The Grief Eater – A Supernatural Tale of Consuming Sorrow

I never meant to become what I became. It started with an accident at my aunt’s funeral.

My cousin Sarah was falling apart. She’d been clutching her mom’s wedding ring so tight her knuckles had gone white, and when she hugged me goodbye, she pressed it into my palm.

“I can’t look at it anymore,” she whispered. “Please, just take it away from me.”

I slipped the ring into my jacket pocket without thinking much about it. But something weird happened on the drive home. This warm feeling spread through my chest, like I’d just had a shot of really good whiskey on an empty stomach. By the time I got to my apartment, I felt… incredible. Light. Almost giddy.

Sarah called me that night to thank me. She said she’d finally been able to sleep. “It’s like this huge weight just lifted off me,” she said. “I don’t understand it, but I feel so much better.”

I didn’t connect the dots until two weeks later. I was having one of those days where you stress-eat gas station junk food, and I grabbed this cherry cupcake with that artificial red frosting that stains everything. The ring was still in my pocket, and when I pulled it out to look at it, some of that sticky icing got smeared on the metal.

Without thinking, I licked it clean.

The moment the ring touched my tongue, it just… dissolved. Like cotton candy. And that same warm feeling flooded through me, but ten times stronger. That’s when I finally understood what had happened.

Somehow, I had the grief eater.

Building a Business on Pain

Five years later, I’d turned it into an underground business. You can’t exactly advertise “Grief Removal Services” in the Yellow Pages, but word spreads fast among desperate people.

The process was simple. People brought me something that connected them to their dead loved one – something that held their pain. I’d consume it, and their grief would disappear. I charged based on how intense the grief was: a thousand for a parent, five hundred for a sibling, two-fifty for a grandparent. Pets were a flat hundred dollars.

The pricing wasn’t scientific. It was based on how much their grief would mess me up afterward.

What I didn’t tell my clients was that their grief didn’t just vanish. It lived inside me. I’d consumed the emotional trauma of seventy-eight dead loved ones, and each one had left something behind – a whisper, a memory, a feeling that wasn’t mine.

I called them the Chorus.

Most days, I could handle it. They were like background noise, the mental equivalent of having a TV on in another room. But lately, they’d been getting louder. More demanding. The whispers had become full conversations. Then arguments. Then desperate pleas.

Let us out. Let us see them. We miss them so much.

I tried to ignore them and kept eating grief. The rush that came after consuming someone’s pain had become addictive – better than any drug I’d ever tried. And trust me, I’d tried plenty. The business was just an excuse to keep chasing that high.

The Nightmare Made Real

Ever since I was a kid, I’d had the same recurring nightmare. I’d be trapped inside my own body, fully conscious but unable to move or speak, while something else controlled me from the inside. I’d wake up screaming and drenched in sweat, grateful to be back in control.

As I got older, the nightmares became less frequent but more intense. The idea of being a prisoner in my own flesh terrified me more than death itself. I’d rather stop existing than exist as a passenger in my own body.

I never connected these nightmares to what I was doing for a living. Never saw the warning signs. Not until it was too late.

On a rainy Tuesday, a woman named Lisa brought me her brother’s baseball cap. He’d killed himself three months earlier, and she hadn’t slept well since. Her hands were shaking as she passed me the cap.

“Will it hurt?” she asked, still gripping the frayed edge.

“Not you,” I said.

After she left, I locked the door and stuffed the cap into my mouth. The fabric dissolved against my tongue, releasing this bitter wave of sorrow that made my eyes water. I chewed faster, trying to get it down quickly so the pain would transform into that familiar warmth.

But this time was different.

As the last threads disappeared down my throat, I heard a man’s voice, clear as day: “Finally.”

And then my hands weren’t mine anymore.

I tried to move them, but they stayed flat on the desk. I tried to stand, but my legs ignored me. My breathing sped up, but I wasn’t the one controlling it.

“You’ve been so selfish,” the voice said through my mouth. “Keeping us all trapped in here. Not letting us reach the people we love.”

I tried to respond, but my mouth wouldn’t open. Panic crawled up my spine as I realized what was happening. I was still here, still conscious, but I wasn’t driving anymore. I was just a passenger.

My lifelong nightmare was happening in real life.

Losing Control

“It’s our turn now,” said another voice – an elderly woman I didn’t recognize. “You’ve kept us quiet long enough.”

The next few hours were psychological torture. My body moved without my permission. My hands opened drawers, searched through files, found my client list. My mouth practiced different voices, different ways of speaking. The Chorus was learning how to drive my body.

They let me surface just enough to feel the full horror of what was happening. I tried to scream, but they pushed me back down into the darkness. Being trapped inside my own skull was worse than any physical pain I’d ever experienced – like being buried alive but still able to watch the world through a window.

By nightfall, they had a plan.

I woke up on my kitchen floor surrounded by broken glass. The clock said 3:47 AM. I’d lost nine hours.

My phone showed seventeen missed calls from unknown numbers. There was blood under my fingernails, and my mouth tasted like copper and salt. When I tried to stand, the world tilted sideways.

“What the hell happened?” I said, but the words felt wrong in my mouth.

“We’ve been waiting for this,” said a voice that wasn’t mine, coming from inside my head. “For someone who could hold enough of us.”

I stumbled to the bathroom and turned on the light. In the mirror, my face looked wrong. My expressions weren’t mine. My eyes focused and unfocused like someone else was controlling them.

“No,” I said. “This isn’t real.”

“Oh, but it is,” the voice replied through my mouth. “You’ve been so generous, making space for us. Now we’re going to return the favor.”

The Test Drive

They took my body out for what they called a “test drive,” and I stayed conscious for every horrible moment. I saw everything through my eyes, but I was just watching now. They used my voice to talk to each other, arguing over who got control next.

“The brother should go first,” my mouth said in a voice that wasn’t mine. “He’s the newest. He hasn’t seen his sister yet.”

My head nodded without my permission.

“Fifteen minutes each,” said another voice using my vocal cords. “Until we figure out a better system.”

They were dividing me up like a timeshare property. And there was nothing I could do but watch.

My body drove to Lisa’s house – the woman who’d brought me her brother’s cap. The Chorus knew where she lived because her brother knew. They rang the doorbell.

When she answered, her face went from confusion to terror.

“Tommy?” she whispered.

“Hey, sis,” my mouth said in her brother’s voice. “I’m back.”

She backed away, shaking her head. “No. You’re that person – the one who took the cap. What are you doing?”

“It’s complicated,” my mouth said. “But I needed to see you. To tell you it wasn’t your fault.”

She was crying now. “This isn’t funny. You need to leave.”

“Remember that summer at Lake Michigan? When I pushed you off the dock and you lost your new sunglasses? I told you a fish took them, but I actually saw where they fell.”

Her face went pale. “Nobody else knew about that.”

“I did. I do.” My hand reached out to touch her face. “I need you to do something for me.”

“What?” she whispered.

“Give him something else. Something with more of my pain in it. My journal – it’s under my mattress.”

No! I screamed inside my mind. Don’t listen to him!

But she couldn’t hear me. Nobody could.

Growing Stronger

Over the next three days, they visited seven of my former clients. Each time, the newest member of the Chorus took control to convince their loved ones to hand over more grief-soaked items. Some people were suspicious, but most were so desperate to believe they were really talking to their dead that they gave us whatever we asked for.

The pattern was always the same. My body would show up unannounced. My voice would say things only the dead person could know. My hands would take whatever they offered – journals, photographs, wedding rings, clothing. Then my mouth would consume them, adding each new voice to the Chorus.

With each new object I was forced to consume, the Chorus grew stronger and I felt myself shrinking, compressed into a smaller corner of my mind. The nightmare was consuming me. By the fourth day, I only got control for minutes at a time, usually when they were sleeping.

During these brief windows, I tried everything to fight back – pain, alcohol, even hitting my head against the wall. Nothing worked. They just laughed and took back control.

The only time they let me surface was when they wanted me to know something. Like that night, as my body lay on my bed, staring at the ceiling with eyes that no longer belonged to me.

“We’re going to the cemetery tomorrow,” explained the first voice – my cousin’s mother. “We’ve decided it’s time to expand our operation.”

“What do you mean?” I thought at them.

“Fresh grief is the sweetest,” said another voice. “We’re going to find people who are mourning and offer our services directly.”

“No,” I thought. “I won’t let you.”

They laughed – a horrible chorus of different voices all using my vocal cords. “You don’t have a choice anymore. You’re just the vessel now.”

Fighting Back

That’s when I realized they were right. I’d been so focused on fighting for control that I hadn’t considered the alternative. Maybe I couldn’t drive anymore, but I could still crash the car.

While they debated their plans, I reached deep inside myself, to the place where my own grief lived. Not their grief – mine. The pain I’d been running from my whole life.

I found the memory of my father’s death – the overdose I discovered when I was fourteen. My mother’s suicide two years later. The friend who died in my apartment while I was out buying more drugs for us. All the grief I’d never processed, never acknowledged, never consumed.

I pulled it up like poison from a well, and before the Chorus realized what I was doing, I turned it on them.

Grief is a living thing. It grows and changes and evolves. And when you feed it, it gets stronger.

My grief flooded through the mental space the Chorus occupied. When it touched them, they screamed. They’d only been echoes, impressions left behind. They’d never been the source of grief themselves.

“Stop!” they shrieked as my pain engulfed them.

“You wanted grief,” I told them. “Here it is. All you can eat.”

I forced every painful memory through my consciousness – every loss, every regret, every moment of despair I’d ever experienced. I’d spent my life running from these feelings, but now I embraced them. They were my weapons.

The Chorus splintered under the assault. Some voices faded completely. Others broke into whispers. A few of the strongest pushed back, trying to regain control, but the attack had weakened them.

For the first time in days, I moved my hand when I wanted to.

The Truth About Grief

I dragged myself to the bathroom, teeth clenched against the battle still raging in my mind. In the mirror, my face was gaunt, eyes bloodshot. I looked like I’d aged ten years.

But they were my eyes again. At least for now.

“This isn’t over,” hissed one of the remaining voices. “We’ll wait. We’ll grow stronger.”

“No,” I said aloud, my voice hoarse but my own. “You won’t.”

I opened the medicine cabinet and took out a pocket knife – the one my grandfather gave me before he died. The one object I’d never consumed despite its grief potential, because it was too precious to me.

I put it in my mouth.

Cold metal touched my tongue. I bit down, feeling it dissolve. But this time, instead of just swallowing the grief, I focused on my grandfather’s love. The pride in his eyes when he gave me this knife. How he taught me to whittle with it. All the wonderful memories that came with the pain.

The knife dissolved into a burst of emotion – not just grief, but joy, love, pride, nostalgia.

And I realized my mistake all these years. Grief isn’t the pain that destroys you. It’s all that love with nowhere to go, pounding on your chest, demanding somewhere to exist. By consuming only the pain, I’d been creating these hungry ghosts – fragments of people made of nothing but sorrow.

I opened my mouth to tell them this revelation, but there was no response. The Chorus had gone silent.

For now, at least.

Making Amends

The next morning, I got rid of all the grief-objects I’d collected over the years. Not by eating them – I’d never do that again – but by returning them to the families they belonged to.

Some people were angry when I showed up at their doors. Others were confused. A few even begged me to take their grief back. I couldn’t. I wouldn’t.

Each returned object lifted a weight from me. With every tearful conversation, every awkward explanation, every apology, the voices in my head grew fainter. Not gone completely – I could still hear them sometimes, especially at night – but more like memories than invaders.

For the first time in months, I slept without the old nightmare. The terror of being trapped in my own body had lost its power over me, not because it wasn’t frightening anymore, but because I’d lived through the real thing and survived.

I stopped taking clients, moved to a different neighborhood, and changed my phone number. But people still found me, desperate for relief from their pain. Instead of eating their grief, I listened to their stories. Sometimes that was enough. Sometimes it wasn’t. But it was honest work.

A New Understanding

A week after my liberation, a man brought me his daughter’s teddy bear. Cancer. She was seven.

“Can you take it away?” he asked, tears streaming down his face. “I can’t live with this pain.”

I sat with him for hours as he talked about her. Her favorite ice cream flavor. The way she insisted on wearing mismatched socks. How brave she was at the end.

Before he left, I told him the truth – that grief is just love with nowhere to go. That the pain he felt was the other side of how much he loved her. That healing doesn’t mean forgetting.

“Keep the bear,” I said. “She loved it, and you loved her. Let it hurt for now. Eventually, it’ll hurt less, but you’ll still have the love.”

As he walked away clutching the bear, I felt something shift inside me. A few more voices in the Chorus faded, replaced by peaceful silence.

I still don’t know exactly what I am or how this strange ability works. But I know what I’m not anymore.

I’m not a grief eater. I’m just someone who’s learning, finally, to digest my own pain.

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Sometimes the things we run from are the very things we need to face. Sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. And sometimes, the only way out is throug