Healing Hands Therapy
The Uncut Author Arena Submission. Conceptualized and written by Kerr Martin, 5/4/26.
When J Wirrowac invited me back into the Author Arena with the challenge of writing a 500-word horror story about a place that should not exist, I was excited. Then, when he revealed that my opponent would be the mighty Stefan Baciu, I knew for sure that Substack was in for a showdown of epic proportions. When writing my story for submission I got a little carried away, and before I realised it, I was way over the 500-word count. The story you are about to read is my story, in its original form, before I had to take the hatchet to it. Firstly, I hope you enjoy, and then come back and click the read more button below to see what became of Healing Hands Therapy. If you still enjoy it there as much as you do here? Give me your vote.
- Kerr
Coach told us to go home. I wasn’t going home. I had been sacked by some behemoth, Andre Evans, in the closing minutes of that shitshow game and I needed a good massage. When I pulled into the arena, VIP parking lot of course, I saw a door that read “Healing Hands Therapy” and it was calling my name.
Stepping inside I was met with all the usual trappings of a hippy dippy massage parlour. There was a massage table in the center, a tall rubber plant in the corner, a desk with a CD player and a stack of Whale Sound and Rainstorm CDs, and of course a bunch of crystals and junk dotted around. It stunk of Nag Champa but I couldn’t figure out where the smell was coming from. Probably the staff room, which I could only assume sat behind the door on the opposite wall than the one I came in.
“Hello?!”
I inspected the desk closely. Apparently, the junk wasn’t just junk, it was superstitious junk. Talismans. A frog with a coin in its mouth, a statue of shiva, and a small golden hand that had a swirl in its palm. I supposed that must have been the healing hand this place was named after.
“You’ve got a customer, y’know? Brett Sandler. Greatest rookie year in NFL history?”
I was sure that would get them moving, but after a couple more minutes passed, there was still nothing. I couldn’t believe it, nobody passed up a chance to meet me, they should have been jumping at the chance to get their hands on an icon. Walking over to the door on the back wall I gave it two hard thuds.
“Hey, you mooks working for your money or is this place just for show?”
The door clicked open and swung back with great force, as if someone had pulled from the other side. I stepped back to make sure no crazed maniac came rushing for me but, to my surprise, the room on the other side of the door was empty.
And it stunk…
Not of Nag Champa but of something foul. Something I’d only smelt in the worst kept locker rooms in the country. Sweat, damp skin, a sourness like the breath of a chain smoker caught in a rotting mouth. I knew that smell well, it was the one that jumped out of Pa’s mouth when he was pissed at me for putting a foot wrong during drills.
It took a second for my eyes to catch up to my nose. The light in there was dimmer, yellowed, like it was being filtered through something thick. The walls…moved.
At first I thought it was a trick of the light. Shadows shifting. Then one of them twitched.
Fingers.
Layered over each other so tightly they formed the surface. Hundreds of hands pressed together, knuckles and palms making up the structure of the room. Skin of every tone, every size, all packed in, writhing slightly like they were dreaming.
I let out a short laugh. “Alright. Real funny.”
I wanted to run. Inside I was screaming in terror, but I couldn’t let the world see I was afraid, Pa would never allow it. So, I stepped inside.
One of the hands peeled away.
Not detached, just lifted, showing that it was part of something much larger. It reached for me slowly, deliberately, and pressed into my shoulder right where I’d landed when Evans planted me earlier.
I tensed and it dug in hard. Pain flared sharp enough to make me wince and then it broke. I should’ve fought it but my body leaned in before my brain caught up.
The knots, years of muscular damage, gone in a single press. I sucked in a breath, half laugh, half groan.
“Okay,” I muttered. “Okay…”
More hands followed from the walls, floor and even the ceiling above me. Cold ones. Warm ones. One that felt feverish. They mapped me fast, like they’d been waiting. Fingers pressed between ribs, along my spine, into my thighs. The hands found everything. A thumb slid into my lower back, went too deep. Then something shifted with a wet, internal click. My knees buckled but the hands caught me.
Held me.
Worked me.
Not random. No movement was random. They knew where to go before I did. They bent my arm just past where it should, held it there, then released it into something better than perfect. Fingers dug into muscle and pulled tension out like it was rot.
Pressed. Twisted. Reset.
It was the best I’d ever felt. Better than a winning game, better than the roar of the crowd, better than being named Rookie of the Year. Better than anything.
When it stopped, it stopped abruptly, and the hands slipped back into the walls like nothing had ever happened. I stood there, breathing hard. Everything was…aligned. No ache. No stiffness. Wellness resting easy in every muscle and joint. Then, one hand rose from the wall again, and I jumped back. It followed me and pressed two fingers against my lips.
I didn’t say a word.
The door opened behind me and I left.
I went back the next night, and the next, until it was time to leave town. We were playing Cleveland and I had to catch a plane, leave all of this behind. But, I’d be back, I had to come back.
I was playing better than I ever had, better than my record-breaking rookie year. Faster. Stronger. I was untouchable. They said I was God’s gift to football, but I knew better. Cleveland, Seattle, Denver, we took them all down, yet after every game all I could think about was that room, those hands. It was eating me alive. Eventually I told a teammate, Big Joe Bronson, I had to. I thought saying it out loud might kill the itch and give me some joy back, let me count the wins at least. I needed to feel something other than the wanting. Joe just laughed, shook his head, and called me a wild ass white boy. What else was he to say?
Then he went.
He didn’t come back.
The police said his body gave out. Nothing had hit him, there was no evidence of a struggle, he just collapsed. Body compressed inward like something had worked him from every side at once, until he was all but skin and bone. It didn’t make sense to them, but it made sense to me.
I’m outside the door again now, I’m supposed to be heading to Atlanta, but I changed flights. Took the redeye just to be here. My shoulder is starting to tighten, my back is pulling just a little, I need this.
I can feel the hands already waiting behind the police tape and “Do Not Enter” signs.
And this time? I know they’re not going to stop.
I just couldn’t keep my mouth shut.
-Vote for Kerr-
I could feel the massage you described. It was impressive.
Man, this was great. It feels like something I would have seen as a kid in the Crypt Keeper cartoon. I absolutely love the sports injury angle, and, as I said in the comment below, I really appreciate horror that begins with something we deeply crave rather than something we deeply fear. I think that is why I mentioned Tales from the Crypt. This has that classical, pulpy American horror feeling, almost like The Monkey’s Paw: the wish is granted, but the price was already waiting in the fine print.