The Funeral Where It May Or May Not have happened...

This is a ghost story I wrote as homework that I thought you guys might like.

The funeral where it may or may not have happened…

By Josh Trew

Cathie wasn’t your typical ten-year-old girl. She was a devout christian in a devout christian family, which while very uncommon in her hometown of Witham, wasn’t what made her different. She suffered from vivid hallucinations that lasted a few seconds of she had no control, many at her saddest, scariest and most stressful times. The funeral for her older brother Jacob was a terrifying mix of the three. Cathie’s brother Jacob was eighteen years old when it happened. He went under a truck on the A12, squished, every bone in his body broken. There was no chance of any kind of survival.

This tale begins in the convoy. Cathie was in the car behind the hearse. Through the glass of both cars, for the duration of approximately five seconds, she saw her brother rise from the coffin, looking like roadkill. He turned to her and laughed, teeth non-existent, head barely formed properly. Cathie’s gut wrenched as she leaned in and grabbed her mum.

“There there sweetie. It’s alright.” These words comforted Cathie so she looked up. The hearse in front of them was back to normal. Cathie breathed a sigh of relief.

The funeral was just as heart-breaking as Cathie had expected it to be. She was the one who stayed the longest at the coffin afterwards. She had waited to go last so she could spend the most time there without holding up anyone else. This was better for everybody else. When it came to her turn she was the last person in the church, everyone else had left to go outside. Cathie had her hands together and her head against the coffin. She was mentally praying. She didn’t anyone to hear what she was praying. Her prayers not only went out to her brother, but also to whoever was sending her the hallucinations. She wanted them to stop, they were the criminal aspect of her life.

Cathie was walking out when she felt a sub-zero breeze pass through her. She was freezing for a good five seconds, and even after that she was slightly colder than usual. A giant thud echoed around the room. She turned around to she the coffin had fell, her brothers mangled and deformed corpse sprawling all over the floor. This time she couldn’t hold it in. Cathie turned and vomited. Green chunks came from her body and it increased her level of fear. She turned and bolted out of the church. She ran around to the nearest bush and sat there. Little Cathie would’ve stayed, if it wasn’t for a question that was overcoming her. How real was it? It didn’t feel like a hallucination but it was too disturbing and scary for her to be real.

Weird noises that sound like they were from the gory horror films her brother enjoyed so much began to come from the church. They disturbed her from the films but they were much worse from here. Cathie held her ears and clenched her eyes shut but this didn’t work. Then, the noises just stopped. Cathie opened her eyes and moved her hands from her ears. She decided to brave it. She got up and walked over to the church, still covered in the revolting green puke that had came from her. A certain fear made her stop at the door. She paused for a moment before braving it.

Cathie’s world exploded like Alderaan in this very moment. Her relatives and her brothers friends were hung dead in upside down crosses, the priest above the coffin. They were in three rows of six, with her anialiated brother standing with his back towards her in front of the coffin. Despite the fear, Cathie began to walk up to her brother. There was a certain… relief. Like him standing there in his deformed and contorted state gave her a deep inner hope that this was all a nightmare. She was standing behind him when a surge of wind knocked her from her feet. Her brother turned to face her. Chunks of his head was missing and his face had no discernible eyes. He then smiled, revealing shattered teeth and a bit of his spine lodged in his throat.

“Hello, sweet little Cathie.” Her brother's voice was unrecognisable. The last thing Cathie remembers was screaming before passing out.

To this day no one knows what happened. The police came when the first of mass later that day arrived. They didn’t see Jacob there, but they didn’t see the body either. The twenty five people strung by the legs were there but there arms were dangling down. Had Cathie witnessed a corpse murder a church full of people, or was it a massacre that the ill ten-year-old had seen as a supernatural attack by the body of a loved one?  Nobody knows the answer, leaving the church massacre of Witham the little town’s one and only great crime.