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The original was posted on /r/nosleep by /u/BadandyTheRed on 2024-09-08 01:36:39+00:00.
Do you believe in curses? I didn't consider myself a superstitious person. I didn't believe in the paranormal and generally considered the ramblings of superstition to be more like modern mythology. People just taking allegories of concepts and held beliefs and trying to give them solid meaning and agency by attaching some force to it that moves beyond the belief of what our own eyes can see.
Recent events though, have forced me to reconsider my beliefs on the paranormal. What I have come to learn and to fear, is that not believing in superstition, might not change how it can affect you. Despite not believing this sort of thing myself, I might have to start. See I think I might be cursed. Silly thing for a skeptic to say I know but I will tell you the story of the last few days and maybe you can tell me if it sounds like I am or not. Maybe I am just being paranoid. The tragedy of recent events having drown my skeptical mind in a wave of the paranormal beliefs of others. Though I fear the nagging feeling that it could be real. If this is all real, then I think I am in trouble.
Two weeks ago, my girlfriend Heather and I were on the way to a somber event. It was the funeral service of her best friend Gwen and she was trying her best to compose herself but having a hard time.
“I don’t know if I can do this.” She said for the third time since we had departed. Her sleeve wet with tears before we had even arrived. I tried my best to comfort her but she was taking the loss of her friend hard.
“It will be okay honey; I know it’s hard all of this has been, but I know she would have wanted you to be there to remember her, along with all her other friends and family.”
I told her that, not really knowing if it was true, since I did not know much about her friend Gwen before she had passed so suddenly. I put a reassuring hand on her shoulder, without diverting too much attention from driving through the light traffic in the small town the service was held at.
“I know I just, just can’t believe she is gone.” She said while wiping her eyes a final time as we arrived at the funeral home. It was a gloomy day outside; clouds shrouded any possible rays of sunshine. The sky threatened rain, yet was not quite ready to unleash the downpour. Very fitting day for a funeral, I thought to myself and I opened Gwen’s door and helped her out of the car.
We stepped out and saw a large group of people in dark colored clothes gathered near the entrance. Moving towards the group Heather noticed Gwen’s parents and suppressed another sob. I tried to reassure her again and we moved to greet them and express our condolences. It was tough seeing the pained resolve on their faces as many cried around them but they did their best to stay composed and thank each person for coming.
The service had not started yet but apparently the viewing had. We were told to head inside and to pay our respects and view the body if we wished, or to just write a memorial note.
Heather decided she was feeling strong enough to go to the viewing and I held her hand as we entered. There were others there softly crying or solemnly looking on in quite respect. Two individuals caught my eye though, I supposed Gwen’s family was religious but these two looked a bit extreme. They were wearing some sort of religious regalia and holding crucifixes. They seemed to hold them up and mutter some sort of prayer. Not too odd if they were priests or something, but it got strange when I heard something whispered quietly about how, “The lord banishes all evil.” and “Through his light we ask for an end to this bloody reaping, we pray for forgiveness.”
The robed figures finished the chant and made the sign of the cross one last time and left the body and the viewing room, looking back at us as they left in an oddly paranoid way, like they did not trust something about us being in the room.
I brushed it off and Heather did not seem to notice or care about the strange priests or whatever they were, or the weird sermon about evil they seemed to have had with her friend's body. We approached the coffin slowly and Heather began crying again. I looked down into the finely carved casket and saw her. The embalming process always alters the look of people no matter how skilled they are, it's just not quite them anymore. I felt terrible for Heather and how she lost her friend and I felt even worse for Gwen of course. To have a heart attack at thirty-four was a genuine tragedy. She had had no underlying health issues of note and lived a fairly active and healthy lifestyle so it was even more puzzling to everyone who had known her.
I had been holding Heather's hand but as we stepped closer, she broke away and reached down and touched the hand of her friend and said her last goodbyes. I looked on and felt moved by the touching scene and felt a shade of the deep sadness that she had felt for her lost friend. In my sympathetic reverie I received a sudden flash of deep and profound sadness which I thought made sense. What I was not prepared for was what felt like a strange buzzing tension in the air and a feeling of unbridled anger like when a furious person is staring someone else down. I looked over my shoulders and across the room but no one else was in there with us at that moment. Then I felt a strange pain in the back of my ears, almost like they were suddenly ready to pop. It felt very strange but I had no idea what was happening I was just standing there unmoving, looking at Heather hold her friends' hand and say her goodbyes. Then I noticed her hand and saw something disturbing.
As Heather held Gwen’s right hand, I noticed what may have been an oversight by the makeup and mortuary workers who are supposed to prepare the bodies for viewing. There were fairly pronounced scratches in irregular patterns on the top portions of her fingers. They were initially hard to see but were definitely there, down about halfway on each digit.
I had a strange fancy that they brightened and thrummed in time with the disturbing feeling in the air and I did not like the weird synchrony. I moved closer to try and put a hand on Heather's shoulder but suddenly the bubble popped and the pressure in my head exploded as it felt like both my eardrums popped and the blinding headache almost made me cry out. Before I could though I heard Heather cry out first, not in grief but in pain.
She was startled out of her own grieving by the pain of something and she clutched her own right hand and looked down at a small but deep cut on her right index finger. It was bleeding a good bit for how small it seemed and I quickly grabbed some tissues nearby and helped her cover it.
“What happened? Was there something sharp left in her casket?” I asked her, while still holding her hand and trying to steady her.
“I, I don’t know there was nothing there I was just holding her hand. Her poor hand, whoever did her makeup and preparation should be ashamed, she hated that color and whatever it was in there cut her hand as well.” Heather responded, looking on the verge of crying again and trying to distract her grief with temporary anger over the thought of her best friend's preparation not being perfect.
We both saw another group waiting to enter and realized our time was up so we exited the viewing room. I was able to get a band aid from the cars first aid kit for Heather's cut. By that time, it had stopped bleeding even though it looked disturbingly deep. I bandaged it anyway and disinfected it just to be safe and Heather let out another whimper of pain.
I apologized profusely and we composed ourselves and went to the main hall for the ceremony. The main service was set to start in about twenty minutes, but we never sat for the service we had to leave about ten minutes later. We were settled in and I thought we would be okay but I heard Heather quietly mumble,
“Not now, not now.”
I asked her if she was alright and she groaned in pain again and held a hand to her forehead.
“No not right now, I can’t I can’t do it I need to go. We need to go.”
She stood up grabbed my arm and we left. Not too many people noticed us leaving since we were close to the back but I shot an apologetic look at those who did. Rushing through the hall I noticed the robbed figures again and they seemed to regard Heather and I with a new apprehension and they cleared out of our way and crossed themselves as we moved quickly down the hall and past them. We moved quickly since Heather was pulling me along but as we departed, I thought I heard one of them say something in Latin or something, it sounded like, “Maledictionem.”
We rounded the corner and I realized where she had been rushing. She had made it to the restroom and promptly went in and I heard vomiting followed by sobbing and then the sink running and the door opening again.
“It’s a migraine, right now of all times. It is so bad I can barely see straight and I puked at Gwen’s funeral. I can’t believe this. We can’t stay we have to go I can’t do this now I said my goodbye to her, we have to go. I am so sorry Gwen.” Heather said while she continued to cry and clutch her head. I held her arm and we quickly moved back out to the car and headed home.
On the way home the sky finally decided to open up and a torrential rain began. Despite the pounding of the rain on the car I could not hear much over Heather’s anguished moaning. I did not know what was worse for her at that moment, the migraine, or the sadness...
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