A small town near forest

I was babysitting my niece Beth. I don't like kids, but my brother had important meeting and his wife, Hannah, was at her parent's house helping cleaning out the attic, so they could renovate the roof. Also, my brother offered to pay me. So I, freshly dating ice cram and pizza, agreed to babysit his little brat, that acted like angel around her parents, but was complete demon whenever they left the room.

When I came to their house, Hannah was just explaining to Beth, that she must go, but i'll look after her. Beth didn't take that good and started trowing ultimate tantrum. Her mother threw a tired look at me and i noded like saying 'I'll take care of it'.

After Hannah left, i bent down to Beth and made her look into my eyes.

,,Listen! I know you hate me and i take it, but life isn't fair. If life was fair, I would be on Die Antwoord's concert with my friends, but they decided to hate me, so I'm babysitting you instead. I'm not happy as well, but I'm here."

After she completely calmed down and finished her alpabet soup, she had hour and half before it was her bedtime.

,,So what do you wanna do?" I asked whilst yawning.

,,Play me some cartoon!" she answered in way which, if i ever used to my parents, would get me endless time of spanking and not being able to do anything which included fun.

When she sat herself on the couch, i opened the cabinet full of VHS's.

,,Which one do you want? Hello Kitty or Spongebob Squarepants......or Powerpuff girls?" I asked while reading labels on cassettes.

,,I don't want any of those stupid cartoons! I want something good!" she shouted as loudly as, i thought, is possible.

,,Okay, okay, just calm down!" i sighted an put all three cassettes back into the cabinet on their previous place. All of these used to be mine, until i got into puberty and started treating all cartoons like junk for little kids. But there was one, which i didn't remember. It had to be really old one, bacause the box was pretty much holding together thanks to duck tape, which was wrapped all around the package. It probabbly used to be some sort of christian documentary, but most of the picture was devastated by the words 'A small town near forest'. Probabbly someone re-recorded something on it. At that time it was pretty much common and it sounded really innocent(Oh, how i was wrong), so i put it in the player and waited for it to start.

It welcomed us with picture of town where we live. Nothing happened for few minutes, but then little clown doll jumped from behind the bush. Straight on i realized, that the graphic, doesn't seem like it was made in the '80 - '90. You could perfectly see every strand of clown's hair.

,,Hello there Beth! I'm glad to see you!" It giggled.

Okay, how the hell does it know her name? 'Maybe, someone made this tape for her and just put it on the VHS.' But why would someone do it? Her cassette player also has slot for CDs and DVDs, so why wouldn't that someone put it on CD?

There was even more questions to ask, but before i could do that, the clown continued:

,,I'm Grimy and today I'll learn you to count from 100 to 1." the clown giggled again.

Why 100 to 1? Why not 1 to 100?

Grimy made few steps backwards and started doing Pennywise - like dance. It looked like those old '30 cartoon dances while the music started playing.

,,100 houses were bulit here

   99 people moved in there

   98 kids were born in that year..." it started singing. Every time it started singing about another number, it was cut on what he was singing about.

My phone rang, so i got up and went out of the room and picked it up. It was my mom. She asked me if i heard about my Brother, bacause she needed talk to him, but he wasn't picking up his phone. I said, that i haven't heard about him since our deal about babysitting Beth. So she said, she'll try phone Hannah. With those words, I hung up. 

I got kinda hungry, so i headed to the kitchen and grabbed one of snadwiches, that Hannah previously made. That time i got call from one of my friends. 

,,Hey, look, we're missing one person, because Ness isn't comming, because she's with her "bestie" dinosaur... so are you coming?"

,,No, i have another plans!" i hung up. How dare she? I mean, she hated me few hours ago and now we're friends again? I sigh and take bite of the sandwich. Sometimes people just don't understand, that their words have impact.

'I better check on Beth and that weird puppet' i tought and started walking to room, where Beth watched the TV. Just when i was in front of the door, i heard the puppet go:

"64  people that day cried

63 caskets were marked that day

62 graves started to get dug.." 

Okay, what kind of twisted children show talks about  caskets and fresh graves?! I started getting more and more creeps with every line of that disturbing song. What made it even worse, was fact, that every line was visualized with one to few pictures.

I got another call. Again from mom. 

,,Dar..Darling....Is-Is Beth okay?!" she sounded like she just had a mental breakdown.

,,Mom, what happened? Did Hannah answer your call?" i tried to sound calmly, but her tone really freaked me out.

,,Hannah and... And Josh...." mom managed to mutter out before she started hystericaly crying.

I, getting seriously worried about anything, that could've happened looked over at Beth watching that cartoon, when i heard that goddamn puppet go:

"32 people witnessed that  horrible accident

31 kids will have nightares that night .." 

And on the fucking screen was very detailed photo of a fucking car accident. Every part of body, that was slit open or totally into pieces was there. Other than bodies and guts there were pices of shattered glass and some carosery from cars. 

But other than that, wht made me have nightmares for the next months was, that one o the car pieces were doors from silver Ford Escort, same car like Hannah had. That made me ralise, that the body, i was watching did indeed belong to Hannah.

My stomach twisted few times. I couldn't have Beth watch this. Gladly, she didn't recognise car, in which she went to preschool every day. 

I ran to that old record player and tore thet cassette out of its slot, threw it on the floor and jumped on it few times, until it completely crushed.

That didn't make it stop there. I wish it did.

The fucking TV faded from usual static back into that goddamn cartoon with puppet. But now, he looked way scarier, than before. His eyes were gouged out and throat slit. Teeth were now fangs with yellow tint, that not even strongest smoker could achieve. Clothes were torn, partly burned and bloody. The colors of video were moderately more vibrant, than before and in the background there could be heard cries together with maniacal laughter.

That got me overboard. I picked up Beth and ran to my car. Hoping, i saved Beth from worse nightmares, than she'll have now. Maybe, if she was like her dad, she got bored and her mind wandered off to whole different world , before those fucked up photos appeared. 

That wasn't the end yet.

The radio in my car, that wasn't even plugged in turned on and we could hear once again that terrifiyng song.

"3 people survived this apocalypse

2 brave women

and one orphaned girl"

Finaly, that creepy song stopped and i managed to get control over my body and threw the radio out of the car. Just to make sure, i ran it over with car, then i stepped on the gas and drove to moms place. 

Beth curled up on the backseat and fell asleep. I was glad, since the only thing, i could see all around me and my car were exploded bodies in pool of blood. We passed car known to me - my brothers car. Its inside was painted with blood red and on drivers seat was pile of fleshy mush.

When we finally got to our final destination, mom was already waiting for us in front of her house. I quickly ran with Beth inside and set her on couch in living room. 

,,Go take a nap in my bed. I'll look after Beth, don't worry"

So i went...