A Perfect Fit: Part Two

READ FIRST: https://horrorsleazetrash.com/2025/12/03/pieter-kohler-9/

Alaric’s girlfriend Lena worked at a clothing boutique, and when her hours and Master Kurt’s free time coincided, we went there. She was petite in stature, short blond hair, green eyes, slim and small breasted. She was dealing with a customer when we walked in, Kurt wearing army fatigues and t-shirt to reveal his muscularity. I wore a short skirt and tight blouse, following Master’s commands.  Kurt was only interested in Lena because she was Alaric’s girl. I occasionally saw her in the on campus chatting with Alaric who towered over her small frame. She could well be submissive to his will, perhaps a willing slave in training, I speculated, except I didn’t know to what degree my student dominated his girl or understood the liberating dynamics of BDSM. 

Ever since the incident at the pet store, Alaric took every chance he could get to stop by my office. He spread his legs on the chair opposite to me to talk about life and love and my soldier friend Kurt. I could see the outline of his hardening cock as he did so. Because I didn’t object, in fact I encouraged it, he became quite at ease, and said he had even talked to Kurt a few times over the phone and told him all about his girl and how she couldn’t get enough. Of course, Kurt told me all about Alaric’s excitement. And my fantasies included Alaric fucking me, which of course I revealed to Kurt, who found that amusing.

And I was intrigued by Kurt’s desire to seduce Lena, fresh prey, he called her, and I wanted to see if he had any chance in that direction. In the boutique, he told me to sit on the chair by a mirror and hold that larger butt plug securely in my ass, which he had inserted after a rough fuck that morning. Frankly, I wanted him to bone her good and hard because she was Alaric’s girl, and the boy was getting me hot and bothered in my office. He made innuendos about how far he wanted to go, how much he enjoyed putting the dog collar around my neck in the pet store, all nudges towards his own desire to fuck me, I think, with my master’ permission. Frankly, I wanted it. Students can be so irresistible, so horny and insatiable. 

Also, after the pet store incident, Alaric had come to the office and said he wanted to be excused from writing the compulsory term paper. He wore a t-shirt with the logo “I eat Sushi” written on it.

“Why should I agree to that? How could you pass the course if you don’t write it?”

“Well, because I’m telling you to,” and he stretched out his legs and crossed his ankles, clenching his hands behind his head. He wore thick-soled black shoes, Doc Martens probably. “And Kurt said you would because you’re obedient and you like me. And you’ll pass me anyway.”

“Kurt said that?”

“Is he wrong? Remember, I collared you in the pet store.” 

He laughed, leaning forward and crossing his arms on my desk, staring me hard and provocatively in the eyes. He obviously knew that he could get away with such boldness, for the barriers between us had crumbled. I stared at his biceps. He flexed them. You know you want to, Miranda.” His use of my first name sent a sweet and sharp pain through my cunt. Of course, I exempted him from writing the term paper and would grant him an A for the course. His cold blue eyes gave me a knowing look. He smiled, winked, and left after standing up first so I could see the bulge in his pants. 

“See you again, soon, pet.”

His use of the word pet brought back the incident at the pet store. I wanted to see Alaric there again. And I wanted to see Kurt mount Alaric’s girlfriend in his bed and fuck that petite bitch senseless with his big dick, holding her arms above her head and maybe even teasing her with Alaric’s name as he opened her up and made her writhe under his power. Even better if Alaric knew about it, or saw it, but I wasn’t going to say anything. This was Kurt’s game; she was Kurt’s prey. I was the obedient observer, even if I joined in the hunt. Just as I had become a kind of game or fresh prey for Alaric, although it didn’t know if he even fully understood how far they could go, aside from the opportunity of fucking his teaching. 

I clenched the butt plug, feeling sensations go up and down my spine. Needing to get fucked. Needing the sharp slap of Master’s hand on my ass. Kurt was physically training me, getting me used to gags and shackles, butt plugs and floggers, collars, hoods, bondage, even tit and clit torture. I was practicing deep throating on a ten-inch dildo, pliable and thick, sucking it in past the gag reflex every day. Keeping my body and spirit in shape for sweet degradation and ferocious fucking. 

An enslaved cunt, which Master sometimes called me, although he generally referred to me as “it.” 

It had ceased to be a professor when in the master’s presence, its other world, the world of obligations, friends, profession, family, etc., disappeared when it was with its Master, and it became just the Master’s possession, collared animal, or mere object, to do with as he pleased. And every day it lived in a kind of ecstasy of expectation. 

Kurt fingered some blouses on a rack and whispered to me. “She’s one little fuckable doll, I’ll give her that. Getting a boner just thinking about her lips on my dick. She’ll be tight at first, but a perfect fit in the end,” he chuckled. Looking up, Lena was startled to see a muscular soldier fondling silk blouses. She didn’t know Alaric’s teacher, at least she didn’t recognize me, as she wasn’t in my class nor did she ever come to my office with Alaric, so I simply remained quiet, watching Kurt flirt with her. 

He said he wanted to buy a blouse for his daughter and, as if it blurted out of her sweet little mouth unexpectedly, she said, “you have a daughter?” Admittedly, Kurt didn’t look like a fatherly type, but he was old enough to have a teen-aged daughter. Lena, Alaric had told me, had recently celebrated her 18th birthday, although she could pass for younger. Alaric was nineteen. I must say that I fancied swallowing his cum. Even daydreamed of two hunky students spit-roasting me in front of my master. Kurt bantered with Lena and asked why she was so surprised that he should have a daughter. How old did he look to her? Maybe he should have a paunch and skinny arms, he chuckled and stepped close to her as he fondled the blouses, almost touching her shoulder, close enough for her to smell his aftershave. She didn’t step back.

“Trouble is I don’t know her size. But I want to surprise her. She likes clothes a lot.” Then he said: “as a matter of fact she looks as if she’d be your size. Petite and trim, pretty like you, too.”

“Well, I take a small in these blouses.”

“You know, it would help if I could see you wearing one. Then I’d get a better sense of fit, you know what I mean. And color too. She sort of has your lovely complexion and her hair is shiny like yours too. What color goes best?”

Without hesitation and blushing with pleasure, she grabbed three blouses of different colors and went to the change room. Kurt playfully punched my shoulder.

“That little bitch will be sucking my dick within two weeks. I’ve got a fucking hard-on for her already. You think she noticed? I’m buying the blouse and will find out when she’s on duty again this week and I’ll come back for something else. First, I’ll chat her up, see if she has a coffee break soon. I can tell she likes me already, and she’s probably creaming her panties in the change room. My little fuck doll, my baby girl. I’ll give the little bitch to my friend Jamal, see how she likes a black buck. Stuff her fucking panties in your mouth; you’d like that, wouldn’t you, cunt? Soon, I’ll give Alaric permission to smack and fuck you, too. By the way, have you licked his boots yet, cunt? We’re going back to the pet store soon.”

The question struck me as rhetorical at the time. I didn’t know when such an event would ever happen or how, despite Alaric’s innuendos and pushing the envelope and my own fantasies. Kurt had not yet specifically commanded that it lick its student’s boots, although it had implicit permission to do so, and it wanted to, just to tell Master when it did. 

And so, he engaged Lena’s attention and got her to smile and giggle. Throughout the patter and flirtation scenario, it could see the fresh prey weakening and growing interested, and obviously flattered that a rugged muscular soldier had taken a shine to her. So much for love and loyalty to her boyfriend. Admittedly, it was somewhat annoyed being ignored while it sat on the chair, and also jealous. 

But it allowed itself to imagine Alaric unzipping in its office to reveal a demanding cock, and laughing. It allowed itself to imagine Alaric’s cock down its throat. Maybe he’d do that in the pet store on our next visit. As Master Kurt chatted with his prey, I clenched the perfectly fitting butt plug and soaked my panties. Pronoun correction: it clenched and soaked itself.

Jacob’s Drift

They go by travelers, traveler punks, traveling kids, hobos, hobo-punks, crusties, crust punks, anarcho-punks, transient punks, punk nomads, road kids, gutter pirates, street punks, dirty kids, train hoppers, rail riders, and many other names that they’ve been called.  Jacob preferred gutter punk. It suited him well, he would say. He would get up, eat cold beans, drink warm beer, and fly the sign, asking for spange.  Spange is short for spare change.  Jacob wasn’t a fan of stealing, but had in the past, when he was really hungry, or needed more beer.  The same couldn’t be said for the people he was with now.  They stole frequently, and as much as they could.  Dogface was a big, burly, son of a bitch, who basically was protection for the rest of them.  He was older, probably in his early thirties. Scumboy was the youngest. He ate and drank anything in front of his face, sometimes for survival, and other times just for attention. Then, there was Firefly.  She was a spitfire of a girl, hence the name. Jacob was infatuated with her to say the least.  Firefly was a petite, but stacked, little red head with dreads, and a shape that would bring most men to their knees.  They met outside of Asheville, North Carolina, while waiting for a train car.  Jacob thought that she didn’t stink like the rest.  They both talked of their travels, horrible upbringings, and painful memories.  It was the attention he needed at that time.

Jacob enjoyed the conversation with a girl, which he hadn’t had in quite some time.  He didn’t want the train to stop.  It did, and occasionally they would have to hide from the railroad police.  They were headed to New Orleans, just in time for Mardi Gras.  Some of Dogface’s friends were already down there as he knew from the ‘sign in’ outside of Asheville.  ‘Sign ins’ are tagging of certain walls as communication between travelers.  Jacob had never been to the Big Easy, as he was only a year into his travels.  The other three had made the rounds a few times in years past. 

“What’s New Orleans like?” asked Jacob.  Dogface almost leaped out of his skin to respond, “It’s fucking amazing.  There are so many of us there, especially this time of year. Beer runs like waterfalls, and leftovers for days, I tell you, days!”  Scumboy had to speak up, “He’s right. Cold beer too.”  Jacob longed to feel the sensation of a cold beer to his lips.  Firefly barked, “Tell him how we get most of the beer.  This waterfall of beer utopia, you speak of.”  Scumboy with no hesitation said, “She shows her tits, and we get beer!”  Jacob thought of this as a win-win.  Not only would he get free beer, but also get a look at Firefly’s beautiful, bulging bumps, which were currently covered by a stained, white wife beater.

It was daybreak when the train arrived outside of New Orleans.  There were no beans left, and all four shared the last beer.  This was Jacob’s first train ride, so Dogface played big daddy, “When it starts to slow down, get ready.  When we jump, you jump. Ok?  And roll like we do.”  Jacob thought, if Firefly was jumping, then he was jumping.  He would follow that girl to hell, and ask for seconds. 

The train slowed to a manageable speed and Dogface yelled, “JUMP!”  They all jumped and rolled onto the dusty gravel.  They made it unscathed for the most part.  A few cuts and scratches are nothing to a traveler. Brushing himself off, Jacob thought, let’s get that free beer.  They had a small walk to endure before the festivities would be enjoyed.  Plus, they had to locate Dogface’s friends.  They had been there for a few months to escape the brutal northern winters.  The best places for shelter and food were already pinpointed by them.  Firefly would provide the beer.

After a modest walk, they arrived at the French Quarter.  They strolled Royal, turned on St. Peter, and saw a fellow kid half way in a garbage can with his feet straight up in the air.  Dogface approached the can and asked about his friends through the opening at the top.  The kid quickly emerged from the bottom of the can, half eaten Po’Boy in hand, and said, “Look, It’s still warm.”  Dogface asked again, “Do you know where the Killhead Drunks are?”  Different sects of travelers took names to separate themselves from other ‘sign ins’.  The kid, with an almost reverent demeanor and tone said, “Oh yeah, I know where they hang. Follow me.” 

They followed, weaving through thugs, drunks, and whores.  Jacob, seeing all the glistening glasses of cold beer in the tourist’s hands, thought, Firefly needs to break those titties out.  They got stares and heard whispers as they passed.  Sometimes it wouldn’t be whispers. “Take a fucking bath!” an old, leather-skinned, drunk whore yelled.  Dogface marched forward through the mass of flesh, said over his shoulder, “Ignore them. Keep moving.”

The kid ducked off between two shotgun houses and they followed close behind.  He took a quick left and arrived at an abandoned house with boards on all of the windows and doors.  The kid knocked twice then ran off into the night to find another trashcan.  As they waited, Jacob gazed upon Firefly’s face in the streetlights and wanted nothing more than to taste those succulent lips.  The board blocking the doorway started to slide to the right.  “Dogface? Is that you motherfucker?”  Dogface smiled, “Yep, it’s me motherfucker.”  They embraced as if they were lovers.  Dogface introduced Jacob, as the others were already familiar with one another.  “Jacob, this is Bull.  He is my bro from way back.  We’ve been in the shit from Oregon to New York City.”  Jacob could feel the unspoken alliance between the two, and after seeing them greet one another, wondered if they had fucked in the past.

Bull was a big one too, about the same age as Dogface.  He had a shaved head, as Dogface’s was short, and unkempt.  “Get in here.  We have jambalaya, some bread, hell, even some fucking fried shrimp.”

“Any beer?” Jacob asked.  “Don’t fucking spit on his offerings!” Dogface said foaming.  Bull laughed, trying to reel in Dogface, said, “It’s cool man, it’s cool.  All out of beer at the moment.”  Scumboy with a mouth full of jambalaya, spat out half intelligible, “Let’s go get some fucking beer!”  Firefly knew she would have to take advantage of tourists by showing her tits.  It really wasn’t a big deal for her.  She thought that it was funny that men would turn into puppy dogs with cash when in front of big, fat, whale-shaped tits.  The tourist would try to give beads, but Firefly would insist on money or beer for her and the boys.  Beer and cash would soon follow after her pale mounds of flesh with dime-sized nipples were exposed.  Jacob, beer in hand, and tits in sight, thought about tasting more than her lips.

They all had their fill of beer and debauchery for the night and decided to pack it in.  On the walk back, Scumboy busted out a car window and took some visible change from the console.  When they reached the abandoned house that would be home for the time being, Dogface and Scumboy staggered inside.  Firefly asked Jacob, “Will you stay out here with me for a bit?” Without hesitation, Jacob responded, “Of course I will.” The two of them sat on a broken set of concrete steps.  “I hope you don’t look at me any different now,” said Firefly.  Jacob almost blushing said, “Well, yeah, I see you a little different, but in a good way for sure.”  Then Jacob moved a little closer, put his arm around her, and went in to kiss her. She quickly stood up, straight as a soldier, and walked over to a dilapidated wrought iron gate.  “I’m sorry.  It’s not that I don’t want to kiss you, but I’m fucked up Jacob.  I’m damaged goods.” Jacob, now with an arm around her once more, said, “You are beautiful.  We’ve all been through shit.  I don’t judge or blame.” Jacob knew it must have been horrific by her closed off body language, but didn’t want to exacerbate the situation.  He didn’t judge nor blame.

Firefly whispered, “I was raped.”  Jacob squeezed her tighter.  “By my uncles and stepfather years ago,” Jacob, unsure what to say, said, “I’m so sorry.  At least you are out of there now.  They can’t hurt you anymore.” Firefly turned, gave Jacob a small, quick kiss on his lips and said, “Come on, let’s get some sleep.”  The look on Firefly’s face told Jacob that there was more to this horror story, but he knew it wasn’t the time nor the place.  They moved the board back in front of the door, found a blanket, laid on the floor, and went to sleep in each other’s arms.

Jacob woke up numerous times throughout the night while the others slept soundly.  The yells, gunshots, sirens, and thoughts of Firefly getting raped plagued him repeatedly.  A few hours later, sunlight through small cracks in the wood woke him again. The rest were still asleep.  Jacob sat up, grabbed a white styrofoam container beside him, and scooped in some cold jambalaya with his fingers.  Everyone else eventually started to wake and move about.

It was a hot morning for early March as they headed out with cardboard in hand.  Dogface, Bull, and Scumboy took one corner, while Jacob and Firefly took another.  It was a rough life for sure, but sometimes freedom costs.  They have avoided the typical trappings of society.  No bills, no overbearing bosses or parents, and no social media.  However, also at times, there was no food, no drink, no warm beds or showers, and no love.  It was a sacrifice that many were willing to make, but Jacob, only a year in, battled with this dilemma constantly.  As they sat collecting a few coins here and there, Jacob reflected on the hardships of his travels, and wondered if this life was truly for him.  He turned, looked at Firefly, and thought that it was all worth it to have met this dirty angel.  She turned, gave him a smile and said, “My ass hurts. Can you look at it for me?  I’m sorry, but it hurts.”  Jacob without hesitation pointed to an alley and said, “Sure, no problem. Right over there.”

In the alley, Firefly pulled her dirty cargo pants down mid-thigh and exposed a supple, pale, very round ass to Jacob. He said, “Yep you have a big ol’ bump. I’m gonna get it.”  Jacob thought that this was the nicest ass he’d ever seen in spite of the huge, glowing red and yellow pustule.  He squeezed the oozing matter out until only blood and clear fluid could be seen, wiped it off with his shirt, and said, “There, all done.  Good as new.”  He gave a little smack to Firefly’s rear just before the cargo pants concealed it once again.  She gave him a light, but sensual kiss as a thank you.  They went back to the corner, but Firefly decided to stand for a while.

It was late evening now.  Bull, Dogface, and Scumboy met up with Jacob and Firefly to discuss and compare the day’s haul.  Of course, Firefly was responsible for their total being much higher.  They even had some one dollar bills, and a five spot swimming around in with the coins.  Tourists, local cons, and whores started to mill about in droves.  Scumboy said, “Get us some beer Firefly.”  Jacob interjected, “We have enough here for beer. Let’s just buy some.”  Firefly appreciated Jacob’s thoughtfulness, but said, “We can save that for food or something.  I don’t mind. Honestly.”  They headed for Bourbon Street, where beer would flow like Niagara.

Jacob stood on the corner drinking a beer and watching old drunks lust after Firefly as she continually exposed flesh.  This had been fine with him before, but now he had a sense of shame associated with the act.  One drunk got a little too close to Firefly and attempted to cop a feel.  He ran his hand up her stomach and grazed the bottom of her tit.  Before he could get a full squeeze in, Jacob was between them, and pushed the drunk back with fury.  “Get the fuck out of here!  Get on down the road, motherfucker,” Jacob said, with a hateful tone, through gritted teeth.  The drunk just smiled, took a few more steps back, and wandered down the street to possibly molest another.  Jacob spit at his departure in disgust.

It was now dark and the five returned to the uninhabited shack to rest.  Once again, everyone staggered in laughing and cursing except for Jacob and Firefly.  They took the same seat on the broken concrete steps and looked off into the night.  Firefly pulled out a joint given to her by a tourist and said, “This is just for us.”  She lit it and they smoked it down until it burned and stained their fingers.  Jacob, sobered a little, but stoned by the weed asked, “Do you ever want a change?”  Firefly took a long pause, breathed in the stale air with the stench of vomit, beer, and piss, and said, “This is pretty much all I know now, but sometimes I think change could be good.  What are you thinking?” Jacob hadn’t thought about it, he just knew that he was now in love, and wanted to spend every waking moment with this girl.  He wasn’t sure if he wanted to return to normal life, or continue on the drift. He did know, however, that whatever he did, he wanted Firefly beside him.  Jacob looked at Firefly and began to speak, “I’m not quite sure.”

Then, through the smoky haze of the night, a medium-sized dog appeared.  Its hair was matted and it was thin. Firefly called the dog over and began picking ticks from its skin. “He’s dirty like us,” said Firefly.  “He just needs a little love, too.”  Jacob went inside and retrieved some stale bread for the dog to eat. As the dog devoured the bread, Jacob looked at Firefly and said with a laugh, “Well, we ARE gutter punks.  We need a dog.  What should we call him?”  Firefly looked up into the sky, then down at the dog again, and said with clarity, “Drifter.”  Jacob loved the choice of name.  They both continued plucking ticks from Drifter’s scarred skin until no more could be found. 

The next morning, Bull, Dogface, and Scumboy woke to the sight of an empty floor where Jacob and Firefly had been sleeping the previous night.  “They’re gone. Where do you think they went?” Scumboy asked without true concern.  Bull kind of shrugged and said, “They may be out getting some food or something.”  A grin appeared on Dogface as he said, “Nope. They’re gone. Continuing their drift.”

As Jacob, Firefly, and Drifter sat in the back of a pick-up truck headed west, the two of them could only smile at one another. They weren’t sure what was ahead of them in this life, but one thing was for sure, they were together. The three of them found the love they had been desperately searching for this whole time. Firefly put a leg across Jacob’s lap, with wind blowing dust from her dreads, said, “Julie. My name is Julie.”

Serial Date

Consuela Reyes hoped she looked slutty enough. At least, for the purpose.

She’d picked the gentlemen’s club strategically. The killer had last struck at another strip joint in Valasia, which was just off the 415 Freeway South. Consuela figured he wouldn’t hit that neighborhood again for a while. If her calculations were correct, Big Joe’s was his next pick-up spot. So she was there too, shaking her ass, kill-bait with curves.

Ogling herself in the bathroom mirror three hours’ previously, Consuela felt certain she had the tawdry goods to snare a murderer of working girls. Pink vinyl boots with platform heels, a black microskirt that left nothing to the imagination, white lace stockings, a blue thong bikini, lacy white halter top. From what she’d grasped from the headlines, he liked them dark, a little primitive maybe. Well, that was her. Masses of dark, curly hair flowed down her back; her face was narrow, Indian, her eyes black as obsidian chips. Her makeup was subtle, accenting her natural colors, her leonine cheekbones. Except for the “Fuck Me Red” lipstick—she couldn’t resist.

She noted the twisted tube of toothpaste “for sensitive gums” on her sink next to her amber-handled hairbrush. That relationship had been brief. The man was vainer than any woman she knew. But not in a hot, self-assured way. Consuela gingerly removed the toothpaste and popped it in the trash. Then, with one final glance around her living room—piles of Anatomy and Physiology textbooks on the glass-topped coffee table, a well-thumbed paperback entitled Extreme Self-Defense—she shouldered her Joosy handbag. From the wall, Ramirez, Dahmer and Bundy—real guys—seemed to give her a collective wink.

Go to it, Sister. We can’t wait for your report.

Now, standing on the sidewalk just outside Big Joe’s parking lot, she wondered. Maybe he’d be able to sense it. Something not right about her, or too right. A set-up. An undercover cop.

WWTD…What would Ted do?

There had been rain, and the neon letters that sat atop the club’s awning smeared their reflection across pools in the asphalt. Consuela lit a cigarette, even though she didn’t smoke. She waited, watching the cars cruising down the boulevard, standing well back from the curb so she wouldn’t get splashed.

Nothing. She flicked the smoking butt onto the ground, where it expired with a hiss. She shivered, wished she’d worn something warmer. That she wasn’t subject to dangerous whims. In a way, she and the killer weren’t that different. Except for the killing part. So far.

Consuela’s hybrid was parked on the other side of the street, down the road a ways. She was just about to pack it in—terrible idea, she could actually be murdered—when a silver Corvette coupe slowed to a stop.

Casually, like she did this all the time, Consuela sauntered over to the car. It matched the description from the police reports and the flyers plastered all over the three-city area the killer was crawling. A zagged scratch extending over the right wheel well exposed the primer like a scar. The windows were smoked.

The driver’s side window rolled down. She leaned in. For a moment, she felt a surge of terror—

it was so dark inside the Corvette. Then a piece of the darkness lifted on a white, white face. He was wearing a hoody.

Her man. He even dressed the part, like one of those signs asking you to watch for suspicious characters.

“Looking for a date?” she asked, batting her eyes. Wasn’t that what pros said in movies and on TV?

The man nodded. “Get in,” he said in a voice surprisingly soft. Consuela slid into the car next to him.

The coupe’s interior smelled acrid, smoky. Adrenaline jazz. She smiled, licked her lips and crossed her legs. He was checking out the package.

They drove for a while in silence. He seemed moody, and she couldn’t get a fix on what he might be thinking. He flicked on the radio: “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” by AC/DC. The flicker of a grin teased his lips. He began to keep time on the steering wheel to the classic song.

“Now this is rock and roll,” he said.

“Right fucking on,” she responded. So far, so good.

“I’ve got a flask in the glove compartment, if you want a drink,” he said. She thought she’d seen this neighborhood before. But it was hard to tell. The same liquor marts, gas stations, bail bondsmen. Were they going around in circles? She flipped through the glove compartment, found the silver flask and took a pop. Cheap bourbon. Well, it hit the spot.

“You want to talk some business?” he asked.

“What kind of business?” Doing her best to sound hard. The alcohol was going straight to her brain. She wished she’d eaten something before, but she’d been so keyed up. “You’re not 5-0, are you?”

He frowned. Had she hit a sour note? At least she hadn’t said “po-po.”

“No, I’m not the police,” he said. “How much?”

What was the industry standard, and for what? “Two hundred,” she said, making her voice husky, blasé. “You can do anything you want, but no rough stuff. And no pee.”

Consuela had really impressed herself with that last note. She hoped he bought it. Two hundred bucks sounded like a reasonable fee for fucking her, or whatever. She was young and pretty, after all, not some gap-toothed slag. She imagined a drop-down menu of hardcore services provided, a naughty fridge magnet poem maker. “Rough teabagging.” “Light anal.” “Bondage shit.” The man grunted. “No worries. I’m not a weirdo like the President.”

Which left a lot of room for the bizarre.

The possibilities excited her. All the things she hadn’t tried. Multiple penetration—cocks fore and aft, wriggling inside her. Suspension. Toys. She was starting to get wet. She lifted the edge of her microskirt and slid a finger down her panties.

The man’s face went cold, rigid. His lips curled over his teeth as her scent filled the car. Chewing down the panic—she hadn’t meant to do that, she was probably pissing him the fuck off—she pushed things a step further. With her other hand she reached over and curled her fingers around his thigh. He was big, but soft, like some kind of Loofah. His eyes went dark. “Cut that out,” he said. His knuckles whitened as he gripped the steering wheel.

“Sorry,” she said, pulling away her hand. She was really, really turned on. The prospect of imminent death aroused her like a drug.

They’d left the city proper and were driving through an unincorporated industrial area. He indicated a field next to an abandoned factory. She shrugged. “Do you have a tarp or something? Looks a little muddy.”

He was silent.

“Well, they say the customer is always right.” She waited for him to get out and open her door. The sky was a profound gray and the rays of the dying sun streaked it like fragments of shattered, bloody glass. They stood at the base of a set of concrete stairs that ended on a ten foot square platform, part of some building project sacrificed to the economy. Weeds jutted through cracks in the platform like wire sculpture. About ten feet away to the left stood a corrugated aluminum shack, and behind a thicket of bushes, a hand-pump.

She timed it perfectly. Turning her back to him, she pretended to fish in her handbag for a pack of cigarettes. Consuela felt his hot breath on her neck, and her hands curled around the can of Mace. Suddenly she crouched, crippling his forward attack. Going to one knee, she kicked out sideways. He struck the platform hard, and the ball-peen hammer he was holding flew from his hand and landed harmlessly on the concrete.

The killer was out cold. While he was unconscious, she tugged off the hoody, pulled his jeans around his ankles, inched down his boxers and bound his wrists and ankles with zip-ties. When his eyes fluttered open, she gave him the spray full in the face. “You fucking cunt!” he shrieked.

“Wow,” she said. “That was so not cool. Apologize.”

His eyes streamed tears from the pepper spray.

“You like to kill prostitutes,” she said. A flat statement. He sputtered and swore at her. “Yes, I know,” she said, pretending this was a reasonable, ordinary conversation. “Mommy was a pro, she abused you, something something. You, sir, are a cliché.”

Consuela suppressed a peal of giggles. She hadn’t intended the last part. But her blood was on fire, the cold was tonic, the moon was out, and she was pretty sure she was going to do and say some other things that were just as much out of character, or flat-out weird coming from anybody.

“You can’t get it up, and when they see your little handicap, they laugh. Right? Not that it’s little…” She kneeled down and took his cock in her hand. At last she was at leisure to examine it, caress it. She kissed the tip. Still soft. “A shame, all that meat and no spine.”

She noted a small trickle of blood oozing from his scalp, like an ooze of black pudding. She swiped a finger across the head wound and brought it to her lips. “Mmm…that’s good. Maybe that’s why you’re so flaccid…your blood is flowing through the wrong head.”

“I’ll kill you, bitch!” he shrieked.

“Maybe,” said Consuela. She rolled off him and grabbed the ball peen hammer. Then she straddled his chest and turned the hammer over in her hands so it caught splinters of moonlight. “This the one you use on your victims?” She placed the haft of the hammer against his throat, and pressed experimentally. He gurgled. “I know you’re into overkill,” she said. “I prefer a more subtle approach.” She pressed harder.

His face grew red, and his eyes bulged. She caressed his neck with the hammer-head. “You like the way that feels against your skin, the cold steel?” He was struggling to speak, but no words came out. Bubbles of saliva burst from his lips.

Consuela slid down her body till she found his cock again. Now it was fuller. Not full enough, but on its way. She began to stroke the shaft with one hand, keeping the hammer pressed against his throat with the other. As her hand moved faster, he grew, filling her palm.

“Houston, we have hard-on!” she squealed. She rolled down her panties and squatted down on him, sighing with relief as his full erection filled her up.

“I seem to be a little dry,” she said.

Her hips grinding against him, up and down, up and down, she picked up the hammer again.

“Nonononononoyoucrazybitch…”

With precise, unerring strokes, she turned his skull to jelly. Riding the spasms as an electrical storm tore through his nervous system, she held on like an experienced jockey, daubing herself with the sweet, sticky blood that bubbled from the wreckage of his face.

She couldn’t wait to tell the boys the story, down to the last toothsome detail.

Blood Dahlia

I can’t understand myself anymore
But I’m still feeling lonely
Feeling so unholy

– Numb, Portishead

Elliott stood outside Carrie’s apartment building for the third time this week.

The apartment’s exterior was faded with age, overgrown with vines that crawled up its sides like thick, dark snakes. Street lamps cast pale yellow light amid apartment buildings and businesses cramped together for blocks around.

He inhaled the November night air, pushed his thinning, stringy hair from his face, and plunged his hands into the pockets of his coat.

Did he have the courage to knock on Carrie’s door and tell her all the things that had been on his mind since their first—and last—date at Applebee’s three weeks ago? He had shown up to the restaurant that night loaded on Maker’s Mark, his nerves like hot wires, his hands almost trembling.

His love for and encyclopedic knowledge of cinema left her underwhelmed; she was not into films. He bragged about his impressive fantasy miniature collection, also to no effect. She talked about her love of animals. He did not like them. At all. They were smelly and needy, although he did not tell her he felt this way.

Toward the end of the date, she asked him whether he had “fabricated” his online dating profile. He admitted he may have done so to some extent. But only because the dating scene was cold and inhospitable. What was a guy to do these days?

After she noticed him staring at her cleavage while she ate her Caesar salad, she promptly looked at her cellphone and remarked about how late it was and that she needed to be up early for work tomorrow. She concluded the date by telling him that she didn’t think it would be good to go out with him again. That she just wasn’t ready to date right now. 

Elliott knew she was lying. They always did.

After she broke the news and left him humiliated and standing outside the restaurant, the words of his cloying mother, who never seemed to receive enough affection from him, no matter how much she wanted, seeped into his mind. The words were an acid that burned through the pitiful layers of his life for as long as he could remember:

No woman will ever love you as much as I love you, Elliott. Never forget that.

His mother drilled this into his brain throughout his fatherless childhood, as if she were performing a verbal lobotomy and sabotaging any chance of happiness he might have with a member of the opposite sex. And it worked.

Until now. 

Carrie was different. Elliott got the sense that she didn’t really know what she wanted out of life, let alone what she wanted in a man. She seemed so delicate, so fragile. As if her whims could change with a gust of wind.

He could be that gust of wind that changed both of their lives.

After their date, he had followed Carrie from a safe distance until she reached her building.

In the days that followed, Elliott found her employer’s website—a veterinarian’s office— and located her headshot. He quietly masturbated to it a few times over the next week in his bedroom, interspersed with occasional online videos of German torture porn, of which he was a devoted curator. 

He was careful, as always, not to let his mother hear him. 

With each sad, messy orgasm, he became more confident that he deserved her and that having her—mind, body, and soul—made him a complete man.

Following work shifts at the movie theater–and sometimes before–he stood across the street from Carrie’s apartment. Hoping to catch her leaving for work. Hoping to spy her coming home with another guy. Hoping their eyes would meet, music would swell from somewhere, and she would realize that no other man could fulfill her the way he could.

But each time he stood across the street from her building, that sense of entitlement grew like a rancid seed blooming within. He had to have her. She belonged to him, whether she knew it yet or not. 

Now, standing outside her place tonight, he recalled a line Billy Crystal said in the film When Harry Met Sally: 

“When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want the rest of your life to start right now.” 

He never appreciated the film and didn’t understand why Sally liked Harry. He was weak and wore tight-ass jeans like one of those twinks. But that line stuck with him after years of rewatching the movie. It was a perfect line of dialogue.

This line was now his North Star. He would convince her that their lives together were just beginning. 

One way or the other. 

He snapped out of this trance, not realizing he was mumbling under his breath, when he noticed someone exiting her building.

It was now or never.

Elliott darted across the street, narrowly avoiding getting creamed by a blaring bus, and reached the door before it closed, bypassing the call box. As the door slammed shut, muffled sounds of crying babies, arguments, yapping dogs, and droning televisions seeped through the walls. The air carried the odors of animals, fried cooking, and dirty carpeting. 

He found her mailbox and apartment number.

A rusted sign hanging on the doors to the elevator declared DANGER: OUT OF ORDER, so he climbed the four flights of stairs to Carrie’s apartment. 

He stood there, one hand inches from knocking on the door. His nerves were conducting his tension like a mad orchestral maestro. Only this time, there was an undercurrent of delicious anticipation.

***

Carrie finished putting the wax-paper-wrapped, freshly cut meat into the freezer and was washing the large, serrated, hand-me-down butcher knife from her late mother. 

Looking down at the wet, gleaming knife, her thoughts drifted to one night decades ago that changed everything for her. 

Carrie’s mother was standing in the kitchen with her only child. She was stroking Carrie’s long chestnut brown hair with a hand that was becoming stiff with coagulating blood, while her 10-year-old daughter’s sobbing subsided.

There was a dark, glistening trail of blood leading from the kitchen to the bathroom. The crimson-coated knife was on the kitchen counter.

“He’s gone now,” Carrie’s mother assured her only child, in a voice that seemed a million miles away. “He can’t hurt us anymore. He won’t touch you anymore either. Do you understand?”

Carrie nodded.

Her mother kneeled down and handed Carrie the knife, handle first. “I want you to keep this.”

She then kissed Carrie’s forehead and held her for a long time.

Now, Carrie was staring at the knife and initials, deep in a dark reverie, when a knock at her apartment door snapped her back to the present. She opened the door slowly.

“Hey, how have you been?” Elliott asked.

A look of shock stretched across Carrie’s soft, pale face, which was framed by her now short brown hair. This expression turned into a slight smile.

She couldn’t believe her good fortune.

“What a surprise,” Carrie said. “What are you doing here?”

“I, um, thought I would swing by to see how you’re doing. I didn’t like how the last time ended, and I wanted to see if you’re doing okay.”

“Well, you shouldn’t have. But thanks.”

She leaned against the door frame, crossing her arms.

Elliott stood there, biting his lower lip and staring at the floor.

After an excruciating moment of silence, she stood aside and beckoned him into her apartment, then smoothed her waifish hands over her dark blue veterinarian scrubs. They were flecked with spots of blood. She must have just gotten home from work. 

Her purple-polished nails gleamed like a wolf’s eyes in the hallway’s harsh overhead fluorescent lighting as she slowly closed the door.

“Mind if I use your restroom?”

She winced, thinking of what her bathroom looked like presently. “Unfortunately, it’s out of order. You know how old buildings can be.” She shrugged. “Have a seat.”

He plopped down on the tired leather couch, folding his hands in his lap, and scanned her cramped studio apartment. The space was absolutely crammed with books, some with titles indicating her interest in human and other creature anatomies. There were also photos of cute dogs, cats, and other mammals, some framed, some merely pinned to dulled white walls. Portishead played softly from a set of speakers connected to a vinyl record player in a corner next to an unmade mattress on the floor.

His gaze lingered on the mattress for a moment. 

Elliott yelped as a cat jumped seemingly out of nowhere onto a couch cushion and hissed long and loud at him. The creature’s luxurious grey-and-white fur stood on end. One of the eyeballs was missing. The eyehole was horizontally stitched up.

“That’s Lucky. He’s a rescue. Very interesting story about him.”

“I see,” Elliott said nervously, not caring about the cat’s story. He kept one eye on the cat and the other on Carrie. She looked so cute in her veterinarian outfit.

“He doesn’t seem to like you very much,” she smiled. She lifted Lucky and placed him gently on the floor. He hissed at Elliott again and disappeared behind the couch.

She sat down on the other end of the couch. “Take your coat off. Get comfortable.”

He removed the coat and placed it on the arm of the couch. It fell to the floor, but he didn’t notice as he continued to gaze at Carrie.

“So, Elliott. What really brings you here?”

“Like I said, I just wanted to check in and make sure you’re okay. The other night kind of sucked.”

“It sure did,” she replied, cracking her knuckles loudly. “Was there anything you wanted to say to me about that night?”

“I know that you were offended that I lied on my profile. I’m sorry. It’s just tough out there, you know?”

She laughed, cracking her knuckles again. This nervous knuckle-cracking thing was adorable.

“I see,” she sighed, draping her right arm over the couch and moving a little closer to him. “Anything else you want to say? You were staring down my blouse, Elliott.”

“Well, yes, actually.” Eagerly, sensing that he was starting to break through. “That was just a compliment. I think that women are too sensitive these days and don’t appreciate when a man finds them attractive.”

Her teeth gleamed in the lamplight over the couch as she smiled. “And?”

“I think we got off on the wrong foot. I think we could make this work. I think we need to make this work. Look how desperately lonely and miserable people are. How we are. I don’t know about you, but the isolation and vapidness of society feels like it’s eating away at my bones sometimes.”

She reflected for a minute. “That’s almost poetry, Elliott. It is brutal out there, isn’t it?”

“Yes!”

She pondered his words, then placed her right hand on his knee and squeezed. “You know what? Maybe I was overreacting a bit. How about a drink? I have bourbon in the cupboard. How do you take it?”

“Neat,” he said, his body shimmering with a flood of endorphins. He couldn’t believe how well this was going.

“While I get our drinks, would you mind playing with my cat? He’s been here alone all day while I was working and needs to get some angst out,” she laughed.

She tossed him a string attached to a chewed-up mouse plush and then moved to the kitchenette for some glasses.

This was a busy week, Carrie thought to herself as she poured two Bulleits. Elliott was even dumber and more pathetic than the last guy.

While Elliott picked up the toy with mild disgust and gingerly draped the string behind the couch.

Claws from Lucky’s paws immediately tore into the mouse, violently yanking the string and knocking his hand hard against the wall.

“Owww!” he exclaimed, more out of surprise over Lucky’s strength than pain.

“See what I mean? Lots of steam to blow off. I know the feeling. Don’t you?”

Elliott started to reply and turned around to find Carrie standing there holding two glasses of bourbon. 

She handed him the drink. He accepted but tried to stop shaking.

A sudden anxiety swept over him. All through high school and into adulthood, he had imagined a scenario like this happening, but no dice. Spurned by girl after girl, all because they were too emotional, couldn’t take a compliment, or just weren’t as interesting as him. Now, for some reason beyond his understanding, it was happening. He was terrified.

He had never been with a girl before. Thirty-seven years. And now, after all the years of his mother smothering him and telling him he was no good for any girl, here he was. Just went to show that persistence and confidence paid off.

He drank the bourbon in one loud, deep gulp. His face turned warm.

Here we go.

“Your shoulders look so tense,” Carrie cooed, sipping on her drink and setting it down. “Turn around, let me work on them. I can do amazing things with my hands.”

Elliott chuckled and complied. His breath caught as she lifted his Slayer t-shirt up and over his head. 

Her cold hands sent a shiver through him. They soon warmed, and he closed his eyes, leaning back against her. He could feel her breasts pressed against his back through the fabric. He sighed, losing himself in the moment.

“Carrie, I think I love you,” he whispered.

Losing himself to the degree that he didn’t notice one of her hands slip down into one of the pockets of her scrubs. 

He felt the prick of a needle. 

“Hey, what the fuck?!”

Elliott tore himself from this fantasy and spun around. Lucky mewed, watching with intense interest from Carrie’s mattress, as she stood before him, putting the cap back onto the needle and launching it into the kitchenette’s sink.

“Have you ever heard of a Komodo dragon?” she asked. “They’re truly magnificent creatures.”

There was an expression on her face—her eyes narrow slits, her lips pouting—that filled Elliott with deep fear.

She sauntered over to the record player and cranked up the Portishead album, then returned.

“Did you know that female dragons can reproduce without males? It’s a process called parthenogenesis. This enables them to reproduce in isolation.”

Elliott, stunned, started to respond as if he knew what she was even talking about. What stopped him was a tingling in his extremities. He stared at his hands, mouth agape, then looked back at her.

“Another fascinating thing about Komodos is that their venom can do absolutely fucked up things to the human body.”

Elliott’s legs wobbled as strength continued to drain from them. He fell to the floor, sitting awkwardly but upright against the couch.

Carrie went to the kitchenette. She produced the serrated hand-me-down from a drawer and a crisp new plastic tarp from beneath the sink.

She swayed and hummed to the music as she playfully spread the tarp out. 

“I have my mother, who was also a vet, to thank for encouraging my interest in animals,” she said. “I’m also grateful for what we learned together about how to handle animals like you.”

Carrie pushed him onto the plastic and straddled him, grinding hard. She groaned then laughed.

“Damn, your tiny cock is still hard! That will change in a minute.”

She placed the blade against his neck, her face scrunched in concentration like a butcher deciding the correct cut to take. She blew a tuft of hair from her face and shifted the blade to his bare chest. Carrie sliced vertically from the collar bone to the navel as the skin peeled open, making a sound like wet paper.

Shock and poison clotted any pain he should have felt. His life essence blossomed like blood dahlias and cascaded down his chest. Elliott could feel the warmth pouring out of his body as it began to pool around him. He tried to scream but only emitted a loud groan, drowned out by the music.

She punched him hard squarely between the eyes.

“How we doing, baby?” she said in an enthusiastic purr.

Stars swam in Elliott’s vision. He tried to struggle from underneath her, but his body now felt very weak. He lifted his left arm to attempt a punch, but he couldn’t complete the swing. His arm fell limp against the floor. 

Carrie tittered.

“Komodo venom takes away muscle control, which is why you couldn’t hit me. It’s also an anti-coagulate. Do you know what that means?”

She dipped a finger into the thick rivulets of blood pouring from his chest and painted a crude smile on his lips. 

“It means you can bleed to death because your blood won’t clot, dipshit.”

“P-p-please, I’ll do anything you want, I’ll apologize. I apologize! J-just don’t let me d-die,” he muttered as the venom increased its hold. He felt his lungs laboring to breathe now as warmth spread from his groin. Piss.

She punched him in the jaw this time and knocked his head to the side, sending a thick line of spittle into the air. He strained to focus his vision on what was under the couch.

Several pairs of men’s shoes sat beneath the couch. Elliott started crying as his wheezing increased.

Her eyes followed his fearful gaze. 

Lucky pranced over and started lapping at the blood pooling on the floor.

“Don’t act like you’re surprised. I’ve noticed you standing outside my building. You’re a sick little twat, buster. Just be happy you’ll be able to feed my cat for months. Now, I need to get to work on you before you lose consciousness.” 

She tugged his jeans down, tore his boxers off, and guided the blade to his now flaccid penis. She yanked it and started sawing to the sound of the cat’s purring.

Meant to Last

The night ends the way it always ends. A pickup truck’s headlights backlighting three men. They wield a baseball bat, fists, boots, a tire iron. It gets harder and harder for me to see through a haze of blood, splinters, and tears. 

I know I am dying, even as I know soon, I will live again. 

***

You’d think that if you had to repeat the same day over and over, at least it would be a day you didn’t sleep in. Nope. I don’t even get ten hours of consciousness in the loop. My alarm goes off on my shitty Cricket phone, and it’s half past two in a grimy room that reeks of ditch weed and cum. 

This day used to be decades ago. I don’t know why this started. I woke up on a day I’d mostly forgotten. This time of my life was lost in a void.

An argument in the next room. The same one I’ve heard thousands of times. My boyfriend’s voice louder, petulant. “They loved me at the interview, I just failed the piss test.”

His father’s voice fills in every gap, lightly accented, and raspy from hand-rolled cigarettes. “I give you almost every dollar I have, I sleep on the couch so you can have a place to stay…for what? You said you could pass the test.”

Of course, he blames me. “He didn’t pick me up on time. I was sweating buckets. I drank a fucking drink, okay, that was going to get my piss clean. But this dipshit had to take a late lunch and the drink went nowhere except my fucking pit stains, okay?”

His dad doesn’t blame me, but doesn’t defend me either. He puts up with me. He hopes that I am going to realize I am a woman and make my boyfriend into a normal man, with a wife and kids and a real job on the horizon.

Sometimes I engage them, join the argument or try to break it up. Most times I don’t. Nothing I say seems to make a dent.

I shrug and put on clean clothes, although they’re contaminated by my unwashed skin. I slept in my binder—I knew I shouldn’t, but some days back then, it was the only thing that made me feel safe. Sometimes I even wore my steel-toed boots to bed. My wardrobe, stuffed in a backpack, is loose-fitting and drab. The kind of clothes that fade well into a corner while my boyfriend’s dealer (and sometimes roommate) works up to hitting his boyfriend. My hair is dramatic, though: layers of bruise colors, from fresh to faded. Enough piercings in my face to delay an MRI. The days I brave the bathroom, I love to stare at my fresh young face.

Grabbing my keys and wallet hidden in the closet makes me grimace as I raise my arm, thinking longingly of my deodorant trapped in the bathroom; might as well be in Siberia, I don’t want to walk past them to get there. And in Tucson, deodorant never lasts long anyway.

Hand on the doorknob, listening for the right lull. I manage to hustle out with a mumble, and without a glance behind me. I need to break through.

***

In this dilapidated landmark tower, now low-income senior housing, I might be the youngest person. In my future, the building becomes something different, luxury condos, office space, something with a lot of steel and windows. In the future, I won’t make it back to Tucson much, but I’ll look for it every time.

My boyfriend lives with his surprisingly-old father—or maybe not that surprising, now that I have processed how much older my boyfriend is than I was. Back in the 90s, “legal” was all that mattered, and he waited until my 18th birthday had passed so I was no longer “jailbait.” Remember, this was the time of websites that counted down until underage actresses would be legal to fuck. The ball dropping in the Times Square of Natalie Portman’s presumptive virginity being up for grabs by schlubs on Geocities.

A rotating crew of one or two other queer men stay with him on the twin mattresses lined up on the floor; no sheets, no pillowcases, just layers of stiff blankets we hide under when we want to fuck. 

Yes, I am one of those squalidly-surviving men who don’t officially live anywhere. My boyfriend is not allowed to live in the building; by extension, I am so unwelcome in the building that I was never sure if it was the last time I’d be able to sign myself in. 

I sign out, this time, every time, to an eye-roll.

I jiggle my car door and ease it up a breaking hinge to get in. It doesn’t lock anymore, but it’s never been stolen. It never will be stolen, if the future unrolls in the expected way. The tape deck will be stolen out of it in a few years, but, well…it is just a tape deck. Not even a CD player. This is a little while before iPods, but a long while after CDs. I work at a used record store; the CDs aren’t even shiny anymore, usually. When someone sells us a pristine CD, I feel like I can see into their future, and it involves escaping Tucson and at last, ironically, being able to afford air conditioning.

I stop and get a sandwich on the way to work. That’s about a third of my $14 for the day. Take it to eat in the midtown park’s recently-repaved parking lot. I could sit at a picnic table, but that’s even hotter than my car. I have a half-full water bottle from yesterday in my cup holder. Drinking plasticky water the temperature of tea really takes me back.

I chuck my sandwich wrapper on the floor of the passenger side, because why not, and go check my email at the library tucked in the corner of the park, a hidden oasis. Somewhere to cool off for approximately 45 minutes, although sometimes I let myself be late to work. (Why not?)

The first time I lived this day, I was still a reader, despite the haze of pot and abuse. Since the loop began, I usually borrow something ambitious that I’d never quite been ready to face over the years. I’m almost at the end of Empire of the Senseless, dipping in throughout my work shift and meal break. I feel a little guilty, borrowing books that I will never return. Will those books go missing in some kind of library of the multiverse? Or does my death transport them back onto this exact shelf, crisp and ready to get me through the next ever-darkening evening?

The ironic part of this errand is that I could check my email at “home,” but my boyfriend is always logged in to a slightly-less-expensive knockoff of World of Warcraft. I’m not allowed to touch his computer. He sits there as the hours redden his eyes, hunched over the keyboard, smoking, scowling, drinking two-liters of Dr. Pepper right out of the bottle. How he hasn’t died by the time I get to my future is amazing. I starved myself for years and will end up diabetic. He pumped his veins full of sludge and has a vibrant fucking life. He ended up, of course, with the lucrative job, lovely wife, and adorable baby. My deepest fears confirmed, that he did not think of me as a man at all, that he wanted to be what his father wanted him to be, that he really wanted a woman and everything easy and conventional, with hashtag “blessed” slathered all over.

Anyway, I check my email at the library most days, because I’ve noticed that sometimes, I get different messages. I always hope that this Nigerian prince or that limited-time offer will have a secret message from Bill Murray, or Natasha Lyonne at least. Never happens. And nothing from my friends or family. My boyfriend has driven everyone away, although I didn’t see it like that, the first time I lived this day. The first time, it was unremarkable that no one was writing me back, that my inbox was barren, full of automated messages and notifications. Every time I relive this day, though, it gets a little bleaker. 

I get to work, and I could tell you about how the afternoon and evening goes. The 41 different customers and which CDs they buy (among other items, including hair dye, lascivious stickers, and DVDs, a format just coming into its prime, and never quite replaced by Blu-Ray as expected). What my coworkers chat about. The store manager stinking up the bathroom in the back of the store by the time clock where I punch in. The incense the assistant manager lights to drown out the smell. The endcap I create out of posters for an album (I’ve created everything from a crooked poster stapled bare onto the wood framing a tray of CDs, leaning into the punk, anti-capitalist aesthetic, to an assemblage of caution tape and layers of jagged, feathered posters threatening to take over the whole aisle. It’s oddly soothing work). The music my coworkers put on; eventually, I get a turn to put something on. This is another detail that shifts with each loop: it seems to vary based on subtle interactions throughout the day; if I play a bright, poppy CD, that might change the decision my goth coworker makes an hour later, to spite me. If I chat about a movie, someone might put on its soundtrack. The assistant manager puts on “Closing Time” at the end of the night, every night—not just this endlessly repeating night; it was his schtick. 

I don’t think any of those things matter as far as why the day is repeating, or how to break the cycle. I’ve really tried every kind of interaction I could think of. 

I’ve tried calling in sick, but my boyfriend has always kicked me out to end up somewhere on the streets of Tucson with a broken-down car, and of course, the truck finds me.

I’ve tried leaving work early, but my shitty car doesn’t start. I can call my boyfriend, on his landline, because during this entire four to midnight shift, he never seems to leave his dad’s apartment. He always says he’ll pick me up. But never shows, or at least, not before the day’s over and I die and live again. I’ve tried calling my dad, AAA, whatever. Only one tow company ever picks up, and they don’t have any availability until it’s too late, and my dad does usually answer, but always says he can’t talk right now, try back later after work; when I do that, it goes straight to voicemail. 

There is no version of this that ends up with me able to get out of the parking lot before ten after midnight. Except on foot, and I know how that goes.

I’ve tried walking every direction, away from everywhere I went during that day. Just walking and sweating in the Arizona sun, cooling off a little after dark, but not much. Finding places to hide. Overheated and hunted. Most storefronts mysteriously closed. Nowhere that stays open late enough. Even the 24-hour Albertsons and Circle K are closed for floor cleaning that night. According to the hand-scrawled note on the door, at least; the disturbing fact that both appear to be written in the same handwriting has not escaped me. 

Every day, I make it until a little after midnight, and then they find me.

I always have $14 when I wake up, cash; no credit card, and my debit card is overdrawn. Just like the financially abusive situation with my boyfriend’s dad, most of my income goes to him too. Not just today; throughout our whole relationship. When we will end up getting kicked out of his dad’s place, I will pay most of the rent. When I will luck into a free two-week vacation, I have to go with about $40 to my name because he needed money to buy a wolf pup, I shit you not. 

$14 goes further in the past. It’s enough to buy me a couple meals, or take the city bus anywhere, or theoretically a short jaunt on the Greyhound or the Amtrak. But if I can make it downtown to the station, they have mysteriously closed up, even though the buses are supposed to run all hours and the first train would be at 4 a.m. 

I’ve tried driving, just cruising past my work instead of pulling into the doomed parking lot, but my engine always gives out at some point before sunset, and I’ve never gotten far. At least, not far enough. 

And then there’s hitchhiking. No one picks me up. I feel like a ghost. I think anyone I hadn’t really interacted with that day can’t even see me, and that I can’t go anywhere I didn’t go that day, either. I still don’t understand the rules, though. Maybe it’s nightmare rules.

I have called every number in my shitty Cricket phone, and it’s always a dead end, if they even pick up. Most of my “contacts” seem to barely remember me, or to pity me. I have even called a few numbers that I somehow remember from my future. No luck there, either; I’ve yet to find a thread that convinces them to save me, although certainly, my future friends and exes are a little intrigued by my promises of stock market fortunes and juicy gossip. Maybe eventually I’ll break through.

***

Today, I’ve decided to take a different tack. My remaining $9 after the sandwich is more than enough to buy a gas can and enough gasoline to do the trick. It would be enough to buy a lighter too, but there are plenty in the display case by the register that I can pocket. I choose a novelty one that says “fuck you, you fucking fuck.”

 In my past life, I never stole shit. Now, what does it matter? (To answer the obvious question about my limited funds, I have, on previous days, tried stealing from the register, and even, lowest of the low, from the charity box by the register where people drop in loose change on the honors system. I am always caught, detained by the assistant manager, made to perform a disgusting sexual favor, and then let go, no richer than I began. I wish I hadn’t tried this as many times as I have; I think I must be losing days off my future every time.)

I know the route their truck takes into the parking lot. They always stop in the same place, although of course, if I take off running in the other direction, they just catch me. But there’s a spot they will go, all things being equal. I take my meal break at around nine thirty. It’s dark and there’s only tweakers around. No one cares what I’m doing. 

I pour methodically, then stash the gas can back in the trunk. 

I head back into the record store, wiping my fingers on my ripped jeans. The metalhead couple leaning on the trade counter, antsy from withdrawal as they try to eke out a little cash, talk shit about me. “Look at his hair. Or is it a he/she?” Sometimes, I get an “It’s Pat!”

Tonight, if instead of buying gas, I’d gone to grab fast food at the only place that’s open, or open to me (and it’s always tempting; this young body can turn anything into fuel and beauty), I would have met the men in the pickup for the first time. For the first time this day. 

I did always keep a vague memory of this encounter; it had stuck with me, although whether the day had originally unfolded with a second encounter is lost to the mists of time. Obviously, I couldn’t have died from it, and I’m sure I’d remember even being threatened or injured. Queerbashing deaths were in the news all the time, back then. I was always very conscious of the risk of being seen.

The first time I met them, they were a looming threat. These guys have baseball bats, and have already started getting liquored up. There’s shouting, and swerving to follow me, but no beating happens, not then, not before midnight. 

It’s not that the future is less homophobic and transphobic, exactly, but it’s been startling to relive how overt it used to be. Even a fellow clerk who I literally will know in the future to be bisexual rolls her eyes and deems all kinds of annoyances “so gay.” 

The closing routine is odd. In the future, even in the near future, I’ll work at jobs that feel more like a family, and at night, we’ll make sure we get to each others’ cars safely, that everyone has a ride, that no one’s being followed. 

As I leave the record store, though, we have to examine each other’s bags after locking the door, standing on the sidewalk in front of the facade. Peering into tampons, chewing gum, dental floss, whatever detritus. This pageantry of people who are poor as fuck policing each other’s possible theft of an item that, at best, might help them afford lunch or an ounce. I rub my fingers over the stolen lighter in my pocket nervously, but of course, it’s just a bag check, not a pat-down. It’s no wonder that after that affront to our common humanity, we go our separate ways in silence. 

I’m parked towards the back of the lot. I liked it that way; if I wanted to eat or read on my break, I didn’t want the clerks who smoke outside to scrutinize my off-the-clock life. But that means everyone else is long gone before I try to start my car. 

I’ve tried changing this outcome. I’ve tried parking right up front. Asking for a ride. I’ve tried delaying someone for almost half an hour with dumb chitchat, everything. It never works out. I will never be so alone as I was during this time.

Anyway, I pull my shitty Cricket phone out of my bag, and pretend to make a call, leaning into its glow like a depressed anglerfish. I head towards my car, by way of that spot in the parking lot. With my other hand, I grip the lighter. 

A little sweat. I don’t know why. If I fumble this, I can always try again. I hope that’s true. Or maybe I don’t.

And here comes the truck, on cue. 

Their voices, even their words, are identical to the moments before all the other deaths etched into my memory. The amount of accumulated trauma must be incalculably high. I don’t know how I will come back from this, even if I can get it to end.

But now, a flick, and the lighter doesn’t catch. 

And then it does, a wavering flame, and I throw it, assuming that it’ll go out or I’ll miss the gas slick trap I’d laid. 

A miraculous fireball envelops the truck. It’s their turn to scream. 

I don’t take long to relish it. I need to book it, before the nightmare can continue with, fuck knows. Them somehow surviving unscathed? A different truckload of assholes?

On a whim, I dive into my car instead of fleeing on foot as planned.

The door swings smooth, like my car is young and vibrant and full of life. And this time, it starts. I make it past the intersection of Oracle Road and Miracle Mile. Yes, those are the real names, because in Tucson, a good omen is always waiting on the same corner as sex workers and drug dealers. 

I get to the freeway, still occasionally glancing in my rearview, not quite believing it worked, and finally relax enough to focus on the gas gauge. Half a tank plus my last couple of dollars might get me out of this state. I regret getting lunch. If I have to turn a trick, at least it won’t be in Tucson, and it won’t be to placate the greasy assistant manager for a fistful of twenties I have to give back anyway.

I listen to Nine Inch Nails; Broken is in my tape deck, and I don’t change the cassette all the way down I-10. It’s only an EP, so it must end and begin a lot of times. Sometimes I go back and listen to a song over and over. I guess I got in the habit.

 I pull over in Yuma for a quick nap.

I don’t know if I will wake up back in my comfortable bed, with my girlfriend’s good morning sunshine emoji dancing on my iPhone, or if I will be back in this time again for good, in my shitty car in Yuma scrounging for spare change melded to the cupholder with congealed soda droplets. 

I don’t know how hard it will be to survive. But I know I’ll get through it. I know that I will return. I have broken through.

Two Stops ‘til Daylight

Jeremy stands at the edge of the yellow ‘Do Not Cross’ line listening to the rattling metallic screech echo in the tunnel. He shuffles backward and looks beyond the platform watching the lights come closer until the train roars past. It shrieks to a halt. Two tones reverberate off the subterranean walls followed by an electronic voice.

“Doors opening.”

Like an ocean tide, the passengers flow in and out of the train car. Jeremy steps through the sliding doors and the voice chimes once more.

“Doors closing.”

The train lurches forward immediately. Jeremy sighs after catching himself on a rubber handhold that hangs from the ceiling. He looks around the car thinking about the strangers he recognizes on his morning commute. He nods to the familiar faces he makes eye contact with, occasionally getting a greeting in return. More often than not, Jeremy is ignored. They are too caught up in their morning routines and sleepy stupor. Like the middle-aged gentleman juggling a thermos, a newspaper, and his cellphone, or the large woman with thinning brown hair and fading dye who chews her breakfast louder than the train runs.

Jeremy glances out of the window at the bleak tunnel walls. He thinks of the other sleepy faces around him. The occasional light bulb whirring past and distracting him from both the familiar and unfamiliar.

He reminds himself beneath his breath. “Two stops ‘til daylight.”

The train’s professional voice sounds off once more, cutting though the uncomfortable morning silence. “Approaching Clarke and Division. Next stop: North and Clybourne.”

A Sikh man bounces onto the train offering all who meet his gaze with a bright smile. After another exchange of passengers, the train surges forward once more. Jeremy closes his eyes after returning a smile and reminds himself.

“One stop ‘til daylight.”

Jeremy forces a low, airy laugh. He finds humor in a wandering thought regarding his morning ritual. It reminds him of turning on the light in a dark room. He closes his eyes to prepare for the onslaught of sudden illumination. The light shines through his closed eyelids. His pupils adjust. Jeremy feels silly. He had already walked through the morning light to get to the train station. The train itself has several fluorescents lighting up the cars. What makes the sun’s light different? Is it the reflective magnification off the city windows? Jeremy plays with different reasons, but none feel like a proper answer.

He shrugs his thoughts away and continues to observe his fellow commuters. He wonders how the pink haired woman with the side cut and dark lipstick reads her novel while squeezed between the loud chewer and a smartly dressed but dazed looking businessman.

The train stops and its voice informs, “This is North and Clybourne. Exit through the doors on the right. Fullerton is next.”

The doors thud open, and the car becomes emptier. The businessman rushes out pushing past a homeless man as he enters. The vagrant looks at Jeremy and smiles. Some of his teeth are missing but his eyes are bright.

“G’ morning, Jeremy, my boy!” 

Jeremy returns a smile. “Good morning, Hughie.”

“Doors closing.” The train launches and repeats itself. “Fullerton is next. Transfer to the purple and brown lines at Fullertron.”

Hughie points to his eyes. “Daylight’s a-comin’! Better close dem eyes before the sun burns ‘em out!” He chuckles and turns away to find his way to the back of the train car.

Jeremy smiles at Hughie. He closes his eyes still wondering what he shields them from. The sudden shift in light? Is it a simple game he plays with himself? Is he thinking too much about a completely normal thing?

The train rattles and screeches. Jeremy sways with the train car, lightly correcting himself with the plastic handhold hanging from the ceiling. The sun’s warmth is sudden and even through his closed eyes, he winces. There is both pleasure in the sun’s warmth and discomfort in his eyes as his pupils adjust. The sound of the train no longer echoes; it makes him feel as though the train is floating away like an object released into space.

The train slows, and the momentum makes him swing forward. The train’s automated voice calls out. “This is Fullerton. Switch to the brown and purple lines at Fullerton.”

Jeremy sighs and the doors crank open. He can feel the bodies shift in and out like the air in his lungs. The sunlight shines through the skin and blood making a find crimson beneath his eyelids. The train calls out to the passengers. “Doors closing. Next stop: Belmont. Switch to brown and purple lines at Belmont.” The doors close rapidly, and the train lurches forward.

Jeremy’s eyes flutter open. He blinks at the rising glass buildings reflecting the sunlight. He looks over the familiar commuter faces and notes that Hughie is gone. There is one new face with olive skin and curly black hair. She is looking at her phone wearing a smile that shines with more light than the sun itself. Her eyes are hazel trimmed with golden flakes. She is radiant. She is a flashbang grenade stealing Jeremy’s sight and sucking the oxygen from his chest. Everything feels like that picture perfect movie moment. Two people see each other. Time slows down. Love at first sight.

Jeremy watches her for a moment. Wondering if it is appropriate to move over and talk to her. He decides against it. Who would want someone hitting on them at six-thirty in the morning? He averts his gaze outside and is taken aback by the sight.

Three birds, a robin and two finches, are frozen in mid-flight next to the window. The train is no longer moving. Nothing is moving. The trees outside are frozen in their dance with the wind. The vehicles and pedestrians on the streets and sidewalks all paused in their movements.

Jeremy looks at all the passengers in the train car. The middle-aged man’s thermos is falling from his hands. The liquid spills over the side, while his phone seems like it’s levitating away. There is a woman holding her phone to her face. Her mouth contorted in the middle of the conversation that she was having. 

“No. This can’t be happening. What is even happening?” Jeremy regurgitates the skepticism. He slides to the spilling thermos. He takes it from the man frozen in time and flips the thermos upside down. 

Nothing falls out.

He releases the container.

It does not fall.

Jeremy screams at the man’s face. No reaction. He pinches the man’s arm. No reaction. Jeremy pinches his own arm thinking of the classic trope that you can wake yourself from a nightmare with a little pain. His fingernails slice his skin. Nothing happens.

“I’m not asleep.” The words drip from his lips. Shocked tears fall from his wide-open eyes.

He lets fear take him like the high tide waiting to breathe calmly. When the fear subsides like the low tide, he looks at her. How the sunlight is fixed on her motionless frame. Her brilliant beaming is comforting and intoxicating. It makes him feel safe.

Jeremy blinks hard as if it will reset his malfunctioning brain. His thoughts race. He must be asleep. Perhaps, he is stuck in a bout of sleep paralysis on the train. Yes! He thinks to himself. That must be it! He sits and leans back in the seat growing lightheaded. The edge of his vision becomes static, tunneling into the center. Jeremy tries to control his breathing. He opens his eyes, and he immediately looks at her. 

“Is it you?” He whispers to himself, looking at her hair like black fire in the morning light. He shakes his head. “No. That doesn’t make sense.” Jeremy tries to tear his eyes away, but his gaze is pulled back. He shuts his eyes hard, stands, and turns away from her.

He looks at the floating coffee, like a liquid in space. He dabs his finger in it and licks it. A thought crosses his mind, and he grabs his phone from his pocket. Jeremy clicks the lock button, and the screen remains dark. He sighs and looks at his reflection. The man stuck in time gently tosses the phone upward, expecting it to stay suspended like the coffee. It falls to the floor shattering the screen. He sighs again. 

“How long?” He wonders out loud. “How long will it be this way?”

***

Jeremy’s stomach growls painfully. He scratches his long, grey beard then sniffs the grime that burrows beneath his fingernails. His nose scrunches. Jeremy lifts his fingers to his eyes. 

“Time doesn’t exist.” His voice wavers. He cannot tell if he is thinking the words or saying them. “This is proof. I am proof. Dinosaurs. Did time exist then? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe. The asteroid. Did it end time? Or did it begin time? Begin. Yes. Because I knew time. Before this. Before the train. The train. It is my asteroid. This train is the asteroid that broke time.” Jeremy’s sunken bloodshot eyes flick toward the radiant woman. She looks like a religious statue carved from the most precious material. “Or is it you? Maybe. Perhaps. Mayhaps.” He hums thoughtfully laying his head down on a pile of clothes he gathered from the other commuters. 

“No. No. No! Wrong! Maybe time is not broken! This is limbo! Purgatory! My damning punishment! If punishment, then this must be hell!”

Jeremy laughs. Hysterical hot tears clean the dirt from his wrinkled face.

He stops and leaps up onto all fours. The birds. He crawls over to the window and presses his face against it. “Maybe this train went off the rails. This is the moment before I died. I am stuck here. Yes. YES! I did not believe in God or any religion! The universe doesn’t know what to do with me! So, I am here! Suspended in time! Yes!” He bares his yellow rotting teeth.

Jeremy’s attention snaps to the coffee man. He grabs the rubber handholds and pulls himself to the man. He crouches lowering himself to be eye-level with the man.

“What do you think, Stefan?” He cocks his head waiting for an answer.

Jeremy nods in agreement. “Yes. I understand. We don’t speak enough for you to want to answer. I apologized for that incident. I just wanted to know your name! The others didn’t mind that I looked at their IDs! It felt improper to call you Thermos Guy! Still, I think I know what you would say. You would agree with me.” Jeremy stands tall and turns to all the other commuters. “You all would agree with me!”

Jeremy sees the man’s phone in his breast pocket. He had not noticed it before. He falls onto his knees and inches forward. His fingers grab it carefully. Jeremy’s stomach drops at the sight of his reflection. His skin is wrinkled and covered in liver spots. His eyes are desperate beads in sunken sockets. His hair is long, thin, and greasy. His beard is unruly and reaches down to his belly button.

“I am my own demon.” He snarls at himself, horrified further by his decaying teeth and infected gums. He throws the phone to the side and looks at her radiance. His voice croaks with lucidity. “I am slipping! I’ve felt it for so long now. How long have I been this way? Have I always been this way? You are my only constant, yet I do not know your name.” He gestures to Stefan and the other commuters. “They have all told me their names. I-I learned what I could about my neighbors. I’ve grown to love them. They are my friends. They’ve brought me solace in this time!” 

He almost loses this sudden clarity when he says time. A smile cracks onto his face then slips away.

Jeremy grabs two metal poles and reels himself closer to the radiant. “I’ve refrained from learning about you. I stopped myself. I don’t want to disrespect you. I don’t want to invade your privacy.” His lips curl into a frustrated sneer. “We could be friends! Like Stefan and I! He shares his coffee with me! Imagine what we could share! Imagine the conversation! I need to know your name! I need to know who you are!” Spittle sprays from his mouth. He breathes rapidly and steps forward hesitating as his hand reaches for the purse hanging from her arm. He reaches in and feels until he grabs a wallet. Relief floods his veins as he pulls it out. 

The train rattles and screeches as it brakes. The sudden shift in momentum throws Jeremy down. He lands on his back. Shocked faces and voices stare at him. They plug their noses, while he grasps the radiant woman’s wallet. His chest is tight with confusion.

“What the hell is wrong with you!” The radiant woman comes into view and snatches her wallet back. 

Everything, everyone is loud now. All his friends are yelling at him. They are forcing him off the train. He stumbles off. He falls and the pavement cuts his palms and knees. Jeremy feels so weak, like the life has been drained from him. He hears the train chime and announce its next stop.

Jeremy looks at the train car. All his timeless friends stare at him. They look confused, but he did not care about them. His eyes are on her. She is smiling at him!

Jeremy smiles back. Despite that he cannot breathe. Despite the pulsating pain in his chest. That smile is enough to give him energy to fight back the pain and difficulty breathing. He stands. He descends the stairs and exits the train station. Turning into an alley, he sits against a brick wall. He looks at himself in a puddle. Old. Withered. Laughing. The energy fades. The pain returns. His breathing is difficult once again.

Jeremy’s eyes close, and he thinks of her radiance. He smiles weakly ignoring the discomfort.

His voice is hoarse. “She is warmer than the sun.” A final breath croaks outward, as if squeezed from a rusted tin can. 

Date Night

I ignored the plain white envelope sitting on my desk. If it was urgent, someone would have visited my office by now. I would have gotten an email label “urgent” and been instructed to look at it. It wasn’t until the end of my workday that I bothered to see what it was about. 

As soon as I opened it, I breathed a sigh of relief as a few flower petals fell out of the envelope. It wasn’t work related, and after the day I had, I was glad about that.

I opened the note. A few more flower petals landed on my desk. It was from Chelsea. We moved in together recently, but it was a busy time at work. I hadn’t been home much. 

Peter,

I can’t wait to see you tonight. If you come home early, I have a few surprises in store. Call me if you’re going to be late. 

Chelsea

I looked at my watch. If I left the office right then, I wouldn’t have been too late, but I wanted to let her know that I was leaving anyway, just in case her surprises weren’t ready yet.

I called. I texted. No answer. 

I didn’t think much of it. Chelsea was always leaving her phone on silent and forgetting it in random places. Sometimes she would go for two days without noticing. She wasn’t tied to the screen like I was. 

I managed to sneak away from the office and get in my car. There, I found a note on my steering wheel. “Check the trunk,” it said. At that point, I did think it was strange that she managed to get a note in my car without me knowing. I didn’t even know she had my spare keys.

I popped open the trunk and found inside a nice suit. I didn’t know if I should put it on before arriving home. I didn’t want my boss to see me and find more work for me to do, so I put the suit in the passenger seat and drove home. 

All the traffic lights worked in my favor to get home earlier than I expected. I took a second to take in the view from my driveway before I entered. It was a lovely little house, and it was all ours. 

I had the suit in hand as I opened the front door. I was waiting for Chelsea to run to me and shower me with kisses, but she wasn’t there. “Chelsea?” I called out halfheartedly. No answer. 

I noticed another note on a still unopened stack of boxes by the coffee table. It didn’t have flourishes of love and desire. It simply said: “put on the suit.” 

I didn’t know what Chelsea had planned, so I stripped down right there in the living room, hurrying to put on the suit so that I could get to the next step of her little love game. 

“Chelsea?” I called out again. “I have the suit on.” I heard a faint thud above me. It didn’t sound like it had come from the second floor, but higher. The roof, perhaps? Or maybe the attic. I hadn’t explored it yet. The former owners could have left it full of junk for all I knew.

I made my way from the living room into the kitchen. Chelsea had left something cooking in a big soup pot on the stove. It was bubbling away. What was emanating from it was a strange smell, not at all like the homemade chicken soup Chelsea’s mother had taught her to make. That would have been a delicious combination of broth and vegetables. Instead, the kitchen smelled like—what was it?—boiled meat. But not chicken. I walked over to the stove, about ready to take the lid off and see what exactly it was, but something caught my eye. Scatter’s collar was sitting on the counter. Scatter was our cat. He was a mischievous little thing, always finding ways to get into trouble, but he was never without his collar. 

As I felt the nylon collar between my fingers, hearing the slight jingle of his tags as I picked it up. It had to be a joke. Just a sick joke. But that wasn’t like Chelsea. She was sweet. She never went out of her way to scare or hurt anyone. 

“Ha, ha,” I deadpanned. “You cooked the cat. Really funny joke. You got me.” Another thud from above, but this time, I saw something drop into the backyard. Instead of investigating the soup pot further, I walked slowly outside to see what had dropped on the ground. 

It was another white envelope. I opened it, hoping that this was the last step and Chelsea would pop out to scare me. Maybe some of my friends had talked her into it, and they were hiding somewhere in the house, too. It had to be a prank. There was no other explanation… 

Peter,

I’ve been waiting all day. Come upstairs. I promise you won’t regret it. 

Kisses, 

Chelsea

This was getting to be ridiculous. I looked up to see where the note came from. There was a small attic window above me. There was also our bedroom window just below that. I sighed. This was going to end now. It wasn’t funny anymore. 

“Chelsea!” I yelled as I stomped back in the house. “This is stupid! I’m coming upstairs!” I took the steps two at a time, not to get up there quicker, but to make my presence known. I was the man of the house. No one was going to toy with me like this. Not even my girlfriend. 

“Chelsea!” I screamed in the hall.

Thud. Thud. 

The sound was still above me. I glanced into our bedroom, and nothing looked out of place. The mattress was still on the floor because I hadn’t had time to build the frame. Boxes were still being used as nightstands. I stepped in, and I noticed as I came around the corner that the closet was in shambles. Chelsea had neatly unpacked our clothes and had already set up the closet. Everything that was on hangers now covered the floor. Boxes half unpacked were turned over, childhood memories and gifted heirlooms from our families scattered. 

I looked up. The attic access was open. There was no ladder, and I wasn’t quite tall enough to reach it on my own. I looked around. The step ladder was back in the corner of the closet, turned on its side. I had a sinking feeling in my stomach. I didn’t know what I was going to find in the attic, but whatever it was, it couldn’t have been Chelsea.

I sucked up my fear and grabbed the stepladder. I took the first step. Then the second. By the top step, my head was fully in the attic space. It took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the darkness. I couldn’t see anything at first. If Chelsea had set this up as a prank, now would have been the time for her to jump out. I waited a second. And another. Everything was quiet and still. I pulled myself up fully into the attic and stood. There was really nothing in the space. I couldn’t stand up all the way because there was quite enough headroom for me. 

A creak came from behind. I turned around and there, in the far corner, was Chelsea. But she wasn’t there to scare me. Instead, she was tied up to an old chair. Tears streamed silently down her face over one of her silk scarves she often tied around her neck in the spring. Instead, it was tied tightly around her mouth. I started to walk over to her, but I was hit in the back of the head. 

Disoriented, I turned around. I didn’t see anyone at first, but my vision is blurred. There could have been someone, maybe someone small, over in the shadows just past the window. I don’t know whether to continue trying to help Chelsea, or to go after the invisible threat.

I hesitated for a moment too long. What came out of the shadows was not a ghost or a monster—it was my ex-girlfriend.

Tracy and I hadn’t ended our relationship on good terms, but I hadn’t heard from her since the day we had broken up, months before I met Chelsea. What could Tracy possibly want from me now? 

I didn’t have time to ask. She took another swing at me with something that she had in her hand. I couldn’t see what it was, but it created a horrible thud against my skull. Before I could get my bearings, I was pushed down out of the attic. I fell and knocked over the stepladder. Somehow, Tracy scrambled down and stepped over me to get out of the attic. She was a small woman. I didn’t remember her having that kind of strength. 

I needed to get up. I had to get Chelsea out of the attic. But before I could get up, I smelled something. It wasn’t the smell from the kitchen. It was closer, and much more dangerous. Something was on fire. The flames were above me. I could see the orange glow through the attic access. 

I wanted to be the big hero. I wanted to walk through those flames to get to Chelsea and save her. Instead, I passed out.

***

“Right now, she’s not in any pain,” the nurse assured me. I was dressed up in protective gear sitting next to Chelsea’s hospital bed. The first responders were able to get me out of the house with only a little smoke inhalation, but Chelsea wasn’t so lucky. Burns covered half of her body, and she was heavily sedated to prevent her from crying in pain. 

The nurse gently touched my shoulder. I smiled, but she couldn’t see it through my mask. “Maybe you need a break. Go get some coffee.” I didn’t want to leave Chelsea’s side, but a break sounded good. 

I had coffee. I checked emails. I gave Chelsea’s family an update, even though there was no changes to report. I dreaded going back up there, watching her suffer like that, but it was the only thing that I could do. I told the police everything about Tracy and what happened that day. They took my version with a grain of salt due to my head injury. The officials inspecting the fire found bad wiring in the attic. They said Tracy had never been near our house. She moved to Europe two years ago, according to her family. The police were still following up on that, but they assured me she was no threat. 

Back in Chelsea’s room, I was hit with the smell of roses—the same flower petals that had been in the note that day. I knew that white envelope I spotted lying on the pillow next to her was out of place. I hesitated to grab it, but it was addressed to me. I opened it, but I didn’t want to read it. I already knew it was bad news. 

Peter,

I can’t wait for our date tonight. It’s been so long. I have so much to tell you. 

I’ll make sure nothing gets in our way this time. 

Love,

Tracy

She Ran

She ran. Into the forest, into the night, into the unknown, her legs pumped, up and down, carrying the woman further from her owner and murderer. Denied clothing during her captivity, she ran naked, desperate to delay the inevitable, to live a little longer. Finally, her body gave up and she staggered to a halt. In this part of the forest, the trees’ canopy blocked even the man in the moon from seeing her ordeal. In the gloom, she located a tree and leaned against it, panting so loudly she was sure they could her. 

As she recuperated, her wet feet seemed odd since no rain fell during her confinement. She lifted a foot and rubbed the sole with two fingers and smelled. Copper! Blood! The beating her bare feet took during her run now caused a sharp ache in both feet. 

With her heart rate approaching normal, the woman took stock of her situation. She peered back down the trail. At least she thought it was the direction she came from. In the dark, direction became relative but no flashlights pierced the night, at least not yet. She stopped to consider if they even pursued her. Why not wait until daylight to conduct the hunt?

***

Ten days earlier, a nineteen year old hooker strolled Wilson Street, four city blocks devoted to go-go bars, porn shops, a cheap hotel and whores. She shared her beat with teenage runaways, always surprised how many men like the young ones. Women of thirty looked fifty, even sixty, as drugs, beatings and just the life sapped their youth. Released from jail for the second time, with her fine paid by her body, she wistfully wished for a different life but with no education, no money, and no family left, she seemed stuck. 

Her chest vibrated from the rumble as the sound echoed off the buildings lining Wilson Street. She looked around to see a Porsche 911 glide up next to her. A large man, a handsome man, a man dressed to match his car, rolled down the window and she whistled.

“Nice ride, mister.”

“Take me around the world, sweetheart,” he said.

She hopped in, “Any place you want to go.”

She started to regain consciousness in a boat. Barely making out the name, Lake View Water Taxi, she thought he said to the driver that she just drank too much at lunch. 

***

The murderer, Burke, taunted his victim inside the lodge‘s basement, showing her the tools he planned to use, screwdrivers, saws, electric drills. Hanging from the ceiling by her wrists, the woman pleaded, cried, blubbered, and finally pissed herself. Burke roared his glee and used a strap on her back. Her captor, she never heard his name, stopped the beating, reminding Burke that they wanted her in prime condition for the hunt. He cut her down and dragged the terrified woman upstairs and slammed her against a door. An evil smile creased Burke’s face as his partner opened the door on a dimly lit room. They shoved her inside where she fell to the floor. Looking up, the captive began to scream and scream and scream.

On the wall, a dozen heads, human heads, female heads, all victims of the hunt, stared at her. At first, she couldn’t look but shortly she could not look away. The faces all wore the same frozen look, not of dread, not of fear, not of pain, but pleading, probably for mercy that did not come. Burke knelt next to her and dangled the hacksaw from his index finger.

“Relax, bitch Your time is almost up.”

The night of her escape, she wriggled and struggled against the knots holding her hands together. Surprised and slightly encouraged when her left wrist moved a bit, she contorted the index finger on her other hand until it found the knot. She felt indescribable joy when the binds loosened until she remembered her island prison, somewhere with no escape possible. With no boats on the island, water taxis brought food and supplies apparently only when he phoned.  

The sadist who took her laid out a map that showed an island no more than two miles in length and a few hundred yards wide. He pointed out the only trail through the forest where she would be pursued, caught and eventually killed.

“A hundred grand! That’s what Burke is paying for you. Easy money. And a new trophy for me!” he cackled.

Once she freed her hands and feet, her gut feeling told her to flee the lodge, to put distance between herself and the men but she thought about an alternative. There must be a knife in the kitchen, a steak knife, a paring knife, a butcher knife! But these men have guns, she remembered. Even if she managed to stab one of them, the other would kill her for sure. She sat on the bed in her room and debated with herself. If she did nothing, she would die after the hunt. If she ran, they would find her, hurt her and then kill her. So she decided to at least try to live and perhaps a miracle would happen and she would kill both of them. Silently she slipped out of her room and edged towards the kitchen. She dared not turn on a light so she tip toed around the kitchen trying drawer after drawer. At length her hand closed around a handle with a serrated blade, probably a steak knife. Elation led to carelessness and the open drawer pulled out of its rails and dozens of utensil clattered to the floor.

The jailer and the killer both hit the floor and rushed towards the woman’s bedroom. She surprised them by leaping out of the dark kitchen, steak knife slashing indiscriminately. The bigger man, Burke, tripped over his own feet and sprawled on the living room floor, his gun spinning out of reach under the dinner table. The other man yelped as the woman’s knife cut deeply into his right biceps. Bleeding profusely he gripped his pistol in his left hand and fired. The shot went wild and the woman bolted out the front door and ran.

***

Leaning on the tree, she knew she hurt one of them, the guy who grabbed her, she was pretty sure. The wound certainly was not fatal, meaning that as soon as he got bandaged, the two would set out after her. Every moment she stood here meant they moved closer. In the end, she decided to take the fight to them. She would make her way back to the lodge. Maybe, just maybe, she would find a gun. Not likely, but a hope. Maybe she could find a phone or a radio and call the mainland, wherever that was. Her challenge, getting there. Clearly, she could not backtrack up the trail. The rough, the unmarked, wild section of woods leading to the western shoreline beckoned to her as the only choice.

Fearful that the men would see her bloody footprints on the trail, the would-be prey brushed dirt on her tracks as she crossed to the opposite side where the wicked and forbidding trees, shrubs, rocks, insects and small animals loomed. Glancing up the trail once again and seeing nothing but black, she stepped into the unseeable. 

According to the man’s map, the coast lay a mere hundred yards away. Anyone could hike that far, even exhausted, even in the dark, even naked, even with bloody, aching feet. Frightened by the sounds of scurrying animals and eaten alive by mosquitoes, the girl persisted, placing one bleeding foot in front of the other, just once more step and she would make it, she said to herself. Weariness depleted her strength, even youth has a limit. Slumping on a tree trunk she slipped into a sitting position and closed her eyes. Videos of her dead family and friends played on her closed eyelids. At first amused, then appalled, at how few would miss her, she shed a tear.

The screech of a nearby animal roused her. She battled to see but the darkness of the nighttime forest defeated her. She knew if she stayed in the forest, she would die. She knew if she managed to reach the lodge she would probably die anyway. She willed herself upright and took a step into the lake. Initially, the cool water soothed her burning feet but the lodge remained hundreds of yards up the shoreline.

She waded into the cold lake water and took a few tentative steps. The rocky bottom dug into her torn feet forcing a loud moan from her lips. She literally bit her tongue. Light was her enemy and so was sound. The shore offered small comfort but she silently trudged northward. With tears of pain running down her face, the woman looked for another tree to rest and then, with a quick break in the cloud cover, she glimpsed the stern of a boat.

“A boat!” she rejoiced and, caution be damned, she clambered over a dead tree laying partially in the water. She didn’t care whether it had a motor, oars or a paddle. If she could shove it off, she’d be content to drift until some fisherman or sport boater found her. She carefully wrestled the rotting rowboat out of the muck and onto the shore. The night drew black again so she felt all around the small vessel for an oar or paddle. Finding none, she shrugged and shoved her salvation into the lake where it abruptly sank. Cursing her awful run of luck, she expended huge amounts of energy lugging the boat back onto the beach. She stepped into the craft and felt the bottom and found a giant hole amidships. Somehow, she stifled a howl of fury and fought back the tears. Having no options, she resumed her trek towards the lodge.

A brilliantly lit deck, that encircled the entire building, greeted her. When she emerged from the shrubs, her first impulse was to run up the steps and get inside but common sense prevailed and she crouched behind a scrub pine tree and watched. She still didn’t know for sure if anyone pursued. With no way to tell time, she surveilled the building for what seemed like fifteen minutes or so. Then, driven by incredible tiredness and pain, she picked up a rock to use on the glass door and charged the stairs. The two goons left the place unlocked so she tossed the stone away and dashed to the bathroom.

Drawing a warm bath and letting out a deep sigh, she immersed her ruined feet in the water. Finding tweezers in a drawer, she pulled out barbs and scrapped off small stones embedded between her toes. Shortly her instinct to live overcame the small comfort of the tub. She found wool socks that she pulled on and a man’s extra large shirt that fit her like a baggy dress. She could not bring herself to put on the underwear she found. She located the basement and killed the deck and house lights at the circuit breaker box and grabbed an old flashlight and a ball of twine as she came back up with an idea beginning to take form.

The woman stood near the front door on the blackened deck unsure if she wanted to see a torch coming or not. A light meant certain death. Finding no weapons in the house, except for that pitiful steak knife, left her helpless. She considered running again but, with no place to go, her throbbing feet anchored her to the lodge. 

Then she saw it, just a flicker in the distance, but there they were, coming back for her, for her life, for her head. Disappointment, hopelessness, and dread tap danced inside her skull. Sobs of huge tears drove her to her knees where she thought about giving up, just  sitting on the stoop until the two men arrived. Would Burke still hunt her in the morning, she wondered, or would he take her to the torture chamber in the basement, or just shoot her where she sat.

Burke’s chamber! Tools, screw drivers, saws, the drill. Weapons! A germ of hope, albeit small, cleared her brain. Survival instinct kicked in and she stood and flattened herself and inched along the wall to the door and fled through the dark house to the basement stairs. Being careful of the trip wires she laid earlier, she wove a quick mesh of twine across the top of the staircase. 

She turned the knob on the door to Burke’s work area. Nothing happened. She twisted it again, same result. She swore out loud and pounded on the door in frustration at the only locked door in the house. Just then, the sound of the lodge door opening keyed her senses. She doused the basement light and thumped her flashlight on. It responded with a feeble light, enough for her to spot a box and crouch behind it. She clicked off her lamp, whispered a little prayer and waited.

She heard Burke searching inside the lodge and, not immediately finding his prey, knew he danced his maglight around the living room, around the trophy room, around the kitchen, and the bedrooms. She heard him rage at losing his victim and screamed what he planned to do to her. His light ultimately settled on the basement door. 

“Can’t be any place else,” she heard him mutter.

The door crashed open and a huge figure filled the doorway, his light shooting laser-like beams across the black cellar. He saw the twine mesh and he giggled.

“Think that string is going to stop me? You dumb cow.”

He took such glee in shredding the mesh that Burke forgot to check the steps and he stumbled on a trip wire. With nothing to hold onto, he cartwheeled and landed on his head which now lay at an odd angle to his torso. The woman breathed for the first time since Burke smashed the door but she would still be helpless when the other guy came.

He did come but not down the stairs. Rather, he broke the only window in the basement, mounted at the top of the wall, allowing in a tiny bit of moon light. She cowered in utter horror when a head, shoulder and arm came through the window. The hand held a pistol that the man started shooting aimlessly. The girl, meanwhile, scrambled away from the gunfire and felt a sharp prick on her bare arm. She fumbled in the dark for the object and her hand closed around a long stick with a sharp end.

“Oh, dear God,” she thought, “An arrow.” 

Now down on her hands and knees, in the dark, with bullets bouncing around her, she searched for the bow but when she found it, she did not have the strength to string it in the dark. It didn’t matter, Time was up. He heard her searching and fired in that direction. One of the bullets ricocheted off the floor, hit her ear lobe and drew blood. The slug slammed into the concrete wall sending chards of cement into her eyes momentarily blinding her. While she cleared the junk from her eyes, more of the man squeezed through the window exposing his entire upper body.

Quieting her raging emotions, she grasped the arrow with both hands and, standing directly beneath her captor, she shoved upwards with all her strength. The arrow punctured his belly spilling blood all over her. She twisted the arrow and pulled it out along with a length of intestines. The man swore, screamed, pleaded, as she jabbed him again and again. She hit her last target, his neck, and blood spurted onto the basement‘s floor, ceiling and walls. He gurgled for a moment and then became as still as his companion. 

She sat on the bloody cellar floor until the rising sun exposed the carnage. Burke broke his neck in the fall and the other one bled to death. She took most of the day to lug two large men, Burke massive, about twenty yards away from the lodge. She left them as carrion for the animals. 

Sleep came hard and fitful, full of dreams of heads, blood and guts. In the morning, she found her own clothes, washed up and dressed, and then she searched both bodies and every nook and cranny in the lodge but was unable to find a phone. Hers probably lay at the bottom of whatever body of water surrounded the island.

Completely drained of adrenaline, the woman sank into a lethargy, unsure of how to get off of the island. No boat, no phone, no radio. She wandered the grounds around the lodge until she came upon a large shed. She looked at the door with trepidation. What horror might be inside? More heads, bones, bodies?  Finally she decided that nothing could be worse than what she’d already been through and yanked open the door.

Inside, supplies filled the building. Toilet paper, paper towels, crates of canned food, a freezer filled with steaks, chops and chickens. Enough to last months, maybe a year. Her blood chilled. With no way to call the mainland, someone must make regular visits but how often, once per week, per month or per year? 

Dejected, she sat on the end of the dock, dangled her feet in the cold water and waited. She did not notice the rings in the post of the dock, rings large enough for a flag pole, for the flag pole in the basement with the bright red flag.

Back on the mainland, the water taxi owner and driver, aimed his telescope at the horizon, stared, and adjusted his instrument. Slowly, a small object came into focus but not a red flag. He’d try again the next day. 

Refried Beans and the Schnarley Code of Honor

Chuck Schnarley was a desperate, broken man.  Anyone traversing through Winnemucca, Nevada could hear Chuck’s desperate howls echoing across the vast expanse of the Nevada desert. His lamentations were as constant as the calls of the coyotes and the hoots of the Western Screech owls. Well, that’s not the total truth. Chuck managed to take short breaks from weeping by watching old episodes of Duck Dynasty while huffing and getting high from a whipped cream canister. 

Hey you, Sister Bertha Better-than-Thou, I see your scornful scowl. Enough with the self-righteousness! I mean, who among us hasn’t self-medicated with nitrous oxide from a pressurized canister, and binge-watched crappy TV shows after suffering the loss of the love of their life? Be better! Excuse my little outburst; now let’s turn our attention back to Chuck, shall we?

A cactus wren perched atop Chuck’s satellite dish serenaded him nonstop with a lovely song, offering hope and comfort in the midst of Chuck’s unending grief. But he responded to this bird’s soothing soliloquy by grabbing his .22 shotgun and aiming it straight at the bird’s head.

“Shut the hell up already! You sound like a damn car that won’t start!” Chuck was a terrible shot; he missed the bird entirely, mortally wounding his satellite dish instead. He sank to his knees, clutching the fragments of metal to his chest, sobbing, “No more Below Deck! My God, no more Tiger King reruns! How will I survive the loss of My Fifty Day Fiancée? My life is over, it’s seriously over!”

Chuck took a deep breath, a desperate attempt to soothe himself. He plopped down into his pink Princess Barbie Dreamhouse rocking chair. Please, no judgment. Chuck won that chair fair and square. That five-year-old brat at the thrift store put up quite a fight, but for two bucks it was worth the tussle. Being a small man, he could fit into it quite nicely. Only 5’4”, but big where it counts… in his heart, ya nasties! Get your minds out of that sewer!

Chuck slinked deeper into his rocking chair, his eyes becoming misty. “Why did you have to leave, LaWanna? And why the hell couldn’t you tell me to my face that you were running off with another man, someone with the IQ of a turnip!”

LaWanna was a cruel coward, making her intentions known with a brusque note taped to the bathroom mirror. “Goodbye, Turkey. Your gravy days are over. My attorney will be in touch. P.S. I’m taking the good toilet paper. Hope your ass gets chapped real good!”

LaWanna, who was not particularly adept at the spoken or the written word, had been listening to a slew of Jerry Reed music at the time of the breakup. So it was perfectly logical for her to plagiarize her “Dear John” letter from the lyrics of Jerry Reed’s, She Got the Goldmine I Got the Shaft.

Recalling this slight unleashed a righteous fury, catapulting Chuck right out of his Barbie rocking chair. And with both fists pumped high in the air, he shrieked, “Right on, Jerry Reed! I got the royal shaft shoved right up my…”

“Wooo! Wooo!” Oh my, what an inopportune time for a train to blow its whistle. The world may never know precisely where this royal shaft was shoved!

Chuck flopped back down into his  chair, clutching his chest. It felt like it was ripped out, marinated in bitter tears,  slow-roasted over a hickory barbecue pit and basted with rat piss.

But if losing LaWanna wasn’t heartbreaking enough, Chuck now had a broken relationship with his sister Noreen. All because Chuck vehemently refused to allow his sister to renege on a family promise, no matter how much she wept and begged. Chuck’s dogged refusal stemmed from his unwavering principles. To violate the Schnarley code of ethics—etched deeply into his very DNA like a birthmark or a hairy mole that couldn’t be removed, was unthinkable. 

His late Uncle Barney had always been Chuck’s role model and hero. On a dare, this brave soul consumed a sandwich made with three-month expired mayonnaise and moldy bologna. But a promise was a promise. Sure, Uncle Barney ended up losing a kidney, part of his liver, and had to endure a painful bowel resection after eating the rancid concoction, but that was integrity. That was the Schnarley way.

For fifteen years, Noreen had made a pledge to Chuck that he would have the distinct honor of naming her firstborn. Her only requirements were that the first and middle name had to be biblical. Noreen was a fine, upstanding Christian woman, much like their dear mother, Darlene.

Deeply touched by this tremendous honor, Chuck scoured the Bible for the most significant names, delving into the original Hebrew meaning. He consulted ancient Aramaic texts, debated etymology with a bewildered group of Hasidic scholars, and even attempted to learn Sumerian cuneiform just in case. He searched for years, endless consultations with pastors and rabbis, until he found the perfect combination.

Three months ago, Chuck’s nephew was born, a perfect twenty-one inches long and eight pounds nine ounces. With his thick crop of raven-black hair and full lips, he was a truly beautiful baby. The whole Schnarley clan gathered around Noreen’s hospital bed, the smell of Lysol and the sweet scent of new life filling the room. Their hearts collectively pounded awaiting the infant’s christening. Noreen gently handed her newborn to Chuck, a raspy sob escaping her lips.

In that moment, Chuck felt a surge of biblical gravitas that nearly buckled his knees. This wasn’t just a baby; this was his burning bush moment, his Red Sea parting. He, Chuck Schnarley, was the Moses of the Schnarley clan, divinely appointed to lead this new generation with a name that would echo through the ages. The weight of this solemn and sacred occasion weighed heavily on Chuck. He stood tall, shoulders back, head held high. All the other Schnarleys held their breath, so quiet one could almost hear the steps of an ant creeping across the floor.

Tears flowed heavy and profuse as Noreen asked with the softest of whispers, “What’s his name, Chuck?”

Chuck bent down and embraced Noreen, his eyes welling up with tears. His voice trembled like the engine of his brother’s El Camino as he answered, “His name is Moses Methuselah.”

Noreen, sounding as if she was choking on a chicken wing, gasped loudly. Eyes bulging, she shouted, “You had one job to do, Chuck… just name the damn kid and somehow you managed to screw that up!”

Chuck patted Noreen’s arm in assurance. “You can always shorten the names in an effort to modernize them a bit.”

Noreen was an angry camel, spittle flying with every word. “Oh… let’s see how that works, Chuck. The shortened version of Moses Methuselah would be Mo Meth! Mo Meth! That really sets a child up for success, doesn’t it, Chuck?!”

Noreen’s shrieks, a combination of high-pitched wails and guttural growls, reverberated through the hospital. One might have mistaken them for the demons Jesus cast into the pigs. Chuck, in an ill attempt at humor, chuckled, “Is there a priest in the house? Because it looks like someone is in dire need of an exorcism.”

That statement dumped gallons of petrol on an already out-of-control fire. Tempers flared, F-Bombs detonating left and right. Security was called and threatened them with arrest. But sweet Baby Mo Meth, slumbered peacefully through it all.

As if his troubles with Noreen weren’t enough, Chuck was soon confronted with an even more shocking revelation. His seventy-five-year-old grandmother, Sis (a tough old broad with a penchant for chain smoking and dirty jokes), had been moonlighting as a stripper at a local club, The Fox Den, or affectionately known by the community as “Herpes Haven,” or, my personal favorite, “Club Chlamydia.” Chuck had discovered this sickening reality purely by accident.

Chuck strolled into the strip joint without a care in the world. He grinned, thinking, “I bet they hired some strippers from Reno. That’s where all the hotties hail from.” Chuck ordered a whiskey neat from Sampson, the burly bartender who ushered him to a front-row seat. Here Chuck settled in, panting with excited anticipation, imagining a menagerie of beautiful women paraded before him like a smorgasbord. His feet hit the floor and stayed there,  immovable, stuck in a puddle of sticky goo. Chuck shuddered, “This damn well better be hair gel. And only hair gel.”

He nervously scanned the joint. It was dingy and dirty, a real dive. Completely empty except for two people: a rotund man clad in a stained Kiss Me I’m Irish t-shirt, who smelled like he’d been marinated in bratwurst and onions. He was trying to win his date, a seven-foot redhead squeezed into a butt-skimming gold lamé tube dress, a stuffed bear from one of those stupid crane game machines. The tall redhead, noticing Chuck’s stares, shouted with a deep, sonorous voice, “You’re in for a real treat, honey! A real treat!” Her Irish date grinned a toothless smile, “It gets less awful the more you drink.”

”The song, “ Pour Some Sugar on Me” blared through the space, Chuck’s pulse rising exponentially with every beat. But once the spotlight flared, Chuck’s excitement curdled into a cold, guttural dread. His eyes, which had been so eager for “hotties from Reno,” now betrayed him with the horrifying vision of Sis, his seventy-five-year-old grandmother, in a sequined thong and her pasties. Oh, those pasties. They did not look straight ahead. No, those pasties stared straight down at the floor, her pendulous breasts swaying back and forth, back and forth. Acid, thick and profuse, crept up Chuck’s throat. And he tried, oh how he tried to look away, but the sight of her 36 XL breasts (that’s extra long in case you were wondering) hypnotized him, his eyes tracking every single, solitary, sickening tit-swing.

She slithered toward him on the floor, her liver-spotted hands clawing in the air. “Grandma, it’s me. It’s Chuck!” But Sis could neither see nor hear Chuck’s frantic cries. She had forgotten her hearing aid that night, and cataracts made it difficult for her to see in the dark. She writhed and slithered, like a geriatric cobra, licking her lips seductively. Chuck’s body and eyes were paralyzed; he couldn’t move or avert his gaze. But the fatal blow to Chuck’s stomach arrived when Sis performed a downward-facing pretzel dog, carnivorously staring right into his eyes. The contents of the Chinese buffet, where Chuck ate earlier, erupted out of his mouth like Mount Vesuvius, coating everything and anyone within a ten-foot radius. To this day, Chuck is reduced to a quivering puddle of sobbing jelly if he even hears the opening bars of the song that dares not speak its name.

Trying to obliterate the visual trauma of his barely dressed grandmother gyrating and contorting her leathery body into unseemly positions from his brain, Chuck rocked faster in his chair, repeating over and over, “Happy thoughts, think on happy thoughts. Like the time you owned a successful restaurant.” Chuck was speaking of the Chuck Wagon, an all-you-could-eat buffet for the low, low price of only $9.99.

His customer base was predominantly the elderly, as it’s a well-known fact that one’s sense of taste is usually the first sense to go in aging adults. Lack of impulse control typically followed. His clientele was quite cantankerous. On more than one occasion, Chuck’s brother Sid had to break out the mace and blast a spray right into the faces of rioting octogenarians. Imagine flying canes and dentures, even a few broken hips. Nothing could get these sassy seniors into a fighting mood quicker than running out of banana pudding.

Fortunately, many of Chuck’s clients were quite wealthy, especially Bea Minsky. She was the eighty-seven-year-old owner and founder of Aunt Bea’s Flooring Emporium, estimated value: forty million dollars. Bea was a former beauty queen, always sporting a full face of makeup, with the shape of her eyebrows in continual flux. Usually alternating between the “horizontal woolly worm” or the “shocked Spock.”

She was a regular at the Chuck Wagon and the most generous tipper, giving at least 5%. This beautiful elderly woman would later be Chuck’s wife, the two separated in age by only fifty-five years.

As Chuck continued rocking, reminiscing on happier times, he had an epiphany. Had he not hired his ne’er-do-well younger brother Sid to be a cook at the restaurant, he would have never married Bea. Would never have experienced a life of opulence for two glorious years. Actually living the dream of being a sea captain, tooling around in Bea’s houseboat, The Coupon Clipper. He even bought a ridiculous captain’s hat, complete with a fake parrot that squawked pre-recorded phrases like, “Ships Ahoy, Matey.” Granted, what Sid did was against all bounds of human decency. However, Chuck knew he owed Sid a debt, not of gratitude for his unconventional ingredient choices when cooking, but gratitude for inadvertently launching Chuck into the gilded cage of marital bliss.

Three months after opening its doors, Chuck extended an invitation to Lloyd Layman, the redoubtable food critic of their local newspaper: The Winnemucca Web, to experience a free meal at the Chuck Wagon. Lloyd, a five-hundred-pound malcontent shut-in, enthusiastically accepted the invitation to stuff his face with gratis grub. He waddled in on Fiesta Night. Burritos, tacos, fajitas, and Sid’s specialty, refried beans, were on the menu.

The place was packed, and everyone was in high spirits, except for Chuck and Sid. The two of them had a vicious fight earlier in the day over Sid’s demand that he be allowed to take the night off so he could attend What the Truck?, Winnemucca’s biannual monster truck rally. They almost came to blows until Chuck threatened to expose that Sid had stolen their neighbors’ pet groundhog, Rocky. This loving, cuddly creature became Sid’s de facto emotional support animal and potential source of protein should the economy worsen. Sid’s jaw clenched as he sneered, “Fine. But I’m warning you, it might taste like shit.” Chuck gave a wry smile in return. “That’s nothing new, Sid. All your stuff tastes like shit.”

Chuck scurried around filling empty beverage glasses, while Sid glowered in the kitchen. Despite the palpable tension between these two titans of culinary delight, the restaurant buzzed with laughter and raucous camaraderie. Lloyd adored the beans, his quadruple chin(s) wobbling as he gripped Chuck’s arm and said, “These beans are simply fantabulous! I can’t quite place the seasoning, but it’s heady and earthy, quite delectable. I’m on my fifth bowl already! My compliments to the chef.”

Chuck’s heart swelled with pride, realizing that he was an entrepreneur. Heck, I might even be able to franchise this thing. I can see it now, a Chuck Wagon in every town.

But Chuck’s fantasy of obtaining cheap food nirvana would soon come to  collapsing ruin. Within six hours, over thirty people would be hospitalized with severe food poisoning. Bea Minsky and Lloyd Layman were among the victims. The ensuing investigation discovered that the source of the foodborne illness was the beans, of which Sid was in charge. Lab tests revealed that these refried beans were full of the dangerous E. Coli bacteria.

The police strongly suspected that Sid had, ahem, placed something awful in the beans. However, without any cameras in the kitchen, police could offer no proof that he committed a crime. Subsequently, all charges were dropped, but the damage was already done. The fallout from the food poisoning scandal was devastating. Sid fled to Wyoming with Rocky to escape further scrutiny. The Chuck Wagon shuttered its doors, and Chuck’s reputation was in tatters. Lloyd wrote a scathing review from his hospital bed, giving Chuck’s former restaurant the unfortunate moniker, The Upchuck Wagon. And as a final kick to Chuck’s dignity, Lloyd penned that eating at the Chuck Wagon was “a most shitty experience.”

And poor Chuck was riddled with guilt, so intense that he visited Bea every day of her six-week hospital stay. They played Canasta, watched old Perry Mason reruns, and sang every song recorded by The Inkspots. They’d share a Jell-O cup, bodies pressed together, gazing into each other’s eyes. During this magical time, Bea fell deeply in love with Chuck, and he in turn fell deeply in love with Bea’s money. The two married rather quickly after Bea proclaimed, “No nookie until you make an honest woman of me.” Chuck swallowed hard; he had hoped, really hoped, that his could be a “nookie-less marriage,” but old Bea was hornier than a twelve-point buck. However, the allure of spending Bea’s vast fortune weighed heavier than his repulsion over “putting out.”

They married at the courthouse after Bea’s release from the hospital. Chuck had sweat buckets the whole time imagining his wedding night as described by Bea, “an evening of unleashed lust and passion with a side of leather chaps, thong underpants and flavored body paint.” His face blanched, and he threw up a bit in his mouth when Bea whispered, “I bought some earplugs for you. I’m a real screamer, like a cougar in heat. Rawr!”

Sis served as their witness. She was honored to be included and doubly honored that Chuck had taken her advice to heart. She continually told Chuck, “Chucky, when you’re young, marry someone old, rich, and sick. But when you’re old, marry someone young, good-looking, and stupid. That way they’re too dumb to take all your moola from the first marriage. Hell, I’m on my fifth marriage. He’s thirty-four, drop-dead gorgeous, and dumb as a bag of rocks.”

Sis threw rice after the marriage was finalized, and Bea celebrated by squeezing a handful of Chuck’s…well, you know. She whispered lecherously between compresses, “Chucky’s getting lucky.” Chuck’s mind raced. Maybe I can say it got shot off in the war. Or maybe I could say I took a vow of celibacy after converting to Buddhism. Or maybe I just down half a bottle of Benadryl and a fifth of whiskey and get it over with.

His immediate terror was tempered only by the ironclad certainty of the prenuptial agreement. Chuck had ensured every clause was airtight: he would receive half of Bea’s vast fortune, provided their union lasted two years and one day. But fate, it seemed, had a cruel sense of humor. Bea passed peacefully in her sleep on their second anniversary, leaving Chuck a mere twenty-four hours short of inheriting millions. 

A bitter lump formed in Chuck’s throat, thinking of the injustice. The only thing he received from Bea’s estate was fifteen thousand dollars and custody of her three yapping yorkies: Winkin’, Blinkin’, and Nod. Meanwhile, Bea’s two ingrate sons inherited the bulk of her estate, including the Coupon Clipper.

Now Chuck lived in a cruddy, roach-infested fifth-wheeler along with three humping yorkies. His only means of transportation was Sid’s abandoned El Camino from when he absconded from the state.

“Oh, how the mighty have fallen,” he thought. Chuck was angry at Sid for his little bean stunt as it cost him the restaurant and his reputation. But his real ire was directed at Sis, as she was the one who introduced him to his now ex-wife. Chuck recalled their phone conversation that took place just two weeks after Bea’s death.

“Chucky, it’s been two weeks already. It’s way past time for you to get back in the saddle. I’ve got the perfect woman for you. She’s a dancer at The Fox Den. A real smart one too, she’s got a PhD in pole-itics. A genius even, her IQ is at least thirty-eight triple F.” A croaky cackle seasoned by decades of cigarette smoke erupted from Sis.

“I’m interested. What’s her name?”

“Oh Chucky, her name is a pretty one, and it describes her perfectly: LaWanna LaPlenty.”

After hearing this unique and very enticing name, Chuck was sold. He knew without seeing her that he had found his bed, I mean, soulmate. Their courtship was brief; just a mere two weeks after meeting, the two married. Whenever Chuck felt frisky, which was quite frequent, he’d say with a wink to his beautiful bride, “LaWanna wanna?”

However, after six months of wedded bliss, LaWanna didn’t want to wanna anymore. Around this time, Chuck noticed that Keevan, the beefy meter-reader with a 1970s porn-star mustache and the requisite cold sores that accompany said mustaches, had been coming around more than usual. A short time later, Chuck received the breakup note from LaWanna, followed by an apology note of sorts from Keevan. The IQ of a turnip had met the spelling skills of a second-grader, but they were still capable of heartbreak.

“Hi LaWanna and me are off to chase sunsetz and make some new mammaries Sorie for the mess we left you in but mayb you can tak comfurt in noing your bill will go down by alot since LaWanna and me won’t be taking those long hot showers Sinsearly Kevan the meader reader” 

Chuck ripped the letter to shreds and set it on fire, a cathartic symbol of letting go of the past and straining toward the future. Chuck buoyed his spirits with the thought that no one could drain the Schnarley blood flowing in his veins. A surge of pride washed over him, thinking of his prominent ancestors who came before him, like the late Karl Schnarley, who invented that culinary wonder known as aerosol cheese. He too possessed the Schnarley traits of bravery and honor, enduring frequent pungent explosions and gross disfigurement in the lab. His early attempts to heat the can to peak- cheese -meltiness, culminated in the loss of his eyebrows and the tip of his nose. But the man continued undeterred with his quest to break the code of stuffing cheese into a metal pressurized container, ensuring him a legacy of innovation and perpetually cheesy breath.

As Chuck gazed out at the setting sun, a flicker of determination ignited inside him; he too could emerge from the ashes like a triumphant Phoenix… perhaps even a Phoenix with a slight E. Coli sensitivity and a lingering fear of strippers and horny old ladies. But Chuck was a Schnarley after all, a blood relative of the man who invented spray cheese for God’s  sake. Failure was not an option, even if the mere mention of refried beans still caused his eyebrows to twitch.

The Fishhook Man

The barb winks and waves at me in the garage’s dim light. My father calls from inside the house, but I am too enthralled to hear him. The hook reminds me of a nightmare that begins as a pleasant dream.

I am fifteen and crammed into the back of an old Astro van with my older brother and cousins. The seats are coming apart at the seams and the felt covering of the ceiling sags, caressing my father’s and uncle’s heads in the front. Any free space between all of us is filled with coolers, luggage, and fishing equipment.

“Last turn and we’re there. Hand me a cold one, will ya?” My dad calls from behind the wheel.

Internally, I groan. He is a heavy drinker, though never belligerent or abusive. A functional alcoholic. I am sitting closest to the cooler with the beer. I reach in.

“Ow!” I pull my hand back quickly and observe a bright red pinprick. The growing droplet of blood shimmers in the sunlight. Peering over the cans and ice, a little fishhook rests in the ice. The barb turned upward. Its point holds my blood, as if bragging it has something that belongs to me.

“Who puts a jig in with the pop and beer?” I ask no one, reaching in, carefully this time.

“You all right?” My brother asks, as I pass the frigid can up to our dad.

“Yeah. Just a pinprick. It just surprised me.”

I wrap the bottom of my shirt around my finger to clean the blood and stem the minor bleeding. Looking out the front window, I observe the larger Upper Peninsula trees. The early afternoon sunlight pierces the canopy, a view that always makes me feel like I am underwater.

The resort comes into view bringing a smile to my face. Pale blue paint covers the bar and office building. There are four rickety steps that lead up to the entrance, above which large white letters read: Cisco Resort & Bar. The gravel drive extends beyond down a hill to dozens of small cabins.

Across from the resort entrance is a red cabin. My smile broadens. Every summer my family rents this cabin for a weeklong fishing trip. It is like a home away from home. The Astro van brakes squeak as my dad parks in front of the cabin. We file out with a series of groans and sighs of relief. I stretch, feeling my limbs come back to life, as the blood flows more freely.

I take in the fresh northern woods air. It tastes different. Cleaner. The lake hides behind the resort. It’s cool blue rolling surface wearing a glittering reflection of the sunlight. I turn toward the red cabin. It sits in the shade of several large trees. The windows are open; these old cabins don’t have air conditioning. Along the edges of the ancient siding, the paint curves upward like dried leaves. Distracted, I saunter over and lightly run my fingers over the rough, ancient paint.

Sharp ticking taps rhythmically pull my attention upward. I look up and grasp at a meaty grey palm hovering centimeters from the glass. The index and middle fingers slowly alternate tapping the windowpane.

“Teddy!” Dad calls. I jump, looking back at him and the rest of my family unloading the van. “Are you that eager to get in there?” He asks, forcing a chuckle, as he tends to do. “Come on. Let’s go get the key.”

“Yeah. Okay.” I respond absently. I walk across the gravel and feel myself drawn to look back at the window. A grey curtain gently wafts in the light breeze. My breathing relaxes, and I rush to join my dad.

We cross the drive and climb the steps leading into the Cisco Resort & Bar. The inside light is low. Various neon signs hang behind the bar top. Following my dad, I read different domestic beer names in bright colors. Fishing trophies and pictures fill the remaining blank spaces on the wall. The bar stools are old, with thick metal frames and ripped black leather cushions. The bar top is scratched from years of service to the workers and customers alike.

My dad sits at the bar. I walk past him. “I’m gonna see if there’s anything new in the game room.”

“Need any quarters?”

“No. I got some. Thanks.” I say, as I enter the game room a few feet away.

My brother, cousins, and I spent a lot of time in this recreational room in previous summers, and, just like I thought, everything remains the same. The room is long and narrow. To my right, shoved into adjacent corners is a hunting game, Buckshot something or other, and a Top Gun themed pinball machine. Near these are two high top tables with no stools and each with an ashtray centerpiece. In the middle of the room is a pool table blemished with stains and torn felt. My middle and ring fingers skip across the billiard table rail as I move to the other side of the room. There is a door that leads out near lake and to the left of this exit are two more arcade machines. One is Area 51, a shooter my brother and I have easily spent a hundred dollars of dad’s money and, more impressively, almost beat. The last game I don’t recognize.

“That’s new.” I breathe, observing another shooter-looking arcade cabinet titled: Carn-Evil. Zombified clowns, carnival workers, bloody balloons, and colorful but muted ribbons decorate the game.

I glance at the doorway to the bar. I can hear my dad already talking up a storm with the bartender. He had ‘the gift of gab’, he would say. One of his many ‘truisms.’

“I’ve got time.” I convince myself and fish a dollar in quarters from my pocket. They cling and clatter as I insert them in the machine. After the fourth quarter, an evil laugh bellows from the game. Two words flash on the screen in a bloody font. 

ONE LIFE

I lift a bright blue plastic gun from the holster and use the barrel to hit start.

“What’d you find, kid?” My dad asks.

I jump, startled and look away from the opening roll that describes whatever scenario made a carnival become evil and zombie infested. 

“Why you gotta sneak up on me like that, Dad?” I ask, returning my attention to the screen and wait for the bad guys to pop out.

“Just wanted to see what you were up to.”

“They got a new one. Figured I’d check it out while you got a drink and the key.” In my head, I add, ‘I wasn’t sure how long you’d take.’ My eyes remain on the screen. The first undead clown shambles out of a tent toward the screen. I can see mine and my dad’s reflection.

“Well, be quick. We unload the van and get the boat in the water.” He finishes the last of his beer and turns to leave.

“I won’t be long. Promise.” I say raising the plastic light gun and dispatching the virtual enemy.

I didn’t catch the story, not that it really matters for games like this. As far as I can tell, the player character is investigating some paranormal activity at a carnival on a wharf. Whatever happened zombified the clowns and carnies and civilians. It seems like an average set up for this kind of arcade machine. A bad thing happens, and a good guy comes in to ‘investigate,’ which may as well be another word for shooting everything that moves. Most enemies walk or run up to the player. Others pop up right in front. After a few waves of this, the game introduces hatchet throwing clowns. I laugh dryly as I shoot a hatchet twirling toward the screen. It spins off its trajectory and out of harm’s way. Why do carnival clowns have hatchets? It’s silly.

A new enemy appears. Its movements are odd compared to the others. The thing feels more real. It peeks from inside a striped tent. Its actions are exaggerated and childlike. I shift my weight, finding this creature’s animation unsettling. Suddenly, it somersaults out and then jumps upward on one leg with the other sticking out, and its arms raised in the air. Compared to everything else, this is so life-like.

The creature is a large round thing with grey skin. Different sized fishhooks pierce its skin protruding from within. It leans left rocking its head and gives me a wave wiggling its thick fingers. Dozens of hooks curve from beneath each fingernail like cat claws. More barbs curve out of its mouth like metal fangs catching the light, as it smiles hungrily. Its eye sockets are empty and pitch-black holes. Fishhooks curve up and down from within the abyssal pits where its eyes should be like twisted eyelashes.

I lift the bright blue gun and shoot.

Nothing happens.

I shoot again and nothing. I use a grenade pickup and, still, nothing.

“Busted game. What a rip off.” I whisper and roll my eyes.

The Fishhook Man approaches the screen. It frowns then cocks its head again in that strangely naive way. The creature catches my gaze and waves, lowering and raising each finger individually. It giggles silently then reaches out, grabbing the edges of the screen. Its claw-hooks catching the plastic frame of the arcade cabinet. 

I drop the gun and take a step back. Incomprehensible noises dripping in fear fall out of my mouth. The Fishhook Man pulls itself out of the screen. I back into the pool stick rack, knocking everything on it to the ground.

“What the hell’s goin on back there?” The bartender calls from the front.

I look toward the bar and back to Carn-Evil.

The Fishhook Man is gone. 

Three words and a countdown flash at the bottom of the screen.

GAME OVER

CONTINUE?

I run out the side door, panicked and confused. Throwing the door open, I stumble down the stairs and fall into the dirt. My chest pounds pumping more fear-instilled adrenaline into my veins. 

Outside, all the color of the world is gone. The trees are barren save for some chains carrying massive, barbed hooks hanging from the branches. The sky is grey; I am unable to tell if there are clouds or if that is just how the sky looks now. The lake is drained of its water. Pits of bubbling tar wait for a meal along the lakebed. The door slams against the buildings outside wall.

I push myself up and run back inside. I grab the door and slam it shut. My ribcage rattles feeling like it’s going to shatter under the pressure of my pounding heart.

The inside of the bar changed. I am standing in a courtyard. There are four pillars that hold up a walkway ten feet in the air. There are four walls with no windows or doors, even the door I entered is now gone. The pillars and walls stretch upward forever until they fade into an obscuring grey black. Like the trees outside, there are dozens of chains carrying hooks hanging from the void above. In the center of the courtyard, there is a chair suspended by some of these chains and hooks.

On the chair, a man sits, quiet and still.

Distorted carnival music begins to play.

The Fishhook Man swings into view. Its limbs lifted and palms skyward, as if mocking an aerial dancer. It starts swinging and spinning around the man in the chair, who begins a slow rotation around the room as well. His chair turns, and he faces me.

Terror strikes through my confusion.

The man in the chair is me.

I feel myself shift. My consciousness is pulled into this other body, my other body. I am trapped in the chair. I cannot move. Forced to participate in this horrifying midair waltz. The Fishhook Man slowly gets closer to me with each rotation. It bounces lifting its limbs with playful terrifying grace. Closer and closer until it is nearly nose to nose with me.

The music stops.

The Fishhook Man smiles wide and slams its face against mine. I feel the barbs pierce my flesh. I feel it pull my face as it reels back with a horrid guttural cackle.

The tab of a can hisses and cracks open. I hear my dad’s voice behind me pulling me back from the nightmare. Back from the dream memory.

“Lost in thought, Theo?” He asks before taking a gulp.

“Yeah.” I say shaking my head, as if I could cure the physical revulsion. “Just remembered a strange nightmare.”

I turn to him, noticing a small metallic glint reflecting the garage’s dim light. 

A tiny barb pokes out of his tear duct, catching the light, winking and waving at me.