Too Many Cooks

Round Two of Too Many Cooks, or Cary Gone Wild

I’ve procrastinated posting my thoughts on the recent round of TMC for a couple of reasons. One is that I believe Maria will be publishing another chapter of her story, and the other is because I’m not sure I’m finished thinking about it. I will share some of the thoughts I had as we went through the cycle. The other writers are great and I wouldn’t dream of critiquing them.

I was very surprised when I was asked to join TMC. I was also flattered, excited, and extremely nervous. None of that has changed. I worked hard on my parts of the stories. I was worried about letting the other writers down, or goofing up their stories by going off on my own weird tangents.

The story I started, Choking, is something that has been in my head for years. It is partially true, but just a small part. I was looking forward to what everyone would do with it, because I wanted to see how other people thought it would progress compared to how it unfolded in real life. I was not disappointed. I thought about tying up loose ends with the last chapter, but then I realized that if I had my choice to do whatever I wanted, I would just burn it all down. So I did. Sometimes, there is just no satisfying resolution. I was afraid readers would hate that ending, but I decided it felt right and everything doesn’t turn out nice and tidy in real life, so why should it always work out in a story?

Nan’s Journey was the hardest for me. I really had no idea what to do with it. Richard was so clever with his start and the winking at the readers and all. I remember thinking “Oh shit, what have I gotten myself into?” I talked to my son and my sister and my friend and I pondered and worried and Googled and hoped I would measure up. I just tried to move things forward while leaving it wide open for the next guy.

Saints Above was hard, too. I don’t have a religious education and again, the set up was the sort of clever humor that I’m not very experienced with. I don’t know much about saints, so I wasn’t really sure what to do with them, either. I decided I better stick with what I know, which is medicine and construction. Thankfully, Paul mentioned tin, thieves and undertaking and made that possible.

Autophobia was more up my alley. Dark and twisty is a place I know, and I was a little more comfortable with this story. In my mind, Warren was either doing those things to himself, or something supernatural was going on. I thought Jay’s succubus ending was most cool.

Finally, Maria’s King of the Sandlot was kind of hard for me, but I’m not sure why. I just wasn’t sure what direction to go with it, especially since I have never really played sports. I wanted to make something happen, so I killed people. I’m still not sure if it was the right thing to do, but damn, was it fun. I can’t wait to see where Billy Joe ends up.

If all of this sounds ambivalent, that’s because it was and it is. The people who participate in Too Many Cooks are creative and terrific, and I’m still so happy to be included. I am learning with each story, and hope to keep improving. Thanks very much for following along, and special thanks to those of you who encouraged me privately.

Even In the Quietest Moments: Thoughts On Round 2

Well, here we are again, at the end of another story-cycle. Hope y’all liked it! Here’s my reflections on how things went:

***

“Saints Above!”—I love a good farce, and I wish I was better at writing them. I really love what Paul did with this story—I mean, aside from the audacity of a light comedy about death and formaldehyde, the prose and dialog and characters were just fun and sprightly. And if there isn’t a St. Sqwirl … well, as a good Catholic I can’t say there ought to be. But the canon would be a much more lighthearted place if there were one. ;)

Overall, this was the story that gave me the most problems in the writing process. I wasn’t sure I could do justice to Paul’s opening chapter, and so I wound up taking a quick left turn onto the earthly plane. I tried to keep things light, but I’m afraid I didn’t quite get the tone right no matter what I did. The comedy wound up darker—but that’s the kind of humor I generally have, so maybe I shouldn’t be too surprised. I think the others did an admirable job saving Paul’s lovely story from my clumsiness.

“Autophobia: A Love Story”—Last round I had a story I knew in full and I posted the first segment to see what would happen to it. This time around I had a chapter and a basic premise and nothing else—nothing plotted, nothing in mind for the ending, nada. And I actually think the result was much stronger, as it was more open ended and gave the other writers more to work with by doing less.

I’ve never made it a secret that I’m a huge fan of Harlan Ellison’s, and so it’s no surprise that I reference him from time to time in my own work. This story is actually something of a homage to him, as my opening chapter references the stories “Shatterday,” “Lonelyache,” “All the Birds Come Home to Roost, and “Erotophobia” (hello, title). The story wound up going its own way in short order, and I really liked how it layered itself as things went along and each writer upped the ante a little more. The end was actually tough for me to write, as I had too much good stuff that didn’t really fit the tone of what had gone before. I had a great bit where Warren winds up getting mobbed in the park after the old lady tackles him, and then has to escape from about 20 women chasing him down the street. It was like something out of Buster Keaton. And the ending was originally going to be the goddess Athena basically telling him, “stop being such a douche to women, you douche to women you,” but that just didn’t have the oomph I wanted. Ellison to the rescue again! Harlan wrote a story called “Lonely Women Are the Vessels of Time” wherein the main character, an autophobic, predatory Warren type for sure—gets his comeuppance from a succubus. I made some major changes (in Ellison’s story the victim survives and has to live with having had the tables turned on him), darkened it up considerably, and got an ending that made me happy. Of the two stories I’ve done with the group so far, this is the one I’m most satisfied with.

”Nan’s Journey“—Fourth wall? What fourth wall? Seriously, Richard (coyotesqrl) pretty much explodes the concept from the get go, and the rest of us came in and stomped the debris into dust. And then Richard came back, looked at the dust, and painted a mustache on it. Which is a roundabout, metaphorical way of saying that I loved everything about this story. It was just funny and fun and flippant and fantastic from start to finish.

Half the fun of writing this way is in following up the other writers’ chapters with something that will not only respond to what they’ve posted, but also set up for the next writer. Well, in a case like this were there are few rules and someone literally tosses the character to you (and yes, Paulos actually sent me the Google Wave message he describes in the story, a moment so delightfully meta it is like a mobius strip of self-reference), it is a remarkably liberating thing, and the rules—even the few that were in place before you got there—go completely out the window. Between the great setup Paul gave me, and the knowing, well-realized smartass of a character Richard created, I was inspired to work on a different level, to play more and be willing to be goofy, and to really play around with convention. I loved the idea that I was writing a character who wasn’t about to take any shit from me … right up until I threatened to sacrifice her to Big Wu. :) And yes, my wife and I really did cut our wedding cake with a replica of Bilbo’s sword Sting. We’re just that awesome.

”Choking”—I love audacity in a writer, and that’s something monkeyfrog brought to the table in spades. I remember reading her opening chapter of this story, going back, reading it again, and thinking: Damn. And then, when her closing chapter came around and she finished things off, I did the exact same thing. I don’t think there was a single point at which she did not do the unexpected thing, take the unexpected turn, or drop a bomb where I least expected to find one. Nothing evidences this better than the story’s end, which steadfastly refuses to bow to sentimentalism or to be sympathetic. It does so well at this that I was caught off guard the first time I read it, and then when I went through it a second time I thought it was a stroke of goddamn genius. One of the twists I really loved was finding out the real identity of the assailant, what a surprise it was, and how well it still worked in the context of what we had all written leading up to the revelation. That takes talent.

My chapter—the grave-digging sequence and the narrator’s escape—was difficult for me to write. First because of a history of domestic abuse in my childhood; writing the chapter led me to revisit some things I’d put behind me a long time ago, and which were tough for me to revisit. Second, because once I finally got a handle on it, I got greedy and didn’t want to stop. I kept coming up with more I wanted to do—okay, now I need to get her to the highway, and then I need to do this, and then that has to happen, and … And I wound up having to stop myself and say, no. Draw a line and leave something for someone else. And I think it’s a measure of how well we’re coming to know each other as writers that coyotesqrl came along and wrote almost exactly what I had in mind. Another thought: in a way, the unremitting darkness of this story was as liberating as the fourth-wall-breaking had been in “Nan’s Journey.” It freed me to write some gritty stuff—the bit with the rock, the spadefuls of dirt—and it was a challenge to see how far I could go with it. Overall, I was satisfied with how it came out.

“King of the Sandlot“—I wanted to pitch baseball more than anything else when I was in high school. I had a murderous fastball and a semi-decent curve, but because of previously-mentioned home issues and then a shoulder injury on the rings in gymnastics (double dislocation and rotator cuff tear when my inverted pike turned into an inadvertent 360-degree AAAAARRRRRRRGGGHHHHHH!!!), I was never able to make the team. So Billy Joe’s story has a particular resonance for me. Maria’s idea would be a standard sports story trope save for two things: the deftness of her writing, and her uncanny grasp of character. There is not a moment in her writing that rings a false note, and because of this she makes it easier for all of us to follow her.

I’ve always felt that writing a short story requires a certain discipline, for the most part—setting and character should be established in the first few hundred words, conflict established within the first one to two thousand words, conflict deepened by four thousand, with a climax and resolution to follow, total length seven or eight thousand words, maybe ten thousand if you have a particularly involved story. There are experimental stories, such as “Nan’s Journey,” which confound, parody, and actively flout those conventions—and which are great learning experiences for any writer—but by and large when I’ve come at my individual chapters for this project I’ve tried to keep those basic ideas in mind. So when I wrote chapter three I knew: conflict should be introduced here. And so I did that, and complicated Billy Joe’s life by making his sports aspirations hang on his grades. I even left the writers following me an out—the teacher was a baseball fan, establishing that she might help him get a tutor, which thanks to Richard, happened just as I surmised it would. He also deepened the conflict by making the love interest the tutor and getting Billy Joe into a state of mental higgeldy-piggeldy. Lots of good stuff to work with there, leading to lots of options for a satisfactory climax and resolution.

And then monkeyfrog killed off Billy Joe’s parents.

Remember what I said about audacity before? Yeah. It takes guts to drop an added twist of that magnitude that late in a narrative. And Maria came back and wrote a strong, powerful Chapter Six. She has another chapter on the way, I believe, to bring Billy Joe’s tale to a close. And now the closure of that story is going to be a hell of a lot more meaningful and poignant than it was, because monkeyfrog dared to do something different, and turned a good story into something that is in my opinion a lot more powerful.

I got to thinking about this because I never saw this coming. I would never have dreamed of doing it myself. And that was an eye-opener to me, as much as the work I did on “Limbs Akimbo” in the last story-cycle did was. It made me realize that I was a little hidebound in my thinking about storytelling, and that maybe next time I needed to loosen things up a little and not be afraid to do something that doesn’t exactly fit the standard storytelling method. Because this was a lesson to me that, while there can be value in convention, there is sometimes just as much—if not more—value in defying it. Because if all we did was the conventional we would never be surprised.

***
As I said, I think Maria has one more chapter to go, and the others have their reflections to post as well, so that’s coming up. After that, round three!

Nan's Journey - final thoughts

For round two, I wanted to write something a little different that would challenge my fellow writers to work in an unusual narrative structure and still be fun for the audience. I think we succeeded in making “Nan’s Journey” a fun story to read. I know I had a lot of fun each week seeing how everyone else was finding a way to fit (or not, as the case turned out to be) their styles to the story at hand and I thought the story was well served by everyone.

One of the goals I set for myself in the first chapter of this story was to lay down a clear blueprint for everyone to follow. I had been a little disappointed in round one when my story took an unexpected dark turn and I wanted to protect against that by constraining everyone in a strict story structure. Which is just plain stupid. I can’t on the one hand want us to be challenging each other in new ways and on the other expect my fellow writers to behave like glorified secretaries. In retrospect, it was only the tonal shift in round one that bothered me, not any narrative shifts.

So this time, when the intentionally by-the-numbers Hero’s Journey plotting I started in the first chapter got dropped in subsequent chapters, I didn’t care. And then when Paulos picked the story up, shook, bent, folded, and spindled it…I literally cheered out loud.

His choice to blur the line even further between the story and our reality took “Nan’s Journey” from cute and clever to another level. It also retroactively smoothed over the slight style differences between each of the prior narrators, freeing himself and Jay to really insert their own voices and themselves into the story in an organic and funny way. As this implied a gradual breakdown between the real and story dimensions, I probably should have expanded upon that in my closing chapter. Thinking back on the story now, that’s one of the ways I definitely failed it. At the time, I was so focused on the plotting of that final chapter - making as many of the story threads come together in a satisfying way as possible - that I missed an opportunity to engage Nan more directly.

I also think I came up short at the end, finishing Nan’s final confrontation far too quickly. In my defense, it was very late at night and the chapter was already over 2000 words. I decided to punt a bit and don’t believe the story was hurt too much, but on a second draft I’d almost definitely extend that fight and then stop the story even more abruptly after her victory.

• Chapter 1
• Chapter 2
• Chapter 3
• Chapter 4
• Chapter 5
• Chapter 6

King of the Sandlot - Chapter 6

Previously…

Billy Joe Danforth didn’t catch many of the details of his parents’ accident until later. Janice the social worker continued to talk, but he didn’t hear a word. There was a roaring sound in his ears, like he was sitting under a waterfall. He looked down at her hand covering his. On her middle finger was a sapphire ring. The back of her hand had two lumpy blue veins that crisscrossed over her knuckles, making a shape like an X. Her hands look old but her face doesn’t, he thought to himself. He noticed the clock on the wall. Fifteen minutes past four. Seven and a half degrees ago, everything was still the way it used to be.

Janice stopped speaking mid-sentence and watched the boy’s face. He didn’t notice the silence. He simply continued to stare at the wall, fat, greedy tears silently coursing down his cheeks.  She made a decision.

“OK, honey. Let’s get some hot food in that belly of yours.”

Janice drove Billy Joe to his house. It looked just like it had that morning, except for the empty driveway. She told him to shower and change and then come down for supper.

“Yes, ma’am.”

Then she set about organizing a meal. In Mrs. Danforth’s fridge she found a platter of fried chicken and a freshly made bowl of German potato salad. She put the chicken in the oven, made some iced tea and set the table.

Billy Joe ate in silence.  Janice knew it didn’t change anything, but it felt right to let him come home tonight. Eat his mother’s food.

This sort of thing was not in any job description. But hers was a small town and she did what she wanted. That night she slept sitting up in Mr. Danforth’s favorite chair, her hands folded simply in her lap.

“The boy,” she said to herself, “should have one last night in his own bed.”

Upstairs, he stared at the ceiling for a very long time.

The weather was beautiful the day Billy Joe buried his parents. Warm and just the perfect amount of breeze. The sun beat down on his shoulders and his skin felt alive for the first time since that awful moment in the library.

Billy Joe barely noticed, because he was too busy staring at his shiny new black shoes, but nearly everyone he’d ever known in his entire life showed up at his parents’ funeral. Ladies from church, kids from both baseball teams, nurses from the hospital where Momma volunteered, teachers from school and the sheriff and all his deputies.  Even Sally Jessup and Paula Lansing were there, quiet for once and looking solemn.

Suzy was there too, of course. Afterwards, when the minister was finished and people started to stand, she tried to get through the crowd to the front row, but her feet got stepped on and she didn’t really know what to say anyway, so she blushed and left. Miss Henton and Coach Willingham did manage to speak to him, separately.  All he could hear was that sound like rushing water.

The funeral was on a Saturday. On Sunday morning, he woke up in his new bed at Mr. and Mrs. Garrison’s place in town.  Mr. Garrison drove him out to his parents’ house one last time. He had already cleaned out his own room. Today they were collecting his bike. They tied it to the roof of the car. Then Mr. Garrison told Billy to go ahead and go inside by himself for a minute if he wanted.

So he did. It was awful quiet in there. He found himself standing in the middle of the kitchen, entranced by the column of sunlight pouring in through the window over the sink. On the glass there was a little plastic suction cup with a hook, and from the hook hung a stained glass hummingbird. He picked it up, wrapped it handkerchief and slid it carefully into his pocket.

Then he left the house, closing the front door carefully behind him.

That night, before he got down to the business of trying to sleep, he let his mind wander.  He thought about Mr. and Mrs. Garrison and how he liked them well enough, even if they were a bit old. He thought about school tomorrow and hoped people didn’t ask any questions. He remembered Janice smiling at him from the other side of his mother’s kitchen table.  Most of all he went over that last morning at home. He wanted to remember every detail, but he couldn’t quite recall the last words he had said to his mother.

He was sure, though, that he had not kissed her goodbye.

Billy’s eyes were still pink and puffy and his throat was a little raw. He felt like he’d been crying for years. He couldn’t cry anymore right now, not because he was any less sad, but because he was a lot more tired. Exhaustion finally overtook the whirlwind in his head and he slept. He slept hard, and he dreamed of Momma. She played with his hair and kissed his freckly cheeks. She stood at the kitchen sink, her face bathed in sunlight. She stood up in the bleachers, watching him pitch. She sat next to him on his narrow bed, put the palm of her cool hand on his feverish forehead, and handed him two Tylenol and a glass of water. Then she tucked him in and read to him, never mind that he was too old for that.

The Garrisons were not related to the Danforths by blood. Mrs. Garrison had been a friend of Billy Joe’s grandmother.  They’d been high school classmates, and three times they had made a quilt together and then entered it in a contest at the State Fair. If you asked Mrs. Garrison why she’d taken Billy Joe to live with her, she’d tell you two things. First, she’d insist you call her Nancy. Then she’d explain that she had simply known it was what she was supposed to do. No way would she sit back and leave the fate of that poor child to strangers.  It was only three and half more years until he was finished with high school, and then he should go to college.  Once they sold his parents’ house, there would be money for him to go, even if he didn’t get a baseball scholarship. Nancy was a retired schoolteacher who had never had her own children. While Billy Joe slept in the guest room that was no longer a guest room, her husband listened to her talk about the boy’s future and knew there was no sense arguing. Her mind was made up. Besides, Billy Joe was well-mannered and polite and obviously used to doing a fair share of chores. It will be nice to have him in the house, thought George. Lord knows my wife needs a project.

Weekly wrapup - Round 2, the final chapters.

Saints Above!

My heavenly tale reaches a happy end for all our Saints.  Well, almost all.

Autophobia: A Love Story

Oledoc finishes things off for Warren.  I told you I saw this one geting creepy!

Nan’s Journey

Nan ends up back where she started as Coyotesqrl ends at the beginning and goes on till he comes to the end: then stops.

Choking

Monkeyfrog burns down the house and leaves a mess.

King of the Sandlot

Monkeyfrog’s callous killing of the main character’s parents has traumatised poor Piscesinpurple resulting in a slight delay to the conclusion of this tale.

Edit - and now the final chapter has arrived! Get it while it’s hot.

***

For Round 3, two of our regulars will be taking a (hopefully short-lived) break.  We’ll be welcoming back a snarky old-timer as well as bringing in a new chef.  We’re aiming to get going again around Thanksgiving.  In the meantime there will be some thoughts about Round 2 going up.

We’ll keep stirring the pot and hope you continue to enjoy the morsels we’re serving.

Cheers.

Paulos.

Choking - The Finale

Previously

I woke up again, not knowing what day it was. I remembered where I was this time, though, and why. I stared out the window, squinting into the sunlight. It was that thin sunlight you only see on a frigid winter day, reflected off of the snow. I was warm, and I felt like I needed to brush my teeth and shower. I must be getting better.

A nurse’s aide limped into the room with her blood pressure machine. “Good to see you awake, doll.” She checked my vitals and asked if I needed anything. “I think I need to get the hell out of here.” She laughed, and so did my visitor. My head snapped around so fast I thought was going to break my own neck.

“Hi honey. Nice to see you feisty again.” He smiled at the aide as she shuffled back out of the room.  “I was worried about you. You look so small in that bed.” I could not believe my eyes. I growled under my breath, “What the fuck are you doing here, you prick? Shouldn’t you be with your attorney working on stealing my money?”

“Now, now. I know you’ve been through a lot. I want you to know I’m here for you. Your dad’s funeral is tomorrow. I’m sure everyone would love to see you there.” So he was killed on that highway, I thought. Served him right, motherfucker. He tried to kill me! Why couldn’t these people just let me walk away? “Where is my mother?” I had to know. Why wasn’t she sitting here, at least pretending to care?

“Well, honey. I’m afraid your mother won’t be coming.” I sighed. “That figures. At least she’s being honest for once. I won’t have to act like she isn’t pretending to worry.” My soon-to-be-ex-husband smiled. His face lit up like the serial killer version of a Cheshire cat. “Unfortunately, your mother won’t be pretending anything anywhere. She had a run-in with your father just before you did. Didn’t I mention it will be a double funeral?”

My jaw dropped. This was unbelievable. I looked into his eyes, and he smirked. He had me at a disadvantage once again, just where he loved to keep me. “Wait. How did she die?” I couldn’t understand how Dad could have killed Mom, hidden in the dark living room waiting for me, and then chased me down and dug a hole to bury me in. He was 70 years old, for chrissakes. Yes, he was strong, but come on. Who can do that?

Daniel’s eyes twinkled as he searched my face. “Well sweetheart, it seems dear old dad put a stake through her heart and left her in the basement. An inglorious end, to be sure, especially for such a proper lady.” He could barely contain his glee. “A what? You mean like a vampire stake? Are you serious? Oh God.”

He changed the subject, looking angry. “You know damned well that money doesn’t really belong to you, anyway. It belongs to all of us. You used us to write that fucking book. You humiliated us, and you made a fortune from it. Now look what you’ve done.” His ears were turning red, so I pushed the call light.

My nurse came in. “I just got your discharge orders. Are you ready to get rid of that IV?” I nodded and held out my hand while shooting a look at the nurse’s face. “Please step out for a moment, would you?” She looked at Daniel and tossed her head toward the door. Once he was out, she asked if I was okay. “Yeah, “ I croaked. “I just want him to leave.” “No problem. I can help you with that.” The IV was out, gauze taped onto my hand and a list of discharge instructions lay on the table for me to sign.

The nurse firmly told Daniel it was time for him to leave, and asked if I had a ride home. I didn’t even know where I was going. She told me a cab would pick me up downstairs, gave me a hug, and told me to be good to myself. I walked out of the hospital holding back tears.

The house was silent. Of course it was. They were dead. I didn’t have much packing to do since I had only moved in a few weeks ago, and the plan was to stay for just a short time while I looked for a new place of my own.  I walked around the house looking at my parents’ things in a daze. I went to the basement. The concrete was blood stained. That was when the tears started.

I sat on the steps, sobbing. What would I do now? I had no one, not even people I despised. I needed to get away from this place. I had enough money, I just needed to pick a place to go, and go there. Once I made my decision, the tears stopped. I wiped my face on my sleeve, trudged up the stairs, printed out a map, and grabbed my things. I only took necessities. Most of my stuff was still at my house with Daniel, anyway.

The bags fit into the truck with no problem. I backed it out of the garage to let it warm up, stepped back inside, and closed the garage door. A last walk through the house convinced me I didn’t forget anything. I lit a cigarette, grabbed the quilt off of my bed, and took it to the kitchen. God, were my muscles sore. The quilt easily reached across the top of the gas stove into the gas can on the floor. Pouring gas all over the old quilt for good measure, I flipped my cigarette onto the floor, turned on a burner, and ran to my truck.

It was time for a road trip. Let someone else clean up the mess for a change.

Nan's Journey - Chapter 6, The Shocking Conclusion

Previously…

Nan listens at the door for the familiar sound of her Chucks squeaking against the tile, heading off to third period. She has a few hours to kill and needs to keep from running into herself; she decides to head to the library.

“You’re saying I need to hide? Or do I need to search for something there?”

I’ve already told you: I’m not your supernatural aid.

“Right, right. Hey, it’s you again.”

What’s this now?

“It’s you. From the first chapter. I recognize your voice. You like semi-colons a lot don’t you?”

How on earth can you hear a semi-colon?

“I think the better question is how can you pronounce them so very clearly. A little pretentious, aren’t you?”

What was it Jay said? That’s right. Be a good girl lest I drop you in a volcano somewhere. And don’t think the Big Woo is going to spit you out to live happily ever after with Tom Hanks, either.

“What are you talking about?”

Never mind.

Nan shoulders her backpack, heavy now with the items she’d accumulated on her journey, and heads to the school library. Small and poorly stocked, she’s only been a few times before. But it’s quiet and tucked in a quiet corner of the school, making it the perfect place to figure out her next move.

“Good morning. Can I be of assistance?” The rich baritone and lilting brogue gives Nan chills in places she doesn’t normally get chills and when she looks up at the man behind the reference desk she gets dizzy from his bluer-than-blue blue eyes.

Nan whispers, “Oh please! That’s embarrassing.”

I’m just reporting the facts, Nan.

“Quentin Quatermain, Librarian. How can I help you?” asks the librarian who looks like T.E. Lawrence, Henry II, and Don Quixote rolled into one tweed-clad, dashing package. He cocks his eyebrow and darts his intelligent eyes about the room inquisitively, as though seeking the source of a strange sound.

Nan swallows and licks her lips before responding, “I just need someplace quiet to…study.”

A wry smile crosses Quatermain’s face; he rounds the desk and leads Nan deep into the library. She barely notices the sparsely filled aluminum shelves as they walk by but when the utilitarian units are suddenly replaced with hand-crafted mahogany and leather-bound volumes she can’t help but take note. She certainly hasn’t seen this corner of the library before.

Quatermain shows her to a richly upholstered club chair, more at home in a gentlemen’s club than a school library. “You won’t be disturbed here.”

Nan drops her bag to the floor with a rattle and collapses into the welcoming cushions. She’s been running for hours and needs a break. A cup of tea and plate of cookies materializes on the table beside her (or were they already there?) and she gratefully replenishes herself.

After a while, she looks around and notices how very old and large the books are. It’s as though she’d—

“Is this your Buffy fantasy?”

What now?

“The British librarian, the—”

He’s Irish.

“Fine. The Irish librarian, the monsters, the books. Am I supposed to kill a vampire? Shouldn’t I have a wood stake or some holy water?”

You know, there were libraries before Buffy and books, too.

“Yeah, but you’re so derivative. I just figured—”

You figured wrong.

Nan sighs and picks up a book from the side table. Opening the cover she sees a corner of the yellowed title page is missing, rough edges marking where it was torn. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out the note. It’s a perfect match.

“So the note came from this book. Secrets of the Immortal by J. Pendergraft. Published in 1916. Huh.”

What?

“The vice-principal’s name is John Pendergraft. Wonder if he’s related.”

Nan flips to the introduction and learns that this purports to be a true account of the author’s quest for the Fountain of Youth. She chuckles to herself and starts reading. The author claimed to have found a map drawn by De Leon himself which he followed deep into the Louisiana Bayou. According to Pendergraft, all the rumors of the Everglades were spread by De Leon in order to keep others on the wrong track. Why he didn’t just keep the search for the Fountain to himself never seemed to have occurred to Pendergraft.

Skipping the many chapters chronicling his failures, Nan gets to the end where she reads about Pendergraft’s meeting with De Leon.

“Oh come on.”

I didn’t write it.

“So Pendergraft met Ponce De Leon and…and ‘he mocked me my foolishness. The Fountain is not a destination but a journey.’ What the hell?”

Nan glances at her watch, “I guess I should get going. Somewhere. I still don’t know who I’m saving, where I’m doing it, or what this stupid book has to do with it. Are you sure you can’t give me a little hint?”

Nope. But I can tell you that you should get going. You shouldn’t detain yourself much longer.

“You’re an idiot.”

Nan grabs her bag and heads to the big classroom where detention is held.

Coming around the corner, she spies Melvin, the obsequious Hall Monitor, patrolling the corridor outside detention with his yellow sash draped magisterially over his Boy Scout uniform. He marches twenty paces, turns crisply, and marches back the other way. Seeing Nan, he bares his teeth and runs toward her. Well, he “runs” as much as an obsequious Hall Monitor slash Boy Scout named Melvin can be expected to run. Which is to say he—

“Enough! What the hell do I do?” Nan rudely screeches at the poor narrator who is, after all, just doing his job.

Melvin’s eyes bug out of his head and he spits venom as he closes on Nan. She can see the very large, very clogged pores on his nose, he’s so close. He lifts his arms, hands in front of him at just the right height to choke Nan, as she pulls out…The Hall Pass. Melvin cries like a Shih Tzu who’d caught its nose in a mousetrap and runs right past Nan.

Putting the Hall Pass back in her bag, Nan jogs to the classroom door. Looking through the glass, she’s struck dizzy with deja vu. The memory of the shoe box and the faces it contained overlays the view through the glass. The faces are the same. Now she can see the expressions of terror on their faces and hear their plaintive cries for help.

“You like to hear yourself talk a lot.”

Nan opens the door and Gianni—

“Gianni? Isn’t he stuck back in—”

“Nan! You come for to save us! I was blind in the place after the fish place. And I think you are never to come back for me. I smoke all my cigarettes but you not come back. But now you are here!”

“That doesn’t make any sense. I mean, what’s the chronology here?”

A girl from Nan’s gym class distracts her inquisitions into temporal causality by yelling, “The door! Don’t let it close behind you!”

Nan quickly props a chair in the door. “Alright, I guess I’m here to save you. From detention? Let’s go.”

The room empties as the students rush the door while Nan stands guard. Three students remain: Gianni, Gordon Wedbetter, and Billy Joe Danforth.

“What’s the hold-up, boys?”

Gordon is still seated and Billy Joe’s bent down over his feet, struggling with something. He grunts, “I can’t untie them, Gordon.”

Then Nan sees. Someone’s tied Gordon’s shoelaces together, and to his desk, in a massive tangle of a knot with a size and complexity that don’t seem possible. Nan comes over and takes a look.

“Yep. That’s a massive tangle of a knot with a size and complexity that don’t seem possible. Gordon, what happened?”

Gordon’s voice breaks in fear as he answers, “Lexi did it. She’s always picking on me.”

“Can you slip your feet out of your shoes?”

“No. I’ve tried. Nan, he’s going to be back soon. You’ve got to help me.”

Nan tries lifting the desk to slide its leg out of the tangle but the knot is too tight. She makes a few half-hearted attempts at pulling it apart and gets a broken nail for her efforts.

“Goddamn!” She sucks her sore finger.

Remembering Sting, she reaches into her backpack and pulls out the short sword. With one quick slice she severs the knot, freeing Gordon.

“Right. Remember this sword isn’t very sharp?”

Right. Sorry. With many back and forth slices she slowly saws through the knot, freeing Gordon.

“Let’s get out of here.”

The quartet runs out the door, turns right, and sees The Custodian.

“Oh shit. Are you getting paid by the word?”

Billy Joe glances at Nan like she’s crazy but quickly refocuses on the advancing dragon. He pulls a bat from his bag and braces for the monster, standing back to back with Nan. Gordon and Gianni cower behind them. The hallway dead-ends a few yards behind them; there’s nowhere to go.

“Didn’t that hallway go through before?” Nan asks aloud.

Um, nope. Always been a dead-end. I’m sure of it.

Suddenly, light floods them from above as the ceiling opens up and Quatermain drops to the floor halfway between The Custodian and Nan. His tweed has been accessorized with a pith helmet, twin revolvers, and a bandolier. But it isn’t the weapons he brandishes. He reaches into his jacket and pulls out a silver flask. Calmly approaching the stalled Custodian, the daring librarian splashes the contents on the dire creature. It howls. It cringes. It winces. It throws its head back and laughs its cats in a disposal laugh and advances. Quatermain pats his pockets, looking for his lighter…

I say, he pats his pockets, looking for his lighter…

“Oh!”

Nan pulls the silver lighter from her pocket and tosses it to Quatermain. He calmly flicks it and sets the creature aflame. A cry like a thousand cats singing the Bulgarian National Anthem (do they have a national anthem? They must.) In reverse. At half-normal speed. Until The Custodian finally disintegrates.

“You’ve got a thing about cats. A phobia or something.”

No, no. Not at all. They just sound like…well, like that.

Shaking his flask, Quatermain finds he has one last nip left. He offers it to Nan who refuses like a good girl and swallows it himself. As he puts it away, Nan sees the same ‘Q’ and ornate curlicues as on the lighter. A matched set.

“Well, that was all quite anti-climactic.”

I don’t know what you mean.

Nan sighs and leads the disheveled group - all but Quatermain, who looks like his clothes were freshly pressed - down the hall to freedom.

“That doesn’t seem anti-climactic to you?”

Just then, Pendergraft comes around a corner right in front of Nan. He’s cracking apart like an egg; it’s been too long since his last feeding.

“Feeding?”

He needs to absorb the lifeforce of others to keep his unnatural body alive.

“See! It is your Buffy fantasy. He’s a vamp—”

As the cracks spread, blinding light streams out. Everyone turns their heads in agony, trying to shield their eyes from the searing brightness. Nan, being an old hat at all of this by now, pulls the sunglasses from her bag and puts them on. She watches the scene as the others drop to their knees in pain. What she sees is horrifying and fascinating.

“It looks like lava, sort of.”

Or molten metal.

Pendergraft stumbles toward Nan but she sidesteps him. He spins and comes at her again, missing again. This time he goes toward Billy Joe who can’t see to escape his clutches. He extends his arms to give the young ballplayer a deadly embrace, heat radiating from the expanding cracks. Pendergraft’s molten core roils beneath the surface.

Nan pulls a fire extinguisher from the wall and aims it at the vice-principal. She pulls the pin and lets loose a fog of compressed CO2. Steam and vapor fill the hallway, finally blinding even Nan, but she keeps her hand on the trigger until no more comes out. As the fog clears, she sees the result.

Pendergraft’s skin and clothes have blistered away; all that remains is a rough stone statue, naked and still radiating warmth. The others open their eyes and blink to adjust. Billy Joe finds himself inches away from the outstretched arms and jumps back in shock. But the fight is over.

“That’s it? It’s really over this time or have you got yet another monster around the corner?”

Nope. That’s it. All done. Finito.

“You’re weird.”

Thanks for playing, Nan. You’ve been a sport. See you around.

Autophobia: A Love Story: Conclusion

Previously

“Where are you, you bitch?” Warren whispered. His eyes darted around, left, right, even up and down. he stood and turned in a circle. “Where are you?” he whispered again. Nobody seemed close enough to have left the newspaper. Aside from the joggers on the path (the women, looking at him, their eyes hungry, their mouths predatory, slowed down as they passed him), there was nobody nearby at all.

So who the fuck is doing this? Elves? Aliens? Claude Rains?

His phone signaled a text message. Warren froze. 

No. No, goddamn it. Enough of this. I’m not going to look.

Even as he thought it, his hand was pulling the phone out of his pocket and he was opening his inbox. He glanced around again while the message came up.

Dude, where U been? Thought u’d b at the clubz last nite. Call me! Joe.

He let out a long hissing sigh.

The phone dinged at him again. A new message came up, sender unknown:

savage ecstasy overflow
solitude in rust and smoke
secret shackles broken
senses reborn trembling
thirst hunger water flesh
merging
enmeshed
bathed with voracious joy
pure clarity alive
inexorable oneness

”Fuck!” he said. An elderly man gave him a disapproving glare, but Warren didn’t notice. He was frantically pushing buttons on his phone, trying to pull up the number of the phone that had sent the message to him.

There wasn’t one. The most recent person to contact him was Joe, according to the inbox list.

That’s not possible. Not. Fucking. Possible.

“Who are you?” he snarled. “Who the fuck are you?!”

A hand fell on his shoulder. He turned around and saw a blue police uniform. Inside the uniform was a police woman. She was plain looking, and eyed him with concern—not to mention dawning lust—in her green eyes.

“Is everything okay, sir?” she said. “You seem a bit distressed.”

Warren cackled. It sounded more than a bit desperate. “Distressed, she says! Oh lady, you have no idea. And before you ask: No, I do not want to help you stress test your handcuffs in the back seat of your cruiser.”

Her face fell. For a second he wondered if she was going to arrest him.

Then she said, “But I promise I won’t lose the key … “

Warren backed away, then turned and ran, looking over his shoulder to make sure the cop wasn’t following him. He got fifty yards before someone crashed into him and they both tumbled to the path in a tangle of arms and legs. Warren tried to disengage himself for a moment, then realized the arms were actually tangled around his legs … and he understood he’d been tackled.

Oh God.

“Jeez Mister, I’m so sorry!” said a raspy female voice as the arms unlocked themselves. The woman who’d tackled him helped him to his feet. “I don’t know what made me do that! I just saw you running from the cop, and, I dunno, I thought—I dunno what I was thinking, I just—”

She stopped as she got a good look at his face. “Heeeeyyyy, you’re cute. You wanna go get a drink?”

The woman was 80 years old if she was a day. This was never going to end. This was Hell—that was it, he’d died in his sleep and he was in Hell or something and this was how he was going to spend the rest of Eternity.

“Um,” he said, “um, I have to go, I really do.”

“You feeling okay, honey?” You look all pale, like you’re gonna faint! I could help bring you back around, if you know what I mean … “

Warren screamed and ran again. This time he made it out of the park without being tackled.

***

He came home after dark, sticking to the shadows, practically sneaking into his own home. Which was hard to do when you were drunk off your ass. The sidewalk kept wanting to be someplace else, and climbing stairs? Forget it. He felt like he should have hired a Sherpa.

Warren had spent the afternoon hiding out in one of the nastiest dive bars in the city—the kind of place that smelled like year-old Budweiser, week-old urine, and ninety-year-old grandfather. It was a place where they had cockroach races on the pool table in between games. It was dark and dank and nasty, and no woman would be caught dead in there. In short, it was perfect. If he got out of this with his skin still on, Warren owed his texting buddy Joe a debt of gratitude for telling him about it.

The bartender took a c-note in exchange for a bottle of Jameson’s, a dark corner, and no questions asked, and Warren spent the next few hours getting blind. Once it was dark he staggered out to the street, dodged the affections of three women and two gay men, managed to pour himself into a cab and get back to his block. And now here he was, fumbling with his keys and thinking he probably should have eaten something tonight. Instead he was knocked out loaded, and in half an hour or so he had a feeling the idea of food would become purely an academic one.

Warren staggered through the door, then crashed into and proceeded to have an argument with his coat rack. After a minute he called it a draw, and managed to disentangle himself. He got the door closed, felt around for the wall switch, found it. Light stabbed into his eyes, blinding him for a moment. Warren stood (well, swayed) there and waited for his eyesight to adjust, then turned around and headed for the kitchen. He wondered what would be waiting for him on the fridge now. Another poem? A photograph? A printout of his birth certificate?

But there was nothing new on the freezer door—just the same poem that had been there last time.  It was … almost disappointing, in a masochistic sort of way. Warren grabbed a glass from the dish rack, filled it with tap water, and wandered back into the living room, sipping it and wondering how the hell he was going to get to work tomorrow with this shit going on.

The woman was seated on his couch. Drunk as he was, he would have sworn she had not been there when he’d passed by before.

The glass of water slipped from his hand and fell to the floor, soaking the carpet and his socks.

“Hello there,” she said.

It was her. Reneé.

“Bet you wish I’d stayed to make you breakfast now,” she grinned.

He stared at her.

“What, nothing to say? Not even a threat to rip my head off? Hmph. They don’t make lotharios the way they used to.”

”Who the fuck are you!” he shouted. “What the fuck are you doing to me!”

“That’s better,” she said, and stood up. Long waves of auburn hair fell to her shoulders, framing her heart-shaped face. Her curvy figure, which had so aroused him a few nights ago, shifted suggestively under the tight red dress she wore. He could tell she wore nothing underneath it.

She advanced on him, looking him directly in the eye every step of the way. Warren tried to back away—and became aware that he was frozen to the spot. He tried to move, but couldn’t—he was rooted there, like a hypnotized bird. His heart was a trip-hammer in his chest.

“Did you enjoy it?” she purred as she strolled up to him. “Did you like finding out what it’s like for a woman? All the staring, the leering, the chasing, the feeling like you can never be safe no matter where you go?”

“Fuck you,” he spat.

“Ah-ah-ahhh, you already did that, dear,” she said. “I don’t give second chances to my chosen … men.”

She leaned in close, and licked her lips. “Poor thing. So confused, so frightened. So out of your depth. And every time I put a new poem up, or found some new way to startle you, it just got worse. Oh, you poor little autophobic. So in love with yourself, yet so afraid of being alone with yourself, burying yourself in woman after woman just so you don’t have to spend the night alone. Wanting us, yet hating us for making you want us. Such an empty, worthless, sad little life.”

“What are you?” he whispered. He’d never been so frightened in his life.

In answer, she touched a finger to his cheek—cold, that finger was, the nail sharp, like ice and razorblades. He didn’t remember her being that cold when they’d made love a few nights ago. She trailed the finger down his face, to his lips, then to his chin, and then to his throat. She drew the finger back—it was slick with his nervous sweat. She licked it off with her crimson tongue, and made a deep, sensual moan of pleasure in the back of her throat. The sound of it completely unmanned him; he began to tremble through his paralysis.

“I have many names,” she said, the tip of her finger still in her mouth. “In Greek mythology I am called Maenad. In Japan, Shikome or Hone-onna. In Ethiopia I walk in dreams and I am called Vandella. The ancient Jews called me Na’amah. They say I’m an aspect of Lilith, though I can’t say I ever met the lady. I’m not that old.”

“I—I don’t—” Warren began, but she waved him to silence.

“I know you don’t,” she replied. “Nobody does any more. I don’t know what they teach you in school, but obviously they’re ignoring some things. Here’s a name you might be more familiar with: succubus.”

Warren’s thoughts caromed and ricocheted off of one another. “Bullshit,” he said, without much force, “vampires aren’t real.”

Yeah? said a voice in his mind. Then why can’t you move, dumbass?

She leaned in close, and nipped at his upper lip. “Silly boy—who said anything about vampires? They really don’t teach the mythological stuff any more, do they? A succubus isn’t a vampire; we don’t feed off of blood. A succubus is a demon. Your blood is the last thing I want.”

“What—what do you want?” Warren whispered.

Her lips stretched into an unnaturally wide smile, showing more teeth than a human being was supposed to have. His heart raced faster. A small whimper escaped his throat. A small moan of pleasure escaped hers.

“Your fear,” she purred. “Why else would I have been trying so hard to scare you? Why else would I have marked you with a spell that makes you irresistible to women? You were so easily unmanned. And the women!” She clapped her hands and laughed like a child. “I can’t remember the last time I giggled so much. Especially with the locksmith. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a lonely person as you in my life. And I’ve been around a long time, dear.”

“Leave me alone,” he said. “Why couldn’t you just leave me the fuck alone!”

“Ohhhh, delicious,” she said, and licked her lips. “And it’s really not an option, my lovely. Not now. It’s like asking a lioness if she wouldn’t like a nice salad instead of the wounded gazelle she’s been tracking. Simply not going to happen.

“That’s not what predators do, you see. We feed on the weak and the sick, and make the herd stronger. And you, o man, are weak. Afraid of being alone with yourself, and of your own loneliness—yet unwilling to commit to anyone who might take that loneliness away. Sad, really. You’re a very handsome guy. But you’re all water—and shallow water at that—and no substance. Weak. Unfocused. Unwilling. Unable. Isolated from the herd. A perfect target for predators. And you are mine, my lovely. My tasty prey.”

She ran her ice-razor finger down his cheek again, and this time when she drew it back it was wet with tears. He didn’t even know he’d been weeping. She looked down at her wet finger, then back up into his eyes, and she smiled that too-wide smile again. Her tongue flicked out, longer and more serpentine this time, and licked the salty liquid up.

“Mmmmm,” she said. “You know, I could have strung you along for a week, maybe two, fed off your paranoia just to whet my appetite and make it sharper. I have sisters who do that kind of thing all the time. Just kept you going until you were a nervous wreck, not sleeping at night, climbing the walls and shouting at your mother when she called you because you were convinced it was me … but no. I’m just not capable of that.”

“Why?” he breathed. It’s a dream, he thought, it’s a dream, it has to be a dream, oh Christ please let it be a fucking dream …

“Well, I could lie to you,” she replied, “and say I’m just too compassionate to see you suffer. But I’m not much of a liar, either.”

Her grin got wider still, and her features began to melt and run like candle-wax.

“The truth is,” she chuckled in a voice like molten lava, “I’m too much of a glutton to do anything but wolf down my food.”

His bladder let go. When he felt it happen he knew it was not just a nightmare, and his throat began to tear itself apart with rough, jagged screams.

She took him in her arms and began to feed, lips locked to his in savage mockery of a kiss. For a moment he tasted creme de menthe on its tongue, and heard the sound of sirens howling their way uptown in the background as his drink-addled senses whirled. Everything afterward was a blur of pain and fear and screams—and finally, the grace of oblivion.

She let the lifeless husk of his body drop to the floor. The body would be found sooner or later; after the autopsy the coroner would call it a heart attack for lack of any other rational explanation. By then she would have moved on to a new name, and a new city, and new prey. And she would forget this one, as she had forgotten all the others. She didn’t even remember his name now.

Not that it mattered. They all had the same name. And every one of them tasted alike in the dark.

THE END

Saints Above - Chapter 6

Previously.

Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi.

Newton’s third law has much wider implications when it comes to interactions between this world and the next. Unfortunately, St. Sqwirl’s flagrant disregard for Interworld Supplicant Protocols had resulted in things getting somewhat out of kilter.  While our trio of Saints were working to improve Amos’ lot, denizens of the Nether Realms were also exercising a degree of influence over the earthly plane. For fear of distressing those of a sensitive disposition nothing has been said of this thus far and further mentions shall be kept to a minimum.

As you know, small doses of formaldehyde are harmless to living humans (and dead ones for that matter). Indeed, it is produced naturally in the human body and can be found in such things as diet soda. Amos, however, had been ingesting rather larger than normal amounts of the substance as a consequence of otherworldly interference.

Despite the lovely, warm day, Amos suddenly realised that he was shivering. His heart seemed to be beating far faster than it had any right to and he was having trouble breathing. He tried to call out to his family but no words would come. He started to lose his vision. And then he lost consciousness.

~

Meanwhile, back in Eternity, St. Dismas, St. Joseph and St. Sqwirl stared in horror at the Interworld font as they were confronted with the following error message:

The Supplicant cannot be found.

The Supplicant you are looking for might have been removed, had their name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.

Please try the following:

• If you typed the Supplicant’s name in the address bar, make sure that it is spelled correctly.

• Open the www.yourhvnlysource.com home page, and then look for links to the information you want.

• Click the back button to try another link.

• Click search to look for information on the Interworld.

HTTP: 666 – Supplicant not found

Interworld Explorer

After exchanging somewhat panicked looks our hapless Saints took off towards the New Arrivals Lounge at a great pace, robes flapping like a nun who’s inadvertently sat on a feather duster.

As you can imagine, word of the threesome’s exploits had spread far and wide throughout the Heavenly Realms, aided in no small part by St. Isidore who was an inveterate gossip. Some even suggested that this was the reason for her creation of the Interworld in the first place. St. Job had also been taking great delight in informing every passing Saint and Seraphim about the situation and was currently rolling around in a cloud bank, convulsed with laughter.

St. Patrick was most displeased at the thought of Guinness being brought into ill-repute, St. Jude, the Patron Saint of Lost Causes, wondered if it was possible to be a Patron Saint to our trio and St. Julian of Norwich tried to assure everyone that all would be well.

Upon reaching the New Arrivals lounge St. Sqwirl ran headlong into St. Rita, the Patron Saint of Baseball. St. Rita was comforting a recently deceased couple who had died in a tragic and bizarre car accident involving a monkey and a frog. St. Rita was assuring them that their newly orphaned son would be fine and that they would be able to keep an eye on his promising baseball career.

“So sorry, Rita!” said a rather flustered St. Sqwirl.

“No worries, Sqwirl,” replied Rita graciously. “I understand you have a somewhat pressing matter to attend to,” she said gesturing towards the Pearly Gates, a barely concealed grin on her face.

St. Sqwirl and his equally flustered friends looked over to where St. Rita had pointed and saw St. Peter engaged in conversation with St. Luke.

They approached St. Peter as though they had been sent to the Principal’s office, feet shuffling and heads downcast. St. Peter, Guardian of the Gates, had a fearsome reputation. Fortunately, he also had something of a softspot for those who were well meaning even if they did manage to make a cock-up of biblical proportions.

St. Joseph appointed himself SpokesSaint for the group and began trying to explain the circumstances. He had only managed to utter an incoherent “Um” when St. Peter silenced him with an authoratative raising of his left eyebrow (a habit he had picked up from watching far too many Roger Moore film and television appearances).

“No need to explain, Joseph. I have been fully appraised of the situation. St. Luke has been kind enough to offer me some assistance.” St. Peter nodded thankfully at St.Luke and indicated that the trio should look at the Interworld font which was stationed by the Gates.

They peered into the font apprehensively and saw a hospital room. Amos was hooked up to a life-support machine and all sorts of tubes were sticking out of him. His family were gathered by his bedside and an elderly priest slowly intoned the Last Rites. Suddenly, and most unexpectedly, Amos’ eyes opened wide and he gasped deeply. A weak smile spread across his face and cries of “It’s a miracle!” came from his family.

The scene faded from sight as St. Peter put the Interworld font into standby mode.

“Well, gentlemen, I trust we can put this matter behind us?” queried St. Peter sternly, albeit with a twinkle in his eyes.

“Yes, St. Peter,” came the sheepish replies.

After being dismissed St. Dismas, St. Joseph and St. Sqwirl made their way to the nearest tiki bar and ordered a round of drinks and felafels with a side-order of manna. They had just made themselves comfortabe when an SNT News report came on the television above the bar. Apparently a thief had been stealing metal items from pensioners and fencing them at a tinsmiths.

“Oooh,” exclaimed St. Sqwirl. “I think we should…”

“NO!” interrupted St. Dismas and St. Joseph simultaneously.

They promptly grabbed a passing cloud, fashioned it into a crate and unceremoniously stuffed St. Sqwirl inside. Sitting on the lid they reclaimed their drinks.

“Lttt mmm ttt ffff hrrrr!” said the crate.

“Did you hear something, Joseph?”

“Why no, Dismas.”

“Well then,” said St. Dismas raising his glass. “Here’s to Tinsmiths.”

“And here’s to Thieves,” said St. Joseph.

They clinked glasses.

“Mazel tov!”

King of the Sandlot - Chapter 5

Previously

Billy Joe must have dropped his papers and equipment five times as he left the library. He had never felt so flustered before in his life. He really wasn’t sure what to make of it. Sure, he knew he had a thing for Suzy, but he was an athlete! Why was he suddenly so clumsy?

As he rode his bike home, Billy Joe daydreamed about Suzy. Suzy in a tight sweater. Suzy sternly teaching him geometry lessons. Suzy cheering for him as he pitched a shutout game. A blasting horn jolted him out of his reverie and into a curb. He flew off of the bike and landed in the grass, humiliated. He quickly stood up, brushed himself off and looked around, hoping no one had seen him. A couple of grade-school kids had stopped playing driveway basketball to gawk, but he didn’t care about them. He straightened his handlebars with the front wheel between his knees, got back on the back and rode home.

Billy got home after dark, and after supper. His mother was not at all happy about it.  “Where have you been? Why didn’t you call? I’ve been worried sick.”

“Sorry Momma. The game went long and then I had to meet my tutor at the library.”

“Was he nice?”

“Who?”

“The tutor!”

“Oh! Uh, she was okay.”

“A girl math tutor! How about that? That’s great! Did she help you?”

“Well…” Billy looked at his dusty shoes. “She was kind of upset, because I was late. But then, yeah, she taught me something.”

“Billy, she is there to help you. Don’t be late again. Now go eat. I left everything on the stove so you can warm it up. Wash your hands!”

He washed his hands and left his shoes on. He and his mother both knew if he kicked them off now, dust would shoot out of the shoes and off of his socks, so it was better to wait until he showered. He nuked his food and sat at the table alone, daydreaming about Suzy. She was smiling at him while he sat in the dugout. His supper got cold but he finally finished it.

Billy walked out of the house with a slam of the screen door and put his bike and equipment in the garage. His last bike had been stolen, and his folks would be pissed if that happened again. He took his shoes and socks off on the back step, shaking the sandlot dust out of them and using his hands to sweep it off of his legs. He then tramped right through the dust to go back into the house, carrying it in on his feet.  He was 14, after all.

His mom was on the phone gossiping with a neighbor, so Billy hopped into the shower. He locked the bathroom door first. He was very shy about undressing and though his parents always knocked first, there was only one bathroom and he would just die if Momma came in by accident and saw him naked.

He stood in the shower and his mind drifted back to the game. He had kicked butt, and felt really good about it. Then the surprise of Suzy at the library was the icing on the cake. He felt himself stiffen when he went back over the day, and blushed in spite of being alone in the shower. He nearly choked when his mother knocked on the door, startling him.

“Hurry up, Billy. You’re using all the hot water!”

He answered hoarsely, finished up and turned off the valve. What the heck was going on with him? He had never thought about a girl more than he had about baseball. This was crazy. By the time he got dressed, his erection had deflated and he was able to walk out of the bathroom.

“Your daddy’s going to be late tonight, Billy Joe. Do you have homework?”

He didn’t have much work tonight, just a little reading and a short geometry worksheet. But Billy went to his room and re-read the whole chapter of geometry. He looked at the exercises he didn’t have to do, and worked them out as best he could. He wanted to impress Suzy tomorrow so she wouldn’t think he was just a dumb jock.

Billy Joe was on time for his tutoring session the next day. He still didn’t understand a lot of what was going on in geometry, but he was very motivated to impress Suzy. She seemed to like smart boys; maybe if he was a good ball player and smart, too, she would like him. In the middle of the tutoring session, a librarian came over to them.

“Billy Joe Danforth?”

“Yeah?” Billy’s heart started racing. This was weird. Why would the librarian be talking to him?

“Come on over here for a minute, Billy Joe. There is a police officer asking for you.”

Billy’s stomach dropped. What had he done? What was happening? Time started to slow down like it did when he was calming himself before a pitch. He felt himself go pale, and saw Suzy look after him with worry on her face.

“Billy Joe Danforth?” asked the officer. “Come sit down for a minute. I need to talk to you.”

“What is it? What’s happening?” Billy was close to tears with anxiety.

“There’s been an accident, Billy. Your parents were killed in a head-on collision.”

Billy gasped. He was shaking his head. His entire body was trembling and he thought he might throw up. “No, that can’t be right. I just saw them this morning. How do you know it’s my parents?”

“This is Janice, one of our social workers, Billy. She will give you the details and figure out what you need to do next, and where you will stay.”

“Oh my God.” Billy was whispering. His throat was too tight to speak normally. “Oh my God. This can’t be happening. How can this be happening?”

Janice took Billy’s hand, and he let her. He sat limply, while she explained that since he had no other kin, he would become a ward of the state. She was very nice and spoke gently, but Billy couldn’t really hear anything she said. Or at least, he couldn’t understand what any of her words meant.