Creepy - Zach Had Maggots Coming Out Of His Eyes

Episode Date: July 17, 2020

He was alive... ***Written by MagpieQuill and narrated by Jimmy Ferrer***Check out our reward tiers at patreon.com/creepypod***You can also subscribe to us on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/creepypod***Produced by Steve Blizin***Title music by Alex Aldea***Intro/Outro Narration by Joe Stofko Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

This is the bloody disgusting podcast network. No. This is creepy. A podcast dedicated to sharing the most famous chilling and disturbing creepypastas and urban legends in the world. Whether these stories truly happened or are simply fabrications is for you to decide. These stories may contain graphic depictions of violence and explicit language. Listener discretion is advised. Creepy presents.

Zach had Magids coming out of his eyes. Written by Meg Pye Quill. And narrated by Jimmy Ferrer. They were alive. And yes, so is he. The day we spoke for the first time was cloudy and gray. I was carrying the compost bucket from lunch through the schoolyard to where the garden was, way in the back.

The gravel path and shrubbery leading up to it was largely ignored by my classmates. A place meant to look pretty, but less entertaining to middle schoolers than the mini soccer field and the swing set. When I slowly lugged the bucket down the path, the squealing and laughing of lunch recess would diminish into background noise behind me. It was on this path in a little corner by the chicken coop that I ran into Zach. I knew little about him other than he was a quiet kid who sat in the back of the classroom, and that Rex, the seventh-grade bully, called him a freak in the hallways. Maybe Rex had gotten to him again because he was sitting on the side of the path in the shadow of the chicken coop and cradling a bruise on the side of his face.

I wouldn't have noticed the maggots if I hadn't given his face a second glance. At first I thought he was crying, but his tears were moving up and down his cheeks. When he noticed me, he hugged his knees tightly and stared up in me, frozen like a statue. Like he had never expected anyone to come down here. What I now realized were little white larvae wormed their way around his pale cheeks. Four or five of them. As I stared back at him, another one crawled out of the edge of his left eye, from between the eyeball. on the soft part of the island.

I saw his throat bob. The toes of his sneakers fidget it. What's wrong? I asked. Zach blinked. It's crawled down his cheeks. He raised a hand to flip them away. Like he perhaps thought I was blind.

Or somehow I hadn't noticed. He was lucky. I'd been the one to find him that day. As I discovered later in life, most boys grew out of their eyes. absolute fascination with bugs by middle school. Fortunately for Zach, I wasn't like most boys. I crouched down quickly and caught his hand before he could swadded the maggots.

Don't do that, I said. You're going to crush them? He inhaled sharply. I did too, without knowing. His hand was strangely soft and cold to the touch. I quickly let it go. Bugs... Bugs are living things too.

I stammer. Then I cleared my throat and straightened up. All life is precious. That's what my dad told me. Zach stared at me, against all odds. He broke into a small smile. You're the pastor's son, right? His voice rustled like a breeze through dry leaves.

I had never heard him speak before. Or maybe I just never bothered to listen. Yeah, I said. You know me? I think I've seen you with him. Long time ago. The maggots slowly warmed their way down his chicken neck. But that didn't seem bothered by them.

If their little winding trails tickled, he didn't show it. I watched, strangely transfixed until the tiny white insects disappeared down his collar. Then I stood up and hefted the compost. bucket. Where are you going? To feed the worms, I said, jabbing my thumb at the garden. Wanna come see? He smiled, a little wider this time. As he pulled himself to his feet, I thought I saw several small, black shapes scurry in the gravel at his feet. We walked into the garden, opened up the wooden troth of the worm farm, and dumped the bucket into it. The worms poked their slimy heads out of their spongy, earth-smelling holes and crawled into leftovers, salads, and applecores.

I put down the empty bucket and watched them with a small sense of pride. You like bucks, too? Zach said quietly. Yeah, I replied, closing up the troth again. Bucks are cool. I have a giant ant farm at home. And some beetles I keep secret from my dad. Without another word, Zach turned to me and held out his hand.

The sleeve of his buttoned down shirt shifted, and a black and red beetle the size of my thumb crawled into the open palm of his hand. I stared down in awe the shine of its eletra, and the fine fuzz of the hair on its legs. The way it moved, the delicate plates of its carapace, sliding in perfect sync with each other. Where did you find it? "'Bucks are my friends,' Zach said simply. He tilted his hand, and the beetle climbed up onto his index finger. Where it spread its translucent yellow wings and flew away.

I waited for him to tell me more. But he turned on his heels in the garden dirt. And that? Was that? Zach revealed his secrets to me quietly, one by one. We now sat in the dirt behind the chicken coop during lunch. treas tucked away from wandering eyes so that I could watch Zach work his magic he had been telling the truth everything creeping and crawling in the yellow grass and coarse dirt was his friend

scarab beetles crawled out the loose soil and onto his sleeves long-legged spiders are pelt down from his collar one time the giant centipede emerged from in between the buttons of his shirt I cried on an an alarm and Zach laughed. His laughter rustled like his voice. A pair of white and brown moths fluttered out of his mouth. Once I was aware of Zach, I couldn't become unaware. There was a mysterious way he kept people from looking his way. He sat quietly at the back of the classroom, and the teacher would sort of see through him, like he wasn't there. Crowds in the hallways after class parted naturally for him. But no one ever talked to him.

Here I realized that Zach didn't have any friends. Rex, the seventh grade bully, picked on him regularly. Sometimes people watched. Zach took it all without a word. The pushes and shoves in the occasional blow to his chest or the side of his face as Rex grew enraged by his silence. As he stood there,

He held parts of his clothes gently. I knew it was so that the tiny creatures in his pockets wouldn't be crushed. Zach walked home with me every day. Though my house is closer, I never learned where he lived. One time, when my father wasn't home, I invited him to my room, showed him my Beatles. They look happy, he said, peering into the plastic bottles. You think so?

Zach nodded. Bugs are simple. He said. If you give them food and a cozy place to stay, they're happy. If you care about them, they'll be your friend. A millipede crawled along the snug cranny between his hair and the curved back of his ear. Not how he could tell my Beatles looked happy. Even as the millipede slowly slithered into his ear like it was burrowing into the ground,

that was the only thing I really wondered about Zach. One day after school, he quietly took me to the Old Town Cemetery. I followed him through the yellow grass until we stopped at the foot of small granite gravestone. I stepped up beside Zach and read the thin white inscription. Zachary Wilson. May 3rd, 1999 to September 17th. 2010. A heart of gold and the voice of an angel.

I looked back at Zach. His smile trembled. He looked nervous. I waited for him to say something, but he held on to his silence. Is this you? I carefully asked, unable to come up with anything better. He nodded curtly. I reached out and touched his shoulder, just to make sure that I could.

The folds of his shirt, the cool skin underneath. Once I was absolutely sure he was there. I let out a small laugh. Why do you look so nervous? Zach's eyes flooded with relief and he smiled again. His real smile. I don't know, he said. I don't know.

For the rest of the afternoon we sat in the graveyard dirt and played with our only pulley bugs that crawled on Zach's grave. As the sun dipped in our shadows grew, Zach took in a small breath and began to sing. A gentle chill went through me as I recognized the song. One of the hymns the boys' choir at my father's church would often sing. Amazing Grace. If someone told me that was the voice of an angel, I would have believed him.

When I went home that day, I waylaid my father on his way to this basement study. I asked him where little boys went when they died. Bittersweet smile lines crinkled around his eyes and he told me that good little boys went to heaven to meet God. I asked him if God ever let little boys go back home. My father said heaven was their home.

That next Monday Rex the bully wrestled me down to the floor on the hallway for looking at Kate Michaels the wrong way. As the grimy bottom of his shoe ground painfully into my chest. I spotted Zach standing amongst the crowd. He stared down at me and then took a step back as if he anticipated something. The next moment, hundreds of round black roaches swarmed out from underneath the lockers and scurried up Rex's leg.

His face blanched and he screamed in the hallway watching us scream too. Rex kicked his legs and shuddered in his gym shorts and bolted down the hallway sobbing. Swarm of cockroaches streamed after him. Zach peaked his head out from around the lockers and smiled. His eyes glittered with mischief. That evening as we made dinner, my father asked me where I had gotten the bottom of a shoe-shaped smudge on my shirt. I told him Rex had pushed me down in the hallway.

Then I asked if Rex would go to hell for that. My father said he better seek forgiveness. I should forgive him? It would be very brave of you, my father said. You would be giving Rex an opportunity to become a better person. We ate dinner and my father brought me orange juice. And I drank it as he looked at the old photo of my mother and the way that he sometimes did. I was particularly tired that day.

and my father tucked me into bed early. Tuesday morning, Rex didn't show up to school. Zach and I joked that he was still running from the cockroach. Zach laughed quickly and covered his mouth before Kate Michaels and her passing could see the moth fluttering on his tongue. Rex still didn't show up on Wednesday, nor on Thursday. And then on Friday morning, his face was in the newspaper. under the missing children's section. I thought maybe Zach had something to do with it.

But he told me he hadn't seen Rex since the cockroach incident. He looked troubled when I told him Rex was missing. I hope someone finds him, I muttered. Zach smiled slightly. He met after what he did to you. My dad says forgiveness gives him an opportunity to become a better person. It's a brave thing to forgive. of.

Zach nodded. Last winter, a few kids had gone missing, there had been rumors about everything from kidnappers to mountain lions. The same had happened a couple years back. But now parents were easily scared, so on Saturday the sidewalks outside felt a little emptier. I'm sure the police are looking for wrecks, my father said. Let's pray that they can find him soon. We spent the afternoon playing checkers at the kitchen table. We were on our third or fourth game when the doorbell rang.

I went to open the door and was surprised to find Zach standing there. Zach, I said. What are you doing here? Is Pastor Nick home? He quietly asked. My dad? Why? I need to see him.

I turned to look at my father. And Zach squeezed past me through the doorway. Past her neck. My father looked up from the checkerboard. And then, in an instant, his eyes widened and his face turned white as a sheet. His lips trembled but no words came out. It's good to see you again, Zach said softly. My father bolted to his feet, sending a stool clattering across the hardwood floor.

You, he stammered. How? Zach tilted his head. Wasn't it you who always told us there's life after death? In all my life, I had never seen my father afraid. Not even when we'd forgotten the turkey in the oven last Thanksgiving and the whole kitchen got engulfed in flames. But now, he was afraid.

And Zach walked closer to him, step by step. Why didn't I make it to heaven? pastor. My father pressed his back against the kitchen table and whimpered something that died at the back of his throat. Zach gazed up in him steadily as he slowly undid the buttons of his cups. Maybe God couldn't recognize me anymore, he said quietly. Not after what you did to me. He pulled up his sleeves and I gasped.

Deep gashes circled his wrists and forearm. White cuts oozing purple blood like someone had carved his arms into little pieces and then messily stuck them back together. His skin was gray around the wounds and pockmarked with red craters. As I watched in horror, maggots and beetles crawled out of the holes and crept along the open seams of his flesh. They were all his friends. As I stood there frozen, my father gasped for breath.

Zach reached his hand up to his mouth, made a small sound, somewhere between a cough and a choking noise. I saw the soft skin of his throat tremble. Then a giant brown scorpion crawled out from between his open lips and onto the palm of his hand. Tell me, Zach muttered as he said. the scorpion raised its tail, tipped with a wicked black stinger the size of my thumbnail. Rex is in there right now.

Isn't he? My father cried and pleaded for mercy. I just watched, numbly. He deserves forgiveness, Zach said. Just like you told your son. But you, Pastor Nick, are a pitiful hypocrite. He lifted his hand and the scorpion leaf. I peeked onto my father.

My father screamed and clotted his shirt. But all that was needed was a single swipe. A flash of the stinger. Scorpion rolled out onto the floor. The same time that my father's knees buckle. As that quietly knelt down and scooped up the scorpion in his hands as my father slammed into the floor, twisting smastically. My friend gazed down sadly at the scorpions crushed carapace and flailing legs.

I'm sorry, he whispered. You were so brave. He gently cradled the dying creature and looked up at me. Rex is in the basement, he said, a sad smile in his eyes. And you find him. Will you let him know that I forgive him too? I stared down at my father, shivering on the floor with his eyes rolled back in his head. choking and fighting for his breath.

And Zach, who slowly slumped back against the kitchen table and closed his eyes. Zach, nice, he whispered. It was nice having friends again. The scorpion wriggled weakly in his hands. Zach smiled. A rise and fall of his chest grew shallow, and his face began to turn pale. The purple blood on his arms turned blood. The earthy scent of decay filled the room.

Like the smell that came up from the worm farm. When the scorpion stopped moving, I slowly turned around, walked into the living room, picked up the phone, and filed 911. Once I finished talking to the dispatcher, I turned back around. Sack was gone. A small swarm of white and brown moss fluttered against the line. light of the kitchen window. I opened the window and they flew into the sky. The police found wrecks tied up and drugged in the basement where there used to be a storage space adjacent

to the study before it was stripped bare and the door concealed using a bookshelf. The emergency medical technicians monitored my father until he woke up and then promptly put him under arrest. Six counts of murder, they said. I told the officers what happened, but of course no one believed me. I moved to my aunt and uncle's house in the city and was enrolled in a new school. I would never get to learn if Rex ever went back to school. One day, I took a bus to the downtown library and shifted through the newspaper archives until I found Zach's photo. From all the way back in 2010 under the missing children's side.

He was smiling in the photo, wearing a white and brown robe of the boy's choir at my father's church, crossed my mind. That someone must have found his body for him to be cleared dead, given a burial. But I decided not to look for those papers. My aunt and uncle hate bucks more than most things. And things like blowflies and moths usually don't last a minute. But sometimes I spot the bugs before they do. And if I'm lucky, I can scoop them into a jar and noticed and let them go outside.

Sometimes, I hope Zach finally made it into heaven. I pray for him on lonely nights when I remember to pray without my father reminding me. And sometimes, I look out my window and listen for soft voices in the wind. Secretly wishing, Zach is still out there. and singing to the small creeping creatures hidden underneath the earth. For more information, including pictures and videos of the stories told on this podcast, or to suggest stories for future episodes, please visit us at CreepyPod on Twitter, Instagram. All stories told on this podcast can be found at Creepastorwickia.com.

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