1
My poor mom had a bad back, so naturally she called me to help her clear out her attic. She was selling my childhood home to downsize into a condo that she would be sharing with my Aunt Reagan. What I did not expect was my boyfriend, Sam, to be so eager to help. I’d been dating him for three years and living with him for two, so it was past time to introduce him to my mom. We made the arduous, four-hour drive in the pouring rain. When we arrived at my mom’s house, I knocked on her front door.
“James! Thank you for helping me,” my mother squealed as she pulled me in for a hug and a big kiss on the cheek. I breathed in her perfume and sighed. I hadn’t seen my mother since Christmas and I had missed her terribly. “And you must be Sam!” she chirped, pulling my boyfriend in for a hug as well. “Nice to meet you after all this time,” she beamed.
“Nice to meet you, too!” he chimed. “I love your home!” Sam was effortlessly charming, and the way he was kind to my mom made my heart melt.
“I am actually about to step out to get the groceries for dinner tonight. I am so excited to have you boys for the weekend!” She grabbed her keys and glided to the front door. “Feel free to get comfortable. When you’re ready, the attic is unlocked. I’ll be back in an hour.” She gave us a wink and headed out. Her car had barely pulled out of the driveway when Sam seized the moment.
“It’s just us,” Sam whispered seductively into my ear as he pulled me toward him from behind. I stood there for a minute, enjoying the warmth of his body on my back and thinking that we had plenty of time to visit my childhood bed before my mom came back, but the gravity of the herculean task hovered over my conscience, and I led him to the attic.
As the ceiling door creaked open, a thick darkness greeted us. Something eerie settled in my gut as I climbed the rest of the ladder. After a few moments of fumbling around, I found the light switch. Boxes were piled high all around us, but we buckled in and started digging through them, finding some pretty cool stuff.
A thousand trips up and down the ladder and three big piles later, we figured out what needed to be donated, trashed, and kept. We had just one box left, so we climbed up to the attic for a final unboxing.
“Chris?” Sam was puzzled as he read the box’s label. “I thought your dad’s name was John.”
“I had an Uncle Chris, but he died way before I was born. Like in the eighties or something. Car crash,” I informed him. I studied the box, labeled ‘CHRIS’ in big, black, faded sharpie. I knew of my uncle, but my family never talked about him; in fact, they actively avoided talking about him. I had no clue what he looked like, nor did I know anything personal about him. No pictures of him beyond his childhood were ever hung up at my grandma’s house, but I knew he had just finished college when he died. Whatever was in that box must have belonged to him before he passed, and I was eager to learn about him. I tore the box open and began to dig.
“He looks just like you,” Sam gushed as he held a dusty, framed photo up to my face. He was right. I could see a lot of my grandfather’s distinctive features on my uncle’s face, the very same ones I inherited.
The rest of the contents in the box were things you’d expect to find in an attic. We found his sports trophies, school achievement certificates, action figures, and some clothes. I guessed that my family kept his stuff tucked away because it might have been too painful to have constant reminders of him lying around the house.
“This fits me like a glove,” I said as I checked myself in the attic mirror. My uncle’s college sweater clung to me in all the right spots. When I wore his sweater, I felt like I could sense his spirit, like I knew him despite never having met him. It was an odd sensation because I felt like somehow he was hugging me from the other side
“Woof, what a handsome man you are,” Sam murmured as he leaned toward me. “This look is working for me,” he purred. He pulled me toward him for a long, warm kiss, and I melted in his embrace. There were many moments in our relationship that I didn’t think I could love Sam anymore than I immensely did, but he constantly found ways to take my breath away. After discovering a connection that was lost to me, there was something about kissing him in that attic that made me feel drawn to him.
The next hour with him went by blissfully. We laid on the floor holding each other and staring into one another’s eyes. I felt like Sam could sense me from the inside, and I him, like a deep, unbreakable bond had been fortified. I knew at that moment that Sam would be in my life for the rest of it.
“I love you,” he whispered in my ear, and again I melted. He rolled me to my side and began to climb over me.
“Ouch,” I hissed. When he rolled me over, my back landed on a hard, rectangular surface, and the pain stung. I sat up immediately and rubbed my back.
“What’s this?” Sam asked as he picked up a small book. I took it from him and thumbed through the pages.
“Huh. It’s a diary. It belongs to my Uncle Chris.” It was surreal to see my uncle’s handwriting in his journal. I had always wondered what he was like, and this diary would be the key to discovering a lost piece of my family.
“Are you going to read it?”
“I don’t know. My mom might want to hold onto it for a while.”
“You should read it.” Sam took my hands and pulled the diary from them. He held it in his hands as if he were weighing it. “I mean, if your mom wanted to hold on to it, she might have kept it with her instead of in the attic. You could always give it to her after you read it,” he encouraged, as if he could sense my curiosity. “It might be interesting.”
“You’re right.” I looked deeply into his eyes and smiled. I was about to pull him back over me , but we heard the front door open.
“Boys, I’m back! Will you help me get the groceries?”
2
“Thank you for making this delicious lasagna,” Sam complimented my mom. He was ever the charmer as he took another bite.
“Of course. I was beginning to wonder after all this time whether I would ever meet you,” my mom smiled in my direction, as if to let me know she approved of my boyfriend. I took a moment to be grateful for my mom. I have heard countless horror stories from other gay people about how their families have either accosted them or cut out communication with them over their sexuality, and here was my mom, cooking dinner for a boy I brought home.
“Mom, I found an interesting box today,” I added. Sam tilted his brow at me with a puzzled expression.
“What did you find?” my mother asked.
“I found some of Uncle Chris’ things.”
“Oh.” She looked down at her lap with sorrow.
“We found his diary in that box. Do you mind if I read it?”
“Sure. I didn’t know he had a diary. It must have been hidden in one of his sweaters.”
I could sense that my mom wanted to drop the subject altogether. She had the same pained expression that my Aunt Reagan had when I would ask about my uncle.
We finished dinner on a lighter note. Sam was able to make my mom laugh with the slightest effort, and it was music to my ears to hear her giggle the rest of the evening.
3
The weekend passed and we had made our way home. Sam offered to read a few pages of my uncle’s diary to me, but I told him I would prefer to read it by myself to get to know him in a more intimate way, which made Sam oddly impatient. Whenever we were home, Sam was relentless in getting me to read my uncle’s story, reminding me on a daily basis, which made me want to put it off that much more.
One night, after Sam had fallen asleep, I cracked open the cover and read the first page. Within hours I was hostage to his story, and my uncle’s life unfolded in those pages. He was funny and his life was full of love and joy; however, his journaling took a dark turn with one single entry.
June 28, 1985,
Oh my God. I have it. I’ve been feeling sick for a while and today the first spots began to appear on my legs. I told my boyfriend. He puked when I told him. There’s a good chance he has it, too. I have done nothing but cry all day. I’m going to lose my job if anyone finds out. I can’t look my friends in the eye and I can’t even begin to think about telling my parents. They don’t even know I am gay. I don’t know if I am brave enough to continue living through the horror that is to come. I’ve seen this thing take too many of my friends. I can’t bear to think that I will die. I can’t die alone in a hospital. I don’t have the strength to kill myself, either. Oh god.
A wave of grief came over me. I reread the entry again to be sure that my eyes did not deceive me. My uncle was gay and he had developed AIDS. My heart went out to him and I felt more connected to him than I could have imagined. I wondered if my family had known about his true cause of death. They had always told me that he died in a crash. I felt betrayed by my grandparents, and I felt betrayed for Uncle Chris, too. While my mom and aunt are truly supportive of me, they begged me to keep being gay a secret from my grandpa. He died never knowing. I wonder if the same was true for Uncle Chris. I had to continue reading his story.
July 8, 1985
It has been almost two weeks since I told Sam about this. He got tested immediately and discovered that he has it, too. He has been searching for a cure for the both of us, and his ‘cures’ have been kind of scary and superstitious. I feel bad for him and I know he is scared, but I can’t handle his paranoia at a time that I am trying to reconcile with dying. I don’t know what to do. I cannot talk to anyone about this except for other gay people, but most of my friends are either dead or they are dying as well. I pray a cure will be found.
July 10, 1985
I broke down and told my sisters last week. We cried on my couch together, but they were afraid to touch me. It is a comfort to know they care. They agreed to keep my secret from mom and dad, but Reagan was too upset about the news to keep it from mom. Dad still doesn't know, and it’ll stay that way for as long as possible.
On another note, Sam has been more withdrawn from me, like he is keeping a secret. Honestly, I don’t mind the space. In search of a cure, he has been asking me to prick my finger and drop blood into a vial. He’s also taken some strands of my hair. I think he has been seeing some Voodoo doctor. I never thought he would ever believe in alternative medicine, but I understand his desperation. I wish I had his refusal to give up. Who knows? Maybe his Voodoo will work. I’m not holding my breath, though.
I was heartbroken to read about my uncle’s coping with death. I cried heavy flows of tears as I read each entry, and I felt a kindred connection to Chris as I learned how similar we were. We even had boyfriends with the same name. With the weight of sadness on my eyes, I had to put the diary down. I slid under the covers and snuggled against Sam, and I fell asleep.
In my unconsciousness, I ran for an entire night through empty, moonlit streets. I was running from a dark, shrouded figure, who no matter how hard I ran seemed to catch up to me despite standing perfectly still. I woke up frequently throughout the night and listened to Sam’s soft snores to calm my heart.
4
Sam was wide-eyed when I told him what I learned about my uncle. He had to know more and urged me to continue reading.
“I need to slow down. The entries gave me nightmares,” I informed him with a kiss on his cheek. He smelled like maple syrup and coffee. I grabbed his empty dish from the table and rinsed it off in the kitchen sink.
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. I dreamt that someone kept trying to hurt me. He chased me everywhere. And oddly enough, when I woke up this morning I still felt the sensation that someone was watching me. Even now I get that sense. It’s touch-and-go.”
“Yeah, something as traumatic as your uncle’s story could have that effect. Don’t worry, though! I’m here to protect you,” he grinned as he glided toward me, planting a big, sticky, syrupy kiss on my cheek. I wiped it off playfully.
It was Saturday, which meant I had the day to myself since I didn’t work weekends and Sam had Saturday meetings. I nestled into the couch with a cup of coffee and opened my uncle’s journal.
August 13th, 1985
Sam has been showing increased strength and health, so today he got his blood checked at a new clinic. His results came back negative, as if he never had the virus to begin with. He has been beaming with joy. He won’t tell me how he did it, but he promises me that I will be taken care of soon. I’m starting to feel hope that maybe this witch-doctor-magic works, while at the same time I feel dread that it might all be a coincidence. I wonder if his first test was a false positive and that I am still doomed, but there is no way he wasn’t positive. He was sick and fainting and he also started to show spots.
I also feel a sense of dread that I am being watched, especially when I am alone. I have had nightmares that I can’t remember. It’s as if the healthier Sam gets, the worse my health becomes. My eyes have begun to sink and my lips have started to curl in. I’ve aged a decade and the spots are starting to appear in places that I can't conceal. I’m going to lose my job and my apartment. My parents could lose their business. I don’t know what to do.
Reading about my uncle’s nightmares and his sense of dread made the hairs on the back of my neck stand.
All at once I could sense a presence in the room behind me, and I could hear its raspy breathing. I squeezed the journal and gritted my teeth. The presence had a malicious vibe and I felt the fight-or-flight adrenaline intensify my pulse. As the dangerous aura grew closer to me, I could hear the raspy breath getting louder and louder. I was as still as a statue.
Eventually, the tension became too great, so I screamed. I bolted for the front door, and as soon as I opened it, a kneeling figure stood up.
“AHHHHHH,” I screamed.
“Babe, are you okay?” Sam asked as he dusted off his knees. He pulled me in for a hug.
“Yeah,” I think something is in our apartment. Let’s go!” I pleaded. Sam pushed past me and searched our entire place until every room and corner had been checked.
“Babe, there is no one here. Have you been watching scary movies lately?” Seeing that the apartment was empty, I was able to relax. Having Sam there with me made me feel safe, but not so safe that I could shake the feeling of danger. The sensation I felt couldn’t have been fake. Perhaps, I thought, I might have been letting my uncle’s experiences get to me.
Sam and I spent the evening exercising, cooking, and watching TV until we passed out.
5
I was a little wary of Sam leaving me the next day. He loved to go hiking alone as it helped him recharge. I never quite shook that feeling from the previous night, and I feared that the presence would reappear with Sam not there. As he waved goodbye and closed the door behind him, I grabbed my uncle’s journal and began reading.
August 17th, 1985
I woke up in the middle of the night to something disturbing. For the past week, I have felt stalked by an unknown presence, and I spoke with Sam about it only for him to assure me I was having hallucinations from the virus. Last night I could hear him talking to someone on the other side of our room. Their conversation was so low that it was unintelligible, but I could detect Sam’s voice and an unfamiliar shrill, raspy voice.
I woke up this morning with an uneasy feeling. Something in the pit of my stomach tells me not to trust Sam. I feel like I am a mouse in a tank and Sam is a python waiting to strike. Something tells me to run, but I am so disfigured with spots that going anywhere would be impossible. I am close to death. I can feel it.
Reading my uncle’s journal entries related to his sickness filled me with too much grief. I had to take a moment and put a pause on it. Sam hated doing laundry, so I figured that I would surprise him and wash all of his pants while he was out. As I lifted each pair, the memories of him throughout that past week warmed my heart. One of my worst habits is one of my best habits: I thoroughly checked my pockets before I put clothes in the washing machine, and as I slid my hand into Sam’s blue jeans, I dropped them immediately and let out a loud scream.
A dead snake jutted out of his pocket. If there is one thing I am absolutely terrified of, it’s snakes. Why would Sam bring this thing home if he knew how much they frightened me? Was he planning on playing a horrible prank on me? That would have been cruel, and Sam was never cruel. Through tears, I put on gloves and buried the snake behind our apartment complex.
When Sam got home, I asked him about the snake.
“Oh my goodness, I am so sorry I scared you,” he soothed. “I forgot that I had it in my pockets. I was walking a trail and picked it up so it wouldn’t frighten any hikers.” I was still uneasy about the situation, but I forgave him.
Throughout the week, I started noticing weird things in our home. Small animal teeth were left on our porch one evening and there were squashed spiders around our place, for which I scolded Sam. He knew how I felt about killing creatures. “Capture and release,” I reminded him.
6
I was beginning to wonder whether my uncle’s journal was cursed because as his sanity declined, my hallucinations increased. I could swear that I would wake up in the middle of the night and see a shadow darting out of our room. I had unexplained nosebleeds at least twice a day, and Sam started talking in his sleep. His sleep talk wasn’t the occasional word or phrase; instead, he would mumble full conversations with someone in his dreams. What was off-putting about his conversations was that there was another voice he would create to answer himself, so I started to sleep on the couch after he passed out.
“Babe, is there something wrong between us?” he asked leadingly one morning after he woke up in bed alone. We spent the morning talking about my feelings and my uncle’s journal. He was ever the attentive listener, and the relief he felt that he wasn't the root of my anxiety was palpable. Sam perked up when I revealed that Chris’ boyfriend shared his name, and he consoled me when I told him about the strange sensations I would feel after I read my uncle’s entries.
“You are the most important thing to me,” he assured me. "I know it's difficult to learn what you did about your uncle, but I am proud of you and I am here for you." He gave me a kiss.
We agreed that since there was one final entry in the journal, I should read it while Sam was home.
September 20th, 1985
I have been trapped in my room for two weeks. Today Sam tells me I am to die as soon as the sun sets, and he has given me my journal to write my final thoughts. I have seen the devilish figure that has been lurking in our home. His name is Moloch, Sam told me. The demon’s eyes pierce with the intensity of hot irons and his presence renders me paralyzed. I am scared speechless when he is around, so I don’t complain that Sam has locked me in our room.
I have also learned I never had the virus to begin with. Sam made a deal with this creature to have the virus transferred from him and placed in me. I'm too weak and too sick to feel angry. For this curse to stick, Sam must make two sacrifices with my blood. One with my death, and the other with the death of one of my descendents. This curse is supposed to grant him immortality.
I hope he is miserable the entire time. I wish I could warn my family that they are in danger. That their children will be in danger…
I stopped reading. I tossed the journal into the corner of my room as if it were a venomous insect. Immediately the room went dark and that recurring, dreadful feeling took over my consciousness. In the room I could feel a presence leering at me and the deep, hateful breaths it took.
Despite the demonic, raspy breathing becoming audible from behind me, I wasn’t panicking and my heart wasn’t racing. Instead, my vision became blurry and my pulse weakened. I remembered that Sam insisted on brewing the coffee for me that morning and how it tasted like almonds, and how he innocently told me he had used almond milk for creamer. I slipped into unconsciousness.
7
“Good morning, babe,” Sam greeted me as I opened my eyes. He kissed me on the forehead and gave me some water. I felt the relief of sunlight as it illuminated the room, and I was comforted by the softness of our mattress and the safety of Sam’s presence. I swallowed the water gratefully, and nearly giggled from the joy of having only experienced a terrifying nightmare. Of course my boyfriend would never poison me, nor would he sacrifice me to a demon! I was so overcome with happiness that I leapt up to kiss Sam, but I couldn’t budge. I was bound to the bed with ropes.
“Sam?” There was panic in my voice.
“I’m so glad you read Chris’ diary,” he cooed. “It would have been impossible to tell you face to face.”
“Why?” I sobbed. The reality hit me: my uncle’s murderer was my immortal boyfriend, and he was going to kill me too.
“I didn’t want to die. And I still don’t.” He stared into my eyes as if he was searching for forgiveness. “I really loved your uncle. And I really love you, too." There was a long pause in which he looked my body over. "It kills me to do this.”
To the tune of his deep sobs, he revealed a long, sharp razor and held it above my chest. As the pointy metal reached the height of his arm span, the sunlight was sucked from the room and replaced with a dull, bitter light. From the corner of the room, I could hear the raspy breaths of Moloch, and the dreadful sensation of doom sunk into the pit of my stomach. Unable to move, I begged for my life.
“Do you really love me?” I asked
“I do.” He was crying, and his tone indicated that he was offended that I could ever doubt that. “I love you more than anything. I have been promised your soul will be spared after your death. I’m only doing this to avoid hell.” He sniffled and wiped his eyes with the same hand that held the blade. I looked around as much as the binding would allow, and I noticed that I was lying in the middle of a circle formed by candles.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” he whimpered. He held the blade above his head once more.
“Wait!” I begged. “Please, just give me one more kiss.” He obliged. He kissed me deeply and passionately, and I coaxed his tongue into my mouth, and as soon as it was all the way in I bit down on it as hard as I could, severing it from his head.
It was the most disgusting thing. The warm, thick, metallic blood from his tongue nearly choked me despite my best efforts to spit it out quickly. Sam was wailing in agony, caressing his face.
The dark, demonic figure that lurked in the room had made his way to the circle. His presence was so foreboding that I felt as if a tornado was forming just a few feet from me. Above Sam’s screaming, the demon spoke.
“Blood has been spilt in the sacrificial space. Your life is spared,” he told me, and he turned on Sam, whose screaming only intensified. The sound of Sam’s choking on his own blood was accompanied by his panicked yelps and the squelching of his flesh being torn apart. I closed my eyes to avoid seeing the carnage, but I could feel warm blood splattering all over my body.
When the demon had finished devouring Sam, he left. I felt the bonds loosen, and I was able to free myself. I couldn’t believe my eyes, but I saw the blood, candles, and satanic imagery vanish. My apartment was clean.
A week passed and I was once again visited by Moloch, who had taken a much less terrifying form. I was looking into the eyes of my boyfriend, Sam. The demon promised that if I kept his secret, I would be free to live my life while he went about the world in Sam's form. And that’s what I intended to do.
I planned a trip to visit with my mom and I told her about my findings in the journal… well…at least the parts about Uncle Chris’ AIDS.
In a prayer, I promised him that I would demand his story be acknowledged in truth by his family. I also promised him I would live the rest of my lfe in a way that honored his memory. I sat his picture on top of my dresser and smiled. He and I were closer than any two family members could be. Shared trauma does that to people.
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