Chapter 2
STEPHEN
The great thing Stephen finds about being a freelance journalist is that he can work anywhere he likes.
On top of that, being a freelance journalist who also happens to have helped solve the infamous forty-year cold case in Cherry Hollow last year, means he can now pick and choose which jobs he accepts.
And he’s bombarded with jobs every day from newspapers, online forums and podcasts, all salivating at the prospect of having the Stephen Mallow working for them. They can’t get enough.
Stephen still works for the London Times, but his boss, Kevin, allows him to write whatever the hell he wants to write because he knows that whatever he writes will sell papers.
Lots of papers. He writes one article a month for the company he’s worked at for the past few years, but can now spread his wings a little and also writes for other publishing houses and newspapers when it takes his fancy.
Everyone wants to know what Stephen has to say.
And they’re happy to pay an extortionate amount of money for him to do it.
Not that Stephen only writes the articles for the money, but it is nice to be able to pay the bills on time and not have to worry where his next pay cheque is coming from.
It won’t last forever, of course. Nothing does.
But for now, he’s revelling in his mild celebrity status.
A year and a half ago, no one had even heard of him. He was just some lowly journalist who wrote trashy articles in the paper; the ones that had no relevance or factual information. No one cared about them and he was paid next to nothing for his time.
But one viral article about The Creature and Cherry Hollow changed everything.
Suddenly, what he had to say mattered to people.
The general public couldn’t get enough of the creepy small town in the Lake District that was supposedly haunted by an evil entity.
Was it real or not? Nobody knew, but it was fun to speculate.
After he helped Detective Graham Williams solve the case, his life turned upside down seemingly overnight and it hasn’t been the same since.
Now, he is not only living in the creepy small town in the Lake District that was supposedly haunted by said evil entity, but he also has a girlfriend called Rachel.
Him.
Stephen Mallow.
The thirty-five-year-old man who has never had a girlfriend in his life and who has always been a laughingstock to most people due to his unique and eccentric mind that only a small portion of the population can relate to or understand.
It’s only made him more popular online. Apparently, his quirkiness is alluring and he is, what everyone calls, relatable to a lot of people.
He stays off social media because he finds it overwhelming, but from what he’s heard, his articles are always trending or going viral.
He knows what that means, but has never cared for the terms, and he’s never been bothered about making it as a viral sensation.
So much ridiculous stuff goes viral these days.
Stuff that doesn’t even make any sense, like TikTok dances and memes, or AI-generated graphics of people that end up having seven fingers on each hand. He doesn’t understand it.
But he’s glad that his article reached a lot of people, and he’s glad that others find him relatable in some way, even if he’ll never meet them.
Stephen knows he’s different and a lot of people he meets find him too intense, too strange and too …
much. But not Rachel. Not his girlfriend.
Well, she maybe does think all those things too, but she also finds him endearing and cute (her words, not his) even though he often turns the light switches on and off seventeen times before entering a new room.
It’s something he is working on reducing.
Sort of. Maybe. It’s a work in progress.
At first, he tried to hide his quirks and eccentricities from Rachel, but the more he did, the more stressed and anxious he became.
He couldn’t hide who he was. As a child, his father tried to beat it out of him for years, convincing him that no one would want to be with a weird, OCD freak, but his father was wrong.
Plus, he’s now in prison for life, so it’s hard to believe anything that criminal and murderer says.
Stephen’s mother had been kind and understanding about his so-called behavioural issues.
Back then, mental disorders and mental health were not as well understood as they are today, but she’d still accepted him for who he was. Then his father had to go and kill her.
Rachel stirs, rolling over so her back is facing him.
Stephen often wakes much earlier than she does and spends the time before his alarm goes off writing his next blog post or article or catching up on the daily events happening around the world.
Not that he spends too long reading the news headlines.
It’s mostly all doom and gloom, but he likes to be aware of what’s going on, even if he does feel helpless most of the time.
He clicks on his recent online article in the London Times, a piece about the ongoing struggles of homelessness. He raises his eyebrows at the number of comments that have appeared beneath it since it was published yesterday.
Love your articles, Stephen.
Great writing, dude!
Omg, I loved the Cherry Hollow story. Freaked me out! Couldn’t sleep for weeks, thinking some dark creature was after me.
What a load of crap.
When are you going to write something else like the Cherry Hollow story?
Couldn’t sleep after the Cherry Hollow story came out. Had nightmares!
Great story!
There’s this weird dude who keeps stalking me. Maybe you could investigate him? Might make a good story?
Looking forward to your next creepy investigation. Stephen Mallow is on the case!
There are many more, most of which he skims over. Many of them mention Cherry Hollow or The Creature in some way, highlighting that the masses want more of the weird and unexplained mysteries.
You and me both.
He enjoys writing about real things that are important to him, but he also likes writing about deep and eyebrow-raising stories.
The ones which make the reader truly think, not only about themselves, but about the world around them and the possibility of the strange and unseen forces that occur every day.
Perhaps the story of Cherry Hollow had been a one off; one in a million.
It certainly had changed his life and opened his eyes to the depths of the human mind, how far people would go to hide the truth from others and themselves.
Not only that, but it’s got people talking about mental health in a much more profound way and he’s proud of that.
Stephen takes a deep breath and closes his laptop.
It’s time to get up and start the day. He and Rachel share a flat in Cherry Hollow and share the paying of the rent.
Rachel has moved out of her parent’s house to live with Stephen, something her parents had been both thrilled and shocked about.
They’d met Stephen and had approved. That was all that mattered.
Stephen leaves the comfort of the double bed, rubbing his eyes as a blinding pain shoots through them.
He staggers sideways as a severe head rush washes over him.
He reaches for the nearest stable object; the bedside table.
Rachel stirs again and looks over her shoulder at him.
She’s cute in the mornings with her tussled hair and blank expression.
Stephen rights himself once the dizziness has passed. ‘One black coffee, coming up,’ he says, pulling on his trousers over his boxers.
‘Strong,’ says Rachel, burying her face in her pillow.
She isn't a morning person, the opposite of Stephen who often rises at five o’clock before the sun comes up.
He does his best writing before the world surfaces and becomes too loud and obnoxious to function.
His brain chemistry means he struggles with too much noise and confusion.
It’s difficult to compartmentalize his thoughts when there is so much else going on, but he’s learning to adjust, alter his actions where he can, but not always.
Sometimes he can’t alter his actions. Besides, why should he have to change to suit the world?
Why can’t the world change to help others like him?
Padding barefoot to the kitchen, he flicks on the kettle and prepares the cups. His smart watch beeps with an incoming email. He takes a quick glance, then turns back to the cups. Several seconds pass before his brain catches up with what his eyes have just seen.
It’s an email from an anonymous source.
The last anonymous email he’d received had started a chain of spectacular events, eventually leading to solving the case of Cherry Hollow.
The young lad who’d sent that particular email was now in a juvenile holding facility for the next few years.
Stephen feels bad about that, but it isn't his fault. The kid came forward of his own accord. He is serving his time, then will be allowed to re-enter society. Not everyone is happy about it, nor do they agree, but that’s beside the point.
The kid made the right choice and is paying his dues.
Most full-grown adults wouldn’t do the same.
Stephen ignores the email, turning instead to finish making Rachel a cup of coffee, and himself a cup of tea. He places the steaming cup on her bedside table and gently shakes her, knowing full-well that she often falls back to sleep. Normally, it takes several attempts to get her out of bed.
‘Go away,’ she says, her voice muffled against the pillow.
He shakes her again.
‘If you don’t stop, I’m going to break up with you.’
He smirks. Usually, he isn’t good at understanding sarcasm, but Rachel has taught him a lot since they’ve been together.
Arguments start because Stephen takes everything she says too literally, whereas most of the time she’s only joking.
But he likes to think he’s better at understanding her sense of humour now.
He shakes her once more.
Rachel huffs and turns to look at him. ‘Fine. You win. I’m awake.’ She shuffles further up the bed so she’s propped against the pillows and then picks up her coffee cup. ‘Thank you.’
‘You’re welcome.’
His smart watch pings again. Seriously, another email? He’s a popular guy today. But he ignores it, heading to the bathroom for his morning shower instead.
Afterwards, once he’s dressed and shaved, he searches for his phone, finding it on the bedside table. Rachel pads into the bathroom, her empty cup on the side. Stephen picks up his phone and reads the anonymous email.
Ah, it’s only junk. No threatening message (which he also receives rather frequently thanks to his constant speaking of the truth; people don’t always like hearing the truth) or random requests to visit another cursed town.
He finds himself mildly disappointed. Every day, he hopes someone will reach out with a mystery weird and creepy enough to tempt him into driving across the country for another adventure.
It’s not that he isn’t interested in solving a missing person’s case, but that’s a job for the police.
No. He wants to solve something the police can’t, or something they aren’t interested in.
Another email pings into his inbox. This one makes his blood run cold.
After he’s read it, he swipes right, sending the email straight into the recycling bin.
That’s a problem for another day.