Natalie Gray
Bio
Welcome, Travelers! Allow me to introduce you to a compelling world of Magick and Mystery. My stories are not for the faint of heart, but should you deign to read them I hope you will find them entertaining and intriguing to say the least.
Achievements (8)
Stories (186)
Filter by community
Green Stuff. Runner-Up in A Taste of Home Challenge.
The memory gets hazier every year, but I'll never quite forget the first time I tasted it. Thanksgiving Day was the occasion; we were all gathered together at my paternal grandparents' house, just like every year before or since. I remember it was cold, and that I was pretty young. How young, I can't say for sure. Old enough to feed myself, but not old enough yet to fix my own plate. My Dad walked alongside me down the buffet my Maw-Maw, great-grandmas, aunts, and mother set up in the kitchen. Daddy held the plate for me, loading up that Styrofoam trough with everything I pointed to.
By Natalie Grayabout a year ago in Feast
Pathogen, Ch. 2
"I'm home," Marnie called through the open kitchen door, barely hiding the cringe in her voice. As expected, sharp footsteps answered from up the hall, marching swiftly and with purpose toward Marnie's doom. Within a minute, her mom's stern face came into view.
By Natalie Grayabout a year ago in Horror
Pathogen
"Now, can anyone tell me the property for X? Anyone?" Crickets filled Mrs. Snopes' fifth period math class. Someone in the back row coughed nervously while a few other students shifted in their desks. One guy a few seats over from Marnie was actually snoring. The idiots on either side of her were more interested in trying to lob spitwads into the sleeping guy's open mouth instead of the problem on the board. Marnie herself was too busy looking out the window, listening to her favorite podcast through the wireless earbud carefully hidden in the cuff of her oversized black hoodie. There was only one person with their hand in the air - Bridgette - seated in the front row with a huge, smug grin on her face.
By Natalie Grayabout a year ago in Horror
Jenny Isn't Home
Bobby was probably the luckiest guy in the world. At least, that's how he felt. It was March of 1963, and Jenny Boudreaux - AKA the hottest girl at Lafayette High - had just agreed to go with him to the Spring Formal. She'd already turned down a half a dozen guys who'd asked her before Bobby, one of whom was the captain of the baseball team. All those jocks had their jaws on the floor, though, when Jenny had said yes to Bobby... probably wondering how a nearsighted, ninety-pound asthmatic like him had managed to do the impossible.
By Natalie Grayabout a year ago in Horror
Beautiful Stranger
People are always talking about how hard it is to find love. Especially online. Like, you always have to look out for creeps who just want nudes and fake profiles that try to scam vulnerable, lonely people out of their hard-earned cash. It's pretty scummy, and I'm honestly not sure which is worse. Even with the legit matches you get, it's almost impossible to find someone you really click with. After all that hard work digging through the muck and mire, once in a while you think you've struck gold. That is, until you actually meet them in person. And find out the hard way that the 6'4" twenty-something sensitive jock/poet you matched with is actually an overweight, balding, part-time pizza delivery boy in his late thirties, who hasn't showered since junior high.
By Natalie Grayabout a year ago in Fiction
The Spangled Duck
"Come on, come on! It's right there... I can almost taste it!" I stand back and watch my daughter at work with a proud little smile. This is the first time we've been to the arcade in ages, but I never tire of watching her eyes light up with delight in a place like this. I suppose that's part of the magic of an arcade; the second you step through the door, you become a little kid again, no matter what your true age is.
By Natalie Grayabout a year ago in Psyche
Royal Match
Have you ever played a match 3 mobile game? Odds are that if you've ever owned a tablet or smartphone, you have. But, in the very odd chance that you've been living under a rock since 1995 and have never heard of such things, match 3 games are fairly straightforward. They're exactly what they sound like: you have a grid of colorful tiles, which you simply swap to form a chain of three or more of the same tiles in a row. After you make a certain number of matches required to pass a level, you are usually given some kind of reward - coins, gems, etc. - and move on to the next level.
By Natalie Gray2 years ago in Confessions
Plans for 2024
This path I've been on for the last handful of years has not been quick or easy. Up until the Pandemic reared its ugly head, I still didn't know what I wanted to do with my life. To be honest, I didn't have much of a life at all: I was on the cusp of my thirties while still clinging fast to my twenties, nowhere near ready to let go, and stuck in a job that caused me so much stress and anxiety I wanted to throw up when I woke up every morning. I had lived nearly a third of my life, but I hadn't really “lived", and I still had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up. In a way, the Covid-19 Pandemic was kind of a Godsend for me, because if it hadn't happened, I'd still most likely be in that miserable place physically and emotionally.
By Natalie Gray2 years ago in Confessions
Mom's Recipe Box
It's Christmas time again, to no one's surprise. Along with all the carols, tree-trimming, and visiting relatives that you pretend to like comes a few very important holiday traditions… one of which is – in my case – dusting off Mom's old recipe box.
By Natalie Gray2 years ago in Feast
The Boy in the Looking Glass
"It's closing time, Lolly." The young brunette jumped six inches off her beanbag chair, blinking her large, impetuous green eyes at the older man who'd addressed her. He smiled down warmly over his silver wire eyeglass frames, his crows feet crinkling around his sparkling blue orbs. Lolly's eyes darted around the room in a bit of a daze, soaking in the countless low, oak shelves surrounding her. Her slightly sweaty fingers still gripped the lemon yellow hardcover book in her mitts tightly, as her subconscious mind wasn't yet ready to let go of Nancy, George, and Bess's adventures. From outside, the five low, dismal bongs of the county courthouse's clock next door reminded her of the hour.
By Natalie Gray2 years ago in Criminal
Deafening Silence. Content Warning.
Tremors ravage my hands and arms, and my knees bounce up and down like I have springs in my sneakers. Figures in scrubs race back and forth along the corridor, their faces drawn, pale, severe. The smell of bleach is all around me; suffocating, nauseating. A noxious, perfumey scent lies on top of it (gardenias, I think), trying to mask the odor, but it only feeds the pounding ache growing behind my right eye. There's another smell beneath it all - much more potent - that twists my guts up in painful knots. I can't quite place what it is, but it reminds me how much I despise hospitals.
By Natalie Gray2 years ago in Fiction
Chapter Two: The Iron Path. Content Warning.
Aidan slowly pushed himself out of the dirt and raised his hands, his Adam’s apple bobbing with a hard swallow. These were the vicious little creatures he’d imagined in his mother’s stories, jabbing their tiny weapons at him. Frankly, he didn’t think brooch pins and toothpicks could mortally wound him. On the other hand, his nose was still smarting where Twig had thumped it earlier. Perhaps these creatures were much stronger than they looked. He already knew their needle-like teeth were well equipped to draw blood, which was enough to leave him quivering like a pup in the snow.
By Natalie Gray2 years ago in Chapters
