write a short story in the style of stephen king a...

The day started out sweet enough. I was eight years old again—sun blazing down on Cedar Street, the ice cream truck’s tinny jingle meandering through the heat waves. I pressed a dollar into the sweaty palm of old Joe, the driver, who winked at me and handed over a single-scoop cone of strawberry swirl. It was perfect: bright pink, cool as a fridge, and dripping already, little glistening beads sliding down the wafer cone like tears.

But then I noticed something odd. The drip wasn’t strawberry. It was darker—deep crimson. With each slow slide it shimmered, red as blood on porcelain, leaving sticky streaks where the sidewalk should be white-hot from the sun. I stared too long, transfixed, as the color pooled at my feet. My tongue flicked out, tasting what I’d expected to be sugar—and got iron.

A cough rose in my throat, harsh and rasping. I dropped the cone and knelt to peer at the smear. It pulsed, as though it had a heartbeat of its own. The air around me thickened; the distant laughter of playing children warped into something more menacing. I stood up, back against the brick wall, but the paste followed me—slowly, purposefully—licking at my shoes.

Then I saw it: the cone itself, still held in my right hand, had begun to warp. The wafer twisted into jagged teeth; the ice cream top slithered, as if alive. My heartbeat thundered in my ears. I heard Joe’s jingle again, closer this time, but it didn’t bring comfort. In the reflection of a dank puddle beside me, I saw my own eyes wide and unblinking—mirroring something ancient and hungry behind them.

I dropped the thing and staggered away, but the jingle followed me down Cedar Street. That night, I heard soft drips on my window, saw small red rivulets tracing patterns across the glass. And in the darkness, I swear I heard it whisper, “Sweet…”