Golden Petals
I first noticed the flower graffiti on walls throughout the city about a year ago, but didn’t really think much about it until my friend Carl Kane disappeared. When I visited his house after weeks of not hearing from him, I found painted on his door, a golden flower.
The neighbors did not really know who Carl was and were bothered when I asked, especially when I bought up the golden flower. A lady who sat on her stoop two houses down from Carl’s shook her head and retreated inside. She turned as if to say something on the matter, but instead closed the door. I heard the bolt being thrown into place, followed by the clattering of a chain lock, then one more bolt; I guess for good measure.
That was a little over a week ago, and I must say that I now am no longer concerned or curious, but instead living in true terror as I know that I can no longer run. After the horrors I witnessed then, there exist a part of me that wishes to continue to move and never look back. Yet, it seems no matter the distance I put between myself and the events that started all this, I am haunted by a new golden rose every morning. I feel that the only way to stop this madness, is to witness just what it means.
I plan to fill the time before my deletion with typing all of what I witnessed that night. In hopes that it will save someone somewhere. For if you find a golden rose and dig further in the matter, it may already be too late.
After the lady left me outside her front door, I met a girl by the name of Lorine Quincy. She was an odd girl in that she was very eccentric and hand wavy about almost all topics, save for the golden rose and music. We met at a bodega down the street. I was fixing a coffee, and she was scratching off cheap lotto tickets and talking about music with the clerk, Nick. They were in an intense discussion about a music group called the ZenoFits. I took interest when I heard her mention a song called ”Golden Petals”. Upon asking about it she was thrilled to find another a fan of the group although I had not heard of the band at all.
She invited me to the park down the street to meet up with some of her friends and on the way she played me the song. It started with a long twangy guitar intro, with a slight electronic rhythm pulsing behind it. The sounds of which was off putting as it bounced from highs to lows in syncopation against the methodical drive of the guitar. I tried to ask her about the melody, but was quickly met with a shush. At last the guitar rang out one lone note, which seemed to hang in the air as the wild electronic rhythm continued higher. It faded into a low hiss which reminded me of white static on old television sets when the cable cut out. My jaw grimaced and my neck shrank in on itself in discomfort when at last it finally stopped and a low bass kicked hard into a different more pleasing pattern. The guitar came back as well this time with some distortion amongst the notes.
Golden the eyes
Wild as the rain she goes
Streaks in the night
Old as the moss that growssss
Hunagruuu
Hunagruuu
Knowsss
Souls to eat
Gold Petals to fall in bows
Come to the meet
Your fear is as far as it goessssss
Hunagruuu
Hunagruuu
Knowsss
It was mesmerizing to the point where I almost collided into pole as the last knows echoed out of Lorine’s phone. She laughed at my clumsiness and continued about how great the song was. I remarked in kind but was curious about the group itself. She told me they don’t actually come out on stage and wasn’t even sure how many are in the group itself. Just that their live performances are “life changing”. The stage is always completely dark save for a lone golden light that searches over the crowd. A thin black curtain is drawn across the platform itself to cut out any foreign light that would attempt to break through the darkness.
We met her three friends at the park: Cora, Elizabeth, and Maggy. All of whom were equally into the ZenoFits. I asked them about the Golden Petals and if they had any connection to the Gold Flowers that I’ve been seeing graffiti’d around town, specifically doors. The four of them looked between each other with wide excited eyes. Lorine cracked a smile and told me that I should come along to one of their shows this weekend. I should’ve denied then and there due to all this secretiveness, but instead I foolishly agreed to meet them that Friday evening.
I spent the remainder of the week texting Lorine off and on about the ZenoFits, wondering if I needed to wear anything special. She assured me I was overthinking it and to just come as I am. I asked her about Carl as well, thinking that he must’ve gotten caught up in this, but Lorine had never met him. When I told her about the Gold Rose on his door, she didn’t respond to my texts further until the Friday of the show. Even then only to give me a time and where they were meeting.
When I arrived the girls were in high spirits and already a bit tipsy. Lorine gave me a hug and shook my shoulders asking if I was ready for this night. Cora, Elizabeth, and Maggy were there, as well as three other girls and six guys whom I did not meet but they moved with us as we went into the venue.
The venue itself was called Local, and I had never been there but to say it was a hole would not be unfair. To enter the place you had to go down a cellar door on the street. A single boarded sign with lights wrapped around it and a bouncer whom I suppose real job was to make sure no one fell down the stairs was the only way to know the place. Lorine walked in the front with Elizabeth, and I found myself alongside Cora. As we descended down the stairs I saw the walls were painted in Golden Flowers of varying sizes. All of them looked similar as the one I found on Carl’s door. I pointed at them and asked Cora what they were supposed to be. She only replied with joy
“Aren’t they beautiful.”
The noise coming from below us was already loud, but did not sound like the ZenoFits. A fog of cigarette smoke burned my eyes as we walked passed the curtain that was at the bottom, the doorway into the main room. There were very few lights and I was immediately pushed back and forth as others danced around me. The little party I was with disappeared and had it not been for Cora I would have just been lost in that smoke and noise. Distorted faces in the dark smoking cigarettes and drinking tall beers as they gyrated to the pulsing bass music were all I could see. Cora grabbed me by the hand and dragged me past the mass of bodies. At points I could not see her anymore as people thrashed in between us nearly breaking our grips on one another. Sweaty jean jackets hit against my chest. The sweatier faces of their owners looked at me as I interrupted their seismic dancing. Faces twisting apologetically as they let me through still being tugged along by the Cora machine.
At last we broke through the bodies and into a calmer area where no one else seemed to have migrated to. There was a lone booth that faced the stage. On one end of the booth sat a chaotic pile of coats, and on the other Lorine and Elizabeth. Lorine was lighting a cigarette and yelled at us as we burst from the dancers. Cora immediately let go of me and jumped onto the bench, Elizabeth pulling her down into the seat next to her.
Lorine got up and came over to me. She started to yell into my ear, but the music completely stopped. There was an absolute silence among the hundreds of people we had just waded through and the few lights that had been on went out. Lorine’s cigarette lit up near my face in the direction of the stage as she took a drag.
“Its about to start.” She whispered. I could hear Cora and Elizabeth nervously giggling behind me as I turned in the direction of the stage, but could not see. In the darkness I felt more people burst out into our area. I was pushed forward, and Lorine silently shouted
“Maggy!” reaching passed me as she did.
A lone yellow light erupted from the stage and swung over the top of the crowd like a searchlight in the mist. Silence still perpetuating amongst the masses. As it streaked I followed it only seeing faces illuminated briefly in golden light. The silence grew heavier as the light circled the room over and over. I stopped trying to follow it and instead looked over at Lorine. Her face and the cigarette illuminating every second as the light grew more rapid, until at last it went dark again. The small burn of her cigarette was alone in my field of vision. I found myself too afraid to interrupt the quiet. Taken in by the pants echoing around me, even they sounded stifled.
The light burst forth through the darkness again only this time not moving, but shining directly at me. My heart stopped and I stared at the beam like a deer on a road. Until I realized it wasn’t actually focused on me, but over my head.
“CORA!” Lorine shouted out in excitement. I turned to look, but only saw an empty seat next to an excited Elizabeth clapping her hands wildly.
“LORINE!! CORA’S BEEN CHOSEN!” They both screamed in delight and the rest of the crowd rallied their cry. The light again went dark, but this time only briefly. It was replaced by a slit of yellow light that ran across the ceiling. A thick fog billowed up around us, as if from the floor itself. I tried to grab at Lorine, but she wasn’t around me anymore I couldn’t feel anyone. Through the yellow light golden petals began to fall, as if detaching from the ceiling, as they did a raucous cheer erupted. I shouted for Lorine, but heard nothing in response. The static noise of an electronic bass machine kicked in, followed by the familiar notes on a guitar.
The ZenoFits were on stage.
I was overcome by a sudden panic, I have never been claustrophobic, but in that particular moment I couldn’t stand to be there anymore. My heart thumped in my chest as I struggled to make out what was around me, but the fog made it impossible. I tried swatting it away, but more of it continued to waft in front of me. The electric beat began it’s syncopated rhythm over the guitar as it picked through it’s scale. Some ominous figure behind a curtain somewhere out in that sea of fog was picking the tune.
I began walking in the direction I had hoped was the one Cora and I had originated from when a hand grabbed me through the mist. Lorine with that same smile on her face as when we first listened to this song together. She was holding some of the golden petals in her hand and raised one to her mouth and swallowed it. She then picked another one and extended her hands to me. I took it in between my thumb and index finger then looked back at her. As more fog blew in-between us and through the dull yellow light I could already see her pupils dilating. The static of the music began as the guitar’s final note echoed out over the crowd. The noise filled the room and the cheers from the crowd grew silent. I turned my head back to the stage and I felt Lorine let go of my hand. Within the static I started to hear something else, something speaking under the surface but the noise made me dizzy. I closed my eyes, clawing at my skull dropping the petal Lorine had given me. I felt like I could not breath. The music cut out.
A scream sounded from the stage. A terrible awful scream, like someone completely overtaken in madness.
Followed by the lone light as it swiveled through the smoke again. The electro bass kicking in hard, followed by that guitar.
Golden the eyes
Wild as the rain she goes
“Everyone’s first deletion is tough.” I heard Lorine say, but I am not sure where she was anymore. Through panted breaths I could not make out anything around me.
Streaks in the night
Old as the moss that growssss
As the light cut through the fog on it’s swivel I started to see shapes. Shapes that were not like anything I had ever seen before, forms almost impossible to describe as they went from big to small. Limbs reaching out over the forms as the mass pulsed to the rhythm of the beat. A few voices began singing along to the music, some deep voices, others were high and shrill. However the majority of the forms were pushing at one another like they were fighting or dancing, yet focused on one point on the floor. The fog was still thick, but it no longer billowed out from below my feet.
Hunagruuu
I felt sweat splash against my face emanating from the sea of bodies that were still pushing forward towards the stage. I looked behind me, and found that I was alone as best I could tell. It seemed that everyone else had moved forward with the surging crowd to that inhospitable locale in which they all seemingly wished to be. I used that moment to move back in the direction from where we had came.
Hunagruuu
Knowsss
I moved slowly through the haze, and was met with no resistance. Occasionally tripping on something in the dark beneath my feet which felt spongy under my shoe, but I did not wish to see. The noise besides the bands slow singing of “Golden Petals” had grown, deeper as well. There were sounds of snarling and other drooling noises resounding from my right, but it only propelled me faster. I took increasingly decisive and higher steps to avoid tripping.
Souls to eat
Gold Petals to fall in bows
At last my hand collided upon a wall and I patted against it like a mad man until my left hand made contact with the fabric of the curtain. I put my hand through with such force my face thumped against the wall.
Come to the meet
Your fear is as far as it goessssss
Unlike the song I heard on Lorine’s phone, the beat swelled into a long deep note. I stopped cold in my tracks and looked back in the direction of the stage. The yellow light continued on it’s swivel, and the fog was less now and the forms varied greatly in size. They no longer were dancing or pushing towards whatever was drawing them.
Hunagruuu
The band did not sing the line, but the forms in the darkness all said it in unison. I stepped back into the curtain, but did not go all the way through. The light still swirling over the forms. The forms that continued to chant.
Hunagruuu
I know not what that word means, but at that moment I did not want to know. With one last glance at whatever this venue had turned into I turned completely through the curtain, until I felt it. Something grabbed hold of my left hand. It was very wet and I felt it dig into my carpal bones. I turned to look at what had grappled me…
“Knows”
The voice echoed, starting deep then trailed out on the s’s in a high shrill pitch. One moment I had five fingers on my left hand, and in the next I was down to two.
I fell through the curtain hitting my face against the bottom step as whatever had grabbed me severed cleanly through my fingers. I screamed out and looked back at the curtain in horror, but it did not follow. I clambered up the stairs and out into the main quiet downtown street.
When I got back to my home I found it to be nearly five in the morning. The stubs on my fingers were cauterized and bled very little, however when I gazed upon myself in the mirror I found I was covered in blood. Was it my blood? I did not know the answers to these questions, but I left that morning.
I have been driving ever since. Every night a new hotel after several hours on the road. I do not sleep, yet every morning when I open my hotel door I find a golden rose painted upon it. I cannot run any longer. Whatever is stalking me from that awful night I cannot shake. Instead today I have booked myself in a nice AirBnB on the outskirts of a small town. In the morning I expect a golden rose to be on the door, and I also suspect that I will be dead.
