Every Sunday, Jackie and her family gathered at Ma’Dear’s house for dinner. Jackie was a wild one–sharp-tongued, quick to laugh, and always in some kind of trouble at school. Just last week, her parents got a call after she was caught sneaking near the woods and lying about it.
After dinner, like always, Uncle Ricky would head out back to the homemade fire pit. Everyone in the hood knew: if you wanted a story–something spooky or strange–you sat with Uncle Ricky. He didn’t just tell tales. He made you believe them.
Jackie and her cousins piled out the back door, crowding around the pit.
“Uncle Ricky!” Jackie hollered, bouncing on her toes. “Tell us one! Please, huh? Please?”
Uncle Rick was finishing the last puff of his spliff when the kids settled in. He gave them a half-smile and grabbed his cup of brown, strong-smelling firewater from the ground.
“Aight, you lil rugrats. Lemme wet my throat first.”
He leaned back in his chair, ash hangin’ off his lip like punctuation, and let the firelight dance across his face.
“Y’all ever see trees look like they ‘bout to trip?
Wind ain’t blowin’, but they lean and dip–
Like they watchin’ you, waitin’ on a wrong step.
Like they know somethin’.”
He took a sip, eyes locked on the flame.
“This ain’t no joke. This ain’t no game.
Me and your daddy? We was bad lil dudes,
Chasin’ honeysuckle, breakin’ Ma’Dear’s rules.
Sid–your pops–was always tryna prove,
Said, ‘Let’s cut through the woods, take a shortcut, make a move.’
I told him, ‘Boy, them trees don’t play.
Ma’Dear said stick to the street–broad day.’”
The fire popped. The kids jumped.
“But Sid just laughed, ‘Don’t be soft, we good!’
So we dipped past the church, deep into the woods.
The sun got shy. Birds went mute.
The air? Thick like Grandma’s beef stew.
Then we heard it–hmmm–real low, real mean.
Like a hum risin’ up from the dirt unseen.
I grabbed Sid’s arm, said, ‘Let’s bounce right now.’
But he stepped ahead, like he couldn’t hear me somehow.”
“That’s when I saw him.
Posted up by the pine.
One eye stitched shut. The other? Blue like crime.
Didn’t blink. Didn’t breathe. Just stared us down.
And the whole damn forest stopped makin’ sound.”
“There’s a man in the woods,” Uncle Rick said flatly now.
“He gave a crooked smile, that blue eye flashin’ with somethin’ foul.
A killer by the pines.
Some folks say what happened next was just my imagination…
But let me tell y’all what really went down.”
Rick’s voice shifted. The rhyme dropped. He looked toward the trees, eyes distant.
“I ain’t never told nobody this–not even Ma’Dear.
But Jackie out here actin’ like them trees ain’t nothin’ to fear…
So listen close.
With a blink, he was right in front of us.
Tall. Face all wrong–kept shiftin’ like smoke, like heat waves on asphalt.
Only that blue eye stayed the same.
It wasn’t just blue–it was like a whole universe in there. Stars and all.
He wore a three-piece suit, but we knew he wasn’t human.
A gold chain swayed like it had a heartbeat.
Then he said,
‘Y’all come for the honeysuckles?’”
“We said nothin’. Too scared.
He smelled like sulfur and somethin’ burnt.
We thought if we didn’t move, didn’t speak, he’d disappear.
‘Don’t talk to strangers,’ Ma’Dear always said.
We thought she meant weirdos.
Nah… she meant him.
Then he sniffed and said,
‘Do I smell somethin’ wet?’
And I looked down.
I’d pissed myself. Couldn’t stop cryin’.
But Sid–your daddy–stood in front of me.
I was clutchin’ his shirt, and I could feel his heart bangin’.
He was scared too, but he didn’t run.”
“Biiiiiig Doooog,” the man said, real slow, like a growl.
Still, we ain’t say nothin’.
Then he smiled again–
All gums and venom.
“I’m here on behalf of your mama.
Something… unfortunate happened to your father—the security officer.
Shot by some Ne’er-dwell’s.
A good man, gone.
I’m here to take you home now… with urrrrgency.”
Rick spit in the fire. The flames hissed.
“Ma’Dear told us ‘bout tricksters.
Said, ‘Don’t trust no sweet talk.
And never follow a voice that already knows your name.’”
He stared hard at the kids, voice dropping low and gravelly.
“Then he said,
‘I’m hungry.
I’m gonna break your necks and suck the life from your lil bodies–
Just like honeysuckles.
How’s that sound?’”
It grabbed Sid by the shoulder.
“I screamed. Loud.
Sid grabbed the biggest stick his nine-year-old body could lift and WHACKED that thing upside the head.
It growled again–low, not right.
Then the trees moved.
Like they was reachin’. Grabbin’.
Maybe it was just shadows. Maybe it was them old twisted branches.
But it felt like hands.
Pullin’ us back. Draggin’ us away.”
“I ain’t know what he was.
Devil? Demon? Some old spirit from before this land had street names?
All I know is, Sid looked me in the eye and said,
‘We runnin’. On three.’”
The fire cracked again. Rick’s eyes didn’t move.
“We took off. Didn’t look back.
I don’t remember my legs movin’.
Just the sound of that hum… gettin’ louder,
Like it was inside my head.”
He tapped his temple.
“By the time we made it to the church road,
It was like we’d never been in the woods.
Sun was back out.
Birds singin’.
But Ma’Dear was waitin’ on the porch.
Hands tight ‘round her Bible.
Eyes red from cryin’.
Like she already knew.
It was sundown. We’d lost a whole day.
And the first thing out my mouth was:
‘Daddy! Is Daddy dead? We saw a man in the woods!’
That’s all I could say between the sobbin’ and the snot.”
Jackie swallowed hard. The fire was just embers now.
“Next day, Sid had a mark on his shoulder.
Like a handprint burned into his skin.
Nobody believed us.
Said it was poison ivy. Or a stove burn.
But me and Sid?
We ain’t never walked past them pines again.
And some nights, when the house gets real quiet,
I still hear that hum…
Real low,
Like it’s comin’ up through the dirt under my feet.
Now, our father–your grandpa–he was fine. Had a scuffle, yeah, but he handled it.
Cancer got him years later—but even that felt like a Ne’er-dowell come back around.
But some nights, when the house is too still,
I swear I hear him callin’ from the pines.
Soundin’ hungry.”
Uncle Rick turned to Jackie. The fire caught in his eye like something still burning.
“Ma’Dear? She never said nothin’ after that day.
Just kept her Bible close and her porch light on.”
Jackie opened her mouth.
Said nothin’.
Just stared into the dark past the edge of the yard.
That’s when she heard it–
A hum.
Real low.
Jackie froze. The woods beyond the yard pulsed in silence.
And for the first time, she didn’t want to know what was waiting past the pines.
Uncle Rick didn’t move. Just sipped his drink, eyes still on the flame.
“So go ahead. Keep sneakin’ off.
But if you hear that hum?
Don’t answer.
There’s a man in the woods.”
For more Southern gothic stories woven in memory and myth, discover Rose Red Snow: A Southern Gothic Horror Novella
Rose Red Snow White 
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