Bogleech.com"s 2015 Horror Write-off:
" The Weird Hair "
Submitted by Austin B.
I used to have something of a picking problem. Just when I was younger, of course, not anymore. I just couldn’t seem to help myself. Scabs didn’t last long on me, but wounds took at least twice as long to heal as they should have. When I was a teenager, it was zits. Not just on my face, but on my legs, my chest, my back. But I’ve squeezed all that out of my system. Okay, maybe I still look for zits to pop in the mirror every once in a while. But at least I’m not my roommate, who’s always plucking hairs. Always with the tweezers, pluck pluck pluck. Leaving little hairs everywhere. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why.
Anyway, right, the story. I was getting out of the shower when I saw it. Right between my left nipple and my armpit. A hair, longer and thicker than the others. And black. I’ve got very light, fair hair, so it really stood out. My first thought was that it was one of my roommates hairs, as I tried to brush it off, disgusted. But, no, it really was attached to me. Ugh, it had to go. I tried to pull it out, but it wasn’t that easy. I couldn’t seem to get a grip on it, it kept slipping through my fingers. I let it go, got dressed went about my day. But I saw it again the next time I showered. I felt something about that hair, something sinister. This time I wasn’t fooling around, I went right for the tweezers.
But I couldn’t find them. My roommate was away for the week, visiting family. Must’ve taken the tweezers with them. Again I resorted to using my fingers. Pinching and squeezing with my nails. The skin around the hair started to bleed. But still I couldn’t get a hold of it. I decided to just ignore it. But as time went on, it got harder and harder to ignore. I saw it every time I took my shirt off, and I felt more and more compelled to just get it out of me. Something deep and instinctual, almost. I found myself loosing time picking at it. I spent over an hour in the bathroom one morning trying to get it, I ended up missing my whole first class. By then there was an inflamed patch about the size of a quarter around the hair by then, and even though rationally I knew that it was probably from digging at this hair so much, part of my mind justified it as being because of the hair, it really was a problem, it had to go.
I seriously considered calling a doctor, but what would I say? “help I have this weird hair I can’t pluck, I need a surgeon” ?
I was about to give up and put my shirt back on and go get some food or whatever, when I got one more good, firm hold on it. I teased it out a little, feeling twinges of pain as the skin around the base of the hair stretch. As I pulled, the tension seemed to go deeper. And deeper, until finally, I felt a snap somewhere near the lower back of my ribcage.
Relief! Sudden, euphoric relief! I could go back to my life! I was a regular person again, I could go out and eat and sleep and study and do sane things like before. I kind of stood there for a second or two, reveling in it, before I realized what I had done to my self.
Where the hair had been, there was a quarter sized hole. I couldn’t see the end of it. It bled, but not as violently as such a deep wound should have. It just sort of oozed, like a scab that had been peeled off, and the pain matched- not intense, just a dull ache that stretched all the way through my abdomen towards my lower back.
What was in my hand was worse. I still held the hair and attached to it was something like a carrot made of flesh. Veins dangled from it like pulled roots. A milky eye gazed out of a fold of flesh, and a single row of teeth jutted from one side.
My head spun. The hand holding the hair-tumor-thing shook, but couldn’t let go.
Blood from the wound was running down my chest. I suppressed a gag and leaned on the sink to keep from collapsing. I heard someone say “What the fresh Hell…!?”
A spasm ran down the fleshy hair in my hand. It jerked and cracked itself like a whip, sliping from my hand and almost gracefully springing off the toilet’s handle into the already flushing bowl.
I could have sworn it’s blind eye winked at me
I fell to my knees, and my roommate rushed up to me. She had been the one who yelled.
“….guda…aarf” I managed, but I protested when she tried to drag me to the toilet, so she helped me to my feet to get in the sink.
I finished and sank back to the bathroom floor. She sat next to me crosslegged, rubbing my back. “H-how are you so calm?” I sputtered. She lifted one of her pant legs, revealing a puckered, quarter sized scar on her calf.
After a few minutes of sitting there, we finally stood up. She held my shoulders and gave me a reassuring smile… but then her face froze. She was looking behind me. I craned my neck around to follow her gaze. In the mirror…
There, beneath my right shoulder blade.
Three thick black hairs growing from the same root. A shudder ran through me, and I saw a ripple spread through my flesh in three directions.
One zigzagged through my stomach into my thigh.
Another ran right down my arm.
The last went up my neck and coiled in the back of my head.
Anyway, right, the story. I was getting out of the shower when I saw it. Right between my left nipple and my armpit. A hair, longer and thicker than the others. And black. I’ve got very light, fair hair, so it really stood out. My first thought was that it was one of my roommates hairs, as I tried to brush it off, disgusted. But, no, it really was attached to me. Ugh, it had to go. I tried to pull it out, but it wasn’t that easy. I couldn’t seem to get a grip on it, it kept slipping through my fingers. I let it go, got dressed went about my day. But I saw it again the next time I showered. I felt something about that hair, something sinister. This time I wasn’t fooling around, I went right for the tweezers.
But I couldn’t find them. My roommate was away for the week, visiting family. Must’ve taken the tweezers with them. Again I resorted to using my fingers. Pinching and squeezing with my nails. The skin around the hair started to bleed. But still I couldn’t get a hold of it. I decided to just ignore it. But as time went on, it got harder and harder to ignore. I saw it every time I took my shirt off, and I felt more and more compelled to just get it out of me. Something deep and instinctual, almost. I found myself loosing time picking at it. I spent over an hour in the bathroom one morning trying to get it, I ended up missing my whole first class. By then there was an inflamed patch about the size of a quarter around the hair by then, and even though rationally I knew that it was probably from digging at this hair so much, part of my mind justified it as being because of the hair, it really was a problem, it had to go.
I seriously considered calling a doctor, but what would I say? “help I have this weird hair I can’t pluck, I need a surgeon” ?
I was about to give up and put my shirt back on and go get some food or whatever, when I got one more good, firm hold on it. I teased it out a little, feeling twinges of pain as the skin around the base of the hair stretch. As I pulled, the tension seemed to go deeper. And deeper, until finally, I felt a snap somewhere near the lower back of my ribcage.
Relief! Sudden, euphoric relief! I could go back to my life! I was a regular person again, I could go out and eat and sleep and study and do sane things like before. I kind of stood there for a second or two, reveling in it, before I realized what I had done to my self.
Where the hair had been, there was a quarter sized hole. I couldn’t see the end of it. It bled, but not as violently as such a deep wound should have. It just sort of oozed, like a scab that had been peeled off, and the pain matched- not intense, just a dull ache that stretched all the way through my abdomen towards my lower back.
What was in my hand was worse. I still held the hair and attached to it was something like a carrot made of flesh. Veins dangled from it like pulled roots. A milky eye gazed out of a fold of flesh, and a single row of teeth jutted from one side.
My head spun. The hand holding the hair-tumor-thing shook, but couldn’t let go.
Blood from the wound was running down my chest. I suppressed a gag and leaned on the sink to keep from collapsing. I heard someone say “What the fresh Hell…!?”
A spasm ran down the fleshy hair in my hand. It jerked and cracked itself like a whip, sliping from my hand and almost gracefully springing off the toilet’s handle into the already flushing bowl.
I could have sworn it’s blind eye winked at me
I fell to my knees, and my roommate rushed up to me. She had been the one who yelled.
“….guda…aarf” I managed, but I protested when she tried to drag me to the toilet, so she helped me to my feet to get in the sink.
I finished and sank back to the bathroom floor. She sat next to me crosslegged, rubbing my back. “H-how are you so calm?” I sputtered. She lifted one of her pant legs, revealing a puckered, quarter sized scar on her calf.
After a few minutes of sitting there, we finally stood up. She held my shoulders and gave me a reassuring smile… but then her face froze. She was looking behind me. I craned my neck around to follow her gaze. In the mirror…
There, beneath my right shoulder blade.
Three thick black hairs growing from the same root. A shudder ran through me, and I saw a ripple spread through my flesh in three directions.
One zigzagged through my stomach into my thigh.
Another ran right down my arm.
The last went up my neck and coiled in the back of my head.