(Feel free to put your own endings in the comments)
I always used to think that horror was some-thing that happened at night. You know the sort of thing. It's dark and cloudy and maybe there's a storm trembling in the air and you're lost in the middle of the countryside and suddenly, somewhere a wolf howls ...
By the time I was 14 I'd read all of Darren Shan and I'd even started on Stephen King although my mom didn't like that because of all the rude words. The sort of horror stories I liked best had ghosts and vampires and hideous monsters that jumped out at you just when you weren't expecting them. I once saw a film about a man being chased by cannibals and I swear I didn't sleep for a week.
But as I discovered, real horror isn't like that.
Real horror is worse.
For me, it all started on a beautiful September afternoon. It was the end of our first week at school and I was walking home down streets that I'd known all my life. I remember hearing the chimes of an ice cream van. A bunch of little kids ran past me, chasing after it. There were a couple of workmen painting one of the houses and one of them raised a hand in greeting as I walked past. In other words, everything was normal. It was so normal that I didn't even notice how normal it was, if you know what I mean. No. That's not quite true.
There was one thing.
I live with my mom and dad in a sort of crescent. All the houses are modern and to look at them you'd think they were all competing to have the prettiest front gardens. We're right in the middle and as I approached the front door, I noticed a crow, perched on the roof. It would have been hard to miss. It was a great, fat thing, almost twice the size of any bird I'd ever seen. And it was very black. Its feathers could have been dipped in oil, the way they hung off it. Its eyes - also black - were as bright as diamonds.
There was something pink and nasty, writhing in its beak. The crow was eating it. But as I approached, it stopped and for a moment it seemed to stare right at me. I don't know how long I stood there, looking at it - probably just two or three seconds, although it felt longer. Then, acting on impulse, I leaned down, picked up a stick and threw it at the crow.
"Shoo!" I shouted. "Buzz off!" The crow lurched into the sky and disappeared. And that was it. It was just a bird, eating a worm and I had scared it away.
That was what I thought.
I'd already forgotten about it as I fumbled for the keys and opened the front door.
As usual, I threw my bag down in the hall and went straight into the kitchen. But nothing was ever going to be "as usual" again. I smelled it first. Sweet and sickening.
And then I saw it.