43. Jeff.wmv by Virtual Fear
I might as well introduce myself. My name is Mitchell, and I’m currently twenty-three years old. A close friend of mine, Natasha, recently committed suicide. This was an utter shock to me, her other friends, family, and the entire town. She was always the kind of person who would brighten up a room when she walked in, and I truly do mean that. No matter the situation, she always had a positive attitude, and was an amazing person to be around. It’s no wonder why her suicide wasn’t taken easy by anyone. A few days prior to her death, she began to act strange. She would be more paranoid, and spent a lot of her time in the house. I had the thought that this could have been the result of personal problems, and is what caused her to end her life.
The funeral wasn’t easy to go to. I sat close to the front, and could only stay for around half the duration, as I couldn’t deal with the thought of one of my close friends no longer being around. She was only twenty. Shortly after the funeral had ended and people began leaving, I went back to her house with her mother, father, and younger brother. He wasn’t much younger than her; there was a three year difference between the two, making him seventeen. We didn’t know each other that well, but there were some laughs shared between us before.
Natasha’s family cleaned out her apartment, giving away to belongings to relatives and friends. Since I was known as the computer geek, they decided to give me her laptop. The one I had was pretty old, so I kindly accepted the offer. Hers was fairly new; she had gotten it around a year ago. It was a Dell, and was in nice condition. Natasha had always kept things clean, which is why it still looked brand new. I spent the day at her parents’ house, chatting to them and her brother. Later that night, at around 9:30, I went home and turned it on. It ran Windows 7, and didn’t take long for it to turn on. When it did, the background was the Windows logo, the same wallpaper that came with a new laptop. It was strange how it wasn’t changed to something, since Natasha was a fan of customizing things. I just shrugged it off.
The first thing I did was look through some photo folders. Most people would just delete whatever the previous owner had, but I decided to save all of her old photos, videos, and music on a USB. This was so her family could have them if they had requested. There were many photos, mainly her with friends or family members.I then went into videos. There were the basic ones that came with Windows, and some she took herself of events and with friends. I then stumbled upon a folder named, “Jeff.” I couldn’t recall her knowing a Jeff, so I was a bit confused as to why she had this. When I opened it, what I saw frightened me a bit.
“Jeff.wmv”
The name wasn’t what startled me, it was the thumbnail. It was the picture of Jeff the killer, the one that was used for the well-known Creepypasta. I stopped for a moment to think; what was this doing here? Natasha was never the one to read or watch such stuff, she was the kind of person who would get scared easily. I moved my mouse over the icon and clicked.
The video came up in a small screen, and took around two minutes to load. This was odd, as usually videos would take a few seconds at most to fully load. It was a still image of Jeff, which went on for around two minutes straight. However, there was sound to it. All I could hear was a constant whistling sound. It sounded a bit muffled, and was going on a constant note for the whole video. I took note that it was obviously looping, and that the original sound lasted less than a second.Around two minutes in, the screen goes black and the sound is gone. For a second, I had thought the video stopped, but when I checked it turns out that it was still going. So, I waited patiently. After a minute or so of waiting, the image and sound returned. However, the picture had changed. The saturation was turned up, and the colors were now extremely different. It seemed like a poorly done edit in Photoshop. But, something about it made me feel sick. It was as if it was actually staring at me. I couldn’t turn it off; I wanted to watch it.
I felt weaker, until the video had ended. It was around five minutes in length. Paranoia then suddenly took over my body, as well as the feeling of being sick. Not even a minute had passed until I had to rush to the bathroom, and vomited profusely. After that, I blacked out.
When I awoke, I looked at my phone for the time; 11:30 p.m. I was passed out on my bathroom floor for over an hour. Slowly, I picked myself up, went into my bedroom and stumbled into bed. Unlike other nights, I had a very hard time falling asleep; it wasn’t until 1:30 until I finally dozed off. All that time was spent looking into the black abyss that surrounded me. Although the sickness in my stomach had passed, the feeling of paranoia still sat in my mind. I could sense someone watching me.
The time was around one in the afternoon, when I woke up. I didn’t have a job; I quit my old one as a cashier at a local supermarket, and was looking for a new one. Not long after I got up, I went to the kitchen, got something to eat, and sat down in the living room in front of the TV. The unnerving feeling of being watched was still within me.
I couldn’t finish my meal; half of it went into the trash. The paranoia was tearing at me, and I constantly felt watched. At five, I decided I’d go out to a local restaurant for dinner, instead of staying home alone, in hopes to deal with this feeling. The place I went to was called Blue Dragon restaurant; it was kind of tacky, but the food wasn’t costly. I went in, ordered my meal, and just pigged out. For some reason, I felt incredibly hungry at this point. After I left, the rest of the day was spent going around town; driving, shopping, typical things. The paranoia inside of me had actually died down a lot, and my mood had increased greatly. I hadn’t gone home until eleven.
That night, I went to sleep pretty quickly. It felt great, knowing that I didn’t have to toss and turn. No problem, until I began to dream. The second that my mind has fully drifted from reality, I began to experience terrifying thoughts. These weren’t ordinary nightmares. They were the kind that would cause someone to wake up screaming. I saw terrifying faces, and all I could hear was blood curdling screams. It was nothing like I had ever experienced before.To my relief, the nightmare eventually ended. When this happened, I tried to turn my head to look at the clock on the nightstand next to me. However, I wasn’t able. Not a single part of my body would move; I was experiencing some form of paralysis. All I could do was lie down in my bed and look up at the blackness that engulfed my entire room.
After a couple of minutes, the numbness eventually faded. Finally, I could move. I turned my head to the clock; it was 4:25 am. I never wake up in the middle of the night, so I felt confused. At this time, I took notice of this sound that seemed to be coming from a source that I couldn’t identify. It was the whistling from the video, and it was just barely audible. Hearing this caused me to feel even more fearful, and it prevented me from going back to sleep. When I had enough, I got up and went downstairs to get some water. Before going back to my bedroom, I decided to use the bathroom before going back to bed. The instant I turned on the light to see my reflection, my heart sank.
My skin was completely white, my hair had gone black, and my eyes… they were, black. Instead of having the green eyes that I did, they were suddenly black. I stood there, just looking at my reflection. I eventually came to my senses, and just thought it was because I was tired and that was causing me to hallucinate.
Once I got into bed, the nightmares continued off where they had left off. This time, they were more intense; there were more faces and the screams were louder. When I woke up this time, I was dripping in sweat. The clock said 6:57 am, but although my body pleaded for more sleep, I got out of bed immediately. No way in hell was I experiencing that again.
The whistling sound had not disappeared yet, and I could still hear it coming from somewhere. This time, it was a bit louder than before. Irritated, I tried to look for the source of it. I search all throughout the house, checked my television, phone, and even the laptop; however, I didn’t find out where the whistling was coming from. Once I had come to terms with this, I went into the living room and got onto the newly given laptop to keep myself occupied.
The background was somehow changed to the still image of Jeff. Seeing this caused me to jump back in fear, and to curse under my breath. I opened Google Chrome and saved a photo of basic wallpaper just so I could get rid of that image. But regardless of the comfort changing it brought me, I began to ask myself how this could possibly occur. Nobody else lived with me, and I didn’t change it before. To help comfort myself, I concluded that it was just a glitch of some sort.
Since I was in need to a job, I decided to look for some local ones to help me get by. As it turns out, there was a small gas station in the area that was hiring and they were able to take calls. I wrote the number down on a piece of paper and planned to call them at ten. Soon after this, the feeling of hunger was felt in my stomach, and I decided to get some breakfast. Thinking back to yesterday, I decided to just make myself some toast since I wasn’t sure if I could keep down a lot. Luckily, the toast didn’t make me feel sick. At this time, the feeling of paranoia had died down a significant amount, and I no longer could hear the whistling.
Once ten had rolled along, I called the gas station to ask about possibly working there. The guy who picked up was name Oliver, and he sounded a bit older than me. We were talking for a few minutes, and he said that I could drop by later that day to see him. For the duration of the entire phone call, I noticed that his voice sounded distant, as if he had me on speaker. The sound was also muffled, which caused me to have to ask him to repeat himself sometimes. Not only that, but that damn whistling could be heard again, and this time in the phone. Although the sound ended when I hung up the phone, the feeling of being watched hit me again, causing me to experience an uproar of fear and anger at the situation.
The video came to mind. I pondered about the possibility of it being the root to all that had occurred so far. Being a rational person, I tried to dismiss the thought. “That’s bullshit,” I said to myself, “how could a video on a laptop cause me to experience such things? That isn’t possible.” But regardless of my efforts, a part of my mind was screaming that this was the cause. To be sure, I deleted the file that contained the video. Within a matter of seconds that clip was gone from my computer and I no longer had to view it. Now, I thought, there would be nothing to fear anymore.The thought was quickly dismissed when I entered the bathroom and looked at my reflection again. Just like last time, that image was still there, but this time I noticed that I looked exactly like Jeff.
Without any warning, the whistling was back and suddenly became so loud that I yelled out in pain as it buzzed through my ears and I had no other choice but to cover them. This caused me to go over the tipping point; I threw my fist as hard as I could into the mirror, causing it to shatter.
The whistling had stopped. Silence filled the room. I let out a massive sigh of relief; no longer did I have to experience both the reflection and that sound again.I had massive cuts all over my hand from the impact that made a bloody mess all over my hand and on the bathroom counter. When wrapping up my hand, I hadn’t felt anything. Although I was clearly injured, there was no pain in my hand. This came off as more weird than scary, and I quickly wrapped myself up. Looking down at the pieces of glass and blood on the counter created guilt to enter me, and I began cleaning it up. When I had finished and looked at the time on my phone, I noticed that it was a good time for me to go see about the job at the station.
When I got to where the gas station was… there was nothing there. The road was barren, and there was no station to be seen. I drove all around town and couldn’t find a single damn place that was under the name of the one I saw online. Out of rage, I quickly spun around and drove home; the mirror wasn’t even a concern anymore. As I was driving, I saw frightening faces in the people who were walking along the side. They were all extremely pale, and had dark hair. The similarity of the people and Jeff made the negative emotions in me worsen, and I turned on the radio in an attempt to help me feel at ease. What I heard caused me to literally stop dead in the empty road. Through my speakers… I heard that fucking whistling again. No matter what station I turned to, it was there. Just like with the mirror, I took my other fist to the radio as hard as I could, breaking it and allowing silence to fill the car.
I got home and slumped down on the couch, turning on the television. The next three days were spent just lying around the place, eating microwavable foods, and sleeping. I no longer had the energy to get up and do anything. After a while, I had enough and called a close friend of mine and asked if I could stay over his place for the night and that I would explain everything when I got there. With what was going on, I didn’t want to stay in the house any longer. Thankfully, he said it was no problem and that I could stay in the guest room. I grabbed my wallet, jacket, and a pair of clothes that I threw into the backseat of my car. It wasn’t long until I was out the door and driving down the road.
My friend’s name was William, and he had an interest in how the human mind works. So, I felt like he would have a pretty good idea as to what’s occurring and would help me seek out professional help. I ran up to his door, banging on it as quick as I could. He didn’t look the same when he opened it. He had the same fucking complexion that everyone else was having, including me. I could have sworn he asked me what the trouble was, but I couldn’t hear it over the damn whistling that had come back as soon as he opened the door. I felt sweat run down my face and felt anger building up within me. He kept talking, but soon the whistling had gotten so loud that I could only see his mouth move.
All I could do was scream as I covered my ears once again, kneeling onto the ground. William got down too, and I could tell he was panicking at this point and was most definitely screaming out my name to get my attention. He grabbed my shoulders, and made me look up facing him. I no longer saw William’s face; it was Jeff, his eyes peering into mine and that massive grin. Seeing this caused me to jump up, knocking him over. I swiftly kicked him in the face, resulting in him covering it with his hands and for blood to slowly leak onto the ground. As I ran to the car, my stomach began to churn; sooner or later I was soon going to vomit. As I started my car, I kept seeing Jeff’s face instead of William’s. This time, he was hunched over and slowly making his way to me. I drove as fast as I could to get away from him.
I tried to think of where to go, but there was nowhere that I could. Any facility that could give me treatment for what was occurring was over half an hour away, and I was becoming low on gas. The nearest place was my apartment, and although I told myself that I wouldn’t go back there, it was the only place I could get to quickly. Once there, I burst through the front door and ran into the bathroom, collapsed onto the floor near the toilet and began vomiting profusely. Once all food was up, I began to feel a massive sharp pain. It was if I was being gutted alive, and now all that was coming up was blood. All control of my stomach had been lost and I threw up so much that the inside of my stomach was damaged and bleeding. The agony lasted for up to ten minutes, and once it was over I curled up into a ball on the floor.
The thought of what I did to William then came into mind; I had kicked my close friend in the face, and made him bleed. I couldn’t believe that I had done such a thing, and this only added to the horrible feelings that were inside me. I couldn’t take anymore, and broke down. I cried to the point where my eyes began to stung, and my face was covered in tears. The damn whistling was still all I could hear, and this caused me to become more furious, making even more tears to roll out of my eyes. It was a vicious cycle that I was stuck in. In a panic, I tried to think of ways in which I could get out of this misery, but to no avail. I couldn’t call anyone, since there was no way that I could hear them, and William most definitely called the police. That means that I only had a certain amount of time to get out of this, and I finally came to my last resort; death.
Suicide was never something that I had seriously considered before, and having Natasha do it herself made me think that I would never do such a thing. But this was too much for me; the paranoia, the faces, what I had done to William and the fucking whistling had taken hold of me. I was torn apart, and became a maniac within days. There was a small pistol in my bedroom that I had kept for personal defense, and it was now the only method of escape. I went to my room, and soon had it in my hands.
Knowing that what I held out in front of me would be my cause of death in a matter of minutes made my blood run cold for a second, and I looked at it for what seemed like forever. Tears began to fall again as I realized just what I was about to do, but it was all that was left. I made my way to the bathroom, and placed it on the counter. Digging into the garbage, I found a sharp piece of glass that was a part of the mirror. Using this, I carved a message into where the mirror once was; whoever finds my body will see it. Once this was done, I sat down in the tub, and took deep slow breaths to help myself relax one final time. Nothing good would come out of my life ever since this shit had happened, so there was no need to continue.
So here I am, lying in my tub, writing this letter as an explanation as to why I decided to end my life. I’ve calmed down now, and this is all that is left for me to do. To whoever this may affect, I’m really sorry. I wish I could turn back time and delete that video as soon as I saw the thumbnail, or even deny taking the laptop. But I took the laptop, I saw the video, and I had to face the consequences of doing so. This is the end of my letter. Take care.
The story above was found written on a piece of paper next to the body of Mitchell Weltz, a twenty-three year old man who had committed suicide in the bathroom of his apartment. His body was found at 5:37 p.m, after a phone call to the police from a man named William Michael had sent officers to the place. Mr. Michael had said that he was physically abused by Mr. Weltz in his front lawn, causing him to have a broken nose and bleeding. The apartment that Mr. Weltz was staying in had been unlocked, and old boxes of various food items could be seen scattered throughout the apartment, as well as empty soda cans. In the bathroom, next to the body, was a message was carved into where the mirror Mr. Weltz described once hung. The message had read, “Now the sound will stop.”