r/shortscarystories
1 day ago
therealdocturner
The Day The Music Died
“Why don’t you just let me in?”
“No.”
The world finally got mad enough to blow itself up and everybody’s gone. Everybody but me and Jesse. Two months come and gone, we been together.
I found this house after wanderin’ through what was left. No front door and a nice porch sittin’ on a scorched plain. When I found it, I had a little food left, but it’s long gone now.
Jesse showed up the night after. Lookin’ through the open doorway with those red eyes at the only person he’d seen in a couple of years. He kept lickin’ his long teeth. We didn’t talk much at first.
I guess in the end, we were just too tired to try anything. Two men wastin’ away from starvation and terrible loneliness. The last of our kind.
He moved in under the porch and never left.
Conversation was next to nothin’ that first night. He was outside the doorway, and I sat inside in one of the rockin’ chairs I found. I’d rock and he’d pace.
It started by singin’ songs out of boredom.
Soon enough we got to talkin’.
After the sixth night, I put the other rockin’ chair out on the porch for him just outside the door.
We talk and sing till the sun comes up.
We look forward to the nights.
I met the best friend I ever had at the end of time. Tonight’s our last night. Only one more sunrise for me.
“You look like you could make it through another day.” He’s eyeballin’ the gun in my lap. He knows I’ve only got one bullet left. “I can’t talk you outta this?”
“My belly button’s rubbin’ against my backbone. I’m tired Jesse. You better get under the porch here soon. You can have what’s left tomorrow night.”
“Aw. Let me come inside.”
“No. I don’t want to go out that way. You need to go. I don’t want you to watch.”
He turns and I try to raise the gun. The sun is almost up and I want to be ready.
My hand starts shakin’ and I drop the damn thing. It bounces out the doorway.
Jesse turns back around and picks it up.
“Gimme the gun, Jesse.”
“Come get it.”
“You know I’m too weak to get outta this chair.”
“Then let me come inside.”
“I don’t wanna go that way, Jesse!”
“Just invite me in, will ya?!”
I finally break and give him what he wants. He walks in and I wait to feel his teeth in my neck, but he pulls me and my chair onto the porch. He gives me the gun.
“Got no interest in goin’ on without ya. This is the last mornin’ for both of us.”
He sits down next to me and we rock as the sun comes up. He starts singing Don McLean’s American Pie and I join in. One last joyful noise unto the world never to be heard again.