Back Seat Driver

December 21, 2022November 28, 2022 ~ Elaine Pascale ~ 4 Comments

“The road was a ribbon of moonlight…”

Like Noyes’ highwayman, Laurie came “riding—riding—riding” but the road she traveled more closely resembled the steel bars of a prison than a ribbon. She knew she could not go home. There was no escape beyond this road.

Words had been said.

Pieces of the past had been resurrected, memories acting as an unwanted Lazarus now squatting in their shared space.

Her necklace had found its way into the garbage disposal. There had been no explanation—a mystery. That the necklace had been a gift from a former lover lessened the mystery, but it wasn’t the necklace that had led her to take the seat behind the wheel.

It was the words. Words that could not be repossessed. Words that assured she could not go home.

Susan had stayed home after the fight. Susan always did what she was supposed to and right now women were told to stay home.

There was no official curfew, but nighttime was considered the most dangerous. Two women had disappeared, their bodies later found. Smiles had been carved into their throats, screams escaping directly from their voice boxes with no use for the mouths that had been sewn shut.

Two bodies had been found: one short of labelling the murderer a serial killer.

Little more had been disclosed. Secrets were necessary for matching the random confessions to the actual criminal. And secrets, along with swallowed truths, had been necessary for keeping Laurie’s relationship afloat.

Only there was no floating on this road. Only driving and more driving.

Laurie knew that Susan had seen the belongings that had been piled on her backseat. The pile had been there long enough to become partially disclosed beneath wrappers and coffee cups and the jacket that had been too warm to wear this early in the season. Laurie had wanted to instill doubt in her partner. She no longer wanted to be taken for granted. She had also wanted to convince herself that freedom was but a choice, hers for the taking. All she had to do was get in the car and drive.

They were both too mature to be playing these games, but whenever they tried to talk through a problem, the words formed into a monster, a threat.

There were no businesses, no homes, no signs of life on this empty road. Laurie again remembered the poem she had been forced to read in school so many years before:

For the road lay bare in the moonlight;

Blank and bare in the moonlight;

And the blood of her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to her love’s refrain.

When had her heart last throbbed for Susan? Their relationship had been incredibly passionate in the beginning. Then it had devolved into the beige existence that Susan seemed to prefer. Laurie needed more. Maybe that was why she was on the empty road despite the cautions. Maybe she wanted to worry Susan into a frenzy that would result in a rekindled passion. Maybe she could go back home after some time had passed and there was space between them and the words. Susan, who was so orderly, would manage to sweep those words away. Susan would make things tidy again and Laurie would swallow truths just as if her mouth had been sewn shut by an insane killer.

But the words they had said were heavy enough to require two people to vanquish them. Susan would not be able to tidy them alone and Laurie wasn’t sure she would ever be ready to face the words. She considered that she might never go home.

That thought did not bring freedom. It brought sadness, desolation. She was growing tired of relationships dying over things unsaid. She would make this right. She would own her part of the fight; she would expose the secrets she had been keeping hidden. She would take the pile of possessions from the back seat and put them in a permanent place in the space she and Susan shared.

Laurie sniffed, plump tears crawling down her cheeks.

“Here,” a man’s voice said from the darkness of the backseat. A hand with bloodied fingernails handed her a tissue.

∼ Elaine Pascale

Death and Taxes

November 30, 2022November 16, 2022 ~ Ian Sputnik ~ 5 Comments

Kristin sat at his desk in the sparsely decorated government office. He was busily reading through the correspondence of the day. The letters were usually the same-old-same. People would query their latest tax demand. They would invent reasons as to why their annual calculation should be lower than what they were billed. He mused over the fact that the initial communication from each person would be cordial, sometimes even fawning in their appreciation of the department taking the time to consider their applications for tax relief. With the exception of a few legitimate claims, most were just pleas to lessen the burden of the annual charge or to extend the payment due date. A second letter from the same member of the public, when reading closely between the lines, would usually show a hint of desperation. The third would stink of desperation (usually after they had received a dreaded ‘red notice’ or final demand, as it was officially called.) If anyone sent a fourth, then that would usually be at the end of the process and, more often than not, would be hostile to the extent of a profanity riddled rant. These would come from people whose cases had been heard and judged upon with a negative outcome. By negative, it meant business foreclosures or asset and property repossessions.

Although not many had the stomach for his career choice, Kristin was happy in his work. If he dared admit the truth to himself, he even found himself rather enjoying the process of punishing those who did not pay their dues. He always paid his taxes in a timely manner, he rationalised, so why shouldn’t everyone else. If unforeseen hardship had fallen upon those businesses who were now struggling to make ends meet, a death of a business partner, a downturn in the market, then they obviously hadn’t put safety measures in place to ensure they didn’t fall into the debt trap. FYI, not his problem.

He lightly perused the last letter in his in-tray and stamped it ‘Claim Rejected’ with a bit more enthusiasm than was called for. He then sat back, looked upon his day’s toil, and stood to leave for the day. After putting on his coat and scarf, he collected the two piles of paperwork from his desk. On his way out he stopped at his secretary’s desk and put each pile in the correct tray. The one for rejected claims, he deposited the large wad of letters. The one for accepted claims, he put in a single letter which he begrudgingly had to admit held merit for tax exemptions. His secretary (he could never remember her name, nor took the time to even try and make the effort to) smiled sweetly at him.

“Good night, Mr Holland. Have a nice weekend,” she said as he turned to leave.

“You too,” he insincerely said in way of reply.

The next morning, he got out of bed at the usual time of 6.30am. Whether it be a workday, a weekend or even Christmas Day for that matter, his morning routine never wavered.

On descending the stairs down to the kitchen, the only thing wavering seemed to be his balance. He felt very unsteady on his feet and felt the need to grasp the banister to get to the hallway below. He walked through to the Kitchen with some difficulty. Each step was akin to traversing a deep sponge.

On looking down at the ground, he unintentionally let out a shriek of horror. He wasn’t walking on the floor; he was walking in it. The soles of his feet were at least an inch lower than the laminate flooring, and they were sinking further with every passing moment. He heard a rattle of keys by his front door and with effort managed to turn to face it. In desperation he called out and tried to make his way to his long-time partner who was returning home after getting the morning papers. He had never got round to making their relationship more official. He had thought about it, as he had to admit the tax breaks that he would receive on getting married made the idea rather appealing.
Now sunk up to his knees within the floor, each step was like wading through a river of treacle. He sank further and further until the ground passed his mouth, making it impossible for him to make any audible sound whatsoever. Then, within a second, there was no sign of Kristin nor any sign that he had been there at any time that morning. The kitchen floor was as hard and unyielding as it ought to be.

Kristin slid silently through the foundations of his house. He then passed through thick wet mud, which oozed into his nose, ears and mouth, running down his throat and making him gag. His face was pushed against the remains of a body which must have been buried on the plot of land his house now stood many years before it was built. The smell of death filled him with nausea and still he continued his downward journey. Despite the physical relationship between himself and the matter around him being broken, he could still see, smell, taste, and worst of all, feel.

As his body was sucked downwards through mud, chalk and eventually stone he could feel his skin being continuously torn from its body. The pain was agonising and unrelenting, as his flesh was abraded by granite and flint. His skin still it seemed to remain attached to his skeleton. Each layer that was sliced or wrenched from his body was immediately replaced by new growth. Although he could not breathe, the unconsciousness of death eluded him. It refused to clutch him to its bosom for that final relief of oblivion. Instead, he had no choice but to endure the relentless torture of having every nerve ending in his body scraped against the innards of Mother Earth.

Each passing hour seemed like a lifetime of pain. And with each hour a different texture and therefore a different kind of pain. Granite felt different as Kimberlite, as did Obsidian, Basalt and Pumice.

The deeper he travelled the colder he became. As well as the searing pain of friction he now also had to bear the mind shattering freezing temperature.

After what seemed like an age he began to feel, at first, warmth, and then searing heat. It started on the soles of his feet, but slowly worked his way up his body. He could see clumps of flesh singe and burn away from his bones. As each slice of meat barbequed into ash, another piece of fresh flesh grew in its place, and so the burning process would begin anew.

He knew that his final destination would be the furnace of the Earth’s core.

Kristin wondered if his fate was the result of him relishing in other people’s misery and his selfish attitude in both his business and personal life.

Or was it in fact true, that all tax collectors deserved to burn in Hell.

∼ Ian Sputnik

Reliquary

November 23, 2022November 16, 2022 ~ Nina D'Arcangela ~ 6 Comments

Tiny bones arranged on a bed of cotton. A single daffodil snuggled in golden glory and lavender sprigs – an offering of love and fidelity. A stone from the garden to keep her beloved grounded; Lucy’s favorite toy sacrificed so she’d never be alone. To say her tears could fill a sea would be an understatement, though today they flowed with intent as each drop was captured in a small heart-shaped vial. Once stoppered, this too was placed with care. A final relic, the band she wore the day she came home. A watershed moment in a life yet unlived. With broken heart, the young one spoke the words only an eight year old’s grief could conjure before the lid was sealed and the small box buried at the base of Great-grans favorite tree.

As they turned to walk back to the house, the ground rumbled, the clouds darkened, and the tree began to shake. Brilliant fingers of light spread below them; enchanted, the child ran back to the tree. She hugged the bark and called out to her beloved Lucy, and Lucy answered in vibrant hues of orange yellow and red. As the phoenix burst through the canopy, the young girl began to scream. Flesh melted from bone. Blood ran free to quench the earth. Flaxen strands crisped in the heat.

∼ Nina D’arcangela

Forest Full of Mirrors

November 16, 2022November 13, 2022 ~ Charles Gramlich ~ 7 Comments

The forest is full of mirrors that reflect the thirteen angels of the land. It is the only safe way to gaze upon them. To see their glory directly would hammer one to silence. It would chain a throat with despair.

The first angel is the angel of moss. She has long hair that drips gray from the limbs of oaks. Her wings are invisible but you can feel them in the breeze as they stroke your sweat to coolness. On hot days I sit beneath her perch, though I dare not sit too long. She might notice.

The angel of leaves wears many colors, changing them with every season. Green is her favorite but sometimes her silks flame red and yellow. At other times they are threadbare, showing the branching of her veins. In the cold, damp winter they are rotted black.

The angel of stone has pitted eyes that glitter like mica. Those orbs watch the little creatures wandering past. They study those who squirm and crawl and hop the forest floor. They decide who to sacrifice and who to spare.

There is another angel who lives in the hives of bees. Striped in black and yellow, she has feelers upon her head. It is said that her coat of pollen is an aphrodisiac. I believe that is true though I have never chanced a taste.

The angel of owls sweeps in silence through the tangled woods. Nothing hears him in flight, but everything flees when he calls. I have heard this piping on eldritch nights—and remain haunted.

The misted angel wears a diaphanous gown. She is cool to the touch. Through the darkest hours, she pants wetly with want. But in the dawn she floats in innocence to heaven. Do not bother to wave. In return she will offer naught.

The river angel’s wings are white in the rapids, deep and green in the pools. Like a child, he chuckles and laughs as he plays. But do not make him angry. He thrashes against his banks then. He turns the world to shambles.

The angel of light glitters like a hoard of gems. She dances with the mirrors, preening for the trees. I suspect she is vain. But why shouldn’t she be? She is more lovely than the sweet face of the moon.

The wings of the ninth angel make a gate. It opens and closes like a bellows. Sometimes things come through. Awful things. Monstrous things. They hide in the light; they stalk the night. Even though they may know your name, do not make them your friend.

The angel of wicked dreams leaves his feathers scattered on the forest floor. Never seek them. Their promise is honeyed; their taste is foul. They often resemble mushrooms and toadstools. Sometimes they follow you home and beg to come inside and bleed.

Even the worms have an angel. He is small and ugly and his pinions are lost. He crawls on his belly in the soil. He has no throat with which to scream. But listen close and you still may hear him. Pray that you don’t.

I once knew the angel with the dirty wings. We were lovers in a snake’s embrace. She left me a gift when we parted, half of one of her fangs broken off in my heart. The thirteenth angel is the worst. Or the best. If you should look right at him, you’d only see yourself. He is a mirror all his own. He would laugh when you laugh, cry when you cry. But in the end he’d eat your soul with a wink.

∼ Charles Gramlich

Futurity’s Shoelaces

November 9, 2022October 20, 2022 ~ Marge Simon ~ 5 Comments

I stare out the window of my cottage, a refuge from a marriage lost. Even the trees are dying. I hear the click of my pen, knowing it must have its way.

“On a sand-scaped shore where life squirmed out from its beginnings, a mother is suspended just above her shadow which grows longer as the sun recedes. The children rise from her shadow …”

Yes, it is another story, I have it in my head. My novels sold well, once. Now, there is no market for novels, no words, no stories. Libraries are a thing of the past, but writing has become a habit.

Yesterday the internet began shutting down. Communications are failing around the globe. I never thought it would come to this.

I make a fresh pot of tea. It is the last of the package. The last of all packages. Richard worked for NASA. He expected sons, or even girls to carry on his dream. I failed.

Esher’s multiples on a plane, pleasing, confounding, petrifying, Stravinsky’s complex compositions, Hegel’s theories, Einstein’s gifts merge into a helix of variables, where past and present play tricks; the child called Futurity ties his shoelaces, draws the bow taut.. I add to my former lines,

“The children know forever. The children never tell, they owe no explanations. Listen, say the children, there’s music everywhere.”

I lay down my pen. Before me is a blank screen. It is past time for the broadcast, the one that will tell us what we need to do.

∼ Marge Simon

Utopia

November 2, 2022August 9, 2022 ~ Lee Andrew Forman ~ 5 Comments

I beg to have this morsel of bread, my knees on cold stone. The clean hand which gives does so with apathy. This weary skeleton is not worthy. It shakes and rattles as it moves away in contorted gestures. Shame used to have meaning, now it is only the infinite permanency of a worn soul.

They know what’s best for me. They always have.

I’ve no coin or cloth; blood is the only currency I have to give. And so my debt is paid by suffering. The countless ways in which they thrill their hearts baffles the mind. No imaginings of one man could conjure how many ways there are to inflict pain. Never has it been said that they lacked creativity.

I once viewed a piece of art. I suppose this is theirs.

Feeble, frail, am I. No longer do I recoil at the thought of the black hood coming to take me. I’ve eaten my share and lived long years. Time is precious, gifted by the keepers of this world by keeping us unworthy alive. And greed has never been my vice.

I’ll see the reaper soon. And gladly give my head to his axe.

∼ Lee Andrew Forman

Paper Dolls

October 26, 2022October 15, 2022 ~ afstewart ~ 6 Comments

Carefully pleated, intricately folded, all the creases sharp and her work precise before she displayed them on the shelf. Mistakes wouldn’t do. Things went wrong from mistakes with strange consequences.
She looked up and smiled. Six dolls sat on the shelf presently, no seven. She always forgot Annabelle; such an unassuming thing, cream-coloured, not bright hues like the others. A breeze from the window rattled their delicate substance, but none fell off their perch. They remained, in their exacting row.
Watching.
Waiting.
Afraid.
She smiled. She knew what the dolls were thinking, so she reached out her hand, her thin fingers tracing the edge of the shelf. If they could have moved the dolls would have trembled. On the shelf they were safe. Once removed, well… a deal with a devil is non-negotiable. Some had been there long enough to see the fate of several past dolls.
Not pleasant memories.
She withdrew her hand. “Not today, my lovelies. I don’t need any of you in my spells today.”
But one day she would. One day they would all leave the shelf. After all, they should have read the fine print in the contract…

Fifteen years of happiness will be granted, whereas at the end of the contracted wish you will forfeit your body and soul to the witch as final payment. You will be transmogrified and housed within a paper doll until used as raw ingredients.

~ A. F. Stewart

In Her Chest

October 19, 2022October 6, 2022 ~ Miriam H. Harrison ~ 6 Comments

It nested in her chest. It was a scrawny, featherless thing, forever screeching for more. But she had already given it her whole heart. Strip by tattered strip, every valve, vein, artery had gone to its ceaseless appetite. Still it cried from inside, rattling her ribs in its hungry fury.

“Hush,” she told it. “Soon.” But words could not soothe it. Only beating flesh.

And so she went into the night, searching for a fresh supply. Hearts were easy enough to come by in the city. Here was one ripe for picking—so ready to pluck he almost tumbled into her hand.

“I can feel your heart race,” he murmured as they slipped into the shadows.

She did not have the heart to tell him it was only the beating of wings. He would learn soon enough. And as she fed her pet, she pondered again the readiness with which we give ourselves away, wondering what might yet grow from it all.

∼ Miriam H. Harrison

The Drifting Snow

October 12, 2022October 1, 2022 ~ Richard Meldrum ~ 5 Comments

The wind blew the dry snow across the road, reducing the visibility to about five feet. Don was forced to slow the car to a crawl.

“We’ll never get home at this rate.”

“Better late than never.”

It wasn’t a good night to be traveling, but they had no choice. They were on their way back from the crematorium. Grandma had died on Christmas Eve, her heart finally giving out as she took the garbage to the roadside at minus twenty.

“I’ll miss her. I loved her so much,” said Linda.

“You were her favorite. She always went the extra mile for you. Remember when she punched that kid who was bullying you?”

She smiled at the memory, looking out the car window at the snow-covered fields.

“She always loved this weather. I thought she was crazy, but it was her favorite time of year. She was such a tough old lady.”

“She had to be, living by herself on the farm.”

“She was so stubborn. Didn’t want to sell up after Grandpa died. She might have lived a bit longer if she hadn’t had to drag those bags to the end of the driveway every week.”

“Well, she’s at peace now.”

Linda glanced out into the darkness. The wind blew across the open landscape, lifting the snow into huge whirling clouds. She saw something moving in the drifting snow, a figure.

“What was that?”

“What?”

“I saw a shape in the snow.”

“A deer?”

“It looked like a person.”

“In this weather? No way. It’s minus thirty out there.”

“We should stop.”

“I guess, it could be a stranded driver.”

He pulled over and Linda got out.

“Hello? Is anyone there?”

There was no response. The snow was blowing into her face, the flakes sharp against her skin. Her face started to freeze. She knew she wouldn’t be able to stay outside for much longer.

“Hello?”

A figure appeared, standing about ten feet away. It was human.

“Grandma?”

She spoke without thinking. The figure danced and twisted in the wind. It whispered to her.

“Go no further…”

The wind stole the rest of the sentence.

Linda’s nerve failed and she bolted for the safety of the car. Don looked up as she climbed back in.

“Anything?”

“No.”

She thought back to the words she’d heard.

“Just be careful. Drive real slow.”

“Slower than I have been?”

“Yes, I have a feeling.”

“Okay.”

Don crawled along at a snail’s pace. A pick-up truck roared past them, horn blaring. Its taillights disappeared into the snow. Suddenly Don braked. Hard. Even at such a slow speed, the car skidded for a few feet before crunching to a halt on the icy road.

“Look!”

He pointed in front of them. The road crossed a narrow bridge. It had collapsed. The taillights of the pick-up truck were visible in the water below. If they hadn’t been going so slowly, they would’ve had no chance of stopping in time. Linda, suddenly aware of what had happened, looked out at the drifting snow and silently thanked Grandma for looking out for her, one last time.

∼ RJ Meldrum

The Suit

October 5, 2022September 16, 2022 ~ Elaine Pascale ~ 4 Comments

She had always feared this day would come.

The dark musings had been anxiety provoking and had included the suit being handed over ceremoniously. But that could only happen in a world where her identity was known. Where the true identity of her husband was known.

Instead, a man had stumbled out of a nondescript car and handed her a box sealed with tape. Not the nice kind of tape, either. Not the smooth type, but the brand with the biting string embedded in it.

The cheap kind.

She had looked at the box and looked at the man. His eyes had been hidden behind large sunglasses. He had been as generic as the box. He had turned and left without so much as a nod.

The box, when opened, had given off a smell that she recognized. Even superheroes had favored brands of soap and deodorant.

The suit itself was harder to recognize; it looked different without her husband in it.

God, she missed him.

She wondered if she would miss him less if they had been able to recover his body; if she had had something to say goodbye to.

Without the suit, her husband was just a man. Without the suit, he blended in. Recovering the body would have required someone knowing who to look for.

She needed to have the smell of the suit around her. In their years together, she had barely touched it. It had been his: his responsibility, his power. She had respected that. But he was gone, and she was grieving, and the only thing she knew to do was to put the suit on. It slipped over her skin as his hands once had. It didn’t snag, it didn’t require awkward tugging. Despite their differences in size and shape, the suit fit perfectly.

The suit was made of latex and some charmed materials and had been secretly manufactured in a hidden lab. The suit maker was no longer alive. No one who knew the identity of the suit’s owner was alive, except her.

She wrapped her arms around herself, capturing the first hug she had felt in weeks. Still holding her arms tightly, she moved to the mirror, wanting to see something of him, anything of him. The suit had looked blue on him; it was a deep purple on her.

Inside the suit, his scent grew stronger. The feel of him, his essence enveloped her. She closed her eyes, to catch her breath, to ground herself. She whispered, “I wish I could see him.”

The mirror granted her wish in the worst possible way. The perspective was startling. It appeared as if she were on her back, looking up at the sky. She could not move: her hands and feet were bound. A cold wind blew over her and she shivered. The air bit at her skin, giving her the impression that she was naked. The sound of breathing filled her ears. It was breathing she would recognize anywhere. It belonged to her husband.

She was not seeing him; she was him. She was him in his last moments. But why was he on the ground? Why was he naked?

The vision of the sky was blocked by a face she has seen on the news. It was the Disposer. He had been terrorizing the tri-state area for months. The Disposer smiled at the shivering body, he smiled at the gasping breath. He was more menacing in person than he was in his mug shots. The Disposer’s eyes were like black holes: they absorbed everything and gave off nothing.

The Disposer pursed his lips as if blowing out a candle. Instead of spewing air, dirt poured out, filling her husband’s eyes and nose and mouth. The dirt smelled of rot.

The Disposer, watching her husband die, said, “I get to teach you something today, professor. You get to research death first-hand.”

She understood. Without the suit, the Disposer had no idea who her husband was. He only knew the alter-ego. Feeling her husband die did not provide closure. In fact, it provided the opposite: a thirst for answers.

She felt raw and battered as the mirror switched perspective to reveal a bit of distinguishable scenery. That glimpse could help her find her husband. Or it could help her find the Disposer. She did not know which outcome she wanted more.

The suit had always been an image of trust, of safety. So why had her husband taken it off when a known villain had been near? She had been accustomed to her husband’s strange hours and secretive behavior. The months leading up to his death had been filled with greater absences and a larger gulf between them. He had not been confiding in her as he had before. Had he been confiding in someone else?

The suit was now the cause of mystery and confusion. What had once been a source of pride was now a source of uncertainty. The only thing she was sure of was that someone knew her identity. The person who returned the suit was either someone close to her husband or an enemy inciting a new foe.

Strangely, she hoped it was the latter.

∼ Elaine Pascale