Easter Eggs and Bunny Boilers: A Horror Anthology

by Matt Shaw

  Horace, put this on, and head downstairs, and don’t forget your basket. Love, Mum.

  Slightly confused at the prospect, but obeying the instructions, Horace began stripping away his pyjamas, throwing them in a pile on the kitchen floor. He struggled as he squeezed his legs into the furry costume and continued pulling it up over his midsection. Eventually he managed to awkwardly slot his arms in and pulled the top section up over his messy hair. Pulling the zip right up to his chin, he caught a glimpse of himself in the reflection from the patio doors. He looked funny, an overweight, furry pink rabbit with two ears pointing from his head. One totally erect and pointing upwards, and the other flopping down to the side.

  He laughed at his reflection as he waggled his head from side to side, making the ears flap around on his head playfully. Heading over to the kitchen surface, he collected the wicker basket that had been left for him, filled with a load of shredded, coloured paper. Inside, there was another note from his mum:

  No peeking. Now come downstairs.

  Intrigued, Horace walked across the kitchen to the door that led downstairs to the cellar. Opening the door, he called out. “Hello. Mum, are you down here?”

  “Yes, honey, come on down.” His mum’s voice replied from downstairs.

  Slowly, Horace began to descend the stairs that led down to the cellar. He continued along the dimly lit corridor that opened out to the room at the end of the hallway.

  As he entered the room he stopped and looked in confusion. His mother stood before him wearing one of her old kitchen aprons. It was splattered with blood. In her gloved hands, she gripped a pair of pliers, and proceeded to rip the fingernails from the hand of his teacher, Miss Fingerhut, who was screaming through the gag wrapped around her mouth. She thrashed violently, naked on the leather bed.

  “Mum, what are you doing?” He asked, confused.

  “It's essential, dear. I had to remove her teeth and nails, we can’t risk having her bite or scratch you.”

  Horace looked on, confused as his mother continued to viciously rip the nails from the woman’s fingers, and toss them carelessly to the floor. Miss Fingerhut spotted Horace as he walked into the room. Her eyes widened, she mumbled something frantically from behind her gag.

  The boy turned back to his mother. “Mum, I don’t understand?”

  “Today, my boy, you are going to become a man. Here give me a hand.”

  Horace placed the basket down on the floor and walked to the aid of his mother, who had proceeded to hold his teacher's left ankle and left wrist together.

  “Grab that duct tape and wrap it around here,” she nodded. “It’s more than sufficient to hold her in place.”

  Horace grabbed the roll of tape and began to wind it around her ankles and wrists tightly. Once secured, he ripped the tape and continued to repeat the process with the other arm and leg as his mother held her in place. Once complete, Miss Fingerhut was left lying on her back with her vagina and arse pointing upwards, exposed.

  His mother ripped the gag from the woman’s mouth and threw it aside. The woman on the bed continued sobbing and pleading, an incoherent babble through broken teeth stumps and blood.

  “Oh shut up, will you woman? Before I cut out your tongue.”

  The boy continued to stare on, incredulously.

  “Right, Horace, grab your basket and take out your Easter eggs.”

  Complying with her instruction, the boy picked up the wicker basket from where he had placed it on the floor. He searched through the shredded bits of coloured paper until he found something. Confused, he removed the item from the basket before placing it back to the floor.

  He held the plastic egg in one hand, attached to another device by a thin pink cable. As his thumb brushed past a switch on the device, the egg that he held in his left hand began to vibrate steadily. It felt a little strange, yet pleasant. On the device was a small dial, as Horace turned it with his thumb, the rate of the vibration increased rapidly.

  He giggled. “What do I do with this Easter egg, Mum?”

  His mother pointed to the woman’s exposed genitals.

  “Use your imagination, son.”

  Horace stood for a moment bemused, before suddenly beginning to understand. He felt himself becoming aroused as he inched closer to the woman, an erection beginning to poke out from beneath the fur of his rabbit costume.

  Miss Fingerhut looked at him, then his mum, then at the love egg in his hand.

  She screamed.

  Horace smiled.

  THE END

  Bio

  Matt is an avid fan of horror fiction. He spends a majority of his free time reading books from both established and independent authors. With a diverse knowledge of the genre, he has now tried his hand at writing horror. With the support of his peers, some of which are established writers themselves, he now approaches a new career, one that will see him take horror by storm. His influences lead right back to traditional horror writers such as Edgar Allen Poe, Bram Stoker and William Hope Hodgson through to the more traditional horror writers such as Stephen King, Richard Laymon, Dean Koontz, James Herbert and Clive Barker to newer names such as Alex Kava, JA Konrath, Bryan Smith, Matt Shaw, Michael Bray, Iain Rob Wright, Graeme Reynolds, Tim Miller and Ian Woodhead right the way through to emerging writers who are currently starting out such as Stuart Keane, Jack Rollins, Kyle M Scott, Andrew Lennon and Shaun Hupp.

  He currently resides in Tipton, a small town in the West Midlands with his partner and two children. He travels the width breadth of the UK on a regular basis as a Sales Manager for a construction company.

  His writing debut, a collaboration with Andrew Lennon; Hexad, is available now as a digital download or paperback from Amazon.

  He has since been featured in an anthology by Matt Shaw – Behind Closed Doors, which is available for digital download now from Amazon, and The Dichotomy of Christmas, featuring such established names as Graham Masterton and Kealan Patrick Burke. To be followed by inclusion into an anthology from Dark Chapter Press – Kids,

  His first full length novella; Jeremy, is now available for digital download from Amazon UK & US.

  Website – www.matthickmanauthor.blogspot.co.uk

  Twitter - https://twitter.com/Matthewhickma13

  Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/matthickmanauthor

  Deb Loves Robbie

  by Mark West

  The egg arrived this morning, like I knew it would. Just like the past five years, it came wrapped in the same style of paper, with a little tag taped to it that read ‘Happy Easter’. And inside was an old-style Cadbury’s Caramel egg with the sexy lady bunny on the front who isn’t on the adverts any more.

  And just like before, the egg was almost five years out of date.

  The Easter Bunny killed Deb Swales.

  He didn’t mean to, of course and I doubt he even saw her but that’s what happened.

  We’d been living in the flats for a few weeks by then and didn’t know anybody other than our immediate neighbours. On the right, against the lounge, was an old couple who seemed to be very happy together and listened to their TV and radio at top volume. On the other side, against our kitchen and bathroom, was a couple in their thirties with a small child. He worked, she didn’t, the kid screamed a lot. We were in our early twenties and in love and didn’t need anyone else. Well, that’s what we kept telling each other, Deb and me, but the reality was much more unpleasant. In truth, we didn’t want anybody to know we were there.

  We met at school, though we’d long been aware of each other because of our families. She had a sister and three brothers, I had three brothers and it was difficult to decide which family was the bigger bunch of arseholes. We were both the youngest and I never found out what caused the initial ruck but any chance to have a bit of aggro and one set or the other took it.

  Deb said it was like that movie “Romeo & Juliet” (which I hadn’t seen) when we had to do a Shakespeare play in fifth year and play the lovers. Loads of wol
f whistling in the class and the teacher telling everyone to calm down and act our ages but something happened. I didn’t really understand what I was reading, but the words began to make sense and when I looked at her, I started to see this really pretty girl who wasn’t part of the Swales family, my mortal enemy, but someone kind and funny who smelled nice.

  Two weeks later at the school disco I plucked up the courage to ask her to dance and she agreed. A week later we were caught snogging behind the design block and got detention. I then noticed my name was on her pencil case and it stayed there to the end of the school year when we both left.

  We kept our romance a secret, meeting in the park or in town and keeping a low profile. She went to college, I went to apprentice in a local garage. Things seemed to calm down between the families when two of my brothers went to prison for trying to knock over a bookies and her sister got pregnant for the first time. We still didn’t make a fuss but it did make life slightly easier.

  When we turned eighteen, we talked about leaving home and setting up together somewhere. We couldn’t afford anything grand - I was still at the garage, she was working in a local hairdressers between college courses - but we did see a flat going cheap on an estate on the other side of town.

  We went out to celebrate. We were spotted. They were waiting for us when we left the pub.

  “You dirty fucking pikey!”

  Before I could turn to see who’d shouted, someone pushed me hard and I staggered forward. I managed to stay on my feet until I was kicked hard in the left thigh which knocked me sideways and gave me a dead leg. They’d timed it perfectly – we had already passed the front of the pub, I was pushed into the little service alley that ran up the side of it.

  I heard Deb scream and someone shouted at her as I tried to stay on my feet, my leg barely holding me up.

  “Fucking stay there,” growled a voice and I didn’t know if he meant me or her. Three big shapes blocked me from the brightly lit street. Another dark shape stood at the mouth of the alley, holding Deb tightly.

  I staggered back. There was a door in the wall to my left, cracked and old and padlocked shut. A bare bulb hung over it, casting a sickly yellow glow.

  “Thought you could play around, did you?” asked the middle shape, advancing on me and I knew who it was before he spoke again. “Thought you could dip your wick in our little sister?”

  Gary Swales, the eldest of the kids, ran the group. He had a hard, handsome face though a deep cut above his right eye put a kink in his eyebrow and you could see his scalp through his thinning hair. He was snarling at me and I knew I was in real trouble.

  “Gary,” I said.

  “You little fucking toe-rag, Robbie Hughes, how long did you think you could get away with it?”

  “But I’m not doing anything wrong, we love each other.”

  It was the wrong thing to say. He made a guttural sound deep in his throat and launched at me, his fist rising and the light glinting off the big sovereign rings he wore on every finger. I tried to move but wasn’t quick enough and he hit my left cheek. For a moment, the whole world went silent and the entire side of my face felt like someone had set fire to it. I staggered sideways as the sounds came back - yelling and shouting, my heart beat thudding, the sound of trainers on concrete. I was falling but tried to stay on my feet. The other brothers advanced and then Gary was in my line of sight again, his fist raised.

  This time he hit my ear and the thud deafened me. I went down, my right temple hitting the slick concrete. I watched three pairs of trainers come towards me, felt someone grab the collar of my jacket and pull me up. A kick landed in my ribs and I felt something crack. Another kick caught my right shoulder, jarring my arm in the socket. Gary punched my forehead and I closed my eyes, tried to bring my hands up to protect my face. More blows rained on my arms and chest, more kicks hit my thighs and shins. Someone kicked me in the groin and blackened lightbulbs flashed across my field of vision, slowly turning red. Something ran into my eyes, blinding me. Another punch, another kick, another horrible cracking sound.

  More black lightbulbs and then nothing.

  *

  I woke up in hospital. The first thing Deb said, after telling me she loved me, was that she’d lied to the doctors and said I’d been mugged. Her brothers beat me until I looked like a rag doll, then threatened her that if she told or was seen with me again, they’d fix her. She rang an ambulance from the pub and said everyone in there knew who she was but none of them offered to help.

  The sovereign rings had done some damage but the pretty nurse who stitched me up did a good job and my broken ribs were taped. What nobody could fix was the damage done inside my head.

  The doctors said I’d suffered a TBI, or Traumatic Brain Injury. I wanted to crack that old joke, the “what brain?” one, but I couldn’t find all the right words and they said that was to be expected. TBI damage can be wide-ranging, they said and vary a lot. They told me I could have physical effects, like balance problems and headaches and dizziness, or my thinking and behaviour could be badly affected.

  Was I sure, they asked, that I didn’t know who’d done it? I took one look at Deb and the panic on her face - for me, for her, for us - and said no.

  When I was released, Deb and I moved into the flat and neither of us spoke to our families. We laid low, to avoid the world for a while and lived our lives as I slowly built my strength back up - though I found it harder and harder to remember how to fix even the most simple of things at work.

  The Thursday before Good Friday I was sitting in the lounge watching TV, as we’d found I needed to chill out after getting home from work otherwise I got ratty really quickly. Deb, in the kitchen, let out a shriek and came rushing through.

  “You’re taking me out for a Mickey D, my love,” she said with a big smile.

  “Why?”

  “Because we need to call into the Co-op at the precinct, I’ve forgotten to buy Easter eggs.”

  I stood up, playing along. “Holy shit, why didn’t you say it was an emergency?”

  We grabbed our coats and left the flat in a flurry of laughter and snatched kisses. The balcony was deserted and we made our way to the stairwell, holding hands and deciding which eggs to buy. She fancied a Crunchie one, I was trying to decide between a Mars or a Caramel.

  “Caramel?” she said, disbelieving.

  “Yeah, I fancy the rabbit.”

  She laughed and stopped near the top of the stairwell. “You twat, how can you fancy a cartoon rabbit?”

  I didn’t have a chance to reply. The front door of the flat she was standing beside opened and someone wearing an oversized Easter Bunny outfit came out, tripping over his elongated feet. He bumped into Deb before lurching sideways and walking along the balcony with a couple of chubby girls wearing Easter chick outfits.

  Deb fell forward, tried to regain her balance and twisted around. She was at the top of the stairs but I couldn’t move fast enough as she began to topple back. She looked at me, her eyes wide, her mouth a perfect O and reached for me but we were too far apart. Her right heel slipped off the step, then the left and, her arms pinwheeling, she fell back, still looking at me and began to scream.

  Her legs flicked up. The scream echoed around the stairwell and in my head, lasting until she landed with a sickening crunch that seemed to cancel all noise. I thought of the fists in the alley, the deafening silence after them.

  She bounced off the step and fell further, landing on her shoulders, her body seeming to fold in on itself. She uncurled and slid down to land in a heap at the bottom, her legs tucked underneath, her arms splayed out.

  “Deb!” I called and ran down the stairs. I knelt beside her head but didn’t know what to do. Should I move her or leave her, should I ring for an ambulance or should I knock on some doors and get someone else here. The questions clustered in my head, confusing me until I couldn’t think straight.

  “Robbie,” she said, slowly and calmly.

  “Deb,” I said and
started to cry, “I don’t know what to do.”

  “It’s just an accident,” she said, “we can sort it like we did with you in the alley.”

  “Yes,” I said, willing to believe that it was exactly the same situation. “What can I do?”

  “I don’t know if I can walk so carry me back to the flat and we’ll figure it out.”

  “If you’re sure,” I said. I was crying and my tears landed on her cheeks. I brushed them away. More fell, some into her opened eyes and she didn’t even blink.

  She was heavier than I expected and as I lifted her head there was a horrible sound like somebody peeling up something damp and sticky. There was a dark smear of blood and hair on the concrete and I pretended I didn’t see it.

  “Thank you,” she said when we were through the door. I flicked the lights on with my elbow and she didn’t blink against the light. “Put me in the bath, don’t make a mess of the bed.”

  “But you’ll get cold.”

  “No, because you’ll keep me warm with your love, Robbie, you can make me whole again.”

  It all made perfect sense as she said it. “Yes I can, that’s what I’ll do.”

  I carried her into the bathroom and set her down, propping her against the wall. I took three towels from the airing cupboard, draped two in the bath and rolled up the last for a neck support. I picked her up and laid her gently in the bath and slipped the support behind her neck but her head rolled to the side, her cheeks loose. Her unblinking eyes were now half covered by the lids, as if she was getting sleepy and I really believed I could see love in there.

  “Thank you,” she said, “I just need to rest now.”

  “Well you’ve had a busy day,” I said and laughed. I thought I saw the faintest of smiles at her lips and wanted to kiss her. “Are you sure you don’t want me to call anybody?”

  “No,” she said, her voice sleepy, “it wouldn’t help. And we have each other.”