"Bedridden" eBook - April 3, 2025
Another grim chapter in the story of Carl, who woke up from a stroke to find himself in a terrifying care facility...
Every Thursday, Silver Gecko Publishing highlights one of my stories, either a work of short fiction, a novel, or an audiobook.
Several weeks ago, I offered a listen to the audiobook for “Bedridden” on Audible and Amazon. Now I am offering a selection from the stand-alone novelette on Kindle.
Here’s what I had to say about the story a couple weeks ago:
This is a rather personal story, which I wrote after my father suffered a stroke in 2017. On one hand, it offers the potential for many horror tropes of institutionalized care (which we’ve seen in many movies and books over the years). But it also reflects the real-world horrors that come with a debilitating event and what people face every day as they - and their families - recover.
If you enjoy what you’re reading, please check out the audiobook or the Kindle novelette.
Enjoy your weekend!
-Kevin Carr
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“Bedridden” by Kevin Carr
PART IV: THE SNARE
Rachel, the head of physical therapy, stopped by while Marian was there. She was a pretty blond woman of medium height and a pleasant smile. She effortlessly hit all the required non-verbal cues to put Marian at ease.
But Carl knew differently. On the surface, Rachel was a friendly person with a pleasant demeanor. However, Carl had seen her true self. She was one of the Shadow People, one of the few that had the ability to move around the Facility during the day.
Carl had seen below her flesh where the real Shadow Person lay.
Marian, of course, was unaware of Rachel’s true nature. She had always taken people at face value, which is how Carl used to operate. Now, he knew to look deeper… sometimes metaphorically, but in this case, also physically and literally.
“How’s the therapy going?” Marian asked.
Rachel smiled her ever-smile, but then pouted slightly in an almost painful way.
“This was a bad stroke,” she said, not losing her smile. “Stroke recovery is very slow. And we’re still very early in the process. I can’t predict what will happen today in therapy, let alone a month from now.”
“Oh,” Marian said softly. She looked at Carl questioningly. Carl just shook his head.
“We have a lot of work to do,” Rachel said. “Fortunately, we have a very good therapy staff. Your insurance will only go so far, but we know how to write the reports to get the longest run of therapy available. Believe me, we are here to advocate for you and your husband.”
She smiled again, but Marian didn’t respond. She was new to all this, and she couldn’t tell whether Rachel was speaking the truth or not. But Carl knew what was going on in his wife’s mind. She may have had doubts, but with a person of authority standing in front of her, telling her that eventually everything will be be fine, she had no reason to question this.
“Am I getting better?” Carl asked, more for the sake of Marian than for himself. After all, he didn’t trust that this would help him. The Shadow People were not here to help him. They were here to feed.
Rachel presented her permanent smile and cocked her head, speaking to Carl as if he were a child.
“Like I said, stroke recovery takes a long time,” she said. “And you need a lot of work. You are definitely going to have to stay here longer.”
Carl felt himself deflate. He was not expecting Rachel to tell him good news, but when it was stated so clearly that he wasn’t getting out of here anytime soon, it stung.
As Rachel stared at him, smiling like a fashion model who was dead inside, Carl’s mind flashed back to the film The Shining. Danny Torrance had just ridden his Big Wheel around the corner to find himself facing the ghosts of Charles Grady’s murdered twin daughters. He heard a voice in his mind paraphrase Rachel’s statement: “Come and stay with us, Carl. Forever… and ever… and ever…”
Carl shook his head as best as the paralysis would let him to get that image and voice out of his mind.
PART V: PREPARATION
Soon, Marian went home, and Rachel took Carl to the therapy room. It was time to prep him for tonight.
The therapy room lay in the center of the Facility, a large gym with sliding tracks on the ceiling and an array of equipment scattered throughout. But Carl knew what could appear therapeutic could also be used to inflict pain and misery.
Instead of seeing carefully designed devices necessary to help people, Carl only saw the pain. He saw the chains. He saw the straps. He saw a tilting table reminiscent of the platform Victor Frankenstein used to create his Monster.
The room wasn’t empty, however it was only other patients and their respective therapists. Carl looked up at Rachel, and her seemingly permanent smile spread ever-so-slightly.
“Are you ready, Carl?” she asked. As she spoke, her face split open in vertical slices, which peeled away like ribbons of flesh falling off. These flesh ribbons landed red-side up around her neck like a spiked, scarlet collar. Beneath the flesh ribbons, Rachel revealed her true self.
She still smiled, but instead of the pretty, frozen beauty-contestant plastic smile, it was hideous. Beneath her flesh ribbons, Rachel had mottled, gangrenous skin. Her smile was even bigger than before, revealing pointed yellow teeth and a gaping maw with no tongue.
She leaned forward and inhaled through her nose, as if checking he was ready by his scent.
“Yes,” she said, her voice becoming gravelly and deeper now. “Let’s get you set up.”
Carl could not refuse. Even if he told her to stop, she wouldn’t. He was hers now. He didn’t have the strength in his voice to scream, and the other Shadow People wouldn’t come to his aid. He was their prisoner. He knew that. Even more terrifying to Carl, so did they.
The Rachel-thing wheeled his chair up to a stationary bike and lashed his feet to the pedals. Carl winced with every pull and every yank on his feet. He tried to resist, but the Rachel-thing’s tiny hands were like iron clamps. It just made the pain worse to resist.
“Start pedaling,” the Rachel-thing said.
Reluctantly and resigned, Carl started moving his legs. Why could he move these now but not in bed at night when the demons were haunting him? Perhaps there was something about the Shadow People’s power at night. Perhaps the daylight really does make a difference. Perhaps that’s why they prey on people like him… they can’t fight back in the day or the night.
“Push, push, push,” the Rachel-thing said, grinning wider as Carl turned the pedals. The Rachel-thing stood up and looked down at Carl proudly. A thin line of turgid drool dripped off her bottom lip and landed on the floor with a small splat.
In Carl’s mind’s eye, he could imagine the puddle of spittle starting to eat through the linoleum like the blood from the creature in Alien.
When the Rachel-thing was sure Carl was doing the work, she stood up tall and started to walk around the therapy room.
Carl wanted to stop. His back hurt. His legs hurt. But he couldn’t take his feet off the pedals, and he certainly couldn’t stand up to walk away.
Soon, the Rachel-thing came back to him as she circled the room, her flesh ribbons still draping from her neck, slowly swaying to and fro in synchronicity with her walk.
“Push, push, push,” she said to Carl with her permanent grin.
Carl was exhausted, and he was becoming ever more exhausted by the second. Was this how the Shadow People absorbed your essence? Was this stationary bike really some monstrous capacitor that stored people’s essence for later consumption?
With every pedal, his legs became more tired, more stiff. Nothing was getting better.
And the pain continued through the exercise and through the day. Much later, at night, his muscles and joints felt tighter and more achy than ever before. He had less mobility now. He could barely move.
Well, except for that third arm.