Chain Letter by Stephen Simpson

Marlene and E'lisa, two seemingly ordinary individuals, receive a chilling email—a chain letter that warns of impending doom if they dare to delete it. Unfazed by superstitions and skeptical of the warning, they dismiss it as a mere hoax. Little do they know, their indifference will come at a terrifying cost.

As the night unfolds, Marlene finds herself face to face with an unexpected visitor—a presence that defies comprehension. The sinister truth behind the chain letter reveals itself, plunging her into a nightmarish race against time. Meanwhile, E'lisa, a fifteen-year-old girl living in London, also disregards the ominous message from her aunt Adele. But when the sun rises, E'lisa's world shatters, and she and her family are thrust into a desperate battle against an evil that thrives on fear and spreads through the digital realm.

Chain Letter takes readers on a harrowing journey where the line between reality and nightmare blurs. With each passing email, the evil force grows stronger, thirsting for souls to claim. Can Marlene and E'lisa unravel the mystery and put an end to the terror before it consumes them and everyone they hold dear?

For fans of heart-pounding horror and pulse-pounding suspense, Chain Letter delivers a spine-chilling narrative that will leave you questioning every click and email you receive.

Shivers run down her spine. She feels the tiny hairs rise on her arms, a prickling in the nape of her neck as she looks at the photo. She is fascinated with the ghostly, pale white figure next to the boy. Standing half behind the boy her long black hair hangs down to her middle. The figure is naked except for a loincloth around her waist and a necklace of teeth around her neck.

Marlene notices she can only see the whites of the eyes of the woman and that she is sneering malignantly. She finds it difficult to look away from the photo.

She decides spontaneously to forward it. The way her life is panning out, she feels she could do with a bit of good-luck, and she will take it from wherever and from whomever. Consciously she does not consider deleting the mail though, because deep down in her subconscious she has taken heed of the warning.

She is just about to click on the forward button when she notices that Adèle has already forwarded it to Lisa. There is nothing worse than finding the same email in your inbox. Marlene moves the mail to her trash folder automatically, without thinking, failing to remember the settings on her trash folder are set to delete all the mail in the folder as soon as she signs out.

Marlene closes her email account page and then opens the page to her social networking site.

She enters her username and password. The page opens – eventually. She reads all her virtual friends' recent activities.

It always amazes her how all the friends she went to school with all those many years ago, never look a day older than they did on graduation day. She uploaded a recent photo, so compared to all her friends she looks like Metusalem, the biblical patriarch who lived to the age of 969, mentioned in Genesis and remembered as the world's oldest human being.

She connects her digital camera to the computer and then she uploads some photos of her recent holiday, a holiday she spent alone on the Algarve in Portugal. The photos are of the beaches, the cliffs, old castles, and the surrounding vistas of Portugal. None of them includes her.

She wonders why Lisa has never registered with this particular social network. If she did, then Marlene would not have to wait for Lisa to send her photos of her grandchildren. Once Lisa uploaded them, Marlene could just look at them herself.

It is probably because this site is mostly for the elderly folk, people only looking for companionship and friendship, looking for long lost friends. There are no young girls parading across the screen with almost next to nothing on.

Once her photos are visible on her site, she signs out. She then does a bit of filing, tidies up the awful gremlin's desk and once again organizes her files methodically.

It is a quiet, peaceful day. When the working part of her sunlight hours is over, she feels relaxed and not at all harassed, most certainly not the hair-on-end emotion that usually accompanies her home.

She shuts down her computer and takes hold of her bag. She switches off the lights as she marches out of the office door.

She walks straight towards her car and becomes aware of the dark and threatening clouds above her head. Looking up she sees they seem incredibly low, close to the ground, heavy with rain. She feels that if she reached up, she could touch them.

A nippy, forceful wind suddenly rushes past her, whirling the leaves in her path and twirling them up into the sky, whipping her hair around her face and into her eyes, blowing her breath away. The wind behind her back shoves her towards her car.

She unlocks the door hurriedly. Sliding into the car, leaves sweep in with her. She pulls with all her might to slam the door shut, leaving the chaos outside.

Sitting back in her chair, sighing deeply, she fills her lungs with air rapidly.

She was so busy organizing the office she never noticed the swift change in weather. She remembers though, looking out the window only an hour ago and thinking what a glorious day it has been.