South Korea(354)

All that they ever wanted was a baby, but they couldn’t become pregnant. They had heard that the man at the end of their street, the man in the huge house, could help them. Now, they’d decided to visit him. They made their way up to the mansion, and knocked at the door. An old man answered, and smiled at them. “Are you here for a child?’ he asked. They nodded. He led them into a room and sat them down.

“I have been making children for the childless for many years.” The old man started, “But I have to tell you that you will be the last to receive this gift.”

The young couple smiled.

“I must also warn you that all I have left to make is a baby with a big head.” The old man said, and sipped his tea.

“How big?” the young man asked.

“Very big.” The old man replied. “His head is larger than his body, and he will need to be carried constantly. He will never grow up. He will always be your baby- your baby with the gig head.”

“Sometimes, he will latch onto your head with his oversized mouth, and he’ll be able to control your thoughts and actions.”

“He will smell not bad- but not good.’

The couple looked at each other for a moment, then back at the old man. They nodded.

“Good” the old man said. “You passed the test. You may have the most perfect baby I will ever create.”

And he did.

And they did.

“Mortimer the Littlest Mortician”

And now an excerpt from the new children’s book “Mortimer the Littlest Mortician”

“Mom, Dad said I can’t stay in the basement. Why?”

“Well, Mortimer sometimes people come in that you shouldn’t see.”

“Like who? I won’t tell anyone.”

It isn’t that you would tell anyone, those types of things are in the paper every week. It might be someone we know from church or school. I don’t even know. You should go up stairs and play a little bit.”

Mortimer conceded and went up the stairs. He was a normal little boy in most regards. Mortimer was six. Unlike most boys of six years he did not like to play with video games, or play sports. He preferred to read or spend time with his father down in the basement. His father was a mortician and Mortimer wanted nothing, but to be just like his dad. Today was odd in that he was sent away from the basement.

Mortimer never got in the way. He was always careful to stay back and to not touch anything that he did not have permission to touch. There were also times when his dad would send him out of the room, but always added a time when he could come back. The fact that there wasn’t a specified return time bothered Mortimer.

If he wasn’t reading a book or in the basement with his father Mort loved to play with Jeffrey. Jeffrey was a strange little boy, also six years of age. He always dressed in all black, and unusually heavy clothing such as black jeans and a black sweatshirt with the hood pulled up. Mortimer thought that maybe he had a skin condition and was embarrassed about it.

As Mortimer went into his room, he saw Jeffrey sitting on this bed playing a Gameboy. Jeffrey snapped it shut and jumped up. “What’s up man?”

“Not much, Jeffrey my dad won’t let me in the basement. He also won’t tell me who is he working on.”

“That sucks Mort. Hey, on the bright side my dad took me to work with him today.”

“Cool! What did you do?”

“We went to visit your teacher!”

“What?”

***************



Watch for more of Mortimer and Jeffrey’s adventures coming to bookstores soon!


-P

USURPER INTERVIEW FOR SPIN

Usurper is a band that I’ve followed for a number of years now. Ever since their debut, "Blood, Guts, Dinnertime" came out in 2001, I’ve been riveted by their odd, dark mixture of Norwegian black metal and NY "no-wave." I found out that they’d broken up recently, so I decided to track down their enigmatic lead singer/songwriter, Viktor Dank, and ask the all-important question; Why?

Rumors had circulated on the internet about how Dank had not only fired the other two band members, but had literally eaten them. I saw this is rumor as just that. A rumor. Probably fueled by Dank’s intensely sick mind, his press agent or his management, DankBlack Enterprises, all three of which circled back to Viktor Dank.

I pulled up to a very non-descript duplex in a part of Vermont that Viktor promised me not to reveal before I started the interview.

"So," I began, "is there any truth to these rumors?"

"No, no, that’s just a lot of hoakum," Dank fired back, sipping on his herbal tea from a mug shaped like a skull. "It was the same reasons why all those bands broke up. You want the music to go one direction, everybody else wants to do something else. I wanted it darker, sicker. Clem and Marv wanted to be more on that NoWave junk. I mean, I appreciate that disjointed shit, sure. But I wanted to keep it hard and dark, you know? We’re not just NoWave, man. We’ve always been a creepy mixture."

"Wait. I meant is it true about this supposed cannibalism? I tried to get in touch with Clem and Marv and I can’t seem to find them amywhere."

"Hey, I’ve been in a lot of bands, man," he replied, "and I can only think of, like, three times where I actually considered the idea of eating them. And that was usually because they missed a gig or showed up too drunk to play or broke a string or something."

"Isn’t that a little harsh," I asked.

"I take this shit seriously and a band is not a democracy. Not one I start, anyway. It’s my band. If I fire you or pick your bones with my teeth, that’s my choice, you know?"

I don’t know what to say to that. Dank has a way of playing everything he says as if it’s part of the Gothy act.

At that point, Viktor started showing me around his place. Lots of what you’d expect. Blood-red velvet drapes, skull imagery, black, black and more black. A prize item of his décor was a decorative, skin-toned lampshade. He went on and on about it to the point of nausea (on my part, at least). Upon closer inspection, I noticed an intricate formal design on it. A snake eating its own tail, forming a perfect circle with the name "Darcy" in the center. I quizzed him on this detail.

"Oh, weird," he replied, "never noticed that before."

As he invited me down to what he called his "musical torture chamber," I told him that I needed to use the restroom.

"Take a right past the sarcophagus," he said. "Hurry up, though. There’s something down here you’ve got to see."

He headed downstairs, I lurch towards the sarcophagus, then zip back towards the lampshade. I inspect it further as the sounds of metal riffs and what sounds like a band saw seeps up through the floorboards.

I spin the lampshade around, making two full revolutions of "Darcy," then notice something on the inside. A dot. A brown dot, to be exact. I take the lampshade off, put the thing around my head and get the dot ½’’ from my nose until I realize what it is. It’s a mole.

"A fucking mole," I said to myself aloud.

"You done up there," I hear from below.

I jump and my heart raced as I replaced the "Darcy" and bust ass out of the place.

When I get home, I dump my copy of "Blood, Guts, Dinnertime" into the trash. The back cover stares up at me. A band photo. The burly drummer, Clem, stares back with a menacing smile. His arms are folded, sticks in hand. On his left arm I can make out a tattoo that says, "Darcy."

I dump coffee grounds on it.




-SLL

Hush Money, Sweet Lois – or Else!

    I walk along the path. Once again, I am always alone. I have the ransom money in hand. The people have been paid. I was paid. I was paid well for three days of work. Not bad. Most people won’t make this much in a decade.  I guess the bad part will happen when the body isn’t where it should be. In fact, Lois and I are meeting later she will be meeting me later at the seven eleven. I won’t walk alone anymore.


-P

Backdraft (355)

The problem was, he just wasn’t from their world, and he had no desire to pretend to be.
What this turned into was a constant battle of wits. Unfortunately, they were not p to the challenge. Their usual strategy was to insult him and run away, or the ever popular “under-the-breath comment”.
Today was no different. He’d taken a small jab at one of their hairbrained observations, and expected them to react like normal people would; laugh along with the revelation that it was a bad idea. Instead, offense was taken.
They were in rare for today, trying their best to get a rise from him. But he wouldn’t play along, making them even angrier.
As the day wore down, he revealed the fact that he wouldn’t be attending a party that they were all going to.
“That’s your problem.” She quickly retorted, and left in a hurry.
He laughed at her for three days.

I HEART EMMA

The Hop-Headed Charlies took to the streets, all of their eyes wide, hazy and crazy. Their white tuxedoes were wrinkled, worn and dirty in spots.

The Nice Phils were all Filipinos, decked out in matching mustard yellow shirts with the words "I," a red heart and "Emma" embroidered on them. They truly did "heart" Emma, each and every one of them.

Out of an alleyway came the Balthazars, each one of their heads adorned with a red fez except for their leader, Bal-1, who wore blue. Their smoking jackets and ascots were very tidy, clean and pressed. They all smelled of Old Spice.

If you pulled any member from any of these gangs into a room, the first things out of their mouths would most likely be three of the following things:  

1. They have an undying loyalty to their prospective gangs.
2. They do not want this fight to happen.
3. They truly do "heart" Emma. 

 Emma was the only reason this rivalry existed. She was the catalyst. And they would end up killing each other over who her heart truly belonged to.




-SLL

My Cosmic Autumn Rebellion

    It was the summer after my senior year of high school. You know the time everyone says is the greatest time of your life. A time of responsibility and no responsibility all at the same time. I met Sarah at the neighborhood pool. She was smoking hot. A “perfect 10” as my dad would say, a real looker. We did everything together. I found out we were planning on going to the same university.
    We liked the same types of things. Swimming, rock climbing, running, the occasional old school game of Wii Sports or some Mario Brothers. She was perfect.
Well, I thought she was perfect at first. She was a bit jealous. Any time another girl would even glance my direction she would go off. I am not talking about just a little bit, but full tilt crazy. There would be yelling, screaming, and throwing stuff. It wasn’t pretty. I couldn’t hang out with my friends that were girls from high school with out her freaking out. My mom thought this was a huge warning flag. I told her that it wasn’t that big a deal. Dad backed me up by saying I was old enough to make my own decisions. He also said if I made the wrong decision then I would need to just take the consequences that came with my actions.
    As a compromise, we usually hung out with my guy friends, which wasn’t that bad a deal. We went to more baseball games that summer than I had ever been to before in my life. She had this way of escalating my behavior by dares. She was real bad about doing this in front of my friends. It was like she knew they could talk me into it if she couldn’t do it on her own.
    She convinced me to sky dive recently. Mom wasn’t crazy about it, but dad was on my side again. We took the lessons and today was our first solo jump. We jumped together holding hands. It was so awesome just falling, holding her hand, and looking out over the deep blue sky. With the wind screaming past our ears, she said, “I want to be with you to the end.”
    “Me too,” I called back.
    She held me close and said, “I didn’t pack our chutes.”
    I looked at her mouthing why.
    She just said, “I love you.
    I pulled her close and watched the ground rush toward us.

-P

(356)

Hogarth thought that he would fall forever. The jagged rocks tore at his skin and broke his bones, but he continued to fall- to roll down the harsh, rocky embankment.
Once he finally did reach the bottom, all that he could do was to cry.
Hogarth wept for what seemed like hours, and eventually passed out.
When he awoke, he was at the top of the hill again. He was paralyzed with fear as he thought about all the times he’d fallen .
Then he fell.

THE BUFFALO GOD

     The Choctaw warrior walked in the clouds. His stride was one of confidence, as if he’d walked this path before. Was this another dream or was he truly in the Big Place his grandmother had always told him about? His robes and feathers dipped down in the cumulous air. He wondered if he would meet up with the Longface again. Would his son be there? The one he had drowned? What of all the whites he had slain? Surely they would not be allowed to walk in this afterplace. By last count, there must have been hundreds, but if he saw them here, what would they do? This was clearly not a place of war. Far from it.

     As these thoughts floated across his mind, he saw a misty form in front of him. The Buffalo God. It stood as high as the Bloodblack Mountains.

     "War has brought you here, my son," it bellowed. "These many days of war were unnecessary in the grand design. You will not win, no matter how hard you fight and no matter how high you soar as a warrior. Your people will fall. Belief in the Buffalo God and an appreciation for the great land will fall. Your future is not in war, my son. Your future and your son’s future and your son’s son’s future is clear. Blackjack. Roulette. Stud Poker. These are not only your future, but these will even replace me as your god as you take back the great land from the whites."

     "What is the meaning of what you speak, oh great grandfather?" asked the Choctaw.

     "Its full meaning cannot be revealed now, my son. It will unfold itself given time. But one last thing before I take my leave of you. One thing you must remember and pass down into the future of our great people."

     "What, grandfather? What?"

     "All-you-can-eat buffet."

     With that, the Buffalo God vanished into the mist. The Choctaw furrowed his brow. The word "buff-fay" spun around like a penny in his head. Beneath him, the clouds began to soften. He sank into the cloud until it no longer held his weight. His body quickly gave way to the sky and he fell at a furious speed. The earth sped towards him. He was not afraid. He did not scream as the ground rushed to meet him. His eyes soon fixed themselves on a spot below. As he got closer and closer, he realized that he was raining down upon a fallen Choctaw warrior on the Bluehills reservation. It was soon now.

     He awoke. His head was heavy and, as he got up, he noticed many whites lying dead, surrounded by charred wigwams and dead, dying friends and kin. Many of his brothers were missing. His home was all but burned away here. He shook many to see if there was life. He gathered the robes and feathers of the ones he recognized and walked away from Bluehills, the thoughts of gambling in his head.

     As he passed the last of the dead whites on the outskirts of the skirmish, he noticed photographs, trinkets and gold coins that had spilled from their pockets. He gathered as many as he could find and separated the wheat and weeds that was so abundant in Bluehills.

     Tomorrow, he would walk to the nearest town, find their casino and put all of the coins on black.



-SLL

I Love Apple Jelly

Frank looked past his turkey sandwich on wheat, and down to his lap. It was a lovely day. The sky was slightly over cast. At 72 degrees, it wasn’t too hot or too cool.

Gary, sitting next to Frank, was enjoying a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Gary said, “Frank, it’s a beautiful day isn’t it?”

In a deep and gruff voice Frank said, “It’s a beautiful day to DIE!”

“HA HA! I loved him in that movie.”

“I’m not kidding,” Frank said as he pushed Gary over the edge of the steel girder they sitting on for lunch. Gary twisted and fumbled for the beam, and Frank caught the sandwich.

“Help,” Gary pleaded.

“Nope,” Frank said.  Frank kicked Gary in the face, and watched him fall forty floors to the ground. He takes one bite of the sandwich and throws it into the wind.

“Yuck! I hate grape!”

(357)

I wasted water all over the top secret documents last night. I swear it was a mistake, but no one can ever know.
What’s worse is that I have to replace the documents. I’ll be up all night trying to fake all those equations and numbers.
I hate working for the government.
My only wish is that no one ever checks the constitution too closely.

THE CHILD IN THE BARREL

     I cried every time my mother took me there. Every morning, like clockwork, I was shoved, kicking and screaming, into a makeshift, run-down house that served as a daycare. Dutch-style awnings, the smell of low-grade, imitation Kool-Aid and Oreo knock-offs lingering, dirty diapers, multi-colored door trim, sharpened monkey bars, rotted tire swings and huge red and yellow oil drums turned sideways on stilts to give the illusion of a children’s paradise.

     I never bought into it. All the bright colors and illegal Peanuts and Disney woodcuts hanging on the fence didn’t mask the fact that I was losing my mother for eight hours, five days a week.

     By mid-day, I’d always cried myself out enough to trudge out to the playground. I had no concept of time back then, but I knew that after a nap, our last trip into this fakery of sand and foul-smelling cedar chips would signal the return of my mother. So, I would endure it. I’d swing for a bit, snake through a series of half-assed jungle gyms and generally keep to myself, knowing that I was just going through the motions.

     On one particular day, the most vivid in my memory, there were two new hapless inmates. A boy and a girl, both with Down’s Syndrome. Like the concept of time, I was aware of what I was seeing before me, I guess. I just couldn’t explain it.

     They played apart from the other children, near the sideways oil drums. What interested me most was the fact that none of the other kids ever attempted to go near them. Not even me. I was just an observer. Of course, maybe so were the other children. What truly struck me was the oblivious nature of the boy and girl. They didn’t seem to care who was playing with them. They had each other and there was nothing else in the world, like none of us existed. This saddened me for reasons that I couldn’t figure out.

     When I got home that night, I asked my mother about the boy and girl. What made them similar to each other, yet completely different from me and the rest of the kids?

     The boiled down explanation came down to this:

"Just because nobody plays with them doesn’t really matter. They’re happy. But they’re happy because they don’t know any better."

     My heart sank.

     The next day and from that point on, I left the kicking and screaming act off the daily repertoire. I entered the daycare sedate as a kitten, fascinated by the boy and girl. Every time I saw them, I felt sad. The explanation my mother had given me had stuck and stuck hard. Their obliviousness was what really got to me. Once that was in my mind, my entire worldview changed.

     That day it rained like nails and it came out of nowhere while we were on the playground. I watched all the kids rush indoors, daycare workers herding them in. The boy and girl were the last ones to realize what was happening, at which point they raced for the house, holding hands.

     I witnessed this from inside the stilted oil drums. And I cried harder than ever I have since.



-SLL

Paper Air Planes

    A man sits alone in a room. He is behind a desk. The desk is littered with papers.  He slowly shuffles them from one pile to another. He is looking for something. He opens a drawer and pulls out a cell phone. The phone is an older “brick” phone. The man begins to shuffle through more papers. He settles on one and slowly dials the phone.

     “Hello, may I speak with Gloria.”

    “Yes, I can wait. … Well how long? … I still want to wait.”

    He puts the phone down and very faint hold music drifts out of the earpiece. It’s a weird mixture of “Message in a Bottle” and “Canon in D.”  He takes the closest piece of paper and slowly folds it in half. He starts to hum along as he unfolds and refolds the paper. His humming starts to get more animated and the volume swells. He brings up paper he has been working on and let loose a paper airplane. The plane banks as it rises and starts to slowly circle the room. The man starts to fold another piece of paper.

    There are twelve paper airplanes circling the room. Each of them seems to catch random drafts of air that help keep them aloft and slowly floating in large lazy circles. He pulls another piece of paper from a stack as his phone calls out, “Sorry for your inconvenience of waiting. How may we help you?”

    “I need help.”

    “What kind of help? If you have our number you must know we offer all types of help.”
   
    “Well, I can make paper airplanes fly.”

    “Sir, anyone can do it.”

    “How many people can keep them aloft for twenty five minutes at a time?”

    “…what? Wait, you can hold paper airplanes in the air for twenty five minutes at a time?”

    “They have been up there for about twenty five minutes. I really haven’t been keeping track.”

    “Sir, we are sending some people over right now. Until they reach you I need you to stay calm, and try to put the planes down.”

    “Yes mam, I will put them down.”

    He turns off the phone and places it back in the drawer it came from. As he gets up from the desk he grabs another piece of paper and starts to fold it. He walks toward the window and looks down on a black van stopping. His paper is now another air plane near the ceiling. “Come my darlings,” he says, “the time has come.” His desk comes alive as papers on top of papers fold themselves into paper airplanes of all shapes and sizes. As soon as the top layer can take to the air, the next ones down start to fold them selves. He watches as men in black jump out of the van. He giggles just a little as he walks back to the desk, picks up a piece of paper, and starts to fold another airplane.

-P

(358)

I ran as fast as I could, or as fast as you can run in a dream. Everything looked oddly familiar, as my brother and I tried to find our way back to a place we recognized.

We came to a strange urban garden where a young man worked picking crops as loud hip-hop played on his boom box. In the distance, I saw a building I recognized- Hannah’s condo.

As we crawled over the gardens fence, trying not to get snagged on the barbed wire by placing our coats on top, the real world seemed to get closer and closer. We both ran, or at least I did, for when I looked back, Joseph was riding a bike.

“Why didn’t you ride yours?’ he asked.

SHELLS

I took the gun completely apart and buried each piece in a different place. Even the used-up shells.

When the thought came to me to do this, I wondered why all the idiots and shitbag killers of the past had just tossed their weapons into dumpsters, pretty much ensuring their inevitable capture.

Christ, I’m a genius.

The barrel was my first order of business. It was still warm and, by the time I got to the Glenwood Cemetary, I’d already planned out where the rest would go. I buried the barrel behind a headstone marked "Schotz."

Five miles down the road I found a Spanish moss next to a closed-down dentist’s office and sunk the gun handle deep into a hole in its trunk.

Shell one was pushed into the fertile soil of a cornfield, just beyond Quantico city limits.

Shell two got dropped out of a ferry heading to Ellis Island.

Shell three was placed daintily into the exhaust pipe of the skeleton of a shortbus, somewhere outside of Lubbock.

Shell four got stuffed up the ass of a dead possum that had been squatting inside an old log in Yosemite.

Shell five I tied a blue bow on and propped in a Goodwill donation box I saw in a landfill.

And shell six was left in a priest’s coin purse at the VFW in Lodi.

My last destination was my old high school. I sneaked into my old shop class and placed the stock into the ceiling tile above Mister Knickerbocker’s desk.

Seems like a while lot of work for nothing, I suppose, but if the tracks are covered well enough, no one will ever know.

I just hope the bodies don’t take this much effort.


-SLL

55 words never spoken

    It was raining as she ran to her car. In her rush, she dropped her keys.  She bent over, the rain ceased. There he was an umbrella held overhead. She opened the door and turned to thank him. He slipped the syringe into her neck, and held her in his arms as she drifted away.

CAUTION, CHILDREN

     My theory is that it happened sometime last night, although I’ll never know for sure and I guess the "whys" and "wheretofors" aren’t nearly as important as getting the fuck out of this town at this very moment.

     I drive west to see how far this thing encompasses. So far, I’m the only car on the road and that ain’t a good thing. Any cars I happen to notice are either parked or crashed headlong into the most odd shit I’ve ever seen: houses, cornfields, grain elevators. No drivers, just cars. As if people were picked out up out of the universe and tossed into a giant basket. If I believed in God, I’d say it was the Rapture. But I don’t , so I have to say it ain’t. Besides, if what I know about that shit is supposedly true, there would be at least one other person around here. And I’m sure God would’ve taken the kids. They’re all still here. Them and me. But that’s all I’ve seen, no matter where I look. Nothing but children playing ball in the streets, wandering around in gangs, busting windows, stealing worthless shit. Every once and a while I have to swerve to keep from hitting one that’s taken a joyride in a car they never learned to drive. All I hear when I have to window down is the yelping, hooping and hollering of these bastards on every street corner, occasionally from a few of the tear-streaked joyriders who haphazardly smash into a telephone pole or (my favorite so far) the carload of kids who tried to tail me on the way out of town. The police cruiser they found the keys to was going too fast to properly brake before they went off that bridge.

     Fuck ‘em. That’s how kids learn, I say.

     I turn off the radio, sick of hoping that I’ll hear some sort of news about this. Any radio stations have been taken over by them. Once they learned how to work the thing, it’s nothing but fart noises, giggles and a steady stream of whatever curse words they’ve learned in their short years on Earth. I’ve got to admit. It is relatively entertaining for the first two minutes or so, but no amount of levity could keep me from worrying about how far this thing goes.

     After three hours on the road with no adult in sight, I realize it’s going to get worse before it gets better. My mind races with the prospect of this fucked, pre-pubescent world. What caused it? Has my hatred for children come back to haunt me? Have I died already? Is this Hell? And it this is really happening, how long can it honestly last? With no police, no fire department, no doctors, not even the Maytag repairman, how long can this society survive? I think about all the newborns who will die in their cribs from neglect. The power company, the food supply, all that shit.

     I just gotta’ keep driving. Driving west. I don’t even want to think about how much blood’s already been spilled in Disneyland.

     Maybe I’ll just skip California.

You know I got Soul

Hogarth woke to find his girlfriend lapping at his belly button. He didn’t ask her why, he just lay back and enjoyed what he thought was about to become a nice bit of morning sex.

It did not.

As soon as she had began, she was done and running into the bathroom.

Hogarth noticed a clear, slightly foul liquid leaking from his belly button. This concerned him for two reasons.

Reason one was that he didn’t think that his belly button was actually connected to anything. He could not figure out where the liquid was coming from.

Reason two was worse, because it immediately became clear to him that his girlfriend was intentionally licking this strange, septic smelling drainage from his stomach.

He walked over to the bathroom door to listen or Helen. He couldn’t hear any sound coming from inside, so he tried the door.

The door wasn’t locked, and Helen was not inside.

Hogarth stood and stared at the open window she had climbed from.

He figured that it would probably be a good idea to try and find her, but he began to feel really weak.

Hours later, when he regained consciousness, he was horrified to find someone else, a strangely familiar man, sipping from his seeping bellybutton.

Hogarth couldn’t speak, he could barely move.

When the person realized that Hogarth was awake, he looked up and made eye contact.

This concerned Hogarth for all the obvious reasons and one very disturbing one- one that was more disturbing that all the others…

The person looked very familiar, very much like Hogarth himself. As a matter of fact, the person was like a mirror image of Hogarth.

But as Hogarth looked at the person, barely able to move, and completely unable to scream, he saw something in the strange doppelgangers eyes:

It was Helen. He was sure of it.

The Helen clone of Hogarth wiped her mouth, and swallowed deeply.

She smiled up at him as he lay there in terror.

“We’ll all be you soon.” Helen said, just as there was a knock on the door.

Beadtime Stories

    Johnny jumped into the bed and quickly scrambled under the covers. He turned to his father as he entered the room. “Dad,” Johnny said, “I want a story!”

    His dad said, “What type of story do you want? Funny? Sad? Action and Adventure? Or, how about a story with kisses in it?”

    “Ewww Gross! No kisses.  I want a scary story!”

    “Mom got mad at us the last time we had a scary story. We both wound up in her bed.”
   
    “But, you are suppose to be in her bed!”

    “I know,” Dad said, “But you weren’t.”

    “Please. I promise that I won’t come get in bed with you and Mom.”

    “Ok I think I have one that is scary, but will keep you in your bed tonight.” His dad removed his glasses and looked directly into his son’s eyes and began.

    “One day John you will grow up. You will go to college. You will go out into the real word and find a job. You will find a lovely girl, and you will marry her. The two of you will have children. You will lose hair on top of your head. The hair that is left will go gray. These children will grow up go to school and move out. Johnny do you know what you will be once your children grow up and move out?”

    “I don’t know, Dad. This doesn’t seem like a scary story.”

    “Just lay there and think about it. Trust me it will freak you out soon enough. I love you, son.”

    “I love you, Dad” As Johnny drifted off to sleep he thought of what his Dad said. As he drifted off to sleep he thought, “Nope not scary yet.”


-P

THE PARKWAY

      No matter what I’m doing or where my mind’s at from day to day, my thoughts usually float back to the Parkway.  In my hometown, the Center Point Parkway connects most of the town,  the end of Apple Valley being one end, the main freeway being the other.

      Friday nights meant somehow getting in touch with my best friend at the time, Tim Crutchfield.  We were about three years apart and lived four houses down from each other.  These differences didn’t seem like much at the time, but now I can see why I could’ve potentially been seen as a hell of a nuisance to him.  I could see pool parties he’d have with older friends from my backyard and I’d find myself steaming with anger that I wasn’t invited.  All it usually took was a phone call to his mom, Charlene, an older woman always immaculately dressed in an off-the-shoulder sweater and white patio pants.  I would start out by acting like I didn’t know Tim was in his pool with somebody else, then I’d go limp and act like it was no big deal, resulting in Charlene suggesting that I put on a suit and come over (though ultimately my self-loathing would get the best od me and I’d chicken out, not wanting to be “that kid” who invites himself to everything).

      At this point in my life I wasn’t old enough to drive, so Tim was my ticket to the incredibly useless world of “cruising.” Sure, I can say it was useless now, but back then it was everything.

      Tim had a huge, dark blue warship of a car that had the most souped-up sound system I’d ever heard.  And he cranked the most wretched music of the day out of those speakers at full volume.  If it wasn’t Styx, it was Triumph.  If it wasn’t REO Speedwagon, it was Rush.  The sheer power that bled from that car stereo was so mesmerizing that it didn’t really matter what cockrock was in the tape player.  Yes, this was that strange part of history where CDs were still in their infancy and high quality tape decks and expensive Memorex tapes were the order of the day.

      Tim’s expertise was the mix tape.  His home stereo system was about as state-of-the-art as the one in his car.  So, he’d culled the greatest songs from his 500-plus LP collection to perfect the most amazing mix tape assortment imaginable.

      I have to say this right off.  Regardless of how much I might make fun of the man’s tastes, they were as varied as you could imagine and my musical like and dislikes from that point on were highly influenced by the mix tapes I heard in those days.

      So, my mind is occasionally floating down the Parkway, thinking about that car as it sped down the road, blaring its high decibel, early 80’s pap.

      As many times as we did this (I want to say it was every Friday night, though I’m sure it might’ve only been twice a month), there are only two distinct cruising nights that stick in my head.

      The first coincided with the street date of Dire Straits “Brother In Arms” came out.  After purchasing it, Tim’s first instinct was to take the one song that was already getting a little airplay, “Money For Nothing” and repeat that fucker over and over on one solitary mix tape.  A constant reminder every seven minutes and four of how awesome that song was at the time.  And one night of cruising was devoted to that.  I have to admit, no matter how many times I heard it that night, I never once tired of it, especially since this was the album version and not the truncated single cut edit.  I guess any song at the right volume with the right hook is going to have a long way to go to get repetitive.  The “Money For Nothing” night was the cruising apex.

      My only other memory happens many years later, where the cruising has grown stale.  Tim was almost out of high school and had moved onto friends his own age and such.  I was a sophomore, just discovering the wonders of punk and what was known as “college radio” (soon to be “alternative music”) at the time.  Who knows who suggested it, this was the last cruise and I think we both knew we were doing it for old time’s sake.  And even though I couldn’t remember the last time we’d done it, somehow I didn’t fully think that this would be the final time. 

      Now, precedence stated that Tim and only Tim was the DJ on this ship.  This was the unwritten rule.  His car, his stereo, his tunes.  I can’t even remember what tape it was, but I kept it in my pocket, afraid to be ballsy enough to suggest replacing the Springsteen cassette that held court at that particular moment.  But as the ending strains of the “Nebraska” album died out and Tim reached into the tan, double-decker cassette case that had always sat between driver and passenger, I made a beeline for the tape in my pocket.  I’m pretty sure it was the Dead Kennedys’ “Bedtime for Democracy” and for argument’s sake, let’s pretend that it was.  My into to punk was pretty late in the game, though that albums release (1985) matches up to my age at the time, so if it wasn’t that I can’t even be sure what it could have been.  I slide the tape in and the first song, a balls-to-the-wall cover of Johnny Paycheck’s “Take This Job and Shove It” exploded out of the speakers in that brash, up-tempo way that the DK’s were known for.  My head bobbed and my teeth clenched and I was loving hearing this shit on such a powerful system instead of in my headphones.  But my mood changed when I saw Tim’s face.  It’s like someone had punched him in the balls.  The pain in his eyes, the furrowed brown, the hunched shoulders.  Thinking back, I don’t know if it was the choice of music and how far it was from his own tastes or the fact that I’d broken the unwritten rule by commendeering the stereo.  I recall him quickly ejecting the tape from the player after the song had grinded to a halt (Tim didn’t believe in ejecting a tape until after a song had stopped or faded out, regardless of how abhorred he thought the song might have been).  And that was the end of it.  A conversation might have ensued.  “What were you thinking?”on his end, “How can you not like Dead Kennedys?” on mine.  I don’t know.  I just remember feeling a strange mixture of anger and sadness.  I’m sure the French have a word for it, but I haven’t found it yet.  On one hand, I was angry because I couldn’t listen to what I wanted to listen to.  I’d done my time.  Genesis?  Laura Brannigan?  I was due.  But I was sad because now there was a rift in our friendship.  Whether it was my bold tape move or that high school mentality, this rift was getting Grand Canyon-sized.  And we both knew it.

      So, at the end of the night, Tim pulled up to my driveway and I got out.  We said our “see ya’s” and I watched him back up four houses down to his house.  No tears, no pomp, no circumstance.  Just an ending like any ending, one that happens when you least expect it.

      Even though we lived four houses down from each other, I saw less and less of him from that point on.  Different paths, I figured.  Or was it that I’d broken that unwritten rule?  I’ll never know. 

      That was the last time I’d ever cruise the Parkway. 

Mechanihand

They all laughed at me when I told them that I would be the next wonder- the next merger of science and flesh.

But they will al learn when I rule the day with my metal and computerized appendage.

They will hate my Metal legs!

They will regret my iron head

One day soon, they will all rue Mechanihand!

Voices

Ok, here is the deal. I am a writer.

    Well, I try. I use to write short fiction in college. I got out of practice after my one semester of creative writing.  I eventually met this writer guy, and we did some movies. I read this quote from Ray Bradbury that said the only way to be a better writer is to write daily. He said that if you wrote a short story every day for one year you would have 365 stories, and it is impossible to write 365 bad stories. We decided to take this as a challenge. How many stories can we write that are actually good?

Question, would nonfiction count in our little challenge? See if I tell a true story does it count? It’s a story, granted a true story.

I have a little problem. I haven’t told anybody this before, but I hear voices. Nothing like demon voices telling me to kill babies. They are more like suggestions. Really nothing violent, they tell me to drop things. We have these trays full of brackets, you know the things we put on teeth, at work. Did I mention I work for an orthodontist? These trays have several hundred brackets. I have these urges to drop these trays. It would take HOURS to pick them up and organize them correctly. I think of this and I laugh and laugh. 

    This happens more and more frequently now a days. I would ask if you thought I should worry about it, but I wouldn’t listen. I enjoy it. It gives me something to laugh about. I hope it doesn’t get worse, or would that be better?

THE UNHEIST

The location we’re going to hit is in that strip mall down the way, sandwiched between the New City Buffet and a vacuum store. 

      How late is New City open? 

      I’m thinking they push out the last of the fat-asses by 10 PM at the latest. 

      And the vacuum store?

      It’s a fucking vacuum store, man.  How late are any vacuum stores open ‘til?  They practically keep bankers hours.  Latest?  5 PM. 

      I say we make this a 3 AM job, then.  Just in case. 

      Right.  Now, as far as security, there is none.  This place went belly-up almost immediately.  Once the bank took it out of the owner’s hands, there were people in that place telling the employees this was their last day and they’d be getting their checks in the mail.  So, all inventory down to the pennies on the floor was left as if the fucking Rapture had just happened.  Pompeii-style shit. 

      We know this for sure? 

      I’ve scoped the place out, man.  There’s still Jolt colas sitting in the fridge, untouched.  The only thing we got to be mindful of is any strip mall, rent-a-cops who might be passing by, but that’s why we place a guy having a smoke outside, just strolling, like he just got through eating at New City, which might make this hard to do at 3 AM, if that’s the case.  But, that’s up for discussion anyway, I say. 

      And we know all the inventory is still there? 

      I’m telling you.  It’s still wall-to-wall.  I’m thinking the bank is just sitting on it until they can figure out how they can make some kind of return on this shit. 

      Do we have a timeframe?  Some kind of window? 

      See, that’s the sexiest part of this situation.  Once we’re in, we’re in.  We might need some kind of low light source to see what we’re snagging, but that’s it.  All the time in the world.  As long as we keep lights off, we can take whatever time we need. 

      There still porn in the back? 

      Far as I know, all that sick shit’s back there.  Which reminds me, we should coordinate who gets what.  We divvy it up like this: hardcovers, trade paperbacks, back issues, magazines, Anime, action figures, sports collectibles, t-shirts . . . what am I forgetting? 

      Porn. 

      Right, right.  The porn’s a two-man job.  Oh, we still got a line on that lockpick? 

      Cousin Coy. 

      Right on.  He into comics? 

      Not really. 

      Well, I guess we’ll make sure he gets the Busty Asian box set in his stocking this year. 

      ‘Kay.  We done? 

      No.  One last thing.  Don’t eat anything that day.  We’re hitting New City before the job.  My treat.
 



-S

THE BRIDGE

      I’m neither high nor low on the whole thing.  Am I some kind of monster or something?  People were killed and I’m already sick of talking about it and hearing it on the news.  Is it that I don’t care or am I doing that “polar opposite” thing that I do with girlfriends and at parties?  Somebody’s having the time of their lives and I swing 180.  A bunch of gloomy Gus’s sitting around, moping?  I light up like a Christmas tree.  What is that?  Where does that shit come from?  Is it something I got from my parents?  I never knew my dad, so maybe I’m getting it from him.  It’s not right and it certainly ain’t healthy.

      I hear they’re pulling bodies out from under sections of the collapsed bridge, tossing bodies in shopping carts.  I’m not phased.  I find myself trying to use this as an excuse to get out of work.  I can’t imagine what I would’ve been like during 9/11.

      I just hope they never find out that I caused this shit.  Who knows how I’d feel then?  Maybe that would cure me of this crap.  Who knows? 
 
 
-S

Happiphobia

I don’t know when or how it started, but it seems that lately I am allergic to other peoples happiness.

Public displays of affection sicken me. I simply hate so see people enjoying themselves.

I think that it is a natural reaction to my never being happy and having to witness others enjoying themselves often.

Groups of people laughing make me want to cry.

I saw a baby take his first steps in the park the other day, and it made me vomit.

Yogi

    Well, I am a bear. Not just any bear, but Yogi Berra-Bear. No relation to that hack Yogi Bear. ‘Smarter than the average bear’ my ass. Unlike some furry forest friends, I actually went to college. I got my degree thank you very much. It wasn’t easy a double major in ethics and business. I later went on to get my MBA. You have to remember this was as a time when bears weren’t allowed in most universities. Hell, most of us, if you remember correctly, couldn’t even finish high school. My parents wanted me to move on and do something bigger than my life than rustle around Jellystone National Park. I wanted out too.
    I had been out of school for maybe three years, and I had already been offered a junior VP position in a top Fortune 500 Company. I took it. Things were looking up. There hadn’t been a bear attack in years. Human/bear relations had not been better. That might have been the problem. Things got too good. This was the point that the “other” Yogi Bear got his TV show. Damn Hanna-Barbera.
    After they got a hold of that other Yogi, it went to hell in a hand basket. Well, I should say pic-a-nic basket. People always asked if I had brought my lunch in a pic-a-nic basket. Sure at first I laughed it off ‘cuz I am a pretty calm guy. Somebody started taking random peoples lunches at the office. At first, it was this joke that ‘hey I bet the bear took it and hid it in his pic-a-nic basket.’ God, how I hated that. I won’t even mention how many times I heard the ‘smarter than the average bear’ line. I know I could beat his ass in Jeopardy any day. I KNOW I am smarter than the average bear.
    That’s why I brought him here tonight. He has screwed things up for the last time. I know he should have heard this speech, but I didn’t want to be that guy who talks the guy he is going to kill to death.  It gives that ‘smarter than average bear’ a chance to get away. You might have been able to pull it off. He couldn’t. So, bam he is dead, and he won’t bother me any more. Well, there are reruns but at least I can slowly buy them up and destroy those. 
    The only hitch is you. You weren’t invited. You shouldn’t be here. I kinda like you. You were the brains, too bad.

    Bye bye Booboo.

    BAM!


-P

BLUN-GEN-JUN

We trapped the blind people in a burning abattoir just to see if they could find their way out.

We broke the backs of the retards and wondered if they had the where-with-all or common sense to beg us to shoot them.

We took all the faggots we could find, cut off their dicks and sewed spiky steel shafts on them using their nerve endings to see if they would get the irony.

We shoved heroin addicts into school buses filled with dope and drove them off cliffs.

We encased the libraries in cement, along with the books and librarians, to keep knowledge to a minimum.

We made all the wetbacks do a Mexican hat dance on the killing floor.

We tested the children while they were hooked up to electrodes so that, eventually, their answers would agree with ours.

We filled the coalmines with deaf people and flooded them with blinding light before we flooded them with water.

We stuffed so much seamen into the prostitutes that it eventually came out of every single pore.

We dropped cripples off buildings into vats filled with the billions of metal shavings from the remnants of their wheelchairs.

We crammed a semi full of newborns and crashed it, full speed, into another semi full of newborns.

We force-fed all the drunks pure grain alcohol through I.V.s and made them dance for more.

We starved the dogs and set them free on themselves.

We broke one leg of each horse and whipped them around the racetrack until it just wasn’t funny anymore.

We created a TV show called “Blun-Gen-Jun” where the actors spoke indecipherable gibberish and watched the ratings soar as the audiences got driven mad trying to figure out what language it was.

We slipped granulated glass into the water supply.

We buried all the clocks and made time an even more abstract concept.

We embedded razor blades into the soles of the waitresses’ feet and still only paid them $2.12 an hour.

We made BetaMax the industry standard once again.

And we did it all to keep America beautiful.

-S

Crusades

I remember when President Kennedy promised that we’d put a man on the moon. Most people didn’t realize that it was due to the terrible state that the atomic age had left us in.
Kennedy’s teams of scientists and experts had determined that if we didn’t do something soon, the ozone layer- the layer of atmosphere that keeps the sun from roasting us alive and its radiation from turning us all into cancerous sores- would be depleted in 40 years or so.
There was a plan, though. It was conducted in secrecy, and most of us regular folks didn’t know about it until much later.
So, we did put a man on the moon just as Kennedy had promised.
What we didn’t know, though, was that we were sending men farther than that.
While most of us sat here on earth, afraid of the Cubans and their missiles, our government was clearing space for all Americans on planets far from here.
Our army and clergy were working together to explore and convert new worlds in the name of America and the Holy Catholic church.
This, in a nutshell, was the story of the crusades and of the great war with Mars and all her people over land and a place for all Americans to call home.
God bless Mars- God bless America.

Wishin'

    “What I wouldn’t give for a nice Hawaiian Pun-, OWE!” Jordan said, as he stubbed his foot walking down the beach.

    “What did you do?” Dan asked.

    “I stubbed my foot on something.” As Jordan bent over and dug an odd shaped object out of the sand, he said, “You know how I am trying to get to volunteer to clean up the beach? This is why.” He straightened up, turned the object over in his hands, and started to brush the sand off of it. He suddenly stopped.

    Dan reached for the object saying, “Let me see it. It looks like one of those lamps with a genie in it!”

    “Wait, what if it is? What if we get wishes? Sometimes genies try and push you in to making a decision. We need to think about it. They only give wishes in odd numbers. Most of the time it’s three, right? What if we only get one wish? It has to be good.”

    Dan said, “Wishes! Gotta always save one to wish for more wishes.”

    “More wishes? You have to be kidding me,” Jordan replied. “Those never work.”

    “How about all the money we would ever need?”

    “Are you dense?  He would plop a pile of money of us so big it would bury us. People would run up stealing money left and right. What we would need is a bag or a wallet that when opened would always have exactly the amount of money we would need for any situation.”

    “I still want a pile of money. Jordan, why did you say they always give wishes in odd numbers?”

    “If you make a bad choice with an even number of wishes you can always undo it with the second wish. An even number always allows for a chance to back out of your pervious wish. Let’s think on it.”

    As the two guys walk back down the beach, they saw a hot dog stand. Hot dogs were two dollars and thirteen cents. Jordan said, “Wouldn’t this be perfect for a wallet that always had correct change?”

    “I guess. I would still rather have a pile of money.”  As Dan said this he dove for the lamp, and sprinted down the beach. “I’m going to rub it!” he called back. Jordan ran after him. Dan started to rub the lamp as he ran. Slowly at first, but gradually got faster and more violent with his rubbing. He finally stopped running and applied all of his energy to rubbing the lamp. First with his hand, then his shirt, the inside of his shirt, the leg of his shorts, and finally Jordan’s shirt.

    “What a crock!” Dan said, as he cocked his arm back to throw the lamp into the ocean. “I wish this lamp didn’t exist!” He then threw the lamp as far as he could.

    A rumble shook the beach, and a deep voice boomed across the water, “If my home is destroyed, I too cease to exist. All of my previously granted wishes will cease to exist. Your wish, and my final wish has been granted.”

    Dan’s polyester swimming trunks disappeared. The hotdog stand disappeared. A plane in the distance took a nosedive into the ocean. The air became much warmer and the water level started to rise.

    Dan said, “Oops.”



-P

BARIUM ENEMY

REAL NAME: Theodore Pinson

OCCUPATION: Geographer, Sonic Engineer

ALIASES: The Disruptor, Sonicus

HEIGHT: 5’8”

WEIGHT: 185

HAIR: Blonde

EYES: Green

ORIGIN: As a boy, Pinson was playing in an underground sewer during an earthquake. Walls caved in all around him, but he was saved by The Bounder, one of Steelville’s first crimefighters, who heard his cries for help. The mixed feelings he got from the fear of the earthquake and the heroics of The Bounder inspired him to become interested in plate tectonics at an early age. This interest continued into college, where his education emphasized the correlation between soundwaves and their effect upon shifts in the Earth’s crust. Hired by the government right out of college, he became part of a top secret “Johnny Project” in their geological division. His main emphasis was on creating machinery that could use sonic vibrations to break or even melt solid objects. He soon leapt forward as the team leader and invented several sonic weapons that could be used for war, capable of breaking bone simply with sound. One night while working late, an earthquake opened up the ground beneath his research lab, causing him to fall nearly 20 feet. Fire consumed the building above him, all of his sonic weapons and research going up in flames. As he screamed for help, a much older Bounder arrived and saved him. As The Bounder grabbed him and flung him to safety, Pinson pleaded with him to go back in and save his equipment. The Bounder, busy with saving other people, told him that his life was more important than his work. With that, Pinson ran inside, determined to save something from the blaze. By the time he got to the main entrance of the lab, an explosion knocked him backwards. Pinson awoke weeks later in the I.C.U. only to realize he was not only battered and bruised, but also completely deaf. Using his experience in sonic research, he spent the next few months, devising a way to regain his hearing without the traditional hearing aid and vowing to get back at The Bounder for not helping him when he needed it most. He reconstructed most of his sonic weaponry from scratch and integrated it into a makeshift battlesuit. After many unsuccessful attempts at killing The Bounder as the self-proclaimed Disruptor, he was imprisoned and was brutally beaten while in jail, putting him in a coma for several months. Upon awakening, he could not remember who he was and, after his jail term was over, led a seemingly normal life until a strange dream came to him in his sleep. In the dream, he saw himself as an ancient gladiator, destroying everything in his path with the sound of his voice. Once he awoke, he remembered everything about himself and found a storage unit, which housed all of his sonic weapons. Using the moniker Sonicus and dressed in gladiator garb covered in microscopic sonic devices, hidden in his toga, he waged battle against The Bounder once again (as well as his superteam, The Freedom Committee). He was never apprehended again and still remains at large. Recently, he was experimenting with low decibel sound waves and realized that a low enough tone would cause a human being’s bowels to release. He changed his name to Barium Enemy, ditched the toga and, so far, has escaped capture by causing every member of The Freedom Committee to shit their pants during their battle.

-S

Cinematic!

“I can’t breathe!” I tried to shout, my voice muffled as she sat directly on my face.
“Breathing is overrated” I thought I heard her say.
I had challenged her to a wrestling match, and I was determined to let her win. So far, she didn’t realize that her victory was planned.
I was having a good time, rolling around the living room floor with my girl. She wasn’t beautiful, but I thought that she was cute. She had uneven teeth, splotchy skin, and her hair was in transition from black to hr natural blonde.
She wasn’t a model, and never could be. But I thought that she was cinematic. If I made movies, I’d put her op on the movie screen so the world could see all the beauty in her imperfections.
She pulled the pillow from my face, and breathing heavily from the tussle, leaned in to kiss me.
I pushed her face away playfully.
She took my hands and pinned them down, then leaned in again.
We kissed.
I couldn’t help but ruin the moment by trying to say something romantic.

Dear Peter,

Dear Peter,

    We have been together for quite some time now. You know things have been fine for the past few years. Not just fine, but excellent. I could not have asked for a better partner. I wouldn’t pick anyone else, even if I had the opportunity to do it all over again.
I love you. I really do. When we have been together as long as we have it’s hard to not love someone.  But, you have lately treated me like shit. The crap you have put me through has been ridiculous.  I think it all started when we went to Mexico. Well, that’s when the problems started. If we were talking this out I am sure you would point out the fact that Mexico wasn’t at fault, or anything to do with that trip. It was lovely. We loved every bit of it, and you know it!
I am sure you will try to blame stress, specifically stress from school. I know that grad school is tough. I know the drive back and forth to Tuscaloosa was rough. It was tiring and lonely. Sitting in your car for hours a day, day after day was not easy. We both know that while these might have contributed to your problem, it was not THE problem.
We found out that you are not perfect. You have defects. We all do. We know my defects and we have decided to work together on them. I thought that we had agreed to work on our problems.
When you decided to push the limits and see how far you could take it you did nothing but hurt both of us. You started sneaking around. I know you started small and almost daily did a little more than the day before.
Finally, you went over the edge yesterday. You went too far and now you will pay.  If you think you can stomach what you have done go ahead and try it again and see where it gets you.  I am not mad at you, just upset. Really, really upset. Your ass will burn for what you have done. I hope you are happy.

You can’t treat me like this, and expect me to stay happy.


Gretchen Isabella Tract


-P

HARDER CORE THAN THOU

It begins today. I’m transforming myself into the most punk thing in history. G.G. Allin, Iggy Pop, step aside. When I’m done, you’ll be forgotten, erased from the punk annals as punk godfathers and edge-pushers. I won’t be some reincarnation of the punk ethos either. I will be the alpha and the omega of punk. When I’m done.

I’ll start by throwing away all non-punk CD’s I own. In fact, all CD’s are gone. Just punk 12” of every shape and form from now on.

Out go all non-black shirts and pants, too. All of the semi-ironic, 80’s hair band shirts? Trash. I only wear punk T’s and have to be black. I keep one pair of black jeans with holes in the knees and crotch. Every item of clothing: hoodies, belts, socks, shoes. All black. When I enter a room, all light is sucked into my void.

I have to find a ratty dog. A half-starved, creepy mutt of a dog. I’ll give him a spiked, metal collar and a leash made of leather. He’ll be as punk as me.

I’ll buy a black backpack from a Goodwill. In there, I’ll keep some black pens, extras punk shirts, a few composition books to write down my thoughts and lyrics to punk songs in my head and, finally, one or two copies of “Maximum Rock ‘n’ Roll.”

I’ll tear up all my credit cards. And any money in my checking account? I withdraw it all and wipe my ass on every bill before I flush it all down the toilet.

I plan on totalling my car in some punk way, possibly while completely drunk and listening to Bad Brains on the stereo. From now on, I walk everywhere with my ratty dog.

I’ll be at every all-ages show, standing to the back of the place, looking down in disgust at not only the band that’s playing, but all of you in the crowd.

I’m so much punker than you.

-S

Rich, white, naked...

I had heard the old adage- “If you are nervous talking to a crowd, imagine that they are all naked.”
I was counting on this advice to be helpful, for today at 3 o’clock sharp I was giving the quarterly report to the company’s shareholders.
I paced around my office all morning and afternoon, and I must have smoked two packs of cigarettes whenever I could sneak outside.
On one of my trips to smoke a butt, I ended up sharing a smoke break with one of the kids from the mailroom.
His name was Juan.
I told Juan about my predicament. All Juan had to say was that if my shit was together, and I knew what I was talking about, then I had no reason to be nervous.
My shit was together, and I knew what I was talking about.
When three o’clock rolled around, I walked into the meeting ready to wow them, even if I did have to imagine seeing a room full of naked old white men.
Surprisingly enough, they were already naked when I walked in.
Surprisingly enough, this did not make me feel less nervous.
I imagined that all the shareholders didn’t have any skin, but this only scared me and caused me to run screaming from the room.
They’ve been calling for a week now, but I don’t answer.
I’m scared to talk to the scary, skinless stockholder men.

STORCH

Storch hadn’t taken a bath in over a fortnight.  His matted hair was no longer greasy.  It was a stringy, thick mass that sat flat on his skin-flaked scalp.  His fingers were blackened and dirt from a hard day’s work seven years ago was still collected beneath his fingernails.  The smell around him was repugnant.  It caused even homeless people around him to vomit whenever he passed.  He’d worn the same shirt, a black, short-sleeved Van Halen “1984” shirt, every day since the he saw the band back in their David Lee Roth heyday.  He only owned three pairs of underwear, which he would switch out every several months.  He’d used the same bath towel and wash cloth since he was 14 and had never washed them once.  Yellowed, sunburned newspapers stacked about his dingy apartment like makeshift walls, the earliest paper being from the day of his birth 37 years ago.  Bags of discarded fast food were littered beneath his couch and any inch of floor that wasn’t filled with newspapers.  Dishes in the moldy sink had piled up for months, never touched, never even rinsed.  A browned, unmade mattress that served as his bed had a Storch-shaped pattern on it, like shadows burned onto the side of a wall.  The mattress was surrounded by toys from his childhood, books opened to various pages, filthy blankets and charcoal drawings.  The toilet had never been flushed. 

Despite all this, he was the cleanest man in town.

-S 

Runnin'

“Hey, wait a sec!”

“Why? It’s just down the block and around the corner we are ALMOST there!”

“I can’t help I am out of shape.”

“You aren’t running in heels like I am.”

“Well, you aren’t carrying a fifty pound boom box on your back.”

“You didn’t have to buy the one that took freakin’ D batteries.”

“My cousin got me the hook up at Best Buy. Plus it’s LOUD! That’s what the people want!”

“The people want a show! The people want to be dazzled! The people want entertainment! The people, this time, happen to be in an old folks home. So, loud music might not be what they want. By the way, isn’t it your Best Buy cousin fault that we don’t have a car?”

They start to jog again. “He told me that he would make it up to us,” he said.

“Sure he will. Just like the time he said he had this primo music hook-up? Or, the time he said he could get us a gig with… Oh crap!” She said.

They round the corner and are blinded by blue lights. The police have already beaten them to the old folks home. Not having a car they arrived to late.

“How many times have I told you? By the time we hear of a crime on the scanner we have to be on the move, not waiting on your cousin to bring us the car!”

“Listen, we should look for clues. Batman would look for clues.”

As she turns and walks down the street they came from, she said, “I bet Batman didn’t let his cousin borrow the Batmobile.”


-P

I, Pinocchio

Pinocchio tapped the steering wheel as he stared at the house in silence.
There would be pork chops for dinner. There would be the same repeats of shows that weren’t even good the first time. His wife would engage him in tales of daily boredom that rivaled his own ennui.
Every night was the same as everyday was the same. He thought that maybe this would be the night that he simply said fuck it and drove away, to adventure, to excitement, to a better life. This would not be that night.
Pinocchio sighed, closed his eyes, and lowered his head into his hands.
“…Real boy.” He said to himself angrily, and got out of the car and walked into his house.

The ACTION is GO!!!!!

GO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

just hours away

Yes mere hours from now you will be basking in the goodness which is Heinous fiction!

Enjoy!

These are the most uncomfortable shoes EVAR!

For real. These 2shoes are just 2uncomfortable. Did I mention only 2  days left?

so small. but so much potential.

We are Powerful
We are Strong
We are Heinous!
3 days

The Wizard Turns On

the lights! the camera! the ACTION!!!

or maybe we are the Wizards. Not long now. Only 4short days.

...where have all the cowboys gone?

They have gone to eat BBQ. Have I told anyone lately I love BBQ? Sweet meat with a smokey flavor drenched in sweet sause....


Sause.

5 cowboys later

Downhill now!

6 Days. Yawn, will these guys ever write something?

I hope we aren't getting your hopes up for nothing.

6 DAYS!!!

ONE MORE WEEK!

<span style="font-family:courier new;">One week! one week! uno week! 7 days left!

I want some candy.
</span>

Restin'

<span style="font-family:courier new;">It's a day of rest, so rest up so you can follow along. Only 8days left!
</span>

Anybody thirsty?

<span style="font-family:courier new;">9 days. Why did we put this start date so far ouT?? Trust me, it will be worth it. At least, three stories a day! they are almost all projected to be entertaining in some shape, form, or ahhh.... something.

9 DAYS!!
</span>

If only

<span style="font-family:courier new;">I wish I could think of something Snazzy other than 10 days left... Wait! I have it!


10 days Left!!!
</span>

Back to the Future!

<span style="font-family:courier new;">Still? What? You gotta be kidding me. only 11 days left? This would be so much cooler if this popped up when it was suposed to.
</span>

Awesome!

Team Heinous will rock you!
And your Mama and them!

The future?

As we tweek things getting ready for launch day, the site will change. Hopefuly for the better.

If you can read this before the 8th then one of two things have happened.
1)You found a way to travel to the future. If this is the case good luck to you sir, and please find me an almanac.


2)Blogger continues to screw up, and you see things as I upload them.

Anyway. 12 days til launch!

13 days

OHHHHHHH lookie here. 13 days till we are LIVE!

13 days.

Chocolate RAIN!!!

test for later day!

Ok let us test this one more time.

test part duex!

Will it work?

Are we live yet?

Yes, yet another post. Well it might be another post, or it could be the first post. Dang setting up new hosting.

14 days!

Test

Test post for Fear the H!

We go live in 15 days.

Fear the H! is live in 15 days!

Count yourself lucky if you are one of the first to read this, fearthe-h.com will be live in 15 days!


You will enjoy!