Category Archives: Fiction.

Another Winter Night in Chicago

By Maryann Lozano

Carl stepped in a slushy puddle that was deeper than he had expected, and dirty snow and mud splattered all over his pants. He went back inside to change, and his mother assaulted him with a long tirade about how much more trouble he was causing her now that she had to wash his mud-stained pants. 

“You’d think she was having to use a hand-crank washing machine and hang the heavy, wet clothes on a line,” he thought as he rushed out the door.

Of course he missed his usual train and was late to work.

“This is the third time this month you’ve been late, Carl” Frankie said.

“I know, I know. I stepped in a puddle and had to change – couldn’t come in with mud all over my pants, could I?” He tried to chuckle but it sounded more like a groan. “Anyway, I’ll start leaving the apartment a little bit earlier from now on. I promise.”

Carl knew it was better to ingratiate himself by apologizing than to punch the guy in the face, which was what he really wanted to do. He had to be careful. The doctor from the hospital had called in a favor to get Carl this job, and if he messed up it would be hard to find another one.

At lunch, Carl went down to the cafeteria on the first floor of the building. He always brought a sandwich from home, but every day he bought a pop and a bag of chips so that Mr. Wu couldn’t complain that he wasn’t a paying customer. Once a month, on payday, Carl would buy a burger and fries.

“Oh. Now who’s a big spender?” Mr. Wu would say, rolling his eyes.

Carl fantasized telling him to shut his pie hole but kept it to himself. 

He sat alone in his booth, choosing the one in the back of the café so that people wouldn’t watch him while he ate the lunch his mother had packed for him. It was the same thing every day – Underwood deviled ham on white bread, an apple, and the chips he bought. Once Mama snuck in whole wheat bread because she had heard on television that it was better for you. Carl brought the uneaten sandwich back home and Mama had yelled at him for wasting food. 

“If you don’t want me to waste food, then don’t give me shit that tastes like tree bark.”

Mama had slapped him across the face. “I ain’t going to stand for that kind of language in my house!” she yelled. “You’re going to go straight to Hell if you don’t watch that tongue.” Mama always threatened him with Hell. He figured it was her snake-handling upbringing. But the next day his sandwich was on white bread again.

While he was eating lunch, he heard the guys in the next booth talking about Monica. They called her a “fat bitch who stuck her nose in everyone’s business” and agreed that they hoped she’d get fired in the reorganization that was coming soon. Carl ran his hand through his thinning, wavy brown hair. He wanted to tell them to shut up too, but Frankie told him that he’d get fired if he caused another scene.

Carl had a crush on Monica. He saw her his first day and found her plain face and straight blond hair beautiful. He might have a chance with someone like that. Carl passed by her desk as often as he could. She always smelled of Dove soap and Jergen’s lotion. Sure, she was a little bit heavy, but his mama had always said, “Don’t look at the outside, son, look at the inside.” Mama was rail-thin—he liked a woman with a little meat on her.

Carl spent the afternoon doing his rounds, cleaning up the break rooms, and making sure the bathrooms were stocked with supplies. He finished early and sat in the dingy, maintenance office reading a true-crime magazine he’d squirreled away in his top desk drawer, slamming the drawer shut any time someone came in. Carl felt more at home in this office, where the walls were covered with black streaks and pockmarks, than he did anywhere else in the building, which was decorated with fancy modern art and shining chrome fixtures. 

Finally, it was time to go. Carl gathered up his things—his collapsible coffee cup that Mama insisted on hand-washing each night, his old worn leatherette wallet, and his newspaper. He put them all into his nylon briefcase with the duct-taped handles. He noticed that the tape was coming up, the handle now sticky. 

“I’d better stop on the way home and buy another roll,” he said to himself. He said goodnight to Frankie, who grunted in response, and walked out.

The darkening day was crisp as he stepped out of the revolving door to walk the two blocks to the train station. He stopped to read the headlines on the evening paper in the box on the corner and was almost run down by a group of people with suitcases. They had come out of the Hotel Lakeside next door to his building.

“I’m so sorry,” said one of the travelers. She was dressed in blue pants, a white turtleneck sweater, and a North Face jacket with a scarf hanging from the collar. She smiled as she narrowly avoided running over Carl’s foot with her bright, floral-patterned rolling bag.

She was sort of pretty, and Carl considered offering to help carry her bag but thought better of it when she turned towards one of the men and started talking to him. The man was tall and handsome and spoke with an accent. Maybe he was her boyfriend or something? Carl hurried past them.

On the platform, an older Chinese man and his granddaughter were playing “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik” on violins. Carl loved listening to classical music—it was the one thing that had kept him sane at the hospital, and Mozart was one of his favorites. Frankie made fun of him when he listened to public radio in the office.

“What? Are you a fairy or something? Who listens to shit like that?” He’d say. 

Carl would shrug and turn the music up until Frankie left again. Frankie listened to rap music, and the lyrics excited Carl in a way that made him uncomfortable. Classical music helped calm him.

The little girl, probably no more than six or seven, played a tiny violin. She rolled her feet back and forth on pink shoes as she played. Every time someone dropped money in the open violin case on the floor in front of them she looked at her grandfather excitedly, but he kept his eyes tightly closed. Carl took a dollar out of his wallet and placed it in the case with a wink and smiled at the little girl. She stepped back warily and missed a note. Carl hurried along as the old man opened his eyes.

The group with the suitcases were on the platform as well, and they were all smiling, watching the musicians. The woman in the white sweater told her companions that she played a tiny violin when she started taking lessons at age five. She was standing to Carl’s left and he took the opportunity to take a better look. He decided his initial assessment was correct — she was kind of pretty with curly brown hair and blue eyes. Some people might think she was a little bit heavy, but in Carl’s opinion, she could stand a few more pounds. 

He reminded himself to stop staring. He could tell by the way her eyes darted away that it made her uncomfortable. 

******

Carl stared at women a lot. Mama always got mad when she caught him doing it, but that was only because the police had questioned him that time the pretty girl from the mailroom had disappeared. 

The police showed up early on a Saturday morning, knocking loudly on the door. Mama had answered the door in her dressing gown. Carl, in his bedroom, listening by the door, heard murmuring and then Mama’s footsteps down the hall.

She opened his door without knocking, hitting Carl in the head.

“Carl! You get out here right now! These policemen are wantin’ to talk to you about some girl from your office.” She glared at him.

“What girl?” Carl asked. “I don’t know anything about any girl.”

Mama grabbed his bathrobe and threw it at him.

“Get out here now.” She said again and turned back down the hall.

Carl walked into the living room and faced the two cops who were standing by the closed door. Mama was in the kitchen making coffee, grim-faced and angry.

“Good morning, officers,” He stammered. “What can I do for you?”

“Do you know Emily Apperson?”

“I think she works at my office, but it’s a really big company, so I don’t know everyone.”

“We think you do know her. We have records of phone calls from your phone, here,” he pointed to the green rotary dial phone on the table, “to her cell phone. And we know she complained to HR that you were making her uncomfortable at work. And now she’s missing.”

Carl shuffled from one foot to the other. He hadn’t known that Emily had complained about him. She was pretty, with green eyes and blond hair, and she wore scarves year-round. Carl had always wondered if she was hiding some kind of a scar or something. Scars fascinated him, and he liked to fantasize that Emily had a long, angry, red scar right down the side of her neck. He imagined running his fingers down its length as she wrapped her scarf around his neck. 

“I called her a couple of times to ask her out, but she was always busy. It wasn’t really a big deal. She said no and I gave up.”

Mama offered the officers coffee, but they refused and left. Good for them, Carl thought. Mama’s coffee was almost as bad as the rest of her cooking.

After the officers left, Mama had watched through the window as they drove away and then turned on Carl. 

“That girl called this house just this past Thursday, threatenin’ to tell the cops if you didn’t stop callin’ her.” She shoved him, backing him into the living room. “Why can’t you just stop being so weird?”

Carl sat down on the couch. He shook his head. “Mama, I swear I didn’t do anything to Emily. I called her some, but I was always too scared to actually ask her out, so I just hung up. But I didn’t hurt her. I swear.”

Mama shook her head, disgusted, and walked back into the kitchen.

“I’m tired of cleaning up your messes. And I don’t like the cops coming and snooping around here. You behave yourself, Carl. Or I swear I’ll throw you out on your ear.”

Mama turned back into the kitchen and took one of her shirts out of the washing machine. She shook it and held it up considering the brown stain on the sleeve.

“Darn it.” She muttered, balling up the blouse and putting it back in the washing machine.

Carl assumed that the stain happened when she was cooking or cleaning and that she would find a way to blame it on him. He braced himself for the usual verbal assault but she stayed quiet. 

On Monday, everyone at work whispered about Emily’s disappearance. Frankie told Carl that they wanted to fire him right then since she had complained about him, but they decided to give him a second chance. 

“But it’s only because you were in that loony bin before, and your shrink is a friend of Mr. Fields. They felt sorry for you.” Frankie brought up the hospital as often as possible. He liked to hold other people’s secrets against them. 

*****

Carl was so lost in his thoughts that he almost didn’t hear the train pull up to the station. Everyone pushed on, but two of the suitcase men didn’t make it and Carl saw them waving and yelling as the train pulled away, like they believed they could stop it. Carl thought they looked stupid trying to get their friends’ attention. Another train was coming soon.

The train pulled away from the station and the men vanished from view, left behind as their group moved on. Carl was reminded of a long-ago field trip, the words, “if you get separated from your group, just stay put and someone will come back for you,” running through his mind. That’s what the teacher had said the day his class went to the museum. Carl had been gazing, fascinated by a painting of a woman being held down by a monstrous angel. When he looked up and realized that his whole class was gone he stood perfectly still, just like the teacher said to. No one came back. Finally, a policeman had called Mama and she had come to get him. 

I got a beating that day, he thought.

His teacher never said anything about it. Carl figured she was concerned that his mother would make a fuss, but he could have told her not to worry. Mama blamed him for getting left behind. 

“You’re so stupid and careless,” Mama told him with a hard swat to his head. “If I were your teacher, I would have left you behind too.”

Mama was mean, but Carl knew she just wanted him to be smart like her sister’s kids. Smart enough to be a success so he could take care of her.

“Now I am successful,” he thought. “I’ve got a good job but she still yells and complains about the work she has to do.” Carl caught the white-sweater woman’s eye. She was standing a few feet in front of him on the train, facing him at first, but then turning around when she saw him staring again. 

“I’m gonna move out soon anyway,” he thought.

He couldn’t ask Monica out until he had a place of his own. Frankie had said a million times, “Carl, you ain’t gonna get any pussy until you move outta that apartment.”

Frankie should know—if you believed the stories he told, he got some every night

Sometimes Carl called Monica, but he could never bring himself to speak when she answered the phone.

Carl looked up at the woman again and smiled to himself at her discomfort. Even though she had turned away from him he could still catch her eye because the windows in front of her were slightly mirrored. She kept glancing to see if he was still staring at her. 

It was hot on the train despite the winter weather. The woman unzipped her coat and the scarf fell from around her neck. Carl bent down, picked it up, rubbed it between his thumb and forefinger. It was a soft, flannel scarf, not silky like the one he found in Mama’s hope chest.

Carl wasn’t supposed to go into Mama’s room at all. But sometimes when she was gone, he’d sneak in and look through the chest. Her wedding dress was at the very bottom, like a dingy lace cushion put there to protect the other knick-knacks from harm. There were the brittle, yellow photographs of people he didn’t know. Mama’s wedding ring and some other jewelry sat in a small, wooden jewelry box, and there were lots of old papers–tax returns, jury duty summons, Carl’s birth certificate, and a copy of her father’s will. There was also a small pearl-handled knife and an old, stained baby blanket. Recently, something new and unexpected caught his eye—a silky scarf with an emerald green vine running through the pattern. He knew he was pressing his luck but he took it anyway and hid it under his mattress.

Back on the train, Carl handed the woman her scarf and looked past her reflection to see his own. He was big and clumsy with a thinning spot on the top of his head. His blue eyes bulged—some mean boys on the train the other day had called him “bug eyes.” He smiled at that Carl in the window, but the smile looked more like a grimace. Maybe that was why his staring made people uncomfortable— because his eyes bugged out and he could never make a smile look nice. Every few minutes Carl made eye contact with the woman again. He could tell she was getting mad, and finally she looked into her briefcase, rifling through the papers in an attempt to avoid looking up again. Carl didn’t care. This was his stop.

Carl exited the train with a final glare at the woman, who looked relieved that he was leaving. He headed down the stairs to the street, walked right past the convenience store, and then remembered the duct tape and turned back.

“Carl!” his mother screeched from her window across the street. “Carl! You’re late!”

“Sorry, Mama.” He yelled back. He had hoped she wouldn’t see him but she was waiting and watching for him, just like always. “The train was late today. I’ve gotta go in here for a minute. Do you need anything?”

“No. But hurry. You’re dinner’s ready. If you don’t eat it soon I’m gonna throw it out.” She slammed the window shut against the cold.

Carl rolled his eyes and walked into the store. Mama was in one of her moods. Frankie said he’d never live with his mama. He said she was a pain in the ass bitch, and he guessed Carl’s mama was the same. Frankie thought all women were. Carl thought he was probably right, knew that he was right about Mama, but figured no one as beautiful as Monica could be like that.

As he walked past the magazine section Carl grabbed a Penthouse Letters and tucked it under his arm. Then he found the duct tape and got in line. The woman in front of him was Mrs. Fleming, a friend of Mama’s, and he hoped she wouldn’t notice the magazine. She’d be sure to tell Mama, and then he’d be in trouble. Mama found his magazine stash before he went to the hospital, and she went ballistic, smacking Carl around before she burned the magazines.

Mrs. Fleming didn’t even notice that Carl was behind her. He paid for the tape and his magazine and put them in the briefcase, walked across the street and up the stairwell.

Even with the lamps turned on, the apartment was dark. Mama had put some black and white photographs of her parents and Carl’s father above the couch, and a cross over each doorway. The only other attempts at decoration were lace doilies on the coffee tables and a large family Bible on the sideboard. 

Everything else was barren. 

Carl’s room had a twin bed, a functional dresser with a small black and white television on it, a bedside table with a drawer, and the cross above the door frame. Mama liked the house to be spotless and was always telling Carl, “I can’t keep cleaning up after you. You know my health don’t allow it no more.” But he knew she’d keep doing it no matter what because it gave her something to complain about.

As Carl walked in the door, the smells of dinner assaulted him. Meatloaf and beans again. It seemed that was all Mama cooked anymore. He hoped she had at least gotten ketchup.

“Did you get ketchup this time, Mama? You know I don’t like meatloaf without ketchup.”

“That’s a fine how-do-you-do for your mama,” she pouted. “You should be glad I even cooked at all. My joints is hurtin’ bad today, but I still spent hours in here cooking your dinner. I ain’t waitin’ on you hand over foot all the time to get treated bad like this!” 

Carl hated that his mother held onto her Southern accent with an iron grip. She had been in Chicago for at least 40 years, but still peppered her speech with ain’ts and dropped final consonants like pennies into a wishing well. Carl didn’t know why they stayed in Chicago after his father took off. He was just a baby at the time and thinking about it now, he wondered why she hadn’t moved back to Alabama, where she was from. He had never met any of her relatives—her parents had died before he was born, and Carl had no idea if she had aunts or uncles, or even cousins. He didn’t remember his father either, of course. When he was a child, he asked her once in a while why his father never came to see him. “He’s just gone.” she had told him. “That’s all you need to know. Gone and left me alone with you to take care of and clean up after. And you’re going to turn out just like him.”

She threw the meatloaf pan on the counter, turned on her heel, and stormed out of the kitchen. “I guess her joints are better,” Carl thought as he followed her into the living room. 

“I’m sorry, Mama. I just wanted to know if we had any ketchup.” He leaned over and kissed her on the cheek. Carl knew he had to make up with her if he wanted any peace. 

“I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to make you mad – I can get my own dinner tonight. Do you want me to make you a plate?”

Mama seemed appeased, at least for the moment. “No, honey. I’ll just eat something later. How was your day?”

“Oh fine, I guess,” Carl answered as he walked back into the kitchen. “The train was late.” He finished serving his plate and walked into the living room again. As he sat down on the couch, a few green beans spilled onto the rug. Carl quickly set down his plate on the TV tray and covered them with his napkin. Then he turned to see if Mama had noticed.

“You dropped your napkin, Carl. You’d better be careful not to spill anything. I use up all my energy keeping this house clean for you. I told you not to eat on the couch anyway. And don’t forget to say the blessing.” She started down the hall towards her bedroom, muttering to herself about the uselessness of reasoning with a clumsy dimwit.

Carl breathed a sigh of relief and picked up the napkin and the beans. Dinner was overcooked as usual; the beans were limp and the meatloaf was dry. After Mama’s outburst, he was scared to ask about the ketchup again, so he choked down what he could and threw the rest in the trash, careful to cover the evidence up with the other trash in the can.

Later that night, after Mama went to bed, Carl was watching the news in his room and saw a story about a plane crash that had happened earlier that evening. The flight had been from Chicago to Pittsburgh. He wondered if the white-sweatered woman was on that plane. Then he picked up the phone and dialed Monica’s number, blocking his own as usual–a trick he had learned after the Emily incident. She picked up after two rings. 

“Hello? She said in a raspy, sleepy voice.

“Did I wake you up?” Carl couldn’t believe he had actually said something this time.

“Who is this?” Monica asked. When she heard only silence she said, “Are you the one who’s been calling me every night?… Are you?… Answer me!” 

Carl smiled at the increasing panic in her voice. He imagined her standing up in a sheer nightgown, looking out the window to see if she was being watched, the way Emily had done the evening he snuck out of the house at midnight and called her from the phone booth outside of her apartment building. 

“I’m going to call the police if you don’t stop calling me!” Monica said, her voice rising with fear and anger.

Carl heard his mother shuffling down the hall and quietly hung up the phone. He opened the drawer and pulled out a small Bible, opening it to a random page. The door opened and Mama looked in. She was wearing a long, flannel nightgown with red hearts all around and had her white hair loose. She looked like a Valentine’s Day ghost, Carl thought. 

“Did I hear talking? Were you on the phone? Who were you talking to at this hour?” She glared at him and shook her finger, her voice getting shriller with each question.

“It was just the television, Mama. I was watching the news. And now I’m reading.” He held up the Bible to show her.

Mama looked suspicious. “If I find out you’re makin’ calls again, I’m gonna disconnect the phone. I don’t want no more cops coming around here.”

“I wasn’t on the phone! Goddammit, Mama! It was the television! And don’t you ever knock? I’m a grown man. I should have some privacy.” 

Mama stormed in and struck Carl across the face.

“Don’t you be talkin’ like that in this house! Lookit you. Holdin’ the Lord’s word in your own two hands and usin’ his name in vain at the same time,” she said with disgust. “If I find out you’ve been makin’ calls again, I swear you’ll regret it. All I do is clean up your messes. If I have to do it again, I’ll throw you out on your ear. You can go find yourself somewhere else to live. See if you can find another fool to do your laundry and cook your meals. Someone who don’t mind living with the devil!”

Carl knew she would never actually kick him out. But he also knew it was best to play along. Carl squeezed his eyes together and thought about the dog they had when he was a child. He had loved that dog and was heartbroken when he got home one day and found that Mama had gotten rid of it. The childhood trick worked, the tears pooled in his eyes.

“Mama. I don’t want to leave.” Carl sniffed and wiped his eyes harder than necessary to make them tear a bit more. “I’m sorry. I’ll watch my language. But you have to believe me. I’m not making calls anymore. I promise.” He put his face in his hands and peered through his fingers. 

Mama’s face softened almost imperceptibly. Carl saw and knew he had won. 

“Fine. But if I hear that kind of talk again, you’ll be out on your ear.” 

The cross above Carl’s door frame bounced on the wall as the door slammed.

Carl listened until he heard the toilet flush and Mama’s bedsprings creak as she got back into her bed. He put his hand between his mattress and box spring and drew out a silk scarf with colorful flowers, enhanced by a lovely, emerald green vine running through the pattern. He rubbed the scarf on his cheek and smiled. Then he reached into his briefcase for the magazine.

Not for Human Consumption

By Jon Sokol

Larry watched as his young friend squinted at an open can of tuna.

“This product not for human consumption,” Deke read aloud.

He turned the can around to show Larry the picture of an orange cartoon cat licking its mouth.

Deke tossed it into the smoky campfire the two men had built to keep away the god-awful South Georgia mosquitos and pissed-off yellow flies. He took another bite from his half-eaten cat food sandwich and tossed the rest into the flames. Deke would cry if he were alone.

Instead, he fished out a tin of Copenhagen from his blaze orange timber cruising vest and smacked it against the heel of his hand. He lifted the metal top and held the cardboard container to his nose savoring the pungent odor of the snuff.

Image by Jon Sokol

Larry fished around in his brown paper bag and pulled out a small Tupperware bowl filled with red Jell-O cubes. He lifted the top and shook the gelatinous mass until it landed with a plop in the dirt between his worn-out boots.

Deke looked over at him and shook his head.

“Dammit, Larry. Every day I watch you dump that shit out on the ground. Why don’t you tell Mrs. Soo you don’t like that mess?”

He placed a wad of dip on his tongue and rolled it around his mouth until it nestled in the familiar spot between cheek and gum.

“Believe me, bud. It’s just better this way.”

Larry snapped the lid on the plastic container. He took a long drink from a warm can of Diet Rite and balanced it next to him on the log.

Larry was a veteran. He had served in the 7th Cavalry Regiment in Korea, but he never talked about it, even when he was ripped on bourbon. Back then, the brutality he witnessed didn’t feel right, even for a once narrow-minded Georgia boy. He would just shake his head when asked about the war and say, “It was so fucked up. Nobody knew what they were supposed to be doing.”

The war atrocities that Larry saw in Korea haunted him still. He credited Soo-Min with saving his once bigoted soul, but privately, he attributed much of his change of heart to his disgust at his unwillingness to stand up to the malicious slaughter of those innocent refugees, almost all women and children.

After two tours of duty, he returned stateside with his Korean bride and enrolled in the School of Forestry at Abraham Baldwin Agriculture College in Tifton. Two years later he was living back in his hometown, cruising timber and running planting crews for the pulp mill up the road in Savannah.

That had been over forty years ago. Now he was teaching young Deke the ropes. It was time for him to turn in his cruising gear and hang up his snake chaps. In two weeks, he would turn sixty-five and have his modest retirement party on the same day. He and Soo-Min were set to haul their horse trailer and otherworldly possessions to northern Colorado. The thought made him smile. He loved his community, but he was disgusted with its excruciatingly slow progress. Still perturbed at the double-takes people gave him and his wife. He was ready to move on.

He was going to miss Deke, though. Most weekdays for the past six months, he and Deke had worked together cruising timber from sun up until the early afternoon, then checking on loggers, site prep operators, and fertilizer contractors from the air-conditioned comfort of a company-owned Ford pickup.

Image by Jon Sokol

Deke was from north of Atlanta and fresh out of college. Twenty-two years old and fifty thousand in debt to the U.S. Government who had carelessly loaned him the money to go to the University of Georgia. He told Larry that, in Forestry 101, he was taught how he could save the planet and all its endangered species by applying well thought out silvicultural treatments to bountiful forests. He said they never told him he’d be humping through pine plantations in hundred-degree weather and moving to a small town known only for having a shitty sawmill and a string of church burnings.

The two men sat on the log together and talked about Larry and Soo’s recent trip to Atlanta to see the Olympics. Larry told Deke how bittersweet it was to see Muhammad Ali, once unbeatable now trembling with Parkinson’s, light the cauldron. And how excited Soo was when Michael Johnson won the gold medal in the 400 meters. But Deke was clearly not interested in the conversation.

“How’s Jill doing?” Larry asked before tossing a handful of pecan halves into his mouth.

Deke swatted at a mosquito, stood up, spat in the fire, sat back down. “She’s going to Minnesota to see her sister.”

“Well that sounds fun.” Larry would not look at Deke.

“She says she ain’t coming back.”

Larry took off his round eyeglasses and wiped them with a faded red bandana. “You sure?”

“I’m sure. She said she didn’t want to be married to a homophobic racist anymore.”

“Hmm. Sounds like she’s pretty sure.”

“What do you think about that, Larry?”

Larry raised his eyebrows and blew out a long horsey sigh. He put his glasses back on wrapping the wire legs around his ears and stuffed the bandana in his back pocket. “Those are some pretty serious allegations.”

“Yeah, no shit.” Deke’s leg bounced up and down like an erratic jackhammer. “The last argument we had was whether Tupac getting shot dead was a good thing or a bad thing.”

“I’ll guess which side you came in on.”

“Look, I might have some opinions, but I wouldn’t say I’m racist. That asshole’s songs were about killing white people.”

Larry put up his hands as if to stop traffic. “I can’t say I ever heard any of the man’s music, but saying that anybody deserves to die is a bit harsh.”

Deke crossed his arms and spat tobacco juice. The fire sizzled.

“Look, here’s the deal,” Larry continued. “Most everybody I know in this damned town is a homophobic racist. Preachers, teachers, the man who owns the bank, my own momma. It’s just the stew we swim in.”

Deke looked him in the eyes then dropped his gaze back to the fire.

“The good news,” Larry said, “is that you didn’t come out the womb that way. It ain’t as natural as people let on. I mean, it’s up to you, but you can change.”

“I don’t know, Larry. She’s got her mind made up.”

“Oh, no. She’s gone. You’ve screwed the pooch on that one, son.”

Image by Jon Sokol

Deke removed his ball cap and clawed his fingers through his dirty blond mop of hair.  “I haven’t even told my folks yet. What am I supposed to say to them?”

“Maybe ask them why they raised you to be so damned hateful.”

“Come on, man. You know I’m as nice a guy as anybody. You and me get along good, don’t we?” Deke’s eyes reddened with anger.

“Yeah, but I’m a straight white dude.”

Deke jerked to his feet. “Fuck you, Larry.”

“Settle down a minute, son,” Larry said. Deke turned his back to the older man. “So far, your education has been mostly in classrooms, Sunday school, and hanging out with your folks,” Larry continued. “You’re out on your own now, and you’re going to find out that things are not as simple as you were led to believe.”

Deke shook his head slowly. “What the hell are you talking about, Larry?”

“I’m telling you that you need to think long and hard before coming up with your opinions. Put yourself in other people’s shoes before you spout off some bullshit you learned watching cowboy movies.” Larry tilted his head to the side. “Jill called you out on that, didn’t she?  Said to stop being John Wayne and to listen for a change.”

“Wait,” Deke said. “How did you know that?”

“Kid, I know more about you than you do.” Larry stood in front of Deke and looked him in the eyes. “I’d love to give you some life-changing advice, but I know you. You’re going to have to live your way through it.”

Deke broke eye contact. He walked to the fire and kicked dirt over it, extinguishing the flames.

“You’re going to have a lot of regrets one day,” Larry said. “Regrets you’re not counting on now. When that happens, don’t beat yourself up about them. Just be glad you can recognize them as regrets.”

Larry turned back to the log and drained the rest of his soda. “In the meantime, just try not to be a dick to people.”

“Jesus,” Deke whispered. He stomped up a cloud of powder dust to the truck and climbed in behind the steering wheel and slammed the door. The engine made an initial screech and settled into a throaty purr. Deke glared through the windshield at nothing in particular. He rolled down the window and spat.

Larry stretched his wiry frame. He squinted as he looked westward into the cloudless blue sky. Turkey buzzards circled overhead, drawn to a stench that only they could smell. Probably some dead armadillo or possum. Something not fit for human consumption.

The Short Straw

By Vanessa Reid

“Go on, stupid! Pick your straw,” said Burl. “I ain’t got all day.”

Teddy stared up at the boy who was at least a head taller than he was. He looked into Burl’s black eyes and thought how this was an impossible situation since Burl was making him choose a straw in order to decide who had to go into the old Walmouth place and Burl had most certainly rigged it so Teddy would select the dreaded small straw. 

Burl’s cronies Paulie and Little Man had already chosen their straws and miraculously, lady luck had been with them. They grinned on either side of Burl Bogle, the biggest, meanest bully at Grover Cleveland Middle School. Teddy sighed and selected a straw. It was the short one. 

Little Man danced around as he hooped and hollered at the top of his lungs. Paulie stood by Burl, with a quiet, slick smile. Burl grinned so hard he looked like a puppet, his face split in half by crooked yellowed teeth. “Well, the straw says you go in, Tumor Teddy. Whatta you know about that? Are you gonna go in like a man?” Burl snorted, “or are you gonna be a pansy like you usually are? Do we have to put you in that old shithole, Tumor Teddy?”

Teddy sighed. He knew this day would come. He could have counted on it like Salisbury steak on Wednesday and church on Sunday. He knew that he had no choice. “I’ll go,” he said solemnly. 

Burl looked disappointed. “No tricks, Teddy. Do you hear? Don’t go sneaking out the back or something. You stay in there until we tell you to come out.”  

Teddy nodded, pocketed his straw, and turned to walk up the steps of the old Walmouth place. He hesitated for a moment taking in the dying house. Once a stunning Victorian with two turrets and a bronzed cupola, its expansive porches sagged, its paint peeled, and its broken windows squinted at Teddy. 

Every Halloween, kids dared each other to enter to see if the ghost of the owner, Mr. Wally Walmouth, still walked its halls. The story went that old Wally Walmouth killed himself in that house when he found out his son died in combat. Kids said the authorities didn’t find his twisted and torn body for over a week. They said he took a swan dive off the upstairs balcony and broke every bone in his body, and now, he wouldn’t leave until his son came back. 

Today wasn’t Halloween, however. It was only April, a special treat just for Teddy, courtesy of Burl Bogle. Big Butt Bully Burl, Teddy thought darkly.

He walked up the front steps which crackled with each footstep. He stood in front of the front door and he hesitated. Teddy turned his head toward Burl and asked, “Are you sure you want me to do this?” 

“You’re not a pansy. You’re a pussy! Get your ass in there, Tumor.” His sidekicks giggled. 

“Yeah, pussy. Get in there, Tumor!” Little Man croaked. Burl gave him the side-eye. Little Man stopped smiling. 

Teddy hated that nickname. Burl gave it to him in the fourth grade after Teddy’s father died from a brain tumor. His grief made him quieter than he already was, and in addition to his small size, Burl seized upon Teddy like a new toy. Burl had beat him up too many times to count, he stuck his head in the toilet at least once a week, and once even made Teddy eat worms in front of Lavender St. James, the prettiest girl in school. Teddy was so upset that he peed himself. It was the second-worst day of his life. 

Teddy reached for the doorknob and after a couple of tries, shoved the door open. He walked in slowly and closed the door behind him. 

Paulie grinned. “He’s gonna come running out like a pussy, right, Burl?” 

“Oh, sure he is. Right, Burl? He’s gonna come running out and oh—he’s gonna pee himself, even. Right, Burl?” Little Man echoed, jumping up and down. 

“Shut the fuck up, you two,” Burl said. “Yeah, he just might pee himself,” Burl said to himself softly. He grinned wider.  

The three boys stood watching the silent house for what seemed like a half an hour. “M- maybe we should call him out, huh Burl?” Little Man asked. 

“Shut up!” said Burl. “Just give him a second. He ain’t been scared enough yet.” Burl squinted at the house, frowning. “What the hell is he doing in there, anyway?” 

Seconds later, they heard a loud crash followed by a thud. It seemed to echo through the house’s halls and spill out of the broken windows. Then, Teddy screamed. “Help! Help me, please.” There was uncomfortable desperation in Teddy’s voice, and the boys could hear him begin to sob. 

“What the hell?” Burl said. Paulie and Little Man just stared at the house, mouths hanging open. 

“Please, Burl, I’m hurt. I need help,” Teddy called through a broken, dirty window, but the boys couldn’t see anything inside. 

“Are—are you gonna go in and help him?” Little Man asked. Paulie looked nervously at Burl, waiting for his answer. 

“I ain’t going in there. We’re going in there. And we ain’t going in to rescue Tumor. We’re gonna make sure he’s not pulling something. Then, we’re gonna kick his ass and lock him in a closet for a while. If he’s pulling something, he’s about to learn real fast that you can’t mess with Burl Bogle. Come on!” The other two boys exchanged worried glances. 

Burl headed up the steps to the front door, then turned around to see Paulie and Little Man still standing in the weeds of the front yard. Paulie looked grave. Little Man looked terrified. 

“Get your pansy asses up here now, or I’m gonna lock you two in the closet with Tumor!” The boys walked up the steps and Burl gave the door two sharp shoves before it opened. Then, the boys walked in, leaving the door cracked open behind them. 

The inside of the house was just as they suspected: dark and decrepit. There were old-fashioned parlors filled with sheet-covered furniture on either side of the foyer which faced a long, dim hallway. Above them on the second floor, a horseshoe staircase spilled down either side onto the landing below, shreds of rotting green carpet dotting the steps. 

“Help me, please,” sobbed Teddy from somewhere up above. The boys looked at one another, relieved not to have to walk down the dark hall in front of them, and then they headed up the stairs on the left.

Once they reached the open hall above, Burl shouted, “Where the fuck are you, Tumor? You better not be jerking us around!” 

“Here! I’m here,” Teddy called from a room to the left. “I’m hurt.” 

The other boys looked at one another and Burl led the way to the door to the left. He reached for the doorknob and then stopped. 

“What is it, Burl? Is he crying for his dead dad or something?” Little Man joked. Burl shot him an angry look and then turned his attention back to the door.

“Be quiet!” Paulie hissed. “Can’t you hear that?” Paulie jerked his head toward the door. Little Man, silenced, leaned toward the door to listen. 

The boys could hear a deep male voice coming from the other side of the door but couldn’t make out what it was saying. “Yes,” Teddy said to someone. “Yes. Yes, okay.” The man’s voice continued but the boys still couldn’t understand it. “I know, you’re right,” Teddy whispered, almost too low for the boys to hear.  

Burl flushed. “What is this? Some joke? I’m gonna kill that kid!” He threw the door open and the three boys rushed in. They found Teddy sitting on a sagging couch next to a broken window, the flimsy sunlight creeping in, and on the other side of the moldy velvet seat sat an old man in a strange suit.

“What the…?” said Burl. 

“You were right when you said they would come,” a smiling, uninjured Teddy said to the man next to him. “You are a wise man, Mr. Walmouth.” Teddy turned and smiled at the other three boys. “Boys, I want you to meet a friend of mine. This is Mr. Walmouth and you are in his house.” 

“Ah! The infamous Big Butt Bully Burl. We have been expecting you, son.” Burl stood in front of the other two boys and paled as he watched the old man in disbelief. 

“What the hell?” Burl said shakily. “You…you ain’t Walmouth. He’s been dead forever.” Little Man had begun to sob and Paulie tugged at his sleeve as he stepped back to the door. 

Mr. Walmouth grinned humorlessly exposing rotted teeth and tiny white worms crawling through the blackened holes. One fell onto his dusty lapel and wriggled there before sliding into his lap. “Yes, Burl, I have.” 

Little Man screamed and Paulie pulled him out of the door and down the stairs. Burl swayed on his feet as a wet stain spread on his crotch. 

“So, Burl,” Mr. Walmouth said. “It seems we need to have a little chat about my son Teddy, here.” 

Burl shook his head. “No, please no.” 

“Oh, yes. I insist.” The door slammed shut behind him. 

Teddy closed the front door and skipped down the steps of the old Walmouth place. He turned back and looked at the house with fondness. He had been coming here since January when Burl had become too much and the grief had become more than he could bear. 

He thought that it would be the right place to take his own life so his mother wouldn’t have to find him, but the day he chose to die turned out to be the first day that he had really lived in a very long time. That day, he met old Wally Walmouth and they became friends. They had much in common—especially their grief—and it was nice to be understood for once. 

Teddy remembered the day he entered the house and climbed to the top of the staircase. He was crying as he stood on the railing looking down and the floor below. At that moment, Teddy’s pain crested. He bent his knees and was preparing to jump when an unseen blow knocked him backward to the floor of the second-floor landing.  When he looked up, Mr. Walmouth stood above him frowning. He had never seen a ghost before but Teddy wasn’t scared. 

Mr. Walmouth guided Teddy to the parlor where they sat and talked for hours. Talked about the death of Mr. Walmouth’s son and his own suicide. He had jumped from that very banister. They talked about Teddy’s father, and how that sorrow was an unending curse. Mr. Walmouth’s grief had overtaken him just like Teddy’s. 

Mostly, they just talked about mundane things like fishing and the books they both enjoyed. Teddy learned that Mr. Walmouth and his boy used to fish together after church on Sundays just like Teddy and his father. Soon after that, Mr. Walmouth began to call Teddy “son” which was a comfort to Teddy. Just like a protective father, when Teddy told Mr. Walmouth about Burl and the other boys, Walmouth said not to worry about them, as long as Teddy kept coming back to visit. 

Now, Teddy was ready to live his life in peace. He was so grateful. Grateful for Mr. Walmouth’s friendship and guidance. Grateful he didn’t hurt his mother more than she had already suffered. Grateful that it was all over. Burl would never bother him again, just like Mr. Walmouth promised. The other boys wouldn’t mess with him either. Maybe they could even be friends. Teddy would come back soon to visit and to thank Mr. Walmouth, but not until they found Burl’s body and all of that business was behind them. He almost couldn’t wait to go to school tomorrow.  

Teddy paused in the overgrown yard, took the short straw from his pocket, and stuck it in his mouth, smiling as he headed home.

Riddles

By Jack Walsh

The late afternoon sun hung low beyond the city walls, and the glare obscured the enormous thing crouched in the shadow of the gates – a thing that had suddenly become very shouty.

An inhuman voice bellowed, the force of it sending a cloud of dust blowing past the man on the road. “Step forward!” The traveller did not feel inclined to do so.

“I said step. Forward.”

The man swallowed, raised his arm to shield his eyes from the sun, and took a step.

“C’mon. Little bit more. Scooch on up.”

The man, squinting, took another half-step.

The thing sighed. “Zeus almighty, guy. Just come into the fucking shade already.”

The traveller crept up until the sun dipped behind the walls. And there, guarding the way in, was a creature more horrible than any he could have imagined. The cruelest eyes looked at him from within a woman’s face, and a long tongue flicked itself over blood-stained fangs. Below all this was the body of a lion, a sight rendered all the more grotesque by the incongruous addition of eagle’s wings. It was an unholy abomination, a magical being seemingly designed by committee.

The creature watched the man as he struggled to process her appearance.

“And don’t forget the tail,” she said, pointing behind her. “It’s a snake.”

Indeed, an asp raised up from behind the monster. “What? I wasn’t paying atten…Oh, hey. I’m the snake.”

“Hey…” said the traveller. “I’m Oedipus.”

“And I…” said the monster, pausing with a flourish as she spread her wings. She then shook her tail with annoyance.

“Sorry,” said the snake.

“And I…” the monster repeated as the snake added to the drama of the moment with a fearsome hisssssss, “am the Sphinx.”

Oedipus said nothing.

“The Sphinx!” she said again.

After a beat, the snake added, “hsssssssss?”

“Like in Egypt?” asked Oedipus.

“No, that’s like a totally other thing,” replied the Sphinx.

“So, you’re like a sphinx.”

“No, I’m the Sphinx!” she screamed, a small burst of flame coming from her throat. “Ow! Holy shit!…I didn’t even know I could do that! Fuck. Do you have any water?”

“Uh, I…I’m sorry. I don’t,” said Oedipus.

The Sphinx flexed her jaw a few times and, grimacing, smacked her lips with distaste. “Ugh, gross…So, you. I imagine you want to go into Thebes or something.”

“Um, yes, ma’am.”

“Then, you must answer…my riddle.”

A look of vague recognition crossed Oedipus’s face. “Oh. The riddle of the Sphinx.”

The Sphinx rolled her eyes. “Ugh, Ares, Apollo and Athena, yes, of course the riddle of the Sphinx.”

“Now, remind me of the deal with that,” said Oedipus

“If you get it right, you pass safely into the city of Thebes.”

Oedipus nodded. “Gotcha.”

“If you do not…” the Sphinx paused again. The snake hissed.

“I die,” Oedipus jumped in.

“Yes,” said the Sphinx, annoyed at the interruption. “Yes, you die. Horribly. Right here.”

“You can turn back, though,” she added. “And maybe I’ll let you run a while across the plain before I swoop from the heavens and devour you alive.”

“Very well,” said Oedipus.

“Very well what?” The Sphinx stutter-stepped with excitement. “You’re going to run for it?”

“I will answer your riddle.”

“Oh.” The Sphinx frowned. “I should warn you; no one’s ever gotten it right.”

“But I shall,” said Oedipus.

“But I shall,” muttered the Sphinx in a sing-songy tone as she reached under one massive wing and pulled out a laptop computer. “Okay. Let’s see here…” She opened it and typed a few keys.

“Shit. Hang on.” She tried again.

Oedipus politely feigned interest in the architecture of the city walls.

“Oh, duh. Caps lock,” said the Sphinx. She clicked the mouse and scrolled down for a moment. “Okay, where was…a ha. Here we go. Oh, you really are quite doomed.”

Oedipus exhaled and rubbed his sweaty palms on his tunic.

The Sphinx looked at him over the top of the monitor and began.

“Name a city…that does not have an “O” in it.”

Oedipus blinked. “Uh…”

“I bet you can’t!” the Sphinx gleefully interrupted.

Oedipus glanced past the Sphinx. “Um…” he coughed, ”Thebes?”

The Sphinx’s jaw dropped slightly, and then she looked back at the city behind her.

“Athens, also,” suggested Oedipus, helpfully.

The Sphinx scowled. “Okay,” she said, looking back at the laptop.

“Oooo, also, Atlantis, Sparta, Delphi…”

“OKAY!!” snapped the Sphinx. “Enough! Fuck. We’ll move on to the next one.”

“Wait, what?” asked Oedpius.

“The second riddle.”

“You just said there was a riddle.”

“No, there’re three.”

“Well, you didn’t say that.”

“Well, there are. Obviously. There are always three magical things. Three wishes. Three guesses of the goblin’s name. Three, I dunno, ghosts or whatever. Three riddles. Okay? I just have to find the next one.”

They were quiet for a moment until the Sphinx began to mutter. She tapped the keyboard angrily several times.

“Shit. I think my IT guy is doing updates right now.”

“In the middle of the day?” asked Oedipus.

“I know, right?” said the Sphinx.

“You should eat him.”

“Ha ha. I totally should.”

“Yeah.”

“Hmmm…”

Oedipus shuffled his feet. The Sphinx watched the screen. The snake hissed softly to himself.

After what felt like several minutes, the Sphinx spoke. “So, what brings you…What’d you say your name was?”

“Oedipus.”

“Right. What brings you to Thebes, Oedipus?”

“I’m here to see my girlfriend.”

“Ah, a special lady in town. Got a picture?”

Oedipus pulled up a photo on his iPhone and handed it to the Sphinx.

“Oh, cute,” said the Sphinx. “Although…”

“What?” asked Oedipus.

“Oh, nothing. It’s just that…you guys look a lot alike.”

“What?” Oedipus laughed. “I don’t know. I don’t really see it.”

“You don’t think so?” The Sphinx held the picture in line with Oedipus’s face and eyed the two. “I mean it’s almost like she could be your sister. Or your moth…”

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Well, y’know how they say,” said Oedipus, taking the phone. “Couples kinda start to resemble each other.”

“Do they say that?” asked the Sphinx. “Hmmm. I thought that was about dogs and owne…oh, hey! Here we go. Next riddle.” She looked at the laptop, and began to read.

“I truly believe that Cyclops is the son of our lord, Poseidon, God of the sea…”

Oedipus waited for more.

“I bet this won’t get many shares. Are you brave enough to share this?” asked the Sphinx.

Oedipus glanced at the Snake, who gave him a look that suggested that if he had shoulders, he would shrug them.

“Tick tock,” said the Sphinx.

Oedipus looked at her. “Wha…?”

“Are you brave enough to share this?!” demanded the Sphinx.

“Y…Yes?” offered Oedipus.

The Sphinx smacked the side of the computer. “Gods-dammit, you are really good at this!”

Oedipus cleared his throat in a way that he hoped seemed modest.

“But I shall feast on your entrails, yet!” shrieked the Sphinx. “I shall drink your blood and pluck your heart from your che..oh, shit. Here’s a good one.”

The Sphinx’s eyes moved back and forth over the screen. Oedipus couldn’t help but notice that she silently mouthed the words when she read.

After a moment, the Sphinx pushed the screen partway down and looked at him. “You have been a worthy challenger…”

“Oedipus,” he said.

“Right. A worthy challenger, Oedipus,” the Sphinx continued, “but you will soon learn that mortals were not meant to match wits with the scions of Olympus.”

The Sphinx opened the laptop again.

“There is a creature that walks on four legs in the morning, two at noon, and three in the evening,” she said.

Oedipus opened his mouth to reply but the Sphinx continued. “This creature is man. Like if you agree.”

Oedipus blinked. “I’m sorry, what?”

“99% will get this wrong!” added the Sphinx.

“I..” began Oedipus and then looked at the snake again, who had clearly lost interest at this point.

“Like if you agree!” shouted the Sphinx.

With some confused hesitation, Oedipus forced a queasy smile and raised his hand in a thumbs-up gesture.

The Sphinx let out a horrific wail, beating her mighty wings and thrashing her tail furiously. “Aaaaaaaa!” said the snake. At the edges of the surrounding plains, thunder boomed. The Sphinx once again fixed her fierce eyes upon Oedipus. He braced himself.

“Okay, well, enjoy Thebes,” said the Sphinx while clicking the mousepad. “The place right inside the gate has killer moussaka, just FYI.”

“Oh…” said Oedipus. “Cool.”

“Actually,” the Sphinx mused, “I could really go for some, now that I’m thinking about it.”

“Aren’t you, I don’t know,” said Oedipus. “Aren’t you supposed to die now that I solved your riddles?”

“Hmm? Oh, no, I don’t think so.”

“I thought maybe you were going to throw yourself off a cliff or something.”

“No,” said the Sphinx. “I mean, I have wings. So. That would be weird. Anyway, you wanna grab a bite? They’ve got WiFi. I have other things I could ask you for fun. Wanna find out what character from the Iliad you are?”

Oedipus eased past the Sphinx, who was making no real effort to move out of the way. “Oh, um, thanks. But, I need to get going and see my mom…I mean, my girlfriend! Haha that was crazy.”

“Mmmm,” said the Sphinx, offering no further comment aside from a raised eyebrow as she turned her attention back to the internet.

fearless

By Jeremy Maxwell

for Amy Tecosky

“Let’s go to Nike,” Sydney says, and starts putting on her shoes. She doesn’t bother with socks because the stick-poke on her leg is not even an hour old, much too fresh for fabric. Fraggle is already getting ready to do another one on somebody else, laying all the shit out on the table and taking giant slugs of whiskey straight out of the bottle. Yesterday he sat in the kitchen floor and did all the veins in his feet, turning them into tree roots twining up his legs. Blood and ink all over the linoleum, it looked like a fucking murder scene by the time she made him quit.

The radio is up loud and when she finishes with her shoes she stands up and turns it off, stops and looks around. Fraggle glances over at her in the new quiet and shrugs, drops everything but the bottle and heads for the door. Chad and Stacy are making out on the futon in the corner and Sydney kicks it as she walks by. They pull their faces apart and Stacy starts messing with her hair and straightening her clothes.

“Come on, Jupiter, get in the car,” Sydney says, and the giant dog lifts his head up off the couch. His ears twitch forward and that’s about it. Chad and Stacy get up and follow Fraggle out of the apartment, hands already all over each other again. “Jupe. Come on,” Sydney repeats and the dog lumbers down off the couch and stretches hard into his front legs. He yawns and shakes his head and follows everyone out the door.

I’m hunched over the coffee table rolling more joints, even though there are already a dozen laying in front of me. I take a drag from the one in my mouth and call behind her as she disappears outside. “Nike? Y’all can barely even wear shoes,” I holler after them. No one listens or cares and I get up and start sticking joints in my pockets. “Well goddamn, hang on,” I say, and hurry to catch up.

***

Thunder Kiss ’65 is playing in the car and as soon as it’s done, Sydney starts it over. She is yelling at Stacy in the backseat and it’s hard to tell if she’s pissed or just wants to make sure Stacy can hear but either way it sounds like she’s having a shouting match with Rob Zombie. “Look,” she says, “when you hit him there’s only three things he can do.” Fraggle swerves around another hole in the road and everybody goes leaning into each other and then back again when he corrects the wheel. The dog is taking up more space than anyone and I try to push him over but it’s no use and I go back to listening to Sydney.

Chad and Stacy are still pressed hard together for no reason and Sydney turns full around in the front seat. I pull out a joint and light it and hand it to her as Fraggle drops the gear and starts the drive up the mountain. We aren’t going to be able to go much further in the car but there’s a place to pull over and park after the first bend. Sydney hits the joint and blows the smoke in Stacy’s face. Stacy looks away from Chad and when she sees the look Sydney’s giving her, she tries to scoot away from him, pulls her hands out of his lap and starts straightening her hair and clothes.

“Yeah, sis,” Stacy says. “Three things.” Chad starts to reach for the joint but Sydney doesn’t even glance at him and hands it to Fraggle instead. He billows smoke against the dashboard as he rounds the bend, finds the cut and shuts off the car. The radio dies when he opens the door but Sydney’s volume doesn’t change. Fraggle gets out with the bottle and takes a long slug, opens the back door for Jupiter to jump out. The dog doesn’t move, even when I start pushing on him.

“He can lash out,” Sydney yells. “He can run. Or he can freeze.” She gets out and leans back down into the car, face to face in the backseat with Chad. “Come on, Jupiter,” she says, and the drop in volume and tone make it clear she wasn’t just yelling over the radio. She glares at Chad from inches away as the giant dog jumps down into the dirt on the other side. He immediately hikes a leg and pisses on the tire. I wait for him to get done before I get out.

Fraggle has already started up the road with the joint so I light another one and climb out of the car.

“That’s not even true, Syd,” I say. “There’s all kinds of shit he can do.” She doesn’t say anything, just pulls her head out of the backseat and scowls at me over the roof, so I keep talking. “He could pull out a weapon.” She keeps glaring, and I go on. “He could fall down and have a seizure. Hell, he could even,” I say, and she cuts me off.

“Are you done?” she growls and steps out of the way so Chad and Stacy can finally get out. They stretch in the sun and Sydney slams the door and walks over to me, reaching for the joint. I hit it again and blow the smoke in her face. “It was anecdotal, you fucking assmonkey,” she says and punches me in the arm. I don’t fight or fly or freeze, I just start laughing and hand her the joint as Jupiter follows us up the road, all of us lagging behind Fraggle and the bottle.

***

Nike Missile Site LA-94 sits on top of a mountain off Sand Canyon Road in the LA National Forest. By the time we get up there Jupiter is panting full out like he might quit and lay down any minute, but as soon as he sees the concrete pad he trots right over and starts drinking from the puddle of water pooled in the corner on the far side.

“When’s the last time it rained, you reckon,” I say, and Sydney stops on the path and calls the dog.

“Jupe, that’s probably radioactive,” she says, “get over here,” and the dog comes panting back across the pad. His tail wags when Sydney starts to move again. She scratches his giant head and he falls in behind her. “Some kids died up here, you know,” she says to me as I fumble around in my pocket for another joint. I find a bent one and spend a second getting it straight before I light it. “Well, back there on the road,” she says. “Prom night.”

“They did not,” I say, and hand her the joint. Chad and Stacy are over by the radar station, leaning up against the wall. They’re starting to get handsy again and even though Sydney’s squinting into the sun she rolls her eyes hard enough for me to see.

“They damn sure did,” she says. “They went to my high school. They were headed up here to smoke pot or make out or whatever kids do after prom. I think they were drunk,” she says, and looks away from Stacy, finds Fraggle out at the edge of the cliff, drinking hard from the upturned bottle. We start to make our way over to him, passing the joint back and forth while she tells me about the ghost that haunts the road we came up, how her hair is flying out on all sides, her face a ruin of made up flesh. How she moves up and down the road trying to find help for her friends. “She doesn’t walk,” Sydney says, “she just floats above the ground and lunges at you with outstretched arms.”

“Tell me you don’t believe this shit,” I say, and Sydney starts to laugh.

“Do you believe there used to be nukes right here under our feet? You better believe I fucking believe it.”

I look over my shoulder for a girl in a floating prom dress, but she’s not there, just some dude coming up over the edge of the hill, carrying a canvas bag. Sydney and Jupiter lope up to Fraggle, standing there in his bare feet, every vein of them tattooed with India ink. She takes the bottle from him and turns it up, finishes it off in one smooth gulp.

“Jesus,” Fraggle says. “I couldn’t of poured it out in the sink that fast.” He reaches in his pocket and pulls out a flask as I hurry over. The sky stretches out in front of us forever, and I wish I wasn’t out of breath.

“You better call your sister,” I say as Jupiter watches me pant, and Sydney turns around. She looks behind me and sees the guy with the bag, takes a few steps back toward the radar station.

“Stacy. Get over here,” she yells, and Stacy pushes Chad away and starts to straighten her hair and clothes. “Right now, Stacy,” Sydney shouts, and Chad finally notices the man who has joined us on the mountain. They leave the building and come lurching across the concrete pad at a trot.

The guy doesn’t pay any attention to us, just walks over to the edge of the cliff on the opposite side. He’s wearing spandex pants and he kneels and puts the bag on the ground. Once he has it open, he starts digging around inside. Sydney looks ready to charge him and knock his ass off the side of the mountain, but all he’s pulling out is a bunch of long poles and an even bigger bunch of fabric.

“Is this guy pitching a fucking tent up here?” Fraggle says, as we watch the guy start putting it all together. He hands me the flask and I take a long pull.

“I’m pitching a tent up here, if you know what I’m saying,” Chad says, and Sydney turns around and punches him in the stomach. His face turns red and you can almost see the steam shoot out his ears as he doubles over and freezes.

“That’s too flat to be a tent,” I say, handing the flask back to Fraggle. “Shaped all wrong, too.”

“Well what is it then,” Sydney says as Stacy moves to comfort Chad. He shrugs her off and steps back, sulking, reaching for the flask. Fraggle twists the cap on and puts it back in his pocket.

“You guys are assholes,” Chad says.

“That’s right,” Sydney says. “Keep your fucking hands off my sister.”

“Guys,” Stacy says. “Look.” Everyone stops and looks at her, follows her outstretched hand. “It’s a fucking hang-glider,” she says, pointing.

The guy steps into it and starts getting his hands set as the group of us goes stock still. We wait there a moment with the silence fraught around us, the city too far away to hear. He takes a couple of steps forward and launches himself like a missile off the mountain.

“Holy shit,” Fraggle yells, and all of us go running over to the other side of the cliff. Jupiter jumps and barks, and Sydney has to grab his collar to make sure the giant dog doesn’t go tumbling over the edge. “A fucking hang-glider,” Fraggle says, and pulls out the flask and hands it to Chad. I dig around for the last joint and we get it going, fearless, staring after the man as he sails ever smaller through the Santa Clarita sky.

the only monster here is me

By Jeremy Maxwell

Audio recorded live during gutwrench. issue 7 release event.

The monster is laid out on the front steps like the end of the world, like the party was yesterday and here he is, Mephistopheles, askew against the bricks and forcing everyone to go around. It smells like sulfur and piss on the stoop, puke on his shirt and spilled beer soaking into his hair. He won’t know how he got here, but this is where he’ll find himself, if he ever wakes up. The morning is soggy and hot and the monster smells worse by the minute.

The little girl stands there looking down at him for a long time. The other kids are coming, she’s going to have to make a decision soon. She looks over her shoulder, hoping they’re still out of sight and knowing they won’t be for long. She bends down and wrinkles her nose.

She pokes the monster on the shoulder, one, two, three times, poke, poke, poke. “Mister,” she says. “Mister, wake up.” He doesn’t move or twitch but the dark spot on his pants becomes a patch, grows darker, starts to spread. The smell gets worse and she scrunches up her nose till it hurts. “Ah, jeez,” she says, and leans in all the way. She takes him by the shoulder and shakes, saying mister and shaking and shaking until he stirs.

His mouth falls open and he begins to groan. It is deep and low and wide, the sound of gravel kicked up on the road.

,” he says. The sound starts small and swells to fill the stoop, fighting the smell for the space. One eye pops open wide but the other is crusted over with sweat or sleep or beer and doesn’t budge. He lays there making the sound, staring out at her through one half-blind busted eye.

,” he says, and the eye swivels up to look her in the face.

“You,” the monster says.

“Mister, you got to get up,” the little girl says and lets go of his arm. “You got to get up right now.” She looks over her shoulder again and there they are, Tommy and Tina and the rest of them, trying to cross the street. “Mister, please get up,” she pleads, and behind his broken, leaking eye, the monster begins to move.

* * *

There used to be a bathroom here but all that’s left is a piece of shattered mirror on the wall and a hole in the floor where the toilet used to sit. The monster pisses into the hole with his pants pooled around his ankles while the little girl stands in the other room. Somewhere down there are flies and a few of them swarm up to investigate his pants, his feet, the puddles on the floor. He makes the sound again and kicks at the flies as he pulls up his pants.

“Mister, you got to learn some more words,” the little girl says as he stumbles through the doorway and staggers past. The counter is lined with liquor bottles in varying stages of emptiness and he turns them up one by one until he finds one several fingers deep and collapses into the only chair in the room. It is plastic and weak in the legs and flops over sideways, spilling the monster into the floor.

,” the monster roars, and the little girl shakes her head and glances back toward the door. She shouldn’t be here, she’ll catch a beating for sure if anyone finds out, from Tommy or Tina or maybe even her mom, it just depends who finds out first. You never go into the monster’s lair, they’ll say. It’s where he keeps his power. Even if she knows better, she knows it won’t do no good to argue. They’ll beat her up for sure if she does that. His other eye is open now and he watches her watch the exit. “Good,” he says, flopping over onto his back and clutching the bottle to his chest. “GTFO.”

“That doesn’t spell anything, mister,” the little girl says, “but at least you’re trying now.” She looks down at him and wrinkles her nose. “Don’t you got anymore pants?” He stares up at her through both bleary eyes and then scrunches up his face and laughs. It starts small and slow and like all else the monster does, swells to fill the room. She’s not sure why but she’s just a little girl so she laughs with him, the two of them roaring there together in the empty house.

They’re still laughing when the knock comes at the door.

* * *

The sound is tiny and she knows it’s Tina even if she can’t say how. She quits laughing and then he hears it too and the silence that follows is as loud as the laughter ever was. It presses in around them and the knock comes at the door again. The monster sits up and drinks from the bottle, throat working against nothing even after whatever he’s drinking is gone. The tiny knock returns and the monster throws the empty bottle at the door. He’s making the sound again and she wants to cower there in the room, she wants to run for the door but the bottle bursts against it and she backs toward the bathroom as glass sprays at them both.

The tiny knock goes away and the monster climbs to his feet. She does cower then, in the doorway of the decrepit toilet, the monster’s lair, the monster’s lair, where have you gone, oh what have you done you stupid little girl. She cowers there still when he snatches open the front door and lurches out onto the stoop. She can see past him and across the road where Tommy and Tina and the rest of them are gathered, but they aren’t all kids, there are policemen there too, looking and pointing at them from the other side of the road, the other side of the world.

“Tommy’s gonna kill me,” she wails and there in the dilapidated doorway the little girl begins to cry. The sound starts small and slow and swells like the monster’s to fill the room, bigger and bigger till there is nothing else. The monster turns on the stoop and leans hard back into the house as the policemen rush across the road.

“Look here, little girl,” the monster says, holding the doorframe with one hand and pointing at his crotch with the other. She knows better than to look but her eyes are wide with terror and there is nothing else to see. “Look,” he roars again, and she does, and there’s nothing there to see, he’s just pointing at his pants. He turns away from her and heaves himself off the stoop, pitches himself toward the crowd. He’s making the sound again but she can barely hear it for her own sound bouncing off the broken walls.

He throws himself at the first policeman and then ducks as the group of them tries to grab his arms, his hair, his soggy pants or puke-stained shirt. The monster dodges and jukes and his clumsiness might as well have belonged to somebody else because his eyes burn with a clarity the little girl has never seen, not in her own eyes or her mom’s or even Tommy’s or Tina’s when they are working her over. He stops there at the bottom of the steps and looks back at her, across the stoop and the empty room and the upturned plastic chair. She is still cowering and wailing in the doorway of the bathroom and the dark spot on her pants becomes a patch, grows darker, starts to spread.

The monster turns back to the nearest policeman and kicks him square in the nuts. It is full and strong and has the weight of a full-grown man behind it. The policeman crumples to the ground and the monster doesn’t dodge or juke, just lets the rest of them reach in and grasp, his pants, his hands, his throat. He just stares and laughs at the little girl as she cowers deep inside the doorway of the abandoned house. She stops crying then, runs forward to the stoop where the smell of sulfur fills the space. She wrinkles up her nose and laughs.

Facedown in the street the monster laughs with her, he laughs until they pick him up and throw him in the back of a car, cuffed at the hands and the waist and the feet. The little girl leans out onto the stoop as Tommy and Tina and the rest of them come running up the steps. She stops laughing and grabs onto the doorframe with both hands.

“What the fuck is wrong with you,” Tommy yells as he reaches for her arms, her throat, for anything. Her leg is already swinging back before he has time to stop, and when she connects with his nuts he goes flying, off the stoop, off the steps, into the street facedown and the sound he makes is so familiar, so full of outrage and despair, it’s not just the monster laughing, not even just the two of them, the monster and the little girl. It’s the policemen, it’s Tina and the rest of them, the whole world laughing at Tommy, laughing as he makes the sound.

any kind of home

By Jeremy Maxwell

They’ll tell you the Panhandle is part of Florida, any map or GPS will say the same, but anybody that lives around here knows it’s just more Alabama, and it’ll stay that way for the next fifty or sixty miles. It stretches out in either direction and it doesn’t much matter if you’re headed east or west, it’s all just loblolly pines and the slow creep of kudzu tearing everything down. Two-lane roads that lead god knows where and tattered billboards that haven’t been legible for years.

I drain the last of the beer from the can and toss it out the window, watch in the mirror as it sails neatly into the bed of the truck. You would think I’ve been doing this forever, because I have. I crack open another and take a long pull.

Pantera gives way to Behemoth and I hear the tires move across the paint, feel the truck begin to shake as it starts whipping through the grass. I snatch it back onto the asphalt and take another pull from the beer. By the time Behemoth is giving way to Hank III, I’m flicking my half-smoked cigarette into the wind and tossing the empty can behind it.

There is no destination; there’s nowhere out here anyone would want to go.

I’m standing beside the truck staring at my phone, smoking a joint and trying to figure out if I still have service. I haven’t decided one way or the other when it rings in my hand.

“Hello, wife,” I say.

“Hello, husband,” she says, and I hit the joint and wait. “Are you at the show?” she asks.

“You know, I don’t think I’m gonna go.”

“Scared they won’t let you in?” she says, and I stand there, stupid. I flick the roach into the weeds and watch it burn; unbuckle my pants and piss on it, stagger back against the truck.

“Why the fuck wouldn’t they let me in,” I say, putting my pants back together and reaching through the window for another beer.

They’ve all rolled into the floorboard and I have to climb in up to my waist to get ahold of one. I pull myself out and walk around the back of the truck, open the tailgate and sit down.

“It hasn’t been two weeks since you blacked out and started doing snow angels on the floor in front of the merch table,” she says.

“I don’t remember doing that.”

“Well, they do,” she says, and I know she’s right.

I’m staring at the woods listening to her tell me it’s fine, to be careful and come on home when I see the cut. You could drive by a million times and never notice it there, even if you were looking for it. I tell my wife I love her and end the call and climb back in the truck, start it up and turn toward the ruts between the trees.

The road goes on forever, it even forks a couple of times and I’ve got no idea where I’m going, just picking left or right and hoping I don’t get stuck in the mud out here in the middle of fucking nowhere in the middle of the fucking woods. The truck is bouncing back and forth and the daylight’s fading and there’s only one more beer rolling around in the floorboard. I’ve just about decided to turn the whole thing around if I can find someplace to do that when the trees open up into a giant clearing of freshly mown grass. It happens fast and I hit the brakes at the treeline and sit there staring straight ahead and wondering what in the hell I’m doing out here. The Kills are singing loud and I turn them down and down and down until the sound is gone.

Out in front of me, seven single-wide trailers are set in a wide semicircle. They’re pushed back almost against the far edge of the trees with very little space between one and the next, enough for a clothesline and a couple of plastic chairs between each one. Some of the chairs have been turned over and there are no clothes hanging on the lines. A pair of jeans and what could be a sundress are strewn across the ground like everything was snatched down in a massive hurry and I get the feeling there were people out here moments ago.

“What the fuck is this, then,” I say, and I want to turn around and get the fuck out of here but there’s not enough room to do that without leaving the trees. Large vegetable gardens line both sides of the clearing. I’m getting visions of meth cooks and cartel weed trimmers and I reach under the seat for the pistol, set it on the center console.

I pull forward and I can see that all the windows are covered and the doors are closed and I know I should just go but now I can’t help myself and I keep moving toward the trailers. I stop a few yards short of the middle one and before I can get it in park the door snatches open and a woman comes storming down the steps with a shotgun. I’m out of the truck before I know what I’m doing and she’s got the thing leveled at my chest and I didn’t even pick up the pistol so I just stand there in the grass and put my hands above my head.

“Put your goddamn hands down,” she says. “Who did you come out here for?” I lower my arms and glance around and now there are bends in all the blinds but I still can’t see inside.

“I didn’t come out here for nobody,” I say, and she doesn’t say shit so I tell her I’m just trying to turn around. I’m drunk and stoned and I should’ve just gone to the goddamn show where the bouncers and bartenders all hate my fucking guts but nobody wants to shoot me.

She asks if I have a gun and I tell her in the truck and she asks what I’m really doing out here and I tell her, really, nothing. A young girl comes out of the trailer behind her with a walkie talkie in one hand and puts the other on the woman’s back. “Nobody knows who he is,” she says, “nobody’s ever seen him.”

“Jesus Christ, you stupid bastard,” the woman says and points the shotgun at the ground. “Well come on in and at least get some tomatoes.” She backs toward the steps without turning around and the girl disappears through the door and I don’t even like tomatoes but here I go inside.

When I ask what they’re doing out here, the woman glares at me as the girl piles vegetables into a paper sack. “Growing tomatoes,” she says, and takes the bag and shoves it against my chest. The place looks more like an office than any kind of home, and again I ask what’s going on.

“Look, I’ve got a dozen ladies out here hiding from assholes just like you,” she says, “and you’ve got them all scared half to death. Couple of bad decisions and you end up married to some prick with shitstains halfway up his back from twenty years of wiping his ass in the wrong direction. Creeping through the woods that way,” she says, shaking her head. “Got them all scared to death. Now please,” she says, “take these and go.”

She follows me out and watches as I climb in the truck and stow the pistol, open the last beer and set out for home. When my wife asks what I’m doing with tomatoes, I set the sack on the counter and pull her close, saying, I love you, I’m right here. I love you. I’m here.

The Undead Have No Dignity

By Jessica Nettles

Lily stood at the weathered wooden door of what had been Marvis-Dorna funeral parlor back in the day. She smoothed the skirt of her black dress and adjusted her hat and veil with her gloved hands. The dress was uncomfortable and hot, not one you’d wear on a late spring afternoon in Alabama, but it was the only one she owned. Had Mary Kat, her daughter, still been with her, she’d have teased Lily about clinging to traditions that no longer mattered to anyone else in town. She wore the dress, hat, and veil to assure herself that she was respecting Edwin like a good Southern wife would. Rules may have changed when folks started going off, but that didn’t mean she had to.

A tear rolled down one cheek, and she reached into her small black purse and pulled out one of Edwin’s handkerchiefs she’d nabbed before she left to make this final step in the ritual of the dead. Her family had always said she was a bit cold, but that wasn’t true. After people started going off, grief was something that just held her back from helping others, so she shut it away altogether. Can’t be strong if you’re a blubbering mess. Loving Edwin meant being strong once again. She closed her eyes, took a breath, and knocked. The door opened.

“Ah, Miss Lily, come right on in, we’ve been expecting you,” said The Coroner. He was wearing an immaculate black suit with a matching black tie, as was the custom. His hair was slicked back like an old-time Baptist preacher’s.

The Coroner took her arm and led her to an office, which was fine by her since her arthritis was acting up something fierce since Edwin’s fall in the kitchen only an hour or so before. Even though she’d taken one of her pills, her hips and feet were aching. She sat down in a floral wing chair while he moved behind his polished teak desk.

“Would you care for some coffee or tea?” he asked with a gentle smile.

“Iced tea? Oh, I’d sure like some,” she answered.

The Coroner rang a tiny silver bell. A girl in a clean apron and a black dress brought in a tray holding a sweating tea pitcher decorated with blue and purple mophead hydrangeas like the ones in full bloom by Lily’s porch and two tall glasses filled with ice cubes. She smelled of gardenia and walked with a small shuffle. Lily studied the girl’s pockmarked face. The last of the children went off last year after a wicked wave of chicken pox, a disease once eradicated. Was that the Dickerson girl? Maybe not.

The ice clinked in the glasses as The Coroner stood, took the tray from the girl, and nodded for her to leave. She hissed softly through her bared teeth as she stood, hands still extended. The Coroner snapped his fingers right at her nose, and her hiss stopped short.

“You may leave now, Rose,” he said.

Rose Dickerson. I was right, thought Lily. She remembered when the family had Rose in lockdown before the little thing had gone off. The girl was the last of the chicken pox group. Folk were chattering for weeks after, saying that maybe whatever caused the going off was moving on. Lily had almost believed this was a possibility, and then a whole cluster of folk who lived by the depot at the edge of The Community, went off on Saturday afternoon for no good reason.

The girl’s pox-scarred arms dropped to her sides. She walked right into the doorframe, backed up and did it again. The Coroner set the tray on a serving table next to Lily’s seat. He approached the girl from behind and set her in front of the door, patting her back as she exited.

“Rose is still … in training,” he said, approaching Lily, who fidgeted with her hat, trying not to stare. “Shall I pour?”

“Please,” Lily replied, charmed that she could hear music in the background. It was a song from back in the day, but she couldn’t remember the name of it. Canned music was a luxury these days.

She took the cool glass of tea and sipped it, pleased that The Coroner took his duties seriously. She considered what she’d written in his job description after his role was deemed necessary in the changing environment.

Civility is a skill The Coroner must have since he will deal with the citizens of The Community daily.”

Not only had this particular Coroner been civil, but he’d also proved to be proactive in ways they’d not dreamed of three years ago. He brought changes that, at least in her observations, had made The Community a better place for everyone, including the Gone-Off. As she sipped iced tea, which was perfect in the teeth-cracking way tea was at Homecoming dinners when preachers were still sent here and church was still a thing, The Coroner sat back down, folded his hands, and smiled at her.

“My Edwin. He passed earlier, but he ain’t gone off yet,” Lily said. “I’m sure you know that.” She knew what he was going to say but felt like she needed to speak the words anyway.

Edwin hadn’t ever liked the way this was done, but she’d told him it was the best they could manage considering the way things had gone, and it was better than folks doing things that would worsen their predicament. He’d voted against the changes suggested by The Coroner after he was hired, but she’d stood with The Council, especially since she was the head at the time.  That one thing had become the one bone of contention between her and Edwin till an hour or so ago. As much as she knew that what The Coroner did was the best thing for all involved, for some reason losing Edwin was harder than she’d dreamed it would be.

The Coroner frowned and said, “We can’t take him if … “

She hung her head and said in a whisper, “If he ain’t gone off.” She took a sip of the iced tea, letting it run down her throat. Then she asked, “What if he didn’t want you takin’ him?” She knew she’d gone off script now but didn’t much care what The Coroner thought about that. She knew what he’d say. It was law.

“Mrs. Smith, you of all people should understand how this works.”

She nodded, and said, “But he never wanted all this.”

“None of us did, Lily,” responded The Coroner. In another time, folk might think he was one of those Baptist evangelists who did tent revivals in August.

He moved from behind the large, shiny desk and pulled a chair up next to her. Then he took her hand in his own. Even through her gloves, his hands were like ice and made her own hands ache the way the cold from Edwin’s body had when she’d moved him earlier.

“You and The Council wrote the rules for a reason. Making exceptions wouldn’t serve The Community,” he said.

She pulled her hands away, rubbing them.

“Can’t I keep him at the house? I need the help. We got no kin left to help. He won’t be any trouble, I promise,” she asked.

“The entire community needs him. Keeping him home is selfish, Miss Lily,” he said.

The grief she’d packed away over the last three years, flushed over her and took her off guard. This wasn’t the first going off she’d attended to, but of all of them, this was the worst. She started gasping and tears flowed down her cheeks. She was losing Edwin twice. She’d been able to manage herself better when Mary Kat went off by pretending her girl had gone off to Auburn for school again. This time, pretending wasn’t an option and besides, Edwin deserved to have his wishes respected after all he’d had to accept the last few years. She dabbed her wet cheeks with Edwin’s monogrammed handkerchief as she fought to regain some self-control.

“I just want to give him some dignity,” she whispered.

“And he will be treated with the utmost in dignity just like your Mary Kat and all the rest. He’ll be of service to The Community, just like he’s always been.”

“So if something … like a tooth or somethin’ falls off while you’re workin’ on my Edwin, could you save it for me?” she asked.

He shook his head but snickered. “No, ma’am. Unfortunately, you know we cannot allow keepsakes.”

Lily nodded and took one last sip of tea, which soothed her. Business concluded, The Coroner stood. As he guided her to the door, he picked up the tablet off his desk. Lily could see the screen, which was filled small photographs of members of The Community. Lily could see Edwin’s photo flashing red.

The Coroner tapped his tablet and said, “I can see that you locked Edwin down. That’s excellent. Now, you just go on home. You wouldn’t want to miss the grand event.”

She looked up at him and said, “Edwin won’t be hurt?”

“I promise.”

Lily saw little comfort in this promise. The Coroner guided her by the elbow to the front door and bid his goodbye as she stepped out. The sky faded from fuchsia to deep azure dotted with pale clouds as she walked down the as-of-yet unlit street back to her house. By this time, she and Edwin would have had supper and been sitting outside on the porch, watching the sunset. It was one of her favorite times of the day because they would sip the last of the tea from supper, have dessert, and talk about the day. Or they would reminisce about the days before the wall when they could go to the movies or go to the famous fish fries at Screamer Church nearby. Sometimes Edwin would sing hymns with her, and the neighbors would come and sing too. After the wall, the hymn singing happened less and less, as they seemed pointless to most of their friends. Edwin would still sing them once in a while, especially at sunset. Now Lily wasn’t sure she could handle a sunset without his growly voice.

1017126_10151922571963269_1409492636_n

As she passed her neighbors’ houses, she could see some of them eating supper at picnic tables in their back yards. It was cooler to eat outside this time of year, especially for those without air conditioning. A few sat out on the porch and waved as she got closer to her own home. Now that they’d seen her in the black dress, it wouldn’t be long till everyone knew one of the elders had passed. She imagined that some of the men would be taking bets on when Edwin would go off even before she began eating her own supper.

The house was quiet and shadowy when she unlocked the door. She was used to Edwin listening to the local radio reports in the evenings before supper, so the silence emphasized the emptiness of the house, which echoed through her. As she walked by the radio, she turned it on. The warm light of the console chased away the darkness spreading through the living room, and the voice of Chuck Landers from down by Screamer filled the air as he reported the safest parts of the lake to fish. At least she could pretend that Edwin was with her for now.

Lavender-scented Pine Sol made the entire house smell like Friday cleaning day even though it was only Tuesday and she’d only scrubbed the kitchen floor and counter where Edwin had fallen hours before. She touched the yellowing page touting the rules of The Community posted on the pantry door and thanked the Great Whosit that she’d done her best to follow the law. She also gave thanks that Edwin hadn’t gone off and tried to take a hunk out of her arm – something The Coroner would fix – while she bathed his body to prep him for the lockdown room.

The law was for the best, but right now she hated every part of it. Edwin was right when he voted against this new order, and she knew, if he could, he’d be shaking his head and saying he told her so. He’d also tell her she’d done her best and that he couldn’t criticize that.

She remembered how deaths were handled before the wall was put up and The Coroner came to town. Sometimes caskets would be open so that everyone could take a last look at the deceased, all made up, dressed up, serene in his or her repose. They’d be surrounded by family, friends, onlookers, and a mountain of flowers in all shapes and forms. People would bring food to the family of the deceased, sit around and tell stories after gathering at the church to tell everyone how wonderful the person who passed had been in life. She tried to remember the last one of these affairs she’d attended. Jo-Jo Walsh. It had been a quiet affair at the funeral home where The Coroner now lived. Quiet until Jo-Jo sat up and bit Reverend Jackson as he stood for the benediction.

After that, funerals weren’t considered exactly practical by The Community. Death could no longer be a sentimental moment. As she ate her supper and listened to Mimi Landers, Chuck’s wife and co-owner of WSCR, talk about the latest murder at the Screamer Hardees, she mourned those days as much as Edwin’s passing. After she joined The Committee, she had to be strong. No more weeping. The Coroner was right. Her request to keep any part of her husband from The Community was selfish and so was any sentimentality she may feel about Edwin’s death.

She had no time or option to go to pieces or sit with friends and remember Edwin’s kindness and the happy moments they’d shared over the last fifty years. Instead, her memories of his last moments would include how she grumbled as she dragged his death-weighted body from the tub to the lock down room, knowing that if he went off, she’d be gone too.

When people started going off after they died, the living had to take steps to take care of them before the town suffered the fate of other nearby towns. At first, Lily remembered voting to turn people out on the far side of the lake in what used to be Comer. The Council figured that they could keep them out of town with one of those invisible electric fences till they could figure out how to control things better.

That didn’t work. Electric fences worked for dogs and horses, but not for those gone off.

The dead returned home. Once that happened, there was an emergency vote. The Council got all the men together and they first built the wall around town The Community. Then they required lock-down rooms in every home. There were gatherings to help build the lock-down rooms each weekend all that first year or so. The ladies would put out a spread of food at the community center and the menfolk would work till they connected the room to the grid at what was the funeral home.

She could see part of the high metal wall from her light green porch glider, where she sipped on a glass of sweet tea and watched the moon begin to rise and cast a silver glint on the pines on the other side of the fence. A slight breeze blew, and she heard the rustling of her pink and blue hydrangea, which was in full bloom. The delicate scent of sweet olive wafted past, and Lily breathed it in. At least some things were evergreen, she thought to herself.

In the gloaming, Lily could see her oldest friend, Mary-Walton, wearing her cat-eye glasses, which glinted silver-purple in the brightening moonlight. Her curly silver hair made her look like she had a halo around her head.

“I brought y’all a pie,” she called to Lily.

“Mary-Walton, he’s passed,” Lily said.

Her friend paused halfway up the walk. “Oh my Lord, Lily! You shoulda called me! Has he Gone-Off yet?”

“Not yet,” Lily said.

Setting the pie down on the porch rail, Mary-Walton joined Lily on the glider. She pushed her foot forward to start a little rocking movement. Lily smiled at the comfort it brought her but said nothing because there was nothing to be said. Her friend understood, and they sat together for a spell. One street light fluttered at the corner down by Mary-Walton’s house, and the radio had gone fuzzy in the background. A white truck marked with a large blue C rolled by. The back of the truck was filled with hoes and baskets of ripe tomatoes. Fred Whitmore, one of the Community farmers, waved from the driver’s seat. There was groaning coming from the trailer it pulled behind it. Both women waved at Fred because that was part of porch sitting and it was just plain polite.

“Edwin’s going to a better place, Lil’,” Mary-Walton said.

“I want to believe that,” Lily said. A tear rolled down her cheek. Her friend looked surprised but pulled out a tissue from her flour-powdered apron.

“It’s better than turning him loose,” she said.

Lily patted Mary-Walton’s hand and said, “You mean turning him out.”

“You wouldn’t want him comin’ back after you.”

“He said to me that he didn’t want to go this way. Ain’t his wants important?” said Lily.

Mary-Walton frowned and said, “You wrote the laws, you know.”

Lily nodded. She’d wrote the rules with The Council. They’d all thought this would be over after a spell. The laws were meant to take care of everyone, even those who’d gone off.

“If there weren’t laws, we’d have to shoot ‘em all. You coulda shot him instead.”

“Yes. I could have,” said Lily.

When the Coroner offered to upcycle the gone-over, The Council immediately voted and approved the motion. No one discussed how he would do this because the idea would serve The Community in a positive way and keep people from having to shoot their kin.

The green light next to the kitchen door began to flash. Lily looked over at Mary-Walton.

“Well, I guess it’s time.”

“Well, I guess it is.”

After just a few minutes, a white panel van bearing the familiar blue C arrived. Two men got out. One had a noose stick, and the other wore a shoulder holster.

Both said, “Evenin’, Mrs. Smith.”

“Mighty fine evening, Phillip,” she said.

“Mighty fine, Mrs. Smith,” the brawny man replied.

“You okay, Mrs. Smith?” asked his partner Darrell Grover, who was younger and blond. Lily remembered dragging the boy to his mama after Sunday school the day he said a word she wouldn’t repeat to Angie Daniels. Any other time, she’d ask how his mama was.

She nodded. Mary-Walton put her arm around Lily’s shoulders. The men entered the house. Lily could hear one of them unlock the metal door. All Pallbearers had master keys for Lock Downs. She heard loud snarling and she heard someone say, “Whoa there!” Then there was a scuffle. Soon the young man led Edwin out onto the porch. Gone-Off Edwin turned his head and snarled at Lily, reaching toward her. His face was gray.

“Oh God…”

Mary-Walton snatched her away quickly.

The second man came out of the house, and quickly put a snub-nosed shooter at Edwin’s back. There was a thwip followed by a grooooan.

“Dammit, Darrell! You weren’t supposed to bring him out here without the hood!” he yelled.

“Sorry, Phillip,” said Darrell.

Lily couldn’t stop staring. That…thing…wasn’t…couldn’t be…no…not Edwin…not…

“Mrs. Smith…” said Phillip.

“I’m…I’m fine. What—” said Lily. It wasn’t the first time she’d seen someone gone off, but this was different. It was her Edwin.

“He’s going to a better place, Lil’,” said Mary-Walton.

“There is no better place than The Farm,” said Phillip.

Edwin had become placid, his snarl replaced with a blank stare that went right through Lily.

Philip looked at Lily, tipped his hat, and stepped off the porch. Young Darrell led the slow-moving Edwin to the van, where he was loaded in the back. Phillip drove the van into the gloaming as Lily stood and watched silently. Mary stood with her.

“Mary, I think I’d like some pie about now,” said Lily.

Salt Life

By Julian Cage

Peter slowed as he approached the house on his recon run. Fuck. This was going to be even worse than advertised. Grant Park, he figured it would be like the other one of these he’d been to, a couple of balloons and a bunch of hipster parents and their “childfree” friends looking for an excuse to drink beer at noon. But this house’s front yard had about a hundred balloons, in colors that matched the tablecloths on the two long trestle tables, each one with two silver urns on it. This was an event. Which meant it was going to be ruled by females.

He took the next right and went around the block for another pass. At least this was one of the few neighborhoods in Atlanta with real blocks, instead of the roads just going off in random directions or dead-ending. Second pass proved him right: the urns were fancy ice buckets, and there was a pudgy chick in full makeup and heels jamming bottles of wine into the ice. All the wine was white, too, of course. Sorority life, fifteen years later. What a nightmare.

Fuck it, Ellen could wait, drink Chardonnay with the Tri-Delts for a while. He went around the block again, pulled out onto Boulevard, drove to the park itself, found a place in the parking lot where the lines of sight were clear, packed the little vaporizer, hot-boxed the Jag while listening to some bullshit on NPR. He cracked the windows and dreamed of an empty calendar and a clean open ocean.

He dozed off a little, got jolted awake by the top of the hour news. Now Ellen was going to be all aggro with him, but she owed him, and he didn’t have the other phone on him, anyway. He hit the vape again, fired up the car, went back to the party.

The pudgy chick was the first to greet him. “You’re just in time,” she said. “If you head out right now, you can catch them before they tee off.”

“Excuse me?”

“The hubbies are all playing golf. After all, their part in this is done.” She put a hand to her mouth. “You have no idea what I’m talking about, do you?” She wiggled her bottle of seltzer water. “I’m Carol. It’s my party, and I won’t drink cause I can’t.”

“Okay. Is Ellen Smith here?”

“Oh, you belong to her. Not yet. But come on in and have a drink. Are you, like, the new man in her life?”

She wasn’t pudgy; she was pregnant. Right.

“No. We work together. Hi; I’m Peter Sandler.” He slipped on the Sales Mask. “Sorry: I’m real late, so I was just a little surprised she wasn’t here yet. Congratulations. Is there beer?”

“Sure. My husband insisted.”

And soon he found himself just where he didn’t want to be, surrounded by women pushing forty, expensive outfits, ridiculous shoes, full makeup on a muggy Georgia day, nice and tight for their age except for a couple of fatties and another few who were still fighting it off. No smokers at all until one of them whipped out a pack and then half the rest did, fogged up the back porch, teased Carol the pregnant girl.

Later, Carol edged up to him. “Feel like a zebra in a pride of lionesses?”

“I was thinking pool full of sharks. At first. But nobody’s really biting. Which is just fine.”

“That’s because they’re all married. Five years ago you would have been chewed up. But nobody wants to act out in front the rest. Gossip.”

“I didn’t even know what this party was all about.”

“And you probably wish you never did. Oh, look; here’s Jennifer. She’s not married.”

Jennifer was hot, too, and this plus all the fancy matching jewelry was a giant blinking red light if she was single. She was way above the crazy/hot axis, or there was something else real wrong with her. But naturally they got paired off, and she was funny and smart and down-to-earth, so maybe there was a tragic death or breakup or whatever. And the fancy jewelry was marketing: she made it in her house.

“It’s pretty profitable,” she said, in the low, throaty voice that attracted Peter in spite of himself. “If I wanted to live like a nun, I could just live off it. But I have expensive tastes.”

That’s it, thought Peter. But before he could say anything, she went on.

“So I work a boring job, mostly for the health insurance. Hey, Laura said she thought you were Ellen’s boyfriend, but Carol said you work together? Which one is it?”

“Work together, sometimes. I sell and lease commercial real estate? Your company needs new offices, I’m your guy. Been doing it since college. Sometimes Ellen helps me out, showing places, that kind of thing.”

“Is that market, like, working again? All I see are signs that say Space Available.”

“That’s retail, which is way overbuilt and I don’t touch. You want to open a jewelry store, I can put you in touch with–”

“My stuff is all Internet. Just me and the FedEx chick.”

“Exactly. But the office market is doing great. I pushed a show until tomorrow so I could meet Ellen here. Though there was about a year and a half where we never leased anything. Lot of people I know went under; I did okay, because I have really, really cheap tastes.”

He switched the conversation back to her, which was easy with a woman, but she was a surprisingly no-nonsense one. He could see himself dating her, he wanted to get involved; just so long as she could get used to Buford Highway noodle places instead of whatever chi-chi shit she clearly preferred. She only had two glasses of wine, and never finished the second, which was a point in her favor, especially given that the rest of the sorority was three or four times over the limit, except for the pregnant chick and one other who it turned out was also a couple of months in.

Jennifer just shook her head.

“Makes you wonder. Me, I have to keep my fine motor control if I want to spend the evening finishing this custom necklace I’m working on.”

Finally, while some of the girls—he couldn’t make himself think of them as women—were chanting “Boot and Rally!” at one who had evidently done the first and clearly couldn’t handle the second, Ellen showed up.

“Where the fuck have you been?” Peter said. “This is my worst nightmare.”

“I texted you twice.”

She passed him an envelope.

“You’re welcome.”

He slipped it into his jacket pocket.

“I didn’t have that phone with me.”

“Well, then. Besides, looks like you’re having fun.”

“That Jennifer girl? What’s her deal?”

“Always a bridesmaid. I don’t know her that well; she’s not a client. From the grapevine? Men get interested, she finds a reason to dump them. She’s picky.” She poked him in the belly.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen you interested.”

“Curious, is more like it. I was going with dark secret.”

“Well, you would. I can find out more if–”

And then there was a crash behind them, and the sound of breaking glass.

They whirled to see Carol trying in vain to hold onto a tray of champagne flutes as Boot and Rally stumbled past her, lost her balance, went headfirst down the stairs, arms stretched out reflexively to break her fall. She landed in a crunch of broken glass that sounded louder than it should have in the sudden shocked silence, then got back up, one side of her white blouse soaked in blood that glistened in the summer sunshine.

She raised her arm and her eyes went wide as she saw the stem of the champagne flute sticking out of the center of her forearm, a gobbet of flesh impaled on the jagged tip, the base of the glass flush against the other side of her arm. Before anyone else could react, she reached up with her other hand and started to pull the glass out.

And then there was Jennifer, vaulting the railing and crunching broken glasses as she landed. She peeled Boot and Rally’s hand off the base of the glass, then held her wrists far apart. Peter noticed that Jennifer was the only woman there who wasn’t wearing four-inch heels.

“No, no, no, baby,” she said, looking straight into the injured girl’s eyes.

“You only pull it out in the movies. In real life, it might be the only thing keeping you from bleeding to death.”

She looked up at Carol. “Call 911. And get me something I can use as a tourniquet.” Carol dropped the empty tray and vomited into the bushes. Half a dozen of the others started throwing up, as well.

Peter grabbed a linen napkin and a fork, tied the napkin around the girl’s upper arm and used the stem of the fork to twist it tighter as Jennifer held the girl’s hands and soothed her. Ellen called 911.

***

Nine days later, Peter stashed the car in the parking garage, walked across the street, sat on a bench in front of the High Museum and texted Ellen a message that would make sense only to the two of them. It was too early for lunch, so he leaned back to peoplewatch for a while.

But it was only about a minute before he noticed that the hot chick walking down the sidewalk was Jennifer, minus the fancy jewelry. He stood up and called to her; she looked, then did a double-take.

“Holy shit,” she said. “I almost didn’t recognize you. That’s a beautiful suit.”

“Just a costume. I had two showings and a closing this morning. I was about to take the train home, hang this beast up, blow up a bunch of spaceships online, go for a bike ride once the sun goes down a little. You work around here?”

“Yeah.” She pointed up and behind him. “Sixteenth floor.”

“Sure. Promenade’s an expensive building, but what do you expect? It’s owned by the architects. You want to get some lunch?”

Over indifferent salads in the skylit food court of Colony Square, he asked her, “So how’s that girl, anyway? Can she use her hand?”

“They don’t know yet. The glass cut a nerve, and a tendon. So they’ve got her in a cast for now, and I think next week they’re going to take it off and see if it healed right. At least she’s a lefty, so it’s not like it’s her main hand. I had a couple nightmares about it. I need both hands to make jewelry.”

“Sure. Hey, you know with all the excitement it kind of upstaged that Carol girl. Did they ever end up showing the ultrasound?”

“Hmm? Oh, the kid thing: it was a boy.” She rolled her eyes. “Never wanted kids: I have enough grubby hands on my time.”

A month later, he was spiraling a finger inward toward her navel in the semen he had shot all over her belly, when she said, “How come we never go to your place?”

“You’ve got a king-sized bed. Mine’s only a full. And it’s a futon, on the floor.”

She sat up on her elbows. “No, seriously: I have rules, and I just figured out I broke one of them. I don’t even know where you live.”

He kept up the swirl. “West End. I rent a room from this woman Amy who owns a loft in a junky old warehouse. Don’t worry; she’s totally gay. You can come over if you want, but it’s a dump.”

“But you make bank.” She sat all the way up, moved his hand away.

“Fuck me. You don’t even have a job, do you? You got laid off back in the crash, and have just been pretending ever since. Hanging out on benches in a suit: I should’ve known.”

He laughed. “I work for myself. And I do make bank. Like I told you, cheap tastes.”

“You drive a Jaguar.”

“It’s what the clients expect. I paid cash for it, off a guy who did get laid off in the crash. It mostly stays in Midtown where it belongs; otherwise, I use my bike, or a bus pass.” He rolled over, grabbed his phone, brought up a picture. “Let me show you why.”

She peered. “It’s a boat.”

“It’s a Sundiver 450. Only the sleekest and most beautiful thing ever created.”

“So you live cheap because you own a boat, and everything goes into that?”

“I live cheap because I want to buy a Sundiver 450. I have a long-term plan: I need eight million dollars.”

“You and me both. That’s what the boat costs? Shit.”

“No, the boat costs about six hundred thousand. I need enough capital so the investment income pays for gas, depreciation, my living expenses. And then I’m gone. No more city, no more clients, no more people. Just me and the Gulf of Mexico.”

“No shit? Total dropout?” She handed him back the phone. “You know, live the dream, but you strike me as a little too focused for that kind of Jimmy Buffet thing. I mean, you’ve got two cell phones.”

“Not Buffet. I don’t even like alcohol. Just empty space, water and sun.”

“But eight million? That’s… a shitload.”

“Why I live in a dump. I’m just about halfway there. When the crash came? I had to live off my savings for nine or ten months. It was like cutting out pieces of my own flesh. Put me more than two years off my schedule.”

He took the phone, put it on the nightstand, slipped a hand under her thighs, lifted her so he could slip a pillow under her hips, rolled back on top, got the angle right and slid back in. “My turn for a question.”

She dug her neatly-trimmed fingernails into his shoulders. “Just so long as it—oh!—doesn’t require high-level reasoning.”

“Why don’t you have any hair at all except on your head? I mean, lots of women shave, but you don’t even have any hair on your arms. Is that like a medical thing?”

She laughed, then gasped at the end of it. “It’s an Italian thing. Don’t stop. I shave, I get five o’clock shadow. Mmm. I went to Mexico a long time ago. Full-body electrolysis. Oh, god. No more mustache, no more stubble. Best three thousand dollars I ever spent. Don’t be so fucking gentle.”

***

The minute they popped out of the crowd, Peter bolted for the nearest empty space he could find, put his hands on his knees, hyperventilated for a minute or so.

Jennifer walked up to him, slapped him on the back. “If I had known something as simple as the Inman Park festival was going to freak you out–”

“Too many things, too many people, not enough space. Give me the open ocean. I’m cool. Could use a drive in the country.” In the car, he said, “All those little stalls selling jewelry? Yours is nicer, I can tell that. But how?”

“Different materials, different market. Mine is a lot higher-end; the precious stones are real.”

“You ever think about doing that, opening a booth, traveling around?”

“Shit, no. That’s hard work: after expenses, those people make minimum wage. Besides, I’d be worried my truck was going to get broken into.” She settled back into the seat. “Peter? I want to change up our relationship a little bit.”

A long silence. “Aw, man. Everyone told me you weren’t into relationships. Why I like you.”

“No, no; not like that. Make it more of a professional partnership.”

His voice darkened. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“See, you shouldn’t have been so up-front about your yacht plan. Not so specific, I mean. If you think you can be on your boat in eight years, that means you’re banking half a mil per year. And you make good money, but not that much. So where’s the rest come from?”

“Investments.”

“Bullshit. I asked around. It took a while to get people to talk to me, but what Ellen does for you is unload huge quantities of high-quality coke on all those sorority chicks. Keeps them thin, right? You got that guy Kevin and at least three other people you send coded texts to–”

“We’re old friends. It’s a bunch of inside jokes.”

“Believe me: I’m not judging you. Those bitches have to get their diet powder from someone; it might as well put you on your boat. The only reason it matters to me is because, remember how I once told you I had some legal problems? Well that’s the thing: they’re not really legal. You get your connections to help me out, not only do I immediately and permanently forget everything I’ve figured out, but I can put you on that boat three, maybe four years quicker. No fooling.”

***

Bobby drank his coffee, poured another. “And you were out in the country? Why didn’t you just shoot the bitch, let the animals have her body?”

“That’s your job. I just make phone calls. People saw us together, at the festival. Cops can track phones. Plus she wouldn’t have been stupid enough to get out of the car. What I thought about was hitting a bridge abutment; but I didn’t trust myself to do it just right. And who knows what she’s got hidden somewhere? I told her she had it all wrong; she said I had until Monday to take care of her problem or she would dime me out.”

“How much does she know?”

“Maybe twenty percent. Enough to make me a fuckload of trouble.”

“Why you thinking with your dick, man?”

“As if you have any right to talk.” Peter opened his briefcase, took out a folder. “She’s smart, and she’s fucking evil, as it turns out. That’s what’s wrong with her. And no, I did not research these articles on my own computer.” Peter made phone calls about office space while Bobby read.

Finally, Bobby said, “Damn. And here I thought I was a criminal mastermind.” He steepled his fingers, sat in silence for ten minutes. Then, “Okay. Tell her you’ll take care of her.”

“I will?”

Bobby rolled his eyes. “No; I will.”

Peter marked them down for cops even before they got out of the car: something about the way they parked. Big swarthy guy, little blonde: Mustapha and Diana. After the introductions, the guy said, “You know, you don’t look Colombian.”

“I’m an American citizen. Came here when I was eight; changed my name when I was eighteen. And my family is old-school Spanish. You wouldn’t believe the racial shit they got going back over there. Please tell me you guys found out who killed poor Ellen.”

“We wish. Your usual carjacker is not the sharpest knife, but looks like these guys got away clean.” He sighed. “Man. She was my friend for years. And all for a stupid car.”

“You guys had just got back from vacation, right?”

“Yeah. And then like four hours later some gangbangers shoot her. It’ll be six months pretty soon; I’m still upset about it. You know, I talked to another detective about this, back then. Two or three times. Black, tall, really nice suit?”

“Sure. We’ve got Detective Peterson’s notes. But it helps to hear the story again.”

“Whatever it takes. Okay, I’m a little down because this woman I’m seeing decides she wants to change her life and move across the country. So I do what I do every time I need a break, which is to go to the Caribbean. This time, it was the Caymans: I got a deal on plane tickets. Ellen hears about it, decides to come. We have a great week, very chill. Ellen meets this English guy, I do a lot of scuba diving. Wish we’d stayed an extra day or two. We get back, I drive her to her place, then go back to mine and start returning phone calls. Couple of hours into that, I get a call from the other detective. I guess he pulled her phone records, figured I was the only one she talked to for a week or so?”

He took a moment to compose himself.

“I don’t know why she went to East Atlanta, but she had friends who live down there. But, you know how you get after you go on vacation with someone? Even if they’re your old pal, you don’t want to talk to them for a day or two. I wish I had something interesting or useful to tell you. Why do people keep getting carjacked there? I mean, can’t you just put a couple of cops on the corner? I read all about that poor guy getting shot a week or so ago, and it was like half a block away. I had one of those flashbacks. There I am trying to convince these folks that this is the office for them, and I have to run to the can and sit there and cry. And here I am talking about myself; while her poor family–”

The guy nodded. “Believe me, we want to get these guys. Tell us about Jennifer Molinaro.”

“Jen? Well, she was the woman I was seeing. I liked her, that she was up front about not being the marrying kind. So, I mean it’s not like I was heartbroken, but it was all kind of abrupt. She said if she downsized everything, she could live off of what she made making jewelry. She was going out West to live with an aunt, or a cousin.”

“Did you believe that?”

“Uh… well, I didn’t have any reason not to. I did ask her if she thought she could handle it; Jen likes the finer things in life. She said she’d figured out that was what was holding her back.”

He shrugged. “People change. Well, they try to.”

“They sure do,” said the blonde. “When did you last talk to her, Mr. Sandler?”

“Well, that was it. Maybe three or four days before me and Ellen went to the islands. So, like, six months ago right now.”

“You never got sentimental, tried to call her?”

“What’s the point? Besides, my friend had just been killed.”

She took out a tablet computer. “That’s why we’re here.” She showed him the screen.

“Jesus fuck!” Peter made himself almost retch. “Man, I can’t handle blood. What the hell is that?”

“Jennifer Molinaro. Dumped behind an abandoned house in Adair Park, a mile or so from where you live.”

“Seriously? Oh, my god.” He took the tablet from her, then put a fist to his mouth.

“Holy shit. But how do you know it’s her? She doesn’t have a head. Or hands. Or… or feet. Jesus, what happened to her? So… now two of my friends are—what the fuck?”

“DNA,” said the big guy.

“Her car is gone, and her apartment was bleached out. But she left a hairbrush in her locker at the gym. It’s her, all right. Zoom in on her legs, will you?”

“Do I have to?” But he spread his fingers on the screen.

“They… shot her? Up and down the legs?”

He held the tablet out to the woman. “I can’t deal with this.”

She wouldn’t take it. “Those aren’t bullet wounds, Mr. Sandler.”

“Half-inch drill bits,” said the guy.

“Someone drilled all the way through her leg bones. Fourteen times. While she was alive. Medical examiner thinks she was alive for a couple of days, afterward.”

“This is real gangster stuff,” said the blonde.

Her partner said, “And not dumbass teenage gangbangers who jack cars in East Atlanta. This is no-foolin’ organized crime. You know, Russian Mafia. Or, maybe, South American–”

“Hey! Don’t stereotype me. I’ve only ever been back there once. The closest I get to drugs is Starbucks. And what would a bunch of gangsters want with Jennifer? Oh, right, gold and jewels.”

“Nope,” said the guy. “That would be chicken feed. They wanted to know something.” The blonde asked,

“How much do you know about her past?”

“She’s from here. She went to UGA. She… oh, right: she used to work in some kind of big-time banking thing—no, it was computers. Banking for computers? Something like that. It was the tail end of the dot-com thing. Said it was too stressful. But all that was years and years ago. Fuck, man: I’m just… now I’m paranoid somebody’s going to come and shoot me, and all I do is sell office space. Or drill me. Jesus, somebody really did that? I’m not—this is a world away from me, man. I’m seriously spooked here. Oh, and of course I was seeing her, so I’m automatically a suspect, right? Do I need, like, an alibi?”

“That’s the problem,” said the guy.

The woman said, “She’d been frozen.”

At Peter’s bugged-out eyes, she nodded. “For how long? We don’t know. She wasn’t even fully thawed when those crackheads found her.”

“Last anyone saw her,” said the guy, “was around the time she told you she was moving to Texas. Guess she never made it outside the Perimeter.”

His partner said, “Did she ever mention a woman named Lucy, or Lucille?” “Um… I don’t think so.”

“Because this Lucy caused Ms. Molinaro a lot of problems.” “What, she’s some kind of gangster?”

“No,” said the big guy. “She teaches art to little kids.”

***

Lucy Newman’s DMV photo in Diana’s computer gave her age as forty-four, but she probably got carded every time she bought a drink. So unfair. Very close up, Diana could see the quality makeup job hiding crows’ feet, which made her feel somehow vindicated.

“You understand that this was years ago, right?” Lucy said.

She bustled around the classroom as she spoke, placing two pieces of cheap drawing paper and a crayon in front of each place at the table.

“Sorry; class starts in five. I gave a deposition to those Feds, way back when. Two thousand, oh-one? I forget. We’re talking about a two-minute encounter here; just a couple of weird coincidences.”

“We read the FBI report. But walk us through it.”

“No problem. I’m in the airport: there was this guy lived in Mexico, I thought he was the one. As it turned out, I was the two, or maybe the three. Anyway, I bumped into Jennifer coming out of one of the gates. She’s all done up, but I recognize her right away.”

“Describe all done up, if you can.”

“All done down, really. Jennifer is good-looking, and she always dresses professionally. Here, she was dressed like normal, but she was the ‘before’ picture in a makeover ad. Ugly hair, bad glasses, bad makeup. And none of the clothes were the right colors or fit her right. She looked like—well, she looked like hell, because if you didn’t know her you think she was just a yuppie lady who could have used that makeover. But the real Jennifer would have been the woman who did the makeover. Always great clothes, accessories, makeup, hair. But this was like an Ugly Betty costume. More like Medium Betty. If you didn’t know Jennifer pretty well, you’d never have thought it was her. Even if you did, you might get fooled.”

Mustapha asked, “How come you didn’t?”

“Years of practice honing my skills.” She squatted down by the table, picked up a crayon, began scribbling.

About thirty seconds later, she handed him a pretty close version of what he saw in the mirror every morning.

“Life drawing.”

He took the paper. “Hey, that’s neat.”

“Anyone can learn: it just takes talent. Which is just another word for making yourself sit still long enough to practice.”

She squatted again: soon, she had a drawing of two women, one a younger version of the dead girl’s face and the other a grumpier woman with a bad haircut.

“Look carefully: it’s the same bone structure. You do this for long enough, people can’t really fool you.”

Diana paged through her tablet. “Whoa, you are good.”

She showed Mustapha a photo of the screen. “Wanda Carlson, our missing thief.”

“Yeah,” said Lucy.

“That’s what she told me her name was. I’m like, you can’t fool me. But she just denied it up and down, said I was mistaken, she didn’t know this Jennifer person. I was just baffled: I mean, it’s not like we were close friends, but we partied together back in college. She totally knew I had clocked her, too, but she just stonewalled me and flounced off. Awkward. I’m like whatever, maybe she’s having an affair, and forgot about it while I went to Mexico and got my heart stomped on.”

Mustapha said, “How did the FBI get in touch with you?”

“They didn’t; I did. I’m back, I’m depressed, I’m self-medicating with trash TV. Saw the local news, something I would never normally watch, and there she was, wanted for embezzling a shit-ton of money. Oh, now I get it. She had been, I don’t know, doing some married guy, I’d have kept shut, but that was other people’s money, you know? Like, real people, not bankers.”

She replaced the crayon. “The FBI was like, we got her. But the DA, the federal DA, was like, no. They didn’t have any evidence. Well, they had all kinds of evidence that Wanda Carlson stole millions of dollars, but I was the only one who could say that she was really Jennifer Molinaro. They said she had been super careful and not left any DNA or fingerprints behind?”

“It was over a dozen years ago. Today, they might find something.”

Diana said, “And in all those years, did you and Ms. Molinaro ever talk about it?”

“Sure. Just once, though. She walked straight up to me: she must have figured out I was the one who narked on her. This was maybe three years later? She was like do you have any idea how many problems you caused? As in, having the Feds think she was this big thief. Only later, I figured it was as in, she had all this money but couldn’t spend it. I bet she’s been on the Feds’ radar ever since; if she goes and buys a boat or something, they’re going to come down on her. Honestly, I’d be pissed, too: that’s gotta hurt, having it all just sit there.”

Lucy cocked her head. “Is that why y’all are here? Did she buy a boat?”

“Yeah,” said Mustapha. “Something like that.”

***

They waited until Peter Sandler shook the clients’ hands, helped them into their car, waved at them as they drove off. He walked back to Diana and Mustapha, smiling, rolling his eyes.

“Those people need to realize it’s not 2009 anymore. How can I help you? Is this about Ellen? Or Jen?”

He looked pensive, blew out a long puff of air. “Man. I’ve got two murdered friends. And yet I’ve got to give a shit about office space. Never mind. Want to get a coffee?”

“Already had some,” said Mustapha. “You and your friend Ellen: why did you go to the Cayman Islands and not someplace else?”

His smile died a little, then reasserted itself. “You know, I’m going to have my attorney help answer that question.”

“Yeah? Makes me think you’ve got something to hide.” “Pretty sure you already think that. Where to?”

Two hours later, Mustapha watched from the viewing room as Sandler and his lawyer exchanged whispers behind cupped hands in the interview room. Having Richard O’Hara as a lawyer ought to tag Sandler with multiple felonies all by itself: O’Hara had made more millions than Wanda Carlson stole, convincing juries that nobody could prove his drug-lord clients were really drug lords.

Sandler had gone for someone who specialized in violent felonies, that would be one thing; but Mustapha could tell he was going to have to make Diana extra tea, get her to do a real background check on him. Or maybe just go ahead and call the FBI—he was surprised they hadn’t already figured out Jane Doe #26 was Jennifer Molinaro. But where was the fun in that?

He saw Diana come into the room, Sandler greet her with a friendly smile. Mustapha walked around the corner and into the room, to hear Diana say, “The real question we have is, why the Cayman Islands?”

“Why not?” said Sandler. “One of the few places in the Caribbean I’d never been.” “

You told us the other day you’d got a deal on plane tickets.”

“Sure.”

“You walked up to the ticket counter, paid full fare for the next flight out.”

“Hey, it was vacation. I didn’t want Ellen to feel bad.”

O’Hara said, “Why do you care about his vacation choices?”

Diana smiled. “We don’t like coincidences. Let me tell you a story. Back in 1999, some people founded a kind of Internet bank. At first, it was like PayPal for porn: anonymous, you know?”

She shrugged and sipped from her water bottle.

“It was the twentieth century: people still cared. They had hired this woman Wanda Carlson to run the business. The COO. She had spectacular references, all of whom confirmed her talents via email. But like a lot of Internet companies, it took them a while to figure out what they could do that was actually profitable. And that turned out to be offshore banking. In the… wait for it–”

O’Hara groaned. “Save it for improv night.”

“–Cayman Islands.”

Peter nodded. “Sure. There’s lots of banks there. Secrecy laws.”

“Right. Offshore banking for the little guy, not the sort who can walk up and pay full fare for first-class.”

“It was vacation.”

“People who wanted to hide fifty thousand, or even twenty. Mostly from divorce lawyers or creditors, not so much the Feds. Nice business. But then one day, all the money’s gone, and so is Wanda Carlson. Twenty-one million, and it’s all hers.”

Diana held up the crayon drawing.

“And Wanda Carlson was your girlfriend Jennifer. Well, really, Jennifer was Wanda Carlson. Supposedly the real Jennifer was living in a cabin making jewelry. Which looked true on paper, anyway. Jennifer was smart. By the way, the jewelry? She shipped almost all of it to the Cayman Islands, some kind of shell buyer. Not seashells, I mean. We’re pretty sure it was her only way of getting at any of that money.”

Mustapha leaned forward. “But she had some bad luck.” Then he leaned a little more into Peter’s space.

“Even before she met you.”

Diana said, “All that money, just sitting there. But,” she pointed to one face on the drawing.

“Someone recognized her,” then pointed to the other, “as her. Couldn’t touch the rest of the money.”

Mustapha said, “And you figured it all out, didn’t you? Pillow talk? Man, she didn’t know who she was dealing with. You tortured her with a drill, my man. Fourteen times. And then she gave up the password or whatever it was. And then you packed your little pal Ellen off to the islands, and you dress her up like Jennifer, and you have her use Jennifer’s passport and the secret code, and she got all the money.”

Diana said, “Thirty-seven million, now: compound interest.”

Mustapha said, “And you took it from her and put it in some other bank, made it disappear, then when you got back to Atlanta, you turned around and shot poor Ellen, too. The chick who knew too much. Cold.”

O’Hara held up a finger. “Mr. Sandler provided a positive alibi for the shooting.”

Mustapha said, “We’re not stupid, champ. Your client didn’t do it all himself. Someone else tortured Jennifer Molinaro while he and Ellen were already in the air. Kept her alive to make sure they had the right password. They raped her a lot, you know. Not that you care. Someone else shot Ellen, too.”

“I’m horrified,” said Peter, “but all we did was snorkel and jet-ski.”

“I really don’t care,” said Mustapha. “You give up your pals and tell the Feds everything you know about Jennifer Molinaro’s crimes, and you can get state time. Clam up and we send you to the Feds. You can bet they’ll find whoever it is you do whatever it is you do it with. Then you’ll get Federal time.”

“No parole,” said Diana.

“No chance,” said Peter.

“No proof,” said O’Hara. “Cops. You’re a bunch of liars. You don’t know what goes on in island banks. That’s the whole point. So you’re bluffing.”

Diana smiled. “No.” She showed them her tablet. “Here she is, on video, taking Jennifer Molinaro’s money in the form of a cashier’s check. She’s wearing Jennifer Molinaro’s jewelry, and one of Jennifer’s dresses. But the woman who recognized Wanda as Jennifer doesn’t recognize Ellen here. Too angular a face, not curvy enough in the hips.”

“That bank?” said Mustapha. “Once we could show them death certificates, they were real helpful, especially when we told them we were trying to find the last time anyone saw her. And that was it; but that ain’t her.”

O’Hara said, “What the girl did? Not our problem. Ask her. Oh, yes; never mind. Anyway, you haven’t given any proof of my client’s involvement. You decide you’re going to arrest him, call me first. And don’t waste my time.”

Within minutes, they were gone.

“I hope he figures it out,” said Diana quietly.

***

Peter almost made it to the Perimeter before he found himself pulling off the highway. Around and back until he slid the rental Honda into the warehouse parking lot, where he had a clear view of the front gate. Maybe two hours to wait in the gathering gloom; he packed the vaporizer, then ended up just holding it in his hand for a long time before tossing it in the cupholder. He heard the pitch of the motorcycle long before he saw the off-kilter headlight.

He bolted from the car, grabbed Amy by the arm. “You have to come with me. Right now.”

She flipped up the helmet’s visor with her other hand, arched a bushy eyebrow. “Hi, Peter. What the fuck?”

“This is not drama; this is real. Come: into the car.” At her planted feet, “I have to disappear, because psychotic Colombian gangsters are coming to kill me. When I’m gone, they’ll come here. And they won’t believe you when you say you don’t know where I went.”

A long stare. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

“There’s two hundred grand in the car in a bag for you. Move cross-country and live it up. You’ll meet a new girlfriend.”

Clear eyes. “I… I can’t leave Scarlett. You know how she has issues.”

“Nothing in that place is worth your life. For all I know, there’s a goon in there right now. They might even be watching us here. Let’s go. A week or so, I’ll get someone to go in there and get your stuff.”

“But…” She looked toward the entry gate. “She’s a cat, dude. She’ll be fine. This is your life.”

“I owe her my life. She’s been through it all with me. Do you know how they treated her before I rescued her?”

“This is fucking stupid,” he said under his breath as they ran through the concrete halls. He said a half- remembered prayer to María as he opened the door, but there was nobody in the loft save a purring Scarlett. He gave Amy five minutes to pack while he waited nervously in the doorframe, then they were off, back through the halls and out the gate, in such a hurry that Peter didn’t even see the man standing by the motorcycle.

“What the–” began Amy, and then there was a cough and a flash, and a warm spray on Peter’s face and chest, and she was sinking, and then she jerked as she went down in another flash, and Scarlett was off like a streak under the car.

Peter put a hand to his mouth and tasted seawater as the hand came away covered in Amy’s blood. He tried to imagine himself on the deck of the Sundiver 450, and to imagine the damp cold of late winter as the ocean’s warmth, and the orange security light as the tropical sun, but the dream wasn’t that strong. He looked into the barrel of the silencer: just a tiny circle, really.

The kid with the gun spoke. “Bobby say tell you he sorry.” And then darkness.

And then, darkness.

The Temp

By Jack Walsh

The nervous one called Aaron couldn’t dance for shit. It was like watching a giraffe with a broken knee and an inflamed nutsack trying to do burpees. Not that the calf had ever seen that before. Or that burpees had even been developed as an exercise yet. One day, men who would come into work from the gymnasium and bend their knees and say to coworkers, “Oof. Leg day,” would also mention burpees a lot. Somehow, the calf just knew this. Knew it all. How the sunrise looked from the top of any and every mountain. Knew the truth about Stonehenge. Knew the decimal places of Pi. All of them. He knew everything all at once.

Which made pinning things down to a specific time kind of tricky. Just a little earlier (Was it today? Yesterday? A thousand years ago?) the calf had known nothing. To say he existed in a void implies awareness of it. He wasn’t aware. He wasn’t anything. But then, just like that, here he was. Golden. Gleaming in the firelight. The people cavorting around him. Naked. Chanting. Dancing. Worshipping. He wished he could offer an appreciative moo. The people seemed to maybe expect it.

The calf breathed in deeply. Smoky. Some sort of seasoning. Was that sage? He thought about it for a second. It was sage. It smelled delicious. Not that he could eat it. He couldn’t open his mouth. Didn’t even have a stomach, let alone the four of most cows. But somehow he was sated. Slaughtering a bull. Presenting burnt offerings. This pleased him. The smoke. The beef. And, sure, that part did seem a little contradictory and wrong, given his bovine form. But, what were wrong and right to the divine? Heh. Divine. Bovine. He suppressed a chuckle. He hoped Aaron had shaped his face to look stern. Amusement wouldn’t really inspire awe or reverence in his people.

“Up,” they had said to Aaron. “Make us gods, which shall go before us.”

Aaron had sighed. His brother had a mountain god, a god of plenty and protection and nature-warping miracles. But also of fire, and locusts, and vengeance. On balance, Moses’ god didn’t seem like one you would want to forsake. But, faith and reason and loyalty and patience weren’t an easy mix for the people. They’d said, “As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we know not what is become of him.”

Aaron’s brother had led the people through seas, deserts and mountains. He’d faced down the Pharaoh. The whole kingdom, really. He’d stood stoic in the face of plague. Of blood-soaked horror. But, Aaron’s backbone was not as stiff.

“Break off the golden earrings, which are in the ears of your wives, of your sons, and of your daughters,” he’d said, improvising as he went. “Bring them unto me.” The calf knew Aaron had felt uneasy about the whole thing. The melting of the gold. The shaping of his body. The making of a god. But then the wine started to flow. Given how Aaron was dancing now, he had gotten over it, at least for the rest of the night.

The drippings from the meat sizzled on the fire and gave off a savory smell. Umami? Was that what you called umami? The calf knew that one day, insufferable know-it-all foodies would use this to describe some flavor, but he couldn’t figure out what they would mean by it. Umami. He said it to himself again. It sounded funny. Heh. Ooo-mah-mi.

The calf took another deep breath. Not so much for the smell this time, but as a savoring of the moment. Just look at them all. They were ecstatic. Blissful.

They couldn’t know that a little later, Aaron’s brother would come down off the mountain and see all this and throw a shit-fit. He would scream and smash stone.

And the calf knew what would come next. Moses would pull him down. Grind him to dust. Mix the dust with water and make the people drink it. Godhood reduced to Ovaltine. Not as any sort of drink-your-vitamins-and-minerals gesture, but as penance. And even then, Moses would still have a few thousand of them killed. His god would demand it.

It would happen. Tonight? Years later? Sometime. But, for now, the calf just wanted to watch the moron dance some more.