Issue 37 October 2016 Flash Fiction Online October 2016

The devil called on Tuesday. I’m hungry, it said. Feed me.

You hung up–but a thing like that doesn’t stop a devil. It called back. And kept calling. Night after night after night until you couldn’t remember what day it was or whether you were dreaming or just sleepwalking through life. The only thing that seemed real was the gnawing in your gut, the tugging on your soul. When the crackling started in your head, you answered the phone because hearing its smoky voice in your ear was better than scorch marks on your brain.

I’m hungry. Feed me.

I can’t, you said, close to weeping now. Call someone else.

You promised, it whined and your ear popped at its pitch. So you went to a restaurant and stared at the menu. You’d given up meat in 2002 and sugar the following year. Soy went six months ago and you hadn’t touched a morsel since. The waiter came over and you sent him away, but he kept coming back. Just like that damn devil. You ordered: Starters and Entrees and Sides, can’t forget those tasty sides, and the food piled up and you opened your mouth and gorged.

The busboy looked at you funny and you said, What? I’m eating for two. He made the sign of the cross and you asked for the check and slunk home to wait. The devil came to your house, crawled into your bed, licked your lips and sighed. In the morning, it was gone and you were empty. Days passed and the phone didn’t ring and you thought, I fed it. It’s over. How thankful you felt then.

Until Tuesday rolled around and the phone rang. It was the devil. For you.

I want, it said. Don’t you want?

And you hadn’t desired anything, but now you did. That gnawing burrowed deeper, made things ache inside you.

Feed me, it said. You’ll feel better if you do.

But that was just something it said to trick you. You knew all about devils and their tricks. This wasn’t your first one.

You had tricks, too. Starving. Cutting. Burning. Because it was true: you could fight fire with fire–you just didn’t recommend it. The smell made you forget you were a vegetarian, then a vegan, then an ascetic. It made you eat.

I fed you, you said. Go away.

But it wanted more. It told you so. It called and called and called, begging you for sex, and your insides swelled and your body demanded release, but you knew how this story ended and you resisted.

If you loved me, it whispered, you’d do this.

I don’t, you said. No one loves you. No one wants you.

It laughed. If you didn’t want me, I wouldn’t be here. You called me, remember?

That’s not how it happened, you said.

That’s exactly what went down, it said. Now go to that truck stop–the one we love so much–and fuck until you’re full.

So you went to the truck stop and you fucked and fucked and fucked, and you forgot how empty felt and you remembered when last night was a promise you kept breaking, and you wanted to cry, but couldn’t because you’d broken that part oh so many years ago and not even the internet could find a replacement. When you ran out of men or they ran out of you, whatever, it was done, you drove home with grunts echoing in your ears, and the devil was there waiting and it followed you up the stairs and into bed and crawled between your legs, and licked and licked.

Do you like love? you asked the devil and it replied, I love love, and you fell asleep with the scent of brimstone in your hair. It didn’t leave for six days and when it finally disappeared, you had the most awful sunburn.

That Tuesday you almost looked forward to its call. You picked up on the first ring and the two of you chatted and it was almost pleasant. You wished it to hell–but respectfully so–and it giggled like knives on a whetstone and hung up. You sat there, holding the phone, wondering how long it’d be sated–not long–and what it would want next and how much more you could take and when it would let you go and how long could forever possibly last?

I’m tired, it said the following Tuesday. You’re exhausting.

Know what you need? you said, barely keeping the glee out of your voice. A nice dirt nap.

It wasn’t convinced, but you cajoled and it agreed to come over and try your dirt. You dug it a nice, deep bed in your yard, six by six by six. You stuffed a pillowcase in its mouth–the better to sleep with, you promised it– wrapped it in your stained sheets–tight like a pharaoh– and shoved it into the ground. You hit it with a shovel; you poured cement over it; you filled the grave and planted flowers–bleeding hearts and lilies of the valley.

You signed up for yoga on Tuesdays and German on Thursdays. Wednesdays you did laundry. Fridays you scrubbed your soul. You stopped eating meat, then dairy, then vegetables, then calories altogether. You threw out your phone, but that doesn’t matter ’cause the devil has your number. So you keep looking out your window and one day, you see the earth buckle and the house shakes and dirt flies and there on your doorstep is the devil. It yawns, stretches. It sees you.

I’m hungry, it says and your stomach rumbles.

Previously published in DarkFuse’s Horror D’oeuvres. Reprinted here by permission of the author.

WE CONTINUE OUR JOURNEY INTO THE GUTTERS, all the stuff that happens between the amazing success stories people collect to make a highlight reel of their career so that it seems like their life is a series of powerfully compelling moments, but is, in fact, a false flag operation for how reality actually unfolds as you toil in obscurity before becoming worm poop. You know, life!

So while I could razzle-dazzle you with contract signings, short story sales, and novel revisions, let’s examine five things that were happening as I crawled from nowhere into being a published, but not professional, author. Because professionals get paid. 

* * *

The Year was 2000. Y2K had failed to destroy Earth. Randy “Macho Man” Savage was still alive (praise be to him). And this was what yours truly was doing to make his stupid dreams come true.

• It was the second year of my MA in War Studies at the Royal Military College of Canada. I got my first research gig, analyzing how major newspapers reported on the growing events of the “Kosovo Crisis” from 1990-1999. This meant chaining myself to a microfiche machine at Queen’s University for two months, day in, day out, because the internet was still in diapers. I almost went blind but learned a lot about the Balkans, including the collapse of the Albanian economy due to a pyramid scheme, the Albanian Civil War, and subsequent peacekeeping operation. The subject was fascinating, but the work left me brain dead and sore. Still, I proved myself a capable researcher to folks at the college. Which meant more work, more success, more exhaustion, and more work, more success, and more exhaustion . . .
• . . . so I started reading a series of novels about people burning out. Wonder why! Among the books on the nightstand was the aptly titled A Burnt-Out Case by the sardonic and sage Graham Greene, that featured a quote I kept close. “You try to draw everything into the net of your faith, father, but you can’t steal all the virtues. Gentleness isn’t Christian, self-sacrifice isn’t Christian, charity isn’t, remorse isn’t. I expect the cavemen wept to see another’s tears.” 
• Such reading infected my academic work. I submitted history papers with quotes from Albert Camus’ The Fall and Herman Hesse’s Steppenwolf. I earned a rep for being a “well read punk” at the college, in part because I championed literature as a means to improve command of language, narrative, and deep analysis. I have yet to find a historian who has written this well and succinctly about the nature of historical scholarship and research: “To study history means submitting to chaos and nevertheless retaining faith in order and meaning. It is a very serious task, young man, and possibly a tragic one” (from Hesse’s epic masterpiece The Glass Bead Game). I used this quote in my doctoral thesis, and it remains a deep drum behind my thoughts.
• SPACE, Canada’s “imagination station,” began rebroadcasting PRISONERS OF GRAVITY, a 1990s show hosted by comedian Rick Greene (of The Frantics!) that explored comics, science fiction, fantasy and other genres via interviews with writers, artists, editors, and more. It provided an informal education on genre writing, and introduced me to Harlan Ellison, Lewis Shiner, and George R. R. Martin when he was a failed novelist and popular TV writer! Since I didn’t have cable, my sister in Ottawa would tape these onto cassette and send them as care packages. POG, as we called it, eased the pain. Because my writing career was a single published story.
• Rejections accrued with every other submission. Was it a fluke? I seemed to get more personal responses now that I had a writing credit on my cover letters. Maybe more credits on my letter might make me look pro, even if those credits were pathetic, and stop the rejection train! I AM A FUCKING GENIUS! So, I sent stories to small, bizarre outfits that were advertised in the costly tome THE WRITERS MARKET (now obsolete), mags with names like Cosmic Donut, Barbaric Yawp, and The Skittle Teeth Journal. They didn’t pay anything, but some of them allowed email subs: which saved me postages in those days of powdered mashed potatoes for lunch. My best story was “Fresh Flowers for Rachel,” based on a true incident from my days as a groundskeeper at a Jewish cemetery. It involved the Second World War, burial rites, and tragic love. As Oscar Wilde might say, it’s terrible, but sincere. After the usual suspects had rejected it, I sent it to a magazine called EYES (but not this sexy one!). They liked it. They wanted it. HUZZAH! I agreed. There was no contract. No payment. But I’d get a contributor copy and another publication on my cover letter. Then, my copy arrived. It was a zine, not a magazine. Poorly side-stapled. Weak, hand-cut blue Bristol board for a cover page, and no picture. The title, punched in from a typewriter (not a printer), askew. Sure. Fine. Go Econo. It’s punk rock . . . until I opened the cover. On the index, my story’s title was correct, but the author was . . . some other guy! Worse? They’d caught the mistake, but, instead of re-doing the index, just crossed out the dude’s name, and, with blue ink and palsied handwriting, scrawled JASON S. RIDLER above the voided ghost writer. Typos riddled the copy, and the other stories were awful.

As the kids say, that learned me! So I got righteous. No more working for free. If you were going to shit on my story with awful production, you’d need to “cross my palm with silver” as Harlan Ellison noted. I needed to get SOMETHING for my labor beyond default identity theft. 

That argument rested, however, on a major presumption: paying markets would want my work. So far, there was ZERO evidence that they wanted anything from me, or ever would. I’d need to drill down, work hard, and up my game. But, as you may have noticed, I was already burning out . . .

So, how long until I sold anything else?

FIND OUT . . . NEXT MONTH! Same Ridler Time, Same Ridler Channel!

Until then, go buy Jay’s latest novel with a brand new cover, A TRIUMPH FOR SAKURA, which award-winning writer and editor Nancy Kilpatrick called “Hunger Games, Fight Club, and True Blood rolled into one bloody good novel.” BUY IT NOW, BE HAPPY FOREVER!

Our House is pregnant.

The Orderlies posted the news on our Noticeboard. No explanation, no fanfare.

We gather in the common room, silent, scarcely able to look at each other.

Then the room erupts. “They’re joking.” One woman, white-faced. A man sits and stares at his hands. Like he had something to do with it. “What happened?” seems the most common question. How could a bricks-and-mortar construction conceive with a human being? Sure, the House is sentient-sensitive and alien (brought in by one of those cursed freethinking long-haul astronauts).

But conception?

It’s beyond disgusting. Try abominable, impossible.

We emote.

The Orderlies observe us, in silence.

Later that night, one pats me on the shoulder. I leap up and nearly bang heads. He holds a finger to his lips. “Come with me.”

I obey. What choice do I have? We inmates signed a formal Agreement with the Counselling Service, which provided us with a free bed and lodging for the week. We were all grieving the loss of someone close to us, a fellow worker. That’s all we had in common.

Now this.

The Orderly escorts me into the communal kitchen and closes the door behind us. “Don’t worry,” he says. “There are no bugs.”

They’ve been bugging our conversations? Oh God.

“You’ve heard the news?” He looks closely at me. I nod.

“Please, sit down.” He pulls out a chair. I sit, rather heavily. “We’ll shift you to a secure House, first thing tomorrow.”

Dread forms a solid pit in my stomach. “Why?”

He hands me a form. “Read this. Don’t scream.”

Don’t scream? I blink, scan the document, reread it, make no sense of it. Chemical formulae, blood readouts, DNA.

“The House is pregnant. Congratulations, you’re the father,” says the Orderly, softly.

I stare at him.

“Mr. Janssen, you heard what I said?”

I nod.

“Your emotional levels, your distress at the loss of your co-worker, penetrated the defenses of the House. We understand, you worked so many shifts together.”

Again I nod. I’d never had a brother. James filled that gap in my life.

The Orderly goes on. “We now face the least expected outcome of space travel. Matter, impregnated by homo sapiens. We will shift you, for your own protection. Even among your inmates here, there may be unexpected prejudice.”

The Orderly observes me.

I say nothing.

I try to keep my face calm, but fear, anger, confusion and above all, disgust well up in me. Suddenly I can’t hold it in. I vomit.

The Orderly cleans up. His face is calm.

I spent a sleepless night, and in the morning, they take me to another facility. My inmates are silent as I walk past them. Perhaps they don’t know. I hope not.

I’m rewarded with food, leisure, the best of everything.

All I want to do is escape.

In the end, I achieve this.

I find a job, live a quiet life, do nothing to draw attention to myself. Using a variety of aliases, I read up on what I’m accused of participating in. There are no words for it, and ‘taboo’ doesn’t cut it. I sleep badly and am inclined to overindulge in both alcohol and women. I never used to be like this. When my wife died, I grieved for a long, long time. Even now, I think the Orderly must have been yanking my chain. Objects can’t be impregnated.

Then the photos started arriving in my mailbox.

A small, igloo-shaped building.

I stare at it and reach for the Johnnie Walker.

The next year, another photo. Bigger.

I sell up, shift, leave no forwarding address, and decide to swear off the grog. My new job is solitary. Except for my marriage, I’ve lived my entire life by myself. We never had children. Mary couldn’t, and I didn’t make a fuss.

Five years later, a large envelope appears under my door. Official. I hesitate. What the hell. Maybe I’ve won the lottery.

It’s a photo. In the ruins of a bombed-out city, the now-much-larger igloo stands undamaged. There’s a sign hanging from its front door. I peer at it. My eyesight is failing. I find my magnifying glass. The sign reads, “Hospital Withstands Aerial Bombardment Intact. All doctors and patients safe.”

I swallow. As a child, I dreamed of becoming a doctor. Later, I wanted to volunteer as an Ambulance Driver in a war zone.

The Igloo went to the war zone and withstood bombardment.

For the first time in many years, I break down and cry. Long, hard, wracking sobs rock my body. At last, I wipe my tears away and pick up the photo.

My son, my son.

My son.

Rule #1: Don’t ask them how they died

Mandy died young but it wasn’t truly tragic. It was in the sense that she was ten years old and would never learn to drive, sure. However, when you looked at how she was being raised (parents in and out of jail, drugs, etc.) she was almost certainly better off hovering above the ground, a spectral little thing giving high-fives and fist-bumps to a lonely guy like me (that’s not, as you’ll see, as creepy as it sounds).

We were having fun until I made the mistake of asking her what had happened. She vanished for three weeks. Truth is, I didn’t notice at first. My partner Jason and I had been arguing a lot. He wasn’t staying at the house anymore and, every other night he was out at a bar with his other friends. I had lost interest in dance floors and collared shirts with nothing underneath, but part of him hadn’t.

Netflix became a regular thing for me, with Jason only coming over on nights that he was too tired from previous jaunts with his trashy, club-kid friends. I should have taken his key, but I didn’t. So we argued, which led him into a three-day bender that he would later blame on me. It was during those three days that I had noticed Mandy’s absence. Define irony: a ghost who haunts you by not being there.

She came back eventually. I woke up one day and there she was, sitting at my kitchen table all bluish and translucent, eating a bowl of Cheerios. I think I was more amazed at the fact that she was actually eating cereal and there weren’t droplets of milk forming a puddle on my floor. I could even hear the soft little clang when her teeth hit the spoon. 

I made some toast and sat across from her while she finished her breakfast. After she slurped the last of the milk from the bowl and backhanded the dribble from her lips she said, “Nice words or no words.” I wondered if all children were eternally bratty. 

Rule #2: Don’t Introduce Them to Anyone

Befriending a ghost is the equivalent to winning the lottery. You buy tickets (do grave rubbings), buy more tickets (use a Ouija board), buy even more tickets (take nighttime cemetery photos), and hope that someday your numbers will appear. When they finally do it will come with a massive amount of pure excitement and splendor. The first thing you’ll want to do is to tell someone. Don’t!

Mandy had chosen my house; she had chosen me. She didn’t pick my brother who lived in Manhattan. She didn’t appear to both Jason and me. Just me.

Like other little ghostly people, Mandy trusted me to not tell the world about her. To let her just exist in her state of purgatory until she was either ready to see someone else or ready to move on completely.  

That worked until Jason came over unannounced. Mandy and I were out back on the wooden porch swing laughing and talking. Her feet were hanging just above the ground, and anytime she would get close to her toes touching I would kick off and start swinging. 

“Alan?” I heard my name through the screen door and turned to see Jason standing there. “Who are you talking to?”

I took a quick look, but I knew she’d be gone. Indeed, there was no little ghost-body next to me, just a vacant seat on a porch swing. 

“Never mind.” He stepped out onto the deck and immediately folded his arms across his chest. Sudden defensiveness is never a good thing, though I suppose if I wanted to I could have given him the benefit of the doubt and thought he was chilly. I did not give him the benefit of the doubt. 

“We need to have a conversation,” he said. I looked up at him, still swinging back and forth, the creaking sounds of the chains providing punctuation between each of his words. “You don’t call me anymore. I’ve been over a few times and heard you upstairs laughing with someone.”

I pursed my lips and continued rocking, disengaged from the conversation entirely, wondering where Mandy was hiding. 

“So what’s his name?”

“Greg,” I said instantly, surprising even myself.

His face contorted, eyes narrowed. “Greg?”

“Your friend from the bar. Oh, I’m sorry, you wanted to know who I’ve been seeing. Well, the honest answer is no one.”

“No one,” he said flatly. “You’re a liar.”

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Stop screwin’ around and tell me, Alan.”

“Fine.” I exhaled sharply. “You want to know what’s been going on.“

And like that, like I summoned her from nowhere, Mandy appeared behind him, shaking her head furiously from side-to-side with a pleading look on her face. All my anger deflated in a second. 

“Well? Alan, tell me right now or we’re done.”

I raised my arms and shrugged, exaggerating the motion like a petulant child. The disbelief on his face only lasted a second. He snapped something crude at me, but I let it roll off and waited for him to storm out. When she was sure he was gone, Mandy rushed forward and hugged my legs with an intensity I imagined only living things could have.

Rule #3: Let Them Win At Monopoly

Yes. Even a ten-year old will pound her small spectral fists on the table when you put a hotel on Boardwalk.  Flippin’ Monopoly, man. 

HALLOWEEN IS A FAVORITE HOLIDAY AT OUR HOUSE. We do it all. Gravestones on the grass, imitation spider web on the rose bushes, creepy glowstick eyes peering out from the shadows, a minimum of 12 pumpkins usually carved to follow a theme (last year it was classic horror literature, as you can see).  

We even fry donuts for all the neighbors (last year we made close to 200). One year we had to leave town for Halloween. No donuts. Someone tried to show their displeasure by toilet-papering our yard. The house-sitter scared them off. We came home to find a half dozen very large, very soggy rolls of toilet paper strewn about the yard, with only a strand or two clinging limply to the trumpet vine. T.P. Fail.

One of our favorite traditions is to listen to the ultimate Halloween story: Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart.”

Several audio versions are available online, including this one.

But one can only tolerate so much “Tell-Tale Heart.”

To mix things up for you, and to enrich your spooky celebration, we’ve put together an amazing Halloween issue for you.  

To begin with, a strange but sweet story by Rebecca Roland, “The Monster on her Cheek.”

Next up, “Three Rules for Befriending Ghosts,” by Benjamin Thomas, in which a ghost becomes a loyal companion. 

Then, an odd little tale of a pregnant house. Yes. That’s correct. “Offspring” by Brenda Anderson.

Finally, our recycled story for the month, “Devil Got You on Speed Dial” by H. L. Fullerton, which originally appeared in DarkFuse’s Horror D’oeuvres.  

Happy Haunting!

WHEN JANE WAS BORN, the first thing the nurse said was, “There’s a monster on her cheek.”

Wendy struggled to sit up. “Let me see her. Let me hold my daughter.”

“I’m so sorry,” the doctor said, her mouth turned down, not quite meeting her eyes.

“Did you get vaccinated?” the nurse said.

“Of course,” Wendy said. And she had. But bitter guilt crushed her.

Jane’s cries were loud and healthy, and her little fists waved in the air, searching for something to hold onto. On her left cheek, a little, fuzzy, steel gray monster covered with bumps wriggled in time with Jane’s fists as if it, too, sought something to hold onto. When it opened its tiny blue eyes, Wendy choked back a scream.

* * *

“I’m sorry,” the specialist said. “The monster is linked into Jane’s nervous and circulatory systems. Removing it might harm Jane. There’s nothing we can do.” She gave a thin smile. “She’s a healthy baby otherwise, though.”

“I don’t understand,” Wendy said. “I took the vaccinations just as recommended. How did this even happen?”

“Sometimes it just does. We’re still studying the virus. It’s so new and… well.” She hesitated. “There’s a support group that meets up in Houston once a week for families with birth defects like Jane’s.”

The thought of going out in public made it suddenly hard for Wendy to breathe. The doctor, the specialist was one thing, but to face others… she wasn’t strong enough to deal with the stares, the questions, the ignorant comments. She was the wrong mother for Jane. Jane needed a warrior, not… Wendy.

* * *

“You need to get out of the house,” Wendy’s mother said. “You and Jane need sunshine.”

“We get out,” Wendy said, the cell phone tucked between her ear and shoulder as she wrestled with the dirty diaper and a squirming, fussing baby. She tried not to look at the monster, but that meant not looking at Jane’s face.

“In the backyard,” her mother said. “That’s not what I meant. Go to the library, or the park, or something. Anything.”

A bubble formed in Wendy’s chest. It grew until it squeezed her heart and lungs. “I can’t. People will say things, and I don’t know what to tell them.”

“It’s none of their business. Tell them that.”

Wendy wished she had her mother’s courage. “Tomorrow. We’ll go out tomorrow.”

“I’ll come with you.”

“No,” she said quickly. “It’s not necessary.” She hung up, knowing that she wouldn’t really leave the house tomorrow, and finished with the diaper.

Jane cooed and smiled. The monster on her cheek blinked.

* * *

Three in the morning, and Wendy dragged her ass up and down the hallway, rocking Jane, singing, telling her stories, playing videos on her phone, trying anything to get her to calm down. She’d changed diapers, offered her breast, offered a bottle, given Jane a warm bath, and then done it all over again, and again.

“Please,” Wendy groaned as she sank onto her bed. Tears stung her eyes. “Please.”

Her eyes burned from lack of sleep. One tear fell on the monster. It shrank against Jane’s cheek, eyes blinking, its little bumps waving much like Jane’s arms waved. In that moment, it looked less like some hideous growth and more like a fuzzy, gray caterpillar.

“Caterpillars aren’t so bad,” Wendy murmured. “They do become butterflies eventually.”

Jane cried louder.

Wendy bent her head over Jane’s and breathed in her baby smell. She planted a soft kiss on Jane’s forehead. As she drew back, she brushed against the monster, touching it for the first time. It was so soft. She jerked back.

The tiny monster blinked up at her as Jane bawled.

The monster’s presence made Wendy’s stomach curdle. But it was tied to Jane through shared blood, a shared nervous system. It wasn’t her, but it was part of her, and Wendy had ignored it this whole time, ignoring part of her daughter.

She leaned forward tentatively and lightly kissed its tiny head. The touch tickled her lips.

Jane’s cries turned to hiccups. She settled in Wendy’s arms, and moments later, she slept.

The tiny monster’s eyes shut, and it curled against Jane’s perfect, chubby cheek.

* * *

The next day, Wendy pulled out the stroller and set it by the front door. They’d walk down the block to the park, then back. She tried anticipating all of the ignorant things people might say or do, wrapping her own responses around her like invisible armor. With Jane in her arms, she paced.

She stopped. “I don’t think I can,” she said.

Jane looked up at her with wide, adoring eyes, as did the tiny monster. They were counting on her to protect them. To teach them. What was she teaching them by staying holed up in the house?

“We can do this, baby,” she said softly. “Monster,” she added. She strapped Jane into the stroller. The baby gurgled and cooed, and the little monster swayed back and forth.

She pushed the stroller out the door into the hot, humid air and sunshine, and they started down the street.