revealed them to be bound by leather straps - perhaps fashioned from old belts? A buckle system around her ankle, she couldn’t see how it was keeping her on the table - perhaps a buckle system around the table leg too? A few more seconds of struggling against the straps and it dawned on her they weren’t about to snap anytime soon.
“Shit,” she muttered under her breath.
She looked up at her wrists.
A similar set-up.
“Shit!” she repeated.
Footsteps beyond the old, wooden door in the far corner of the room. They’re coming. Her heart skipped a beat and she screamed when the door was pushed open.
Out of time.
CONSUMED
M A T T S H A W
TODAY
CHAPTER ONE
Michael walked straight past screen nine as the doors opened and the audience slowly began to filter out. He walked straight past his colleague Emma - a short, bossy woman who looked as though she should still be at school and not working in the local multiplex - and threw his broom against the door of the usher’s cupboard.
“You’ll need that!” Emma called over to him.
“I’ve finished,” he called back. He didn’t even look at her when he spoke, he simply continued to walk towards the staff-room where he could fetch his belongings before signing out for the night.
“You’re not going to help?” Emma shouted. Michael pretended not to hear her. He could use the hustle and bustle of the leaving audience members as an excuse for his ignorance. He didn’t see why he should hang around and help her. He was supposed to finish at two o’clock in the morning and it was ten to now. From past experience, he knew he’d be late leaving if he did stay and help her with the final clean up operation. Especially considering the cinema was packed to its three hundred seat capacity. “Thanks a bunch!” Emma yelled as Michael disappeared into the male locker room. Besides - Emma never was his favourite work colleague. Despite her small size, Michael found her overbearing. What she lacked in height she made up with the volume in her voice. And where did she get off with barking orders at people as though she were part of the management team? At the end of the day she was the same level as Michael; nothing more and nothing less.
Michael couldn’t help but smile as he pulled his belongings from his locker; the first smile of the day brought on by the fact it was not only the end of an extremely long ten hour shift but also because he’d never be returning to the cinema again. Not that they knew that. At the age of twenty-four, one of the oldest working there, he had always had trouble keepi
ng hold of a job despite rarely being fired. He simply got bored with them and would walk out with little, or no, warning - often leaving his colleagues in dire straits as they’d try and manage their shift knowing they were a man down. Even if boredom hadn’t taken a hold of his senses, in this particular job, he had known from the first day of working there that he wouldn’t fit in. The other staff members were in their late teens and he found it difficult to speak to them on their level. Hell, even the managers looked as though they should have still been in diapers. Some of them even acted like it too.
Two o’clock in the morning and it was still warm outside the air-conditioned building, not that Michael minded having left his home without his coat. He stood in the doorway and lit up a cigarette; a quick drag and the sickly sweet nicotine evaporated any residue stress. He dropped his silver lighter back into his trouser pocket and ran his hand through his dark brown hair. He could feel it was messed up. Another problem with the job was that they forced you to wear a baseball cap. On some people they look cool. Not on Michael. He always complained they made him look special and a few nights into working there he had already come to the conclusion they weren’t even necessary; the management simply made the staff wear them to bring down their confidence a little more. With lowered confidence they’d be easier to control. No one else shared in his beliefs and he had already received two warning letters from the management for failing to turn up in the correct work uniform on the days he decided he didn’t want to wear the hat. A pointless show of disobedience, on his part, for there was always a spare hat close by for him to wear.
From across the car park a stationary van flashed its headlights catching Michael’s attention in the process. Another flash of the headlights when Michael smiled and raised his hand in the air to show he had noticed it and was on his way.
“See you tomorrow,” said Wayne - one of the cinema’s many managers - as he stepped out of the building behind Michael.
Michael flashed him a smile as he walked down the stairs towards the car park, “I don’t think so,” he muttered.
“What was that?” Wayne called out after him.
“I said okay,” Michael lied. He couldn’t be bothered to end the evening on an argument.
He pulled the van’s passenger door open as soon as he was close enough and peered in to one of his best friends, Joel.
“Put that shit out,” said Joel - his green eyes fixed on the cigarette hanging from Michael’s mouth.
“Can’t we just open the window?” asked Michael as he jumped up onto the seat of the VW camper van.
“I mean it, put that shit out,” Joel repeated. “You fucking stink.”
“Jesus, deny a man his simple pleasures, Joel...” moaned Michael. He took an extra long drag before flicking the butt out of the van. “Happy?”
“You going to spend the whole weekend smoking?”
“Depends if you’re going to spend the whole weekend being a miserable fuck.”
There was the slightest of pauses before they both started laughing.
“How have you been?” asked Joel as he started to drive the purple vehicle out of the car park.
“Well...I’m better now I’m not going back to that shit-hole. You got my bag?”
Joel nodded, “What did they say when you told them?”
“Told them? I haven’t told them anything.”
“You’re just not going back?” Joel was a little younger than Michael not that you’d think it if you looked at them side by side. Years working in cold garages, training as a mechanic, had ruined his complexion and he always looked as though he hadn’t bothered to wash the various engine greases from his black hair; always knotted and matted.
“Damn straight. I don’t owe them any favours. You finished the van then?”
“Sort of.”
“Sort of?”
“Sort of.”
“Well it’s looking good.”
“Yeah, I got that bit fixed up okay.”
The van did look good. A classic VW camper van with a funky sparkling purple paint job which certainly caught the attention of people passing by. The roof rack was a shiny chrome metal. Even the van’s grill was chrome. The insides had been fixed too. The seats, once covered in torn smelly fabric, were now a lush leather - a lush leather Joel was extremely protective of even to the point of asking people to remove any keys from their back pockets before taking a seat for fear of causing a rip.
“So what bit wasn’t fixed up okay?” asked Michael.
“Let’s just say we nearly ended up having to get a taxi...”
“What?”
“It wouldn’t start.”
“But it’s okay now?”
“I guess. I haven’t actually switched the engine off to check if it starts again. I got it started. I figured why rock the boat?”
Michael laughed, “Don’t you think it would have been a better idea to get the engine fixed first?”
“Aren’t you a little old to be working in a cinema?” Joel countered.
“Ah ha! I don’t work there anymore!”
“Touché! Anyway, I don’t have the money to fix the engine at the moment.”
“Where are we picking the others up from?” Michael asked as he made himself comfortable.
“They’re all waiting at Lara’s house.”
“Lara?”
Joel nodded.
“She’s still coming?” asked Michael.
“You know, she never wanted to come on this trip. She was only doing it to please me...”
“And now you’ve broken up?”
“Well now she’s coming on it just to piss me off.” Joel noticed Michael was looking at him with a look of concern on his face. No doubt he was worried about the potential non-stop bickering from the ex-couple.
It wasn’t just jobs Michael drifted between - it was also girlfriends - and he was a firm believer in the impossibilities of remaining friends once you had broken up with someone you’d ejaculated in. ‘Lines had been crossed,’ he always told people who argued that it was possible to remain friends.
“It will be fine,” said Joel with what was supposed to be a reassuring smile, “we’re both adults...”
* * * * *
“Asshole.” Lara was standing at the van’s side door. It was the first time she had seen Joel since he had unceremoniously dumped her via text message; an act brought about by lack of phone credit as opposed to cowardice - not that Lara believed him and certainly not what she told their mutual friends who preferred to simply not get involved.
“Whore.” Joel’s insult was merely a reaction to being called an asshole. He didn’t believe Lara was a whore. He had been her first love and knew she hadn’t seen anyone since they had broken up. As soon as the word escaped his lips he regretted it - not that he wanted her to know.
“Okay, you can sit right at the back,” said Hayley - another of the group - as she pushed Lara into the seats towards the back of the van; the furthest point from Joel.
Hayley and Lara were complete opposites; whilst Hayley was a natural blonde, with brain cells to match, Lara was dark haired and highly intelligent. Hayley was stunningly attractive whereas you had to look deep to see any beauty in Lara - that’s not saying it wasn’t there, it was just well hidden underneath the shield she continually put up to protect herself from the assholes of the world. A shield which Joel saw straight through after initial, careful navigation. Hayley never left home without a full face of carefully applied make-up - used expertly to enhance her model-like looks - and Lara never left home with make-up. Even when she and Joel were dating she still preferred the natural look as opposed to a look which gave the impression of being too ‘try-hard’.
It would be a safe assumption that neither Hayley nor Lara would have been friends had it not been for their mutual acquaintances.
With Lara tucked into the corner of the back row of seats, Hayley climbed up onto the row of seats behind the driver’s seat.
“They
haven’t started already, have they?” asked Dan. He jumped into the seat next to his girlfriend, Hayley, and turned to Lara. “You haven’t started already, have you? You’ll never win him back at that rate...”
“I wouldn’t take him back,” she hissed.
Michael leaned over to Joel and whispered in his ear, “Dude - she hates you...What did you say to her?”
“Not a lot. I only had enough credit to send the one text.”
“You text her?”
Joel nodded.
Michael couldn’t help but laugh, “That’s awesome.”