Days of Madness 4

by Chris Allinotte

  ***

  Mr. Miller groaned at the news of Buster getting run over by a car. He’d paid 20 bucks for the dog, and couldn’t afford another one at the moment, but made a point to start saving again for her birthday. He mentioned it to Patty Newton across the street and asked if Sarah would like to come over and play with Lucy-Lou while he was at work.

  The doorbell rang, and Mrs. Miller went to answer it. As soon as she did, Sarah ran into the house.

  “Hi Lucy!  I’m Sarah. Can I see your room?”

  “My name’s Lucy-Lou.”

  Sarah paused at Lucy-Lou’s curtness, but a smile grew over Lucy-Lou’s face.

  “It’s upstairs,” Lucy-Lou said, pointing. She and Sarah ran upstairs gleefully talking of dolls along the way.

  “I’m sorry for the intrusion,” Patty said. “I spoke with Allen this morning. He told me what happened to Buster. I’m terribly sorry. We thought maybe Lucy-Lou would like someone to play with, maybe help take her mind off things.”

  Mrs. Miller caught her breath. “Well, yes, that’s kind of you.”  She glanced up the stairway, weighing if a play date were such a good idea. She turned back to Patty. “I suppose that would be all right. I’ll make them some cookies.”

  “Wonderful. I’ll come get Sarah at lunch time.”

  “Sure. Thank you,” Mrs. Miller said. She waved good-bye, shut the door, and then angled a sharp ear towards Lucy-Lou’s room. When she heard only giggles, she gave a heavy sigh, and went into the kitchen to start the cookies. After they finished baking, she brought a heaping plate of them and two glasses of milk upstairs to Lucy-Lou’s room. The girls had stopped giggling, and Sarah crouched herself into a corner of the bedroom.

  “Is everything okay, Sarah?  Lucy-Lou?”

  “Yes, mother. We were playing hide-and-seek. Thanks for the cookies.”

  “You’re welcome. I’ll be downstairs.”

  As soon as Mrs. Miller shut the door, Lucy-Lou turned to Sarah.

  “I have a secret. Do you want to see it?”

  The clacking sound of teeth biting echoed out. Sarah shook her head and climbed beneath Lucy-Lou’s bed. Lucy-Lou kneeled down and peered underneath. She held out the plate of cookies. “Sooner or later, you’re gonna have to come out.”

  Honey Trapp

  Absolutely*Kate

  Intelligence was being worked to wrap around policy. Word around streetcorners conjuring desire was --That’s why they called in Honey.Smokey too. The gals from Glissando were agency tops. Only overt success measured how swell these dazzling dames exceeded sexpectations. Their tactics? Well – those weren’t up for overt scrupulations. The top gals whom the Chief personally signed Requisitions #8643 and #8644 for from Glissando, Honey Trapp and Smokey Blue, worked undercover under covers. They gave ‘comforter’ and ‘no sheet’ a whole new context feel.

  1

  “I’ll meet you at The Moon.”

  “Same place? Dinner at eight?”

  “Nope, Cliché Girl. Actually, Konrad wants us to meet for further instructions at a new venue. Break tradition. Start fresh and hit the ground running, well -- strutting our stuff as this case may be,” spoke Smokey Blue, soft and direct where her bluetooth conveyed copacetic confidence. Smokey stood five-feet-eleven atop dove-grey suede Jimmy Choos, but when she leaned against the plaster pilaster inside the Romanesque exhibit at the Met, she was closer to five-nine-and-a-half. Style may slouch, but Smokey’s espionage skills never did. They were sharp, they were direct, they were on-target alluring – the stuff of secret-procuring, false information planting, and asset-stroking in all handlings of the handler’s way. Her dossier was red-stamped ‘Prima-Perfecta’ her second year at Glissando and she moved up the hired hierarchy with vim and vigor. The academy’s Russian culture instructor, Vim Vigorsky, predicted Smokey the illusion-force to ~ Go. . .all . . . the . . . way. Dah! Speciba!

  And she did. Right into Special Agent Secret Services – S.A.S.S – as covert cover girl on determent duty. That’s where she met Glissando’s ace of no traces, Honora Isadora Trapp. The master spy-mistress went by Honey Izz for short, went for assignments for love of long shots. Honey relished staying-power, and knew how to relinquish it. S-l-o-w-l-y. The two lovelies were like butter and cream when they met on the Life Is But A Dream operation. Honey, the buxom blonde stalking cliché, and Smokey, the pearly-skinned raven allurist, posed as actresses-in-their-roles to move more than screengems out of The Sundance Festival to expat sleeper-agents, Irving and Beryl Lynne at Cannes. After the assignment was filmed, putting the kibosh on a bogus diamond smuggling ring in the process, it got funny when Honey got nominated for a supporting role by both the Academy and BAFTA. Smokey proved herself the jaunty gal-pal jokester, twisting the arm of their French director, Marc DuManne, to go commando ‘neath sprayed-on gold lame´ lacquer, rap-rap-rapping on Honey’s door, offering himself up as a gilded fellow named Oscar looking for his Greatest Night.

  Honey gave him the night-of-all-nights and didn’t mind what she realmed in return. (Marc, for his part, declared he saw stars.) Late next morning, Honey rang up Smokey Emmaline Blue, extending an invitation to lunch and laughs. The ladies liquored and lingered past three Red Sun margaritas at Maxim’s, swapped stories of how-I-got-into-this-business-in-the-first-place and took note of the fine measure they took of each other. Worthy comrades over any advancing adversaries, they became.

  Now they were hooked-up to be be bait in a bigger fishin’ game. Foreign affairs was what whiff of action Smokey had smoked out and Honey affirmed she’d ferreted fairly the same. Not one for hesitation, Honey halted Smokey’s case contemplation, “You gonna blurt where we’ll meet or does my taxi circle aimlessly ‘til it runs ripshod ‘round yours?”

  Smokey laughed. A delectable laugh. Unarched spine from the pilaster of her pillar, surveillance point for staking-out Della the Dilettante, a dainty dilly-dallier roaming romance and classic cliché art thievery, returning-to-scene-of-crime-clues at the Met. Gathering up a beaded jet-black cardigan and scarlet-red Kate Spade messenger bag, Smokey let slender hips set pace in place as Jimmy Choos chose beeline to front entrance. She returned Honey’s sass while click-clack-clicking a fast clip over gold marble floor slabs, avoiding the main metal detector with more Silly Putty over her snubnose .45 than nonchalance, “No silly. Don’t call a cab a cab until you really need to. From where I think you are right now, should intel be riding ripshod over radar, you can make it in a brisk walk – even a slinky saunter should you be inclined for extolling your strolling.”

  “Get on with it girl. Where’s Konrad want us to show for our next show?”

  “Little bistro. Doin’ big business. Bella Luna Bakery & Savoury. It’s a luncheonette serving delish – ”

  Honey cut her off like a password. Brief, curt, to the point of the point, “Fine. I’ll meet you at The Moon.

  2

  Mad Man in the Moon

  “That’s the guy?”

  “That’s the guy.”

  “Looks OK to me. Up and up, blue serge suit, surging up front. He looks easy to please.”

  “Looks are deceiving.”

  Smoky sighed. “You get all your wisdom off Amazon book blurbs and boxtops?”

  Honey held her own, “You’d crack open seeming illusions too, if it happened to you.”

  “What? What happened?”

  Silence.

  The man in the Moon moved. Stepped forward. Extended his hand. Reached eagerly towards each girl sent to him from Glissando, extending his other hand. It was then the third hand appeared. From ‘neath folds of his rumpled black London Fog.

  The girls had been well-counseled in expecting what they didn’t expect to expect in any scenario, so neither changed sparks of gazes at an extra body-freak-part reaching into their partnership. Folks in The Moon did though. Started screaming. Rushing. Anything to cut away from their savoury bakery bills. The Moon lost a lot of dough that day.

  “I’m Max,” the three-armed man in The Mo
on stated simply, smoothly. “I was told you ladies know how to pull a caper with fewest questions asked, the least hesitation and an ease in fulfillment surpassing all other services. And I hear tell,” he paused for effect, quirking his left bleached brow, “you have a cornucopia on the entrée menu when services are offered.”

  Honey responded first -- a natural at taking the lead as well as the payoff – a bulging manila envelope, such as the third hand held. Simultaneously, she gripped his first palm and smiled into grey-silver eyes not as cold as they calculated. Those peepers – danced, they actually danced. This guy was finding something funny in –

  “Charmed to meet you, I’m sure,” Smokey dolled out, gripping hand two, pecking the guy’s cheek, leaving a Revlon DNA pucker-smear to be picked up by Glissando’s global-tracking-system. “And yes, we deliver capers swell. Your words on the street peal true. Now, Mr man in The Moon, what is it precisely we can do for You?"

  3

  Madness, Sheer Madness

  The caper involved invisibility. The caper involved revenge. The caper set into motion terror that might have no end. The gals from Glissando, Honey Trapp and Smokey Blue, were hired to entice. What – rather ‘whom’ they were hooked as bait for, was not that nice. A professional nemesis, the client Max methodically explained, crumbling croissant after croissant after flaky croissant between three hyperactive hands. A mad scientist as clichés have their day, stealing medical testing technology capable of replicating superfulous appendages where before was but yearning ‘neath untainted skin. Maximillian Trostle had tried, under collective guise of the USDA, Global World Health and CNN to bring him in, halt his HUGE -- Human-Unlicensed-Guineapig-Experimentation. Those earnest gambles rolled no dice. He was chloryophormed, given his third hand for – strong-arming intervention. The mad scientist’s maniacal humor? Accessory to crimes of purloined laboratory and undocumented testing components.

  The gals from Glissando powwowed inner minds double-quick. Unreadable their facial expressions. Took the case. Two keen, gleaned, honed and toned able-bodied minds against one mad vile one – “Odds are even in our favour,” they told Max, shaking hands, and hand again.

  “One glitch,” Max divulged, “before you really commit.”

  “Glitch?” Smokey demurred.

  “Glitches are modis operandi where madness comes playing. No prob,” Honey quipped.

  Max cleared his throat. Nervous tic edged his right cheek into a clockface. “Uh, you were told foreign affairs are involved in this case, correct?”

  The gals from Glissando nodded.

  “Well, this guy’s out of this world.”

  “Like I said, no prob,” Honey splattered, impatient to get going. “Mad men are.”

  Max Trostle gyrated his noggin, scoped the emptied-out Bella Luna Bakery & Savoury, lowered his whisper to dusk, “This guy’s from Gliese 667, in the constellation Scorpious. Been there much? Oh, and he’s invisible. It’s clearly a case of sheer madness.

  4

  Maidens vs Madness

  Global allure is another enticement game altogether, but Honey Trapp was pendulating for orbit. She gripped Smokey’s smoky gaze. Double-dog-dared, “Gal, you gonna let a little thing like the Earth ground you? C’mon – it’ll be a breeze.”

  Transport was arranged. NASA launched S.A.S.S.

  Surreptitiously. No broadcast news at 11.

  Glissando on Gliese proved no contest. One of the girls beckoned. One morphed.

  Honey dripped.

  It was a very sticky situation.

  Once they’d outlined their invisible operation, special cosmic tracking forces took over.

  Hand over hand they got their man, defused the ectoplasm of his apparatus.

  Score another for Glissando.

  Perfectly Indifferent

  Benjamin Sobieck

  Another midnight alone by the fire outside, the darkness surrounding me worn thin by the flames like an old tire. Brandy in one hand. Pistol in the other. Nothing but thoughts of the day's work done. Nothing but the spasms scrambling along my muscles like dying rats. Nothing but the dry burn stinging my eyes from the heat of the blaze. I refuse to blink. Because someone has sat down across from me. Someone I didn't invite.

  Someone with eyes as vacant as mine. Someone with white orbs suspended between the flames like fleshy marshmallows. Someone with eyes almost human. Almost not. Almost my imagination.

  "Who are you?" I say. "Why are you here?"

  The eyes blink and squint in response. I detect a grin in their posture, but it could be my mind filling in the space.

  I don’t care for games, though. Except the ones I play for myself. No company allowed. My thin patience shifts attention to the pistol dangling in my lazy hand.

  "I have a gun," I say. "I can use it."

  "I know," says the voice on the other side of the fire.

  The voice is like a child talking down to her feet. I scan the night. No child. Only eyes.

  There are no other words after that. Maybe it was the brandy talking.

  "Speak or I'll shoot," I say.

  I hear nothing in reply except the rusting of the night.

  I aim the pistol between the eyes and pull the trigger. That ought to do it.

  The gun goes off, but nothing happens to the eyes. The orbs just stare at me. They look like two teardrops from the full, pale moon, tugging at me with the steady hunger of gravity. Like how I stare at my life on fiery evenings like this one.

  "What is it you want?" I say.

  "I want you to die in a horrible way," the voice says. "I want you to suffer terrible things. I want you to feel the pain you put me through. I know your secret."

  One of my victims, no doubt, has found my sanctuary in the woods. The place I go to light fires at night outside and think. Think about why I do the things I do, and to once again receive no answer. No reply from anyone or anything. Just a fire. And me. And brandy. And this pistol. And the grand indifference of the universe up top.

  Until tonight.

  "So we've met before, have we?" I say.

  "Yes. I was the homeless man you killed. The one you said no one cared about. You told me this before you killed me. About how I don't matter," the voice says.

  "And no one did. You may as well not have existed at all. Bums like you are a penny a person, if even that," I say.

  "That's right. No one cared about me. But I was also the prostitute you strangled, that runaway addicted to meth. Remember her? She grew up so fast in that home, then left too young. Never enjoyed a happy moment her entire life, save for the brief lie you told her to get her into your car," the voice says. "No one even reported her missing. No one cared. Not even her so-called family."

  "That's right. Another easy target," I say. "I suppose next you'll tell me you're the crippled drunk I pushed off the bridge. Or the mentally ill woman at my job in the nursing home I cut with a knife just a little each day until she died. No one gave a fuck about any of them. They were nothing. They should be grateful for the little use I made of them."

  "Yes, I am all of them. No, nobody cared enough about them, not even to organize funerals," the voice says.

  "You’re just telling me things I already know, though," I say. "How about filling me in on who or what you are. A ghost? Or my imagination?"

  "No, I’m not a ghost. You've been coming out here at night, lighting these fires and wondering why, if these impulses are wrong, that no one stops you. You wonder, is it right so long as there are no consequences?" the voice says.

  “Shouldn’t it be right so long as I enjoy myself?” I say. The words slur from the brandy.

  “Stop being so cocky,” the voice snaps.

  “I’m not being cocky,” I say.

  “If you have to ask the question, you’re not so confident.”

  I shift in my chair.

  “Point taken. Got a better answer for me?” I say.

  “It’s your unlucky night. I do,” the voice says.

&nb
sp; "Great. Then tell me. What’s my answer?" I say.

  "There is no good or evil. There just is," the voice says. "But nature, for all its indifference, abhors a vacuum. Everything must be in perfect balance. You can’t get away with killing people forever, even if no one cares they’re dead.”

  “What do you want me to do then, oh holy voice by the fire? Drop to my knees and beg for your forgiveness?” I say.

  “I am not a god. I don't love you. I just hate the vacuum you've created,” the voice says.

  “Good for you. Can’t say I’m too worried, though. It’s not like you’re going to walk over here and beat my ass or anything," I say and sip brandy once, then twice.

  “You’re right. I can’t do anything to you,” the voice says. “But I know something you don’t know.”

  “Oh, yeah? What’s that?”

  "If you can't find justice, it'll find you.”

  “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” I say.

  Then the eyes blink and are gone, dissipating into the smoke.

  Good. I’ve had enough bullshit for one evening. Must’ve drank too much. Time for bed. I pour a fresh cup of brandy, then rise quickly to leave. Too quickly.

  Between the brandy and the late hour, my feet trip as I stand. I tumble forward onto the fire. The brandy douses my body as it spills, cocooning the flames around me.

  I try to lift myself up, but my hand digs into the hot coals for support. I shriek in pain as my other hand scrambles for something cool to grasp. But no one hears my cry. I’m alone in this night. No one cares.

  I try desperately to stand, but my balance is all off. My body only digs deeper into the fire.

  The flames burn away my clothing and flesh the same way it does the tinder and the wood. The air escapes from my lungs to fan the flames. The fire does not stop because it touches human skin. It is what it is, and I am who I am. We are both indifferent and dead by the morning.

  Lifting the Veil

  Park Cooper and Barb Lien

  “I do not know whether any human being has ever lifted that veil; but I do know, Clarke, that you and I shall see it lifted this very night from before another's eyes. You may think this all strange nonsense; it may be strange, but it is true, and the ancients knew what lifting the veil means.”--Arthur Machen

  The next patient to enter Dr. Travers’ office was about 25 years of age, and would have been quite attractive if she didn’t look like she was scared to death about something and probably hadn’t slept for at least two nights. “Miss McDaniel,” said the nurse, handing the doctor the paperwork.

  “I’m here for an abortion,” said Miss McDaniel as soon as the nurse left. “I’ve already been through the paperwork and all the rest in the outer office. I was told it could be today.”

  “You have to have a vaginal ultrasound, to take a look at the baby.”

  “No I don’t. I’ve felt really scared about this pregnancy—it’s felt wrong from the start.” Her words were rapid but very clear, like she was trying to show the doctor that she wasn’t actually being panicky or hasty. “It’s from a one-night-stand who just disappeared the next day, and I never saw or heard from him again, but that’s not the point—I’ve just felt… weird, like something is wrong. I need the abortion. I’m completely sure about that.”

  “Ma’am, it’s the law in this state. You have to have a vaginal ultrasound first, if you want to get an abortion. Since we’re both women, we don’t have to have a nurse in here if you don’t want—

  “Fine. Just you. Let’s hurry up and do that, then.”

  The doctor talked to her about what was going to happen, and Miss McDaniel simply nodded back at her, tight-lipped, to hurry her up—she clearly didn’t care about the details, just wanted it over with, which wasn’t exactly unusual.

  So the ultrasound was initiated. “Here, something’s showing up…” said the doctor. “That’s…a shoulder… that’s… the ribcage… here comes the stomach…” She turned back to her task for a moment.

  “…My god,” said Miss McDaniel. “Is that… a tail?”

  “No, that’s a common mistake—that’ll be the umbilic—“ the doctor turned her head from what she was doing to the screen, and stopped. “Um… that’s … well, it’s a boy…”

  Miss McDaniel pointed to the screen. “No, I’m saying that, there, is that the start of a little tail—

  Doctor Travers looked, too, at where Miss McDaniel was pointing. Neither of them said anything, for some moments. “What do you know about this man who was your one-night-stand?” the doctor finally asked.

  “Greek guy. Ethnic, but very attractive. Name was Xeno. Full name ‘Xeno Aegocerus,’ if I heard him right—he only said it once.” She couldn’t say it, herself, without stumbling over it a little. “Upper-class guy—when I came up to him at the club, he was telling stories about the time he spent partying at his constantly-drunken uncle’s private Greek island… he made it sound fascinating, but there was something about him—”

  “—I’m going to move it lower—” said the doctor.

  “…Before we left and went to my place, he’d had more to drink than I had, though he didn’t act much like it… I was on birth control, but I guess it didn’t—”

  “--The legs look hairy,” interrupted the doctor, “but perhaps that’s just oh my god the legs are—those joints are totally bending the wrong—oh lord, the feet look like—like little split hoov—”

  Miss McDaniel screamed a little scream, and to a lesser extent, so did Doctor Travers.

  They both jumped a bit, too, for somewhat different reasons.

  “What was that,” said the doctor.

  She didn’t expect an answer, but when she turned her eyes away from the screen to look back at her

  patient, she saw that there was one. “It… it kicked…” Miss McDaniel reported.

  “I saw it happen,” said the doctor, “but I-- how long since the one-night-stand?”

  “It’s been 11 weeks.”

  “You sure? It looks bigger, like it’s been a little longer than that—“

  “—It hasn’t.”

  There was more silence again, as they both stared at the screen.

  “…I’ll call the hospital,” said the doctor. “We’ve fulfilled what the law says; now let’s get this done.”

  “…Please,” said Miss McDaniel.

  The Talking Hand

  William Davoll

  I remember how this all started, like it was yesterday. It was the early hours of Christmas morning 1976; I woke to a rustling sound and the rich smell of Christmas paper. Is it just me or did wrapping paper smell different back then, almost like spruce I think. The electricity of anticipation was in the air, as my sleepy eyes adjusted to the dim light of the spare room. I always had to sleep in there when relatives came to stay. The hair at the nape of my neck had caught in the bed springs of the put-me-up, and my follicles burned as I lifted my head from the bed leaving the roots of my hair behind.

  He’d been! Leaving behind what seemed like an acre of gifts in brightly coloured wrapping paper. One stood out from all the others. It was tall like a monolith, and wrapped in striped crepe paper. The gift seemed to bulge and contract in waves, like something inside it was moving.

  As I swung my legs over the edge of the camp bed to get a closer look, the paper on the top of the parcel began to tear, and my breath ran short like downy hairs were growing across the back of my throat and nasal passages.

  As the lid of the gift flapped open, I could see a shock of ginger hair, followed by a permanently furrowed brow and two glassy green eyes, then as the head emerged unaided from the box my hands moved instinctively to support the rest of the body as he lifted himself from the packaging.

  In my arms I held the body of a tiny ginger haired man wearing a tweed suit, his head turned to look at me and in the broadest of Brooklyn accents he said “Hey kid, place your hand inside the hole on my back, there you go that’s it, that’s how w
e do it.” He leaned in as if to conspire with me and whispered “Can you feel that stick? Put your hand on it, that’s how you move my head. Can you feel the cord? You pull on that and my mouth moves, but you don’t need to worry about that.”

  It felt like something was caressing and wrapping around the hand that held the control stick. The little man turned his head and looked me up and down as if he was taking the measure of me, and asked “What’s your name kid?”

  “M, mm, M, Michael” I stammered.

  “Nice name kid, but from now on you will be called Mumble, because it’s not your job to talk. I'm Michael now, but you can call me Mickey; Mickey da Mouth.”

  A pang of fear grasped at me and my hand tried to let go of Mickey’s control stick, but something sharp and strong dug into the back of my hand making my grip tighter, and causing me to cry out in pain.

  “Don’t let go kid, bad things will happen if you let go, and trust me bad things will happen!” The words fell from Mickey’s mouth as a threat, and in my mind I could see only misery and pain if I didn't comply. I knew then he was not someone to be disobeyed.

  Christmas morning came and went with Mickey holding court, first with my parents then Aunty Edith and her husband Uncle Pete. Other relatives followed as we got closer to dinner time. All seemed impressed by my newly acquired skill. No one seemed to notice; I was still wearing my Pyjamas, and hadn't spoken without the help of Mickey for the whole morning.

  It seemed Mickey had cast a spell on the grown-ups, and I was staring in on my life from the outside, I had no control over what I said, or did any more. By now the Christmas drinks were flowing freely, and Mickey excused us from the lounge to get a drink of our own. Alone in the kitchen Mickey’s mood turned away from the raconteur that had entertained the adults. His face contorted “We've got things to do Mumble, open the cupboard under the sink” He stank of whiskey and Urine, and something bitter. I just wanted to get away, but knew I had to do as he asked, or face any consequences.

  “Now let’s see what we have here.” his hands pushed at the contents of the cupboard, a place I wasn't supposed to go in. “That’s it! Pick up that packet the one with the rats on it”, he menaced. On the cooker the vegetables were boiling, their pan lids rattling, almost like they were shaking in fright, knowing what was coming next.

  I took the lid from the first pan and emptied in some of the poison, and watched as it dissolved in the furious boiling water. When I had worked my way around all the pans, Mickey made me put the box carefully back in the cupboard.

  When it was time to sit down for dinner, I could only sit at the table watching as the grown-ups made ravenous by the seasonal drinking cleared their plates and went back for seconds. The only one missing from the feast was Uncle Pete, he had been the most enthusiastic at drinking Dads whisky, and was sleeping it off in the lounge.

  Dad was the first to expire. He started shaking; slowly at first, but soon his tongue swelled up and tried to escape his face, eyes bulging as he choked and turned blue. The initial shock and concern from those at the table soon turned to panic for their own lives as each one convulsed in a purple haze of death.

  The commotion woke Uncle Pete, panicked by the sight that greeted him and still half asleep, he ran out of the house to the phone box at the end of the street forgetting we had a phone in the hall.

  When the police came they asked questions, they were tough on Uncle Pete, pointing out that using a phone box, could be seen as a deliberate attempt to delay help arriving. They were gentle with me though, they even suggested I use my ventriloquist doll to detach myself from the horror of what I had witnessed. Of course Mickey did all the talking.

  They asked me who gave me the doll; Mickey made his voice sound scared when he spoke "Uncle Pete, Pervy Pete bought me to keep Michael quiet." I bowed my head in shame unable to speak, but Mickey knew what to say  "Shhh! Michael mustn't tell, everyone’s gone now so here’s a gift to keep You quiet, you mustn't tell, Shhh!"

  I never saw Uncle Pete again after that, they put me into care, and they even took Mickey away from me, because he was evidence.

  I tell you all this because the Jury need to know my past, so the truth today can be heard. I've not seen him for thirty seven years, and hearing his voice again today on the video link still strikes terror into me. They say things come full circle, and that’s why your honour I can with all confidence protest my innocence. I know all the fancy psychoanalysis devices that are used these days and so does he. No I'm not pointing at the kid; I'm pointing at Mickey da Mouth; the thing that you think is just a ventriloquist doll in his hand. You think it’s a device to help a victim surface the truth. Well I tell you now; he has a vendetta against me. I know that’s not really a doll, it can really talk; it can make people do things. That’s not the victim talking, it’s Mickey and he tells lies.

  Five Hundred and Twenty Six Sugar Pills

  Mav Skye

  Addie slid her feet into pink slippers and tied the housecoat about her waist. She walked to the bedroom window, and pulled back the white lace curtains. It was snowing outside, a wet heavy snow, covering the ground like slushy paint.

  Snow is cold, her sister had told her, very cold. Stay inside when it snows. That was fine with Addie, she liked to be warm. It was good to be warm.

  The furnace lit up, and blew heat at her feet. Her housecoat and night slip billowed around her legs. If Addie had left her housecoat off, she might resemble Monroe in the Seven Year Itch. This made her cackle and she stood there for a minute, enjoying the warmth.

  Just then, she remembered that she had left her favorite sweater in the wash, and would need to put it in the dryer. It also needed ironing before… before what?

  Hmmm…

  She left her bedroom and glanced at the gothic corner table. It was ebony. Deep, intricate carvings of ivy covered all three legs. Her sister had found it at a garage sale. A steal of a deal, they both called it. Above the table hung a round mosaic mirror with glass flecks the color of amber, rubies and sapphire. The mirror reflected a face, but she didn’t know whose. Addie quickly glanced away from it, down to the table, where she opened the single drawer and retrieved writing paper and a pen.

  She brought them into the kitchen and set them on the small dinette. She sat, tapping the pen against her chin, then rose and went to the coffee pot, dumping out yesterday’s grounds, and refilling with a fresh tablespoon of her favorite: Helena’s Grand.

  Addie wiped at the sink with a dishtowel, buffing out the watermarks. When she was satisfied, she glanced out the window. Fat plops of snow hit the ground. Then, as she heard the last sputters of the coffee filling the pot, Addie lifted a yellow mug with purple butterflies off the mug tree, and poured herself a cup. She measured one teaspoon of sugar and one teaspoon of creamer and mixed them both into the steaming brew.

  She brought the mug to the table, wrapped her housecoat more snugly about her, and sipped at the coffee, then set it down next to her pen and writing paper. She picked up the pen, tapped it against her chin. The lazy susan caught her eye. It held one bottle of pills, a butterfly napkin holder and a butterfly salt and pepper shaker.

  Addie’s gaze rested upon the bottle of pills, but then she glanced down at her writing paper (also butterfly themed) and brought her pen to it.

  Nothing came. So, she set her pen down.

  “Hmmm…” She stood and walked to the refrigerator, a note on it catching her eye. She carefully removed the butterfly magnet and tried to read the memo note. She remembered, now, it was from her sister. She had read it just three days ago or possibly fifteen days ago. She had read it just fine then, but now the letters mixed and dashed together as if in another language.

  She brought the note back to the table and she sat down, and took another long drawl of her coffee. “That’s good coffee,” she said, because, it was. “Very good.”

  She examined the note further, she recognized the high loops as her sister’s handwriting. What did the note say?
And thinking of it-- where was her sister? Addie couldn’t remember.

  She picked up her mug, letting the warmth of the cup seep into her hands, she sipped more coffee, and once more, the bottle of pills caught her attention.

  She grabbed the bottle and read her dosage carefully. The words and numbers didn’t make sense, so she uncapped the bottle and poured a handful of the little white pills in her hand. They might have been sugar pills.

  Sugar pills might go good with her coffee. But how many?

  This was another guessing game. Addie was good at guessing.

  “Let’s find out, you,” she said. She’d taken to calling herself “you” this last week or, possibly, the last five weeks. She couldn’t recall her name, although she knew her sister knew her name. However, she also could not recall her sister’s name, which made Addie sad, so she didn’t think of it much.

  Addie poured the little handful of pills out on the table beside the sheets of writing paper. She examined the pile hard and said, “There’s either two or,” she scattered them about, thinking real hard, “Or… five hundred and twenty six.”

  She smiled at herself. Five hundred and twenty six sugar pills! “Yes, yes, very good. These are good for me, Sister says so.” She scooped them up in her hand, sipped her coffee, swished it around and put five hundred and twenty six pills in her mouth.

  She chewed them, but, they didn’t taste like sugar. “Yuck!” she said, and sipped more of the very good coffee. “What a scam! No sugar in the sugar pills.”

  Moved by passion, she picked up the pen and wrote, even though her head felt fuzzy. Fuzzier than her slippers, and that, Addie wasn’t sure, was so very good.

  She wrote in loops, like her sister’s. She couldn’t read what she wrote, but she knew what she meant. But then the pen fell out her hand and her hand collapsed in her lap of its own free will. “Oh my, I dropped…” but then the words were gone too.

  She could see the window from where she sat slouched in her favorite kitchen chair. Her head so heavy she couldn’t raise it from the back of the chair, but she could see the fat plops of snow falling.

  She also heard the gentle creak of the front door. “Mom? Mom! We’re home.”

  Footsteps fell softly like the snow. “Granma?” said a tiny voice. “Granma drew a heart, Mommy!”

  Then, “Oh, no, no…”

  The snow came inside. It drifted and enveloped Addie like sugar flooding a sugar bowl. The snow tasted like sugar, but it wasn’t cold. It wasn’t cold at all.

  And this was good.

  The Embalmer

  R.S. Bohn

  Gustav had taken the coins from many a corpse's eyes, and spent them, unlike his predecessor, on a pint or two at day's end.

  It was not that the funeral home's former embalmer had been particularly superstitious. The man had saved the coins, and when a body came along with no family, no loved ones, he bought a few flowers to put on the casket. When he had died himself the previous summer, and Gustav called in to prepare the body, there were no coins on his eyes, and no family to attend his funeral. The only flowers were two red roses from Mr. Markowitz, the home's proprietor, laid upon his breast before the casket was closed.

  Mr. Markowitz never asked about the coins, merely checking on Gustav from time to time, standing behind him and watching for a few minutes before gliding away again.

  And so Gustav had managed a nice bonus, for while embalming made for a decent living, it was far from generous.

  On this evening, however, the corpse in front of him would not give up its bonus so easily.

  Gustav pried at the deceased's eyelids, wondering what sort of person they had been, to inspire such maliciousness that someone would place the coins beneath the lids and then glue them shut.

  He could see the outlines clearly; these were not small coins. He expected a good bit of silver when he finally freed them from their socketed prison.

  Taking small forceps, he struggled to crack the seam, but the glue was strong, and the forceps left marks along the eye rims. He next took a tiny pair of scissors, only four inches long, and attempted to snip the glue, or failing that, to snip a tiny sliver of the wrinkled rim. As he poked carefully along, looking for a spot to place the tip of the scissors, he became aware of a presence in the room besides his own.

  He froze, and after a moment, said, "Good evening, Mr. Markowitz."

  "Gustav," said the man standing just behind him, peering over his shoulder. "And how is Mr. Kelley doing?"

  "Mr. Kelley?" Gustav looked down. "Oh. He's fine. It's just... someone put something beneath his eyelids. You can see yourself. I thought I'd take it out, but it's proving difficult."

  Markowitz stared. "The currency of our immortal souls—it's love, only love. "

  Gustav waited, hesitating with the scissors in his hand, until Markowitz moved away, out of the embalming room. Gustav sighed. Markowitz was the least pragmatic funeral director Gustav had ever met, given to poetry and philosophy. Gustav saw no use for either.

  He supposed there were other things he ought to do, such as shaving Mr. Kelley, or disinfecting him. But he always took the coins first, and it bothered him that he couldn't this time. It was as if the dead man didn't want him to have them. How rude. It was Gustav's job to embalm him, and the coins were... were like a tip. After all, he did a very good job, considering the pay.

  He brought out the disinfectant, mixed it with water and began swabbing. After, he took a razor and set to shaving Mr. Kelley's face, although he realized too late that the razor needed sharpening, and it left a bit of a scrape on the dead man's left cheek.

  Gustav, overall, was quite annoyed with Mr. Kelley.

  After another try at prying open the lids, using a bit of solvent, he became irritated and decided to leave the coins and finish the embalming. He did not care one whit about the coins any longer. The man's kin would have to see him in his coffin with the bulge of coins beneath his eyelids, and that was that. It was their own fault for doing such a stupid thing in the first place.

  That evening after work, Gustav slipped into his favorite seat at his favorite pub, and paid for his favorite pint with the last few coins in his pocket. Three pints on his tab later, Gustav reconsidered.

  Those coins were rightfully his. And he was a man with the talent to get them.

  Gustav, in his time, had witnessed a number of bungled embalmings. Jaws sewn too tight, giving the deceased the look of a puppet. Floaters gray and wrinkled, the embalmer unable to return their smooth, pink color. Not to mention enough powder and cosmetics to make it seem as if the clown trade lost one every five minutes.

  Not Gustav's work, however. He was a skilled craftsman. His employment of scalpel and forceps, with needle and thread, was particularly invisible. He could make a ninety-year-old dead of bull goring look forty-six, gone in the throes of pleasure.

  And he could, without a doubt, remove two coins from beneath eyelids without anyone the wiser.