My nostalgia-tinged horror story Many Deaths Before Dying has been published in Horror Over the Handlebars, an anthology of horror stories set in Connecticut in the 1980s and 90s. When a giant, silvery puddle appears in the field where they play, four boys encounter an inexplicable horror that will change them forever.

The empty lot next to Eddie’s house was the football field where Joe Montana threw the game-winning touchdown to Jerry Rice. It was the baseball diamond where Mark McGwire beat Jose Canseco in the most epic Wiffle ball home run derby in MLB history. It was where Rambo took down the Predator with a Nerf gun, and where RoboCop blew the Terminator’s head off with a Super Soaker. It was my favorite place to hang out with my three best friends.

And it was the last place I saw them alive.