#paranormal!reader

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Sweet Thing

The smell hit first—rot, smoke, and iron.

You’d stopped gagging hours ago. Now you just sat there, hands bound, knees scraped raw, staring at the floor while screams echoed from the barn outside.

Luda Mae’s voice cut through the noise, calm and motherly. “You poor thing… look at you, shakin’ like a leaf.”

You didn’t move when she came closer. Her fingers, warm and calloused, brushed blood and dirt from your cheek. “Such a pretty face under all that mess.” She tutted softly. “They ain’t gonna hurt you, sweetheart. Not you.”

Outside, a thud. A scream. Silence.

Your throat burned, but no sound came out. You’d seen too much, felt too much. Your friends—gone. The air itself felt heavy, thick with death.

“Can’t have you lookin’ like roadkill,” Luda murmured, taking a brush to your hair. “You’re a good girl, ain’t ya? Don’t talk much, just do what you’re told. That’s a blessing in this house.”

You blinked once. That was all the response she ever got.

After that day, she wouldn’t let the others touch you.

When Hoyt snarled that you were a loose end, she shut him down with a glare sharp enough to skin him alive.

And when Thomas lingered too long, eyes idling low towards you, she would ask, “Ain’t she a sweet thing, Tommy?”

So that’s what you became. Sweet Thing.

The silent ghost that moved through the Hewitt home. You washed dishes, mopped the floors, and never looked anyone in the eye. You didn’t need to speak to survive.

Weeks blurred together until another van came rattling down the road.

You heard it before anyone said a word. The laughter, the music, the sound of life. It cracked something inside you. You knew what came next. By nightfall, the screams had started again.

You didn’t eat that night. You didn’t sleep either. You just sat on the porch, staring into the dark, until the sound of running feet snapped your head up.

“Dammit!” Hoyt barked. “One’s gettin’ away!”

Before you could think, you were inside, your hands closing around the old shotgun propped on top of the fireplace. Your pulse was gone and steady, cold, mechanical. You walked into the kitchen as the girl stumbled past, her face streaked with tears. She looked at you like salvation. “Please—help me!”

The gun roared.

Her body dropped.

Smoke curled from the barrel as you stood there, laughter bubbling out of your chest that was broken, high, wrong.

Hoyt stopped mid-step, grinning at first until he saw your face.

Thomas froze behind him, chainsaw in hand. His eyes narrowing through the mask.

There was something different about you now. Something hollow. The way your head tilted, the way your eyes didn’t quite focus on anything.

Luda Mae stepped into the kitchen, voice low. “Sweet thing… what did you do?”

You turned toward her, still laughing. “You said not to let ‘em go.”

That night, no one slept. Not because of the screams—but because, for the first time, they weren’t sure if you were one of them…

or something worse.

And they never found out that before your car broke down on that lonely Texas road, you and your friends were headed south—to Mexico.

To find a priest.

To drive something out of you.

But it was too late.