UnCommon Bodies: A Collection of Oddities, Survivors, and Other Impossibilities (UnCommon Anthologies Book 1)

by Michael Harris Cohen

  The restaurant's the kind that puts a basket of bread on the table. I like that. If I don't get hurt too bad, we can probably go on Friday after her shift.

  There's a commotion and I turn, bouncing in place. I take a look at my opponent and I'm laughing inside. I know him—we shared a few shifts at the docks a year back. He's a wiry little guy with great hairy paws that can probably pack a wallop, but I figure this one's in the bag. It's a bareknuckle fight. Five rounds at a minute and a half each, and I can take a helluva beating before I'm knocked out. I nod to him and then pull my shirt over my head and toss it out of the ring. There's no barrier to speak of, just a bounding square in chalk on the pavement. It's freezing out and my skin steams a bit from my warm up.

  There are two refs for a fight like this. Mine looks like he's been in a few good fights himself. Bastard puts his hand on my shoulder before I can dodge it, and I end up shoving him back a step. Not a great beginning to the match, what with him staring daggers at me. Means he might miscount the punches I land. Swearing to myself, I try to shake off his touch, but it's put me on edge. The feeling in my guts has gone from bad to worse.

  Think about Suzy.

  Breathe.

  Fists up, head down, protect your arm.

  As soon as the fight starts, I begin to feel a bit better. Breathing hard around my mouth guard, I'm almost able to ignore the bursts of panic I feel every time my knuckles slam into his flesh. My fists are the only ones doing damage, and by the fourth punch, he's blinded with blood and needs a minute to rest.

  By the time the fifth round's halfway through, I'm nursing a few bruises of my own, but nowhere near the damage I've caused.

  Then I hear it. I'd recognize that sound anywhere. I spin around and look for her. Suzy's a few feet from where she was standing before, pushing at some men who I figure are trying to cop a feel. She's cursing them out the way she does, but that sick, bad feeling is back in my guts. I just walk out of the fight. Glass crunches under my shoe and one of the assholes looks up in time to see my fist connect with his face.

  "You stay the fuck away from her!" My shout pings off the walls of the warehouses to either side.

  The biggest of the guys messing around with my Suzy gives me a look, and I recognize him. He beat the living tar out of me once. My stomach takes a dive just remembering the way he held me down.

  "What makes you think I care what you gotta say, you sack of shit?" His voice is low, and I can see ugly things in it. "Mind your own fucking business. We're just having a little fun here." Suzy yelps when he grabs her backside hard. I see another guy has her by the shoulder.

  I'm frozen like a statue. My heart's like a rat trying to claw through my ribcage. I can't breathe. The fear has hold of me. I don't want him to touch me. The nausea begins to rise. Just being a few inches away from him is enough to make my skin crawl.

  Suzy lets out a yell and stomps on someone's foot hard. All shit breaks loose. I'm still staring like a dumb fuck when the first guy clocks me in the jaw and the second hits me in the ribs. But everything falls away when Suzy flies backwards from the hard backhand dealt to her.

  There's nothing in my world but red. Fear can't touch me. Pain is meaningless.

  My fists connect with skin, breaking cartilage and fracturing bone. I'm a whirling demon, not even feeling it when they lay into me with their boots. I barely register the knife that slices into my bicep, or the bottle that shatters and opens my scalp.

  But the bullet that rips through my chest stops me.

  Not because it hurt, but because Suzy's scream is so loud in the narrow alleyway that it breaks through my trance. I stand in a daze, staring down at the blood pouring out of me. Someone yells something about cops coming.

  In seconds, Suzy and I are alone under the buzzing street lamp.

  "Beau... oh shit... Here." She hands me something. I think it's my T-shirt. Even now, she's so careful not to touch me. I push it against the bullet wound, but that's not gonna stop the blood running down my back. Blood everywhere. In my eyes, in my mouth. My arm's busted again.

  I fall to my knees and keel over. Suzy presses a hand to her lips for a second. She's covered in blood too. Afraid, I reach for her.

  "You...hurt?"

  The laugh that bursts out of Suzy sounds deranged.

  "It's your blood, you asshole."

  "Oh."

  It takes a second for me to realize I'm holding her hand. Her too. We both stare at our gory fingers linked together.

  "Beau." Her eyes wide, she looks up at me. "You don't feel anything?"

  "Yeah, I do," I mumble. The cold pavement is drinking up my warmth, one heartbeat at a time. "Just you, nothing else."

  Tears are running down Suzy's face, and she squeezes my hand. I can hear sirens. They're too late, though. I lift my other hand and put it on her cheek. She's trembling.

  "My angel."

  "No...Don't talk like you're leaving me, Beau."

  "Mm." Even though my hand's sticky, I can't help but think how soft her skin is against mine. What a fucking way to die. I always figured I'd get done in the ring. But at least I get to touch her without fear before I go.

  "Beau! Oh baby, open your eyes. They're coming. We'll get you all fixed up."

  I think about how just how much I love her.

  "Touch me." It's barely a whisper, but that's all I can spare. Suzy understands though. She knows what I need.

  Her fingers stroke my face, slide down my side, and run through my hair.

  I drift away to the feeling of her hands on my bare skin.

  About the Author

  Born and raised in a small coastal town in northern Québec, Bey spent his early summers on his uncle's boat and running wild on the beaches of the surrounding islands, lighting fires and building huts out of driftwood and fishermen's nets. As an adult, he eventually made his way to university and earned a degree in Art History with a strong focus on Anthropology. Primarily a portrait painter and graphic artist, Bey sat down one day and decided to start writing.

  Bey currently lives in the wilds of Montréal with his best buddy, a ridiculous, spotty pit bull named Murphy.

  www.beydeckard.com

  Three Poems

  by Deanne Charlton

  Brenga's Body

  Brenga internalizes everything but nobody

  knows why she grows upso thin from

  fat experience. Left alone, she secretly

  laps life like a cur at the gutter,

  ever watching as

  she cuts her hair, her eyebrows, her

  nails to the quick, slowly turning.

  Punctured everywhere, she

  twists each hardness like

  a worry stone:

  one for mum; four for dad; bro the pro

  had six before she cast him off,

  part of her purging routine,

  unpurified. She always binges

  on the same boy,

  although he has different bodies. He

  likes the moving pictures sprawled

  across her heartache by the

  thousand unnatural shocks

  her flesh is heir to, then

  something shiny always catches him and

  he's gone and pain, not enough, sends

  her alone to slit her skin yet again and

  insert her tears into the now newest gap

  that never quite closes.

  Eternity in a One-night Stand

  She gave her body to an astronaut

  but was allergic to moon dust,

  she, the velvet loop to its many jagged hooks.

  The scratches bloomed, tiny protoplasmic peonies

  in all her private places. Doctored

  all wrong, they grew, bonded shards

  of sand, limestone, feldspar, ash

  and cosmic minerals not intended

  for human flesh. Invading her viscera,

  eyes and beating heart, their task

  near completion, they lovingly encrusted
<
br />   her ivory skin. Fiery opalescent now,

  she gazes at stars, missing her siblings

  flung across the teeming void.

  It Runs in the Family

  Deep South deep woods,

  nineteen hundred and fifteen, white kids,

  not albinos, fuzzy hair colored

  like boll fruit. Not all of them

  cottonheads; just the middle three.

  People stared, of course,

  pondered the why. School

  was perplexed; church, askance.

  Born that way, they finally decided.

  Not a problem. Clap the chalk erasers,

  pass the collection plate.

  Deep South deep woods folks,

  a hundred years on. Two white mothers

  living wrong with their uncommon bodies;

  two damn daddies holding hands.

  People stare, of course,

  wonder why. School frantic; church rabid.

  Not born that way, they decide.

  A problem, sure. Delete enrollment,

  pass the collection plate.

  About the Author

  Residing with a view of the Great Smoky Mountains, Charlton has visited 49 U. S. states, including North and South Denial; moved over 50 times; traveled in 7 foreign countries, including San Francisco; and prefers eating sorbet to being drawn and quartered or complimented. She enjoys editing books, short stories and magazine articles.

  Ruby

  by Bob Williams

  Summary: It's nineteen thirty-six and the town of Ransom, Oklahoma is barely functioning after the "Dust Bowl" storm of the year before. Michael Wootten sits upon the porch of his dilapidated house and watches a caravan of trucks pull into town. Melvin Mitchell Presents: Ruby and her Amazing FreakShow Friends. Maybe this is just the thing to pump a little spirit into the near-dead town. But everything comes at a price, and Ms. Ruby always takes her cut.

  1

  Michael Wootten sat on the front porch of his home on an already blistering Sunday morning in Ransom, Oklahoma. Michael and his father had completed the decking a couple of years before and planned to start setting the posts for the overhang when Michael Sr. suddenly died of a heart attack. Michael never could force himself to finish the project. On mornings like this however, when the blazing sun seemed to hand pick him out of the world's population to torment, he sure wished he had.

  There were still significant repairs that needed to be completed on the house but he just didn't think he could bear it today. He'd been slaving away on the damn repairs since the "Black Sunday" storm had decimated the Oklahoma Panhandle, then traveled south all the way to Amarillo.

  The gale force winds had caused significant damage to not only the roof, but structural damage to the house itself. Michael honestly didn't know how he was going to fix the cracks which had shown up throughout the home. All but one of the windows were boarded, and it was unclear when Billingsley would be able to order the glass from El Paso for the replacements he was building.

  Michael had spent the better part of two months sweeping and removing what felt like thousands of pounds of dirt and debris. The Ledger had reported that particular storm from April fourteenth, nineteen thirty-five had displaced over three hundred million tons of topsoil by the time it was all said and done. Another man referred to the storm as the "Dust Bowl." Michael couldn't deny that name was appropriate. He often thought all three hundred million tons must've landed in Ransom.

  The city itself was in squalor. About three quarters of the town had fled in the weeks and months following the storm. The utter devastation the "black blizzard" had inflicted on the panhandle itself had been historical. Ransom had been sucker punched.

  The aftermath left the town crippled, with no clean drinking water for weeks. No electricity for a month. It was chaos. Currently, not a single elected official served in office. Brent Peterson was sort of the Sheriff. Mr. Billingsley stuck around to keep his hardware store open–granted, he was closed for several months before reopening. The Clements stayed to operate the grocery but it took great effort to reopen. A very small group of townsfolk were present but that barely made an acceptable infrastructure. The truth was, Ransom was dying.

  It wasn't difficult to see. In fact, everyone left in town wore it like a badge of defeat upon their daily dressing. You never saw a smile anymore, not even on the faces of the few children still sprinkled about. It was like they'd already been taught to say, "Fuck it," by their parents and given up. Then again there weren't many, or any, reasons to smile, to be honest. Michael never smiled himself because he could feel the dust coating on, and in between, his teeth. And not a soul alive needed to see that.

  Michael took the thought one step further. We're not only not smiling, we're not talking to one another. Ransom, I can't...hear...you. Your heart used to beat with such passion and vibrancy! Will you ever return to the city you once were?

  Michael stood from his rocking chair, removed the hat from his head, and used it to wipe the sweat gathering in his furrowed brows. "I don't know," he said aloud, mostly to hear the sound of his own voice. It had been too long. He turned, with hat in hand, and strode towards the door. It was time to get inside where it was only slightly cooler. His hand on the knob, he saw something off in the distance: a cloud of dust, and it was heading towards town.

  2

  No more than forty-five minutes later, a small collection of trucks pulled right into the heart of Ransom. Michael had never quite made it inside, but stood and watched the entire time it took the small convoy to arrive, at his doorstep.

  Next door to Michael's house was an open field that had once housed the Allendoerfers, but their home had been all but destroyed by the storm. They had packed up quickly and headed for Texas, and the house had been demolished in the hope that eventually someone would build on the land. Suffice it to say, that never even came remotely close to happening.

  A finely dressed man of about six feet or so exited the passenger side of the lead Ford truck with much fanfare. He had a very fine walking stick with a gold knob handle. Cupped between his forearm and hip was a black top hat with a blood red band circling the brim. His pressed pants were made of the finest material Michael had ever seen. Velvet? And the polish on his black shoes was of the finest quality.

  Once comfortably out of the vehicle, the man placed his hat upon his head and surveyed his direct surroundings in three hundred sixty degrees. That done, he placed his hands on his hips before barking orders in rapid fire succession. There were twenty-two people in all mingling around the trucks. He quickly became animated, pointing and waving his walking stick wildly in all directions. After that, he walked excitedly across the street and right up the walkway to the Sheriff's office. Turns out the walking stick provided more than just effect, as one of his legs was significantly longer than the other. He wore a special boot that matched the other in style but had a much thicker heel.

  The well-dressed man knocked for several minutes but the "occasional" Sheriff, Brent Peterson, never answered. He tried the door in that manner of "once you determine it's locked the first time you believe it simply can't be true so you shake it violently several times to confirm" kind of way. The man showed no kind of frustration as he threw on a wickedly huge smile and made his way back to the cavalcade.

  Michael was in complete awe of the situation. Even before the storm, Ransom just wasn't the place carnivals and sideshows came to. The top attraction in nineteen thirty-six Ransom, Oklahoma was a mouth full of dirt.

  Two extremely hairy men pulled a rather large sign out of the back of the third truck and carried it over to the main entrance of a massive, candy striped tent and pounded it into the ground. The tent was truly stunning in both its size and brilliant white and red stripes. It had been quickly and efficiently erected. About the same time the sign was being tacked up, a rather scaly looking man with a sheen to his skin sort of slithered up to the side of the second truck and released two knots, dropping a can
vas mural of phenomenal color and design: MELVIN MITCHELL PRESENTS: RUBY AND HER AMAZING FREAKSHOW FRIENDS!!!

  Ruby... 'freakshow friends?' Michael began to seriously inspect the crowd of visitors congregating around the truck. There was a lady with a beard. Another man who was easily eight feet tall. Little people, a woman with weird eyes and pointed tongue, even a man who looked like a tree! A few other unique individuals, along with the man who must be Melvin Mitchell, mingled with a few of Ransom's inhabitants who had come out of the woodwork.

  Michael, however, kept his distance. Michael was looking for Ruby.

  Michael had never known a Ruby before. He felt that the name Ruby carried with it an air of nobility. Anyone, he thought, named Ruby would certainly stand out. When his eyes finally landed on her, he would say to himself, Ah ha! There she is! That is Ruby!

  But that never happened.

  What did happen was a late-as-usual appearance by Sheriff Brent Peterson. He sauntered up with a perturbed look on his face. His face, which wasn't the most dashing, had a rather distinguishing scar across his cheek from a childhood scythe accident.

  Michael watched him enter discussion with Melvin Mitchell which wasn't exactly heated, but also wasn't exactly cordial. Sheriff Peterson pointed and flailed while Melvin Mitchell simply smiled and nodded at carefully orchestrated times. In the end, the two begrudgingly shook hands and the Sheriff went on his way as Melvin Mitchell returned to his friends.

  Michael wanted to engage the strange gathering of folks next door to his house but couldn't seem to make himself leave the front porch. In fact, after several hours of gawking at the "Freakshow Friends," he'd gone inside. The mystery of Ruby and who she was had begun to take hold on Michael. He sat alone at his kitchen table. Waiting. Patiently. Later that night he would go and see RUBY AND HER AMAZING FREAKSHOW FRIENDS.