The Stadium: Haunted Coal Ridge, #1

By Chuck Sperati

A series of intertwined supernatural stories that will make you wonder where the darkness ends and the light begins. All small towns keep secrets, but in Coal Ridge when the secret gets out, it begins to feed…again.

Story 1: "The Stadium"

Football Friday night in Coal Ridge is about more than a game, it's the community gathering to support the school, the kids, and one another. While Cynthia Ramsey and her husband Mike sit in the stands cheering on their son, a shadow of the town's past hovers nearby, waiting for the moment to strike. A typically pleasant October evening, was about to devolve into a waking nightmare, with their only way out hidden in a childhood event that even those who experienced deny.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Writing Distracted
• Release date: Aug 11, 2018
• ISBN: 9781646390021

Chuck Sperati

Among other things, I'm a writer--with some published experience--whose been mostly quiet for the past few decades, mostly because I let life get in the way. I've long had a creative outlet at the gaming table and recently found another when I started building a website. With this new outlet also came inspiration. Right now I'm working primarily on a series of short stories that has received some very positive feedback, so I'm sharing. If you enjoy anything I've written, check out my website at https://www.chucksperati.com, where you can find more things that have crawled out of my imagination.

Book preview

Dedication

Coal Ridge is based on Ohio’s Finest Village. It was a great place to grow up and continues to be a remarkable community to which I enjoy returning to see friends and family. For those who live there, take a moment, look around, and be wary of the shadows.

Preface

A series of intertwined short stories that will make you wonder where the darkness ends and the light begins. All small towns keep secrets, but in Coal Ridge, when the secret gets out, it begins to feed...again.

Set in a small, somewhat geographically secluded Midwestern town, the blue-collar people of Coal Ridge are friendly and laid back. They enjoy block parties, gossip, and the simple joys that come with being a close-knit community. Since everyone knows everyone else, secrets are hard to keep, but some are so well hidden that they’ve been forgotten.

These short stories explore a supernatural awakening that will test the bonds of family and community.

The Stadium

October 13th, 2017

Cindy, where are the stadium seats I bought last week?

Standing in the bathroom, staring at her image in the mirror, Cynthia Ramsey took a deep breath. With great effort, she bit back the urge to tell her husband of seventeen years that the damned things he’d bought were still sitting on the workbench in the garage where he’d dropped them. Instead, she said nothing and awaited his inevitable arrival when he would ask again.

Stadium seats, she snorted, brushing her hair in yet a different direction. Those are crappy covered foam cushions with a handle that cost us forty bucks.

The venom in her tone brought deep lines out on her forehead.

Sitting for so long on those aluminum bleachers as Mikey’s football game went into overtime last week left her feeling sore the entire weekend. She’d asked Mike to get them foldaway stadium chairs with some back support. Instead, he’d bought those flimsy logoed cushions from that spoiled Winslow girl who lived down the road.

The reflected scowl deepened, drawing her attention away from her forehead and to the lines around her eyes. Putting down the brush, she leaned closer, wondering exactly when those lines had begun to mar her face and why she hadn’t noticed them before.

Standing back, the ordinarily cheerful mother