You don’t need a lot or words to make a big impact on a story – you just need the right words. 500 pages or, in these 13 cases, just a few sentences, it doesn’t matter.
If you’ve got something scary, bring the goods and the goosebumps will find your readers.
13. I screamed a little.
It sat on my shelf, with thoughtless porcelain eyes and the prettiest pink doll dress I could find.
Why did she have to be born still?
12. Parents have nightmares, too.
I begin tucking him into bed and he tells me, “Daddy check for monsters under my bed.”
I look underneath for his amusement and see him, another him, under the bed, staring back at me quivering and whispering, “Daddy there’s somebody on my bed.”
11. It’s always a face.
The grinning face stared at me from the darkness beyond my bedroom window.
I live on the 14th floor.
10. There’s a whole story here.
The doctors told the amputee he might experience a phantom limb from time to time.
Nobody prepared him for the moments though, when he felt cold fingers brush across his phantom hand.
9. Definitely a ghost.
There was a picture in my phone of me sleeping.
I live alone.
8. Speaks to a primal fear.
I can’t move, breathe, speak or hear and it’s so dark all the time.
If I knew it would be this lonely, I would have been cremated instead.
7. Only one sentence. Boom.
I just saw my reflection blink.
6. Never look up.
Don’t be scared of the monsters, just look for them.
Look to your left, to your right, under your bed, behind your dresser, in your closet but never look up, she hates being seen.
5. Ghost stories, man.
Working the night shift alone tonight.
There is a face in the cellar staring at the security camera.
4. It’s the “again” that does it.
I woke up to hear knocking on glass.
At first, I though it was the window until I heard it come from the mirror again.
3. 80s kids everywhere know a party is about to start.
They delivered the mannequins in bubble wrap.
From the main room I begin to hear popping.
2. I don’t like that at all.
They celebrated the first successful cryogenic freezing.
He had no way of letting them know he was still conscious.
1. It wasn’t me.
She asked why I was breathing so heavily.
I wasn’t.
Some of these sent a shiver straight down my spine!
Which one got to you the most? Tell us in the comments.
