HUMDINGER LITERARY E-ZINE MARCH 2006

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

Click on blue links to view. SUSPENSE SHORT STORY CONTEST FINALISTS, POETRY, COMIC FICTION, MAINSTREAM FICTION, POETRY AND , ROMANTIC COMEDY FINALISTS, ROMANTIC SONNET FINALISTS, HORROR POETRY

REUNION

By M.W. Hamel

TO CUT A BREAST

By Chris Goebel

THE SELF AND A FEW TIRED METAPHORS

Thomas Saunders

A journal for Janie.

By Suzanne Cosquer

SUSPENSE SHORT STORY CONTEST FINALISTS

Click here to begin reading.

ANGEL OF DEATH

By David R. Caudell

LAST DAYS

By Jorge Solis

In Pursuit of Love

By Loraine R. Degraff

Marathon

By Michael Reitema

It Came with the Sun

By Ryan Crawford

Nick of Time

By Scott M. Sparling

Being Sam

By Chrissie Sparling

Saving the Girl

by Bryan Schingle

Library and Beer

By A. Sailboat

COMIC SHORT STORIES: CLICK HERE.

Dysfunction This–-Halloween

How I Recycled an Internet Joke

By Dennis T. Kotch

HARRY B.

By Les Combs ¬ Humdinger Award Winning Poet ¬

A Sorry Bus Story

By Tony Robles

HORROR POETRY CONTEST FINALISTS

Click here to read.

The Face of Death

By Ana Trask

Confeitur

Dan I. Radakovich

Lament the Living, Loathe the Dead

Composed by Duriiel in the year of our Lord two-thousand and six

http://www.duriiel.com

Nightmare

By Michael Reitema

Faster

By Sophya Vidal

Inner Linguist

By Scott M. Sparling

POETRY Click here.

Progress

By A. Nan Emyss

Collection of Poems

By Bill Perryman

COLLECTION OF POEMS

BY EDUARDO PLASENCIA

The Gleaning

By Kaye Belcher

The Running Wall

By Patrick Norton

Frantic Searching

By Thomas Saunders

Collection of Poems

By Tony Robles

Romantic Comedy

CLICK HERE TO VISIT THE ROMANTIC COMEDY SECTION.

Confessions of a Southern Hustler:

A Eulogy for Decorum and All Things Sacred

April 2005

BH Shepherd

Making of a Writer

By Tony Robles

Romantic Sonnets

CLICK HERE TO VISIT THE ROMANTIC SONNETS PAGE.

VII: Sonnet: Emerald Rain. (To Melanie M.)

By Kalae S. Anthony

Essaying the Romantic Sonnet (Italian)

Essaying the Romantic Sonnet II (English)

By Lukas Sherman

MAINSTREAM FICTION

I figured Jill must have been around three years old, but I also knew that Joanne hadn’t wanted to meet with me because I was the father.

REUNION

By M.W. Hamel

I had to sit and wait. Joanne was always late and I hated being in one of these hellholes where a smile is a nod of the head. She hadn’t spoken to me in years. I was expecting a woman who had fucked me over so many times to try to do it again.

What the hell. She had moved on and so had I. As I asked the bartender for matches, the door closed loudly. I didn’t need to turn my head. Her heels reverberated before she took the seat next to me.

I wanted to turn and face her but I couldn’t do it. Her lipstick and mascara would bring back too many things I didn’t want. She ordered a drink and then touched my arm when it arrived. I finally turned and saw an unadorned and sad face. Only her voice was the same. “Jill died.”

I tried to recollect a mutual friend named Jill but couldn’t come up with anything. “Who’s Jill?”

“My daughter.”

She stared at me as she uttered those two words. I realized then that her eyes didn’t contain sadness. They held remorse. I figured Jill must have been around three years old, but I also knew that Joanne hadn’t wanted to meet with me because I was the father. “Why tell me this?”

She stared at her untouched drink for a long time. “You’re the only person I’ve ever trusted.”

Joanne had been screwed up and used by the system just like I had been. We had spent countless drunken evenings together talking about how fucked up everything was and that a person was only born to die.

“People don’t have problems, they have life,” I said, in the hope of making all of this go somewhere.

“Jill’s dead.”

“How old was she?” I asked.

“Three years, two months and eleven days.”

I ordered another drink. “What happened?”

“I didn’t take her to the doctor. I could’ve saved her if I took her to the doctor.”

I stared at the bar mirror in front of me. None of this was right. I had always hated the world but at that moment, I wanted to do something about it.

I looked at Joanne and felt the void. I felt the terrible sickness that comes with knowing the world is a painful and ugly place to be. But why is it that way when we can feel the passion and beauty inside us? “Who was Jill’s father?”

Joanne looked at me as though my words were the only ones she had ever heard. “He’s gone,” she said. “The same thing that killed my baby.”

She looked so beautiful when she said that. Joanne started to cry and I cried along with her, but not because I felt her pain. I wanted to be where Jill and her father were. I wanted to be away from all the shit and problems and circumstances.

I don’t believe in heaven or hell, but I do believe there’s something better than what the gods have cursed us with.

Joanne finished her drink and looked at me as if there was something more to be said. Eventually she stood up to leave. “Jill wasn’t yours.”

She walked out of the bar as I ordered another drink.

“Fight with the missus?” the bartender said as he set down my drink.

“Just a fight with life.”

I walked back to my hotel knowing that life was endured and not lived. There are happy moments, and then there are moments like these.

Elaine always won arguments. Maybe her sexual prowess won some of them for her; regardless, this was a fight she couldn’t win because she couldn’t dominate his will to live in the here and now.

TO CUT A BREAST

By Chris Goebel

Her gaze, one eyebrow half-lifted, impaled him, reminding Dirk of Family Guy’s Stewie’s proclamations of imprisonment in “estrogenical tyranny.” Yes, estrogen’s toxic spell ruled Elaine now, because she despised him as utterly as she’d devoured his contemptible flesh an hour before. The bed sat a few pleasing inches more distant from the wall, pillows askew; the faint remainder of musk compelled his negotiations.

“I can’t live it anymore, Elaine,” Dirk pleaded, “it’s not reality.” Dirk’s forest green breeches, thigh-high boots, black cape, and rooster feathered cap appeared ludicrous.

A dog barked outside and he stilled his eyes, desirous of rolling incredulity. No, if he belittled her, she’d disappear. “Look, it’s okay for a weekend, maybe a month, but we can’t live at the festival. We’ve got careers, rent—cars!”

Not even the dog barked now. Still, her eyes seethed with passionate rage. At least, her wench’s gown was as revealing as ever. “Come on, Elaine. Every once in a while, I crave electronics. The radio, TV, the damn cell phone. We’ve forgotten movies even.”

That irked her. He wondered if she’d respond in Queen’s English—Shakespeare’s queen that is. “You didn’t mention an electronic penchant before, Dirk. Yes, a month. A month of no complaining, no whining, just living. Now you want to return to zone-out land. How could I not know you crave mindless zoning out in TV la la—”

“Not mindless—”

“Oh please!”

An inspiring thought. “That must be it. Elaine’s pleasure, the center of the universe and I’m the flea, not the lover. I’m sucking your pleasure away.” Little did he know how much he blamed himself for her unhappiness.

Elaine’s pupils swelled with sadness and her voice deepened and sped along like well-rehearsed lines. “Don’t go there and insult Donne’s poetry when I loved you with it. Made love to you with it. Nothing’s sacred with anyone anymore, Dirk. It’s all just vaudeville, a boorish stage with frumped-up couch potato clowns.”

His response was slow. “Couch potato clowns?” Where’d she come up with this stuff? How could he convince her otherwise? She hated TV, contemporary living. Elaine always won arguments. Maybe her sexual prowess won some of them for her; regardless, this was a fight she couldn’t win because she couldn’t dominate his will to live in the here and now. He dreaded the ensuing conflict. Dirk didn’t relish losing his tranquility to her archaic ideas, as useless nowadays as dragons and unicorns. That’s where the argument had to go then. “Living the Renaissance life in the twenty-first century is like hunting for unicorns.”

She lowered her head and glared up at him. Those damning, gorgeous, dark-lined light eyes, that treacherous, full-lipped mouth, those beguiling cleavage heavy breasts! Her long, wavy hair could entice his desirous hands from across the room! But she wielded her words as well as a double-edged, twenty pound sword. If they fought with swords on a battlefield, Elaine would do whatever it took to win. Even cut off one breast, as a Viking woman once did to thwart a first-shocked-then-deceased opponent. Were all women this competitive? He’d beat her at her own game—cut his own breast and see if she could win then.

“You don’t hunt unicorns,” Elaine muttered.

“No, you’re wrong,” Dirk argued. “We have to hunt to survive. Even unicorns. We probably hunted them until they didn’t exist . . . because they couldn’t survive time’s change. It’s survival of the fittest, baby.” His last words sounded resolute.

“But—“

She wouldn’t cut him off this time! “You know what? You’ll never be happy in the present. I figured that out right now. Sure, Renaissance festivals are fun, but to live them? Get real! Know what else? You’re an accident, “ he said, unsheathing his sword, “You shouldn’t be in the 21^st century.” Dirk lifted his sword for the plunge. “You shouldn’t be with me.” The cut now bled, his breast cleaved cleanly from his body.

Her eyes glazed, but Elaine lifted her chin a notch and smiled like Da Vinci’s lovely Mona Lisa—as hidden delights in her eyes plunged into unknown fathoms beneath a frozen ocean. Dirk waited for her to speak. No words came and the door closed like a turning page behind Elaine, in front of him.

He swooned. No bloodless battle ever severed a breast so mercilessly.

No matter how many petty reasons society presents you with for not listening to that lovely voice inside of you, I tell you to ignore society instead of yourself. Society would rather you ignore the voices and have your pants fall down than to listen to them.

THE SELF AND A FEW TIRED METAPHORS

Thomas Saunders

Dear James,

I hear you've been sad lately. Novembers always do it to me too. Especially red Novembers that always come with a dark sky and when I am walking down the alley to the grocery store with that forward winter hunch and collar up; I don't want to even look at the sky. Instead, I watch my feet moving over the cracked cement and they seem to slow down because of the watching. Each step’s more difficult, more amazing; how many more steps until spring comes, until I can look up at the blue sky again not worrying about my feet and just watch? How many steps before walking becomes pleasant again?

When you feel this sadness, rejoice. When you feel this sadness you know there is a voice inside your head who wants to talk. Don't ignore it. Don't ask me who it is, I don't want to talk about the self and all its unknowable complexities. But you know the voice you hear. It often mutters to me for hours on end about what a crock this all is, what a joke, what a jailhouse this earth is for a bunch of beautiful insect souls. I don't know what it does in your head, maybe it sings out of tune choruses, maybe it reads poetry to you in binary code, maybe it repeats the word 'windchime' over and over. For a long time, I ignored them. So many methods to do so. Work, school, circumstances, etc. And I always got nervous of talking with them, afraid of what they might say...

After Balsen died, that voice got louder and others joined in and soon I couldn't do anything but look at my feet and agonize over the fact that they wouldn't go anywhere. It had been November. But how many years have passed. I've been so content here in New York with Margot. And the cat (picture attached). And please tell mom to stop asking when a grandchild is coming. Tell her I can be her grandchild. Better yet—tell her she already has plenty of them. Anyways, tell her I miss her too.

After Balsen's death I quit ignoring the voices, I let them speak even. They're my voices, and the ones you hear are yours; you won’t hear their secrets anywhere else. Only when you ignore them for a long time do they become unreasonable; only when you ignore them for a long time does the possibility of appeasing them without great conflict become zero.

Well, enough of the voice and self metaphor. I'm sick of being so good at tiring metaphors out. Never wake a metaphor during its afternoon nap and never ask it to do the dishes on Monday morning; I do it all the time with terrible results. Never make metaphors about your metaphors (I've made an exception for you).

I think I've been happy since I started wearing suspenders. You know the ones, they're my only pair. It started back at Sophie and Adam's wedding. Those gold clips clinging to the gray suit pants Grandma found at Penney's for me. Every once in a while, the clips would become unclipped and, when I was without a jacket, the brown elastic of the suspenders, previously stretched so tight, would fling up towards my face. Wearing suspenders is not so easy as it looks, especially when you have to embarassedly re-clip them to your pants every twenty minutes in front of a bunch of relatives who already don't think too much of you.

I didn't wear them again until Balsen's funeral and, hidden under that black suit (also from Penney's) which no grandma should ever have to buy, they clung valiantly as I knelt and cried. And for so many terrible moments they were not clinging to my pants but me to them. Someone had always been telling me to wear the suspenders after Sophie's wedding but I was scared to and I didn't listen. But this was a different voice I heard. I like to think it was Balsen telling me to wear them. I know it's an absurd myth to believe in but nonetheless, we're all entitled to a stupid belief or two. So I listened. And people think it weird; they only expect suspenders at weddings or musicals set in the twenties. And when worn with the wrong pants, they reveal how skinny I get sometimes. It takes experience to clip them in such a way that they don't become unclipped. It takes courage to face others who think you are just trying to be audacious. But all this becomes irrelevant when you finally really know how to wear them.

And now it seems so easy to do the little things my self requires of me. Those voices are a part of your self, James. No matter how many petty reasons society presents you with for not listening to that lovely voice inside of you, I tell you to ignore society instead of yourself. Society would rather you ignore the voices and have your pants fall down than to listen to them.

And I said I wouldn't talk about the self. And I said I was tired of tiring that metaphor. Lies, James. All lies. Some moments when I'm staring at the computer screen writing really late, veins full of coffee and lungs of smoke, I realize that all we've got is the self and a couple of tired metaphors. That's all we can talk about. Here I will use my coupon for one free haiku, redeemable in every letter sent to you:

self and metaphor

is all we can talk about

let us do it well.

I remember when you and Balsen were building that treehouse in the stand of trees that stood within the cornfield across the road from our house, and Mr. Bussiere found you there with saws and hammers in hand, sawing down the smaller trees and nailing their pieces among the bigger ones. You always built things so efficiently with so little around you. It was a remarkable architectural job for a twelve and nine year old, respectively, as my friends and I discovered when we used to sneak there to do elder teenage things.

But I remember that afternoon watching Mr. Bussiere escorting you and Balsen back to the house, both of you carrying an armload of assorted tools and a guilty look on your faces. And you were doing nothing wrong to deserve the punishment Mom and Dad gave you. You just weren't aware that because of money arbitrary lines are drawn everywhere, to indicate who can do what where, and you guys happened to be in violation of them.

What I'm getting at is why I used to call you Zarvox the Penitent; I had been reading a science fiction book with a character named Zarvox (you probably don't even remember the incident/ how many treehouses had you overseen the construction of... how little did this one matter...?) and I remember that face you held walking up to our front door with Mr. Bussiere beside you. It was guilty, and at the same time even more sorry, never wanting to do wrong again. That face could be the inspiration for a new religion, and it was that face you always gave all the time, even when you weren't bad. But that time it had been magnified by the degree of Mr. Bussiere's quiet anger, and I thought, My brother is Zarvox the Penitent!

Here I am talking over a memory of mine while you sit in some hospital bed. Do you remember me calling you that? Maybe you haven't forgotten this, I don't know. Is there a way to accurately measure forgetfulness? I’d venture to guess you have forgotten. I wrote this letter solely to remind you that you still are Zarvox the Penitent, and I hope that in so doing I can also help you remember what a noble title this is.

I remember the year before my wedding that you lived with me, and I cannot recall a better time for me in my relationship with you. It pains me that we've moved east and I cannot smoke cigarettes with you out the porch of 3417 42nd Ave; and I just hope someday you'll come here or we'll get bored of trying to fit in here and we can be close again. I think during that time you were very lonely having the semester previous been asked to leave St. Marks, and you were starting anew, as they say, in the big city at the university. I always saw it in your face, that sad look of anxiety over yourself. You had been listening to too much music in the minor key and you always never talked. I suppose you've always never talked but it seemed when you lived with me you didn't talk, although you had something very important and not so uplifting to say, whereas usually you didn't talk because you simply had nothing to say.

It seems that during that time you stopped being the penitent little child I knew for so long, the guilty one who was always guilty of being so perfectly childlike and you became just plain guilty of what you were and always will be all about. There's a difference between the guilt you always showed as a child for being yourself— it was such an innocent guilt, if that isn't too much of a contradiction, and a pure sorrow you carried yourself with for the time you lived with me. It seemed as if after you were asked to leave St. Marks, you were seriously guilty for something you had done consciously and had been really responsible for, whereas Zarvox the Penitent was always guilty of and penitent for something he wasn't really guilty of.

I remember an afternoon when you were no older than eight and Balsen was with you as always. It was a particularly windy day on 11147 Panama Ave. S. and I had nothing better to do than to hang out with the Sweasy girls down at the end of the cul-de-sac. We were playing with Barbie Dolls or some other horrible thing that girls are supposed to do and I was walking home because I was bored and there, from the end of the cul-de-sac I see you bending over the front of some little red wagon with the handle in hand, steering the sailing vessel toward me while you barked commands at Balsen to hold the sail in better ways to catch the wind. Some blanket from the basement had been liberated for your purposes of sailing a wagon down the street. Balsen held the checkered quilt (which I still actually have and my cat sleeps on it every night) in some position which you dictated and which also caught the wind in such a way as to send the wagon-ship towards me at seemingly unsafe speeds. This and other episodes of your childhood are not uncommon to my memory and it was always you and little Balsen, such a perfect Tonto, in such extravagant little adventures. I am sure, too, (my sureness was confirmed by rare instances in your residence with me) that you have always been extremely guilty of being such an irresponsible leader of spontaneity (however redundant that is) and that you will always be as such.

But enough has been said upon Zarvox the Penitent I want you to be sorry for the world because it can't handle or understand whatever you happen to be doing. That's how you acted as a child and that's what I've loved about you. And I want you to stop being guilty for whatever you've done, because that guilt for what you've done is really detrimental–

It can lead to neuroses, it can lead to anxiety. It can lead to lying in the hallway next to mom and dad's bedroom in the early morning, with shaking legs. And it can lead to the hospital. It can lead to convincing oneself that one can't walk-

James set the letter down on his lap. It was cool outside. Although the leaves had all blown somewhere, and winter was forecasted to come soon, James sat comfortably in his wheelchair outside the back door of South Grove Community Medical. He wondered how many pages Arden thought to be obligatory to a brother in a wheelchair. Arden the Successful. James lit a cigarette. Ardox the Long Letter Writer. Balsen the Dead.

James wondered, as he watched his cigarette ash fall on the cement beneath him, whether he had simply convinced himself he couldn't walk. James flicked his cigarette butt into the skeleton twigs of a nearby lilac. He hoisted his body with his arms, like a gymnast on some wheelchairesque contraption, and his feet dangled inches from the ground. He tried to make himself feel penitent instead of guilty. James listened to the voice telling him he could walk, swung his left leg forward; for a moment between the first and second step James believed, and everything Arden had told him about himself was right.

His body collapsed onto the cement. Unhurt, unworried, and still unable to walk, James felt comfortable lying on the ground. He still had his cigarettes, and the letter lay next to him. He could finish it. He could read the part where Arden would say James you can walk, you just have to believe. And he could wait for someone to come and put him back into the wheelchair.

SUSPENSE

Most in America would say that Charlie, if ever caught, deserved the death penalty. But Charlie didn’t see it that way at all.

ANGEL OF DEATH

By David R. Caudell

It seems like cold coffee is a metaphor in Charlie’s life. That metaphor being that everything with a good, warm feeling eventually decreases, and goes cold. Across the street, the XXX-Theater neon sign flashes off and on, making a disappearing and reappearing silhouette on the side of the joint. The waitress comes over and fills hot coffee into Charlie’s cup.

“Would you like the house special pie this evening?” she says.

“No, thank you,” he says.

He could feel the waitress stare at him. Not just her stares, but everyone else in the joint’s, too. He knew they all stared at his forehead with the huge scar. Charlie didn’t care if they stared. He welcomed it.

Most of these people in the diner you could tell made their living doing night jobs. The place was filled with factory work shirts, trucker chain wallets, and guitar cases from the street musicians. The diner resembled any other waffle house within the Louisville-metro area: urine smells, ugly brown-plaid wallpaper, dim lighting, and a jukebox in the corner blasting out old country songs. Charlie never really gave the atmosphere of the place much thought.

The only thing Charlie focuses on is the Russian SV-98 sniper rifle buried beneath some bed sheets in the back of his van. The same sheets he and his wife had lain together in, side by side for ten years. In fact, she is the one to blame for everything. In Charlie’s mind, she started the snowball effect that led to this moment. Not even the truckers, drunks, and creatures of the night that shared the same air in this little diner could take Charlie’s mind off the sensation of his life’s miseries.

Charlie Styles was a serial killer, no doubt about it. Within less than a year, he has killed dozens people, most done execution style. Charlie’s favorite thing to do was to shoot them in the back of their heads, with wrists and feet bound by rope. When the police and detectives found his victims’ bodies, not only where they lying down in a pool of blood, but most of the time, Charlie cut the eyes out of their sockets, too.

Most in America would say that Charlie, if ever caught, deserved the death penalty. But Charlie didn’t see it that way at all. Charlie revered himself as an angel.

An angel of death.

To look at him, one wouldn’t think he was up to no good, besides the huge scar on the side of his head. He looked like a normal forty-year-old man, with fair height, built body, and a receding brown hairline.

As he sipped his coffee, Charlie thought back to last year, when his “rebirth” as he likes to call it, occurred. The events which led to this moment rewinded in his head, like a VHS tape. He remembered what it felt like to lose his wife, kids, and job. The pain and suffering that it caused him. But most of all, he remembered the bullet he blasted inside his skull, and how it felt almost like a baptism.

His thoughts raced back to that day.

As he sat inside his car on the brown leather seats, he reached for the glove box. Deep down, he knew this was the answer. Inside was his father’s Smith & Wesson pistol he gave to him before he died. Charlie took the gun out of the glove box. Between his fingers, he felt the plastic with rubber overmold. Gently he stuck the gun up to his head, and pulled the trigger.

That was last year, and it seemed like a decade ago.

So, there he was, drinking shitty coffee, in a shitty little diner. Thoughts raced through his head, as his chest moved up and down from breathing. Sure he was breathing air, but he was still dead.

His hand rested against his cheek, and in every insignificant move he made with his fingers, he felt the brush of his five o’clock shadow. He tried to remember how many bullets he had left in the Russian. Was it three, or five? No matter, he still had his stolen five-inch Smith & Wesson tucked safely inside his jacket pocket, whose chambers were loaded with maximum power.

On his way out, for no apparent reason, he took the revolver to the waitress’ head and blew out her skull. The blood splattered the desert case behind the counter. The drunks and creatures of the night screamed in horror, as they watched this patron saint of the food service take her last order, forever.

Nick Garrett knew deep down inside he was going to die that very night.

LAST DAYS

By Jorge Solis

Chapter 1: Awakening

The cold rain was pouring down from the black sky, pounding loudly onto the rooftops of the parked vehicles. The tall, lone figure strolled clumsily across the wet sidewalk. Nick Garrett knew deep down inside he was going to die that very night.

The brown trench coat kept him slightly warm. His short black hair was a mess, as if he hadn’t combed his hair in a week. He kept his hands on his collar, keeping the trench coat closed.

Up ahead was a tall black streetlight, a pole he could lean on. The glowing white bulb flickered. A young man running across the street held a gray newspaper above his head. He wore a black leather jacket and black jeans, ripped at the ankles.

He bumped into Nick rudely, jamming his elbow accidentally into the bullet wound. The sheer pain alone caused Nick to clench his teeth tightly.

The stranger barked at Nick, “Get out of my way!”

Nick nodded slowly. He opened his coat slightly. Blood was still gushing out of the bullet wound in his stomach.

Nick asked himself: What are you doing here?

Chapter 2: The Job

The old man said, “What are you doing here?”

The old man wore a long, red robe and he had dark blue slippers on his wrinkled feet. There was not a trace of hair on his head. His short mustache was pure white. He barged into the luxurious private room a moment ago swinging the two large doors wide open.

The thing that made the old man enter the room was the loud noise the bookshelf made when it hit the floor. Nick Garret had also spread hundreds of papers he had taken out from the desk all over the green rug. He knew the place had to look like it was robbed.

Nick Garret stood in front of the fireplace with the revolver aimed at the old man. Next to him, the vault in the wall was open. A briefcase full of green bills sat on top of the desk.

He replied, “I’m here to kill you, Mr. Blair.”

There was a look of shock on Mr. Blair’s face, as if his best friend betrayed him. “Why?”

Nick said, “Because your wife told me to.”

He pulled the trigger afterwards. There was nothing left of Mr. Blair’s teeth when the bullet hit his mouth.

Chapter 3: Marriage

Nick cried out in pain as he wrapped his bleeding stomach with his arms. His knees hit the pavement because they were too weak to stand on their own.

He leaned his head back, closed his eyes, and opened his mouth wide. The pouring raindrops flooded the inside of his mouth. He hoped the rain would drown him.

Two nights ago, as usual, Sally Garrett stood naked in front of the bedroom mirror examining her round stomach. Nick was at the doorway staring at her.

Earlier, he was in a seedy motel room with Emily, Mr. Blair’s wife, ripping her clothes off. They both knew if Mr. Blair died suddenly, Emily would gain his fortune. Nick knew this because he was the lawyer who set up the will.

What attracted Nick to Emily? Was it her long, luscious blonde hair? Was it her bright green eyes?

The reason didn’t matter to Nick. He wanted her body. Not even the news of a baby on the way stopped the affair. Emily cried out his name in ecstasy as she dug her red nails into his back.

Sally turned her head to face Nick. She said, “What do you think we should call him?”

Nick shrugged, “I don’t know.”

Chapter 4: The Money

I don’t know if I can make it, he told himself. A red phone booth was at the corner of the sidewalk. Nick crawled on all fours across the dirty puddle.

He bit his lip hard, lifted himself up wildly, and stumbled toward the phone booth.

His nose was breathing hard and his heart was racing. Nick leaned against the booth and slid the doors open. The white light inside the phone booth beamed.

Suddenly, he started coughing up red blood onto the floor.

Their meeting spot was at an empty parking lot. Dark clouds gathered across the full moon. Emily got out of her red sedan when she saw Nick’s car approaching. A long black coat covered her slender body. She had black sunglasses on her face. The harsh wind blew her hair.

Nick parked his car next to hers. Soon he walked toward her with the briefcase. He saw himself in the reflection of the black frames from her glasses as he handed her the briefcase.

Nick told her, “He’s dead.”

She whispered, “Good.”

And then she took out her gun and pulled the trigger.

Chapter 5: Absolution

Nick cried, “Please forgive me!” as he yanked the phone from its cradle and shoved the quarter inside the slot.

He punched the keys with his thumb, dialing the number to his household.

Twenty minutes ago, he was lying on cold pavement bleeding. His body shook uncontrollably. Nick yelled out in pain while Emily fired two rounds at his tires.

Nick lifted his back up from the concrete, placed his hand inside his coat’s pocket, and slowly took out his revolver. He aimed the revolver crookedly at the back of Emily’s head as she got back into the red sedan.

He dropped the revolver when the sedan drove away. He lay back down on the floor. Suddenly it began to rain.

Twenty minutes later, Nick Garrett lay dead inside a phone booth. His teeth were smeared with red blood. The rain continued to beat on the glass of the booth. The phone hung next to his face.

The answering machine turned on. Sally’s voice said, “You’ve just reached the Garrett residence. We’re not home right now. Please leave a message.”

A sudden rustling penetrated the tranquility. The man’s eyes flew open and his body stiffened. Holding his breath, he listened keenly….

In Pursuit of Love

By Loraine R. Degraff

The old man looked back terrified. His eyes could not pierce the eerie darkness, but a strange sense urged him to leave the place at once. Some inner knowledge warned him that the thing had once again picked up his trail and would soon be upon him.

Trembling, left the shelter of the brush, making the small, careless noises of a frightened man trying to be silent. Sweat poured from his heavily lined face and his hand shook uncontrollably as he wiped his burning brow. The night was still, but his heart thundered, knowing that somewhere in the blackness, the thing stalked not far behind.

The old man’s heart fluttered as, once more, the horrifying reality flashed through his mind. He had created that monster. In an attempt to defy the powers of the supernatural and redirect nature, he had brought to life a grotesque form of some unnatural being. What started out as a passive curiosity in his small genetic laboratory had grown into an insatiable passion. Life, and its inception, intrigued him. Experimenting with biological and genetic material became his life’s work. So much that he had become a guru in his field. The knowledge of his expertise sparked a fearless and unnatural desire within him. Could he himself create life?

The man shook his head to clear the frightening vision. What he had created was a monster and it was now tracking him down. He ran as fast as the tangled weeds and vines would permit. His heart hammered against his heaving chest and he stumbled wearily across the uneven ground in search of escape. Very quickly, his breathing became painful. The dull ache that radiated up and down his spine seemed to paralyze him. His feeble legs, no longer able to support the weight of his weary body, buckled underneath him. He crumbled to the ground. Painfully he gasped, trying to force new air into his nearly collapsed lungs.

The man lay still. A trickle of blood oozed from a gash on his forehead and tickled his face as it mingled with the dirt and sweat already accumulated there. Gradually, his feeble heart stopped racing and settled into a slow uneven rhythm. His rasping breath became a soft purr.

There was a suspended hush in the air. As the silence enveloped him, the man gazed up at the dark blanket high above him. A tiny light emerged from the blackness and winked at him. Another appeared. Another. And yet another. Soon the dark sky was covered with a sprinkling of twinkling lights. The man marveled at the majestic scene. His heart quickened as a new realization engulfed him. Was he trying to compete with the Great Creator–the Master Designer? His conscience smote him and he felt utterly ashamed. He was conscious of a strange force impressing itself upon him, and he willed himself to resist with all his might. The force persisted and seemed to squeeze out his very essence. Harder, stronger, the force permeated his being. The man felt himself breaking under the pressure of the force. Soon, he could no longer resist and something within him shattered. A great feeling of helplessness engulfed the man and he felt his entire being appealing to the mighty force, reaching out to embrace that which was so greatly impressing itself upon him. The force invaded his very being and without understanding how it happened, the man realized that he was now part of the force. The war within him ceased. A quiet peace prevailed. The man was oblivious to his surroundings. His eyes slowly began to close …

A sudden rustling penetrated the tranquility. The man’s eyes flew open and his body stiffened. Holding his breath, he listened keenly. There it was again. Closer. A rustling in the bush and a steady pop-pop-pop of snapping twigs. Once again, fear gripped his heart as he strained in the darkness to catch some glimpse of what might be there. He desperately prayed that it would not be what he thought. Then he saw it. A large dark shape, blacker than the night, tearing its way through the brambles and heading straight toward him.

With a scream of pure terror, the man struggled to his feet and forced his stiff legs into motion. Thorns tore at his face and hands as he made his way through the brush, but he felt nothing except the closeness of the horrible thing behind him. Once again, his heart thundered in his chest. Once again, his breathing became painful and he felt the sharp stabbing pains in his chest. He glanced back quickly to see how close the thing was and froze in fear. The thing was practically upon him, a deformed claw already stretching out toward him in the darkness. The mutilated head, too large for the distorted body, loomed above him like a drunken giant in dark. The old man screamed in anguish, clutched his chest and, once again, crumbled to the ground.

The creature stared at the lifeless form lying at its feet. With a loud cry of despair, it fell upon its knees. Madly, it tore at its chest. Lifting its head to the sky, it opened its mouth and emitted a blood-curdling wail that echoed through the bush. It had tried so hard to reach its master, and now that it had, they were farther apart than ever.

Soon his naked hands were covered in bloody ice crystals, skinned raw from numerous impacts with the rough terrain and frozen hard by the unforgiving night.

Marathon

By Michael Reitema

Picking up his feet—one-two-one-two-one-two—was just about the only thing Arron could do. He thought about nothing, only running, only about covering as much distance as humanly possible.

Sounds assailed him from all sides: bells, horns, shouts, the barking of dogs. His heavy-soled shoes slammed the cobbles again and again, sending shock after excruciating shock splintering though his ankles, knees, hips, to his spine and into his brain. The noise it made in his head was a car crash, a train wreck.

Icy wind tore at Arron’s brown hair, flew up his nose and froze his breath. Every exhale was a sulphrous cloud that bathed his head, stinging his eyes with glass shards. The setting sun blinded him, staining the sky with violent blood above a fiery orange globe. He ran straight toward it, ignoring of the effects of the late-dusk air on his exposed arms and face. Sweat froze in his hair, on his face and forehead. Icy foam gathered in the corners of his numbed mouth, frozen saliva lead a glacial trail down his chin.

His skinny legs pumped up and down while his chest heaved to bring oxygen to frozen, pushed-to-the-limit muscles. His eyes froze shut, one by one. He lifted tired arms to snap them open, tearing flesh to leave bloody icicles like evil tears down his cheeks. Still he pushed harder, even as the sun finally disappeared and cold night with its impenetrable darkness throttled the land.

Arron’s wounded eyes could not pierce the heavy gloom that smothered the countryside. The darkness was unnatural. Even the warm friendly glow of a cottage seemed to wither from the oppressive cold as he ran by, feet moving him blindly through the night.

His legs pounded furiously, ankles screaming as his feet slipped on icy cobbles and rolled. He fell often, but did not slow. Soon his naked hands were covered in bloody ice crystals, skinned raw from numerous impacts with the rough terrain and frozen hard by the unforgiving night.

In time his legs slowed, his blood cold and thick in his veins. It became harder and harder to pick up his feet, and his hands swung pendulously on his arms. He counted the seconds until his last frozen breath seized in his lungs, and he fell, cold and alone, at the roadside.

A bead of light pierced Arron’s blurred vision. Although the heavy gloom had distorted the familiar journey beyond recognition, he knew his destination was near at hand. Hope renewed, his dead limbs lifted lighter and fell more quickly. The pinpoint of the open tavern door blazed before him. He stepped through the portal, his message pursed on chapped lips.

And there it died.

Pewter mugs lay scattered about the floor among the detritus of smashed hickory tables and chairs. Blood left slick black stains where it pooled before draining between the rough pine floorboards. He was too late.

Arron stepped inside, and the heat warmed him. The tears that welled up no longer froze to his face. The wounds that had frozen shut reopened, and blood flowed freely from eyes, knees, hands and feet.

Blinded, Arron sank to his knees. The flow of blood became a rush; the rush became a torrent, a tiny stream swollen by spring’s thaw. His shoulder cracked, split open, and his arm fell from his ragged shirt, shattering on the floor. His waist gave way, causing his torso to slough slowly off.

He half knelt, half lay on the ground, feeling the flesh of his face peel and flake, exposing raw bone and muscle. Soon that, too, melted and settled, and Arron’s consciousness ran through the cracks in the floor to mingle with the blood and souls of the slain.

It Came with the Sun

By Ryan Crawford

“Do you even know where you’re going?” he asked above the engine and passing frozen air in a way that made me want to wring his neck. I shouldn’t have brought him along.

But he was scared, and why not? We were in total darkness, no moon, no warm human lights on the horizon, zero visibility. I knew I was close, knew it because I had been here so many times before.

“It’s time to land,” I said without looking at him, “buckle up.”

“How do you know that? There’s nothing out there.”

“I’ve been meaning to test the strength of these windshields. When I hit a rough spot and our speed drops sharply, you can be my crash test dummy.”

Immediately I heard the clacking of his seatbelt.

I pushed down to 5,000ft and kept her going slow and steady. 4,500…4,000… 3,500…

We touched down nice and soft; I get it better every time. Pleased at making such a flawless landing, I looked over and smiled at him as I put on my gear, slid the clip into my gun, and took the packages from behind the seat.

“Stay here and don’t touch anything,” I tried to say it menacingly, but there were still traces of the smile I couldn’t remove. He would stay anyway; he had no interest in what was out here. I flipped off the lights and started walking.

We were in the tundra 35 miles SE of Barrow. I had one more stop to make after this, then I was going home. It was January 23. For months I had been in darkness, the sun never making it over the heavy line of the Artic horizon. But I needed this for my work. This was my season, the dark months, and it was coming to an end. The Inupiat call January siqinyasaq tatqiq—moon of the returning sun. Soon the day would once again exist. You could already feel the glow of its coming.

I took out my flashlight and began searching for the shack, the packages under my left arm, the gun in my jacket pocket. If I was pointing north, it had to be to my right, about 150 paces. It was searing cold. I kept my eyes down to take as little as possible from the sharp blade of the wind. The sputter of the plane’s engine grew quiet as I walked further into the darkness.

The first soft trembles of fear were in my bowels. I listened carefully through the wind for the sound, like bees in the darkness, but could only hear the frozen ground crunch and groan under my boots. The flashlight illuminated a circle of white ice with scattered low plants the color of milky jade. I moved the circle from left to right, searching, searching, searching. There it is! Jack you old bastard, you did good. 147 paces. Better every time.

It was a bit larger than an outhouse, no higher than my forehead, but built solidly, built to protect. I put the flashlight in my mouth, tasting the familiar rubber lining, and took out the keys, starting with the massive lock at the top and working my way down to the fifth, each with a different key. Leaving each lock swinging on its respective latch, I took out a pickaxe and broke up the ice at the foot of the thick metal door. With the last key, small and silver, I opened the cover of the combination lock. 25-19-1, then I fought to pull it open.

Inside there were several packages like the five I had with me. Wrapped in paper, the size of a thick novel, unmarked. I had risked my life to bring them here. It used to be quite easy, with the only danger being engine failure. Now you got some guys out here on snowmobiles with rifles who will do anything to get their hands on what I’ve got. It’s just not worth it anymore, but when you’ve been doing something so long, it’s hard to stop.

After stacking the packages, I carefully secured the door, checking each lock, and walked back to the plane mumbling thanks to god, allah, buddha, and all those other guys that I was still alive. For peace of mind, you understand, and I had my right hand on my gun to top it off.

I found the plane, engine still going, thanks again gents, and climbed in to get the hell out. I threw the gear in the back then said, for myself more than for him, “One more to go, Marcus old boy.” I patted his shoulder. It was wet with something. I flipped on the lights and jumped against my window. There was a walrus tusk shoved deep into his neck with blood still seeping a bit from the wound, his head slumped forward onto his chest. Of all the things to use, a walrus tusk. For a moment I kept myself against that window, as far away as I could, then tried to bring myself out of it. Got to get the hell out. I reached slowly over to his door, knowing he would jump or spasm, but he didn’t and I opened the door and shoved him out.

Why they didn’t deal with me, I don’t know, and I didn’t care. I pushed the throttle forward and lifted off into the darkness. Marcus, you poor bastard, you were just a kid. I had picked him up in Point Hope. He was just some college kid traveling around Alaska, looking for adventure and the northern lights, taking rides in cargo planes along the coast. I told him I ran a dangerous gig, but he gave me 500 bucks to get him to Anchorage, and I was going there anyway. Jesus, what a way to go. It was a message for me. Pretty clear message.

“Just make it to Rampart, Jack, then you’re done.” I thought of what I had to do when I got there. Land the plane, leave the packages, fly to Anchorage, take the money, go home. That’s it. I repeated it in my mind a few times, trying to relax. One more, then it’s crop dusting in Louisiana.

The flight was smooth, though the landing was quite rough. I blamed it on my nerves. Had there not been a walrus tusk in the neck of my passenger, I’m sure it would have been just as nice as the Barrow stop. I was ten miles NW of Rampart, what was left of it. I looked down at the blood frozen on the seat, then flipped off the lights and grabbed the packages.

As soon as I hit the permafrost, I heard it, the buzzing, the bees in the darkness. The full rush of fear ran up my spine and emptied black, sounding like millions of tiny keys jingling in my ear. I jumped back into the plane and pushed the throttle. I saw the headlights getting closer. Shots fired and pierced the window, then the fuselage, then the engine. “No, no, no,” I kept repeating. I was so close, why the hell did they have to find me now?

I crawled over to the passenger door, opened it, and jumped out of the moving plane, hoping they wouldn’t see me. Bullets continued to spark off the body of the plane as I lay there. The headlights lit the tail and wings as the snowmobiles pulled closer beside it. They pumped all they could into the cockpit and the engine and flames rose from within. One of them must have noticed the passenger door was open, because they circled back around, and I was up and running. I left the packages in the plane; they didn’t matter anymore.

There was nowhere to go or to hide because there was nothing but cold desert around me. I had lost my bearings, so I didn’t even know where the shack was. The only thing left to do was to get down and take out the gun. I dropped on my stomach and took aim just above one of the approaching headlights. One shot took that one out, and I aimed at the one beside him, but missed. A bullet threw chunks of ice in my face, hitting a few feet in front of me. I aimed again and hit him this time. The last guy kept coming and one of his bullets caught my left shoulder. I jumped up and ran toward one of the empty snowmobiles, firing two shots his way to keep him off me. The snowmobile was running; I pushed the dead guy out of it, and took off.

The last guy had circled around to come after me as I buzzed past my burning plane. I’ll miss it. That plane and I had been together for fifteen years from Florida to Fairbanks. My shoulder was bleeding quite a bit. I wanted to wrap it, but he was coming strong behind me. I turned off my lights, but it didn’t matter, the sky had begun to glow and color and shadow were painted across the desert.

Nothing, not even the northern lights were as beautiful as the first blush of the sun after a long cold night. For a moment, the drone of the machine faded, the fear and pain and worry melted away, and I was captured in the incandescence and warmth, never even feeling the bullet pierce my neck like a walrus tusk.

She stood when she saw her parents enter. It felt as though the blood had rushed from her brain and flushed her face making her dizzy and hot. Behind her eyes, Barbara felt her heart pounding. She tried to slow her breathing.

Nick of Time

By Scott M. Sparling

The look on Barbara’s face did not match the classy elegance of the clubhouse and its patrons around her. Where the clubhouse held a mystical quality that enchanted all who entered: the classy pianist, the glorious draperies that blew in an artificial breeze, the black and white suits and evening gowns of rainbow splendor—Barbara’s face was pasty and horrified. Her mascara puddled in the corners of her eyes, and her lips twitched distractedly. Though her eyes were wide, she saw none of the elegant surroundings. She was drowning in her own mind.

She checked her watch. Six-fifteen. Her parents would be here any minute now.

Barbara dabbed at the corners of her eyes again, and then refolded her napkin on her lap. She looked at the three empty seats at her table. The napkins were delicately folded on each plate, wine glasses at the ready and all sorts of silverware perfectly positioned and glistening in the candlelight.

When he arrived, her father would sit across from her—he always did—and her mother to his right. Her eyes drifted to the one seat that would remain empty, patiently awaiting Andrew. What the foolish chair and the silly silverware couldn’t understand is that Andrew would not be coming this evening. He had cancelled.

He had not just cancelled the diner plans . . . Andrew had canceled their life.

“He what?” she could hear her father saying in her own head. “I knew it! I told you he was no good for you. You’re too damn young to get married anyway. See what happens when you don’t listen to us? Stupid girl!”

“You haven’t even met him,” she argued with her imaginary father aloud. Her voice trembled. A leaf touched by the wind. “You both hated him before you even met him!”

And then her mother would try and comfort Barbara with her strange reassurances. “It’s better this way. Now you can move back home and be done with it. You’ll be much happier with a good Christian boy anyway. Why do you always rush into things?”

“I don’t!” she said a bit louder than she intended.

“Ma’am?” the waiter asked, eyebrow lifted.

Barbara looked over at the empty seats. She hadn’t realized the waiter had approached. “I don’t want any water.” She meant to phrase it as a statement. It came out sounding like a question.

“Oh. I was just checking to see if I could offer you some wine? An appetizer, perhaps?” His name was Roman, and he was arrogantly handsome. Every time she had eaten here with her parents, he had always looked down his huge nose at her.

“No, thank you,” she said, looking at the empty wine glasses to avoid his gaze. “I’ll wait for my parents.”

He faked a smile and nodded, walking away with his nose held high. For a moment, she worried that Roman might tell her parents about her peculiar behavior. Everyone knew each other here at the clubhouse. But then to her relief, she remembered that her parents probably wouldn’t hold intimate conversations with the waitstaff.

Barbara looked around to see who sat nearby. It was a little busy for a Thursday night, and though she recognized many of the people around her, none were close friends of her family. That was a blessing.

“And what’s you’re grandfather going to think of this?” her father’s disembodied voice came again. “We’ve already told everyone that you’re getting married. This is going to be an embarrassment to the entire family!”

“I . . . I . . .” She knew it was exactly how her father would sound. He got very upset about social appearances and moral obligations.

“You what?” She imagined how he might look at her, arms crossed like a grey haired child pitching a fit, eyes glowering like coals in a fire.

“I have to use the restroom!” she said to the people that weren’t there. Barbara got up fast, bumping the table and causing the silverware to jangle. Her napkin fell to the floor, but the eyes of her peers prodded her on before she could pick it up. She hurried toward to bathroom.

The floodgates broke before she even got to the door. Tears stung her eyes and spilled out onto her cheeks, and she stifled a sob as she pushed the bathroom door open. Immediately, she went for a stall and finally released the pressure in her throat and head by sobbing loudly and uncontrollably.

“What am I going to do?” she asked, voice thick with tears. “What am I going to say?”

No answer came. She let the tears come for about five minutes, then dried her eyes and blew her nose. The toilet paper was softer than tissue, so she unrolled a bit more and put it inside of her bra for later. She was sure there would be plenty of crying later.

When she came out of the stall, Barbara gave a gasp of surprise. Sitting on the edge of the sink, with arms crossed and a sympathetic look on her face, was her best friend Angel.

Angel wore the dress and apron of a waitress, and her hair was done up in big, looping curls, heavily hair sprayed and tinted plume. She was ten years older than Barbara, who was only twenty-three, but she looked almost forty. It was the smoking, she had said.

“Angel. How long have you been in here?”

“I followed you in when I saw you go tearing across the restaurant.” She looked like she was going to say something else, but instead shrugged and hugged Barbara. “Why are you doing this? Why didn’t you just call your parents and cancel dinner?”

Barbara couldn’t help it. She sobbed again. “I couldn’t do that! They came home from vacation two days early to meet Andrew. I can’t just cancel.”

Angel shushed her and grabbed some towels off the counter. She started drying Barbara’s cheeks. “You haven’t told them yet, have you?”

“Andrew just called this morning!” she said in disbelief. “He just called and said that he wasn’t going to marry me, and that he was leaving with his new fiancé to go on a boat cruise! It’s not like I had time to think about it. Plus . . . I don’t know. I guess I was hoping he’d change his mind.”

Throwing her hands up in disgust, Angel said, “He admitted that he was cheating on you and you were hoping he’d change his mind? And a boat cruise? You didn’t tell me about a cruise when you called earlier.”

“That’s not the point!” Now Barbara felt like she was whining. Her voice had an edgy, panicked quality that she didn’t care for at all.

“Where was the cruise going?”

Barbara stuck her bottom lip out. “Hawaii!”

“Oh God, I am so sorry!” Angel often missed the point.

“Who cares?” Barbara said. “I don’t care if they were taking a boat cruise to Ethiopia! He left me. Left me for another woman. His old dorm-mate’s girlfriend. He’s been seeing her since last year!”

“There aren’t any boat cruises in Ethiopia,” Angel pointed out.

A new feeling was rising in Barbara’s chest. The heat of anger and betrayal. “A full year,” she said. “And I didn’t even notice. How could I not notice?”

“I mean, there might be boat cruises around Africa and stuff. But not Ethiopia.”

In the mirror, Barbara caught her reflection. It made her panic, removing the growing anger with a sort of desperation. “Oh no! Angel, please have your make-up on you. Do you have your make-up on you?” She turned the sink faucets on and ran her hands under the cool water as Angel reached behind her apron and pulled up a small, thin compact.

“This is all I got.”

“It’ll work,” Barbara said, wetting a towel and scrubbing at her eyes. “My mom’s going to be here in just a few minutes. I need to get ready!” She opened the compact and rubbed the powder puff across the base. Angel’s skin was a lot darker than Barbara’s pale color, so naturally the base was too dark, but she had to cover her blotching with something. She then went for her hair, which was straight, blonde, and impossibly stringy.

“Why don’t you go home?” Angel suggested, watching her carefully. “I’ll tell your parents you were sick or something.”

“No!” she said, halfway because her parents didn’t approve of her and Angel’s friendship, and halfway because she couldn’t cancel on her parents. She wasn’t sure how, but knew that not showing up at dinner would make the matter worse. “No. I have to tell them. Here. Tonight. Or, maybe I could tell them Andrew’s dead! Yes. Andrew died this morning! That’s what I’ll say.”

She went for the door, knowing she would say no such thing, but trying to convince herself of it anyway. It would give her the courage she needed to make it back to the table. Maybe.

“Good luck!” Angel called out behind her.

Her father’s hair was whiter than she remembered, though she had just seen him four months ago for Christmas, but his dress and style was still the same, unchanged from even her earliest memories of him when he was a businessman in Seattle. Straight, no nonsense creases on every article he wore, the bold red ties and his highly polished shoes.

Mother came in looking a little older and a little more ridiculous. She was wearing a pink evening gown (the color had never suited her) and a large brooch of some sort that sparkled in the low lights of the restaurant. No doubt the brooch would be something silly—a dragonfly or lotus perhaps—but it would have real diamonds and cost more than Barbara could make in a month working at the coffee stand.

This brought another tear to Barbara’s eyes and she quickly fought them down. Earlier that week, she had quit her job at the coffee stand on Andrew’s promise that he would take care of her and pay off the rest of her student loan. Now, she would have to depend on her father’s money. “I told you!” she could almost hear her father saying as she watched him shaking hands with the restaurant owner and they passed pleasantries with large, fake smiles. “I told you that you’d never be able to pay on your own. But you’re so stubborn. Have to try and prove yourself by paying for school in a coffee shop! What nonsense!”

“I’m not listening,” Barbara forced her tears back and swallowed hard. “You’re not even talking to me yet, so shut up!” She strained a smile onto her face and waited as her parents made their way across the room.

When her mother spotted her, she held her arms out extravagantly, knocking a drink off Roman’s tray without even noticing. “Darling! You look fantastic!” Barbara stood with her hands clasped in front of her, waiting for her mother to take her all in. Her skinny frame. Her nearly non-existent hips. She always became aware of how slim her hips were, and how tiny her breasts were whenever her mother looked at her that way.

Finally, mother’s examination stopped and she came forward to hug her daughter. “Mommy!” Barbara said. “It’s so nice to see you. I missed you so much!”

“Oh, I miss you too dear. Why didn’t you wear the red dress I sent you last month?”

“Scoot over and give Daddy some room!” Her father tried to squeeze his way in and her mother reluctantly let go. While her mother sat down, her father gave her his signature one-armed hug, which was more the kind of hug one man might give another at a football game. The kind of hug that said, “Hey buddy! How are ya!”

“Daddy!” She had to fake the joy. Her heart hammered inside her chest, trying to escape and hop off down the street, where it could cower in a dark alley away from this horrible night.

Her mother looked around expectantly. Her father did the same, then took a step away to take the seat across from Barbara’s. They both looked at the empty space where Andrew was to be.

“So, dear, where’s this Andrew?” Mother asked, as if she expected Andrew were not real at all. Some figment of her deranged daughter’s imagination. And her father’s look was no better, eyebrows raised, as if expecting disappointment.

Could they already know? Who would have told them?

“Darling? Where is Andrew?”

She looked at her mother and opened her mouth to respond. A squeak came out, and nothing more. Her eyes began to moisten again, and she turned to her father, hoping that maybe the words would crawl out under his stern gaze.

Still, nothing came out. Silence hung in the air between them. Amid all the clinking of silverware on plates and the low murmur of the dining crowd about them, her own silence was deafening and the only sound that seemed to exist.

“Andrew?” she finally managed. Her lips trembled delicately. The room tilted to the left and she fought for control. “He . . .”

“He what?” Now her father knew something was wrong. It was too late to uphold appearances and play a charade. Both her parents were looking at her, with scowls instead of concern as any other parent would show.

“He . . .”

“He’s right here!” said a new voice from behind them. A man of medium height and dark curly hair stepped up from behind Barbara. He had an award-winning smile and was very handsome, despite his disheveled appearance. “Sorry, I was in the restrooms. A little nervous about meeting my new parents. I’m Andrew!” He stuck his hand out.

Barbara’s parents waited for a brief moment for an introduction, but Barbara only stared at the man as if she’d never seen him before, eyes wide and mouth open. Her father covered for her quickly by introducing himself. “I’m Arthur Mulligan. This is my wife, Patty Mulligan.”

The curly haired man shook hands with both of them, giving Mr. Mulligan a good, firm handshake and a nod, while Mrs. Mulligan received a light shake with a gentle kiss. She smiled politely at this and, though he was a handsome young man, she refrained from being charmed. “You smell lovely, Andrew,” Patty Mulligan said.

And he did smell lovely, but there was one thing wrong.

The man standing next to Barbara, shaking hands with her parents and smiling with all the charm of a royal prince was not Andrew.

Barbara had no idea who he was.

She winced as the straps continued to cut into her legs and arms as she dangled between life and death.

Being Sam

By Chrissie Sparling

How do I always get myself into this mess? Sam wondered, shifting slightly to ease the pressure of the tangled parachute straps that were digging into her skin, cutting off circulation to her arms and upper thighs. She tried, without moving too much, to get her body weight more centered as she dangled upside down over the cliff side at the end of the world, clinging to the roots of an old twisted tree that grew sides out of what was left of the earth. She had missed her mark on the landing above by only twelve inches, but those inches meant either life or death for her.

Anybody who knew her (they didn’t even have to know her well) would say this was just like Sam, “Always looking for trouble.” Quite contrary to popular belief, she didn’t. Old Calamity just always seemed to fancy her.

Sam, cautious not to risk losing her grasp on the tree roots above, turned her neck just enough to view the underside of earth. She had never seen this little section of the world before, and quite frankly didn’t know what to expect. Of course, the little kid inside her hoped there would be a whole new world down here; new sites to see, new terrain to live upon, and new faces to get acquainted with, but the teenager was bright enough to know that wasn’t likely. Earth had broken apart eons ago, and all that was left was the island of Goody surrounded by a dizzifying void of speckled lights. If she fell here she would drop from existence—fall off the face of the earth. Her body would never hit anything. It would just float away into the void. Would she die? Probably. But she seriously doubted it would be instantaneous. It would probably happen after she screamed herself hoarse, when she was beyond fear of death and anxiously welcomed freedom from that weakening sensation in the pit of her stomach that would continuously rise and fall.

Sam squeezed the roots tighter, clutching onto them with every ounce of energy she had. She swore no one told her they were jumping today, and they definitely left out the fact they would be coming in this close to the end of the world because she never would have agreed. Not ever.

Of course, no one in Goody would ever believe that. “That girl’s crazy,” was the catch phrase that followed her everywhere she went. “Trouble with a capital T.”

Sam never saw it that way. She was always just in the right place for catastrophe. That’s all. Half of the stuff she got herself into wasn’t even her fault. Like this for instance, she was going to have lunch with her boyfriend Scott today. They were going to eat at one of the dives in town, a seafood joint that he liked. But as she was leaving she got this call. She could have sworn it was Scott’s voice on the other end telling her to meet him on the strip outside The Seven Wonders Miniature Golf Course.

Now that she looked back on it, she should have known it wasn’t him. He doesn’t even like miniature golf, but foolish little Sammy dropped everything, grabbed her new zipper pocket coat, jumped onto her bike, and flew into town.

When she got there, a group of boys Sam knew to be the real problem kids were there to greet her. Common sense screamed at her to turn her skinny little butt around and go to the seafood joint to meet Scott, but like usual, she ignored the warning and parked her bike next to the fence and took up a seat on the rickety, sun warped, greenish-brown picnic table that sat crooked in the parking lot just outside the Pyramid of Giza—the sixth hole of the old mini golf course that Mr. Miller inherited from his father just last year.

The place was starting to look like a ruin rather than a “kiddy fun land” like the flashing sign over head read when all of its lights worked; right now it flickered “Ki …y f ... La”. That never would have happened if Old Man Ricky was still around; he replaced the bulbs religiously. However, his son, Mr. Miller, just didn’t care about the place the same way. Rather ashame too, because Sam had fond memories of coming here every Saturday to help Old Man Ricky gather balls and sweep the greens. She loved listening to what everyone else referred to as the ramblings of an old man. His tales of what the real earth were like back in the day were fascinating; oceans of blue instead of the black void that surrounded them now, shores of soft sand that squished between your toes rather than hard clumps of dirt surrounding the ends of the world. There were once other cities with other people, but now there was only Goody.

“Hey Sam,” Josh had said, nodding his head toward her. His long, curly brown hair blew back off his chest and shoulders, revealing a cut up Pistols and Pansies shirt.

Pistols and Pansies meant Josh was feeling reckless. Sam knew right then to make an excuse and go and meet Scott for lunch, but she replied stupidly, “Hey Josh, what’s up?”

Right there, stop everything.

If Sam had a time machine, she would go back to that point in her life and tape her mouth so that she never would have said anything at all. Or at least that was what she wished would have happened considering her current state.

She winced as the straps continued to cut into her legs and arms as she dangled between life and death.

Sometimes she just wished someone would kick her in the teeth before she left her house each day. It might have saved her life. Clearly, she wasn’t capable of doing it herself. If she were, she would have just kept her mouth shut when Josh clasped her hand in his and pulled her close to him where he then whispered in her ear. “Funny you should ask?”

Next thing she knew, she, Josh and a couple of the other guys he hung out with pushed Old Man Ricky’s bi-plane out of the hanger and onto the high school football field. Josh dangled the key he swiped from Mr. Miller on Saturday when he swept the green, in front of Sam and the others. “What’s up? We are!” He so craftily bellowed as he mounted into the pilot’s seat.

“Shot gun,” Sam zinged before the others, running for the co-pilot’s chair, which forced the rest to file into the back where the plane was cramped. Too cramped for them all to squeeze in comfortably. The gorilla boys had to lap it, which they whined about not being fair. Luckily, the roar of the plane’s engine revving up drowned them out, so Sam didn’t have to listen to it this time. However, last time they swiped the plane, they complained too. It was starting to be a headache type ritual that Sam was getting rather sick of.

“Either come for the ride or get out of the plane,” she had told them when Josh pulled back on the stick and the plane lifted into the sky. Now, had she thought any of them would have taken her seriously about getting out of the plane, she probably wouldn’t have said anything at all, but she didn’t know—honestly, she didn’t.

Josh kept pulling on the stick so the plane zoomed up into the sky that encompassed Goody. He wasn’t even messing around doing loop to loops like he sometimes did out of the gate. Today he went straight up.

“How far up you think we can get before we need to jump?” he asked Sam.

That was when she knew she really should have gone to the seafood joint with Scott.

“Jump?” Sam replied nervously, showing her weaker side for the first time.

“Are you scared, Sam?” Josh looked at her to wily to be being nice.

“No,” she spat back, pushing the stick toward Josh even more so that the plane stayed on target; heading in an upward spiral toward the boundaries of the bubble that kept what was left of earth from drifting lifelessly into space.

But she was scared, how come she just couldn’t admit that? It wouldn’t have killed her …well ….she looked over her shoulder once more …not like this anyway. It definitely would kill the person everyone expected her to be—the wild child—the bad girl.

But didn’t she want that reputation to be buried? To be free of “Little Miss Trouble with a captital T”?

“Better put it on, Sam,” one of the gorilla boys had shouted over the roar of the plane, pushing a pack into her hands.

“What are we doing?” Sam remembered asking.

“Giving Old Man Ricky back his plane.” Josh laughed, and then screamed with excitement as he put on his own chute. “Hurry up, Sam.” He added motioning at her to get geared up.

At that point, Sam knew Old Calamity had found his way to her once more and anyone looking at the circumstances would have seen how the situation just enfolded her. She had nothing to do with it. Honestly, she didn’t even want to be here.

“Aim for the shore.”

“The shore?” Sam had shrieked, which made her realize that in a slight way she did know she was jumping near the end of the world. It was just she wasn’t expecting to jump at all to begin with.

“The one who gets the closest wins.”

“Wins what?”

“R-E-S-P-E-C-T,” sang Josh. “Everyone goes on three.”

Sam had hurried to get her chute strapped on so that on three, she was able to jump with the rest of them, but they had all cheated. Josh started counting. As soon as he hit “one,” the gorilla boys jumped, giving them a false start. Then on “two,” one of the other guys fell, and before he even said “three,” Josh and the last guy fled, leaving Sam alone in a pilot-less plane. She had no choice but to follow suit.

Out the door, she tucked and rolled. Her stomach dropped as she fell toward the anthill that she knew to be Goody. Whistling wind filled her ears as she straightened her body like an arrow and pierced the sky, heading toward the ground. Below her, chutes began popping up, but foolish little Sam didn’t pull hers, instead she pressed passed those cheaters until she got below the gorilla boys. Then she flipped in the air, just to show off a little, yanked her string; her chute came up and she glided in toward the edge of the world. She planed to stop a few feet away from the edge so that she could run the final distance, but an untimely gust of wind pushed her off course and instead of landing twelve inches back, she fell off the edge. Her chute tangled in the branches of the twisted tree that grew sideways over the earth. It was the last thing before the void that the earth was connected to. At one point, there were other trees and rocks, but through the years, they had all slipped from existence.

Some of the straps of her parachute busted above her, causing Sam to slip farther down the roots she had clasped onto for additional support. With nothing under her, she realized she was going to find out very soon what it felt like to slip from this world. And what was she leaving behind? Nothing as grand as a miniature golf course, that every kid in Goody would tell you was the best spot in town. Nope—Sam would leave behind a slogan, “You kids behave yourselves or you’ll end up like Little Sam!” Instead of “Trouble with a capital T,” Goody would remember her as, “Trouble with a capital S.”

Sam’s arms began to shake.

Holding her breath, she swung her legs up to catch onto a half-rotted branch above.

As they missed the first try, she started imagining the people of Goody who would come to her funeral. They would look over the edge of the world tossing flowers and drinks in her memory, but how many of them would know anything about her other than she was the crazy girl who did anything and everything, and one day she fell off the earth?

Sam pushed harder to get that tree branch. Her arms threatened to quit, but she couldn’t let them. Not yet. She wasn’t ready to be a bedtime story. She swung out a little further like she used to do when she was a little girl going over the flip bar at school, and this time her leg caught on and she quickly wrapped herself around the branch.

She shimmied to get off her back and onto her belly. Below her, the spiraling stars swirled amongst the gas clouds in space, but Sam was not in fear of them anymore. She was safe on her tree—the tree of life.

“Sam,” Josh’s ashen face peered over the edge. His scream was eaten by the void before it could echo. His chute was still attached behind him.

“I won,” Sam replied looking up at him from her tree branch.

“You’re alive!” Josh laughed, and Sam saw the stress lines easing on his face. “You are one crazy chick.” His hands were still shaking as he pulled out his knife and started to make a rope with his parachute straps to get Sam off the tree.

Just then, Sam’s pocket vibrated; very carefully, she unzipped the pocket of her new coat and pulled out her cell phone. “Hello.”

“Where you at?” Scott asked.

“Oh …just hanging out.” Sam answered truthfully.

“You’re not getting into trouble, are you?”

“Me?” Sam questioned sarcastically, finally accepting that maybe she and Old Man Calamity were like soul mates, maybe they went hand in hand. “Nothing I can’t handle,” Sam said with a smile.

“Hey, Jack, you still looking for them girls gone missing?”

I told him I was and whipped out my notebook.

Saving the Girl

by Bryan Schingle

I had worked a kidnapping only once before, shortly after making detective. After that, I was permanently assigned to homicide. That is, until recently.

Over the last two weeks, three young girls had been kidnapped in Denver. All three occurred in the same fashion. Early in the morning, each child was walking to school alone. According to witnesses, a black van with no plates would pull up next to the girl, a masked man would jump out and grab her right off the streets.

It was a slow month for death, so I had some extra time. My lieutenant recommended that I help out with the kidnappings, get some fresh thoughts on the case. That had been almost a week ago.

With the Mayor breathing down the necks of every officer in the department, we had added more patrol cars to the streets every morning, hoping to catch the kidnappers in the act. Most of the task force was out, investigating the kidnapping of an eleven year old girl, Lisa Dolan. The villains had struck at seven thirty. A patrol car was only two blocks away.

I spent the morning looking over every witness statement and scrutinizing crime locations on a map, trying to see a pattern, or lack of one. I flipped through hundreds of files, finding people with previous records for kidnapping or child abuse. For those that were out of jail, I looked the addresses up on a map, to see how far away from the crime scene they were. After lunch, I would check the DMV, to see if any of them owned a black van.

I was climbing into my car for lunch when my cell phone rang.

“Detective Benson,” I answered.

It was one of my informants, a homeless man named Cat. “Hey, Jack, you still looking for them girls gone missing?”

I told him I was and whipped out my notebook.

“I got a line on it. These two guys been selling these girls, you trackin’ me?”

“Yeah, for sex.”

“Damn straight.”

“Who are the kidnappers? Do you know their names?”

“No, not yet. Don’t know who they’re selling them too, either, but I was gonna watch their place, a dump out in east Denver, when I saw the black van pulling out of the garage. They’re both cruisin’ right now, west on Colfax.”

I started my car. “You got a plate number?”

Cat ran the number off and said he was going to try to find out where the girls were being sold. I hung up and grabbed the radio, squealing out of the parking lot.

“Attention all units,” I nearly screamed into the mike. “This is unit Adam Six. Look out for a black van, Colorado plates 8-2-2 William Boy George. Occupied twice, two males. Suspects wanted in relation to multiple kidnappings.”

I tore into the street and slapped the plastic siren onto the hood of my car.

The police department is pretty far west on Colfax, but I wasn’t sure how far along the suspects were. I took the chance that they hadn’t passed the building yet, and started heading east once I got one the street.

I was flying by other cars as they pulled over. I had to swerve around several others who had no room to move.

I had flown by four blocks when I saw the black van. As I got closer, I saw my plate number.

I yanked the emergency brake and spun the wheel, pulling into the right lane and blocking the van in. I yelled my exact location over the radio and requested back-up before I got out of my car.

My gun was in my hand, aimed straight at the windshield across the roof of my car.

“Don’t move!” I screamed.

Both men went for their doors. I stepped to my right, letting my car cover me from the man on the passenger side while I confronted the driver. “Freeze!”

The driver tried to hide behind his door, and stuck a small revolver out, ready to shoot.

I fired twice, both .45’s tearing straight through the door. The driver fell flat on his back.

I spun to my left and stood up. The passenger had an automatic aimed at me.

My gun spat three bullets, one after another. All three missed, but the man dived for cover behind a parked car. I sidestepped over to the van, praying for a better view of my target.

His gun appeared over the hood of the car and started firing. I hid behind the van, hearing bullets zip past.

I peered under the car he was hiding behind, hoping for a leg shot. I couldn’t make anything out. I fired two shots into the windows of the car he hid behind, trying to distract him while I reloaded.

The passenger must have reloaded too. A fresh barrage of bullets started flying my way.

I ran around the back of the van. I was planning to flank the passenger, get behind him and finish the situation.

As I made my way past the rear of the van, I saw the man running. I took off after him, screaming for him to stop.

He didn’t fire any shots. I assumed he had run out of ammunition and I broke into a full sprint.

I tackled him low, around the knees. He crashed to the ground, but began writhing and twisting, trying to scramble out of my grip.

My gun was still in my right hand, but my left was free. I grabbed his right wrist, shoving my thumb against the back of his hand. He yelped in pain. When I twisted him to the side, he turned over. Before he could try to attack me, I slapped him across the jaw with the butt of my gun.

“Don’t move,” I screamed, pointing the barrel at his forehead.

He quit struggling and raised his hands above his head.

I heard sirens screaming and cars screeching to a halt. I was soon surrounded by uniformed officers. They busied themselves searching the man and handcuffing him. I stood back and caught my breath.

Making my way back to the van, I saw two officers standing over the man I had shot. I could see in their eyes that he was dead.

I had shot a man once before, but the bullet had gone wide and clipped his arm. I realized that I had just killed a man. And I didn’t feel bad about it at all.

My hands were shaking from exhaustion as I opened the back doors of the van. A young girl was lying on the floor, her arms tied behind her. I recognized her tear-streaked face from a picture I’d seen earlier.

“It’s okay, Lisa. You’re safe now.”

I decide in my drunken ego if I can’t touch the back wall and back to the front doors without being discovered, then I shouldn’t be allowed to drink in the library ever again.

Library and Beer

By A. Sailboat

I am in movement up the stairs of the U’s library steps, with seven beers in my backpack, four in my gullet and one in my hand dressed as Arizona Ice Tea, the kind with the green wrapper disguising anything on the interior. This is perfectly normal and not at all my fault. I am not an enrollee. I am not of the check out caste. And I must read Bukowski! I decipher the Dewy Decimal System while driving my open container down my raspy throat. There is a thick head due to improper pouring procedure in the parking lot. A dyslexic can wander with Dewy for quite some time, what with the letters and numbers and all. I am on the right path almost. The dual letters are correct and the numbers growing closer.

Can it not be helped that carbonation, especially with big beer head, results in the silent belch from time to time? Can this not just be overseen, called courtesy by the masses? Why I do see the nostril of the tall man with knit vest and trousers expand wildly outside the realm of normal? His muscles clank ridged. There is now some mysterious stick in his poop hole. He makes further steps in his venture, then thinking he can no longer walk. “Something must be done, some act against this boy and his beer.” This man composes this thought in a few still seconds. His brain is unhinging. Then he realizes that he has stopped, and it startles him. I, amused, continue the watch. His head turns with all the grace of a rusted bolt to meet my eyes, then he rubberbands back into action. Out the glass doors he goes and toward the stairs. Then wait. His squirrel brain freezes. He holds his nuts in his throat and changes direction. To this, it is clear he is to be the pansy nark.

Now please, do not think me slovenly, I do have proper respect; I am, after all, in a place of literature. To show my class, I cap and close the bottle when passersby do their task. I do have manners; I am an upstanding citizen. It is un-American to read the good works of Charles Bukowski without beer, wine, or whiskey; this would be disrespectful to the author who died in 1994. I am not here to see to the turning of graves.

It is my imagination that he reached the information counter, and with peril proclaimed the injustice to this institution of learning. The woman with fat acknowledged his message of espionage and this sent her fully stocked brain cells a flutter. She is bumbling with the telephone and at the same time thanking this good Samaritan for his service to the community. He taps the table twice and is relieved by his tattle tale, but would he expect he remains a half cup jittery? He walks away, rubbernecking for explosions or blood. “What a day—whew.”

This woman’s phone reaches 35 feet from her, where in cubicle of position, a man the caliber of a green bean responds with quick action. The tele-commutations transpire: “Okay, fat Doris, first you lead in, figure out what isle he’s in … don’t stop, pass him as normal. Then turn and wait my instructions. Okay?” “Okay, Darren,” click. The trap is set. Uncertain endorphins soar in the thick, yellow chub and in long, thin lank of our heroes as they enter the area where the criminal was last seen.

Through the spaces between books and shelves, I am spotted before I spot her. It is my luck that merely my sight in the flesh causes Doris to freeze up. Darren should have known. She too is stopped in tense formation. Deep below butt flab is a small set of sit-muscles clenched in half step. Despite my non-Army experience, I react with tact I’ve learned from movies. I crouch down out of sight. To this, the shark has moved into the dark waters and the swimmer Doris panics, my eyes can still see her. She turns around to retreat. Down low, I have the upper hand. To this, I take a victory swig. She is the deer in the headlights. Darren must have urged her to continue, so she turns and tiptoes to pass me. I am ready.

With big wave and a roar, “hello” teeth in friendly smile, she quickens her steps and continues along six rows away. To this, my humor is pleased. Then the man I imagine to be Darren walks up to bat with cool and calm motion, yeah he’s ice. If it wouldn’t be against dress code, he would be wearing dark glasses. Like ice in a drink, he waits where she once stood. His cool doesn’t mix well with the hot flashes of fat Doris and steams their hand signal communications. Nothing is clear. Her hands flap with fear and frustration. He is telling her where and how to go in attempt to corner me in. My grin is huge. This time, I let the suds sink fast to the bottom of the bottle, creating a noise that freezes Mr. Darren and his ears perk. As he starts the move in retaliation, she follows suit. He comes toward my row and Doris fats down her row to head me off at the pass. This puts me into motion, staying low, and I have just enough time behind the thick of the shelf to miss Darren as he passes and just miss Doris as she enters the long rows. I keep moving as they do and stop as they stop to see each other. Confusion in the mouse maze. How have they made it in the rat race? I could make the move for the exit; they would surely look for me there. So I head on the outside and pass in plain view of the man, but he is transfixed in whisper to fat Doris. I stay at the end of my shelf with them at either side on the other side. The man walks down the long isle away from us; Dorris heads my way. I scoot around with expert skill and like clockwork, she is late for our lunch. I can tell by their torsos they’re distraught when they again find each other. I cannot keep from laughing, but I do so in my coat sleeve.

I decide in my drunken ego if I can’t touch the back wall and back to the front doors without being discovered, then I shouldn’t be allowed to drink in the library ever again.

So with this at stake, the dance continues, though gets slightly harder through the thicket of books, what with the long isles the only way of advance. A few others see me with inquiry in their eyes; I shake it off and keep moving. The near misses excite me. I dash when backs are turned and dart when they might be near. I reach the end and look into the pit, almost there. I move across the wide row and can see the doors at the far end. I run and touch the wall like a relay race. I am an Olympian. With my aboutface, I see Darren looking to his right. I sidestep tight against the books, missing the eyes of genius. I have finished my beer. As I pass, I leave the bottle as a calling card. One patron sitting thinks me rude; I pause wanting to properly catch him up on the game and the points and the stakes, then he would root me on. But I don’t. I worry other would-be good Samaritans may put the math together and join the ranks with Hitler. With zig zag and laser tag skills, I duck and dive to the finish line. I push open the front doors and make for the stairs. I imagine a confetti of red, white, and blue photographers taking my finish. Four stairs down, I turn around to see in a small space the fat one lurking with caution on every row. I reach in my bag and arrogantly extract another. On the steps, I crack it and exit the champion.

COMIC SHORT STORIES

Mom can sew, and iron, and cook. Truth to tell, she can cook up a storm. Makes up for all the rest of the spastics at the table.

Dysfunction This–-Halloween

How I Recycled an Internet Joke

By Dennis T. Kotch

Conversation for Gus wasn’t difficult—that is, when no one else was around.

“Damn! Has it been a year already? The holiday, if that is what you want to call it, is fast approaching. How the hell does a family have a get-together on Halloween as its family tradition? Always the last Saturday of October. What the hell happened to Thanksgiving? Is Christmas for in-laws or strangers now? Big difference this year. The ‘ho is now my ex. Divorce was final in July. The slut. Running off like that. With her freaking gynecologist, no less. The bastard was doing more than looking up there. Must have seen something I never saw. Much more. On top of it all, kind of, he had the nerve, the freakin’ nerve, to bill me for his ‘services.’ I guess there is a bright side to it though. Now that she moved away to that fancy neighborhood, the Judge refused to renew the restraining order she took out. She had a brass set pressing charges against me. It’s not like I smacked her around all that often. Not that she didn’t deserve it, she did.”

“Time to go over to that ‘Amityville Horror.’ Before the day is over, everyone will be pissed-off at each other. As usual, it’ll be a real cluster-fuck. By springtime, everybody will swear that they had a great time. Lying fools.

“The Great Pumpkin, or as we like to call him, Dad, always sitting in his patch at the end of the table, always wearing a filthy orange t-shirt, like it was summer. But, you know, drunks have only one season, drinking season. The pig! Regaling us all with his concerts in g-flat-ulance. As if tandem burping and farting were a spectator sport and he was the champ up at the plate, so to speak.

“What is even worse, the little munchkin bastards, I mean my nieces and nephews, all, and I do mean every single last one of the pains-in-the-asses, imitate him. Last year, young Joey crapped in his pants trying to match his Grandfather’s ability to pass gas. The little shit didn’t have the brains to tell anyone. Of course, we noticed the stench rather fast. Then Joey ran from the table, leaving a trail of effluvia. His whole Michael Jackson costume was ruined. His mother, my asshole brother’s wife, went to pieces over the matter and sat in a corner of the living room most of the afternoon crying. The dumb bitch was incapable of cleaning up after her walking abortion. She didn’t, and I have to say, neither did my dimwitted brother, even think to take him home to wash and change clothes—even though they only live on the next block. They had to be told. Several times. If Darwin were alive, he would have their pictures on his wall.

“My brother deserves both retards. It’s what he gets for marrying someone from his rehab center. She used to sell herself to anybody who had a few bucks and a couple of rocks of crack. Of course, if he wasn’t there recovering from his own addiction, they wouldn’t have met. Maybe. Junkies always seem to find each other, no matter what.

“Sis—now that’s a piece of work for you. Every year she shows up with some new guy—not a straight one in the bunch. Two years ago, the Light–in-the-loafers she brought over was dressed as Mary Poppins. She came as Marlene Dietrich. Give me a fucking break. Who is she trying to kid? Her roommate, who will never be a candidate for Miss Congeniality, dresses like a lumberjack, curses worse than a drunken sailor, and throws a punch that Mike Tyson would have trouble handling. They share a one-bedroom apartment and that one bedroom only has one bed. Does she think everyone is too stupid to see the obvious?

“Aunt Aggie. What planet did she come from? Never married, never kissed. Always complaining. Don’t cook, can’t even boil water; can’t sew; can’t iron; but, boy can she whine. Sixty-eight years old and still a virgin; who the hell is she saving it for? She and Mom, her sister, are just the opposite. If they didn’t look so much alike, you wouldn’t know they were related.

“Mom can sew, and iron, and cook. Truth to tell, she can cook up a storm. Makes up for all the rest of the spastics at the table. And I know for certain she isn’t saving it. Not giving any of it to Dad either, anymore. Caught her more than once doing it with her boyfriend. A couple of times with the old slob passed-out on the couch with an almost empty bottle of cheap booze on the floor next to him. She doesn’t know I know what’s been happening. I never let on that I was watching. They like doing it on the kitchen table. I even saw them doing it on it twice in one night. The same table she stuffs the turkey on every Thanksgiving. It must be the table or something.

“It’s a bitch being the only squared away one in the family, only one with class. I better get dressed.

“I just love wearing Mom’s panties under this Prince Charming outfit. All those people going to be around, and no one will see. Hot damn!”

**On October 30^th, Gus was brought before a night court Judge. A police officer in a patrol car spotted Gus inside the fence of a local farm stand. When the officer approached him, she noticed his trousers were down and he was pumping away like mad into a pumpkin. She reports the following conversation with Gus.

“Sir, do you realize that you are screwing a pumpkin?”

He turned around and replied, “Oh my God! You mean it’s after midnight?”

Gus is now receiving psychiatric care at a nearby facility that specializes in dysfunctional families.

**During 2004, this section made the Internet rounds as a story purported to be true. The names have been changed.

HARRY B.

By Les Combs ¬ Humdinger Award Winning Poet ¬

I shifted from one foot to the other in front of my editor’s desk while he barked into the phone. Poston had summoned me from O’Grady’s. I’d no more than walked into that dimly lit refuge, intent on having one quick belt, when the phone at the end of the bar rang. O’Grady answered, looked at me and mouthed, “Are you here?” I nodded, and he said into the phone, “Just walked in.”

I don’t know how Poston did it, but he always seemed to know my location. I’d considered giving myself pat-down searches for a homing device. I walked into his office and stood before his landfill desk. A crusty old bird, he made a career of terrorizing his reporters. He slammed the phone in its cradle and focused on me, shaggy brows converging over his meaty nose.

“Billups, I’ve had word about a devil-worshipping cult that’s raising hell over in Arkansas. I think you’re the man for the job.” I read malice in that last sentence in spite of his twisted smile. “Drive your own car, make damned sure you record your mileage, and hang onto your receipts.” He gave me the fish-eye, daring me to protest. “You can leave in the morning, save one night’s motel bill.” He began pawing through papers, and I realized I’d been dismissed.

“Uh, Boss, I don’t suppose you know what part of Arkansas I’m headed for?” Without looking up he pushed a paper through the desk clutter toward me. I gave him a mock salute and made for the door.

The note read, “See Fason DeWitt in Harmony, AR.” It was mid-afternoon the next day, and I pushed my eight-year-old Lumina down I-40 faster than prudence would dictate. I’d made a late start due to my commiserating with O’Grady far into the previous evening. I munched an apple from the bag of mixed fruit I’d purchased. My stomach, in its delicate condition, grumbled.

A confirming glance at the open road atlas on the seat next to me, and I took the Clarksville exit. On a secondary road I located the town of Harmony, a blue dot on the map, not many miles into the hills. I stopped at DeWitt Grocery & Gas. Inside I found Fason.

Cadaverous was the only adjective I could come up with to describe the man. Thin and leathery, his face had the look of taxidermy failure. One pale gray eye sighted at thirty degrees to its brown counterpart. He sat with one hip on the checkout counter, a feather duster sticking out of a rear pocket, a can of Mountain Dew clutched in his hand. “Good afternoon,” I greeted him.

He nodded and took a swig from the green can. “Sir, my name is Harry Billups.” I offered my hand, which he ignored. “I’m with The Mid-South Times-Mirror.”

“You selling subscriptions?” he croaked. His voice had the quality of a spring night in the wetlands.

“No sir, I’m a reporter, and I understand you can tell me something about a devil cult operating in this area.” His eyes did something funny. I’d swear that the last time I noticed, the brown one was on the left and the gray one on the right. No matter.

He stood and faced me or, rather, looked down on me. The man was six-eight if he was an inch. “Can’t tell you nothing about that,” he said, his mounted-trophy face inches above mine. “Outsiders aren’t welcome. It could be hazardous to your health”

Not easily deterred, I pushed ahead. “Sir, I drove all morning to get here. This assignment is important to me.” His eyes may have changed back, I couldn’t be sure. The brown one seemed to bore into me.

“I can take you to a meeting tonight so you can see for yourself, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.” I agreed to meet him right here “at the crack of dark,” as he put it.

There being no business district in Harmony, I returned to Clarksville to while away the remaining hours of daylight in a tavern I’d be ashamed to die in. But the beer was cold and the bartender not unfriendly.

With only a smudge of gray on the western horizon, I parked in front of DeWitt Grocery & Gas. No more than five minutes passed until a caravan of assorted vehicles stopped on the highway. A pickup truck rolled up beside the Lumina. A figure clad in a white sheet and a Richard Nixon rubber mask motioned for me to follow. God, I loved that nose.

Several miles upcountry on the secondary road we branched onto a tertiary road. A mile or so farther, the parade turned onto a quaternary road, a dirt track, and I followed for a quarter-mile to an abandoned barn.

More ghostly figures, twenty or so, exited cars and trucks and milled about in my headlights. All wore facemasks; several Ronald Reagans, two Jimmy Carters, a couple of David Lettermans, a few Henry Kissingers and one Hillary Clinton. Either they had attended a Halloween grab-bag sale or the cult had an eclectic pantheon of deities. I wished I’d brought my Groucho getup. All sported the linen-closet motif. Wal-Mart must have had one helluva white sale. My car door opened, and Hillary beckoned me to follow.

The Springmaid brigade closed around us, and we all entered the board-and-batten building. Gas lanterns hanging from support posts lit the cavernous interior. The bed-sheets formed a circle with me standing ill at ease in the center. I had my notepad and ballpoint at the ready, as if to record impending events, but my hands shook.

A king-size percale broke through the outer ranks, a swaying censer held out front. It had to be DeWitt behind the Nixon mask. Bilious green smoke rolled from the metal container and settled earthward.

“O Burning Focus! I have come into Thee; I have cast about me the robe of the waters; I have girt myself with the girdle of knowledge,” he intoned in DeWitt’s amphibian voice. This was pretty flowery language for Milhaus. I hoped it wouldn’t be a long service.

He held the pot over my head while fog the color of pond scum descended over my body. “From the skull of his head hang down a thousand thousand myriads of hair. All are in order.” I couldn’t guess what this guy’s reading habits were, but they gave me the creeps.

While I reached up to scratch an itchy spot on my head, the lights blinked out as one. In the next minute, automobile engines coughed and started. I could hear them leave amid the sound of grinding gears and bad mufflers. I was alone.

I groped my way to the door and saw my car, solitary in the moonlight. Geez, my head itched. I retraced the rough roads, roared through Harmony well above the posted limit and pulled into a motel at Clarksville. The Pakistani night clerk darted furtive glances at me while I registered and offered my credit card.

In room 106 I opened my bag and retrieved my shaving kit. I felt grungy, in need of a shower and shave. I walked into the bathroom and stopped short, almost turned and ran. I’d seen dogs do that; come tearing up to something that turned out to be scary, then flip ass-over-tea-kettle to get away.

An unfamiliar image stared back from the mirror. Reddish-gold hair, thick and four inches long, tufted from its head. The growth started above the eyebrows and extended inside the shirt collar, covered the ears. I could be mistaken for a rain-forest tree-dweller.

I tore open my shirt and choked back a scream. A deep-pile, brassy-red growth carpeted my chest. The thing in the mirror glared at me, Harry Billups transformed into a Clint Eastwood co-star.

A hot shower and shampoo did little but expose the extent of my pilose condition. Like a creeping fungal infection, the hair spread southward. Naked, I leaned toward the mirror for a closer look and shuddered.

Divorced and alone, semi-alcoholic, facing a mid-life crisis, I was sunk in despair. And that was yesterday, before the hair thing.

Restless, I swung with one hand from the swag lamp, until it tore loose from the ceiling. In my car I found a leftover banana. I scampered up a huge oak tree next to the parking lot, finding solace among its lofty branches.

It’s funny how a banana and a high perch can change one’s perspective. A few minutes ago, despondent, I reflected on suicide. Now I felt purged, re-born. I leaped from branch to branch in an expression of joy. In my best Tarzan imitation, I thumped my chest and shrieked with gladness. Motel room lights popped on. How delightful, how utterly marvelous to be alive, filled with animal vitality.

I could hardly wait to see the look on old Poston’s face when I reported back tomorrow. Banana in hand, I’d request Workman’s Comp.

A Sorry Bus Story

By Tony Robles

The city bus is the microcosm of the world. Sit down; take a look around. It comes out from the exhaust pipe, through the window and makes its way through our nostrils and miscellaneous membranes. It permeates the bloodstream and every passage and by-way; in an efficient system, stopping at every muscular fiber, every twitching nuance until it exits from some unfortunate orifice; better known as the end of the line. We breathe the noxious and obnoxious oxides until we’re left staring straight ahead, emotionless, as though saying hello or nodding to the person next to you were a felony. I don’t know how the current state of the bus system became what it is. My grandfather was a bus driver long ago. He drove a city bus in San Francisco over 20 years. From what I’ve been told, he was a very courteous driver. He drove a bus in the days when drivers wore money-changers on their belts. Therefore, if someone, say, gave him a $10 bill, and the fare was 45 cents, he’d have to very quickly calculate how much change the rider was to be given back. Back then, I assume this was standard stuff, unlike today where a fella can get a job as a cashier and not know how to add or subtract, thanks to the breakthroughs in technology.

Sit quietly on a city bus and observe. You’ll see many different people with different hang-ups and/or philosophies. There are those who wear the word “entitlement” in big bold letters on their shirts and even on the soles of their shoes if you get a close enough look. These folks basically feel they’re entitled to take 2 seats for the price of one. There are the types who will plop their bag or suitcase, or even their legs upon the seat next to them, not allowing for anyone else to sit. And when you do ask, the person looks at you as though you imposed on them! I will oftentimes continue standing rather than endure the trouble of sitting down. It’s embarrassing when an elderly person stands while an available seat is taken by somebody’s backpack. You’d think people would know better, but it gives us reason to be on the lookout for that word written on the sole of the shoe: Entitlement. And it continues in different ways. Someone brings in a radio and blasts it though the windows, never asking the rest of us if we like the song or the radio station. It’s as though the rest of us are deaf and can’t possibly object to a loud radio on the commute home, after enduring eight or more hours of a computer screen, or an office of chattering idiots, or shoveling shit or flipping hamburgers. Why would we object to a loud radio on the way home on a packed city bus?

Some people you encounter on the bus have physical problems. Some have to rely on wheelchairs and canes. Others have problems, and seem to make it a point to address them on the city bus filled with passengers. I remember one commute home where I encountered a funny sight. I sat next to a man of about 50. His hair was coarse, extremely so. When I looked closer, I noticed it was a toupee. It was very poorly constructed. It could’ve easily been the cover of the lid of a toilet. I looked closer and the toupee had white flakes falling off like winter snow. His toupee had dandruff! It was on his shoulders and thighs. I shook my head and got off 3 stops later. I’ve seen people pick their noses and placing its contents on a rail or wall, with the care of someone placing a chip inside a computer. I’ve seen insects crawl off one guy’s leg onto another guy’s leg. I’ve seen another guy with a horrendous toupee on the “N” train, but his was slightly better because it appeared to be dandruff-free.

The absolute worst experience I’ve had was coming home on the “N” train. The train was nearly empty when a white man, about 45-50, boarded at a downtown stop. I sat in a single-seat, tired from the stupid day and the stupid job. The fellow wore a coat, which hadn’t been cleaned in a while and he pulled a laundry basket filled with old newspapers. He approached me and announced to me in his official tone, “This is an area for handicapped passengers.” I looked at him thinking, So? He stood over me and I said, “Why don’t you sit in one of those seats?” I pointed to at least 10 available seats in our compartment, but the man insisted on having my seat. “You look healthy to me,” I said. “I have a broken back! Now you get out of that seat right now you immigrant!” I looked at the man and thought that if he truly had a broken back, he would be bed-ridden and not hassling me. I sat and continued looking at him. “Get out of that seat now you son of a bitch.” Rage frothed from his lips. His face was somewhat close to mine and I felt a drop of spittle hit me on my lower lip. It was the type of spittle which normally renders a person silent; for fear of embarrassing the spitter. For some reason, that spittle, that random particle burned into me like fire. I lifted my leg in my seated position, and deposited a kick into his backside. A hard kick. He landed at the foot of the automatic door. My adrenaline was full-throttle. “Driver, Driver!” the man yelled. He continued to yell until the train came to a halt. I’m sure he was examining the words on the sole of my shoe while down there on the ground: Entitlement.

And believe me, he was.

HORROR POETRY

The Face of Death

By Ana Trask

I would never have awoken

if it wasn’t for the smell–

that most pungent of aromas

that I’ve grown to know so well.

It assaulted all my senses,

in a most immoral way.

I almost cried from vomiting,

tasting entrails and decay.

After moments I looked up,

from my spot on the damp floor,

and saw a bloody heap of flesh

lying broken near the door.

Somehow I invoked the courage

to investigate the mess.

It was a female body, hacked,

with formidable excess.

The head was nowhere to be found,

and I searched the tiny room.

I found it underneath the bed,

exuding poisonous perfume.

I embraced the shattered head,

that was drenched with Death’s red wine.

Even though the face was slashed,

I recognized that it was mine.

I don’t know how long it’s been

since I’ve been stuck in this room,

clutching this head, paralyzed–

an eternity of doom.

Confeitur

Dan I. Radakovich

The story is quite simple—very simple—for you see,

A man who is a coward finds it hopeless to be free.

His dreams by fear are stifled and his actions are enchained;

His spirit burden-shackled and his draughts of liquid pain.

His failures seem cemented and all victories grow pale

Whilst all motion is made circular by ennui's dull gale.

The thunder loud and sulphurous clatters like an empty can, as

The soul slowly, softly shreddens in this shadow of a man.

Any shout of battles gained inspires no more leaping chord

Within the heart's dry husk when in the prison of the bored.

Tales of heroism, cynicism, satire fall unheard

As the circlet wrought of silence heeds no voicing of a word.

Once enwrapped, entombed, encircled he is losing his life's glow,

Feels the heinous, horrid rictus have its hideous grin grow

On the face that faintly flickers in the mind's imminent end

And on bony fingers forging into cruel hooks that rend

The tesselated pattern of his life and bleach it blank,

While the breath of life now stopping grows more noisome, vile, and rank.

A stillness without ending drums throughout the rigid corpse

When the quiet words are spoken—heard—"of Lazarus, come forth."

And the greatest tool of darkness shatters in its clutching hand

As the horror-state of walking-dead is lifted from the man.

Lament the Living, Loathe the Dead

Composed by Duriiel in the year of our Lord two-thousand and six

http://www.duriiel.com/

“LAMENT THE LIVING, LOATHE THE DEAD”

upon the tomb that starkly read

an epitaph which rest’d the head

the vaguest name among the dead

in fervent gray and tired red:

CURSED TONGUE WITH STUPID RHYME

BOUND BY HEAVEN, WROUGHT BY TIME

A TEMP’RAL LIFE OF TOOTH AND HIDE

A FAIR SUBSISTENCE LIFE DENIED

AMID THE PEACEFUL COUNTRYSIDE

And with their slightest lapse in care

the preternatural curse would bear

the promise of the revenant’s tomb

to seep out of its earthen womb

rotting in a rotted shell

East of Eden, West of Hell

to steal across the countryside

unto the safe asleep inside

delivering its sweet demise

And etched into the stony depth

the face’s tomb now grimly read

in fervent gray and tired red:

“LOATHE THE LIVING, LAMENT THE DEAD”

Nightmare

By Michael Reitema

The creatures of the darker realm—

companions in this trying time—

have given voice to funeral bells

that stab at me with razored chimes.

Running through the empty streets

with bleeding ears and broken arms

and blisters on my naked feet,

my body, splintering, falls apart.

The rising light will reveal it:

the beast of darkness gathered around

and feasting on my rended flesh,

as my life spreads across the rocky ground.

The blood of all the things I have done wrong

will fill the river banks of coming dawn.

Faster

By Sophya Vidal

Night closes in,

my steps echo across the cobble stone road.

I feel something behind me.

“Faster,” I think and huddle in my warm wool coat.

The street light flickers—a glimpse out of the corner of my eye.

My heart is pounding, as the smell of the city fills my mind.

“Faster,” I think as night closes in,

huddling in my warm wool coat.

The street light flickers as my footsteps echo.

I feel something behind me—a glimpse out of the corner of my eye.

So loud is my heart; so strong is the smell.

I slowly turn to face my attacker.

No one is there. My Shadow closes in.

Inner Linguist

By Scott M. Sparling

The Blood comes out in splashings

from my fore arms’ brand new gashings,

as I sit and cry while laughing

on the bathroom linoleum.

“I don’t remember doing!”

I scream as Blood’s accruing;

It’s crawling, slowly moving,

dripping, pumping requiem.

I sit in the warm puddle

in the corner, tightly huddled

and I cry out, still befuddled,

“Who has done this act to me?”

And then I answer back

through that narrow mental crack,

“I’m to blame for the attack!”

Oh, the cheerful blasphemy.

And I laugh and sit and cry a bit

and wrestle hard with all my wit

to try and understand all it.

But it doesn’t make much sense.

“I cannot question and then reply

to my own question because I

am surely not that insane!” I cry.

“And surly not that dense!”

Then I hear myself answering

in a gentle voice that’s whirring

and still inside me stirring.

“That’s why I slit your wrist!”

And in the Blood’s reflection

I see my face’s imperfection.

I see someone else’s reaction.

That revealing inner linguist.

POETRY

Collection of Poems

By Bill Perryman

8

No inception of start
closed without ending
looping in circle
ceaseless solitude,
Infinity's hourglass
sand influx
refilling itself
within these 8 lines

TRUER WORDS NEVER SPOKEN

Still in warm embrace
lying in the tranquility of
ecstasy's afterwards.
My tongue too drunken
by imbibing so deeply
from your love wine,
now beading between
nectar moistened lips
of Venus.

So without
utterance,
I let my gaze of
adoration,
my smile in the
delightment
that is you
alone,
make my conveyance
genuine.

THE ENIGMA OF HIS MUSE

By Bill Perryman

Pallid requests seeking residence therein
being repelled by his own banalities
of lauding this capricious mistress
syntax upon syntax,
building this very pedestal
from which, on up high
She reposes,
deaf and inattentive
to all, but
Herself;
soul entwined with mind,
beauty mirrored in purpose.

Reflecting his writer's vanity
in admission
that once still waters
merely damned,
awaiting to surge forth,
are now evaporated in
his desert of self-doubt.

Partnered now,
not prisoner,
Her inspiration ascends
mortal coilings of
once random phrasings.
Mismatched meter
suddenly step in step,
streaking from transcendent thought
to fingertips hastening
the words outward,
racing his Muse's
eventual, inevitable
dissipation.

Cursing Her
until his mind's open arms
find embrace again,
in Her bedroom eyes’
shine of vacancy,
welcoming him
to Her bosom of creativity.

© Copyright Bill Perryman

MUSIC NOTES FROM A FOGEY

My view askewed on the
electronic glass teat of
angry young white men
[w]rapping themselves in
ebonic skins/phrases
they were not
by birth bestowed.
Down home Country songbird divas,
of the wide open spaces,
unattired in garments
their fellow Pop queens
would modestly shy from.
Head bobbing stadium filled throngs,
a generation deafened by excess
punching them in the chest.
Though its vacuous message
never reaches
either their minds or hearts.
Leaving me commensurately
headphoned in stereophonic
companionship
with MY music,
reverbing back to a time of
the time honored stamp
of my own parents’ disapproval.

© Copyright Bill Perryman

I DREAMT I WAS A POEM
{ with proper acknowledgment to Adrienne Rich }

I dreamt I was
a poem.
With prose wildly sublime,
a cadence of truth
perceived
by one, by all.
Women blushed aglow,
not the least bit offended,
by the revealing mysteries
of lore,
I now did know.
Men nodding
in grunts of
mutual agreement
at the wisdom
contained in my
rhythmic rhyme.

I spoke in the tone
of endless waves
that crested beaches
of humanity
beginning and distant.
From nurseries
of the newborn,
to the elderly
cared for in
homes not their own.

Drifting from slumber
to awakening,
that exultation of expression
was now stilled.
In its passing
I wept
penned tears,
soaking and running off
the paper
in pursuit
of that time of
wishful enchantment,
when I dreamt this most
beauteous dream,
that I was
a poem.

© Copyright Bill Perryman

                       SINGULAR MIRRORED

                                           STARTING
                                                OFF
                                                 ON
                                            STOPPING
                                                 LOUD
                                               SPEECH
                                               FULLY,
                                               emptied
                                                  mute
                                               writing
                                                  from
                                                   me
                                                    to
                                                   you

© Copyright Bill Perryman

                                       CRANK OF DAWN

Seated in this square chest
resplendently attired in cross-bone vest,
lies a pious pirate awaiting
the turning handle to be escaping,
striking that one lone note to cull,
commencing in his stern arrival.

    "Gallows Jack-I'n-be,
scuttling treacherous rogues like’n
scouring sea.
Let no lies flee
from lips of thee,
lest ye desire be
naught of mercy
from one, such as me.

I come ‘fore
time of yore, waters
sopped in gore.
Where a soul shredding gale,
like’n fevered wail
did reach mine sail.
Maroonin' me to this hell,
encased in the depths of here lacquered shell.

From that time on,
me mortal guise be gone.
Fresh passage at the
crank of ev’r dawn,
crow-ey'd view of
evil's pawn.

So draw ye near,
let me into yer whites peer.
If ye be havin' a
conscience clear,
ye have'n naught
to fear
of what ye seek in such
as me,
         Gallows Jack-I'n-be ."

The Gleaning

By Kaye Belcher

Deep within briers and brambles

father and I sit

a white bucket beneath me

I search through

flawed fingers to find

the perfect blackberry

A cloud of gnats buzz between us

unfazed father's hand

gives a dismissive whirl

his bucket moves closer

Brier blood collects in my fingernails

mingles with indigo juice

and I absently lick it away

over a cliff where nobody sees

father's hand upon my thigh

Deep within briers and brambles

father and I sit

a white bucket beneath me

my voice the perfect blackberry

slipping through flawed fingers

COLLECTION OF POEMS

BY EDUARDO PLASENCIA

But Mostly Bullshit

By Eduardo Plasencia

Sheep with eyes wide open,

a tolerance of life or

whatever makes it that much faster.

It’s kind of sad if you think about it,

but if you don’t then it makes sense;

I know I can’t be trusted with my life.

The portal to another dimension

thrives on your fear of it.

So with that said, drunken monks are fun,

but midgets in Speedos are forever.

Glamour

By Eduardo Plasencia

Syndrome surfacing to grab your reality,

a quick intoxicating stare to impair mentalities.

One life to live,

two eyes to see through,

a government to fuck us all,

but that’s getting off the subject.

Substance and disease and corporation, swimming in everyday transactions

as kids continue to drink their milk

or if lactose intolerant,

juice instead.

Better yet,

HIV, ADD, depression,

whatever MTV’s new trend is,

getting food to us

and our society hungry for more.

So Concludes Our Evening

By Eduardo Plasencia

9:41 PM, looking at all the dirty clothing

on my bedroom floor;

they have been there for over a month now.

I saw my fat body in the mirror;

I look like a 400-pound pregnant woman.

No female can find me attractive,

No education, no job, no future,

but in a bullshit moment like this

it’s the least of my worries.

Then I turn the lights off for a more mutual feeling;

she’s sorry for not making my birthday “Happy,”

and added, “but that was yesterday,

and tonight is tonight!”

I thought of nothing or something close to nothing;

I realized she was so fuckin’ right.

Then I replied, “And tomorrow will be tomorrow.”

I said goodbye, hung up, scratched my nuts,

and that was it.

The Running Wall

By Patrick Norton

Residents tried to clean floodwater receded.

Hundreds of homes spilling over their banks,

towns remained.

Inches of rain: flash flood as the first rain rose debris,

shut down the Interstate.

The River crested and an unknown number of residents left in emergency shelters.

The Wall is some 10 miles deep.

After cutting south, only settlements:

towns near ghettos, thus severing

communities surrounded into military closures.

The Wall closed the West. 90% of the Wall’s intentions

prolonged the threat of flooding as the first wave inundated

many areas back within as the forecasted rain,

a threat of busy moving rock and region.

"We got hit very hard, are shoveling out."

In spite of the Wall, the rain, the broken muddy river: The stage largely spared.

Efforts challenging after an avalanche were blamed on the annex at the northernmost bank.

To the north of, and at points east/west, thereafter stretched through:

the loss of hermetic personal property.

On the still expanding settlement, shorn sand and swamp grass

in two days washed up across thick layers of the business district.

Officials were to evacuate at a falling tree.

Runs through the western shore, built on or near,

right into the neighborhood’s heart

where it connects the running Wall,

devastated every aspect which provided their sustenance.

As the Wall grew, washed away, became isolated:

an enclave, checkpoint, imprisonment, closure.

"We're not that concerned this water. It's wonderful."

Frantic Searching

By Thomas Saunders

The poetry was not there anymore,

I checked four times, all the drawers

were empty.

I found lungs emptied of their song

in the pantry, and the vocal chords

were puking in the bathroom.

The computer screen was full of porn,

and the word processor had

gone out for a drink.

The books had all slit their throats

and the alphabet dripped from the

library shelves, puddling on the ground.

I called an old friend who

was always good for a poem

and got the machine.

The drawers were empty,

I went to bed hungry.

Tomorrow I will do without poetry,

I repeated to myself.

Tomorrow I will do without poetry.

Progress

By A. Nan Emyss

Progress feels awesome:

an ending to the struggles

I have overcome.

Problems in jingles

sorted into their places

as geese in gaggles;

each the same paces

as geese before and behind,

drawing their sky ace.

Each goose will be lined

as words written in a poem:

each wing is in grind

till their destiny they’ve come.

--A. Nan Emyss

A note about the poem:

This was written after a day on which I had a weird creative spell that was just poetry: several pieces that each cover a different topic and are written with different styles and characteristics. I felt a certain amount of pride in each because they all seemed to have potential to be something good—not forced, not downright terrible, and not anything that I needed to write off as being experimental (no offense to those who like experimental—I have seen some that I strongly appreciate). Each was a decent rough draft that only needed minor touch ups.

This started as a haiku and grew (rhyme not intended right here). It’s been edited by myself a few times: the first stanza can no longer function as a haiku due to lacking a nature reference, the last stanza was always four lines, and the whole piece has a rhyme scheme. It’s now no longer even a string of haikus but it works and expresses my mood better.

Go to Humdinger Literary E-zine.

Go Home.

Collection of Poems

By Tony Robles

White Power Poem

By Tony Robles

He had it

tattooed on

his forearm

the begbugs

had covered

his body and

mind with bites

Soon his white

power tattoo

was covered

the heat was

out and his room

felt like a meat

freezer

The others

had been

bitten too

They had

black power

brown power

yellow power

red power

tattooed on various

areas of their

bodies

They were

all cold

and bitten

The landlord

responded with

a letter

delivered by

wind power

The landlord's

power tattooed

everywhere

The people are

cold and

bitten

but not

beaten

Time to

bite the

power

Winner by TKO

By Tony Robles

I remember the years my father
worked as a janitor
for the city
and county

Kids at school would ask,
”What does your
father do?”

”Building repair” or

“Maintenance,” I’d usually
reply

I went on a date with
a beautiful Indian
girl when I was in
high school

We had a
good time

A movie
and popcorn

When she found out
my father was a janitor,
she told her
mom

She never dated
me again

She was gone but my
Father’s job was still
there

He cleaned toilets
sometimes with
and sometimes
without gloves

And of course, some fella
I didn’t even know
swept up the popcorn
me and the Indian girl
left behind

My father taught
me to clean toilets,
wash windows,
mop floors and
vacuum carpets

Nice wide
strokes

(To make a good impression)

He started his own small
janitorial
company

A 2-man team,
he and I

He was an entrepreneur,
hustling new
accounts

He took supplies from
his regular 8-hour job
and applied them to his
new business

A free supply of toilet
bowl-cleaner, floor wax,
toilet paper and plastic
garbage bags

Lots of powerful countries
engaged in the same type
of thing throughout history

Taking resources that do not
belong to them
and accumulating wealth
based on it

My father made a
few bucks

And I had a roof over
my head and food
in my gut.

I think of this on the
train heading for my
downtown office job

My father lives
in Hawaii
now

He doesn’t do
janitorial work
anymore

Works in a hotel
replacing light bulbs
and other related tasks

He works 3 hours
a day, tops,
gets paid for 8

Spends his time
creating
art

He makes collages
by cutting pictures
from magazines discarded
by the rich folks

He’s kept it up
through the jobs
through the years

keeping the
fight
alive

His first art
exhibition
just passed

It was a
success

I guess what I’m
trying to say,

without fanfare
or fancy words

or having to
raise my father’s
hand in the air
in victory

is this:

Dad,
you won