Submitted for the Approval of the Midnight Society, I call this story...

Playthings





It’s Sarah’s birthday today. I need to get her something nice…something no one else could get.

It can’t be anything I could buy. What kind of boyfriend would that make me? Any idiot can buy a thing, but what happens when that thing runs dry or breaks?

I can’t make it for her. She’s spurned those attempts in the past, and rightly so; they weren’t good enough for her. Sarah deserves better and I know that. I’ve punished myself for those mistakes and won’t repeat them.

I’m waiting in the park. It’s a rare warm and sunny day and all manner of people are about. There’s a coalition of hippies gathering at the top of the hill. Everywhere they walk, a cloud of dust seems to trail along behind them. The ones already settled begin playing drums, enticing others to join them. They pound out a tribal rhythm that turns the sloping greens into a primitive hunting ground.

There is a Chinese family playing catch. The children’s coordination is no better or worse than their father’s and I imagine that not once in their lives will they be mistaken for being athletic. I commend the father for trying, but the mother seems to know it’s pointless. She lounges in the shade of a tree, watching their futility.

A group of what might be sisters troops up the hill. One of them lays out a blanket, clearly too small for the three of them to share. They argue and giggle over the lack of relaxation space, struggling to squeeze themselves onto the fabric square, as if the surrounding grass is boiling hot lava. The one I assume is the oldest adjusts her top, her breasts threatening to spill out. She sees me watching her and smiles. I turn away. I’m here for Sarah, not myself.

A young man and woman take up a wide space in the center of the hill. They remove their shirts in the blazing sun. She has a tight jogging bra clamped down over her rail thin frame. He wears nothing but his skin and a faded pair of basketball shorts. He’d been in shape once, I could tell that. His girlfriend probably pined for the days when he played high school ball, before his well-conditioned muscles began to melt, to be coated in an ever-expanding avalanche of greasy fat.

The man knows his athletic days are behind him, so he makes up for his less-than-impressive physical performance by belittling his girlfriend and reliving the past. Sure, he missed that last catch by inches, but he had made the play at the plate in the 1999 state championships. Of course he could throw it harder, but he’s afraid he’ll hurt her if he does. He could play all day, but she looks tired, so they’ll stop.

He’s not Sarah’s type.

Two young men saunter up the hill, purposely shirtless, flipping a football between them. They’re athletes, that’s easy to see; cocky, too. They look like models that have walked off a Guess billboard, and as such, are very out of place in this park, on this day. They are tanned to perfection, artfully and artificially crafted. They each possess the body I could never have, as I lack the youth, genetic predisposition and the bull-headed tolerance to pain that would be necessary to achieve it. But…what Sarah wants, Sarah gets.

I know she’d leave me for someone like this in a cold heartbeat. Luckily for me, her heart beats slower than most, if it beats at all. As long as I can keep her happy, she will keep me by her side. I couldn’t ask for anything more.

The muscle men throw the ball back and forth with effortless confidence. One sends a toss seemingly out of reach, but the other dives and makes a perfect catch, coincidentally landing near the big-breasted sisters huddled on the blanket.

The girls’ eyes follow the men’s every move. The girlfriend of the past-his-prime athlete steals secret glances at them, eyeing greener pastures. The Chinese woman watches them shyly, knowing her children would have had more than a proficiency in math and computer games to look forward to if one of these men had been their father. Even the hippie drum circle seems to play to the rhythm of the men’s movements, threatening to break the restraints of civility and drive the women into an animalistic frenzy.

While the women watch the kings of the mountain, and the men flirt back with the women, none of them notice me. This is how it’s always been. I’m not one, nor the other; not either. It’s what Sarah sees in me. It’s why I can do what I do.

It’s dusk and the men are finally leaving, alone, much to the women’s collective disappointment. The sisters will go home to their boyfriends or solitary fantasies. The rail-thin girl will go back to her boyfriend’s dorm and suffer under his sweaty bulk for a blissfully short period of time. The wife will return to the suburbs and perhaps put the kids to bed early. Each of them will be picturing the handsome, well-built strangers from the park, seeing them in their lovers’ faces.

Neither of these men will make it home. It’s Sarah’s birthday after all, and I promised her a present. Both delivered at the same time, perhaps? Or should I keep one as a spare? Whichever one I chose, Sarah will be pleased; such pretty playthings. I only wish she didn’t finish with them so quickly.

~VK

Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society, I call this story...

"What's Owed"



As soon as I walk in, I recognize the man I’m looking for, even though we’ve never met. He’s seated at the bar, elbows propped up, with one hand around a rocks glass and the other around a nearly empty bottle. His head is sunk down below his slouched shoulders. He looks like any one of a hundred desolate drunks that blow in and out of Sally’s every week; but this one is definitely my mark.

“Rough day?” I ask as I take a seat on a bar stool a couple spaces down from him. He looks at me with red eyes, bleary from crying or drinking, it’s hard to tell. He nods, finishes the glass and fills it up again with the most of the bottle’s remaining contents.

I order a bottle of something I can’t pronounce. The bartender raises an eyebrow at me and disappears for a few moments. When she comes back, she leaves a dusty glass and an equally dusty bottle of dark liquor that pours like smoke.

“To women,” I say, raising my glass in a toast. The man makes a sound between a grunt and a cough, then drinks down a portion of his liquor.

“To hell with em,” he says, topping off his glass. “Always taking, never satisfied, taking, taking, taking,” he says as the honey-colored liquor spills over the rim. “Taking til there’s nothing left.” He slams the empty bottle on the counter as if making his point. I already know his situation better than he thinks.

“Can’t live with em, I guess,” I say.

“Sure as hell can’t live without em either,” he replies. “Wouldn’t want to.” He heaves a heavy sigh and pounds his drink down again. He nudges the empty vessel towards the bartender, but she shakes her head and walks away.

“Here, allow me,” I say, taking his glass and pouring a pair of smoky shots. He’s drank enough to get flagged, but not so much that he could turn down a free drink outright. He eyes the smoking liquid suspiciously.

“The hell’s this stuff?” he asks, taking a sniff.

“You seem awfully young to be so distraught over women already,” I say, pretending not to hear his question. A stretching of the truth, that. This man is 36 years, eight months and two days old, to the minute. Long past his due.

“Mister, you don’t know the half of it,” he says. “I’ve only ever wanted one, just that perfect one. No matter how close I get, they always seem to just slip away.”

“Alas, the tenderness of youth feels the sting of heartache most acutely,” I say absentmindedly. He looks at me sideways for a moment.

“You a poet or something?” he asks, still not sure he wants the drink I’ve offered him. I’ve forgotten the language of this particular time and place. Casualty of the job.

“No, no. Just an errand boy. My boss is, something of a collector,” I say with a hint of a smile.

“My boss is something of an asshole,” the man says, laughing heartily for the first time during our conversation. I take the opportunity to raise my glass in a mock toast.

“To our bosses then!”

He raises his glass, but something in the mirror catches his attention before he drinks.

“See that girl back there, standing by the door? She looks like El, first love of my life,” he says. A chestnut-haired college girl stands near the front door of Sally’s, waiting for a table, a friend, a boyfriend. It doesn’t matter. I know it isn’t El.

“El was the one, Mister,” he continues. “You ever have the one? The one that got away?”

I grunt and nod to him, suggesting that, like any other man, of course I had.

“She was perfect, through and through. It was like someone had made her just for me, ya know? Like we each knew what the other was thinking. Made conversations great, made fights short. There is no one on this Earth quite like her,” he says, swirling the smoking contents of his glass. “And you know, I don’t mind saying it, but when she left, I really feel like she took a big piece of me with her.” And he gets to it at last.

“Surely there were others?” I ask, urging him on.

“Oh sure, sure. None of em quite like El, though. They were bits and pieces; she was the whole package. Only thing they had in common with her was they all up and left eventually.” He keeps swirling the glass. A strange grin parts his lips.

“Had some good times, all right. There was this Japanese girl, used to work a sushi bar by day and a Go-Go club at night,” he says. His grin widens as he recalls their private moments. “Then there was this bookish little thing, all shy and reserved on the outside. But turn the lights out and,” he snaps his fingers, “watch her go wild.” He leans back away from the bar, feeling better now, reliving his glory days.

“There was the pixie-haired girl I met during an airport layover; oh, and I spent a drunken night with a friend of mine from college, though both of us pretend that never happened; can’t forget my best friend’s sister either, not that he knows about it,” he says, laughing to himself. He seems to have almost forgotten that I’m even there.

“Funny thing, though,” he says, all the happiness in his expression ebbing away, “no matter how much or how little time I spent with them, I feel like each one of them took a piece of me with them, a piece I can’t get back.” His body slouches forward again and his hands curl around the smoking glass. He turns his deflated face toward me once more.

“Mister, do you think I can ever get those pieces back?” he asks. I smile my own smile at last and raise my own glass.

“To the next one,” I say. To my relief, he finally picks up his own drink.

“To the next one,” he says, barely smiling. We down our Plutonian shots. He shudders.

“Colder than I expected,” he says, smacking his lips. “Like I can feel it all-”

His eyes shock wide open. He stares at my reflection in the mirror behind the bar, at something strange that only he can see.

I change. A friend’s sister. A college companion. A traveling pixie. A bookworm. A Go-Go dancer. A chestnut-haired vision of perfection.

When he looks back at me, I’m as he saw me before, as everyone around us sees me.

“You’re spent, Larry,” I tell him, putting money down on the bar. “And even though I’ve arrived a bit late, I’m here to collect what’s owed.”

I stand. A shiver runs the length of Larry’s body. His hands are shaking. I touch his shoulder and he is calm, recognition dawning in his eyes.

“The next time you offer up your soul for the perfect woman,” I tell him, “be sure to be a little more specific. Come on, it’s time.”

I lead him away from the bar. I’ve found that reclamation is best done by leaving a bar or restaurant; no one inside expects you to return, no one outside expects you at all.

“Will it hurt?” Larry asks me as I reach for the door. It opens and reveals nothing beyond it but unbroken light. I keep my hand on his shoulder.

“Not half as much as your life has.”

I guide him through the door and we pass into a place where no man desires to go, but all men must.

Submitted for the Approval of the Midnight Society, I Call this Story...

The Curse of Engine 49
Based on a true story*



Jerry Townsend wasn’t exactly sure how he ended up driving his Honda at 90 miles an hour headed north on Route 33. The last thing he remembered was coming home for lunch and seeing his wife’s blonde hair and long legs all tangled up with another man under the bed sheets. Then there was a lot of screaming, a lot of blood. Somewhere along the way, Jerry had gotten it in his head to run.

There were no sirens yet, but he was sure they’d find him soon. And then what would he do? He couldn’t outrun them. He had nowhere to hide, no safe house or close friends to take him in. Jerry wasn’t the criminal type; he was just a man who’d lost his cool. “Temporary insanity,” they’d call it. He wasn’t even sure if he could survive in jail while awaiting trial. So Jerry made the only choice he had left. He pushed the gas pedal to the floor and took his hands from the wheel.

The Honda stayed true to its course, but the road beneath it curved sharply left. Jerry slammed against the steering wheel as the front end of his car collided with the guard rail at over 100 miles an hour. Metal screeched on metal and the Honda broke through the barrier, spinning through the air. It landed on its side and tumbled down a hill, coming to rest in a crumpled heap at the bottom.

- - -

“She’s a beaut, huh Roy?”

Roy Alvarez and Tony Buccoti stood in the driveway in front of Station 49. Their brand new 1,000 gallon tanker truck gleamed in front of them, all fire engine red and polished steel.

“You still sure you want to let her go, Larry?” Roy asked. A bald, big bellied man was going over the details of the tanker with a rag.

“Not my decision either way, Roy. But I’m sure you boys down at 13 will give her a good home,” Larry said, looking up at the rig with a mixture of regret and relief.

“Mind if I check her out, Chief?” Tony asked, eyes lit up like a kid on Christmas morning. Roy had barely finished nodding before the rookie had scampered up into the cab of Engine 49.

“So why are you getting rid of her? Brand new rig like this…there’s nothing wrong with her, is there?” Roy joked. Larry didn’t quite meet his eyes.

“Like I said, not my decision. We’re downsizing is all I know, and you boys can use some new equipment,” Larry explained. Roy couldn’t disagree with him there. Station 13’s current tanker had more duct tape than an HVAC convention.

“Fair enough,” Roy said. “We certainly appreciate it.”

The horn blared suddenly, making the two men jump a step back. Tony broke into a fit of laughter up in the cab.

“We’d better hit the road before that kid drives me up a wall,” Roy said, shaking Larry’s hand. Larry’s grip lingered a second too long. His eyes met Roy’s for the first time.

“Just be careful with her. She’s got some…gremlins, from time to time. Ya know?” he said, all too serious. Roy laughed it off and placated the old timer.

“Of course, we’ll take good care of her.”

Roy joined Tony up in the cab of Engine 49. With a roar of the engine turning over and a final blast of the horn, the two were off to Station 13. Roy caught one last glimpse of Larry in the side mirror, a look of concern still plain as day upon the old man's face.

- - -

Jerry braced his feet against the driver’s side door of his ruined Honda and pushed. The warped metal budged only an inch before digging into the earth of the hillside. How he had survived nearly unscathed, Jerry had no clue. Launching off of the highway at that speed should have killed him; that had been his plan anyway. He hadn’t expected the hillside to slow his descent or the sprawling vineyards of a small winery to cushion his fall. Now, people had noticed the apparent accident and were trying to help. That meant the authorities would be arriving soon.

He hauled himself out of the broken window and dragged himself onto the dirt by his elbows. It was a long climb back to the highway, away from the eyes of the good Samaritans closing in on him. If they found him, tried to keep him there, tried to help him, it wouldn’t be long before the authorities had him in custody. So Jerry climbed.

- - -

“You know, you’re lucky you’re not driving one of the old rigs. I learned how to drive stick on an engine with a double clutch transmission parked halfway up Harker’s Hill. My chief told me that I had two choices: learn how to drive the rig or burn out the clutch, collect my things and leave the station. Guess which one I did?”

“I know, I know, Roy. You’ve told me this story a hundred times,” Tony said with a smile. “Didn’t you have to hand crank the thing to get it to start, too?”

“I’m not that old, smartass. You kids today, don’t know how easy you have it,” Roy said with a fatherly smile. Truth was, the modern technological marvel they were riding around in made things a lot easier. Especially for his back. He wasn’t complaining.

“Man, Cookie’s gonna flip when he sees this thing. I’m sure I’ll hear all his old stories again, too. He likes to talk even more than you do,” said Tony.

“Let him talk. It’s what us old timers do,” said Roy.

“As long as he’s got a pot of chili ready for us, he can talk all he wants,” Tony replied. Roy didn’t answer. He was looking at something across the road in the northbound lane.

“Looks like someone went off the road up – watch out!”

A man stepped out in front of the rig and exploded on impact. Blood and brain matter spattered against the windshield. Tony stomped both feet on the heavy brakes. Engine 49 came skidding to a halt in the middle of the highway, but the damage was already done.

“What the fuck?” was all Tony could say. His face had gone clammy and gray. “Didn’t see him,” he muttered. He switched on the wipers out of habit, smearing the man’s remains across the glass in gory streaks. Roy took a deep breath, leaned over and switched the wipers off.

“Just pull off to the side of the road there,” he said, barely able to keep his stomach calm. Tony rolled the rig into the grass just before opening the door and vomiting onto the ground. Roy kept his composure until he came around to the front of the rig. At the sight of the blood spattered grill with chunks of flesh and guts stuck to the radiator screen, Roy’s knees went out from under him and everything went dark.

- - -

Cookie let out a long whistle. He surveyed the front of the new tanker as it pulled into the garage.

“Musta been a big one. Ten-pointer at least, I’d say,” he said. Roy and Tony stepped out of the rig on rickety legs. “The matter with you boys? Long ride get to ya? It’s nearly dark, what took ya so long?”

“We’ll tell you later,” Roy said. “Is there chili on?”

“Course there’s chili on,” Cookie said, wringing his big hands. “But Rookie can’t eat until he hoses all that deer meat out of the grill.”

Tony burped and ran off to the bathroom. Cookie cocked a bushy eyebrow after him as he ran.

“The hell’s his problem?” he asked.

“Later, Cookie. Lay off the kid for now,” Roy answered, already moving toward the dining hall.

- - -

“No shit. Well I’ve never heard of anything like that before. Bad bit of luck, that. What’d they reckon his problem was? Touched in the head?” Cookie asked.

Roy thought over the conversations he had earlier with the cops and the people at the winery who’d seen the whole incident. Tony picked over his chili, not eager to eat the bowl full of blood-red ground beef.

“Had some sort of domestic incident at home and just took off runnin’,” Roy answered. “Folk at the winery said he crashed through the guardrail, damn near took half the vineyard with him, then just up and ran across the highway until-” He smacked one fist into his open palm. Tony dropped his spoon in the bowl of chili and pushed it away.

“That is a damned shame,” said Cookie. “But it doesn’t let you off the hook, Rookie.”

Tony looked up at the old veteran with heavy lidded eyes.

“Bringing a new rig into the station is bad enough mojo without a dead man’s parts all splattered across it,” Cookie said. Tony looked like he was going to be sick for the third time that day. Cookie continued unperturbed.

“Anyone knows that when you bring a new engine in, you gotta wash it with the water from one of the other tankers. Then you gotta slap all new decals on her while she’s still outside. Then, once all that’s good and done, we roll her in here by hand, no engine runnin’. Don’t do it and you’re just begging for trouble.”

Tony stood on wobbly legs, used to doing whatever the older guys told him to do. Roy put a steady hand on his shoulder and guided him down into the chair.

“Enough, Cookie. It can wait until tomorrow,” Roy said. He turned to Tony. “Why don’t you head up and get some rest, kid? If there’s a call, we’re gonna need you sharp.”

Tony nodded and made unsteady progress up to his bunk. Not to be put in his place by a man with less time in the gear, Cookie grabbed up a decal from a drawer, walked over to the new engine and slapped the big 13 logo over the old 49. It hung crooked, but stuck fast.

“I guess I’ll be turnin’ in too. No tellin’ what we can expect tonight, bringin’ all this bad voodoo under our roof,” Cookie mumbled as he followed Tony up to the bunks. Roy joined them a few minutes later, cutting the lights on the mess hall and the twin bays where the old and new engines sat side by side.

- - -

In all his thirty years of service, Cookie never once forgot to turn the stove off after a meal was prepared. In all the excitement of Engine 49’s delivery and the macabre story that accompanied it, the burners had been left on long after the men had gone to bed. A window left ajar allowed a breeze to stir a roll of paper towels in the kitchen. As it touched the red hot metal of the stove top, the entire roll began to burn.

Then the holder. Then the countertop. Then the cabinets. Then the baseboards, walls and floors. Before long, the entire kitchen was engulfed in flame. The fire burned through the wall and began to consume the dining hall, the garage bay, the closets full of gear. Some of the batteries in the smoke detectors chose that particular moment to die. Flames kissed the old engine, climbed its tires and melted its headlights, crept down the lengths of hose like living dragons. By the time a smoke alarm finally sounded, waking Roy, Tony and Cookie to their worst nightmare, the whole station was beyond saving.

The three firefighters stood in the street, waiting to hear the familiar wail of sirens that meant help was on the way. For the moment they weren’t concerned with the years of jokes they’d have to suffer at having their own station house go up in smoke. They were busy watching as the flames licked up and down all sides of the building, black smoke thick as coal billowing out through the openings, listening to muffled pops of exploding glass. They didn’t see the fire crawl across the floor of the garage, following an inexplicably precise line of spilled oil that led to the wheel chocks under Engine 49.

As the triangular bits of wood burned away, the new engine slowly began to roll itself backwards. It was almost as if someone was pushing it from the front, getting it clear of the raging inferno. The trio of firefighters watched the ghostly engine coast to a stop in the relative safety of the front driveway.

“Told you it was evil, bringin’ that thing in here. Bad blood, she’s full of it,” Cookie said, spitting onto the pavement.

“There’s not a mark on her,” Roy said.

As the station burned and onlookers gathered around, as sirens grew louder from approaching engines from other departments, Tony watched as the Station 13 decal caught fire. It started as a little ember around the edge, turning black and curling back on itself. It looked for all the world as if an invisible hand was peeling it away. It fell to the ground and burned, turning to a lump of ash. Still clinging to the door, neat and clean as the day it was put on and untouched as the rest of the rig, was the decal bearing the logo of Engine 49.

~VK

*As creative as I am, I can't take credit for the first half of this story. The domestic dispute, the crash, the winery, the transporting of a new fire engine from one station to the other, and the incident that ended the man's life are all true. Names and details were changed, of course, but I felt I had to document this "crazier than fiction" story.

As for the rest of the tale, I originally planned on having the fireman burn in their own station house, owing to the cursed engine. The last image was meant to be of a pristine engine rolling itself out of the garage while the building burned.

But I couldn't in good conscience do that, even to fictional firefighters. I have friends and family who have served and continue to serve as both paid and volunteer firemen. Also, rather than pretend I know anything about fighting fires, I left out some battles of blazes I had planned, complete with the cursed engine making things harder for our heroes. This short story got long enough on me without adding that in!

And I have one person to thank for some insider info on firefighting. Check out his firefighting blog here and be sure to look at his incredible photos!

Submitted for the Approval of the Midnight Society, I call this story...

Ripper



Patience is a virtue.

Without patience, I never would have made it through med school. Without patience, I wouldn’t have survived the long and difficult years as the coroner’s deputy. Without patience, I couldn’t sit here night after night, waiting for the man that ruined my life to show his face just one more time.

It’s just after midnight and I’m parked less than two blocks from our old apartment. It’s a moonless night, but the darkness is cut by the lights of a twenty-four-hour dry cleaners and a dingy corner bar. Far from illuminating the street, the light casts shadows across men’s faces and darkens the alleys where they lurk. A group of black teenagers argue on one corner while an old, white, homeless man picks through trash in a dumpster. I haven’t seen the bald man with a cross tattooed on his neck. Not yet.

It was over a year ago, 413 days to be precise. A long time to plan, to let old wounds fester. I’ve talked to the local streetwalkers, drug dealers and shop owners. They may have seen the man I’m looking for, might even know his habits. They may be the ones who saw what happened that night and stood by idly, ignoring her screams and letting her sudden silence go unreported. For the moment, they are not my concern. I have been patient.

A clean set of prints and a DNA sample from the rape kit was enough to ID the suspect. The man, known on the streets as Smilin’ Jack, apparently earned his moniker from his good looks and reputation as a ladies man. I sat back and waited patiently while the proper authorities took him through the long months of due process; all the while my insides were boiling. The evidence was more than enough for a trial, but not enough for a conviction. The prosecution highlighted a lab error that rendered the evidence inadmissible. A thief, rapist and murderer let go on a technicality. I watched him walk out the door. How patient I’ve been.

It’s after one in the morning. Smilin’ Jack steps off a city bus and his bald head gleams in the streetlight. Its glow contrasts the black cross inked into the corded muscles of his neck. My patience has paid off.

I watch as he walks by my car, close enough that I could reach out and touch him. But not here; not yet.

Smilin’ Jack continues down the street, heading for familiar ground. I check my bag of supplies and get out of the car to follow him. I know where he’s going. I’ve been there every day for more than a year. I know it better than he does now.

He turns into an alley that serves as a shortcut behind our old apartment complex. She used to use it on her way home from work. Smilin’ Jack used it as his hunting grounds. Tonight the hunter has become the hunted.

He’s built like a boxer in his prime; a chloroform-soaked rag more than levels the playing field. Though he’s a burden to drag into the ground level apartment, my 413 days of pent up rage and frustration give me plenty of strength. I’m glad I kept our old apartment after all this time. It will give me peace and quiet while I repay Smilin’ Jack in kind.

-

His body stirs and he opens his eyes groggily, owing to the chloroform. Smilin’ Jack wakes to find that his hands and arms are bound. He lies naked on his back, limbs outstretched, pulling his body into a taut x-shape. Plastic zip ties are cinched far too tightly around his wrists and ankles to allow blood to flow freely. His hands and feet are ghostly shades of flesh, giving him the appearance of wearing pale pink gloves and socks. Smilin’ Jack tries to cry out and finds that he cannot make a sound.

“That won’t do you any good,” I tell him, holding a bloody scalpel high for him to see. “I’ve nicked your vocal cords. A little trick I learned from a veterinarian friend of mine.”

Smilin’ Jack bucks at his restraints but they are as unforgiving as my blade. I hold up a bloody swatch of skin with a black cross inked into it.

“I also took your tattoo, I hope you don’t mind,” I say, dropping the piece of flesh into a ziplock bag. “People like you don’t deserve to bear the cross.”

He flaps his mouth open and closed, trying to shout every expletive he knows at me, but no sound comes out. His face reddens from the strain and blood leaks through a rectangular hole in his neck. I return to my work.

“Do you know the Code of Hammurabi?” I ask him. His eyes scream with the rage that his severed voice can’t muster. “I bet you do. ‘Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth?’ Heard of that?”

I set about probing the skin around his ankles with my scalpel. It’s pale and bloodless. It cuts away like dead skin over a blister. Beneath the translucent layer of flesh lies a network of veins and arteries, ligaments and tendons, muscle and fat. I cut it all away. Smilin’ Jack screams in silent agony.

“A good rule to follow, Hammurabi’s Code, but a bit archaic for my tastes. I feel that a punishment should be worse than the crime.”

I sever the final connections, sliding the fleshy parts of his foot off the bone like a grotesque slipper. I move on to the other foot and repeat the process, collecting the parts in a specimen bag. Smilin’ Jack writhes in pain, his frayed nerve endings scream in protest. His feet are stripped down to greasy bone, clacking up and down without any control. The sight puts a terrible laughter in my heart.

“Well, now you won’t be sneaking up on anyone again. But you can still do damage with your hands,” I tell him. “Those awful hands of yours will simply have to go.”

Smilin’ Jack thrashes about more than ever, but my restraints hold. His forearms flex and twitch, trying to get his unresponsive hands to assist in the fight. They’re as useless as his flayed feet. I perform the same surgery on his hands, taking care to sever each individual tendon, delighting as they spring apart once relieved from their life of tension.

“These hands have done terrible things, Mr. Jack.” I say, moving onto his remaining one. “And these hands of yours were what got you caught to begin with, leaving little prints everywhere.” I drop the second fleshy glove into the collection bag. “Well, you won’t have to worry about that any more. But you had another filthy habit that got you in trouble, didn’t you, Mr. Jack?”

I position my blade above his midsection and let the scalpel drop onto his manhood. If Smilin’ Jack thought he was in pain before, then this was torture derived from Hell itself.

“You see, I didn’t want to numb this area,” I say as I begin cutting. I don’t take the care to make precise cuts here. I want the man to bleed and I want him to feel every slice. “Do you even remember her name? Or were you too busy going through her possessions after you raped and murdered her that you couldn’t stop to learn her fucking name?”

The months of frustration begin to boil over now. Strips of flesh still connect his manhood to his abdomen, but I yank the whole sorry mess free and stuff it into my collection bag. Smilin’ Jack’s eyes roll up into his head. I slap his face to bring him back around.

“Almost done, Jacko. Just one thing left. That handsome face of yours.”

I make an incision along his hairline, tracing down one side of his jaw and up the other. His eyes dart frantically from side to side as I cut the fat and muscle away from his cheeks and forehead.

“You know how I found out about her, about what you had done to her? She ended up on my autopsy table, plain as the way you left her,” I say, puncturing his face with intentional slips of the scalpel. It starts to come away like a gory Halloween mask. “A man should never have to see his wife like that. It does things to the mind. Crazy things, Jack.”

I lift his face off and hold it up to the lamp to admire it. Specks of light filter in through the slits made by my scalpel. All in all, it’s a handsome face with a peculiar smile still frozen into it. Smilin’ Jack, however, is in worse shape: useless bony hands and feet, a greasy grinning skull and his manhood oozing lifeblood. I sever the bonds holding him up and he crashes to the floor.

“You’ll die soon, Jack. That’s for sure,” I tell him as I move toward the door. “But not soon enough. You’ll try to get out of here first. Hell, maybe you’ll even succeed. But sooner or later, you’ll end up on my table. I wanted to be sure I’ll recognize you when you do.”

I open the door and hold Jack’s face up in front of mine for his lidless eyes to see one last time. He crawls awkwardly toward me on knees and elbows, grinning his lipless smile. Before I lock him in our old apartment, I leave him with a few last words.

“Her name was Patience, Jack. If you can bring her back, then come and see me some time,” I say, holding his bloody face aloft. “Maybe I’ll give you your smile back.”

~VK

Submitted for the Approval of the Midnight Society, Harper Rose Blackwell calls this story...

Self Defense 101




He leaned against the cool brick building, shaded from the late summer sun by a dirty green awning. He took a long drag from his cigarette as he watched the students shuffle by. They talked excitedly, familiarizing themselves with the bustling city streets that would serve as their campus for the next four years. A college T-shirt, a baseball cap, and boyish good looks allowed him to blend in seamlessly among them: a figure that could disappear without a second thought. He glanced absently at his watch. “Nearly 7:00,” he mused. “Time for the seminar.”

A park bench across the street from a large group of students served as his base of operations. He pulled a rolled up newspaper from his back pocket and unfurled it as he sat down; his eyes faced its pages, but his attention remained elsewhere. The college freshmen were gathered around a police officer dressed in full regalia, a hulk of a man who towered over the expanding crowd. The officer addressed the students as they fidgeted with darting eyes, growing more suspicious and edgy by second:

You’ve made a good decision by coming to this self defense seminar. Especially for students on a city campus, it’s important to be aware of the dangers you face every day.

He smiled at the sound of the officer’s voice: his oblivious benefactor. Each fall, the officer held a crash-course in self defense for the incoming freshmen, and each year, it changed slightly to warn against the most up-to-date dangers that the city had to offer. For students, it provided a feeling of security and heightened awareness; for him, it provided a guidebook to choosing and isolating targets. By knowing what they would look for, he knew what not to do.

Now that you have an idea of what you’re up against, everyone line up behind me and we’ll walk through the simulation.

His favorite. A smile curled the ends of his mouth. The students huddled up and followed the officer’s lead through a veritable campus crime obstacle course while he followed behind silently. Every few feet, one of the officer’s concealed companions would perform some sort of criminal circus act: an attempted purse snatch, a jump from behind a wall, an aggressive verbal confrontation. After the action, the officer would demonstrate how to avoid injury and escape to safety. The girls shrieked with each simulation, then descended into fits of nervous giggles. He savored this part, imagining how different those shrieks would sound when stifled by his hand. Then he noticed her.

She lingered toward the end of the pack, sighing heavily every few moments. Her bright green eyes rolled with each planted attacker, emeralds of indifference. She stared off into space as the officer attempted to impart potentially life saving information to the group; she was infinitely more interested in throwing her honey-colored waves over her shoulder.

The most important part of self defense is mental preparation. Buying yourself time to think can be the difference between life and death.

She looked impatiently at her watch, then ahead toward the officer and her fellow students. She grinned and slowed her steps, allowing them to pull ahead. He froze. Could he be so lucky? Could his field research so easily translate into opportunity? He was the predator; she had fallen away from the herd. It was his duty to show her the error of her ways. She rounded the corner and pulled a set of headphones from her purse, laughing to herself at her rebellion. The officer’s voice still carried through the evening air:

Try to stick with a group if you can. There’s truth to the phrase ‘safety in numbers.’

He began the approach, plotting his course to account for the growing shadows that stretched across the streets. Adrenaline coursed through his veins as his steps quickened. He smirked; though his gait was light and agile, the music blaring through her headphones would have blocked out even the most thunderous of footsteps. He came within 20 feet. 15 feet. 10 feet. His heart raced as he pulled within arm’s reach. He could smell her perfume.

A hand slammed down on his shoulder, jolting him from his hunter’s trance. As he turned to face the threat, the grip tightened, sinking razors into his flesh. He was forced around sharply into a brick wall of a fist. All turned to black.

He awoke with a start and gasped, gagging on a piece of fabric that had been stuffed roughly into his mouth and secured with duct tape. His eyes betrayed him in the unnatural dark, giving him no clue as to his whereabouts. His head ached and his left side burned where he had been dragged through gravel and broken glass. The sounds of the campus were still audible, though faint; he hadn’t been taken far. Any attempts at escape were in vain. He felt the blood blossoming from his wrists as he struggled against his bonds, then slowly trickle down his arms as his movements became more frantic. A cutting laugh pierced the darkness. The last words he heard were a muffled warning from his benefactor wafting in with the other noises of the street outside:

Stay alert, guys. Remember: there are worse things out there than petty criminals.

He might have appreciated the irony of that moment had he not felt the cold metal plunge into the back of his neck.

- Harper Rose Blackwell

For Submission to the Midnight Society, I call this tale...

Cthable Guy



Jenny is surrounded by boxes, standing in the living room of her dream house. It has been only a matter of weeks since she received a letter notifying her of the passing of an estranged relative. In that letter, the eccentric and reclusive Aunt Kaye bequeathed Jenny her 19th century Victorian home that looks down on Providence, Rhode Island from its place on a hilltop, along with a substantial inheritance. Within days, Jenny had packed up her tiny apartment, quit her dead-end job and moved across the country to her own personal mansion.

Jenny was never that close to Aunt Kaye, but her childhood memories still held some vague impressions of this place. Beautiful summers and terrible winter storms, old fashioned gas lamps and water basins filled from a pump in the basement. Luckily the old place had been retrofitted with new electrical work, plumbing and central heating and cooling. All it needed now was a touch of 21st century technology.

Jenny sits on a plastic-draped couch and pulls a business card out of her pocket. It had been given to her by the realtor as part of a “Welcome home” care package, along with brochures for nearby attractions, a map of Providence and a travel size toiletry kit. The card reads “HPL Cable and Internet Service.” Oddly, the phone number only has six numbers listed after the area code. Jenny dials just for the hell of it and is surprised to reach an operator.

After a very pleasant conversation, an installation tech is sent to Jenny’s house and is expected to arrive within the hour. Pleased with their customer service so far, Jenny sets about unpacking the TV and setting it up. By the time she has the stand built, mounts the flat screen and connects all the peripherals, the tell-tale chimes of the front door ring.

“HPL, ma’am, how are you today?” asks the technician. He is surprisingly well dressed in a button-down shirt, slacks and even a smart little bow-tie. He even has slip-covers over his loafers. Jenny had been expecting muddy boots, a beer gut and plumber’s crack. She gestures for the man to come inside and he does, carrying a tidy installation kit with him. He lays it out expertly next to the television. Jenny watches as the man removes odd looking equipment from the kit. While she’d seen cable boxes, modems and wireless routers before, this looked nothing like them.

“I know it looks a bit strange,” the tech says, following her confused expression, “but it’s a proprietary piece of equipment we like to use. Our company’s President is a little on the eccentric side.”

The technician removes an oblong box of brass and polished wood. There are little windows of ochre-colored glass set into it at odd intervals. The technician places the box on the TV stand and extends a v-shaped antenna from the back of it. After flipping a few switches and turning a few dials, a line of electricity arcs between the antennae.

“That should do it, ma’am. If you have any questions, you can call us 24/7 at this number,” the tech says, handing her another HPL business card. He packs up his installation kit and stands up to leave. He hands her a remote that is styled in brass and wood, similar to the arcing box on her TV stand. “Just press ‘0’ and a tutorial will explain how to work everything. Good day, ma’am.” The technician makes his way out the door.

“Wait, don’t you have to connect something here?” Jenny asks, but the tech is already gone. She turns back to the TV and it turns on of its own accord; a daytime soap starts playing. Jenny looks over the strange box that’s still crackling with electricity. There are no electrical wires coming out of it, no ports for a cable going into it. By rights, nothing should be working at all.

Jenny presses the ‘0’ button and the TV screen rolls black. A countdown appears like in an old fashioned film reel. She takes a seat on the couch as the sepia toned filmstrip starts up. A man in a 1920s style suit is standing in what looks to be a lab. Goggled scientists work diligently in the background, pulling on levers and cranking gears with rubber-gloved fingers.

“Hello there. We here at HPL are constantly working to improve upon our technology and provide top-notch service for our customers. Now, sit back, relax and let us show you the wonders of HPL.”

Jenny does as the baritone voice on the TV suggests. The heat of the room and exhaustion from the move seems to get to her. In a second, she passes out on the couch.

She wakes with a start; the room is dark and the TV shows nothing but static. There is a misty fog lying low along the floor and it brings with it a creeping chill. Jenny walks over to close the windows, thinking this is a typical occurrence on New England nights. She finds them inexplicably shut. Thinking that perhaps the technician left the door ajar, Jenny crosses the floor to find that it’s closed as well.

Turning around, Jenny finds that the fog is flowing down the staircase from some source on the floor above. But something she sees at the top of the stairs freezes her steps. Two beady eyes glow in the dusky light. Soon, the eyes are joined by many other pairs, all jostling and scrabbling over each other. There comes a scratching sound wafting down with the fog.

The gas lanterns that line the wall along the staircase flare to life spontaneously. Though the dim light is enough to pierce the fog, it also shows Jenny the source of the scratching noise. Dozens of oily black rats are gathered at the crest of the stairs, clambering over each other in a writhing pile. Something keeps their hungry eyes at bay and for that Jenny should be thankful.

She turns back to the front door and goes to make her escape, planning on waiting until the morning to call an exterminator. As she opens the door, she finds the way blocked by a fearsome creature. All angular limbs and lean muscles, it waits, hunched in the doorway. Before Jenny can slam the door closed upon the devil, it shoots a barbed tongue at her, narrowly missing her face. She closes the creature’s tongue in the door to Hellish sounds of pain and rage.

Turning away from the door once more, Jenny finds that the rats have descended the stairs and now occupy every square inch of the floor and furniture. Some are chewing their way out of the walls, others burrow out from the couch cushions. The fog continues to thicken, obscuring most of the vermin for better or worse.

Jenny makes her way to the couch where her purse lies and, inside it, her last chance for help. She feels the snap of backs and the bite of tiny teeth as she steps on countless rats. When she reaches her purse, she notices the TV no longer shows static. The black screen seems to be bulging and flexing, as if some monstrous thing was attempting to break free from inside.

Jenny pulls the phone out of her purse and frantically searches for the business card left by the HPL tech. She punches the numbers in and hears the blissful ringing tones on the other end. The rats continue to bite and scratch at her legs. The bulging TV screen begins to crack, threatening to shatter.

“Thank you for calling HPL. Para espanol, marca dos. For trouble with your service, press 1.”

Jenny presses the number 1 so hard she nearly breaks her phone. Behind her, pieces of LCD-laden glass fall onto the floor. The bulge presses further out into the room. The rats stir into a frenzy.

“Thank you. For trouble with your cable television, press 1. For trouble with your internet, press 2. For all other issues, press 3.”

Jenny presses 3 to the sound of squealing mice and shattering glass. A bundle of coaxial cable bursts through the television screen and whips around the room like a massive tentacle. Jenny makes a run for the stairs, rats be damned.

“Thank you. All operators are busy assisting other customers at the moment. Please stay on the line and we will assist you as soon as possible.”

An old time jazz tune plays through the phone as Jenny scrambles up the steps. A second tentacle of cable wraps around her ankles and hauls her into the air. On the floor below her, rats leap up out of the fog, trying to sink their razor sharp teeth into her flesh. The cabled tentacles begin to retract, dragging her back across the room and into the television itself. As Jenny’s body disappears within the flat screen, she grabs hold of the edges of the TV in a last ditch effort to save herself. The cellphone falls from her hand as she is pulled into the abyss.

“Please stay on the line. Your call is important to us.”

---

In the light of day, a well-dressed man enters the house upon the hill in Providence, Rhode Island. Other than the millions of tiny scratch marks all over the floor, not a thing is out of place. He sets down his briefcase and pops it open. The man picks up the brass and wood box, which is slightly heavier than it used to be, and places it back in the case. He snaps the lid shut and leaves, locking the door behind him. He makes sure to leave a business card behind for the realtor's next client, as per their ongoing arrangement.

Updates

As indicated by that snazzy orange button over >>> there somewhere, my debut horror novel "Crawl" is still available for purchase. The printers tell me that each run of copies is being done at midnight under a full moon to enhance the creepiness. I've asked them to use sacrificial virgin blood in place of ink, but they say the costs would be prohibitive. Let's face it, I'm trying to keep costs low for you guys, so I guess I'll have to wait for the special "Virgin Blood" edition. Anyway...

In other news! I've been busy editing my sci-fi novel, "Indigo," for a few months now. As we speak, the beta-reader copies are on their way. I'm pretty excited and I really dig this story. It's a futuristic detective story about a team of agents who are tracking down a group of kidnapped children rumored to possess psychic powers. I could talk about it all day but I'll sum it up as "Bogart meets Blade Runner." (And a little bit of Logan's Run, but I do love my alliteration.)

So, if one project is up for sale and another is in transit, what does one do in the meantime? One moves on to the next book in the stack! Since my editing cortex is burnt out, I'm moving back into creation mode. There's a nifty little story I've been wanting to sketch out for a while. It's got robots and bandits and walled cities and quests through the badlands and keys, so many keys!

I don't know if it's been branded or not, but in the vein of steampunk, clockpunk, etc I would have to call this "keypunk." More info on that as it progresses.

Last, but not least, I'll be posting the second submission for the Midnight Society short stories tomorrow. It's a monstrous little tale by J. Rodimus Fowler that's sure to entertain you, so stop by tomorrow morning!

~VK