The Misunderstood and Other Misfit Horrors

by Jason Brannon

  “We’ll have to use your car,” Lindberg said. “Like I said before, I lost my van.”

  Rich nodded and helped Lindberg get Lucinda into the backseat. He didn’t say anything as he drove. He simply followed the directions he was given and checked his rearview mirror periodically to monitor Lucinda’s ever-deepening coma.

  When Lindberg told him to stop the car, he wasn’t even sure if they were in the right place. The term ‘carnival’ had given him the impression of a loosely linked group of street performers who worked for pocket change. In reality, it looked more like a leper colony than a midway.

  “We’ve got to go to the hospital,” Rich said, taking one look down that dark alley and seeing bodies lying in dirty puddles. “There’s nobody here who can help Lucinda.”

  “Trust me,” Lindberg said. “The juggler can help her.”

  “If Lucinda dies, so do you,” Rich said, taking his pistol out of the glovebox.

  Lindberg’s eyes widened. “We better get going,” he said.

  The alley was all clouds of flies and rotten smells and cardboard houses. The street beneath their feet looked like it was made of vagrant flesh rather than asphalt given the number of unconscious. It was difficult to walk through such a sea of limbs while carrying Lucinda, but somehow they managed.

  Contrary to what Rich had thought at first, there were actually a few games being played here. A man was throwing darts at rows upon rows of balloons taped to a sheet of plywood. The dart he threw missed its mark, and immediately he began to beg the dirty barker with the red moustache and the Led Zeppelin T-shirt.

  “That’s why it’s called a gamble,” the barker said. “There’s no guarantee that you’re going to win.”

  “Please,” the loser pleaded. “I’ll find something else to give you.”

  “There’s nothing left,” the barker said. “I’ve already got the deed to your house. All you’ve got left is your life. Twenty years, I think, was our bet.”

  Tears streamed down the loser’s face as his hair began to grey and his face puckered up with the onset of new wrinkles. Rich gasped as the young man aged before his very eyes.

  “Come on,” Lindberg said, obviously afraid.

  The odors got worse the further they went. It was almost like walking deeper and deeper into a massive length of bowel.

  “The juggler’s close,” Lindberg said. “I can smell him.”

  Rich adjusted his grip on Lucinda. She was starting to get heavy. Despite his emaciated condition, Lindberg didn’t seem to be bothered by the extra weight.

  “There he is,” he said. “Over there. Behind that dumpster.”

  At first, Rich didn’t see anything. Then he saw what looked like just another bum sleeping away his hangover.

  “Juggler,” Lindberg said.

  The bum stirred slowly, rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands.

  “I’ve brought somebody to see you,” Lindberg said.

  The juggler smiled, showing several blackened teeth. He stroked his white beard lazily with one hand and picked bugs out of his hair with the other. Sores marked his face like the cattle brands from a hundred different ranches.

  “My girlfriend needs help,” Rich said. It was apparent in the way he said it that he didn’t put much faith in the juggler.

  “Everything has its price,” the juggler said.

  “Name it,” Rich said. “I can get the money.”

  “Money’s not everything.”

  Rich thought about this for a moment. This seemed like a strange thing to hear from the mouth of a homeless man.

  “What do you want then?” Rich asked. Lindberg laughed at the question.

  “I’m a juggler of affliction,” the old man said, pulling his shirt open wide to reveal a multitude of running blisters, black lesions, and swollen red whelps. One of his eyes was covered with a thin white film. Thick clumps of hair fell out as he continued to remove the bugs from his scalp.

  “My abilities are limited,” the juggler explained. “I can’t juggle an infinite number of diseases and sickness. But I can trade. One for another. Your girlfriend’s malady for one of mine.”

  “You mean you can bring her out of her coma, but she’ll wake up with some sort of disease?”

  The juggler looked at Rich evenly. He didn’t have to nod to show that that was exactly what he meant.

  “What good will that do?” he asked at last.

  “She won’t be dead, will she?” the juggler replied.

  “She’ll die eventually from whatever you give her,” Rich said.

  “Not all sicknesses are fatal,” the juggler said. “There are lots of them that aren’t. Herpes. Some strains of hepatitis. Malaria.”

  “But?” Rich asked, sensing a catch.

  “But you have to take one of my sicknesses too. I need a little relief. I’ve been a juggler for far too long. I think it’s about time to give it up. So I’ll take on your girlfriend’s problem. In return, both of you take on something a little less lethal.”

  “You’re crazy,” Rich said, turning his back on the old man. “I’m taking Lucinda to a hospital where a real doctor can treat her. I don’t think you could heal her anyway.”

  Carefully, he hefted Lucinda over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. He didn’t wait to see if Lindberg was following him.

  “I think you’d better stop now and put your gun down,” Lindberg said. It wasn’t the junkie’s voice, however, that made Rich stop. Rather, it was the almost imperceptible click of a hammer being cocked.

  “I want my van and my drugs and my cash back,” Lindberg barked at the juggler. “You said you’d give it all to me if I brought them to you.”

  Suddenly, Rich realized where Lucinda had gotten the drugs that sent her into a coma. Lindberg had intentionally given her a bad dose as a way of luring them to the juggler. That’s also why he had coincidentally shown up the moment that Rich found her lying there unconscious.

  The juggler laughed, showing his blackened teeth. “I did say I would give it all back to you, and a deal’s a deal. But you have to take a disease too. I’m tired of juggling.”

  “I don’t think so,” Lindberg said, pointing the gun at the juggler. “We had a deal. You make good on it. I want back everything that I lost.”

  The juggler smiled. “Of course. I’m a man of my word. You’ll find the keys to your van along with your drugs in that dumpster over there.”

  Like a dog on the scent of fresh meat, Lindberg leapt into the dumpster and immediately found a fresh syringe.

  “Yes,” he said. His eyes rolled back to expose the whites as he pushed the plunger down. He had just gotten the needle out of his arm when he slumped over.

  “Lindberg?” Rich said. But the pusher didn’t move.

  “Dead,” the juggler replied glibly. “Coronary. What he didn’t realize was that he actually gained something during the course of our negotiations. Yes, he lost everything he ever had. But that included a weak heart. Of course, he insisted on getting back everything so I gave it to him, damaged ticker and all. It just couldn’t withstand anymore drugs.”

  “You didn’t do that,” Rich said, even though he was obviously unsure.

  “Didn’t I?” the juggler replied.

  From somewhere deeper in the alleyway came a high pitched female shriek that might have been the sound of a clandestine abortion or another rape statistic. It reminded Rich of Lucinda and of the urgency of his decision.

  “You can keep her from dying?” he said.

  “For the price I mentioned,” the juggler said. “Like I told you, I’m tired of juggling. I want out.”

  “I love her,” Rich said calmly. “I want to do this for her. But how can I make this sort of decision? How do I know what kind of sickness you’ll give her? Maybe death would be better to the alternative.”

  “Maybe,” the juggler said. “Maybe not.”

  “There’s no way you can tell me what you’ll pass on to her?”

  The jugg
ler sighed. “Think of it this way. Each disease I carry is a flaming torch that I struggle to keep in the air. Let’s say that I’m juggling ten different illnesses right now, ten different fiery knives. It would be extremely difficult for me to pick a particular one out of the air and throw it to you. It would be much easier to simply throw you the first one I caught.”

  “I see your point,” Rich conceded. “In other words, Lucinda could end up with a bad case of psoriasis or she could end up with leukemia.”

  “That’s the way it works,” the juggler agreed.

  Rich looked down at Lucinda’s drawn face and wondered how he had allowed her to ruin her life like she had. She had the worn look of a junkie. But she was beautiful, a pale flower laid across a grave.

  “I tried to learn to juggle once,” Rich said. “Never could get the hang of it.”

  “Maybe you started off with too many things in the air at once.”

  “Maybe,” Rich agreed. “Maybe it would have been better to start out with two or three.”

  “That’s how I did it,” the juggler confirmed.

  “Then that’s how I’ll do it. Take away Lucinda’s sickness and give it to me. I’ll take on both diseases.”

  “You don’t know what you’re asking,” the juggler said.

  “I don’t want to put Lucinda through any pain. If anything, I want to take that pain away. Teach me how to juggle.”

  The dour expression on the juggler’s face was proof enough that he wasn’t happy with the way this was turning out. “I wouldn’t recommend this.”

  “Show me,” Rich pleaded.

  At long last the juggler nodded. “Have it your way,” he said, reaching out his hand. The moment he touched Rich was like a moment spent in a womb of free flowing electricity. Rich bucked and moaned and shuddered as something passed from the juggler to him. When the old man pulled back his hand, it was clear that things had changed. The juggler’s eyes had a slight sparkle to them. There were dark circles under Rich’s eyes.

  For the first time since Rich had found her unconscious in her apartment, Lucinda moaned. It was obvious, however, that she was still very weak.

  “You’re juggling now,” the old man said. “There is a struggle for balance going on inside of you. A tug of war between sickness and health.”

  Rich found a broken piece of glass in the alley and studied his reflection in its dirty surface. Bloody tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. He knew it wasn’t a good sign. The old man, however, looked much improved since the first time Rich saw him.

  “It takes a little practice to get the hang of it,” the juggler said. “At first, there will be days you won’t even be able to move or get out of bed. Then like a juggler of balls and hoops and knives, you’ll eventually learn how to move the diseases around, shifting them from one part of the body to another before they can do any lasting damage.”

  Rich could already feel certain parts of his body begin to tingle painfully. His legs felt shaky, and nausea rose in him like floodwater.

  The juggler touched him again, this time on the head. “See how I do it?” he said. And somehow, through that brief contact, Rich understood the shuffling and relocation of disease, the migration of sickness from organ to organ, limb to limb.

  “Do you think three maladies would be too much at first?” he asked, hesitantly. Sweat poured from beneath his arms, from his brow, from the small of his back. It was all he could do not to collapse.

  “It’s your choice,” the juggler said. “I’ve shown you how to do it. But I’ll tell you this much. This is a one performance show that lasts a lifetime. Drop one disease, and the show’s over. Your body will be ravaged before you can ever regain control.”

  Rich nodded and slumped to the ground. “I love Lucinda too much,” he said. “I want to take away her pain. I want to take away her addiction.”

  The old man called over his shoulder as he walked away. “I’ve tried to warn you. You’ll do what you want from this point on.”

  Rich slumped against the damp fetid wall of the alley and marshalled his strength. He understood how the juggler how managed to handle so many sicknesses, but wasn’t sure if he was strong enough yet to take on any new infirmities. Still, he wanted to give Lucinda her life back.

  Weakly he leaned over and kissed Lucinda on the lips, drawing the affliction out of her. Almost immediately, her eyelids fluttered like the wings of hummingbirds, and Rich could see the relief on her tired face.

  It was only when she opened her eyes that Rich realized his mistake. Lucinda screamed at the sight of him and the ravages of disease that ate away at his face.

  “I did it all for you,” Rich whispered as the woman he loved ran off into the night.

  It was obvious that she didn’t love him the way he loved her, and it hurt. But it was also good to know how she truly felt.

  Rich only wished he hadn’t paid such an exorbitant sum to find that out. But the blisters and oozing sores would be a constant reminder.

  Knowing Lucinda, she would eventually need his help again. And when she returned for his help as he knew she would, Rich would only have to touch his hand to one of his infinite painful wounds, and the memories of what she had done to him would come flooding back. Of course, he wouldn’t kill her for her desertion. But she would certainly regret running away from him when he needed her the most.

  In the meantime, Rich would have a lot of time to hone his skills.

  He walked down the dark alleyway until he found a man lying beneath a wet sheet of cardboard.

  “Perfect,” he thought, imagining each disease as a ball with a distinct color.

  “I think I’ll choose the red ball this time,” he said aloud as he knelt down to touch the bum. “Red was always Lucinda’s favorite color.”

  The man briefly stirred in his makeshift bed. Then he screamed as he began to bleed from his pores.

  The alleyway was filled with painful lamentations. But only for a few seconds. Then there was only the echo of footfalls on the wet pavement as Rich went in search of other diseases to juggle, other lives to heave into the air and then drop like so many knives and flaming torches.

  Mother Mary

  The service station looked like the sort of place that a disease might frequent if it had a driver’s license and free will. Yet given the scarcity of pit stops along the way, Liz decided to pull over anyway, thinking that it might be quite a while before she found another place like this out here in the middle of the scrub-infested desert.

  “Mother Mary’s,” the clapboard sign above the entrance to the dingy convenience store read. “The only place this side of Perkins County for water.” Liz laughed to herself, thinking about the infamous Last Chance Saloon she had seen on so many of the old westerns. As far as she could tell, this was the modern day equivalent.

  Although Liz was hesitant to touch the gas pump for fear of contracting some exotic germ that might cause her hand to rot off at the wrist, she had no other choice given that all fueling bays were marked self-service. Hesitantly, she used the tail of her shirt to grab the pump and inserted it into the tank. As she did, a spider scurried up the hose. Another one soon followed behind it, leaving a thin wisp of silk behind. If the webs left by the fleeing arachnids was any indication, the pumps hadn’t been used in quite a while. Undeterred, Liz squeezed down on the handle and waited for the attendant inside to hit the button that would send a dozen gallons of gasoline into her fuel tank. But nothing happened. Then Liz noticed ‘Please pay first’ sign which had been taped just below the octane rating. Sighing at the inconvenience yet thankful that she had been given a reprieve from touching the slimy gas pump, Liz headed inside, wondering why they couldn’t have had one of those credit card machines installed out on the island.

  As it turned out, Mother Mary wasn’t minding the counter. Instead, there was a wrinkled up prune of a man whose name had been ceremoniously sewn onto his shirt standing next to the cash register, grinning to show the shreds of tobacco tha
t had gotten stuck between his teeth. Bentley, the shirt read. With a cheek full of Red Man and a few teeth missing from his mouth, the ill-named Bentley was about as far from a Rolls Royce as you could get. A 1950’s Ford pickup was more like it.

  “How’d do, ma’am?” Bentley said with a tobacco-flecked grin. “Need gas I would imagine?”

  Liz nodded, her eyes wandering from Bentley to the huge neon sign that read “Mother Mary’s” and back again to the unsightly clerk. “Is there really a Mother Mary or is that just a cutesy name somebody thought up to pull in lonely truckers?”

  “Oh there’s definitely a Mother Mary, and there ain’t many rig operators that would drive up mistaking her for a mistress. By the by though, she’s around here somewhere,” Bentley said as he took the ten-dollar bill from Liz, touching her hand for just a bit longer than was necessary to grab the money. “You may see her before you leave. She has a certain fondness for customers.”

  Although he was crude in a backwoods sort of way, there was something about Bentley that reminded Liz of her father, notwithstanding the bits of tobacco that marked his smile like blacked-out teeth. Maybe it was the way he combed his hair. Or maybe it was that sparkle in his eye that held her fast. Whatever it was, Liz felt simultaneously comforted and slightly alarmed by the man. While she was vaguely reminded of her dad, Liz knew that her father would have never held onto her hand as long as Bentley did. That was what made her uneasy. But then she stopped to consider that Bentley was an old timer and chalked it up to his slow reflexes. Or loneliness perhaps. She didn’t suppose many people dropped in to talk to Bentley out here in the middle of nowhere.

  “You out here all by yourself, ma’am?” he asked politely, pulling at his collar to let a little air in. Liz thought of lying and then decided against it.

  “Yeah, it’s just me,” she said as Bentley adjusted his shirt, noticing the white, puffy scars that ran down either side of the old man’s chest. When he noticed that Liz was looking, Bentley quickly pulled the lapels of his work shirt to cover the blemishes.