It Has Fingers
A Short Story by Za
Moving back off the grid was the best choice Jed ever made.
This cabin in the woods, his childhood home, was all he’d ever wanted his pa to leave him behind. With nine siblings, you can’t ever want for too much.
As he sat rocking on the porch, fingers idly plucking at the strings of his banjo, a familiar sight came trotting up the dirt road. A small herd of six fluffies waddled to the steps, led by their smarty, Wiggles.
“M-mistah Jed! Nice mistah Jed!” Wiggles chirped, the unicorn clamoring up Jed’s front steps. He swung a leg at him, an idle gesture, but enough to keep him at the bottom step.
“What’cha want, Wiggles?” Jed sighed, leaning his banjo against the wall. The fluffies trembled behind their smarty, mumbling amongst themselves.
“Wiggwes saw a munstah wast dawk time!”
Jed cracked a smile.
“Is that right? You ain’t seen nothing but a bear, or a coyote, or… heh, a squirrel.”
Wiggles shook his head, his wet eyes pleading for Jed to believe him.
“Nu, mistah Jed, was tuu scawy! Nu bawkie munstah! Was taww, scaaawy munstah! Wif big see-pwaces an pointy toofies… an hooman fingies!”
Huh, Jed thought. Fluffy must’ve had a nightmare, because that doesn’t sound like any animal he’d ever heard of. Or maybe it was a mole or something, their little claws look kind of like fingers. But then, the eyes…
“Can hewd stay in mistah Jed housie?”
“There ain’t no damn way I’m letting all you little idjits sleep in my cabin again. Y’all done shit in my floor twice and I ain’t fixing to let you do it again.”
“Pwease mistah, pwease! Fwuffies tuu scawedies! Hab widdwe babbehs, nu wan munstah to eat hewd babbehs! Wiggwes sweep outside housie so nu can make bad poopies on fwoow again! Pwease wet hewd sweep in housie!”
The smarty was scrambling up the steps, clinging to the leg of Jed’s overalls like a scared toddler. He scooped him off, scooting him back down the stairs.
“No, I told y’all I wasn’t doing it again. It’s just some kind of rodent, if y’all don’t bother it, then it ain’t gonna bother you. Y’all’s part of nature, if I took ya inside I’d be upsetting the natural order of things.”
Jed picked the banjo back up, strumming a little tune he didn’t know the name of. The fluffies huu-huu’d a bit, wandering back to the brush line as Wiggles promised he’d protect the foals.
That night, Jed awoke to a nightmarish rhapsody of tapping hooves against his door.
“MISTAH JEEEED! MISTAH JEEEEEEEEEEED!”
The door swung open, Jed standing there with nothing but britches and a shotgun. An oil lamp illuminated him from behind, the only light on a moonless night.
“MUNSTAH TOOK SMAWTY! HEWP FWUFFIES! CAUWIFWOWEW BABBEHS NEE HEWP!”
“You left your foals? You fuckin’ idjit!”
Jed slipped his loafers on, barreling down the steps and back to where he knew the fluffies stayed. He’d go out there and bring the soon-mummahs bread crusts or vegetable stems or apple cores. Whatever he couldn’t eat that they could.
“Fine, I’ll go spook whatever in the hell y’all are so skittish of and y’all better let me get back to bed!”
He brings the shotgun to his shoulder, scanning the horizon for any movement. The clearing is a mess, a testament to how quickly the fluffies picked up and booked it once they saw the so-called monster. The foals were nowhere to be found, unfortunately. Whatever pack of animals scared them off probably ate them and ran off. But a tuft of fluff caught Jed’s eye, stuck in a briar patch. The only fluffy in the herd with a coat that shade of yellow… is Wiggles.
Jed marched forward, his eyes trained on the bush.
“Wiggles, get the hell out here and tell these little idjits you’re alright!”
Behind the briar patch wasn’t Wiggles, but the foals.
Their eyes were torn from their sockets, missing. A few small teeth had been plucked out and discarded. Each little chest cavity was torn open, ribs broken outward and organs removed. The poor things had their faces twisted with pain. They didn’t die with any mercy.
Jed fell backwards onto his rear, the adrenaline surge hitting him so hard he threw up in the grass next to him.
“What the FUCK?!”
The fluffies didn’t run. They were too scared to do anything but break down into sobs. They didn’t even nestle into a big huggie pile, they just… froze, shaking like leaves in the wind, their gazes glued to the defiled corpses of their children.
Jed pulled himself to his feet, pointing back to the cabin with his gun.
“Get to the house!”
The fluffies didn’t move, they just looked up at Jed, shaking and crying.
“TODAY, GOD DAMMIT!”
The herd all turned at once, galloping to the house and up the stairs, waiting by the door for him. Jed ran back, never lowering his shotgun from the trees. He slung the door open, pushing the fluffies inside before slamming the door. At times like these, he wished he had a lock. But living this far out, he doesn’t usually need it.
Cauliflower immediately started wailing.
“Buh… BAAAAABBEEEEEEEHSSSSS, BUUHUUHUUHUUUUUUUUU!”
“Wuh… wuh aminaw du dat, mistah Jed?” another fluffy, River, asked. He was trying his best not to start crying again.
“Ain’t no goddamn animal. Y’all stay quiet. Don’t say nothing.”
Jed pulled the curtains back, letting his eyes scan the trees for any movement. He didn’t see anything that couldn’t be attributed to the trees. Everything felt still, silent… unnatural. This wasn’t like anything he’d ever seen. He wouldn’t put it past some punk kid to do something like this, but nobody lived anywhere nearby. And what kid would walk this far into the woods to find a herd to kill when there’s dozens of ferals on every street corner?
(tap tap tap)
“Mistah?”
A knocking on the door. A weak, raspy voice.
“Pwease… smawty scawed…”
Jed craned his head to try and see Wiggles, but to no avail. The door was too far from the window.
“Dewe’s a munstah…”
The fluffies were whispering, begging Jed to let him in.
“Smawty hewe! Smawty save fwuffies! Wet Smawty in, mistah Jed! Pwease!”
“Huwwy, mistah!” Wiggles begged. “Pwease hewp smawty!”
Jed shushed the fluffies as he replayed that last sentence in his head.
“I don’t know what you are… but you ain’t Wiggles. You don’t even know my name.”
Wiggles did not reply. There was a sickening crunching noise outside the door. Jed backed away, the curtains still wide open.
That thing… it was wearing Wiggles like skin. But if it’s as tall as a fluffy, it can’t reach the doorknob.
But he watched out the window as a slender, bloodied hand pulled the fluff away.
It’s just like Wiggles told him.
It was tall.
It had empty eyes.
It had sharp teeth.
And that last part…
As the doorknob turned…
It had human fingers.
