Help me identify these short horror stories?
January 29, 2008 6:16 PM Subscribe
Help me identify these four short horror stories, based on descriptions of their plots and endings. SPOILERS AHEAD!
No plagiarism involved this time, thank the gods. No, these are just four stories I read many, many years ago, and they've stuck in my brain and haunted me ever since. I'll give you the premises and the endings, as best I remember. Perhaps you can tell me more?
1) A boy is teased and ostracized by his classmates because of the hump on his back. At the end of the story, he removes his shirt, spreads his wings and flies out the classroom window, never to be seen again. (Not really horror, more fantasy/SF.)
2) A man is the captive of a woman who force-feeds him until he becomes grossly, immobilely obese. Tapioca pudding is her weapon of choice, and I distinctly recall a description of the woman jabbing a funnel into the man's mouth until his gums bleed. (This is not "Topsy" by Paul F. Wilson.)
3) The narrator struggles painstakingly to climb a flight of stairs. He is a scientist who invented a formula for immortality. The reason for his difficulty with the stairs is that he has been beheaded, and has only his lips and tongue with which to move. The story ends with him finally reuniting with his body in order to take revenge on his attempted murderer.
4) A throwaway scene in a larger story: An astronaut/space explorer has been physically altered by some misunderstanding aliens. He described a pin-up cheesecake image as his "ideal," and the aliens decided to do him a favor and make him more like it. They removed his external genitalia and attached things to his chest the size of elephant trunks. (Again, not so much horror as science fiction.)
Good luck, and thank you!
No plagiarism involved this time, thank the gods. No, these are just four stories I read many, many years ago, and they've stuck in my brain and haunted me ever since. I'll give you the premises and the endings, as best I remember. Perhaps you can tell me more?
1) A boy is teased and ostracized by his classmates because of the hump on his back. At the end of the story, he removes his shirt, spreads his wings and flies out the classroom window, never to be seen again. (Not really horror, more fantasy/SF.)
2) A man is the captive of a woman who force-feeds him until he becomes grossly, immobilely obese. Tapioca pudding is her weapon of choice, and I distinctly recall a description of the woman jabbing a funnel into the man's mouth until his gums bleed. (This is not "Topsy" by Paul F. Wilson.)
3) The narrator struggles painstakingly to climb a flight of stairs. He is a scientist who invented a formula for immortality. The reason for his difficulty with the stairs is that he has been beheaded, and has only his lips and tongue with which to move. The story ends with him finally reuniting with his body in order to take revenge on his attempted murderer.
4) A throwaway scene in a larger story: An astronaut/space explorer has been physically altered by some misunderstanding aliens. He described a pin-up cheesecake image as his "ideal," and the aliens decided to do him a favor and make him more like it. They removed his external genitalia and attached things to his chest the size of elephant trunks. (Again, not so much horror as science fiction.)
Good luck, and thank you!
I think #1 might be in the book Free to Be a Family...?
posted by Asparagirl at 11:35 PM on January 29, 2008
posted by Asparagirl at 11:35 PM on January 29, 2008
#1 Reminds me of one of the stories in the first Wild Cards collection... except it's a man and he flies out of a church.
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:53 AM on January 30, 2008
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 1:53 AM on January 30, 2008
This thread is closed to new comments.
#3 is 'Heading Home,' by Ramsey Campbell. I have it in '100 Hair-raising Little Stories.'
posted by stoneegg21 at 6:37 PM on January 29, 2008