The Beast Sleeps Down in Georgia
By Sophia Flamoe

      The car pulls into the lot, gravel crunching and spraying, scattering in the wake of the Michelin tires. It’s red—the car—waxed until glossy, but deep, like fresh blood. Drip, drip, dripping from the hide of the beast. 
      When Kell and I step out of my 1967 Dodge Coronet, the scent of freshly turned soil, stale cigarettes, and the general putrid air of squalor barrels into me, so pungent in the thick humid air, I can practically feel it take up residence in my hair.  
      “You’re sure this is the story?” Kell asks, for what must be the millionth time, pulling a face at the smell, and dropping a hand protectively over his Arri Amira camera as if it will permanently disfigure the lenses or the settings or whatever other priceless parts that small fortune of a camera contains. Maybe it will. How should I know? Kell knows how to work the camera; I know how to work the audience. Or the story. Whatever.  
      A story isn’t good until I say it’s good. And if I’m in it, it's good. If I’m in it, it’ll sell.  
      “Just hold the camera, Kell. And try to get my good side this time. None of that shit like on the Queen Mary. I swear, I’ll never forgive you if I see my right-side profile on this weeks’ footage.”  
      I think I hear him mumble something about establishing shots or b-roll footage under his breath, but the sound is lost to a high keening howl somewhere to my right, in the thicket of trees, and the darkness lingering within. 
      “It sounds like it’s in pain.” Kell says, concern coloring his tone. Ever the empath. 
      “It’s a wild animal, Kell. It can take care of its—” 
      But the grumble of a deep inhuman growl cuts me off. Loud and uncanny. Setting my teeth on edge. 
      After a moment of silence, Kell finally breaks, his tone changing, “And you’re sure we had to come at dusk?” 
      “Spook factor.” I answer, reapplying my lip liner in my car’s sparklingly clear mirror. “If you’re scared, they’re scared. And that’s how we make our money.” I shoot a pointed look at Kell, then up at the ever-darkening sky. “Clock is ticking, though.” 
      And just like that, Kell gets in place for the establishing shots of the land, the shop, and me—my lipliner intact—stepping out of my shiny red convertible, then a pan to the sign on top of the shack in front of me. Really, there’s no better word for it. Aged wood, crumbling shingles. Streaky windowpanes, and a porch that is so saggy I’m shocked it didn’t collapse when I looked at it.  
      Belladonna Oddities and Curiosities. 
      Kell gets the crunch of gravel under my heeled boots, the sound of the car door as it clicks shut, and, as I walk through the front door, the tinging of the bell, signaling our entrance into the store.  
      So it begins.  
      “Welcome in, folks, unfortunately, cameras and filming equipment of any kind are not permitted.” The voice is sticky sweet, syrup-y and southern. So painfully, stereotypically southern I almost laugh out loud. But, of course, that would be rude. And I have a store owner to win over. 
      No cameras or filming equipment. 
      God. This again. 
      When I found the subforum on reddit talking about Belladonna Oddities and Curiosities—its strange presence, and unsettling aura of the owner and the novelties inside—I thought I had struck the next big thing in horror media. I reached out via email to the owner; they didn’t even have a phone to call, just the one @yahoo.com email, and a two-weeks-in-limbo response speed. What a joke. They’d told me the same thing. No filming, no cameras. For the safety and privacy of our store and our patrons. How they expect to get anywhere in this digital age is beyond me.  
      I look to the woman manning the counter and have to reel in a laugh once again. Except it’s not funny. It’s not funny at all. She is going to ruin my shot. What with her clearly gray-but-died-bubble-gum-pink-hair, cropped to just below her chin, sunshine yellow space-goggle-esque glasses, and rainbow animal print explosion… dress. Pinafore? Apron? She is an absurdly, offensively bright presence in an otherwise perfect atmosphere of aesthetic oddities and dark academia. Her only saving grace here is that one eye, almost entirely hidden behind her space age glasses which is white blind. Almost creepy, and yet, nothing to write home about. She does not fit. This is so not going how I’d pictured.  
      “Cut the camera, Kell.” I whisper to him, before pasting on the widest, fakest smile I can muster. “Well hi!” I call, almost imitating her southern drawl, but with out all that dorky honkey-tonk whatever. Her accent has to be a façade for customers. She can’t possibly look and sound like that. “My name’s Eva, this is my friend Kell. I believe you and I have been in contact over email about my coming and reporting on your fine store.” 
      If at all possible, it seems the woman’s smile grows wider, the corners stretching her cheeks into an almost unnatural point, her glassy eyes lighting up. “I’m afraid I’m not the owner, ma’am, just watching over the store today for Mr. Belladonna, as he’s out with a nasty cold, poor old man. And he just recovered from that awful case of the flu he had, what terrible timing, though I suppose it really is going around town, isn’t it, and Mrs. Wall has been saying she feels some unnatural, evil energy coming our way, and—” 
      Jesus Christ, “Look, Ms…” I break in, trying to squash the monologue she was clearly gearing up for. Why she thinks I would care to hear about Mr. Belladonna’s nasty cold or awful flu, or even Mrs. Wall and her spooky predictions, I could not hazard a guess. 
      “Oh please, honey, call me Mrs. Sunny.” She has a sort-of-lisp, I realize, from an overly long, lean tongue, so her s’s become elongated hisses. Almost serpentine. “Oh! Haha! Honey and Sunny, well wasn’t that just a funny little rhyme! And I didn’t even mean to, really! I do just crack myself up.” She doubles over in laughter, as though it is just the funniest joke she’s ever heard. The old building around us gives a creak and a thump, as if laughing with her. 
      There is just no way. It’s just my luck to get stuck with a rambling, hysterical old maid, intent on wasting my time and money. Although… Over email with the owner, I may not have been able to convince him to let us film, but this woman… this overly bright, friendly, past-due southern belle just might be gullible enough to let us. After all, she said it herself, she doesn’t own this shop, she doesn’t know the rules.  
      “Mrs. Sunny, Mr. Belladonna must have forgotten to tell you we were coming! We’ve been in contact over the past few weeks discussing the story. This town is just so beautiful, and I truly believe the world needs to see it! Kell and I are travel and lifestyle reporters.” Lie. “The whole internet is interested in the story behind Belladonna Oddities and Curiosities, but we think there is so much more in—” It takes me a second to remember the name of this tiny, insignificant town, “Tallulah Falls.” Population almost nothing, and nothing else worth coming to see but this shop, but she doesn’t need to know I think that. “He agreed to let me film inside his shop, since he knew how important this story would be for Tallulah Falls.” Lie, lie, lie.  
      “Well, I’m not sure… Mr. Belladonna was very thorough in his instructions for me today… surely he wouldn’t have forgotten to tell me about reporters coming to town…” She absentmindedly starts fixing her hair and swiping at her clothes. As if that will iron out whatever’s wrong with her. 
      “Please, we’ve driven such a long way to be here, and I know that it was important to Mr. Belladonna that I cover Tallulah Falls. He cares so deeply about the town and the people in it... And what’s the harm, truly? If we just take a few photos. I want to put Tallulah Falls on the map! Just picture the kind of business and publicity this story could bring in. Belladonna Oddities and Curiosities is the hook, the mysterious intrigue to a tiny town, but I want to capture it all, show the world what else they’re missing in Tallulah Falls.” I know I’m laying it on pretty thick, but Mrs. Sunny is just eating it up. Her eyes going distant, that unsettlingly wide smile still plastered on her face.  
      “Well… I suppose if it’s for the good of Tallu—” 
      I don’t let her finish, “Wonderful! Thank you so much, I am going to take Kell here, and start our first walk through of the store!” 
      And with that, I grab Kell’s clammy hand and yank him behind me into the nearest aisle. It’s the first time I’ve been able to get a good look at the store since we got here. Racks upon racks, rows upon rows of the strangest, most grotesque items I have ever seen. Next to my head, a taxidermied rat chases a taxidermied cat, but their proportions and poses are all wrong. Neck’s bent at unnatural angles, eyes in glassy slits. On my other side, a jar of eyeballs sits—something I thought only existed in movies. But the jar is cracked, the gray-green liquid they’re floating in dripping onto the shelf, then the floor, and reeking of something rotten. In fact, I don’t know how I didn’t notice it before, but the whole place smells like decay. As if seeping up through the floorboards and out of every strange manner of object lining their walls. And wow, do those walls stretch far. So much larger on the inside than it appeared on the out. I can hardly see the end, as if those unlit corners stretch on forever. It’s dizzying. And so hot. Was it always this hot? Pushing in around me, shoving the thick smell of old and dead into my brain. 
      I wanted to make some comment about Mrs. Sunny, but all thoughts of her are pushed from my head as I take it all in.  
      “What the hell?” I breathe. The sound of my voice cutting through the unnatural quiet that I hadn’t realized had settled over us. Kell at my back, his ghostly, clammy hand still clutched in mine, squeezed until I can feel his bones. It must hurt. It has to, but Kell has made no indication. In fact, Kell has made no movement or sound since we entered the store. “Kell?” I whisper, finally turning to look at him, and trying to make my voice so quiet it all but disappears. 
      I am met with the wide, glassy eyed stare of my camera man. But it’s not right. It’s not right at all. His Amira—his $48,000 Arri Amira—is dangling limply from his fingers, almost touching the grimy, dirt crusted floor, as though forgotten, as though he does not care. Screen still on and lit up to show the last image it captured. A still from the end of our opening footage, from the first moment we stepped into the store: the back of my head just in frame, the expanse of strange curiosities consuming the rest. 
      His face is inches from mine. Those glassy eyes staring, wide and intent. When I meet them, his face cracks into a wide, loopy smile, similar to Mrs. Sunny’s. His cheeks straining. I stare at him, unable to move, unable to breathe, waiting for him to break, waiting for him to start laughing because this is some funny joke. Some prank he’s pulling. But it’s not funny. It’s not funny at all, and when he breaks, I’m going to strangle him for trying to scare me like this. He is so not as funny as he thinks. 
      “Why don’t I show Kell around the store so he can get some good footage?” I practically jump out of my skin, dropping Kell’s hand, and whirling around to find Mrs. Sunny standing behind me; her smile still plastered in place. 
      The quiet settles over us again, and I realize I’m supposed to speak. Speak for Kell. “Uhm ok,” I give a small, nervous laugh. “Sure. Yeah. That would be great.”  
      Before I can even finish getting the words out, Mrs. Sunny’s hand shoots out towards us, and I flinch. But she is only reaching for Kell’s hand to usher him away. And he takes it. Obediently. Like a trained dog. He doesn’t even look at me, his camera still limp in his hand, and as she pulls him away, I watch as the lens slips through the green-gray sludge from the jar of eyes, still drip, drip, dripping away. 
      And then I am alone. In this empty aisle. The store so large, so empty, so quiet. I strain to hear their retreating footsteps. Or the sound of Kell’s voice as he should inevitably be over-explaining a million things about lighting, and angle, and aperture. But nothing.  
      Nothing at all. 
      I lean against the edge of the shelf with the rat and the cat, careful to not actually touch them, and try to catch my breath. But a thump to my left jolts me right back up, my neck cracking as I whip my head to the sound.  
      Nothing.  
      One heartbeat. 
      Nothing. 
      I strain my eyes through the gloom. 
      Is it getting darker? 
      Another heartbeat. 
      Nothing. 
      Nothing, nothing, nothing, 
      Of course. I’m being silly. It’s an old building. I said so myself. Old building’s creak. I’m fine. It’s fine. I’m being silly. This is my job. I investigate creepy and haunted things for a living. If I can’t handle a little strangeness from the places I’m investigating, I’m in the wrong business. And I am wasting my time. Kell will be getting his footage, and I need to be crafting my narrative. The angle I am going to take here. 
      Dead-end small town boasts creepy, skin crawling oddities shop; it stinks but you’ll have a great time with the taxidermy! 
      I pull out my phone and start down the aisle, turning the flashlight on to cut through the gloom that is seeping in at every corner. 
      I decide to start at the back. Make a full loop of the perimeter, then wind my way through the center. Down, and down and down the aisle I walk, my footsteps echoing on the linoleum flooring. Somehow—somehow—the smell is getting worse. And so are the items. A taxidermied dog that is stuffed like roadkill, a tire mark through its stomach, blood matting its fur. Fake flies dotting its head and maw, as if feasting on its flesh.  
      Creepy? Yes. Like any other oddity shop I’ve been to? Not in the slightest.

      Farther back, I spot a painting of a family. It almost seems absurdly out of place, next to the other pseudo-dead things, what with the bright valley background they stand in, and their wildly colorful clothing. Rainbows, and animal print. And they’re all smiling. I open my phone camera to take a picture but stop dead in my tracks. Their smiles… wide, and unnatural. Uncanny. Eyes glassy and wide.  
      Like Kell. Like Mrs. Sunny.  
      A scream cuts through the thick silence like a gunshot. Loud and keening. Like a wild animal. Like a dog. I jump so hard; my phone falls from my hand and clatters to the floor. Landing with a sickening crack, before sliding under a shelf.  
      Then it all goes silent and still again. 
      Completely and utterly. 
      Fuck this. 
      I’m getting out of here.  
      Fuck.  
      I’m finding Kell and we are getting out of here. 
      Fuck. 
      I’m finding my phone for its flashlight because it is so damn dark in here, finding Kell, and we are getting the fuck out of here.  
      Maybe I’ll look back and laugh for my cowardice, maybe I’ll curse myself for running from a good story because of a few spooky objects and a weird shop attendant, but it doesn’t feel like just a few spooky objects and a weird shop attendant. It feels like something old and wrong. It feels like I may never get out if I don’t try right now. 
      I don’t want to touch that floor, I don’t want to reach under that shelf. I don’t want to put my back to everything around me. But it's so dark back here. Too dark. And I’ll need maps to get out of this forsaken town.  
      I need my stupid phone.  
      And fuck, where the hell is Kell? And what the fuck is going on in here?  
      As quickly as I can, I get to my knees, and then lower, shove my chest into the ground, and reach blindly under the shelf. Heart hammering so hard I can feel it in my throat and in my eyes. I can feel it pulsing through me, squashed between my bones and the floor. I feel around the dank and dusty underbelly of the shelf. 
      Fuck, fuck, fuck! Where is it? 
      At the exact moment I feel my hand connect with the now shattered glass of my phone screen, I see it.  
      A pair of glassy, wide eyes, staring back at me from under the shelf. 
      Staring, staring, staring. 
      “Fuck!” I yelp, hands curling around my phone, and body, on pure animalistic instinct, jerking back so violently, I crash into the shelf behind me, sending its contents cascading to the floor, and cracking my head against the wood. Stars explode around my vision, and a ringing begins in my ears, but nothing so loud as to drown out the sound I now hear. 
      The sound I should have heard all along. A hissing and slithering and crackling along the floor to my left, and a low keening growl, tingling up my spine and through my body, to my right.  
      I make it to my feet. I am clutching something in my hand, but it is sharp. It must be glass. Something shattered, because I feel the biting sting as it cuts into my palm. I drop it on instinct. 
      And I start to run. 
      But where can I run? 
      I feel it in my bones. That heat surrounding me, the humidity of it seeping into me. The ground is moving under my feet. Shifting and pulsing like breathing. Like being in the belly of the beast. 
      The beast is dark.  
      The beast is hungry. 
      The hissing catches up to me. 
      It fills my brain. 
      My eyes. 
      The keening growl I can feel in my stomach. 
      In my mouth. 
      It sounds like a scream. 
      It sounds like nothing. 
      Nothing at all.