I could get lost in an IKEA. That’s what my girlfriend always said, as if that were some kind of dig. Who among us hasn’t gotten lost in that sea of Scandinavian furnishings? Sure, there are literal arrows that direct you about the floor, but how am I supposed to follow the arrows when I’m busy deciding whether my apartment more thoroughly desires the Extorp or the Järvfjället. Because that is important to consider. Contrary to popular belief, places have desires.

Take IKEA for example. When you wander into that warehouse of cheaply made, cheaply purchased furniture, you typically have a set agenda. “I need one Kallax—white—and one Norberg—white.” But you never leave with only that which you came for. Why is that?

My take? Often, when entering that blue and yellow warehouse, you are also in a state of flux. I, personally, have never entered an IKEA without having first undertaken a move. In that state, I’m impressionable, malleable, and more sensitive to the whims of place. And so I load up on Voxnans and Mästerbys, Toftans and Hemsjös. Not because I wanted them, but because the place wanted me to want them.

Perhaps another, simpler, Occam’s razor-like explanation is the coalescence of capitalism and consumerism. Ok, you got me there. Maybe a business as an example is too easy of a mark—we all know, inherently upon entering, what that building desires.

A town, on the other hand, is a tougher subject entirely.

In all my life I’d never encountered a place with a greater sense of desire than when I stumbled upon—and subsequently got the fuck out of—Sublimity.

Sublimity shouldn’t have existed. And yet, some years ago I found myself—freshly divorced, listless in life—driving along a suddenly paved road in the backwoods of rural Washington. I came upon an idyllic welcome sign—rich brown wood, a mountain landscape expertly painted upon its face, stark-white, calligraphic script set atop the scene:

“Welcome to Sublimity. Where life is sublime.”

“A little on the nose,” I thought to myself. But, the moment my car rolled upon the street and my eyes took in the welcome sign, I was overwhelmed with a sense of dread. The hairs on the back of my neck stood on end and I broke into a cold sweat. Was it because I was lost in the woods in an unfamiliar place? Or was it because of something more insidious?

The town itself was—for lack of a better word—sublime. Townspeople sauntered along a bustling Main Street, the shops of all kinds lined the road evident of a booming economy. As far as the eye could see it was square jaws, coiffed hair, colorful dresses, and pearly white smiles. Indeed, everyone in Sublimity appeared beautiful and happy.

As I was drawn further into the center of town, my senses were assaulted by tight, straight lines of two story homes with white picket fences and manicured green lawns. I stopped my car in front of one such house—nondescript, the same as every other house on the street in every way, except for what was on the front lawn. My car lurched to a stop, I rubbed my eyes and stared at what appeared to be two and a half children playing in the front lawn.

You read that right. No, I don’t mean the half-child was a small child. No, I don’t mean “half-child” in the “half-man” sense of Tyrion Lannister. What I mean by “half-child” is that there was an actual human child—beautiful, smiling, playing with their brother and sister in the front yard, not a care in the world—bisected down the middle of their body. No, not a legless torso; the child was all right side. You’re saying to yourself right now, “what the fuck?” And I was—and admittedly still am—right there with you.

“Where the fuck am I?” I muttered to myself.

Part two coming soon. r/InMyLife42Archive

    Dark clouds roiled in the distance, hurling tendrils of lightning to the ground. The cool wind blew them towards the small, strange, idyllic town where Lauren found herself stranded. She'd gotten lost after her phone died and now she'd run out of gas. Stupid, she thought, I always fuck up. Everywhere she looked was a pristine rambler-style house with a small, lush yard. They came in two types, with a white picket fence, and without. A suburban neighborhood miles away from anything urban, surrounded by corn fields. She walked the pothole free streets and noticed the women wore shirtwaist dresses, the men suits.

    "Is there a gas station somewhere near?" she asked a man in a gray suit and dress hat. He looked at her black denim skinny jeans with disdain.

    He scoffed and said, "No."

    Lauren noticed that everyone looked at her as she passed. Several times she tried to ask the same question about the gas station and each time she got the same simple answer, "No." As she approached the town center she met eyes with an old man. He had slicked back hair and sharp teeth.

    "Storm's coming," he said with a smile. Lauren quickened her pace to get away from the man. As she passed an alley, someone pulled her in, putting their hand over her mouth.

    "Shh, I'm going to help you," he said and slowly removed his hand from her mouth and turned towards him. The alley was dark, but she could make out his striking yellow eyes and his diminutive stature made smaller by hunching over.

    "What is this--" she started to say, but he cut her off by shoving a book in her hands. He disappeared back into the alley and Lauren thought she could make out scales on the man's back as he left.

    She inspected the book. It was leather bound and felt old, ancient even. The musty scent of the pages was almost overwhelming. As she flipped through the book, she noticed everything was handwritten in almost illegible script. It detailed how an ancient species that inhabited the abandoned mines to the south had cursed the town. Frozen in time since 1950, it didn't take kindly to outsiders.

    As she read, it was growing dark and the thunder clouds had started to roll into town. The thunder boomed and reverberated off the buildings near her. It started to rain. Thick, heavy sheets of rain. It was almost pitch black now. Lightning flashed, illuminating the town square long enough to see a circle of people, maybe a hundred in number, holding hands under the biblical rain. They began to chant in an ancient sounding tongue. In the middle was a hunched, scaly, grotesque facsimile of a man. For a long moment, there was no lightning and Lauren stood in the silent darkness of the alley, hoping they wouldn't spot her.

    Lightning flashed again and she saw it. The entire crowd was twenty feet closer to her and moving now. Lauren recoiled in panic, running deeper into the alley until she was in the light of a back entrance lamp. Hopefully she could at least see when they were upon her. She breathed and remembered there was an inscription at the back of the book in a foreign language. She flipped to the back of the book as the first figure reached the edge of the light. She read the inscription:

Akhea, oh h'las me whro

Akhea, oh me'ras me whro

Me'ras, akhea mneas.

    Lightning struck the tree in the center of town square and it exploded into burnt embers. The figures in front of her fell to their knees, unable to keep their balance, and gasped for air. They looked up at her with confused expressions.

    "Where are we? Who are you?"

    Lauren breathed a sigh of relief, I don't fuck everything up.

​

It was the shifting of the car, the change in the engine sounds, that woke me up from the uneasy and fitful sleep I’d managed to get. I woke up, my eyes taking a few moments to adjust to the view of the inside of the RV we were traveling in. I’d crashed out on the couch, tired after having driven this behemoth of a vehicle for the previous eight hours or so. Thankfully it hadn’t been terribly windy, but enough that with every large gust of wind, the damned bus wanted to wallow back and forth across the highway lanes like a sail. Fighting through that, and having to stay more alert keeping on the road and in the proper lane, had tired me out.

Erica had elected to drive, then, letting me have some time to try and rest; rest it seemed that I had needed, though now I was idly wondering where we were.

“Hey hon,” I called up to the front of the RV, just a few feet above my head, as I shifted on the couch to sit up, “everything okay?”

“Yeah,” she called out, as she was slowing down; I took a quick look around, and saw that we weren’t on the highway anymore. “I was feeling a little nibbly, and saw a sign for a Chic-Fil-A, so I figured we’d stop here in town and get a bite.”

“Where are we?” I asked, trying to see a sign out of the front window; failing that, I took a quick look around the side windows, hoping to see something that would give me a clue as to where we were.

“Some little town named Benton,” she remarked, as she turned off the off-ramp and began driving in the direction of what looked like a town.

Benton.

Something about that name pinged a thought in my mind, but it didn’t stick around, and for the moment, I shrugged it off.

It didn’t take very long for us to slide into town, and at first it looked…quaint. Small. Like one of those little towns that the highways bypassed a few decades ago. It was close enough to the highway but it didn’t seem like it had been touched by modernization. There was still a soda-shop on one of the corners as we drove through, and all of the people I could see, were dressed a bit more to the “Sunday dress” than I would have expected of a more modern town. Here and there I saw a few turn-of-the-century notes— a McDonalds that had, thankfully, been brought up to at least the appearance of the 90s- but for the most part, it could have been a town that time forgot, sometime after the 70s or thereabouts.

But something pinged the back of my mind again, and I frowned.

“Where is that Chic-Fil-A?” Erica groused, more to herself.

That -something- in my head clicked once. I took a better look at the people on the streets, and then my gaze turned back to Erica for a moment, looking at the back of her head, catching a glimpse of her ear.

My frown deepened, and that -something- clicked a second time.

“We’re still in Kentucky, right?” I asked, feeling a sense of foreboding.

“Yeah,” Erica tossed back at me over her shoulder, and then gave an almost inaudible squeal, followed by a “there it is,” to herself, as she angled into the turning lane to make a turn to take her to our destination.

Something was really wrong; my brain was shouting at me that there was something very not right about this situation; I had a sudden urge to look at a map to see exactly where in the heck ‘Benton, Kentucky’ was.

I got the map pulled up, as Erica was slowing down to turn into the restaurant parking lot. It didn’t tell me anything that I didn’t know, but I was still worried, and that worry was rapidly shifting towards fear. I went to check a search engine site about Benton, and what came up made my blood run cold.

“Erica,” I said, “we need to go, right now.”

“Huh?” She blurted, slowing down to try and find a place she could park the RV.

“We need to go,” I repeated, “what time is it?”

“Hon, we just got here,” she offered up a complaint, then added, “The dash clock says it’s about a quarter to six.”

“Fuck Chic-Fil-A,” I snapped, “We need to leave- we REALLY need to leave, NOW!”

“What? Why?” She pulled the RV to a stop, put the bus in park, and turned to look at me.

“Benton is a sundown town!”

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The fact that he was lost was apparent to him, he probably took a wrong turn somewhere but at this point hes so far into the walk its best to just find a place to settle for the day. If Jack just had given him a better map he would've been there already, and chances are slim he'll find anyone, Bloodfog rolled through this area unexpectedly yesterday.

Something clawed at the back of his mind however, something just felt wrong about this place. He just couldnt put his finger on it however, just an overwhelming sense of dread.

Nothing like the normal level of paranoia one develops in this wasteland, but something different; so far beyond normal instincts, instead something deeper was clawing at him, telling him this area just wasn't right.It took him a while to realize it, "Wait." he says, stopping in his tracks and looking around the area.

"Bloodfog hit this area last night, but there's nothing out here. Not even rats,
normally i'd be having to kick them off my legs around now. What the
hell is up with this place?" He says paranoid, breaking into a jog.

Soon however he sees something. A town in the distance, buildings still in decent order and overall looking fairly nice. Walking over to the place, there's a sign next to the road leading in. "You are now entering Andell, Welcome!"

"Since when was there a town out this way?" He asks himself and walks into the town.

"Hey! Welcome to Andell, What's your name?" A voice comes from behind him, and
he spins around quickly brandishing his pipe in shock.

But upon turning around, all he sees is a normal person just standing there in a vintage
dress shirt and trousers.

Catching his breath from the shock of someone coming up behind him, he answers. "David, what is this place and why are you dressed like that?" David asks, looking at the clean and nearly spotless attire this man is wearing, vastly opposed to the more practical and defensive attire mostly designed to protect from threats of all kinds.

"Nice to meet you David, you can call me Richard. You seem new to town, do you have a place to stay tonight, its supposed to get awfully bad out tonight." Richard says, extending his hand for david to shake.

Shaking the man's hand David answers, "No, i was looking for a place, but didnt expect to find this place."

"Well, why don't you come stay the night at our place, my lovely wife mary is cooking a wonderful dinner of Salisbury steak; she'd be delighted to have someone for dinner. We also have a guest room you can stay in for the night, hows that sound?" Richard says, slapping a hand on Davids back.

Turning to look around the rest of the town, he sees dozens of people; all of them staring at them, having stopped their yardwork to watch. Each of them wearing similar garb to Richard, and each of them looking eeriely clean.

"ah, I'd love to. Thank you for the offer!" David says, thoroughly creeped out and just wanting out of the street.

Richard walks David to his home, which just like him, looks spotless. Inside the home is more of the same, the house is clean and perfect. "Mary, wehave a guest for dinner. Come and say hello to David," Richard calls out, and a woman wearing a slightly stained apron and dress comes walking to the both of them.

"Nice to meet ya David, Im Mary but you know that I'm sure. We're glad to have ya, come! sit at the table, dinner will be finished soon." She says, leading the two to a dinner table.

Sitting at the table, Richard sits down as well on the side of the table while David sits at the end.

a few minutes later, Mary comes with 3 plates of food and sets down a plate of Salisbury steak and mashed potatoes in front of each of them and sits down opposite Richard.

Mary and Richard begin eating, and Mary turns to him. "So what brought you to our lovely town?" she asks politely like nothing is wrong in the world.

"Just a job, gotta find something for someone. The map they gave me must've been
wrong, or I read it wrong because I got lost and ended up here." David says awkwardly but starts to eat the steak.

"Well out of all places to get lost in, our humble town is certainly the best!" Richard says, gesturing with his fork.

The passive conversation continues, and David slowly starts getting more comfortable. The unease never fully left, but maybe this is just his brain playing tricks on him. It's been so long since he's seen a nice town that wasn't full of mercs and drunks.

Something catches his mind however, a stray thought popping into his brain. "There was three chairs when i walked in, and why did they just 'have' a dinner for three cooking?" Panic starts to set in, something really doesn't feel right about this place, his vision starts to dull.

"David, isnt my wife just a fantastic cook? I bet you can barely taste the muscle relaxants and sleeping pills in your food." Richard says casually, a smile on his face.

The panic fully sets in and David shoots up and out of his chair and he starts to make a break for the door. But his legs feel like their in molasses, and eyes start to feel heavy. Before he realizes it he's out.

When David awakes, he's in a dark room and Richard and Mary are standing around him. "Ah, he's awake." Richard smiles, picking a meat cleaver up off the table and tossing it in the air and catching it with ease.

David wants to scream, to yell for someone but pain comes from his throat as he tries. "Sorry
dear, we had to cut your vocal cords out before you woke up. Didn't want you disturbing the peace and quiet in the neighborhood now did we?" Mary says innocently as if she didn't just admit to such a terrifying thing.

"Yknow, we just love having guests for dinner. Much better taste, better then those
things affected by the fog." Richard says, cleaning the cleaver with a rag.

"Bloodfog just gives the meat an off taste, but with you here." She doesnt finish her sentence but just chuckles to herself.

"Sorry about this David, but it cost alot to bribe Jack to give you that map and a mans gotta provide for his family. Im sure you understand." Richard says, walking towards Davids lower half and begins hacking away.

Slowly and efficiently they cut and hack at flesh and bone, Making sure each piece is a perfect size and placing each into wrappings to store. The Process is long and horrible, but soon enough the blood lost gets to David, and he goes into a deathly sleep.
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