Louis's family didn't understand him. At times, he didn't even think they liked him, but loving him was required.

Louis is a writer. He wants to someday make a professional career out of his passion. The only teen boy he knew who would willingly read a book, let alone write one, was himself. His main interests consist of horror and the supernatural. He loves writing about animals and their butchered remains, and how someone would make them into food for other animals. He loves writing about people who's personalities are made from bits of him and how at the end of his stories they hang beautifuly from a tree like ornaments.

Louis is not only a strong opinioned agnostic and a firm believer of life after death, but he is obsessed with dying and where someone would go afterward.

Dying is just being reborn again.

Recently, Louis wrote a story about the grim reaper. He wrote about how grim helped the dead get up and walk again, how all those souls were lost and grim was the one who found them.

"Dammit Louis. Do you ever put that stupid notebook away?" his mother snaps.

Louis's mother jerks her head around to see if her son listenes to her or not. She is a husky woman, and the reason why the right side of the SUV outweighs the left as the vehicle wobbles down the roads of South Carolina. Her hair resembles a red brillo pad, short and scratchy. She is quite the close-minded, ignorant woman who thinks her opinions are above all others. The slightest bit of individuality is deemed a threat to her.

Flies hit the windshield during the family's cruise through the country side.

Louis's older sister sits beside him in the back seat. She cracks her bubble gum at least every five minutes, and fixes her hair constantly due to Louis's open window.
"Just let him be a freak, mom." It's the closest she had come to defending him.

Shayne always found her annoying little brother a menace but at least he didn't try to act all cocky around her friends. He would stay in his room and only come down to get a snack or walk the dog.

"You can't make a living off being an author. Writers and poets are all poor, son," his mother continues.

Louis doesn't bother to tell her that a poet is also a writer and what she probably means to say is that writers and painters are all poor. He is well aware of the 'starving artist' sterotype.

"What about Stephen King?" Louis asks.

Mr. King certainly isn't a part of the sterotype.

"Who?" the teenage boy's mother retorts.

"He's the king of horror, mom. He writes incredible books that get turned into movies. He plays a small part in all of his movies," Louis explains, yet she still has that confused look on her face.

"I don't want to hear all your nonsense. Why don't you study some medical books for you can become a doctor?" the red headed lady suggests.

"Fine," Louis replies.

He would never be a doctor but he was willing to say anything to get his mother to shut up. He scribbles more story ideas into his notebook with a blue pen.

Sitting beside his mother, is his father of course, who's on his sixth cup of coffee from the last two hours. Louis's father is a stern man in his fifties, with thin strips of hair lining just above his ears. He doesn't say much, treating his voice box as if it were an endangered species, and leaves the subject of disciplining the children upon his wife, LeeLee.

"Dammit. We're almost out of gas," he groans.

Luckily, there is a gas station half a mile away.

Louis's dad pulls into the Shell Co, the rumming of the SUV's engine now silent.

They are the only ones in the parking lot.

One person is inside the store. The clerk.

Louis's father goes to buy gas on pump two as his wife and daughter follow behind to get packages of Tasty Cakes.

Louis is in charge of watching the car. He is told to lock the doors if any strange characters happen to come by. He steps outside to stretch his legs as the sun beats down on his neck. The gas station is completely abandoned with the exception of him, his family, the cashier inside, and a few wandering crows.

He looks across the street, where a black figure comes into view. The figure is dressed in a black cloak. Louis can't spot any limbs or facial features on the creature.

Making sure the sun isn't tricking him, Louis rubs his eyes with clammy palms, but when he looks again the figure is gone.

Louis did his research, though many claim his research is mearly mythical. Nevertheless, Louis knows enough about the black cloaked figure to know that he saw death, or grim as death was also known as. Or perhaps he didn't really see anything.

It could have been a hallucionation.

It's a terribly hot day and Louis is dehydrated.

He climbs back into the back seat, the air conditioner turned up to full blast.

Minutes later, his family comes back outside carrying plastic bags.

Louis's dad fills up the gas tank and soon enough the gear switches from P to D.

His sister and mother munchies on cupcakes and doritos while he's handed a cold bottle of water. He eagerly twists the cap off and takes three long swigs.

Their on the road for two more hours when finally, the family reaches their destination: Great Aunt Marcy's house.

Great Aunt Marcy was a rich old hag who lived in a mansion.

LeeLee takes an ancient brass key from under the door mat and turns it in the knob. The wooden door opens with a creek and dust particles dance in the air.

"Why don't you two go upstairs and give Marcy a great big hug?" asks the father.

Although they don't want to, Louis and Shayne do as they are told.

After the siblings browse through several rooms, they finally locate their Great Aunt Marcy. She's in her study, her head leaning back in her tall chair.

"Hey, Great Aunt Marcy!" Shayne was great at faking a nice voice.

Louis's sister finds that her arms are wrapped around a cold, stiff, corpse. She shrieks, yet Louis stays silent. If he was ever to be the king of horror someday, he would have to get used to seeing dead bodies and the phantom in black escorting their souls.

'Goodbye, Great Aunt Marcy.'