Expiration Date

by Nancy Kilpatrick

  * * *

  Elaine Pascale lives on Cape Cod with her husband, son and daughter. Her writing has been published in several magazines and anthologies. She is the author of If Nothing Else, Eve, We’ve Enjoyed the Fruit. Elaine enjoys a robust full moon, chocolate, and collecting cats.

  The Twenty Seven Club

  by J. M. Frey

  Liquid shivers at the end of the needle. It’s clear, vaguely blackish in the way that the curve of the drop reflects in the low light of the dimmed pot lights, and enticing. I have no idea what it is, but I do know that it’s deadly.

  Terry wouldn’t be offering it if it wasn’t.

  “No,” I say. “I’ve… I’ve changed my mind.” I move to get up off the edge of the tub, but Terry’s hand is on my shoulder. She doesn’t push, she just presses her nails lightly against my bare skin. A thrill rushes up my spine, chiming inside my brain, filling my ears with the addictive hum of songs that have yet to be written down.

  Terry laughs. It’s like a hundred strings being plucked together. Sometimes it’s heavenly when she laughs, orgasmic joy in the pizzicato ripple of a sound wave, perfect, delicate harmony. Today it sounds like a toddler mashing a piano keyboard.

  “You can’t change your mind,” she says.

  “But I have. I have!”

  She sighs, put-upon and patronizing and even that makes my fingers itch for a pencil and some staff paper. “Okay, fine. You can change your mind. But that won’t change your fate. You signed the contract. We have a deal.”

  She waves the syringe at me, and the droplet splashes onto the pristine tile. The movement of her arm is a glissando against the air. Her toes tap beside the poisonous splatter, a barefoot drumming in perfect four-four. I spare a thought for the poor hotel maid who is going to find me. I suppose that thought should be one of charitable pity. Mostly, it’s fury that some poor hotel maid is going to find me at all, and I can’t stop it.

  “I kept my end of it,” Terry says. “Your turn.”

  “But I don’t want to. Can’t I just… can’t you just take it back?”

  “You think you’re the first one to try to bargain on the precipice?” Terry snarls, anger flooding her classic features briefly before melting away, leaving her face statuary blank. “You think Kurt didn’t whine? You think Dickie, and Leslie, and Alexandre didn’t suddenly decide that they’d rather be has-beens?” She purses her pouting lower lip, tapping the syringe thoughtfully against her flesh, a small white indent against shiny strawberry-flavoured gloss. I want to kiss her so bad. I want to everything her so bad, so bad it hurts in ways that no one else can ever understand. Well, no one who hasn’t had a contract with Terry would understand. No one who hasn’t had her skin burn their palms. “Jimi, though. Jimi went with his pride intact, head high. Good man, that Jimi. Kept his promises.”

  “I was a kid!” I try. “What was ten years of fame to a teenager? I didn’t realize that I’d want the rest of it, too.”

  “Greedy,” Terry admonishes. She leans down to lick the side of my ear. Whole albums of melodies pour out of her sigh. “You’ve lived more in a decade than most people do in a lifetime, and you want more? More cars, more vacations, more booze, more concerts, more groupies to fuck? More designer denim and designer drugs?”

  “But there’d be more for you too. wouldn’t there? A hundred more—”

  “Ringtones and compilation records and parody songs? No. I’ve sucked all the art out of you, my darling. You’ve got nothing left to give.”

  “But I do!” I should be ashamed that I’m crying. Thick, wet sobs, mucousy, desperate and disgusting, no accord between my choking coughs and the clench of my fists in the fabric of her trousers. But I’ve never had shame in front of Terry. She stripped it all away, all the confusion, all the self-loathing, all the awkwardness. She made me swagger. I gave her everything in return. All of it. Anything she asked for. Everything she asked for.

  Except this.

  “You don’t have any more. You’re a husk.”

  “I can hear it. When you touch me.”

  “Those aren’t for you.”

  “You goddamned tease.” I try to push her away, to shove past her, but Terry isn’t the kind of person that you can just shove away. She is the earworm that nibbles at your brain until you go mad with it, mad for her. Mad for her breath against your neck, her legs around your waist, her hair, the pluck of her fingertips as she plays your spine. “Why show it to me if I can’t have it?”

  “You can have this.” She holds up the needle.

  “No!”

  She sighs again, adagissimo, petulant. “Really, my darling, this tantrum is getting ugly. You made the deal. It’s even signed in blood, you theatrical little thing, you. I’ve used you up.”

  “So just go away and leave me alone.”

  Terry laughs like a chorus of silver bells, a rolling roulade against the empty glass and cold ceramic that embraces us. “Oh, no. If you live, then everything else you’ve done up until now becomes meaningless. You do understand that, don’t you? That’s been the whole point of our little living arrangement. For your work to feed me it has to be respected, treasured, rare. There can’t be any more. No slow slide into ignominy. No gigs at has-been clubs for lusting cougars. No embarrassing reunion tours. It all has to be gone. Completely. And in an instant. And for that to happen, you have to be dead.”

  I’ve been arrested for assault before, but I’ve never hit Terry. That’s why it surprises her when I ball up my fist and crack her across the jaw. Con Bravura. Even the most loyal of dogs fight for their lives when they’re backed into a corner. Shock gives me the opening I need to dart past her. I am out of the bathroom and slamming down the hotel corridor. I expect to hear an enraged scream, or a crescendo of laughter echoing after me.

  All I hear is some stupid gaggle of tourists gasping. “That’s—! Omigod, I can’t believe it, that’s really—! Did you see!?” their voices screech, allegretto vivace. They raise their camera phones, sway forward, catch themselves, suspended in their self-surprise for a long heartbeat, then press back against the wall. They are caught in that beautiful magnetic metronome that makes them shy away from celebrity and yet grasp for it at the same time. The three-four waltz of attraction.

  I used to love that dance. The seduction, the slow smile, the gesture— plucking one of them out of the safety of their numbers for a night, making that one special among his or her peers, just by laying my hand on theirs. Transferred divinity.

  I’ll never do that dance again.

  The slam of the fire door against the concrete wall of the staircase rattles in my ears. Blood rushes to underscore the sound of my feet as I run down the stairs, a harsh counterpoint in the arching suck of air whooshing in and out of my lungs. Music in everything I do, even as I flee.

  I swerve when I hit the lobby, take the back way out, past the paparazzi parked by the valet stand. I always dive straight towards the cameras, that’s my habit, living life con force. Breaking habits might save my life. If Terry can’t anticipate what I’ll do next, maybe I can…

  Night air slaps my cheeks. Terry is standing by the side of the service road. Waiting. Smiling. Arms open, hands empty. No syringe. My heart splutters into a caesura, silent indefinitely, until it ratchets back up, pattering in cut time.

  As if I could ever outrun her. Silly me.

  I slow to a jog, then stop beside her. “Terry,” I plead. “Please.”

  “If you didn’t intend to keep your end of it, you should have never signed the contract.”

  “I was a kid. It was my first gig. You fucked me in the coatroom. How could I say no?”

  “Human weakness is not my sphere of influence,” Terry says with a shrug. Unfeeling bitch. “It’s time, my darling.” She takes my hand, and I can’t fight the automatic muscle memory that makes me curl my fingers around hers.

 
“Please.”

  “It’s less tragic, but this will do,” Terry says. She sounds regretful. “I did so want something a bit nobler for you. You could have gone out like Jimi.”

  She pulls me forward, right to the edge of the sidewalk. Around us, the streetlamps spark and crack, plunging this section of the roadway into dangerous darkness. I am wearing black. I never wear anything else. Appearances are everything in this business. And no one but me can see Terry.

  She cranes her head to the left. The lights of a lone delivery van bobble along the road.

  “No!” I dig my heels into the edge of the kerb, struggling against the coda. “They O.D.ed! All of them! All the rest! That’s how it’s supposed to go! Not like this, Terry. Please!”

  “Don’t be silly,” Terry breathes, her breasts hot against my arm. “Don’t you use Wikipedia? If it isn’t drugs or booze, it’s usually an auto accident.” And then she shoves.

  The pain is so fleeting that I don’t bother to catalogue it. The crunch is loud. I don’t know if it’s coming from inside my own body or if it’s the sound of a windshield fracturing. Hitting the tarmac drives the air out of my lungs. It takes an inordinate amount of time to drag more back in.

  Legato, dolce, a quiet slow hiss in the rest between movements.

  The horn blares, the driver shouts. It’s some poor stupid roadie who is probably going to sue my estate for millions for the emotional trauma. That’s fine. I don’t need my millions any more. I don’t need anything.

  Except, maybe… Yes. I think I am allowed to want that. One last time. It’s the least she can do.

  “Terry.” I turn the ruin of my wrist, pulp of a hand palm up, fingers cupped, like she taught me. I reach towards her as a supplicant. Praying.

  Terry smiles softly, colorless eyes sparkling. She crouches. She takes my hand.

  Nothing. Silenzio.

  The music is gone.

  “No.” I think I say it. Something burbles in my chest, wet and red. It might come out sounding like the word. I bet Terry understands, anyway, so I try again. “Not fair!”

  Something is wrong. It’s not working! For the first time in ten years, the brush of her otherworldly skin against mine makes no sound at all.

  That hurts far more than getting run over ever could.

  I scream.

  “Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you—” Terry warbles into my ear. Al niente.

  * * *

  J. M. Frey is a actor, author, and fanthroplogist. She is the author of Triptych (Dragon Moon Press); Hero Is a Four Letter Word (Short Fuse); The Dark Lord and the Seamstress (CreateSpace); “Whose Doctor?” in Doctor Who In Time And Space (McFarland Press). This is her first horror short.

  Trinity Death

  by Steve Vernon

  Did you ever wake up with a thirst that you couldn’t quench?

  Two floors below me a man is opening a tin of beer. Rolling Rock, my favorite brand. I can hear the fizz of the cold bubbling ale. He laps at the tin, sucking at the spillage and trying not to waste a drop.

  He is preoccupied.

  He is easy.

  I enter him while he blinks and belches.

  For a moment the beer spills down his chin as his eyes glaze over.

  The rotating ceiling fan whispers like the incoming tide.

  And then he begins to swallow and I drink with him enjoying the heavy malt-ridden wetness filling my throat. I savor the sharp hop tang, the yeasty odor, the strong pleasing aftertaste. I empty three more tins in quick succession and then — as I feel him becoming slowly and sluggishly aware of my presence — I leave him to his empty beer tins wondering where the time slipped away.

  My thirst is quenched.

  I want something more and so I scan the building for sensation.

  In the bedroom of the apartment above mine, a young couple is making love. They each wear rings of gold but neither is pledged to the other. Their fear adds a piquant spice to their furtive coupling. The sordid stink of danger and intrigue hangs heavily above them like a scented silk awning in a seraglio. I enter while their thoughts are scattered between passion and mutual unshared guilt. It is an intriguing sensation. I am inside him, inside her. A double penetration — sharing each within each — joining with them in the sweet percussion of flesh.

  I dance within their thoughts.

  Their dreams belong to me.

  He has a wife, young and pregnant and waiting for him to come home to the imagined sanctuary of the split-level suburbs. She, in turn, has a husband away on a business trip. I force them into harder sex, goading them, urging them into a heated frenzy. Alternately they beg for respite and plead for the other to never stop.

  I want to tangle it further. Perhaps I should reach out and find their respective mates. Possibly I could lead them into their own parallel affair with each other. Perhaps I could bring them here for a foursome.

  Enough.

  The two illicit lovers have become aware of my presence. They feel the weight of my unseen eyes gazing upon their adultery. They blame bad nerves, they blame each other. He wilts and she dries shut. There is blood where he has torn her and the chaffing of friction burns their flesh.

  I open my eyes, safe and comfortable upon the sanctuary of my living room couch. My erection tents the fabric of my trousers and begs for release. I scan their apartment for further opportunities. My search is frustrated. The young lovers have rolled to the border of their shared beds. He makes excuses for his sudden unexpected impotence. She merely wishes he were somewhere else.

  Good.

  I have stolen their passion.

  I smile, unzip, and gently masturbate.

  Images of my childhood unroll across the movie screen of my memory. I remember everything. I skim quickly, seeking the choicer memories. The juicy ones. They are far more apt for my current needs.

  I see my brother exploring his puberty as he beats off in the bedroom. It is dark. The house is empty. Twenty-three years away and he thinks no one can see.

  I see my sister, babysitting at the neighbors. The children are asleep. Her boyfriend has stopped by. Life becomes interesting.

  I see my mother in bed with a strange pale man. I believe him to be my father yet I am uncertain. My memories begin at the gates of conception, dark and hazy. I cannot see his face no matter how hard…

  And then I come— casting my seed upon the barren floorboards. Such a waste.

  Perhaps I should consider luring a woman. Perhaps I should give her my child.

  He could be a god.

  It would be easy. I have impregnated so many women by proxy. Why not try it for real? A man should have a child of his very own. It is an immortality of a sort. That would be a thing worth having. Someday I may need it. I have lived through a thousand men’s lives. I have shared countless dreams, yet someday death will come for me as it comes for every man.

  Enough.

  I banish thoughts of love and breeding with a wad of tissue and a shower. Who am I trying to kid? A woman would only bind me with her misguided love and weigh me down with care. She could not possibly understand the pure joy of sharing in another’s thoughts and dreams. My mind would grow shackles.

  I might as well be dead.

  I stand on my balcony, naked to the night. Fifty floors below me is my city. My playground. I set my thoughts loose, sifting the many minds, exploring all of the countless possibilities.

  I dine late at three of the city’s finest restaurants— having steak with an underpaid business man, caviar with an overpriced killer and a chocolate sundae with an acned teenager. His fantasies are particularly sordid.

  Tasty.

  After dining, it is time for a quick check on my financial situation. My banker for this month has decided to work late. His decision was my idea. He is tired, and it is easy to nudge him into dropping a decim
al point in my favor. He may catch the error three months later but by then I will have camouflaged my savings beyond the memory banks of a half a dozen separate financial institutions. I have heard that embezzlement is difficult in this computerized age but for me it is easy. The gears of finance will always turn upon the bones of men.

  My landlord is happy in his ignorance. He overcharges the other tenants and never notices my own rent-free existence.

  All is well with the world.

  After business I find a dance club, shifting from body to body, losing myself in the rhythms of swaying flesh. It offers me a riot of sensation, frustrated yearning and egotistic showmanship.

  After dancing I sleep.

  It is in sleep that I enjoy the greatest of freedoms for only during sleep can I cast my mind’s tendrils far into the night, mingling with the dreams of other people. I explore them. I taste them. Like a restless cable television watcher I flip through the channels and seek out fresh entertainment.

  Here, a widow is dreaming about her dead husband. I lie with her briefly, enjoying his feel inside her.

  His taste.

  People come in so many different flavors.

  A ditch digger dreams of his sleeping wife. In his dream he simultaneously throttles her with on hand while using the other to jack off into her upturned face. She drowns in a sea of poorly planted life. I cross over, touching her dreams, seeking continuity but she is merely falling. I linger with her for a brief moment, lodging within her throat as she falls into an endless pit of trapdoors that continually open at the very last minute giving her the gift of unending vertigo.

  It would be fascinating to try and exchange their dreams, each for each. Some night perhaps I will try. It is always interesting to find out just how far I can take this ability of mine. For now, though, I am quite content to fall with her for a moment longer, hoping that she might hit bottom and perhaps prove or disprove the old myth about dying when you stop falling.

  Instead she awakens with a small gasp, perhaps sensing my presence. Her husband reaches for her from the depths of his slumber, and she smiles, unaware of the dark depravity of his aching dreams.