Blind Trust

A blind woman regains her sight, only to discover her beloved husband may be involved in something sinister… Short story published in DysFictional 3. ~*~*~

BLIND TRUST

This year, Gina’s gift to her husband would be extra special. It had been years in the planning; an interminable wait list, clandestine phone calls, hasty arrangements with the help of her sister when the time finally came.

Keeping the secret from Stuart had been agonizing; usually, they told each other everything. Conveniently, he was away on business when Gina and Maxine boarded a taxi for the airport. She told him her sister was recovering from surgery and needed an extra set of hands around the house for a couple of weeks. It was a half-truth; she did stay with her sister in Boston, but it was Gina who was recovering from surgery.

Gina had spoken to Stuart on the phone several times while she was away, but hadn’t told him she was returning early. He wasn’t expecting her for another day. The surprise would be perfect. His birthday wasn’t for another week, but she would give him his gift as soon as he arrived home that evening.

The sunset faded from orange to purple as the taxi pulled up at the curb. Gina stood on the sidewalk for a few minutes after getting out of the car, savoring the view.

The first thing Gina did when they reached the house was remove Max’s harness. She wouldn’t be needing it anymore, but she had left it on for the flight so Max could fly as a guide dog and not as a pet. The German Shepherd gazed up at her, puzzlement in her amber eyes. Gina reached down to stroke her head.

“It’s ok, sweetheart. As of now, you’re retired from active duty. Let’s go inside and get some dinner, shall we?”

Gina brought her suitcase into the bedroom. Though previously accustomed to navigating in darkness, she now noticed the dimness of the room with the curtains drawn.

She clicked the switch on the lamp and gasped. She saw its beauty with her own eyes for the first time. In truth, she was seeing it through someone else’s eyes; the corneas of a young man killed in a motorcycle accident, whose family had donated his organs.

The lamp was one of Stuart’s creations, handmade in his workshop. His art took many forms, mostly jewelry and small figurines carved from hardwoods – yew and walnut, he told her. He had a process for curing the wood that hardened it to almost a porcelain consistency, except much stronger. The lamp was one of his finest pieces.

He had made the lampshade as well, from soft calfskin leather, scraped thin in places to create an intricate design of tree branches, which would light up when the lamp was turned on.

Even though she couldn’t see it, for years she had felt the design with her fingers and formed a picture in her mind’s eye. The base of the lamp formed the trunk of the “tree”. The curve of the wood mimicked a tree trunk perfectly, right down to its graceful curve and non-uniformity of its shape. On the surface he had carved a heart with their initials inside. Tiny bumps covered the surface of the trunk, each painstakingly carved by her husband. It was a Haiku, written by him and inscribed in Braille for her:

Sun may fade from sight

Love for you burns ever bright

My eternal light

Now, for the first time, Gina saw the lamp in all of its glory, and it was exquisite. The glow of the lampshade projected the intricate tree branch design on the walls, giving the illusion that she was surrounded by forest. Gina caressed the shade, which she had felt hundreds of times, but now she could see what her fingers felt.

What unusual leather, she thought. It was unlike anything she remembered from the days before she lost her sight. She had expected it to be more of a tan color, but this was a pale cream shade with a pinkish hue. A muted floral design decorated the edge of the shade. The trunk looked different than she had expected as well. She had always envisioned it being the deep brown of walnut, but it too was a light cream color, almost white.

Stuart was a true artist. She wished he would give up his sales job and focus on his craft, but Stuart insisted that the things he made weren’t worth selling.

“I do this because I enjoy it, dear. Nobody wants to buy a bunch of homemade junk. Knowing that you like them is enough for me,” he had told her.

* * *

After feeding Max and making some dinner for herself, Gina contemplated calling Stuart to find out when he would be home, but resisted the urge. She didn’t want to ruin the surprise, but the anticipation was too much to bear.

She paced nervously, stopping to stare at herself in the hallway mirror every time she passed. She barely recognized herself; so many years had passed since she had seen her own face. She compared her reflection to the wedding photo of her and Stuart that hung on the wall next to the mirror. It was hard to tell the difference from the photo, but she found it unsettling nonetheless.

Gina turned on the TV but couldn’t find anything interesting to watch. What to do? She could take Max for a walk, but it was dark out. She chuckled. Too dark! Darkness had never been a problem before. Maybe she could take Max out into the yard at least. She hadn’t looked at her garden yet. She shoved her feet into her shoes and slipped into a light jacket. It was late spring, but a chill lingered in the air. She called Max and opened the sliding door to the backyard. Max stayed by her side at first, waiting to be harnessed. Once she understood that her mistress didn’t require her assistance, she bounded across the yard and busied herself sniffing all the nooks and crannies.

The tulips were in bloom near the shed Stuart used as a workshop. Their colors stood against the darkness, bathed in a glow from the window. That was odd. He must have left a light on.

Or perhaps it wasn’t odd at all. Gina knew nothing about the methods he used in creating his art. Maybe part of the wood-curing process required light of some sort. She didn’t know because she had never seen. She had never even been inside his workshop.

I shouldn’t. I should wait for him to show me. It didn’t feel right to snoop, as curious as she was. She would ask Stuart to give her the grand tour when he came home.

Maybe just a little peek. What harm could it do?

Gina tried the door. It was unlocked. She pushed it open a crack and peeked inside. A curtain hung in front of the door, obstructing her view of the inside of the shed. She pulled the curtain aside and entered her husband’s workshop.

Something tickled her hair and she jumped back, startled. Eerie shadows danced on the walls. A string swung next to her shoulder. She brushed it away and looked up. The string was connected to a chain, which was attached to a dangling light fixture. The swaying bulb was the sole source of light in the workshop.

The workbench was cluttered with tools and debris from partially finished projects. A bit of wood here, a scrap of leather there. A pale stick of wood was clamped in the vise, a work in progress judging by the half-worn sheets of sandpaper and fine layer of dust on the bench below. She caressed the graceful curve of the piece with her fingertips, wondering what it was going to be. It always amazed her; the way Stuart could create such elegant contours from an ordinary chunk of wood. She couldn’t wait to watch him work.

A large barrel sat in one darkened corner of the room. Curious, Gina lifted the lid to peer inside. A powerful odor assaulted her nostrils. The barrel was filled with some sort of dark liquid with a strong chemical smell. Things floated inside the liquid, but she couldn’t see what they were. She wasn’t about to poke around in that nasty stuff. Her toe bumped against the barrel, causing the liquid to slosh a bit. Something floated to the top. A recognizable shape, but no – it couldn’t be that – it had to be a trick of the light. Gina used the pull-cord to swing the light bulb in the direction of the barrel. Back and forth it swung. Light splashed over the barrel, then dark. The thing disappeared between the surface of the liquid. She kicked the barrel again and swung the light.

Light. Dark.

Light. Dark.

Light. The thing came into view again. The light swung, revealing the shapes of skeletal fingers.

Gina screamed.

The bulb swung another arc, illuminating the far corner of the room. A wooden crate came into view. It overflowed with sticks much like the one currently clamped in the vise. Now she saw that they weren’t sticks at all, but bones.

Human bones, she was certain. What else could they be?

She stumbled backward, scrambling for the door. She ran outside and tripped over Max, who had heard her scream and come to her rescue. She landed face down in the grass. Max whined and rushed to lick her face.

She heard vehicle approaching and headlights flashed across the driveway. Stuart was home. Gina ran to the house with Max close on her heels. She dashed inside and ran to retrieve the Max’s harness from her bag. With shaking hands, she slipped the harness on the dog and fastened it in place. She dove onto the couch and managed a few deep breaths to appear calm before the door opened and Stuart walked in.

“Hey, beautiful! You’re home. I wasn’t expecting you until tomorrow. Why didn’t you call? I could have picked you up at the airport.”

She took care to look past him rather than at him to maintain the illusion of blindness. But she did see. She didn’t miss the dark splotches of red on his grey t-shirt. He looked like he’d been in a fight.

And won.

“I wanted to surprise you. Besides, I know how busy you are. I didn’t want to bother you.”

“You’re never a bother, sweetness.” He leaned down to kiss her cheek.

She smiled and kissed him back, keeping her eyes downcast for fear he would see a difference.

“I’m going to take a shower. Have you eaten yet? We could order pizza,” Stuart suggested.

“Yes. I mean, no, I haven’t eaten. Pizza would be fine. I’ll call while you’re in the shower. You want the usual?”

“Whatever you like, my love.”

Gina couldn’t fathom eating, but she knew she needed to keep up appearances. She couldn’t let him suspect anything was wrong.

* * *

A week passed. They celebrated Stuart’s birthday with dinner at a nice restaurant and she gave him a watch as a gift. She maintained her façade of blindness, kept Max harnessed and allowed the dog to guide her everywhere she went. Max knew something was different, but Gina’s secret was safe with her.

She wracked her brain to devise a way to escape her predicament. Leaving Stuart without an explanation didn’t seem like a viable option. She was afraid of him now. A homicidal monster lurked beneath his kind and loving exterior, and she had no idea what it would take to trigger his wrath and turn that monster on her. She needed to know more about what motivated him to do the things he did.

She waited patiently and watched his daily activities. Soon a pattern emerged. Monday through Thursday he was home for dinner, but on Fridays he worked late. Or so she had always thought.

One Friday night she looked out the window and noticed the light was on in the shed. Stuart was out there, and yet his van was not in the driveway. Gina slipped out the front door with Max in harness and walked around the block, where she discovered Stuart’s van parked in the alley behind their house. It seemed he was parking in the alley and sneaking in through the back gate. He didn’t want her to know he was home.

As she watched, a truck pulled up behind his van. A strange man got out and the two of them unloaded a large plastic-wrapped bundle and together they carried it through the back gate and to his shed.

A chill ran down Gina’s spine. She didn’t have to think very hard to guess what was inside that bundle.

Who was the man? Stuart had an accomplice? She tried to get a look at the license number, but it was too dark.

What was she to do? Call the police? With what evidence?

She didn’t even know what kind of truck it was. She couldn’t tell a Ford from a Dodge because she had never seen different types of vehicles up until now.

Gina realized she had a long way to go in acclimating herself in the sighted world before she could be a reliable witness to anything.

Gina spent the following week studying everything she could to fill her brain with visual information – books, websites, and just going for walks with Max and taking in the sights in her neighborhood. She had sworn her sister to secrecy about her sight restoration. The neighbors still believed she was blind, and it was easy to fool them as long as she wore her dark glasses. She could carry on conversations while studying the minute details of a person’s face, clothing, and immediate surroundings and no one was the wiser.

She spent hours in the attic, searching through old boxes, some of which had been there prior to their marriage. The house had been in Stuart’s family for generations. She found old photos of his parents and grandparents and marveled at the resemblance he bore to them. Another box held photo albums from a more recent era, from Stuart’s childhood through to adulthood. She pulled a white album from the bottom of the box and gasped when she saw the photo on the first page. It was a wedding photo, of Stuart and another woman. He hadn’t told her he’d been married before. Why?

Then again, it wasn’t the only thing he hadn’t been honest about.

She flipped through the pages, studying the woman’s face. His previous wife was in other albums as well; vacation photos, mostly. There they were standing in front of the Grand Canyon, and here on a beach in Mexico. His ex-wife had a nice figure for a bikini, curvy but not quite plump, and had a lovely floral tattoo down the length of her thigh – some sort of delicate vine with little pink flowers on it. What kind of flower was that? She was sure she had seen it before, recently. It had to be recently, since she had only had her sight for a few weeks.

* * *

One afternoon Gina gathered the courage to take another look in the shed. She let Max run loose in the yard. Stuart wasn’t due home for hours.

The sludge barrel was empty. It smelled foul and strong. No hands or feet to be found. The same crate of bones sat in the corner. In the daylight they somehow didn’t look as ominous. What should she do? Take some of the bones to the police? That would probably be the best way to proceed. She crouched beside the crate and reached toward it.

“I see I’m not the only one with a secret,” Stuart said behind her.

Gina screamed and leaped to her feet. She stumbled backward, tripping over more bones.

“How long, Gina?”

“I – don’t – know what you mean,” she stammered.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Why would you hide it from me? Jesus, Gina, you can see!” Tears shimmered in his eyes. “It’s a miracle, and the biggest event of your life – of our lives – I just don’t understand why you wouldn’t share it with me.”

“I’m sorry. I meant to tell you. I wanted to surprise you, I just – I didn’t know when to tell you, and then I found… I found…” Gina looked down at the scattering of bones at her feet.

“I guess I owe you an explanation. I should have told you. But it was easier to let you think I was crafting with wood. People find bones a bit creepy, even when they’re just animal bones.”

“Animal bones?”

“Of course! Gee whiz, Gina, what the hell did you think they were?”

“But I came in one night, and I saw… in that barrel… it looked like…” Gina looked down at her hand and spread out her fingers, then looked back up at Stuart.

“A hand? Is that what you thought it was?” He laughed. “I think I understand now. Sweetie, have you ever seen a human skeleton? Or an animal one for that matter?”

“Well, no, I guess not,” Gina admitted.

Stuart put his arm over her shoulders. “Come with me, darling, and I will show you. I think we can clear up this whole misunderstanding.”

As they walked back toward the house, Stuart hugged her close and leaned in to kiss her cheek. “I can’t believe you can see! I want you to tell me all about it!”

Gina’s heart warmed with renewed love for her husband. He had already forgiven her lie and suspicion. She beyond embarrassed that she could have suspected he was a murderer.

Back at the house, Stuart sat Gina in front of the computer and showed her pictures of bones on the internet.

“You see? This is a human hand, without the flesh. Does that look like what you saw?”

“Yes, actually, it does.”

“Now look at this. This is a bear paw. Do you see the resemblance? Once the flesh is removed, the toes actually have a finger-like appearance. Could this have been what you saw?”

Gina hung her head. “Yes. The lighting was poor, and I only saw it for a few seconds. It could just as easily have been this that I saw.”

“Just for comparison, this is a fox, this is a wolf, and this – this is the fin of a whale. All mammals share the same characteristics in their skeletal structure.”

“Who was that man I saw you with? I saw you and another man carrying a bundle into the shed.”

“That was Lars. He’s one of the hunters I work with. He brings me carcasses after he’s stripped them of meat, so that I can clean the bones and make things from them. That was a bundle of moose bones we were carrying. I almost have enough for a matching pair of rocking chairs. I wanted to try my hand at building something larger.”

“That sounds amazing.” Gina hung her head, her shoulders shaking with sobs.

“Hey,” Stuart said, taking her in his arms, “Don’t do that. What’s the matter?”

Gina sniffled. “Being blind most of my life, I’ve always had these pictures in my mind of what I thought things looked like, but now that I can see, everything is so different! I feel like I’m in an alien world, and I don’t know what to trust anymore.”

“Shh,” he said. He held her against him, stroking her hair. “It’s ok. I can’t even imagine what you’re going through. Just tell me what you need so I can be there for you.”

“I have everything I need. I have you.”

She felt ashamed for thinking he could be capable of anything so unspeakable. Her husband had an odd hobby, granted, but his art was beautiful and she couldn’t have been more proud of him.

She decided not to mention the old photo albums and wedding photos she had seen. Whether or not he had been married before was none of her business unless he chose to tell her. It was a conversation for another time.

* * *

Later that night, after a romantic candlelit dinner, Stuart led her upstairs, where they made love by the dim glow of the handcrafted lamp. Along the edge of the lampshade a faded design was visible – a delicate vine with little pink flowers.

Copyright © 2018 Mandy White

Pod People: Invasion of the Laundry Zombies

Some of the stories I write are pure nonsense, written for no other reason than fun. This is one such story. Published in WPaD’s Weirder Tales anthology, 2018 ~*~*~

POD PEOPLE: INVASION OF THE LAUNDRY ZOMBIES

Ernest sat up in bed. “ You hear that?”

Louise looked up from her book. “What’s that, dear?”

“There it is again! It’s the basement door. It’s those damn zombies.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’s nothing. Just the wind.”

“Wind my ass!” Ernest muttered, glancing at the shotgun leaning against the wall in the corner of the bedroom. These days he kept both barrels loaded, just in case. “It’s zombies, I tell ya! I thought I told you to get rid of those fucking laundry pods.”

The door rattled again. Ernest had installed sturdy new locks, but they would never give up as long as what they desired lay on the other side of the door.

“Dammit, Louise! This is your fault!”

Louise peered at him over the rims of her glasses. “Seriously, Ern? And what do you expect me to do with them? Just throw them away? I paid good money for those, and I can’t buy them anymore. I’m not going to throw away perfectly good products! Besides, they get the laundry so clean and bright!”

“Clean and bright isn’t worth risking our lives.”

Louise gave him one of those looks reserved for naive children and simpletons. “Isn’t it? Stain-free clothes are worth a little risk. Don’t be a coward, Ernest.”

Ernest opened his mouth to argue, then closed it. He knew when he was licked.

“Ok, fine, use them up then. How many are left?”

“I bought the Mega Pack from Costco. I got in on the sale just before they pulled them from the shelves. It was one of the last ones, and I was lucky to get it. People are so rude. Fighting, clawing, just to save a few dollars.”

“Isn’t that the same thing you were doing?” Ernest pointed out.

Louise shrugged. “Well, I got them, so I’ll be damned if I’m just going to throw them away.” She sighed. “I’m sure going to miss those things. They get the laundry so clean and bright.”

* * *

What had started as a stupid YouTube stunt turned into a disaster of epidemic proportions. The idiots who ate Tide laundry pods experienced unfortunate side effects from the chemicals contained in the detergent. Brain function slowed. These individuals, clearly short on brains to begin with, became shambling, babbling shells of their former selves. (one still might argue that it was an improvement) The other, more disturbing effect was the hunger. The Pod People craved the colorful packets of toxin and would go to any lengths to obtain them. They possessed an uncanny ability to sniff them out. Stores stopped selling the detergent after the first few weeks of the epidemic to stop the looting. Citizens were ordered to turn their Tide Pods over to authorities. Anyone found with the pods in their possession would not be eligible for police protection in the event of zombie attack. Attacks were the biggest concern, because bites were the way the plague was spread. And Pod People were bitey little fuckers. They were faster than they looked, in spite of their shuffling gait, and inordinately tenacious when focused on something they wanted – that something being Tide Pods, of course. A bite from one of the Pod People would transfer the toxins that flowed through their veins. Victims of bites began to crave laundry pods, overcome with an irresistible urge to eat them. If not apprehended and incarcerated, they wouldn’t rest until they found and ate some of the detergent. Over time, brain damage set in, transforming them from desperate junkies into shuffling, mumbling zombies. Pod junkies were more dangerous than full-fledged zombies because they still retained some of their (albeit limited) intelligence and still looked like regular people, aside from their desperate, pod-craving behavior. They were also contagious; a bite or scratch from a pod junkie was all it took to spread the addiction.

* * *

And now someone was trying to open the basement door, attracted by the scent of those godfucked laundry pods Louise was so bloody insistent on keeping. Ernest hoped it was just a zombie and not a junkie. Pod junkies were crafty enough to find a way past a locked door. Zombies just bumped against the door like a trapped Roomba until something else caught their attention. Either way, Ernest knew he was in for another sleepless night. He checked his guns to reassure himself they were loaded, and prayed the locks would hold.

* * *

The next night Ernest awoke sitting in his recliner, where he’d dozed off while watching TV. He heard a sound in the laundry room downstairs. He raced to the bedroom to grab his shotgun. The locks hadn’t held after all. One of the bastards had gotten in and from the sound of it, was in the laundry room chowing down on Tide Pods.

A fucking pod junkie.

Ernest cussed silently and crept toward the sound, shotgun at the ready. The hunched figure in the laundry room had its back to Ernest. He raised the gun and clicked the safety off. The junkie stopped munching and turned to face him, streaks of blue and orange running down its chin.

“Clean and bright!” Louise giggled. “Yummy! And they make everything clean and bright!”

Louise wiped an arm across her mouth and Ernest saw the deep red scratches on the underside of her arm. The scuffle at Costco had yielded more than just a bargain on detergent.

“Join me, Ern. It’s Heaven! Heaven, I tell you!”

“Stay back, Louise. Don’t make me – ”

Louise lunged at Ernest and he squeezed the trigger.

Copyright © 2018 Mandy White

This story can also be found in DysFictional 3:

Battle of the Bean

This remains one of my favorite stories. I wrote it for WPaD’s Goin’ Extinct anthology, published in 2014, and the sequel, Vacation, for Goin’ Extinct Too, published in 2020. It answers the question that none of us have dared to ask: What would happen if there was no more coffee in the world? (shudder) ~*~*~

BATTLE OF THE BEAN

It was the end of the world as we knew it, and nobody felt fine. Remember that song? It’s been stuck inside my head since this whole thing began.

Anarchy reigned; society was in chaos. People rioted in the streets. Yadda-yadda apocalypse…

All because of one little thing. A tiny thing, really. Not quite miniscule, perhaps the size of a pea, but a tiny thing nonetheless.

The all-powerful coffee bean.

We were warned of the impending extinction of our precious bean, but like so many warnings before it, we chose to ignore it until forced to confront the ugly truth.

It began early in the century, when farmers in Colombia noticed a troublesome blight affecting the Arabica plants. The blight, known as “coffee rust”, was a type of fungus that spread rapidly, despite all efforts to eradicate it.

Some blamed pollution, others blamed global warming, but regardless of whom or what was to blame, Arabica crops in Latin America were wiped out by 2027, and from there it spread to crops in Africa.

Still, the public pooh-poohed. As long as Starbucks kept pouring eight-dollar lattes, there was no cause for alarm. The problem was far away from their sheltered yuppie environment. Cultivation was the farmers’ problem, not theirs. Even when the Arabica crops were gone and the price of that particular variety skyrocketed, people simply switched blends.

It wasn’t until every coffee plant on the planet was dead that we were willing to acknowledge that we had a problem. The problem escalated to catastrophic levels when the governments took control of the world’s remaining supply of coffee.

Coffee disappeared from supermarket shelves. Starbucks went out of business. Coffee shops with boarded-up windows littered the urban landscape.

At more than ten times the price per kilo, coffee replaced cocaine as Colombia’s most lucrative illegal export. Coffee cartels waged war on each other in hopes of controlling the world’s dwindling supplies of the precious brown bean. Penalties for smuggling coffee ranged from several years to life in prison or even death by firing squad, depending on which country one was arrested in, but that didn’t stop an intrepid few from trying their luck.

Street value of an ounce of ground coffee climbed higher than that of gold. Users traded automatic weapons, priceless family heirlooms and even the deeds to their homes for a cup of espresso, just to get one more fix of that aromatic black nectar.

We tried consuming tea, colas and caffeine pills, but it didn’t take us long to learn that caffeine wasn’t what gave coffee its addictive nature. It turned out there was another ingredient we had overlooked. A mystery ingredient that latched onto the brain much like cocaine did. Suffice it to say, lack of this ingredient made some people very unhappy indeed. Scientists analyzed it, tried to isolate it and tried to synthesize it but to no avail.

The increase in violent crimes due to coffee withdrawal led to the global legalization of marijuana. Pounds of Purple Kush, Amsterdam Indica and BC Big Bud now occupied the shelf space that had once displayed pounds of French Roast, Breakfast Blend and Decaf. A society of anxious, stressed-out bean-hounds became laid-back and complacent, sleepily smiling as they crammed their mouths full of snacks.

Of course, there were still the hardcore addicts, for whom nothing else but the bitter ambrosia would do. White-collar professionals became organized crime bosses, dealing the world’s most valuable substance to street addicts, some of them former colleagues. When the coffee finally ran out, one country accused the next of hoarding it, even though nobody had any coffee anymore.

With everyone at each other’s throats, the UN dissolved. Their final meeting ended in a massive brawl; a Battle Royal between nearly 200 delegates that resolved nothing. The situation deteriorated to the point of war, with everyone pointing warheads at everyone else.

With a bunch of coffee-starved world leaders holding their jittery fingers over the red button, I did what any sensible man would, and went to ground.

I found the bomb shelter in my neighbor’s back yard after investigating the sound of a gunshot. I found him at his kitchen table, where he had been trying to snort lines of instant coffee before giving up and swallowing the barrel of his .357. Poor bastard – everyone knows there’s no real coffee in that instant stuff, but looks like he died trying.

I found a shovel and thought I’d do the neighborly thing and give him a decent burial, but damn, the ground was hard! I tried a few different spots but kept hitting rocks, then at one point I hit something metal. Curious, I dug it up, and damned if I didn’t find a bomb shelter! Probably built during World War II and long forgotten under layers of landscaping. My neighbor probably bought the house without even knowing it existed.

So, when the threat of nuclear war became imminent, I packed some supplies and retreated into the shelter with plans to stay put for a few weeks or months until the coast was clear. I brought food, plenty of water, books to read, flashlights and batteries, but I needn’t have bothered to pack so much because when I got down there I discovered the shelves well-stocked. Sure, eighty-year-old canned goods might not be ideal, but they were better than nothing if it came down to it. I scanned my flashlight over the shelves and lo and behold! What did I see? Coffee! Cans and cans of magnificent, marvelous coffee!

I had packed a butane camp stove and several cases of fuel, so I was all set to prepare hot meals. Now hot coffee would accompany those meals! This dark, dusty hole in the ground had suddenly become paradise.

I’m writing this down, partly to keep myself busy so I don’t think about coffee. I also thought it would be a good idea to record what became of our world just in case nobody else is alive to do it.

As close as I can figure, it’s been about six months since I felt the first of the bombs hit. My food supply is dwindling, even the really old stuff. If I have to eat another can of cold lima beans I’m going to scream. Who the hell puts lima beans in a bomb shelter? I guess I could leave the shelter, but as long as I have coffee in my possession, I run the risk of getting robbed, maybe even killed for it. Lord only knows what’s happening up on the surface.

I’m down to my last can of coffee, but I’ve been putting off opening it because once it’s gone, then I truly will be out of coffee. After that, I will leave the shelter and see what awaits me up above.

I’ll wait one more day to open it. I can go without coffee for just one more day. I’ve been saving one last can of butane to make it nice and hot. Cold food I can handle, but cold water won’t brew coffee.

See? One day wasn’t so tough. Why not make it two? If I have a cup of coffee every two days, it will last twice as long. If I wait one more day before opening the last can, that’s one more day before I run out for good.

I made it a whole week. Wow. That’s one more week before I run out. As long as I have that can of coffee, I’m the richest man on earth. I might also be the only man on earth, but… mere details.

Two weeks, and that damn can of coffee sits there unopened, mocking me, daring me to open it. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? Nice try, coffee can. I’m smarter than you. After all, you’re just a stupid can of coffee. I’m over you. I don’t love you anymore. I could quit you cold turkey if I wanted to.

Aw, fuck it. Since I know I can quit anytime I want, I might as well drink it and enjoy the last coffee on earth.

I’m doing it. This is it. I’m opening the can.

Tomorrow.

I’ve been out of food for weeks now, and starvation is weakening me more each day. The can of coffee still sits unopened, though. I have decided to save it until the very end. If the last thing I do before I leave this world is drink the last cup of coffee in that can, I will die a happy man. I’ll have to do it soon, though. I’m on my last two gallons of bottled water.

Maybe it’s time I left the shelter. There is probably clean water on the surface. Hell, I don’t even care if it’s contaminated, just as long as it will make a decent cuppa Joe. But… what if it’s total chaos up there? I’d be killed for my can of coffee for sure. I guess I could leave it in the shelter. Nobody knows it’s here. But what if I was followed on the way back, or worse, what if someone found this place – and my coffee – while I was away? Without my coffee, I have nothing. No, the only way it will be safe is if I stay and guard it.

When I finish the water I have open, I will open the last jug of water along with the can of coffee and brew a nice steaming cup of Heaven. When the coffee is gone, I will leave the shelter. If the world is destroyed, I’ll use the revolver I took from my neighbor’s hand and exit in likewise fashion.

NO! NO!!!! I went to open the last water jug and found it empty! DRY! All this time I thought it was full but I didn’t actually pick it up and shake it. The jug must have had a leak at the bottom because the water is long gone. No! No! No! I can’t live without water, because without water I can’t make coffee. A world without coffee is not one I want to face.

Goodbye world, whatever’s left of you.

* * *

The steel door groaned open. Two faces peered into the hole, closing their inner eyelids to shield their eyes from the rising dust.

“What is this?”

“I’m not sure. Looks like some kind of ancient ruins. There’s a cave or something down there. Let’s go down and check it out.”

They scuttled down the shaft into the cavern below.

“Look, there! Bones! What kind of creature is that?”

“I don’t know, but it’s not one of us. Look, only four appendages, and it doesn’t even have a tail! Must be some kind of weird old fossil.”

“What’s that object beside it?”

A webbed, green-scaled hand reached for the metal can.

“Is it some kind of weapon?”

“I don’t think so. Maybe it’s food or something. Look, I can open it.”

Sniff. Sniff.

“What is that?”

“I don’t know, but it smells delicious! Should we taste it?”

“No, it might be poison. Let’s go and ask Mom first.”

Copyright © 2014 Mandy White

For the sequel to this story, read on:

Vacation

“Are we there yet?”

“No.”

“How much farther?”

“I don’t know.”

“I’m bored. Can’t we stop somewhere?”

“Will you stop harassing me? We will get there when we get there.”

“Don’t yell at the children, Dax. They’re just restless. They’ve been cooped up in this vehicle for ages. Can’t we find a place to stop so they can get some exercise?” Sky said.

“Where would you suggest?”

“I’m sure there’s someplace suitable around here. How about that place?”

“What if it’s no good?”

“There’s only one way to find out. Scan it.”

Dax entered the coordinates into the computer and read the results.

“Sounds ok, but might be some kind of tourist trap.”

“Well, we’re tourists, so it sounds perfect.”

Dax sighed. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to stop and stretch our legs for a while. Maybe we will find a nice place to camp.”

“That’s the spirit. We’re on vacation. Let’s relax and enjoy ourselves.”

* * *

The place looked promising. Clean air, trees, plenty of water. The children scrambled out of the vehicle and rushed toward the beach. Within moments they were splashing happily in the water.

Sky nuzzled her mate. “See? That was all they needed. Why don’t you relax while I find us something to eat?”

Dax was feeling more relaxed already. The place was pretty nice, he had to admit. Maybe they could stay a while. It seemed like a great place to spend a holiday.

Sky wandered away, taking in the sights while Dax basked in the sun, lying on a large flat rock near the water. Some time later, Sky returned, her arms filled with tasty looking food.

“What are those?” Dax asked.

“I don’t know, but they taste good. Here, try one.” She handed a wriggling, furry creature to Dax.

“Children! Come and get something to eat!”

“But I wanna swim!” Chi whined.

“You can go back and swim after you eat something and warm up for a little while. You don’t want to get a chill,” Sky ordered.

Pouting, Chi and Dik left the water and joined their parents on the beach. Their reluctance quickly turned to enthusiasm when they saw the delicious treats their mother had brought.

“This is nice, don’t you think, Honey?” Sky said, gazing up at the brilliant yellow sun on its backdrop of blue.

“It sure is,” Dax agreed, “Why don’t we stay here for a while and camp? Looks like we have the whole place to ourselves.”

“Yes! Let’s do it.” Sky said.

“Yay!” the children shouted in unison.

* * *

The next day, the children did some exploring while their parents napped in the sun. They happened upon a strange object.

“Wonder what this is?” Chi said, examining the rounded metal thing.

“I think it’s some kind of lid. Help me open it.”

The steel door groaned open. They peered into the hole, closing their inner eyelids against the rising dust.

“What is this?”

“I’m not sure. Looks like some kind of ancient ruins. There’s a cave or something down there. Let’s go down and check it out.”

They scuttled down the shaft into the cavern below.

“Look there! Bones! What kind of creature is that?”

“I don’t know, but it’s not one of us. Look, only four appendages and it doesn’t even have a tail! Must be some kind of weird old fossil.”

“What’s that object beside it?”

Dik’s webbed, green-scaled hand reached for the metal object.

“Is it some kind of weapon?” Chi asked.

“I don’t think so. Maybe it’s food or something. Look, I can open it.”

Sniff. Sniff.

“What is that?”

“I don’t know, but it smells delicious! Should we taste it?”

“No, it might be poison. Let’s go and ask Mom first.”

“What’s this other thing?”

“I don’t know, but it looks like it was as important to this creature as that container. It died holding both of them.”

* * *

They ran back to their parents carrying the metal container and the other strange object they had found clutched in the arms of the fossilized remains.

“Mom! Dad! Look what we found!”

Dax and Sky examined the objects their children had found. The container was filled with dry, dark brown granules that had an intoxicating aroma. The other object appeared to be a collection of ancient writings, inscribed on thin sheets of a brittle, delicate material.

“I’ll scan this with the ship’s computer. Maybe we can decode it,” Dax said.

He scanned the documents and then left the computer to analyze the alien language. Meanwhile, the family went out to explore, starting with the cave the children had found.

It appeared to be some sort of underground home, accessed by a metal tube. The remains of a lone life form lay below. Nearby, they found some ancient ruins, above ground. Inside, they found the remains of another life form, and its death appeared to have been caused by a large hole in its head.

“What happened to these creatures?” Sky wondered aloud. “Do you think any of them are left?”

“I don’t know,” Dax said. Maybe those ancient writings will have a clue.”

“Let’s look around some more. These things are fascinating if nothing else.”

Some distance away, they found more ancient ruins that appeared to be untouched since the demise of the civilization that had built them. It was an archaeological marvel, this crumbling city, destroyed by some sort of war or disaster. They found more remains, lying where they had fallen. Whatever had happened, not everyone had seen it coming.

They explored until dusk, and then returned to camp. Dax checked on the ship’s computer to see if it had made any progress decoding the ancient language. It had. The results were amazing.

“Sky! Children! Come here! You have to see this!”

They crowded around the screen as Dax read what the computer had translated.

“According to what the being in the cave inscribed, this planet was once a thriving civilization, but it was destroyed by war. That cave was not a home, but a shelter, built to withstand the blast. It seems that poor fellow went down there to escape the war and ended up starving to death, even though he could have come back to the surface.”

“What made him stay down there?”

“He was protecting a substance more valuable than anything on the planet; the very cause of the war. It seemed this civilization worshiped the substance, until one day the plant that provided it became extinct. When the supply ran out, war broke out. They bombed themselves out of existence with their own weapons. That guy found a treasure trove of the valuable substance down in the shelter, so he went to ground and locked himself in. He had one container left when he ran out of water. He died down there, probably of starvation, locked in with his treasure.”

“The container! That must be the treasure!” Chi exchanged an excited look with her brother. “We just found the most valuable thing on the planet!”

“So, what exactly is this treasure?” Sky asked. “What makes it so valuable?”

Dax leaned over the screen again.

“It says here that it’s some sort of drink. They called it COF-FEE.”

Copyright © 2020 Mandy White

The Good Husband

I know Valentine’s Day is over, but I have another tale of romance gone wrong… Published in DysFictional 2.

Harold was a good husband. His mother taught him that a good husband should cater to his wife’s every whim. His father had left when he was two years old, so he didn’t have much basis for comparison. On her deathbed, his mother begged him to find a good woman and hold onto her.

“Promise me, Harry. Don’t chase after some bleach-haired floozy. Find a sensible woman who doesn’t sleep around and put a ring on her finger. Be a good husband. I want you to be taken care of.”

“I promise, Mama.”

True to his word, Harold ignored the flirtations of his lovely secretary, Linda, who was clearly waiting for him to ask her out. His mother would not have approved of Linda. She would have called her frivolous. Linda’s long, manicured nails, perfect makeup and unnaturally crimson hair meant she was a high-maintenance woman who probably spent all of her free time at the beauty salon. Personally, Harold wouldn’t have minded if his wife spent extra effort on her appearance, but he had made a promise to his mother. If nothing else, he was an honorable man who revered his mother above all others.

He met Bernice at a charity fundraiser he was obligated to attend on behalf of his employer. Bernice was a volunteer.

She was a solid woman; more than a little on the heavy side, with an angular face free from makeup. Her dishwater-blonde hair twisted into a severe bun without a single stray strand out of place. Mother would have approved of Bernice.

Linda wore her hair up as well, but she always had a few loose strands wisping over her smooth, rouged cheeks.

Harold proposed to Bernice after just two months of celibate dating, foregoing intimacy to consummate their marriage the way a proper husband and wife should.

The dream honeymoon he had planned didn’t turn out quite the way Harold hoped. He wanted Hawaii, but settled on Niagara Falls because Bernice felt it was more practical to drive a few hours away than spend all that money to fly over the ocean to a resort filled with “starved bikini-clad sluts”. Howard acquiesced, intent on pleasing his new bride. His spirits weren’t dampened much; the promise of sexual release made mere details like location unimportant.

The honeymoon proved to be a disappointment. After one obligatory roll in the hay, Bernice refused to let him touch her. Like a good husband, Harold respected her wishes, confident that she would warm up to him when she was ready. She took his credit cards and spent the entire week shopping, leaving Harold waiting patiently in the hotel room.

Weeks passed, then months, still with no intimacy. To compensate for his nonexistent sex life, Harold threw himself into his work, climbing the corporate ladder with ease and bringing home increasingly larger paychecks, like a good husband should. Bernice sat on the couch eating snacks, drinking gin and watching the Home Shopping Network, spending the money as quickly as he could earn it.

Harold did his best to please Bernice, but she was never happy. She rarely spoke to him without yelling. Not much of a cook, she insisted on being taken out to eat frequently, which he dreaded because she took every opportunity to humiliate him in public.

Harold was miserable, but never allowed his feelings to show. He endured Bernice’s abuse with meek subservience, replying only when a response was required.

“Yes, Dear. You’re right, Dear. Whatever you want, Dear,” became his mantra. He recited the words automatically, often without even hearing what she had said. He knew his mother would have been proud of him for being such a good husband.

He wanted out, but there were only two ways he knew of to get out of his miserable marriage: divorce or suicide. Neither seemed like a viable option. Divorce meant lawyer’s fees, a hefty settlement and alimony. Although suicide would nullify his life insurance, Bernice would still keep all of his possessions and money, which was substantial. It would be win-win for Bernice, with Harold the loser in either situation.

As the years passed, Harold’s desperation grew, as did Bernice’s waistline. His eyes had been wandering for some time; after all, he was a man, and only human. His secretary, Linda, grew lovelier the more he watched her, and he spent many afternoons with his office door locked while he satisfied his urges, imagining various scenarios involving the two of them.

One day, his fantasy came true. Preoccupied with the low-cut dress Linda was wearing, he had forgotten to lock his office door. He was on the verge of climax, eyes closed and head thrown back in ecstasy when the door opened and Linda walked in.

“Mr. Benson, I need you to sign these requisitions for…” She froze when she saw him, sitting at his desk with his pants wide open.

Harold scrambled to cover himself and recover whatever dignity he had left. Linda’s next stop would be Human Resources. He would be publicly humiliated and probably asked to resign. His career was over.

What happened next was unexpected.

“Can I help you with that?” she asked, voice dripping with honey.

Unable to speak, Harold merely nodded. Linda leaned back against the door, shutting it. He heard the lock click into place.

“You don’t know how long I’ve been waiting for this,” she said, slipping out of her dress and letting it fall to the floor.

Every fantasy he’d ever had was about to come true. For one sickening moment, Harold was certain he was asleep and dreaming; that he would wake up just as she was about to touch him.

When Linda climbed onto his lap and made love to him, he didn’t wake up from a dream. He did, however, experience an awakening of another kind.

His affair with Linda continued, and as the months passed, Harold felt his confidence returning. For the first time in his life he felt like a man. He accepted the possibility that his mother may have been wrong. Subservience didn’t make him a man. It made him a doormat. Standing up for what he believed in was the mark of a true man, and he believed that he wanted to be with Linda.

He made a decision. No more would he endure Bernice’s abuse. He would ask for – no – he would DEMAND a divorce that night.

* * *

Harold ducked to avoid the half-full tumbler of gin and tonic Bernice hurled at him. The glass exploded against the cupboard door behind where his head had been a second earlier.

“A divorce?” she screeched. Her cheeks flushed with alcohol-fueled fury. “Oh, you think so, do you? You think you’re just going to put me out on the street like some used-up old whore?”

“I believe you actually have to have sex to be considered a whore,” Harold said calmly. He never would have dreamed of speaking to her that way before. Now, he felt cool and confident. He was unafraid of her, and liberated by his newly found courage.

“What did you say to me?” Bernice roared, wobbling a bit in her drunken haze as she looked around for something else to throw at him.

“You heard me.”

“Well, let me tell you something, Mister Smartypants.” Bernice grabbed her bottle of Tanqueray and took a swig of straight gin. “It just so happens, I know a thing or two.”

“Do tell, Dear.” Harold made ‘Dear’ sound anything but endearing.

“I know about your little affair with that slut in your office.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“DON”T FUCKING LIE TO ME!” she screamed.

“Calm down, Bernice. It’s quite simple. I don’t love you. I don’t know if I ever did. This marriage has been a sham from the beginning and I want a divorce. I’ll see that you’re well taken care of. I don’t think we have much else to discuss.”

“Oh yes, there is, you cheating bastard!” Bernice squinted, curling one side of her mouth into a sinister sneer. “I know. I know everything. About Linda, your little office grope-fests, those nights you were supposedly ‘working late’. A while back, I got an anonymous call from someone in your office. Someone cared enough about the sanctity of marriage to tell me what you were up to. I didn’t care much. If you were getting it from her, then you wouldn’t be always trying to put your perverted hands on me.”

“But I never…!” Harold protested, trying to quell the rage that boiled inside him. He had long ago given up making any attempts at intimacy with his wife. It was more peaceful just to leave her snoring away in her gin-soaked slumber.

“No, you never, did you? All these years, I’ve tried to make myself attractive to you, and you won’t so much as lay a finger on me!” She sniffled, tears forming at the corners of her bloodshot eyes. “I’m a woman, you know! I have needs too! Needs that a limp-dicked loser like you could never satisfy!”

Harold’s jaw hung slack as he struggled to comprehend her incredulous accusations. He had tried, Lord knew how hard he had tried to develop an intimate relationship with her early in the marriage, but she’d made it clear she did not want to be touched. Where was this coming from? Then all at once he knew. She was already preparing her case for divorce court. She planned to paint him as cold and neglectful and herself as the longsuffering victim of a loveless marriage.

“This is your response? To try and make it all my fault?”

“If it isn’t your fault, then whose is it? You’re the one who wants the divorce. After I wasted all of my best years on you!”

“Those were your best years? Then it’s a good thing I’m getting out now, because I don’t think I could handle the worst ones.”

“For better or for worse, I believe it was. But,” she waggled her bottle of gin at him. “I thought I’d better get some insurance, just in case. So I hired a private investigator. I have photos of your little love affair. Photos you aren’t going to want shown in court.”

A sudden chill gripped Harold’s gut, squashing the bravado he’d felt moments earlier. With proof of adultery she would assassinate him in court. He’d be left with nothing. Linda wouldn’t want to be with him if he was broke, he was sure of it. He needed to rethink his strategy.

“Bernice, Honey, let’s not be hasty.” He did his best to muster up some realistic-looking tears. “I’m sorry. I take back everything I said about not loving you. I was weak, I admit it, and I’m so sorry I hurt you. Please, Darling, forgive me. I’ll do anything to gain your forgiveness,” he wept.

“Anything?” Bernice grinned, a wide, cruel expression that stretched her already too-thin lips to the point where they almost disappeared.

“Anything you want, Dear. Haven’t I always been a good husband? Haven’t I always provided for you and given you everything you wanted? All I ask is you forgive me this one transgression. Tell me, Darling, how can I make it up to you?”

“Oh, it’s going to take me a while to make a list, but the first thing you’re going to do is fire that floozy you’ve been fooling around with.”

“Fire Linda?”

“You got a problem with that? Fire her tomorrow or I’ll call my lawyer.”

“Sweetheart, tomorrow is Saturday. The office is closed.”

“Then Monday, stupid! Do I have to do all the thinking around here?”

“Yes Dear, whatever you want, Dear.”

“That’s more like it,” she slurred. The gin was almost gone, and hopefully she would go to bed soon.

Harold’s mind reeled. He didn’t want to fire Linda, but he needed more time to think. How could he make the weekend last longer? Then he had it.

“Darling, I’m desperate to make it up to you. Why don’t we take a trip, just the two of us? Two weeks, anywhere you want to go. You can go shopping. We’ll eat someplace fancy every night. Please, I don’t want our marriage to end like this.”

“Anywhere I want?”

“Anywhere.”

“What about work on Monday?”

“I’m an executive. I can take time off if I want to. I’ll just call in sick.”

“You are sick. You know that, don’t you?”

“Yes, Dear. You’re right. I’m sick.”

“I know where I want to go. You’ve always refused to take me there.”

“Where?”

“Hawaii.”

Harold wanted to punch her right in the middle of that smug grin. She was the one who had refused to go to Hawaii, not him! But he gritted his teeth and gave her what he hoped was a sweet smile.

“Fine. Hawaii it is. I will make flight arrangements first thing tomorrow. Why don’t we get some sleep now, Dear?”

“Way ahead of you,” she mumbled, wobbling off toward the bedroom.

The last thing Harold wanted was to do was take a vacation with his shrew of a wife, but it was the only way he could think of to buy some time. He had successfully distracted her from demanding that he fire Linda on Monday. If he booked a Sunday flight, he would have the excuse that he’d have to wait until they returned to fire her. In the meantime, he would get a message to Linda, informing her of the recent developments and ask her to take care of business matters for him.

* * *

Luck was on his side, and Harold managed to secure two First Class seats on Flight 266 to Honolulu and a room at a luxurious oceanside resort.

The following morning while Bernice was sleeping off her hangover, Harold slipped out for coffee at Starbuck’s so he could call Linda in relative privacy. He related the previous night’s events to her.

“I just don’t know what to do, Linda. I’m so sorry you got dragged into this. If I divorce her now, she’ll ruin me.”

“Then there’s only one solution,” Linda said.

“If you know of a way out of this, I’m all for it.”

“You take her to Hawaii, but only one of you returns.”

“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

“Yes. Read between the lines, Harry. All I’m going to say is, lots of accidents can happen in Hawaii. People drown in the surf. You take a hike up a volcano, then… oops! Use your imagination, Babe. You’ll figure something out. When you get back, I’ll be waiting for you. I love you, Harry.” She hung up before he could respond.

She loves me! His heart fluttered, in a way it never had for Bernice. No matter what happened in Hawaii, he had Linda.

But kill Bernice?

He had to admit, he’d thought of it more than once, the same way he’d fantasized about having sex with Linda. That fantasy had come true, so why not this one?

His phone dinged, indicating a text message. It was from Linda. He opened it eagerly. It was a picture of a breast. The message said, ‘Remember what’s waiting for you. Now delete this and go get ‘er!’

He picked up a bouquet of flowers on the way home and walked back into the house whistling a light-hearted tune. For the first time since he walked down the aisle, he saw light at the end of the tunnel.

After receiving a tongue-lashing from Bernice about buying flowers that were just going to be dead by the time they returned, Harold helped her pack for their dream vacation to Hawaii.

It was going to be a dream, all right. A dream come true. He had the entire flight and subsequent two weeks to plan and execute his wife’s demise, and then he could finally start his life.

* * *

The plane hadn’t finished taxiing down the runway when Bernice started to complain.

“This seatbelt is faulty. It’s too tight. I’m taking it off.”

“Just a few minutes, Dear. Once we’re in the air you can take it off.”

“Well who designed these damn things? Probably the same assholes who design clothes – anorexics only!”

Harold clamped his lips shut tight. It wouldn’t do to argue with her or point out that the seatbelt was tight because she had gained considerable girth since their wedding. It was a good thing he had booked First Class, because he didn’t think her ass would have fit in a Coach seat.

The moment the Fasten Seatbelts sign went off, Bernice had the flight attendant running, bringing her gin after gin, slippers, a pillow, then a new pillow because the first one smelled like farts.

Harold gazed out the window at the rugged snow-capped mountains below, picturing the curve of Linda’s breast in her last text. He mulled over the various ways he could kill Bernice. Drowning might be difficult, since a woman her size was incredibly buoyant. With his luck, he’d push her overboard and she’d bob there like a cork until someone rescued her. Of course, there was always the possibility of a shark attack…

The volcano option was unlikely, since Bernice wouldn’t hike anywhere unless a buffet was waiting at the other end.

Poison, perhaps? Alcohol poisoning? Maybe he could make it look accidental. There had to be a way.

The plane gave a sickening lurch, then shuddered violently. Harold jumped in his seat. The Fasten Seatbelts sign lit up again. Bernice muttered curses into her gin and tonic.

Oxygen masks dropped in front of their faces, and a crescendo of screams rose from the Coach cabin behind them. A flight attendant emerged from the cockpit and gathered the others into a cluster, where she whispered to them urgently before ducking behind the curtain that separated First Class from Coach.

A woman’s voice came over the intercom.

“This is flight attendant Julie Todd. The captain has informed me that we are having mechanical difficulties. The cabin may lose pressure, so please take a moment to place your oxygen masks over your faces. If traveling with small children, please put on your own mask first before assisting with theirs.”

Harold detected a quaver in the flight attendant’s voice. She sounded scared, and it frightened him. She was trained to handle events such as this.

Harold put on his mask, noticing that Bernice was still sipping her gin. She had made no move to fasten her seatbelt or put on her mask.

“Honey, you should put your mask on. This could be serious.”

“Bullshit. This is just a drill. They do it all the time. It’s like a fire drill.”

Harold knew for a fact that she was mistaken, but decided to leave her alone. She’d be better company unconscious anyway, if the plane did depressurize. A flight attendant was headed in their direction, having seen that Bernice was not wearing her seatbelt and oxygen mask. The plane suddenly banked to the left, sending the flight attendant and anything that wasn’t nailed down hurtling to the other side of the plane.

“Assume crash position and brace for impact!” the captain’s voice said over the intercom.

Everything moved in slow motion. The sounds of fear and chaos filled the cabin – screams of passengers. Flight attendants telling people to place their heads between their legs to prepare for an emergency landing.

Harold dared a peek out the window. Did those mountains look closer? The plane was traveling in a distinct forward slant now, and he realized that he probably wasn’t going to survive.

His thoughts went immediately to Linda. Not to the loss of his own life, but the loss of what might have been if he hadn’t been such a pushover all his life. If this is what it meant to have your life flash before your eyes before you die, his was a pretty poor example of a life. So many regrets, so little life lived.

Bernice’s screams jolted him out of his reverie.

“This is all YOUR fault, Harold! You dragged me onto this death-plane against my will! Is this how you planned to get rid of me? To kill me in cold blood? You coward! You’ve been a coward all your life, and now you’re going to die a coward!”

Suddenly, everything became crystal clear to Harold. His biggest regret was not that he was going to die without having really lived, but that he was being robbed of the chance to kill the red-faced screeching banshee wedged into the seat beside him.

Harold tore the mask off his face. Nobody reprimanded him, because all of the flight attendants were already strapped in and tucked into crash position. He unbuckled his seatbelt and lunged at Bernice, wrapping his hands around her throat.

“I’m going to kill you if it’s the last thing I ever do!” he shouted into her face, squeezing with Herculean strength he didn’t know he had.

She made a gackkk sound and flapped her thick, doughy arms at him. Her face darkened from red to purple. Harold squeezed for all he was worth. He felt her windpipe pop under his thumbs and he pressed harder. There seemed no end to his strength, and he’d never felt more alive than he did at that moment. All the years of quiet subservience, humiliation and frustration culminated into that one single act.

Bernice’s eyes bulged and her lips opened and closed, silently for the first time since he’d known her. She looked like a giant purple fish, dying on the shore.

“You WILL die before I do!” he panted, spittle raining over her violet face. “You owe me at least that, you insufferable bitch!” Harold closed his eyes and clamped his hands down with everything he had. Bernice’s head sagged limply to one side, but he maintained his iron grip on her throat. This was how he wanted to die. They would literally have to pry her from his cold, dead hands. He would have the satisfaction of seeing her suffer in his last few moments of life, and that was the greatest gift she could ever give him.

“I love you, Linda! Harold shouted, bracing himself for impact.

* * *

Linda stretched out on her couch with a glass of Chardonnay to watch the evening news. Harry would be in Hawaii by now, and hopefully he had figured out how he was going to kill his wife.

It had been a long, slow process, but she had finally succeeded in seducing her boss. Now that he was in her back pocket, all she had to do was get rid of his wife and she would be on Easy Street. With Bernice too dead to drain him for alimony, everything would be theirs, and eventually hers. As Harry’s wife, she would no longer have to work as his secretary. Her replacement was already waiting in the wings – a sultry blonde named Brittany, who had given up exotic dancing for secretarial school. Harry wouldn’t be able to resist Brittany. Once a cheater, always a cheater, and now that he’d done it once, the second time would be easier.

Linda would use the same trick she had suggested to Bernice when she placed that anonymous call months earlier. She would hire a private investigator, most likely the same one Bernice had used, to gather all the evidence she needed to prove adultery.

Yes, Easy Street. She’d earned it.

Lost in her champagne and caviar daydreams, Linda only half listened to the newscast, until something about a plane crash caught her interest. She sat upright when she heard the word Honolulu.

Wait – what? That was where Harry and Princess Bingo-Wings were landing. What the hell flight were they on? It couldn’t possibly be the same flight! She turned up the volume and sat, riveted to the screen.

“Flight 266 from New York to Honolulu experienced engine failure while flying over the Cascades near Washington State. The pilot saved the lives of nearly all passengers and crew with a last minute maneuver that steered the plane away from the mountains and over Puget Sound, where he executed a heroic water landing. The Coast Guard arrived quickly and rescued all survivors. There was only one casualty, a woman whose name is being withheld pending investigation and notification of immediate family. There has been talk of extenuating circumstances surrounding the woman’s death. She did not die as a result of the crash. Apparently she was deceased beforehand, having been strangled to death by her husband, who survived the crash. Several witnesses have corroborated the story, though authorities have declined to comment.”

The picture switched from the newscaster to live footage of passengers disembarking from Coast Guard cutters in Seattle. The dejected masses wrapped in blankets lost the spotlight to a single passenger, a man, who was led from the boat wearing handcuffs and handed over to waiting police.

Copyright © 2014 Mandy White

Skin Deep

Moving on with the February romance theme, here’s another tale of dysfunctional marriage with a touch of magic thrown in. Published in DysFictional 2 and WPaD’s Dragons and Dreams.

She sits at an antique dressing table in front of a large, ornately framed mirror. The bridal veil perched atop her perfectly coiffed head cascades past her waist, brushing the floor. She checks her makeup, and then checks it again. She adjusts the veil, careful not to disturb her hair.

As she continues to primp and preen, a disembodied voice narrates in the background. It reminds her of Rod Serling from that old TV show, The Twilight Zone.

Fitting, she thinks, noticing for the first time that she and her surroundings are in black and white, just like in the show.

“The wedding day,” the narrator says. “The day every woman dreams of. The very best day of her life. Doesn’t she make a beautiful bride?”

Silently, she agrees.

I am beautiful, aren’t I?

The voice continues, “It’s the one day when she will be the star; all eyes will be upon her – the bride.”

There’s a pause, as eerie music rises in the background.

“But there’s one thing she doesn’t know about. One thing nobody has told her about. Nobody has warned her about…”

Her image in the mirror zooms in like a camera lens until only her neck and shoulders are visible. A shadow darkens her skin, beginning at her collarbone and creeping over her shoulder, blackening her skin to a charcoal hue. She brushes her fingertips over her skin and the darkness spreads to her hand and arm while continuing to envelop her neck and face.

“The black shadow…” the voice finishes.

* * *

Jane fumbled at the lamp until she found the switch. Soft light flooded the room, which was in full color, as was she. She held her hand in front of her face for confirmation, even though she knew it was only a dream. No blackened skin. No Rod Serling narrating in the background.

As disturbing as the dream was, Jane didn’t believe in prophetic visions, omens or any of that nonsense. She was, for all intents and purposes, an atheist, although she didn’t proclaim herself as such. She didn’t believe in ‘ists’ or ‘isms’. She preferred to think of herself as an “anti-ismist”.

She sighed and reached for the bottle of Nytol on the nightstand. That dream was probably the only chance she’d ever get to see herself in a wedding dress, so she might as well enjoy it, eerie as it was. She had given up on the white picket fence dream long ago. She was short, stocky and plain looking. Girls like her didn’t get swept off their feet by fairytale princes; they had to be happy with what life gave them. Her high school nickname, “Plain Jane”, suited her well.

* * *

One year later, Jane found herself wearing a sensible yet elegant wedding gown, selected by her fiancée’s mother. She sat at an antique dressing table in a back room of the church where she was to be married. The room, which was a parlor reserved for private conversations with the minister,  also served as a waiting room for brides preparing to walk down the aisle. She had never imagined herself having a church wedding but it was important to Victor. Besides, who was she to argue? She was finally getting married – what else mattered?

She checked the clock. She had another thirty minutes before she was to walk down the aisle. She had gotten ready early, but on this day, she had no place else to be.

Jane primped in front of the ornate mirror, the ominous Twilight Zone dream all but forgotten. She wished she wasn’t so ordinary looking. Why couldn’t she be beautiful like the women pictured in the bridal magazines, even if just for one day? Her husband-to-be had accepted her the way she was – and for that she was grateful – but she still wished she could surprise him at the altar by arriving transformed into one of those breathtaking brides who modeled in the bridal magazines.

She reached into her purse and pulled out a small plastic bag containing the items she had purchased at the drug store earlier. She spread the objects on the tabletop and examined them. A tube of lipstick, almost the same color as her lips, but just pink enough to brighten them up. Some eye shadow, in natural tones with a frosty pink highlighter. One eyeliner pencil, charcoal gray and matching the mascara. The woman at the cosmetics counter had helped her choose the colors and shown her how to apply the foreign substances.

Here goes, she thought.

She outlined her eyes and then brushed the eye shadow over her lids the way she had been shown. The mascara was the trickiest – every time she touched the brush to her eyelashes she blinked involuntarily, getting the stuff on her skin where it wasn’t supposed to be. Finally she mastered it and sat back to admire the result. Her eyes looked sultry and mysterious with the long dark lashes. This was a look she could get used to.

The lipstick was the finishing touch. It was perfect.

She looked more beautiful than she ever had in her life

Victor would be so surprised!

A knock on the door jolted her out of her fantasy.

“Are you ready? It’s time,” a woman’s cold voice said. Marlene was Victor’s sister and also her maid of honor. Jane had wanted her best friend from high school to stand beside her on her wedding day but Victor forbade it. His family disapproved of Michelle Dhaliwal, partly because her family was from India, but also because she was a fashion model. (A whore, according to Victor) Michelle was tall, leggy and busty and Jane had always admired her exotic beauty. Victor believed she was a bad influence on Jane and insisted she sever ties with her best friend. Michelle wasn’t even allowed to attend the wedding as a guest. Jane was crushed, but Victor had the final word. Only members of the Baptist church would be present at their wedding. Suffice to say, the entire wedding party consisted of Victor’s family members. The “bride’s side” of the chapel would have been empty had it not been used as overflow seating for Victor’s family and members of their church. Jane’s parents were deceased, so Victor’s father had volunteered to give her away.

It didn’t matter; a wedding was a wedding and this was the only one she would get.

Jane pulled her veil over her face and waited for the music to start, then opened the door to her future.

* * *

The mascara ran down her face in ugly black streaks, carried by the tears that marked her wedding night. Locked in the bathroom of their honeymoon suite at the Marriott, Jane sobbed as she scrubbed and scrubbed, trying to remove all traces of the “whore paint”, as Victor called it.

Victor had gotten the surprise of his life when he lifted the veil to gaze upon his beautiful bride. He was not pleasantly surprised. In fact, he was livid. He managed to maintain his usual cool composure for the duration of the ceremony. He recited his vows monotone, repeating what the minister told him. When it came time to kiss the bride, his lips barely brushed hers before turning his face aside in disgust. He immediately wiped his mouth as if he had just tasted something revolting.

Jane struggled not to cry in front of everyone but was unable to stop the tears from flowing. Her makeup ran down her face in ugly black streaks, dripping down and staining the front of her dress. This was supposed to be HER day! How dare he ruin it like this?

Victor remained calm until they were behind closed doors inside their hotel suite. Then he exploded.

“How DARE you embarrass me like that? What were you thinking? Get that whore paint off your face NOW!”

Jane burst into tears.

“I thought… I just wanted to look… you know, pretty.”

“By defacing the temple of the Lord? Why don’t you just spray paint some graffiti on the wall of the church? You don’t look pretty! You look like a WHORE! You made a laughingstock out of me! I told them I was marrying a virgin! And you show up looking like a… a…” he sputtered, running out of words in his fury.

“But I am… a… I’ve never…” Jane whimpered, humiliated.

He unbuttoned his trousers. “You’d better be. You’d better hope to God you are, or there will be Hell to pay!” He shoved her toward the bathroom. “Cleanse yourself, whore! I can’t stand the sight of you!”

Jane’s introduction to sex was a miserable experience. It was the exact opposite of the way women’s magazines and romance novels described it. Victor was rough and uncaring, forcing himself into her without regard for her comfort. She bit her lips to keep from crying out but could do nothing to stem the flow of tears as he lay on top of her, grunting and thrusting. Fortunately, it was over in about five minutes.

Her wedding night set the tone for the rest of her married life: Pain, followed by degradation, followed by humiliation, followed by more pain. Sometimes the abuse was verbal, other times it was punctuated by a slap or a punch when he felt he wasn’t getting his point across. Victor wielded his fists in the name of the Lord, with a fury he mistook for righteousness.

Jane endured her loveless marriage year after year, accepting her husband’s mistreatment with a quiet resignation. It didn’t occur to her that she might have a choice. She had taken a vow and signed her life away. After all, marriage to a strong man was a woman’s purpose in life, wasn’t it? After six years of marriage they remained childless, which added to Victor’s disappointment in the wife he had chosen. He had married her for the purpose of producing an heir to carry on his family name and she had proven to be a failure in every sense of the word. His religion forbade divorce, so he was stuck with her and she knew it. He took the words, ‘until death’ very seriously.

 The marriage would end only with one of their deaths.

* * *

She hadn’t heard from her best friend in a very long time when a package arrived, addressed to Jane. She squealed with delight when she saw the return address. It was from Michelle. She rushed downstairs to her sewing room to open the parcel in secret. Jane’s sewing room was her only haven; Victor never went in there. It was the only truly private space she had in the house.

She gasped when she saw the item Michelle had sent her. She had never seen anything so elegant. It was a rectangular jewelry box, about twelve inches long and six inches wide. It looked old; antique, possibly from India, made from what looked like carved ivory. She ran her fingers over the surface of the box, marvelling at the intricate carvings. When she held the box at different angles, the designs seemed to change, from figures of people to marvellous exotic creatures. The box sat on four finely carved feet that could be either avian or reptilian, complete with toes and talons.

What she found inside the box shocked her even more.

Jewelry.

Inside the box were several pieces of Michelle’s jewelry – expensive looking gold rings with gemstones in every color; dangly diamond earrings and a choker to match.

There was also a letter, from Michelle.

Hey Janey,

I’m sorry I couldn’t be at your wedding, but nobody can stop me from giving you a gift, just between us girls. This box has been in my family for generations. It was given to me by my mother, and her mother before her. My grandmother called it “The Box of Dreams”. She told me that it has the power to make dreams come true. Whatever that means. I used to keep jewelry and coins in it. I thought you might be able to find a better use for it. You deserve to have some beauty in your life. It is supposed to be passed from mother to daughter, but I will never have children. Maybe you’ll have better luck. Never forget how beautiful you are. Never let anyone tell you different.

Miss you bunches!

Love, Michelle.

xoxo

Jane’s eyes stung with tears when she read the note. Michelle had been diagnosed with cervical cancer at age nineteen. A hysterectomy was the only way to save her life. She had always laughed off the fact that she would never have children but Jane knew how deeply her friend was hurt. Adoption was not an option Michelle would consider, in case the cancer returned.

Michelle had chosen to give a family heirloom to her, even after being denied the opportunity to be her best friend’s maid of honor. She didn’t deserve such a good friend.

The box was exquisite, exotic. Decidedly un-Christian.

Victor would not approve.

Fuck Victor!

She gasped. The vulgarity of her thought shocked but delighted her at the same time. Yes. Fuck him and his stupid rules. He didn’t have to know. He never had to see it. She hid the box in a drawer filled with cloth scraps and spools of thread, where she knew Victor would never have any interest in looking.

She called Michelle to thank her for the beautiful gift but there was no answer. She tried again the next day. Still no answer. After a week with no luck contacting her friend, Jane assumed Michelle was working out of town. She would try again the next week.

Three weeks had passed with no answer at Michelle’s number when a letter arrived from Michelle’s mother. Jane crumpled to the floor in tears when she read the words Mrs. Dhaliwal had written.

The cancer had returned with a vengeance. Michelle had been given three months to live, six with treatment. Rather than suffer the brutality of radiation and chemotherapy, only to die in a hospital, she had taken her own life with an overdose of sleeping pills. She had left a suicide note explaining her motives, along with instructions that Jane be sent the enclosed envelope. It was another letter:

Hey, Janey,

Please don’t hate me. You know how I am. I do things on my own terms. If I have to die, I don’t want it to be emaciated and bald, in pain and puking my guts out. You know the saying – die young and leave a beautiful corpse. I’ve always known my life could come to this, and trust me, I’m ok with it. I’m sorry I didn’t call you to say goodbye. Please try to understand and forgive me. I will always be with you. As long as you have the Box of Dreams we will always be connected.

Remember, beauty is more than skin deep, my friend, and you are the most beautiful person I know.

Love you always,

Michelle

xoxo

* * *

Jane spent her days in a robotic routine of housework, gardening and frugal shopping excursions. She filled her empty hours window shopping and browsing through stores without buying anything because she wasn’t permitted to have anything frivolous. She could purchase groceries and household items and basic personal needs but nothing else. If she did not meticulously budget the allowance Victor gave her, there would be trouble.

Victor had been spending more time away from the house. His work hours seemed to stretch longer and longer. He offered no explanation and Jane didn’t ask for one. She didn’t care. The less she saw of him the better.

Jane spent more and more time in her sewing room when he was away. Sometimes she just sat and gazed at her secret box, remembering Michelle. She ran her fingers over the carved surface, trying to decipher the exotic designs. Sometimes she would find that hours had passed and all she had done was gaze at the box. Except for what Michelle had sent her, she owned no jewelry other than the simple wedding set which she never removed. She couldn’t wear Michelle’s jewelry. It had to remain in the box where Victor could never see it, lest he take it away.

Sometimes she just held the box and let her imagination wander, dreaming of the days before Victor, back when she was free and her life could have meant something. If only she could do it all over again. She would stay single. She would be a strong, independent woman who took shit from no man. She would wear makeup and pretty clothes and nobody would dare call her a whore.

One day, she decided to try on the jewelry, just for fun. Even if she could never leave her sewing room wearing it, she could at least see how it looked. One by one she slipped the rings on her fingers. There were four rings in total, and they looked absolutely stunning. Her wedding rings looked cheap and dull next to them. She clipped the choker around her neck and held her hair up, pretending it was styled into a fancy updo. Her ears had been pierced once, but she hadn’t worn earrings since before she met Victor. She didn’t even know if she had holes in her lobes anymore. A quick push, a twinge of pain and the earrings were through.

Gorgeous, dahling!

Jane smiled at her reflection in the mirror, blowing herself a kiss.

Jane reminisced back to her wedding day. If only she could have worn something this exquisite on her special day. If only that day had been special. She had looked so pretty – up until the moment Victor lifted the veil and made her cry. If only she could look that way every day of her life.

The box grew heavier in her lap.

She shook it.

Something rattled inside.

It had been empty a moment ago. She opened the lid.

Inside were the cosmetic products she had purchased for her wedding, six years earlier. She removed the objects from the box in awe. How could it be? She had thrown them in the garbage the same day, after Victor had raged at her and called it whore paint.

Did she dare? It would be hours before Victor returned home. She would have plenty of time to remove all traces of the makeup before he saw. She just wanted to see again… she just wanted to be pretty one more time.

This time, applying the makeup was easier. The eye makeup glided onto her skin, perfectly shaded, with just the right amount of light and dark everywhere. The mascara melded to her lashes with a quick stroke of the brush, without clumping or smearing onto her skin. The lipstick seemed to soak right into her lips, giving them a soft, natural pink blush.

Jane admired her face in the mirror.

Beautiful!

She lay back on the sofa in her sewing room, pretending she was an elegant model, posing for a photographer. She fell asleep clutching the box.

She woke to the sound of Victor coming in the door.

Shit!

Dinner was not ready and he would be livid.

Jane tore off the jewelry and shoved the box back in the drawer, then rushed upstairs before he could summon her.

Victor seemed distracted and he smelled of alcohol. He mumbled something about wanting a sandwich and stumbled off into the living room, where he fell asleep in front of the television.

Jane was shocked. What had happened to the raging, God-fearing man who took every opportunity to debase and degrade her?

She prepared a sandwich for him – roast beef piled high on light rye bread slathered with Dijon and placed it on the table beside his chair. Then she went to take a shower before bed. When she saw her reflection in the mirror, panic gripped her insides. She had forgotten the makeup! How could he not have seen it?

She scrubbed her face in the shower to remove all traces of the makeup. But when the steam cleared from the mirror, she saw to her horror that it was still there! Her face was flawlessly made up, as if she had just stepped out of the pages of a fashion magazine. She tried rubbing lotion on her face, then more soap and water, but nothing removed the makeup. It seemed to be permanently tattooed into her skin.

Victor was going to have a fit!

Fuck Victor!

It was the same voice she had heard in her head the day she had gotten the box. She assumed it was her inner voice of rebellion; it was so unlike her own voice and she never used profanity.

Jane curled up in bed and slept soundly for the first time in years.

* * *

When she woke, Victor was gone, presumably to work. He hadn’t bothered to wake her to make him breakfast.

She caught sight of her face in the mirror as she was getting dressed. The makeup was still on her face, not a smudge, not a fade, as if freshly applied. Her lips were glossy and pink. Her normally pale skin had a healthy glow, as if she had been spending more time outdoors than usual. Her hair was perfect as well – brushed and styled as if by a professional, without a hair out of place.

How could this be?

Only movie stars woke up looking perfect. It never happened to real women.

Even her figure looked better – slimmer, trimmer and bustier.

And somehow taller.

How?

* * *

Back in her sewing room, Jane took the box from the drawer. She opened the lid. The jewelry was still there but the makeup was gone. She had put all of the makeup back into the box after applying it, but now it was gone. She felt less surprised to see it gone than she had been when it appeared.

Reflecting on the events of the previous day, she returned to the moments just before the makeup had appeared.

What had she been thinking about? That was easy – she had been remembering how pretty she had looked on her wedding day and wishing she could look that way forever.

And then the makeup had appeared in the box.

Like magic.

Would it work again?

What should she wish for?

A thought immediately came to mind and she pushed it away.

No!

She didn’t want to hurt Victor. She just wanted him to leave her alone.

I must keep this wish something small; something personal, and keep Victor out of it.

First, she put on all of the jewelry, just like she had the day before. Then she wished. Something small, something personal. Something that would go with her new look.

The box didn’t increase in weight this time, but when she shook it, it felt… fuller.

She opened the lid, then gasped.

She pulled the items out of the box, handling them with care even though she knew they weren’t as delicate as they looked. She knew even before she put them on that they would be a perfect fit.

She stood in front of the full-length mirror she used for fitting the clothing she sewed for herself. Victor did not let her spend money on clothing: she’d always made her own. Never, ever, would he have allowed her to have something as sexy and exotic as the lacy bra and panties she now wore. Black lace accented with fuchsia satin, the set rivaled anything she had seen in a Victoria’s Secret catalogue. The French-cut panties barely covered her rear, allowing the cheeks to peek out saucily on each side. The push-up bra gave her cleavage she never even realized she had. She looked ravishing.

Just like a model.

She slipped her plain housedress over the lingerie and put the box back in the drawer, then proceeded to do her daily household chores. The feel of the lace between her legs awakened new sensations in her body. She managed to ignore it until the washing machine entered the spin cycle. Then she pressed her hips against the machine’s steel front and allowed the vibration to bring wave after wave of ecstasy through her body.

* * *

Victor arrived late again, and drunk again. He smelled of women’s perfume, but Jane didn’t care. He didn’t seem to notice anything different about her, even though her makeup had darkened during the course of the day. Her eyes smoldered with heavy eyeliner and black lashes so long they almost looked false. Her lipstick had deepened from the previous day’s soft pink to a bold fuchsia to match her new underwear.

Once again, she went to bed alone and woke to an empty house.

I could get used to this. She smiled to herself at the thought.

* * *

Back in the sewing room, Jane opened the box again after making her wish.

Once again, she stood before the mirror admiring her reflection, wearing newest acquisition: black stockings, a garter belt and a pair of shoes. The shoes were stunning – black patent leather pumps with scarlet soles and delicate rhinestone anklets and rows of rhinestones running up the back of the six-inch heels. She had seen shoes similar to these in a catalogue once, by a designer called Christian Louboutin.

She had never worn anything so sexy before and it made her feel giddy. The tall heels shaped her legs and made her ass look great. Teetering at such a dizzying height, she felt like a model on a runway, or a dancer on a stage.

She giggled, swaying and gyrating in front of the mirror.

Now all I need is a pole to swing around!

Her mood sobered at the thought. Be careful what you wish for.

She wondered what would happen if she was dressed that way when Victor came home. He hadn’t noticed the hair and makeup. Surely he would notice the lingerie and heels.

He would be furious. He would probably beat her and make her burn the sexy clothing. No, it would be best to hide it from him so he couldn’t spoil things.

She slipped her plain housedress over her secret and went about her daily chores.

* * *

Victor behaved as if Jane was invisible, which wasn’t a bad thing. Ignoring her meant he wasn’t abusing her, but for some reason it angered Jane. She had wanted him to leave her alone, but now that she had embraced her sexuality, she wanted to see his reaction. She no longer wanted to please him and no longer cared if she angered him. In fact, she welcomed his anger, because for the first time she felt like she had the strength to stand up to him. He moved around the house as though he were the only person present. Except for once stepping aside when she blocked his path, she would have sworn he was completely unaware of her existence. She went to bed alone and woke to an empty house. He must have fallen asleep in his chair or on the couch.

* * *

Jane sat in her sewing room, busy at work, dressed in her jewelry, lingerie and heels. A basket of laundry sat on the floor beside her chair. She picked up an item from the basket and went to work with her dressmaker scissors.

Snip! Snip!

The plain housedress fell to the floor in a pile of small fabric scraps.

She picked up the next plain, drab garment and shredded it in a likewise fashion.

No more.

She was a strong, sexy, independent woman and from that moment forward, no man would dictate what was appropriate attire for her. No longer would she be prevented from wearing pretty things; from looking like a woman.

Snip! Snip!

When her entire wardrobe was shredded, Jane picked up her ivory box.

She smiled when she felt the weight of the box increase.

She opened the lid.

Perfect!

She slipped into the dress and rushed to the mirror.

The transformation was complete, and it was breathtaking.

The slinky black gown dipped low in the front and even lower in the back, slipping open up the right side all the way to her hip. Jane felt like she should have a red carpet beneath her feet.

If Victor didn’t notice this, then surely he was blind.

* * *

She met him at the door, holding a glass of red wine in her hand. Jane was not allowed to drink alcohol; ordinarily, that would have been enough to earn her a slap in the face. She didn’t care. She wanted him to notice. Most of all, she wanted a reaction from him.

I dare him to touch me. I dare him to so much as raise his voice to me. He will be sorry.

She blocked his path when he opened the door.

“Hello darling,” she crooned, in her sexiest voice. Maybe all Victor needed was permission to be a bad boy. Maybe there was slim hope for their relationship after all.

He seemed to see her for the first time in weeks, his eyes traveling from her face to her feet and then back up again.

“What is this?” he asked, clearly annoyed.

“What does it look like?” she asked, running her tongue over her glossy fuchsia lips.

“It looks like somebody let a strumpet into my house.”

“Fuck you, Victor.”

His face flushed. “What? What did you say?”

Jane was no longer in control. Someone else was in charge of her body, and the words flowed from her lips like venom.

“Fuck you! You heard me, you lying, cheating hypocrite! You dare to call me a whore when you’re out fucking whores every night! I’m not taking your shit anymore! I’m finished with you!”

Victor’s hand swung back. “Fie on you, Jezebel! In the name of the Fa–”

Jane’s hand snapped up, catching his arm in midair.

“NO! No more. This stops here and now. You will never treat me like dirt again.”

“I treat you how you ask to be treated. You think you’re special, you ungrateful she-bitch? You’re nothing! You were nothing before you met me. I was merciful enough to marry you and take care of you, and what do I get in return? I’m stuck with a used-up old whore! Dried-up and barren like an old dead stick! You’re God’s punishment to me for saying, ‘I do’!”

“We’re through, Victor. I want a divorce.”

“You will rot in Hell before I break my sacred vows.”

“THOU SHALT NOT COMMIT ADULTERY!” she screamed in his face. “You’ve already broken more than just a meaningless marriage vow. We are finished!”

Victor pushed her against the wall, his booze-soaked breath wafting into her face.

“You are mine, bought and paid for. You will obey until death do us part.”

Jane shoved him out of her path, stalking away with the steely composure of a soap opera vixen. Before leaving the room, she turned to face him one last time and said,

“I wish I’d never met you. I wish you had never been born.”

* * *

Jane woke to an empty bed and an empty house the next morning.

Good riddance. Too bad it wasn’t permanent, she thought.

She strolled to the bathroom to shower, even though she still looked movie-star fresh. She examined her nude reflection, noting the improvements that had inexplicably taken place. Her pale, plump figure had transformed into a taut, lean, tan body. Her breasts were at least two cup sizes larger. Her mousy hair was darker, glossier.

Like Michelle’s.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

* * *

Victor didn’t come home that night. Jane wasn’t concerned; after all, they’d had the fight to end all fights the night before, so he probably needed some time to cool off. She slid between the sheets completely nude for the first time in her life and slept the sleep of the contented.

The next day, Jane baked cookies, cleaned the house and worked on some sewing projects – all while wearing nothing but her high-heeled shoes. She felt comfortable with her nudity and relished the delicious decadence of it. She didn’t get dressed when the time came for Victor to return home. She dared him to see her; dared him to say one disapproving word.

Victor didn’t return that night either.

Or the night after that.

After a week, Jane decided he’d had enough time to cool down. Enough silliness already. She called his office to speak to him.

The receptionist had never heard of him.

She must be someone new. Typical big corporation.

That night, she called his parents’ house. Odds were, he was staying with them if he hadn’t checked into a hotel.

Victor’s mother answered the phone.

“Hello, Mary, it’s Jane. Sorry to bother you, but is Victor there?”

There was a long silence on the other end.

“Excuse me? To WHOM did you want to speak?” Victor’s mother said.

“Victor. Your son. It’s Jane calling.”

“Who?”

“Jane. Your daughter-in-law.” Jane tried to hide the irritation in her voice. “Look, I know he’s angry with me, but I really need to speak with him if he’s there.”

“Is this some sort of joke?” Mary sounded angry.

For good reason, Jane thought. Her son is married to a rebellious, barren, Godless whore.

“Victor and I had an argument, and we really need to discuss it, now that he’s had a chance to cool off.”

“Victor? How do you know about Victor?”

“What do you mean?”

“Who are you?”

“I told you, I’m Victor’s wife, Jane.”

“This is not funny, young lady! Why would you do this? Victor could not possibly have a wife.”

“I don’t understand. I must have made some sort of mistake. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. Please, will you tell me about Victor?”

Mary sighed. “I guess it won’t hurt. After all, it’s no secret,” she said. “It was the will of God for me not to have another child after Marlene. I understand that, but it didn’t make it any easier. I was six months pregnant when I lost my son. I don’t know how you could possibly know about him. We named him after his late grandfather before we laid him to rest. The miscarriage saved my life, because that was when they found the cancer. Cervical cancer. They removed it but it took a hysterectomy to get it all. It was God’s will that I live instead of my son, but even the will of the Lord is difficult to understand at times.”

Copyright © 2013 Mandy White

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Your Heart Will be Mine

February is the month of romance, or so I’m told. As I’ve said many times before, I don’t write romance. Every time I try, it goes horribly wrong and someone dies. In my DysFictional world, all is as it should be. The month of February will be my tribute to romance, dysfunctional as ever. The first is an older story, published in 2012 by WPaD Publications. ~*~*~

Your Heart Will be Mine

You twist through my heart

Like a bolt through a nut

I am a nut

Think twice before you bolt

Megan wept, curled on her side in the tightest ball she could manage.

She had been curled up in the fetal position on her bed for hours – days, actually, doing nothing but cry. Barely moving except to use the bathroom and drink a bit of water. She couldn’t eat, she couldn’t sleep and the ache in her chest wouldn’t go away no matter how many painkillers she took.

So this is what a broken heart feels like.

She now understood why they called it heartbreak. What she felt was beyond sadness; it manifested as a tangible physical pain in her chest that radiated down into her belly. It was the most horrible sensation ever, and it was all HIS fault. How could he have been so cruel to her when all she had done was love him? She didn’t know where she had gone wrong. She had given him everything; waited on him hand and foot and catered to his every wish but in the end it wasn’t enough. He took her heart and tore it to shreds and then walked out the door as if the last two years had meant nothing.

She wanted to die.

If I died, you’d be sorry! You’d have to live with it for the rest of your life, knowing that YOU were the one who drove me to suicide!

Died of a broken heart.

That would show him how much she loved him.

Nobody else will ever love you the way I do! You’ll see! One day you will come crawling back to me with your heart in shreds, then you’ll know how you made me feel. And then I can kiss you better. We can heal together.

No, she would not end her life. Life was worth living as long as there was a chance of winning him back.

She would get him back.

Or die trying.

Richard tried to leave her several times during the last year but each time she convinced him to stay. She begged and pleaded and promised to be everything he wanted in a woman but he became cold and aloof nonetheless. He didn’t want intimacy anymore. He participated in sex when she was persistent enough to make his physical urges overcome his mental reluctance but his lack of desire was obvious.

She was willing to accept his lack of enthusiasm in their relationship as long as he didn’t leave. They could work things out. She would make it better. She just had to make him see how much she loved him and he would know they were destined to be together.

The pregnancy changed everything.

The one thing that should have cemented them together forever was the catalyst that ended their relationship. He was willing to stay for the sake of the baby. He even agreed to marry her after much pleading and cajoling on her part.

It would be the perfect wedding. She had already chosen her dress – a high-waisted design that would look stunning even with the bulge in her belly. She booked the church and hired the caterer and sent out invitations. It would be the beautiful fairytale wedding of her dreams. Afterward, he would take her in his arms and carry her over the threshold and make love to her, tenderly and passionately the way a husband should. Their life together would be picture-perfect.

There was just one small detail:

She wasn’t pregnant.

Megan thought she was pregnant, without a doubt. Even though the pregnancy tests (three of them, to be exact) were negative, she assumed it was too early for them to be accurate. She experienced all the symptoms – the missed period, tender breasts, bloated belly, and irritability. She even felt sick in the mornings. When her period arrived late, it was easy to hide it from him since he showed no interest in her physically. Since their engagement Richard had become even more distant, never meeting her eyes and only speaking to her when necessary.

It didn’t matter that the pregnancy was a false alarm. She would be pregnant by the time they got married; she would make sure of it.

She managed to convince him to have sex once during the following month but it did not result in pregnancy. Panicked, she redoubled her efforts to seduce him, but the harder she tried, the less receptive he became. When they did try, he couldn’t sustain an erection long enough to finish.

Four months passed. Then five, and still she wasn’t pregnant. She faked the symptoms, pretending to get sick in the mornings and eating like a horse so she would gain some girth and appear pregnant. The wedding was just six weeks away and she only needed to keep up her charade until after the minister declared them husband and wife. After that, she could fake a miscarriage and he would be there to comfort her and they could try again to start a family.

She began to wear padding under her clothing to keep up the appearance of an advancing pregnancy.

* * *

She didn’t hear him come into the house that day.

The past few months, he had been moving around the house like a ghost, silent, never speaking unless spoken to. On that particular day, he came home from work early. Megan wasn’t expecting him. She stood in front of the bedroom mirror; trying on the next size pillow she was going to bind to her belly to make it look thicker.

She had no idea how long he had been standing there, watching her in silence.

He said nothing, but his eyes spoke the rage in his heart.

He refused to speak to her, no matter how she cried and pleaded. He started packing immediately and left that night, taking only the bare necessities. She clung to his leg, begging him to stay but he peeled her off of him in disgust. He walked out of her life without giving a second thought to their future together, leaving her blubbering on the floor.

Megan was not only heartbroken; she was humiliated. He told his family and all of their friends about her deceit and his reason for leaving. Nobody would speak to her.

She was alone.

* * *

A year later, Megan still sobbed herself to sleep but not as often. The pain in her chest had diminished to a dull ache but it never went away altogether. They said time heals all wounds but she knew that in her case it wouldn’t. She still loved Richard heart and soul and would never stop. They were meant to be together. He was hers and no amount of time or distance would ever change that.

She wasted her Saturday afternoons wandering through the mall, gazing at the gowns in the bridal shop, the sexy lingerie in Victoria’s Secret and the endless displays of adorable children’s clothing. From infant to toddler to preschooler… there were too many cute outfits to choose from. She should have been buying clothing for her own child – for their child. Instead, she could only look and dream.

She wandered toward the food court to feed her craving for sweets. She had been living on junk food and had gained a considerable amount of weight. It didn’t matter because she had nobody to stay thin for. At that moment, Cinnabon called to her.

A baby stroller blocked her path as she navigated through the tables to get to the food counters. She edged around it, pausing for a moment to admire the baby, a little girl about three months old, dressed in an adorable pink outfit. The parents, engrossed in conversation, giggled and shared an intimate kiss.

Megan froze.

No.

It couldn’t be!

It was him. Richard.

Her Richard.

Judging from the age of the infant in the stroller, he hadn’t wasted any time after leaving her. He might have already been seeing that woman behind her back! That would explain his lack of interest in Megan. The slut had already tired him out before he got home.

Rage boiled inside her when she saw the engagement ring on the woman’s finger – a large, stunning diamond solitaire. Nothing like the cheap little band he had grudgingly given her.

“YOU BASTARD!” Megan roared, sweeping the food and beverages off the table onto the couple’s laps.

“YOU DIRTY CHEATING MOTHERFUCKER!”

“Richard?” the woman said, her voice fearful. She pulled the baby stroller away from Megan.

“You stay out of it, slut! I’m talking to my husband. You’ve done enough already!”

Richard finally spoke up. “Get the hell away from my family, you crazy bitch.”

“YOUR family? YOUR family?” Megan sputtered. “What about OUR family? The one you couldn’t even give me because your dick was always limp!”

“I never wanted you, Megan. I never loved you. You were a mistake. The biggest mistake I ever made.” Richard’s tone was calm. He spoke the words without emotion. How could he not feel anything after sharing his life with her for two years?

Richard’s bitch had taken her child and moved away from the table. She was talking to the clerk at Cinnabon and a security guard was making his way toward them.

“You think you’ll be happy with her?” Megan yelled. “She’s nothing! You and ME! WE were meant to be together! Nobody will love you the way I do. Nobody!”

The security guard stepped between them.

“I’ll have to ask you to move away, ma’am. Leave these people alone.”

“Fuck you!” she spat, leaning around the uniformed man to make eye contact with Richard once more.

“You can’t escape fate, Richard. You’re mine! One day you’ll come crawling back. You love me. I know you do.”

Two more security guards came from behind and took her arms, leading her away from the food court. They demanded that she leave at once or the police would be called.

Megan left. She had said her piece.

Richard knew the truth.

She would make him see the truth.

* * *

Megan’s outburst with Richard energized her; freed her from the shackles of depression. She felt electrified, filled with new hope. She had a purpose again: Richard, and her future with him. She just needed to take the place of the baby-making whore in the food court and everything would be perfect again.

She would win him back. His heart had always been hers; he just didn’t realize it yet.

Having been banned from the local mall, Megan’s Saturday shopping trip took her to the streets and a new neighborhood where she had never been. Her Obsessive Compulsive Disorder made it difficult to deviate from an established routine. As a result, she seldom visited new places. Occasionally change was forced. This time she found it refreshing instead of disturbing. Her therapist, whom she hadn’t seen in more than five years, would have called it “a positive step”.

The weathered red brick buildings offered a nice change of scenery from the icy-smooth grey concrete downtown. The new neighborhood featured a wealth of second-hand stores, a few hippie bong shops and some dusty-looking used bookstores. It was in one of these bookstores that she found it.

The tattered brown binding of the book caught her eye and immediately she reached for it.

The Joy of Spellcasting.

She chuckled at the silly title.

It sounds like a cookbook. Why not? It could be fun. Megan purchased the book and walked home with a spring in her step.

She opened the book to the table of contents and quickly found what she sought.

Love Spells – page 131.

She noticed handwriting at the bottom of the yellowed page. The ink had blurred over time but was still legible. Megan held it up to the light to make out the words.

“Be warned, ye who goest here. Think ye long on what thou desirest. The spells contained within be those most powerful. What thou desirest, thou shalt receive.”

Megan smirked. It sounded like something out of a low-budget after-school Halloween special.

Good to know. Let’s see if it’s true.

She turned to page 131 and began to read.

There were several love spells and potions but most of them looked complicated. They contained ingredients she had never heard of and took too long to yield results. They ranged anywhere from six months to three years to complete a spell. Megan wanted results now.

She settled on the One Moon Love Charm. It claimed to return a lost love in one month and she had all the ingredients to make it work:

A container made from wood or metal.

A likeness of your lost love. OR

An object belonging to your lost love, OR

A sample of your loved one’s blood or flesh.

Write on a piece of parchment exactly what you desire.

Seal with your own blood or flesh to bond with your lover’s flesh for all eternity.

Bury the container three feet deep in dark soil under the light of the full moon.

Stand over the burial site and turn around three times and then say the incantation every night for one month. When the moon reaches its next fullness, the object of your desire will come to you.

Megan selected a heart-shaped wooden jewelry box Richard had given her when they first started dating – back when he still knew he loved her. The box held no jewelry except the engagement ring she no longer wore. She had been using it to store her favorite photos of Richard, all carefully cropped with a pair of scissors to a heart shape.

A likeness of your lost love.

What better likeness than an actual photo? She left all of the photos in the box.

OR an object belonging to your lost love.

Richard had left most of his belongings behind when he left, so why not add that as well? She selected a watch she had bought him for Christmas that he always seemed to forget to wear and his razor, which he had left in the bathroom.

OR a sample of your loved one’s blood or flesh.

Technically, the razor already had that covered, since it contained beard stubble and probably skin cells as well. She wanted to add as much punch to the spell as possible. More would be better, right? She cleaned the bathtub drain, extracting a slimy hairball made up of both his hair and hers. That covered both samples of their flesh.

On a plain white piece of paper, she wrote the words she had chosen:

Richard Cole, I desire your heart and nothing else.

She folded it neatly and placed it in the box.

She sliced her index finger with a razor blade and let the blood drip over the contents of the jewelry box.

Under the full moon she stood, on the fresh mound of dirt beneath which the box was buried. She turned around three times and then recited the incantation, which she had memorized:

“By the Earth below and the moon above,

You will be my one true love.

Bound in blood and sealed in Earth,

Waiting for our love’s new birth.

Empowered by the Law of Three,

Richard’s heart will come to me.

Three times Three.

So mote it be.”

She repeated the incantation two more times just for good measure. If the Law of Three was a real thing, then it made sense to do everything three times to amplify the power threefold.

The following night she repeated the ritual, chanting the incantation three times. After a pause, she recited it three times more.

She couldn’t stop the pattern once it had begun. Richard had hated her OCD but it was one of the things that made her organized and precise in everything she did. Every night she added three more repetitions to the incantation. When she reached the 29th night she recited it a total of 87 times. When she went to bed at night, the rhyme played over and over inside her head until she fell asleep.

The moon had reached the first day of its three days of fullness. It would be at its fullest the following night. Megan snuggled happily into her bed, confident that Richard would be with her soon.

* * *

 “Jenkins! Get in here! You gotta see this!” Ralph Anderson shouted to his assistant.

Jenkins wandered through the double doors of the morgue, stuffing the remains of a tuna sandwich into his mouth.

“I’m still on break. Couldn’t you have waited another ten minutes?”

“No, I need you to see this. You gotta tell me I’m not crazy.”

Jenkins approached the table where his superior was conducting a routine autopsy. The ribcage was splayed open, revealing the inside of the stiff’s chest.

“So what’s the deal? You find an alien in there? Looks pretty normal to me.”

“Look again. Tell me what you see. More specifically, what’s missing?”

Jenkins leaned over the corpse to take a closer look, licking mayonnaise off of his fingertips.

“Yeah, so it looks like you’ve already removed the heart, and—”

“But I haven’t,” Anderson said, almost in a whisper.

“Sure you have. It’s not in there.” Jenkins looked around at the empty stainless steel trays that surrounded the autopsy table. “So, where’d ya put it?’

“I’m telling you, it wasn’t in there when we got him.”

“So, what is this then, a serial killer case?”

“No. Probable heart attack. Sudden death, cause unknown.”

“So, where’s the heart?”

“That is the question, isn’t it? There was no incision in the body, no sign of hemorrhage inside. It’s just… missing.”

“We gonna record this?”

“Who’s gonna believe us? I’m closing him back up and labeling him a coronary.”

* * *

Megan woke the morning of the thirtieth day, feeling well rested and energized. Today, Richard would return. She would take a nice long bath and put on something pretty and fix him a nice dinner. It would be the perfect day – one for which she had worked very diligently.

She stretched and yawned, rolling over to caress the pillow where Richard would lay his head that night.

Her hand touched something wet.

Something rounded, about the size of her fist.

It was warm, and pulsed with a steady, rhythmic beat.

Copyright © 2012 Mandy White

Published in DysFictional Volume 1 and WPaD’s Passion’s Prisms.

The Red House

Mona sloshed the mop into the steaming pail, the aroma of bleach strong in the air. It was industrial strength; several times stronger than ordinary household bleach, but it was necessary, for this was, after all, an industrial task. Back and forth she scrubbed the floor and the plastic walls; section by section, panel by panel.

It was important to do a thorough job, for any contaminants could result in mold and other fungal growth, which would harm the seedlings that would soon fill the greenhouse.

Scrubbing greenhouses was one of the least desirable jobs at the nursery, so nobody objected when Mona volunteered to take on the task. She was on her third of twenty greenhouses but it was necessary work. It was solitary work, and it gave her plenty of time to reflect on her life and how drastically it had changed in such a short time.

Her husband had never allowed her to work outside the home. She had enough to do, he said, keeping his home clean and caring for the children. But once the children were grown and able to care for themselves, Mona found herself with little to do. When Richard lost his job, the bills began to pile up. When Mona suggested he apply for work at a local nursery that was hiring, she received a black eye for her trouble. Richard frequently let his fists do the talking. Mona had always cowed to his will, but this time she swore it would never happen again.

The bank was on the verge of foreclosing and Richard still hadn’t gotten a job. He sat at home in a drunken stupor, day after day.

Mona went behind her husband’s back for the first time, and went to work. She accepted the same nursery job he had refused. Richard didn’t appear to notice she was gone each day.

Until he did.

She didn’t notice his truck, following at a distance as she walked to the bus stop, and then following the bus until she got off and walked the rest of the way to work.

She didn’t hear him enter. Mona listened to her radio as she used a razor knife to trim excess plastic from a newly installed panel in the greenhouse wall. She was unaware of his presence until her head was yanked backward, cruel fingers entwined in her hair.

“You fucking liar!” he growled into her ear, spraying spittle on her cheek.

“Ow! Rich, you’re hurting me!”

“Oh, you don’t know hurt, you sorry bitch. I’ll show you the meaning of hurt. You don’t lie to me and get away with it.”

“Rich, no! Please!” Her plea was cut short by rough hands around her throat, choking off her air.

Mona struggled to breathe. Flailing, she tried to thrust his hands away from her neck.

The world turned red.

At first she thought blood vessels in her eyes had burst from being choked; all she could see was red. Then Mona realized she could breathe again and the pressure on her neck was gone. She wiped her sleeve across her eyes, and then as her hand touched her face she felt the sting of a blade on her cheek.

“Ow!” The razor knife dropped from her hand.

She touched her cheek where the blade had scratched it and her hand came away red. Far too much blood for such a little scratch. Or was she cut deeper than she thought? She looked down at her clothing to find them also covered with blood, and a dark pool surrounded her shoes.

Oh my God, I’m bleeding to death!

She stumbled backward, frantically patting her body in search of mortal injury and finding none. Her foot struck an obstacle on the floor and she fell, landing on top of the lifeless form of Richard. The dark pool of blood originated from a gash in his neck.

The razor knife lay where she had dropped it, covered in his blood.

“Oh, Rich! What have I done? What did you make me do?” she whispered.

So many times he had uttered those very words to her after beating her black and blue. He always blamed his rage on her.

* * *

Mona stabbed the compost with the pitchfork, lifting forkful after forkful of the heavy, smelly material. It was important to turn the compost regularly to speed decomposition. It was an unpleasant task that the other workers were happy to let Mona take on. She was going to be very busy, between cleaning the greenhouses and maintaining the large compost pit. Springtime was on the way and new crops needed to be planted.

Mona had a hunch the compost would be extra Rich that year.

Copyright © 2022 Mandy White

A Stitch in Time

Published in DysFictional 3 and WPaD’s Creepies 3.

The sound of the shower ceased. Heather’s head poked out of the bathroom, wrapped in a blue towel.

“You don’t have an outlet in here,” she said.

“Well, it ain’t the Hilton.”

Heather held up a blow dryer. “How am I supposed to use this?”

“There’s a mirror in the hall. The outlet there should reach.”

Josh heard an exasperated sigh, followed a few minutes later by the sound of the blow dryer in the hallway. He rummaged in his sewing box for the right scrap of fabric. He found a suitable piece, snipped it to the correct shape, and then threaded the needle with matching thread. He sat calmly, stitching the pieces together.

The blow dryer stopped. Heather returned to the bathroom and Josh heard the clatter of makeup items being dumped on the countertop.

“I appreciate you letting me stay here,” she called through the open door. “I didn’t want to bother with a hotel for just one night.”

Not like you couldn’t afford it, Josh thought.

“Not a problem.” He snipped the thread and started a new seam on the other side.

“I’m going to stop by the hospital on my way to the airport. I need to see her one more time before I go…you know, just in case.”

Josh said nothing.

“I really wish you’d go with me.”

Not a hope in hell, he thought.

“Josh?” Heather poked her head out of the bathroom.

“What?”

“Did you hear me?”

“I heard you. And the answer is no.”

“But Josh! She’s our sister!”

“YOUR sister. Not mine.”

“She’s sick, Josh. Really sick, and they don’t know what’s wrong with her.”

“Don’t care.”

“How can you say that? How can you not care?”

“You have no idea how easy it is.”

Heather emerged from the bathroom, fully dressed and made up. She stood in front of Josh. “How can you be so cold? She is your sister, Josh! She is family.”

“Ex-sister, and she is no family of mine.” Josh stitched furiously, pulling the thread too tight and causing the fabric to pucker. He loosened the thread before continuing.

“But she needs us. She has no one else.”

“Boo-fucking-hoo. I told you I don’t care.”

Heather thrust her cell phone in front of his face. “Please, just look at this. I made a video so you can see I’m not exaggerating.”

Josh finished the seam and knotted the thread before pausing to watch the video. He supposed it would be disturbing to watch…for someone else. The woman in the video screamed and thrashed on the hospital bed.

“What’s with the restraints?”

“Apparently she tried to claw her own eyes out. According to the doctors, she came in that way. Blind and screaming about pain in her eyes.”

“Holy shit!” He let out a chuckle. “She really is fucked up.”

“You think this is funny?”

“It kind of is. Not ha-ha funny. More like poetic justice.”

“You know what I think? I think it’s guilt. She regrets what she did to us, especially to you, and can’t express it, so it’s made her sick.”

“I agree with you there. She brought this on herself.” Josh said.

“Why don’t you go and see her?”

“Now that’s funny!”

“Maybe your forgiveness is all she needs. Couldn’t you find it in your heart to try?”

“I’ll send thoughts and prayers.” His voice dripped sarcasm.

“Don’t you think she’s suffered enough?”

“Oh, no. Not even close.” He snipped the thread and reached for a spool of red to match the next piece of fabric.

“What the fuck are you even doing? Are you sewing?”

“It would appear that way.”

“What are you sewing? Are those…doll clothes?”

“Mama Antoine has been teaching me.”

“Who?”

“Mrs. Antoine is kind of like a mother to the whole block. She makes dolls. I help her out with chores and she’s been teaching me to make stuff. I’ve learned a lot from her. It’s very relaxing.”

“I don’t even know what to say. I don’t know you.”

“And that’s always been the problem, Heather!” Josh set aside his sewing project to give her his full attention. “You don’t know me. You don’t know what I’ve been through. You don’t know much of anything except for your own life. Where the fuck were you when I was thrown out of my home? The house MY father wanted to leave to ME, his only son. You knew what Dad wanted, but you didn’t stick up for me. You didn’t stand with me when I wanted to challenge the will. You knew Kristen was mentally incompetent, but you just stuck your fucking head in the sand! Where were you when she was out of control, and I needed your help?”

“I didn’t know how badly out of control she was, Josh. I wish things had gone differently.”

“A stitch in time.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“It’s an old saying: ‘A stitch in time saves nine.’ It’s about taking preventative measures. If you act when you first see a problem you can prevent something worse from happening.”

“I couldn’t possibly have known how bad it would get.”

“You didn’t WANT to know. I tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen. In fact, you went to great lengths to make sure nobody could tell you anything. Running around the Australian outback with your husband, hiking some Bibbity-Boobity Trail. Who in their right mind goes for a walk for three fucking months?”

“The Bibbulmun Track is a huge commitment. We trained for months to prepare for that hike.”

“Your timing was impeccable. You found the perfect place to hide where nobody could reach you. A convenient excuse to not get involved. Let poor dumb Josh twist in the wind while Miss Psycho destroys everything his father worked a lifetime for.”

“It wasn’t like that.”

“It’s always like that. You’re always training for some kind of marathon. You use fitness as an excuse to hide from anything you don’t want to face. You ignored what was happening, what she was doing to me. It wasn’t until she attacked you that you stepped up and did anything. But by then it was too late.”

“There are things more important than money, Josh.”

“Says the wife of a millionaire. You didn’t get pissed off until she wanted money from you. Yeah, there are things more important than money. Dad wanted me to have his fishing gear and tools. Those are the best memories I have of him, and it meant more to me than money. I would’ve gladly paid for them, but I wasn’t even allowed to do that. Instead, she has an estate sale behind my back and sells my memories to strangers for a few lousy bucks.”

“It was wrong of her to do that, I agree. But can’t we let by-gones be by-gones?”

“Maybe you can, but you have a lot less to forgive than I do. You didn’t have your life torn apart. You weren’t the target of personal attacks, of false accusations. You weren’t driven from your home into a shitty apartment without so much as a memento.”

“Isn’t that a bit dramatic?”

“How is the truth dramatic? Dad was my best friend. We did everything together. When he got sick, I took care of him. She never called or visited. Not until he was on his deathbed. Then suddenly she showed up, looking all weepy. And everybody bought her bullshit act.”

“So I can’t talk you into coming with me to the hospital, then? I have to leave if I’m going to make my flight.”

“I think my answer is pretty clear.”

Heather stomped to the spare room to collect her things, then with the slam of a door she was gone.

Josh didn’t have to explain himself. He had plenty of reasons not to care what happened to Kristen. He didn’t believe in Heaven and Hell, but if there was an afterlife, he hoped his father waited for her on the other side to make her answer for what she’d done.

* * *

The three siblings shared a mother, but the girls had a different father than Josh. When their mother was diagnosed with cancer, Josh was only twelve. Kristen was eighteen and Heather, five years her senior, was already married to a famous athlete and living in Sydney.

The day after their mother’s funeral, Kristen moved out, stating that she could not live another day in that house with HIM. She despised her stepfather, and resented Josh’s close relationship with his dad.

With both sisters gone, it was just Josh and his dad. He spent his teenage years fishing and learning to fix cars. His father was his hero, his mentor, and his best friend. Josh was well into his thirties and still living with his father when the old man’s health began to fail. With Kristen estranged and Heather in Australia, it was up to Josh to take care of his dad, which he did lovingly. His father promised to leave Josh everything: his house, his tools, his fishing gear – the things that had shaped his childhood and held beloved memories of their life together.

When the time came, Heather made the trip from Australia to say goodbye to her stepfather.

And then came the reading of the will. Josh assumed it would be a will created by his father leaving everything to him as promised; him being the only biological child. Then came the surprise: Josh’s father had never made a will. But his mother had, years earlier, when she was dying. Her husband, grief-stricken, had signed without question. After her death, that will became his and he had never bothered to update it. Their mother’s will named Kristen as executor, or “executioner”, as Josh came to call her, and ordered all assets to be sold and split equally between the three children.

At his father’s funeral, Josh faded into the background and Kristen took center stage. She played the role of bereft daughter to perfection, sobbing and hugging, soaking up sympathy like a toxic sponge. The moment the door closed behind the last guest, the tears dried and a ruthless tyrant stepped forth.

Growing up, Kristen had been the embodiment of middle child syndrome: acting out to get attention, and then telling lies to get out of trouble. She was jealous of her siblings: of Heather, for having more privileges due to being older, and of Josh, for being the “spoiled baby”. Josh was the only one of the three who had a relationship with his biological father, and Kristen did little to hide her resentment.

Being appointed as executor finally gave Kristen a chance to stick it to her brother and sister. Mentally unstable, drunk with power, and bent on revenge: it was the recipe for a perfect storm. A shitstorm, that was.

She arrived at Josh’s home unannounced, suitcases and screaming children in tow. She moved into “her” house and declared everything in it to be property of the estate, even Josh’s personal belongings. She barked orders at Josh like he was a servant, then screamed and raged when he refused to obey.

Kristen made it her mission to make Josh’s life as miserable as possible. She convinced the rest of the family Josh had been stealing from his father. She had her lawyer waste countless hours poring over years worth of old bank statements. When no evidence of fraud was found, she accused him of stealing “estate assets”, which were, in fact, his own belongings.

Josh had no choice but to leave. He walked away from his father’s legacy and the only home he had known for 34 years, and moved into a cheap apartment. Yet again, Kristen spun it to make Josh look like the villain and she the victim. He had walked away and left her, a poor single mother, to care for that large house and property all alone. Nobody in the family cared to hear Josh’s side of it.

Heather watched events unfold from a distance, through the rose-colored lens of Kristen’s lies. Josh begged and pleaded with her to listen to the truth before it was too late, but his pleas went unheeded.

By the time Heather suspected a problem, four years had passed and she was thousands of dollars out of pocket – money she had sent Kristen for “estate expenses”. When Heather refused to send any more money and demanded to know when she would be repaid, Kristen showed her true colors. She vowed to drain the estate until not a penny was left. Heather hired a lawyer and brought Kristen’s reign of terror to an end, but by that time Kristen had already wasted most of the money. After legal fees, only a few dollars remained.

Josh didn’t care about the money. Everything that had mattered to him was gone. All he had left of his father was a collection of bittersweet memories.

But maybe Heather was right. Maybe he should pay the bitch a visit.

* * *

Josh stood in the doorway for a moment, observing.

Kristen moaned in pain and thrashed on the bed. Her face was covered with angry red scratches.

Josh entered the room. The door clicked shut behind him. Kristen turned toward the sound, her sightless eyes glassy from pain medication.

“Who’s there?”

“Hello, sister dear.”

“You!” The glaze in her eyes turned to clarity.

“Yeah. Me.”

“You did this to me.”

“Actually, you did it to yourself.”

“Fuck you!” she spat.

“Poor little Kristen. Always the victim. And look at you now. Hope it was worth it.”

Kristen responded by literally spitting at him.

“Gross. You always were a slob. You invaded my home and stole my father’s things, and didn’t even have the decency to clean up after yourself. I had to clean your nasty hairball out of the shower drain. Luckily, I had a use for it.”

“I never asked you to come here. Get the fuck out!” Her fingers groped for the nurse’s call button. Josh yanked it out of her reach.

“Don’t worry, I’m leaving. Just had to see you one last time.”

“Get out! Help!”

“I’m going to need you to shut up now, Kristen.”

“Help! He – ” Kristen’s scream cut off abruptly.

“That’s better. I’m sick of hearing your voice. All it does is tell lies.”

Kristen kicked her legs and fought against the restraints. When she tried to scream, no sound came out. She gasped and panted, but remained mute.

“It’s a shame you have to be strapped down like that. I think I can help.”

Josh held an object in his hand. A doll, hand-sewn from scraps of cloth. A clump of human hair harvested from the shower drain adorned its head, embedded in a bit of wax. Pins protruded from its eyes and various other parts of its body. 

“You were always such a pain in the neck,” he said. He twisted the pin he had just inserted into the doll’s throat and shoved it deeper. “There. Now I’ve returned the favor. Now you won’t need those restraints anymore.”

Kristen’s struggles ceased and she lay limp on the bed.

“How’s it feel to be powerless? At someone else’s mercy?”

Her unseeing eyes smoldered with the blackest of hatred. Tears trickled down her cheeks.

“I don’t know what you’re complaining about. You may be paralyzed, but at least you aren’t numb. You can still feel everything. Everything. ”

He examined the doll thoughtfully. “I wonder what we should do next. We’re going to run out of room eventually. When that happens, a nice jab to the brain should finish you off.

“I’ll leave you alone…for now. But every once in a while, when you feel a little twinge…or maybe a big one, you’ll know I’m thinking of you.”

* * *

Josh stitched the final seam together and snipped the thread. He admired his handiwork. Mama Antoine was right. He was getting better the more he practiced. All it needed was a final touch.

He ran his hand over the carpet below the hallway mirror and found what he was looking for. He then proceeded to the bathroom, where the blue towel still hung on the shower curtain rod. There, he found three more long auburn hairs. Cleaning the shower drain produced several more.

He lit the candle and melted the wax while speaking an incantation in an ancient language.

Josh inserted a pin into one of the doll’s knees, then the other. He repeated the process with six more pins in the legs of the doll.

Heather didn’t deserve what Kristen had gotten. She wasn’t a bad person. Self-absorbed perhaps, but not hateful like her sister. With a few preventative measures, Heather could improve. She could learn to face her problems instead of running off to the wilderness. No more hikes. At least not for now.

Copyright © 2018 Mandy White