The summer me, Benny, and Jo spent with my uncle Marty, turned out to be quite the eventful one. The idea to do so had been mine, as my uncle Marty lived in a big house that just happened to be quite close to the beach; and Marty and his wife were more than happy to host us, in exchange for a summer of helping Marty out at his successful seconds store.
The store was a warehouse-sized building, with an old, faded hand-painted sign that read: used furniture 4 sale, tacked up beside the front doors, that were always left open during the day, so any rubber-neckers could get a good look at the embarrassment of secondhand riches within, and maybe stop by.
The furniture, despite being pre-owned (as Marty called it), was very good quality, never decrepit or damaged. Some of it even bordered on antique level. Most of these were sourced from estate sales, storage box auctions, and the like. The best stuff was not sold in the store, but kept in the back for higher paying private customers.
Of course, there was more to Marty's store than just used furniture, there were lamps, knick-knacks, army surplus fare, and a metric ton of books, CDs, DVDs, VHS tapes, radios, VCRs, board games, and on and on. All used and all cheap.
The man himself was big, boisterous, and fond of tall tales that ended with "Gotcha!", once the listener was fully taken in. His wife, Margaret, was of the quiet and reserved type. In the evenings she would cook us fantastic meals as we would all sit at the dinner table, laughing and yattering about the happenings of the day and the news of the hour.
After dinner, the three of us would find our way over to the beach, and watch the sun go down amidst talk and play.
Benny and I were best friends since childhood, since my family's house and his were next door to each other; we were practically raised together. Benny was the tall man of the group, so much so that, by all rights, he should have ended up a football player in school; were it not for his professed hatred of football (much to his dad's dismay, and the bitter disappointment of our high school's coach).
Jo was a middle school era arrival. Pale, petite, and pretty, she had long blonde hair, worn in a constant ponytail. Something of a tomboy, she enjoyed wearing capri pants and blousy shirts; crowned with a jaunty beret.
Benny and I had the inevitable season of crushing on her, and competing for her affections. This season did not last long, however; as we were both disappointed with the soul-crushing: "Our friendship is too important for me to risk it with a relationship" line.
Disappointment did not linger long, for she was right about one thing: as a trio of friends, we were inseparable. Occasionally, Jo would invite one of her occasional boyfriends to join us on outing. It was always awkward for them, and the poor sap was inevitably the odd man out. They would never return for another excursion; as a group, anyway. The three of us together were too much of a three-headed monster it would seem.
Such were matters when we came to the event in question.
Jo was in the store section of the building, with Marty's other employee/nephew, Brian, tending customers; of which there were few that hot afternoon. Me and Benny were in the back part, with Marty, bringing in a new truckload of stuff he and his business partner had bought at an estate liquidation auction. Only the first half of the building space was customer accessible. Separated by a wall of bookshelves, the roped-off areas were employees only. This area was for items yet to be priced, and higher quality furniture to either be appraised, or sold privately.
Once we were done loading things off the truck, me, Benny, and Marty dropped ourselves down on a big luxurious sofa that was part of the stock, to recuperate. Marty's business partner took off in his truck again, on some other store errand. Jo showed up with a tray of iced teas, and distributed them. It was tea from the sun tea jar Margaret had prepared for us that morning; it had been sitting outside, soaking up the sun's rays all day. The ice was from the big box freezer Marty had in the store, filled with drinks, for hot days such as this one.
"Brian minding the store?" Marty asked Jo, as she pulled up a chair.
"Yup. There's only one lady there right now; and she made it crystal clear she was just here to 'look'."
"That's what they all say," said Marty, laughing to himself, "Until they start buying things! Right boys?"
Me and Benny laughed dutifully, Jo just smiled.
I suddenly remembered something Benny had told me about, the night previous, after talking with his mom on the phone. I tapped him on the shoulder.
"Hey! Tell Marty about the thing your mom wanted. Remember?"
"What thi---oh! Oh yeah!" he said, not sure how he, or I for that matter, had forgotten to mention it earlier. He turned to Marty.
"Yeah, ummm, my mom's sister, Patty, just brought a new house for her and her family, but they're still furnishing it. My mom promised to give her the nice dinner table set she inherited from their parents, which we had in our storage shed because we already had a dinner table set in our house when my grammy died. Thing is, it got scratched up something awful when my dad was moving some heavy things in there. Long story short, we need a dinner table that matches the chairs we already got. In my mom's words: 'something cheap that don't look cheap'."
Jo laughed at that one, "Is she trying to pull the wool over her sister's eyes?"
"Pretty much." Benny laughed in return, "My aunt Patty won't notice. She's a lovely, lovely person, but not the brightest star in the heavens, God bless'er."
"I'll be happy to give you a special employee rate," Marty said, "You have a picture, or something..."
"I remember what it looked like." Benny said, "I'm duly deputized to pick the table. My dad will pay and come for it when he can get my uncle Dale to lend him his pick up truck. So...in a few days." he noted, "Dale's sometimes hard to find."
We had finished our iced teas, and set them aside on a little side tray put there for that purpose.
"Well, we got some time," Marty said, getting up slowly, "I can show you some mid-priced tables right now. What was the wood type, Benny?"
"Almond." Benny replied. He got up as well, and the rest of us followed suit.
We spent the next ten minutes going over Uncle Marty's stock of cheap, but not cheap-looking, tables. As usual, when we were looking for something specific for someone, Jo came with us to help, but was inevitably drawn away by some book on a shelf, or some dresser topped with old knick-knacks.
At last a table was found that met the proper criteria of appearance and price. Marty was slapping a "RESERVED FOR" sign on it, and was fumbling with his pen to write Benny's name on it, when Jo called out from somewhere unseen.
"Hey! What's up with this?" she said, appearing from behind a bookshelf at a far corner we had not had to access heretofore.
Marty's head swiveled up with what could only be called alarm. "Don't mess with that, Jo! You have no need to be over there!"
This piqued our curiosity, mine and Benny's, as Marty had never raised his voice with us before. We, with Marty behind us, made our way over to where Jo had called from.
Like the artificial wall between the store and warehouse regions of the building, a massive bookshelf had been used to create a previously unseen (by us anyway) alcove.
A mangled brace of old, rusty bicycles had been set before it, like a gate. Inside was a small, beautiful table of dark cherry wood. It could sit four comfortably at all four sides, though it seemed to have no accompanying chairs.
Thin pixie that she was, Jo had slipped through the bicycle gate effortlessly, and was admiring the table.
Me and Benny got there, and between us, pulled aside the singular mass of bicycles, to allow entrance. Behind us, Marty lagged, calling out, "Don't touch that, honey! Leave it alone!"
"Why, is it like a super-antique, or somethin'?" Jo asked, "Why is it walled away here like a pariah?"
Marty reached them. He seemed calmer now that he could see that no one was touching the table.
"Oh it's old, alright." he said, "But that's not the reason it's set apart here, and that's not the reason it's passed through so many hands throughout the years that it's impossible to suss out the original owner. Lord knows I've tried."
"Why then?" I asked.
Uncle Marty's eyes searched the heavens, trying to find the proper words.
"It's weird." he said, "It's a strange effing table that inevitably freaks the wiggins out of whoever owns it to want to get rid of it. Present company included."
"How the hell is a table weird?!" I asked, "Is it haunted? Do ghosts appear above or below it and go 'wooooo'?"
"Is it cursed?" Jo added, clearly unbelieving where this story was going, "Do people mysteriously die around it?"
"UFOs?" was all Benny could muster at the moment.
"No, no! Nothing so dramatic..." Marty said, clearly pressed between either going all in, or backing away, "It's something simple. Something stupid. Something simple, stupid, and absurd, yet when you see it, it freaks you out to your core."
Me, Benny, and Jo leaned in for the reveal.
"It disappears." Marty said.
We all blinked stupidly at each other.
"What--what?!" Jo barked.
"From time to time, at random times, for no reason known to mortal man, this table disappears. It ceases to be. It puffs out of existence without sound or prelude, and anything on the table when it goes, goes with it."
"Where does it go?" asked Benny, with the slow measured tone of one speaking with a child, or a madman.
"God only knows," Marty replied, dead serious, "But sooner or later (by my information, five to ten minutes), it pops back into reality. Everything that went with it comes back, with...exceptions."
"Exceptions?" I asked.
"Cloth," Marty said, as if that made perfect sense, "For some reason cloth never returns, be it tablecloth or doily or handkerchief. Gone baby! And food, or anything organic; it does come back, but it comes back all gross and ruined, and smelling like rot."
I looked at Jo and Benny. It was obvious that none of us were buying this particular Uncle Marty patented tall tale; it was too goofy on the face of it. But it was certainly the most imaginative he had ever offered, and we were more than happy to play along.
"How did you get it?" I asked.
"It was sold to me under false pretenses, like most people in it's long history. When I saw with my own eyes what the table could do, I searched and found the man that had sold it to me. He fessed up easily enough, since he felt guilty about his deception. Together we compared notes and started seeking out and researching the table's history."
"Has anyone considered putting a camera on it...see where it goes?" Benny asked.
"I'm sure someone's thought of it, but I have seen no record of anyone actually capturing that video. You'd have to get lucky; it's pretty random. There can be stretches of up to three years between activity. I've owned it for two, and I've seen it disappear only once."
"Two years?" I asked, "What are you gonna do with it?"
"We don't want to just sell it again under false pretenses. We thought at first to destroy it, but God knows what powers are at work on that table, something catastrophic could happen. We were hoping to get it to someone with a scientific background, who might know how to handle it. But try getting anyone scientific to listen to your story about the mysterious disappearing table."
"So, has anything...alive...ever made that trip?" Jo asked. her lip quivering. I could see that she was trying very hard to control her jollity, but it was quickly coming to a boil.
"By our research, there are only two known incidents of something alive being on the table when the table did it's thing." Marty said gravely, as if he weren't imparting the silliest nonsense of his bullshitting career, "One of the farthest back owners that can be found put his beloved canary on the table mere seconds before it disappeared. When it came back, the feathers had fallen off, and it's little head had exploded."
Me and Benny almost exploded with laughter, I don't know how Jo managed to keep a lid on hers.
"The second incident, was much more recent," Marty went on, continuing to destroy us, "A man used the table to display his hamsters. He didn't actually see the table disappear until much later, but he saw the results. He said the hamsters looked like they all had been turned inside out, and their eyes had popped off. They were dead of course."
That final sentence tore it. Me, Benny, and Jo doubled over laughing and applauding.
"WELL DONE, UNCLE! Well done!" I shouted, clapping an arm on Marty.
It was then I realized, he still wasn't laughing. Nor was he going to any time soon.
Things happened quickly then, too quickly; though in my memory it seems to happen in exaggerated slow motion.
Benny was laughing, as was Jo who, in a sickeningly quick motion hopped over on the table and lay on it, in a coquettish pose.
Marty's eyes flew wide open, and he moved to grab her.
"Hey boys, wanna ri---" was all she managed to get out before the table disappeared, right then and there.
It came back soon enough, but the screaming, screeching, inside-out, bleeding yellow eyes thing that came with it, eventually had to be taken out of it's misery.
January 28, 2016
January 24, 2016
RUN
Long thin straps…my favorite kind.
The woman stands at a store front, window shopping. She’s an odd bird: forty-something, ugly pale, yellow hair worn long and wavy. She is wearing a colorful sun dress that seems to have been hijacked from one of the more regrettable corners of the seventies. At her side hangs a boxy black purse hanging from long, thin, vinyl, spaghetti straps.
All too easy for the likes of me.
I walk up to her, weaving around the occasional passers-by, and close in. From her reflection in the store front’s glass, I can see she has many blotchy freckles on her face; I can also see that she has seen me too, and has begun to turn.
I make my move. I catch the purse strap at a point around her elbow, and unhook it from her shoulder in a smooth and well-practiced move. Time slows down for me as I quickly run the strap down the length of her arm, to free it, even as I start to accelerate. Usually, I can get it free and start to run before my victim can hook it with her fingers, and get a good grab at it. Occasionally, they do manage to grab the strap; but not for long. By then I’m running, and the strap usually slips from their grip. Vinyl can be slippery.
The blonde woman, though, manages to get a good solid grasp of the strap. Instead of her losing her grip, it is I who nearly lose mine. I am almost pulled off my feet. I turn and grab the purse with both hands. There is a tug-of-war I begin to understand I cannot win. She is screaming something unintelligible. People on the street and on the sidewalk are starting to turn around and take notice. This is not good.
I am about to release the purse to get away, when the strap breaks in her hand, causing the both of us to fall on our rears.
It seems I have won after all, but now I see from behind the woman, a young, athletic-looking guy start coming towards me.
The heroic type. Fan-fricking-tastic. This I do not need.
I get up with my prize, turn, and start running.
As a purse-snatcher, my greatest asset is speed; and I am fast. That is enough, usually, to get me out of most scrapes.
As the world around me blurs, I tuck the purse into the cradle of my left arm, like a football, and haul ass. There are not that many people on this side of the street, which is a blessing, as dodging around obstacles will slow me down and complicate the task of escape.
I really want to stop and look behind me to see if the guy is still giving chase, but I know better. I resist the urge and continue on. Besides, there is an intersection up ahead, and I will have to slow down to avoid getting hit by a car. I’ll look then.
When I reach the intersection, I slow to a quick stop. Seeing no cars on the intersecting street, I get ready to start off again.
Before then, though; I risk a quick look back.
Son of a bitch.
He’s still coming.
He looks up and sees me. I can tell that he’s determined. Very well, I’m determined too. I turn and commence running again.
I run as fast as I can, and the world blurs once more.
I now have no idea where I am anymore. I should, as I’ve only run in a single direction from my original position, but somehow I don’t. I try to calculate it in my head, but a bleary haze of confusion gums up my concentration. It feels as if all blood and energy is draining from my body, into my legs. A second wind perhaps, as I can feel myself going faster and faster with less and less pain. Soon, all senses bleed away and the world has fused into a single focal point.
Suddenly, I trip on something, and my speed and momentum flip me into a forward somersault to the ground. I actually end up on my back somehow, staring up at the sky like a broken doll.
For awhile, the sky is filled with spots and colors; a giant doughnut of purple then bleeds through the blue of the sky, and subsumes the other colors into itself. I close my eyes, and the purple doughnut is with me in the dark; it looks at me with a cold naked stare. My head feels like a parcel that’s been shaken a little too violently by the postman.
Also, I hurt like hell.
I’m breathing like a morbidly obese man near sexual climax, and my heart feels like it’s lodged in my throat and trying to squeeze its way out. My bones feel like shattered glass.
So I lie there and await my pursuer to reach me, as he certainly must, any moment now.
But he doesn’t.
I wait longer, and still he doesn’t.
After another interval of time, I open my eyes again. The purple doughnut is gone, and has taken all the other color spots with it. The sky is blue once more.
Slowly, painfully, I get up. My brain still feels gelatinized, but my breathing and heart rate have slowed to something more rational. To my relief, my bones are not broken. I get up to my shaky feet and realize that I’m alone; my pursuer is nowhere to be seen.
I must’ve run really fast.
I look around. I seem to be in an abandoned and unfamiliar part of the city. This is strange because I know the city well, and yet I’ve never seen this part of it before. The buildings look empty and the store fronts are shuttered; a pervasive feeling of gloom and unpleasantness hangs over everything like a suffocating mantle. There is no one is around.
How fast did I run?
I look, but cannot find what tripped me, but the odd woman’s purse lies at the entrance to a narrow alley. I go to it. After all, it is my prize, and I paid dearly for it; it’s only right that I take its contents for myself.
I pick up the purse and sit on the ground, my back to the alley wall. It is gratifyingly heavy; though it feels solid, and when I shake it, there’s no rattle of items, or sense of looseness. Whatever is in there is densely packed.
I turn it over in my hands until I see the zipper, but only to find that it is missing its opener. The silver metal fasteners seem to smile at my frustration, as I try to pull it open first from one side, then the other, to no avail. It will not open.
I take out a small pocketknife from a leather holder looped into my belt, and try to jimmy the zipper. When that also ends in failure, I stab the side of the purse with the pocketknife. One way or the other, this purse is going to spill its guts.
But the knife finds a meaty thickness I was not expecting. It feels like I just plunged my little knife into the side of a cow; and like a cow, the purse begins to bleed a thick red liquid that stinks like a swamp. It gets all over my fingers and pools into my lap, but I am only more determined to pierce into the mystery of this purse.
I pull at the flap of the “wound”, and see only bleeding red meat. I jam my thumb into it, but cannot press past a superficial depth.
The purse suddenly moves and bucks in my befouled hands, and in surprised shock I throw it out into the street.
It wiggles on the empty street, and rights itself, broken vinyl spaghetti straps whipping in the air like living things. From underneath its bottom, long bird-like stick legs unfold, and bear the purse aloft.
It seems to look around, until it “sees” me, and starts skittering my way. My shock breaks, and I get up and run, into the alley. This is a fatal mistake, as there seems to be a chain link fence blocking the end of the alley.
When I reach the fence, I start to climb. I almost make it to the top, when two long thin vinyl straps wrap themselves around my ankles, and pull me back with enough force to make me lose my grip on the chain links, and fall to the ground.
I turn around and cannot fail to notice that the purse’s zipper is open now; and the last thing I see before red hell is two grinning rows of silver needle teeth chomping and salivating, eager for their meal.
The woman stands at a store front, window shopping. She’s an odd bird: forty-something, ugly pale, yellow hair worn long and wavy. She is wearing a colorful sun dress that seems to have been hijacked from one of the more regrettable corners of the seventies. At her side hangs a boxy black purse hanging from long, thin, vinyl, spaghetti straps.
All too easy for the likes of me.
I walk up to her, weaving around the occasional passers-by, and close in. From her reflection in the store front’s glass, I can see she has many blotchy freckles on her face; I can also see that she has seen me too, and has begun to turn.
I make my move. I catch the purse strap at a point around her elbow, and unhook it from her shoulder in a smooth and well-practiced move. Time slows down for me as I quickly run the strap down the length of her arm, to free it, even as I start to accelerate. Usually, I can get it free and start to run before my victim can hook it with her fingers, and get a good grab at it. Occasionally, they do manage to grab the strap; but not for long. By then I’m running, and the strap usually slips from their grip. Vinyl can be slippery.
The blonde woman, though, manages to get a good solid grasp of the strap. Instead of her losing her grip, it is I who nearly lose mine. I am almost pulled off my feet. I turn and grab the purse with both hands. There is a tug-of-war I begin to understand I cannot win. She is screaming something unintelligible. People on the street and on the sidewalk are starting to turn around and take notice. This is not good.
I am about to release the purse to get away, when the strap breaks in her hand, causing the both of us to fall on our rears.
It seems I have won after all, but now I see from behind the woman, a young, athletic-looking guy start coming towards me.
The heroic type. Fan-fricking-tastic. This I do not need.
I get up with my prize, turn, and start running.
As a purse-snatcher, my greatest asset is speed; and I am fast. That is enough, usually, to get me out of most scrapes.
As the world around me blurs, I tuck the purse into the cradle of my left arm, like a football, and haul ass. There are not that many people on this side of the street, which is a blessing, as dodging around obstacles will slow me down and complicate the task of escape.
I really want to stop and look behind me to see if the guy is still giving chase, but I know better. I resist the urge and continue on. Besides, there is an intersection up ahead, and I will have to slow down to avoid getting hit by a car. I’ll look then.
When I reach the intersection, I slow to a quick stop. Seeing no cars on the intersecting street, I get ready to start off again.
Before then, though; I risk a quick look back.
Son of a bitch.
He’s still coming.
He looks up and sees me. I can tell that he’s determined. Very well, I’m determined too. I turn and commence running again.
I run as fast as I can, and the world blurs once more.
I now have no idea where I am anymore. I should, as I’ve only run in a single direction from my original position, but somehow I don’t. I try to calculate it in my head, but a bleary haze of confusion gums up my concentration. It feels as if all blood and energy is draining from my body, into my legs. A second wind perhaps, as I can feel myself going faster and faster with less and less pain. Soon, all senses bleed away and the world has fused into a single focal point.
Suddenly, I trip on something, and my speed and momentum flip me into a forward somersault to the ground. I actually end up on my back somehow, staring up at the sky like a broken doll.
For awhile, the sky is filled with spots and colors; a giant doughnut of purple then bleeds through the blue of the sky, and subsumes the other colors into itself. I close my eyes, and the purple doughnut is with me in the dark; it looks at me with a cold naked stare. My head feels like a parcel that’s been shaken a little too violently by the postman.
Also, I hurt like hell.
I’m breathing like a morbidly obese man near sexual climax, and my heart feels like it’s lodged in my throat and trying to squeeze its way out. My bones feel like shattered glass.
So I lie there and await my pursuer to reach me, as he certainly must, any moment now.
But he doesn’t.
I wait longer, and still he doesn’t.
After another interval of time, I open my eyes again. The purple doughnut is gone, and has taken all the other color spots with it. The sky is blue once more.
Slowly, painfully, I get up. My brain still feels gelatinized, but my breathing and heart rate have slowed to something more rational. To my relief, my bones are not broken. I get up to my shaky feet and realize that I’m alone; my pursuer is nowhere to be seen.
I must’ve run really fast.
I look around. I seem to be in an abandoned and unfamiliar part of the city. This is strange because I know the city well, and yet I’ve never seen this part of it before. The buildings look empty and the store fronts are shuttered; a pervasive feeling of gloom and unpleasantness hangs over everything like a suffocating mantle. There is no one is around.
How fast did I run?
I look, but cannot find what tripped me, but the odd woman’s purse lies at the entrance to a narrow alley. I go to it. After all, it is my prize, and I paid dearly for it; it’s only right that I take its contents for myself.
I pick up the purse and sit on the ground, my back to the alley wall. It is gratifyingly heavy; though it feels solid, and when I shake it, there’s no rattle of items, or sense of looseness. Whatever is in there is densely packed.
I turn it over in my hands until I see the zipper, but only to find that it is missing its opener. The silver metal fasteners seem to smile at my frustration, as I try to pull it open first from one side, then the other, to no avail. It will not open.
I take out a small pocketknife from a leather holder looped into my belt, and try to jimmy the zipper. When that also ends in failure, I stab the side of the purse with the pocketknife. One way or the other, this purse is going to spill its guts.
But the knife finds a meaty thickness I was not expecting. It feels like I just plunged my little knife into the side of a cow; and like a cow, the purse begins to bleed a thick red liquid that stinks like a swamp. It gets all over my fingers and pools into my lap, but I am only more determined to pierce into the mystery of this purse.
I pull at the flap of the “wound”, and see only bleeding red meat. I jam my thumb into it, but cannot press past a superficial depth.
The purse suddenly moves and bucks in my befouled hands, and in surprised shock I throw it out into the street.
It wiggles on the empty street, and rights itself, broken vinyl spaghetti straps whipping in the air like living things. From underneath its bottom, long bird-like stick legs unfold, and bear the purse aloft.
It seems to look around, until it “sees” me, and starts skittering my way. My shock breaks, and I get up and run, into the alley. This is a fatal mistake, as there seems to be a chain link fence blocking the end of the alley.
When I reach the fence, I start to climb. I almost make it to the top, when two long thin vinyl straps wrap themselves around my ankles, and pull me back with enough force to make me lose my grip on the chain links, and fall to the ground.
I turn around and cannot fail to notice that the purse’s zipper is open now; and the last thing I see before red hell is two grinning rows of silver needle teeth chomping and salivating, eager for their meal.
January 20, 2016
The Premium Fix
It was in that moment of pure, thoughtless, fury, when one becomes divorced from one's better judgment, and becomes one's own worst enemy, that Bob Margrove found himself with his hands wrapped around his wife's neck.
She had driven him to this, again.
Even now, with his hands at her throat, held back from throttling her to death by the last fragile thread of his self-control, she continued to harangue him with her harpy’s voice.
"You won't do it! You don't have the balls!" she laughed hoarsely, spraying saliva all over his face, "Those left you a long time ago, along with your sex drive! You're a worthless sack of NOTHING!"
That did it.
While it was true his sex drive had driven off a cliff in his middle-age, that hadn't always been case; and the fault that their thirty years of tumultuous marriage had produced no children lay clinically well-documented on her malfunctioning egg basket; nevertheless, as she damn well knew, this was the angle of attack that drew from him the most frothing, thought-destroying rage.
"Maybe if you didn't have such a LIMP DI---"
Margrove tightened his grip, cutting her off mid-word
Mrs. Margrove's eyes grew large, as she started to make choking sounds. Her hands pulled uselessly at his, and her head tried to shake in the attempt to negate what she had been spewing at him for the last few minutes; in the grim hope of taking it all back, just so she could breathe again.
But Mr. Margrove was beyond recall; with a ferocious smile that mixed anger with satisfaction, he choked the life out of his wife.
When she at last went limp, her eyes still open in horror; he released her and fell back. They both fell to the floor simultaneously, but she would not be getting back up on her own.
"Look what you made me do!" Mr. Margrove said, his heart beating like an out of control drum solo. At his age, and expanding girth, a heart-attack was a real possibility; so he tried to slow down his breathing to get his heart to stop thumping so damn loud.
It took awhile, but his heart eventually mellowed out.
Now there was the matter of his dead wife to contend with; but he had an ace in hole, and was not too concerned about ramifications. All the maids and servants worked only during the day, and they did not live on the premises. He had learned that lesson early; Danielle's freak-out moods tended to happen in the evenings, when she headed for the drink.
Mr. Margrove got up, and went to his dresser drawer. There, under his underwear, were four identical business cards. He picked one up.
It was an odd and muted shade of yellow, NICK OLSSON was printed in the dead center.
Under it, in italics was writ: I fix everything.
There was telephone number in the lower right corner, under the legend: Premium Services.
Mr. Margrove went to his phone and dialed the latter number. It only rang once, then a voice somehow silky, somehow raspy, answered with this: "Again, Mr. Margrove?"
By now used to Olsson's creepy way of always knowing it was him when he called, Margrove replied, if a little sheepishly, "Again, Mr. Olsson."
"This is the fifth time, Mr. Margrove. You do know my price increases every time I have to do this?"
"Yes, I know. I can afford it."
"I'll be right there, then."
"I'll leave the gate open."
It was his golf buddy, Tim Lafkin, who first let him in on the best-kept secret among the well-to-do in their area. Especially those with anger and self-control issues.
They were playing a round, when Bob admitted to Tim how close to the edge Danielle was driving him; how he knew one day he would snap.
"So why don’t you divorce her?" Tim asked. He managed to keep a straight face before the both of them started laughing.
The prospect of a divorce from a wife used to the good life, who knew where her husband's skeletons were hidden, was absurd. Prenup or no prenup, a good shark lawyer would know how to drag it all out in the public, and make the husband pay dearly, one way or the other.
Lafkin stopped, and took out his wallet.
"Should you ever find yourself in a pickle; there's this guy who'll help you with that."
From one of the pockets in the wallet, Lafkin retrieved a business card. There was another just like it behind it. He handed the card to Margrove.
"A repair man?!" Margrove said, insulted, "Is this a joke?"
"I'm not joking, Bob." Lafkin said, dead serious, "He fixes things, and he fixes people. I know how that sounds, but he helped me when I had an...incident...with my daughter. I was alone and afraid, and called my lawyer friend Bellman. He told me about Olsson, and his Premium Service. I called, he came, and he fixed Joanna. I don't know how he does it, and I don't want to know. All I know is that I got my Joanna back, and she didn't remember a thing. That's part of what he does, you know; he fixes their memories, so they don't remember. He's discreet, but expensive; and he only takes cash. If you need a repeat visit, however; the price goes up. Just call that number. You'll thank me for it."
And he did.
That was over a year ago, and Margrove had needed multiple visits.
The front doorbell rang, and Margrove ran to the door to open it. He looked through the peephole, and saw Olsson standing there, on his doorstep.
Physically, he was a young man; tall and thin, dressed in crisp black pants and a matching suit, over a white shirt and red tie. He had a pale youthful face, and raven black hair; but his knowing eyes belied his youth. In his left hand he carried what looked like a black carpet bag, from its stylized wooden handles.
Outside there was still some light left in the day, but it was raining. Despite this, Mr. Olsson was perfectly dry, and as usual, there was no car or cab in the driveway behind him.
Just how Olsson managed to reach Margrove's secluded manse at all hours without any apparent vehicle (or without getting wet, in this case), was just one of the many mysteries that surrounded the man.
The last time Margrove had needed his services, he planted himself in the windows facing the front door. Seeing no one, he was startled by the ringing of the doorbell. He threw opened the door, and found Mr. Olsson there waiting, as now.
Now, as then, Margrove gestured Mr. Olsson to enter.
"Has it been raining long?" he asked. In his screaming match with Danielle, he had not noticed the arrival of inclement weather.
"Not long," Mr. Olsson replied, "It rolled in maybe ten, fifteen, minutes ago. Is your wife in your room?"
"Yes." Margrove said, and led Olsson up the stairs to his room.
"What was it this time?" Olsson asked.
Margrove stopped at the top of the stairs, turned around, and made choking gestures with his hands around his own throat.
They reached the room, and looked down at Danielle's body.
"This is becoming a habit with you and your wife, isn't it?' Olsson said.
Margrove didn't answer. He helped Olsson carry Danielle to the bed. Her eyes were still open.
"Alright then, leave me to my work."
From the beginning, Olsson had demanded total privacy for whatever it was he did to bring Danielle back from the dead; and sneaking a peek was a big no-no, and grounds for his quick departure, job unfinished.
Margrove left the room, closing the door behind him. He marched to his office and went to his safe. He unlocked it, and retrieved enough cash to cover Mr. Olsson's price. He put the money in a paper sack, and walked back. There was no hurry, though; whatever it was that Mr. Olsson did, it took a good ten to fifteen minutes or so.
All there was left to do was wait.
Light flashed from the crack under the door, like paparazzi swarming a celebrity, but there was no sound. Olsson neither spoke nor chanted, he did his job in dead silence; only the flashes of light gave proof that something was indeed occurring in there.
At last the door was opened, and Olsson stepped out. He met Margrove in the hall and opened his carpet bag. Margrove placed the sack of cash in there. Olsson didn't bother counting it; Margrove suspected he would know if someone tried to cheat him.
As always, the carpet bag was empty when he did this. Yet, it always seemed hefty, somehow.
Olsson gave Margrove another one of his cards. Margrove didn't bother telling him he had some already, as it didn't seem to matter; it was one of Olsson's little eccentricities that he always had to provide the customer with a new card.
With that, Margrove led Olsson back downstairs and to the door.
"Good night, Mr. Margrove," he said, "Until next time I see you."
Margrove closed the door, and went back up to his room.
Danielle's eyes were closed, and was sleeping soundly. She looked peaceful, and had not a single bruise around her throat.
As the times before, she would likely wake up fuzzy-headed, without any memory of the last few hours, or the violent events that had occured within. He would tell her she had taken a nap, and she would believe it. What was there to doubt?
The premium fix was fantastic that way.
Margrove began cleaning up some of the evidence of the rather explosive argument/fight in the room, that had ended with Danielle's death. This included her purse, that had been knocked from the dresser, upside down to the floor, spilling it's contents.
Margrove bent down and turned the purse over slowly.
Above him, on the bed, Danielle emitted a light, coming-to-wakefulness, groan. So Margrove hastened in scooping the purse's much too many contents back inside, until he was stopped by an object that caught his eye.
It was a small credit card caddie, with pockets for credit cards, coupons, pictures, and things of that sort; but it was what was in those pockets that stopped him cold.
Two business cards, of an odd and muted shade of yellow.
She had driven him to this, again.
Even now, with his hands at her throat, held back from throttling her to death by the last fragile thread of his self-control, she continued to harangue him with her harpy’s voice.
"You won't do it! You don't have the balls!" she laughed hoarsely, spraying saliva all over his face, "Those left you a long time ago, along with your sex drive! You're a worthless sack of NOTHING!"
That did it.
While it was true his sex drive had driven off a cliff in his middle-age, that hadn't always been case; and the fault that their thirty years of tumultuous marriage had produced no children lay clinically well-documented on her malfunctioning egg basket; nevertheless, as she damn well knew, this was the angle of attack that drew from him the most frothing, thought-destroying rage.
"Maybe if you didn't have such a LIMP DI---"
Margrove tightened his grip, cutting her off mid-word
Mrs. Margrove's eyes grew large, as she started to make choking sounds. Her hands pulled uselessly at his, and her head tried to shake in the attempt to negate what she had been spewing at him for the last few minutes; in the grim hope of taking it all back, just so she could breathe again.
But Mr. Margrove was beyond recall; with a ferocious smile that mixed anger with satisfaction, he choked the life out of his wife.
When she at last went limp, her eyes still open in horror; he released her and fell back. They both fell to the floor simultaneously, but she would not be getting back up on her own.
"Look what you made me do!" Mr. Margrove said, his heart beating like an out of control drum solo. At his age, and expanding girth, a heart-attack was a real possibility; so he tried to slow down his breathing to get his heart to stop thumping so damn loud.
It took awhile, but his heart eventually mellowed out.
Now there was the matter of his dead wife to contend with; but he had an ace in hole, and was not too concerned about ramifications. All the maids and servants worked only during the day, and they did not live on the premises. He had learned that lesson early; Danielle's freak-out moods tended to happen in the evenings, when she headed for the drink.
Mr. Margrove got up, and went to his dresser drawer. There, under his underwear, were four identical business cards. He picked one up.
It was an odd and muted shade of yellow, NICK OLSSON was printed in the dead center.
Under it, in italics was writ: I fix everything.
There was telephone number in the lower right corner, under the legend: Premium Services.
Mr. Margrove went to his phone and dialed the latter number. It only rang once, then a voice somehow silky, somehow raspy, answered with this: "Again, Mr. Margrove?"
By now used to Olsson's creepy way of always knowing it was him when he called, Margrove replied, if a little sheepishly, "Again, Mr. Olsson."
"This is the fifth time, Mr. Margrove. You do know my price increases every time I have to do this?"
"Yes, I know. I can afford it."
"I'll be right there, then."
"I'll leave the gate open."
It was his golf buddy, Tim Lafkin, who first let him in on the best-kept secret among the well-to-do in their area. Especially those with anger and self-control issues.
They were playing a round, when Bob admitted to Tim how close to the edge Danielle was driving him; how he knew one day he would snap.
"So why don’t you divorce her?" Tim asked. He managed to keep a straight face before the both of them started laughing.
The prospect of a divorce from a wife used to the good life, who knew where her husband's skeletons were hidden, was absurd. Prenup or no prenup, a good shark lawyer would know how to drag it all out in the public, and make the husband pay dearly, one way or the other.
Lafkin stopped, and took out his wallet.
"Should you ever find yourself in a pickle; there's this guy who'll help you with that."
From one of the pockets in the wallet, Lafkin retrieved a business card. There was another just like it behind it. He handed the card to Margrove.
"A repair man?!" Margrove said, insulted, "Is this a joke?"
"I'm not joking, Bob." Lafkin said, dead serious, "He fixes things, and he fixes people. I know how that sounds, but he helped me when I had an...incident...with my daughter. I was alone and afraid, and called my lawyer friend Bellman. He told me about Olsson, and his Premium Service. I called, he came, and he fixed Joanna. I don't know how he does it, and I don't want to know. All I know is that I got my Joanna back, and she didn't remember a thing. That's part of what he does, you know; he fixes their memories, so they don't remember. He's discreet, but expensive; and he only takes cash. If you need a repeat visit, however; the price goes up. Just call that number. You'll thank me for it."
And he did.
That was over a year ago, and Margrove had needed multiple visits.
The front doorbell rang, and Margrove ran to the door to open it. He looked through the peephole, and saw Olsson standing there, on his doorstep.
Physically, he was a young man; tall and thin, dressed in crisp black pants and a matching suit, over a white shirt and red tie. He had a pale youthful face, and raven black hair; but his knowing eyes belied his youth. In his left hand he carried what looked like a black carpet bag, from its stylized wooden handles.
Outside there was still some light left in the day, but it was raining. Despite this, Mr. Olsson was perfectly dry, and as usual, there was no car or cab in the driveway behind him.
Just how Olsson managed to reach Margrove's secluded manse at all hours without any apparent vehicle (or without getting wet, in this case), was just one of the many mysteries that surrounded the man.
The last time Margrove had needed his services, he planted himself in the windows facing the front door. Seeing no one, he was startled by the ringing of the doorbell. He threw opened the door, and found Mr. Olsson there waiting, as now.
Now, as then, Margrove gestured Mr. Olsson to enter.
"Has it been raining long?" he asked. In his screaming match with Danielle, he had not noticed the arrival of inclement weather.
"Not long," Mr. Olsson replied, "It rolled in maybe ten, fifteen, minutes ago. Is your wife in your room?"
"Yes." Margrove said, and led Olsson up the stairs to his room.
"What was it this time?" Olsson asked.
Margrove stopped at the top of the stairs, turned around, and made choking gestures with his hands around his own throat.
They reached the room, and looked down at Danielle's body.
"This is becoming a habit with you and your wife, isn't it?' Olsson said.
Margrove didn't answer. He helped Olsson carry Danielle to the bed. Her eyes were still open.
"Alright then, leave me to my work."
From the beginning, Olsson had demanded total privacy for whatever it was he did to bring Danielle back from the dead; and sneaking a peek was a big no-no, and grounds for his quick departure, job unfinished.
Margrove left the room, closing the door behind him. He marched to his office and went to his safe. He unlocked it, and retrieved enough cash to cover Mr. Olsson's price. He put the money in a paper sack, and walked back. There was no hurry, though; whatever it was that Mr. Olsson did, it took a good ten to fifteen minutes or so.
All there was left to do was wait.
Light flashed from the crack under the door, like paparazzi swarming a celebrity, but there was no sound. Olsson neither spoke nor chanted, he did his job in dead silence; only the flashes of light gave proof that something was indeed occurring in there.
At last the door was opened, and Olsson stepped out. He met Margrove in the hall and opened his carpet bag. Margrove placed the sack of cash in there. Olsson didn't bother counting it; Margrove suspected he would know if someone tried to cheat him.
As always, the carpet bag was empty when he did this. Yet, it always seemed hefty, somehow.
Olsson gave Margrove another one of his cards. Margrove didn't bother telling him he had some already, as it didn't seem to matter; it was one of Olsson's little eccentricities that he always had to provide the customer with a new card.
With that, Margrove led Olsson back downstairs and to the door.
"Good night, Mr. Margrove," he said, "Until next time I see you."
Margrove closed the door, and went back up to his room.
Danielle's eyes were closed, and was sleeping soundly. She looked peaceful, and had not a single bruise around her throat.
As the times before, she would likely wake up fuzzy-headed, without any memory of the last few hours, or the violent events that had occured within. He would tell her she had taken a nap, and she would believe it. What was there to doubt?
The premium fix was fantastic that way.
Margrove began cleaning up some of the evidence of the rather explosive argument/fight in the room, that had ended with Danielle's death. This included her purse, that had been knocked from the dresser, upside down to the floor, spilling it's contents.
Margrove bent down and turned the purse over slowly.
Above him, on the bed, Danielle emitted a light, coming-to-wakefulness, groan. So Margrove hastened in scooping the purse's much too many contents back inside, until he was stopped by an object that caught his eye.
It was a small credit card caddie, with pockets for credit cards, coupons, pictures, and things of that sort; but it was what was in those pockets that stopped him cold.
Two business cards, of an odd and muted shade of yellow.
January 17, 2016
The Wrong Aisle
Mr. Maclendon entered the supermarket with a sigh of vast reluctance.Vera always did the shopping, and she did it alone; but today she had taken ill, and had insisted he go. He had resisted all day, but the be-damned woman had pestered him until she wore him down.
She had, however, had the foresight to provide him with a shopping list. A list which, he now realized after rummaging through his pockets in a panic, he had forgotten to bring with him.
So now, what?
He considered calling home, but remembered that Vera had just taken her medication when he left, and was no doubt sleeping like the dead, and snoring like a foghorn. Going back home was also unpalatable; Vera would just chastise him for forgetting her list, and use the incident as a further example of his ineptitude.
No, he would just have to try and remember what he could of what had been on the list.
As always, when nervous, he felt a need to pee. He decided to ignore this feeling, and push on. The sooner he was done here, the sooner he could be back home, in his comfy chair; where the noise and speed of the world could be safely ignored.
He walked toward the racks of shopping carts and attempted to wrestle one free. The cart seemed welded to its rack, but finally wrenched free with an unpleasant metallic screech.
“There, damn you.” Mr. Maclendon muttered under his breath.
A tall woman standing beside him gave him a glaring look.
“Are you talking to me?” she asked.
“No Madam, I was swearing at the cart.” Mr. Maclendon replied.
The woman looked at him as if he were bonkers, and retrieved a cart with barely any effort.
Mr. Maclendon looked up to the heavens for solace; finding none, he turned his cart and maneuvered it through a glut of loitering shoppers. This wasn’t easy, as the cart’s wheels kept skewing him to the left.
His first stop was the produce section. He couldn’t recall if there had been any fruits or vegetables on the list; the tinkle of supermarket music from the tinny speakers made concentration difficult.
Just to be sure, he put a pound of grapes and a bunch of bananas in the cart. Vera loved grapes, and he was fond of bananas, so it was a safe bet that both were on the list. He moved on.
He lingered awhile in the frozen foods aisle, but nothing rang a bell.
The meats section was practically deserted, but it reminded him of something that had been on the list: ground beef. He went to the cold counters and picked his way through the shrink-wrapped packages of meat and poultry, until he found the ground beef.
The sudden growl of machinery startled him.
He looked up. Just beyond the meat counter, three large windows looked into a white room, where the butchers sliced and packaged the meat. There was only one butcher there now, operating the meat slicer. It was the roar of the slicer, as it was switched on, that had startled him.
Mr. Maclendon looked into the room. He couldn’t make out what the butcher was slicing, but whatever it was; it was spraying out a profuse amount of blood. The butcher’s whites were smeared with it, and his beard was dripping with it.
The butcher felt himself being looked at, and looked up at Mr. Maclendon. He smiled with his red teeth, and waved.
Mr. Maclendon dropped his ground beef into the cart and scurried off.
He turned a corner and nearly collided with another cart being pushed by a small foreign woman. She was old and bedraggled, and her cheeks seemed spotted with mold. Her cart was filled with packages of poultry atop many cans of creamed corn.
“Pardon me, Ma’am.” he said, as he pushed his cart past her.
She mumbled something unintelligible under her breath, as she turned the corner and vanished. Mr. Maclendon tried to shake the notion that he had seen the old woman’s poultry struggling against the shrink-wrap.
He began to notice that there were less fellow shoppers than when he had entered, and as he traveled down the aisles, the less he saw. Perhaps it was a slow night.
Another thing, the plaques above the aisles were all wrong. The one above the hair treatment products read: Beverages; the cereal aisle read: Dairy Foods; and so on. Perhaps they had changed the layout of the store, and hadn’t gotten around to resetting the signs.
As he puzzled over this, Mr. Maclendon entered what seemed to be the pet food aisle (the plaque read: Snacks).
Bells rang in his head: dog food!
Of course, dog food. He remembered seeing it on the list, a big sack of dog chow; how could he have forgotten?
He pushed his cart past the canned chow and chew toys, and towards the end of the aisle, where the big sacks were stacked.
At the end of the aisle, there sat a boy of about five or six, hunkered down on the floor, and eating from a small bag of cat food.
Mr. Maclendon was appalled.
“WHAT are you doing?!” was all he could get out.
The boy looked up at him, and smiled sheepishly. He was drooling, and his drool contained flecks of cat food in it. He did not answer, but instead offered a handful of cat food up to him.
Mr. Maclendon waved it away. “Where are your parents, son?” he asked, in his best “grown-up” voice.
The boy giggled; a high girlish sound that cut through Mr. Maclendon like fingernails on chalkboard.
“Are you lost, son?” he asked.
The boy stopped giggling, and his eyes darkened.
“You’re lost.” he replied.
“Son, I think we should go find your parents---“
“Asshole…” the boy muttered.
“WHAT DID YOU SAY?!” Mr. Maclendon gasped.
The boy started laughing loudly now, in a wild and deranged fashion, louder and louder; his face expanding and distorting beyond any semblance of sanity. Mr. Maclendon backed his cart out of the aisle, and hurried away; dog food be damned.
He decided right then, to just get the hell back home. He would deal with Vera’s recriminations if he had to; nothing was worth this level of discomfort and unsettlement.
He soon realized, after some time walking through deserted aisles, that he was, indeed, lost. The directional signs were no help; they were as useless as the aisle plaques. To make matters worse, his bladder felt like it would explode, if he didn’t urinate soon.
It took some time, but he managed to find his way back to the produce section quite by accident. Like everywhere else, it was empty.
Mr. Maclendon’s eyes fell on something he hadn’t seen before: two aluminum-plated swinging doors with round porthole windows at the far corner of the produce section with the words EMPLOYEES ONLY stenciled over them.
The first thing that popped into his mind was: the employee’s restroom! Sure, there had to be one! Just thinking of a restroom made his bladder ache all the more.
Abandoning his cart, he sprinted over to the swinging doors, pushed them open, and walked in.
Inside it was dark, but dimly lit somehow; and everywhere he looked, there were piles of boxes. Many of the piles went very high, to a ceiling he could not see because it was beyond the range of the light.
“Hello?” he yelled, “Anybody here?”
No answer, but the weird echo of his own voice.
Up ahead was a door marked RESTROOM. He walked over to it, and opened the door.
It was dark inside, and stank of urine. He tried the light switch, but the light didn’t come on.
He did not want to have to pee in the dark, but such was his need that, he would if he had to.
He considered using his pocket penlight, but remembered that its battery was nearly dead. He found, though, that by keeping the door open, some of the light from outside it would spill through, and illuminate (somewhat) the restroom.
The door, however, resisted all attempts to keep it open. Mr. Maclendon ended up having to use a box of canned beans, from one of the smaller piles, as a doorstop.
He looked inside. The light was slight, but at least it was no longer pitch dark. The restroom was unusually long, but sparsely furnished: one sink with mirror, one paper towel dispenser with trashcan below, and at the far end of the room, one toilet.
He noticed two things when he stepped inside.
The first thing was that the restroom floor was lower than the store floor by about three or four inches. The other thing was that the restroom floor was flooded by about an inch. That was why it stank to high heaven. The floor was slippery because of it.
He carefully sloshed his way toward the toilet; his bladder approaching critical mass. He reached it, unzipped, unfurled, and cut loose.
Relief felt so damn good, it was like Heaven.
The sound coming from the toilet, though, was odd. It did not sound like he was pissing into standing water; it was more like a tippity tappity tippity tappity sound, like the stream was hitting a wet rag.
Perhaps someone had dropped something in the toilet?
It was not unheard of; who has not come across a public toilet stuffed with paper beyond its capacity to handle?
It would certainly explain the flooded floor.
Mr. Maclendon leaned forward, but could see nothing; the light was too dim to show what was in the toilet bowl. It was a pool of darkness.
He finished his business, and zipped up.
Out of curiosity, he took out his pocket penlight. Sure, the battery was near dead, but since he had not used it in a while, it might yet give one good last beam of light.
He flashed it at the toilet bowl, and found he was right.
For about one or two seconds, bright light illuminated the bowl, and he saw what was in there.
Inside the bowl, almost to the rim, there floated a thick mass of what seemed to be pale, mottled flesh, with tufts of long wiry hair.
In the moment before the light died out; it jerked around violently, splashing water, as if startled out of sleep.
Mr. Maclendon gasped.
He turned away and started to run, but tripped on his own feet. He avoided falling face down into the filthy water by landing on his hands, but his pants got soaked.
He started to get up, but was frozen in place by sloshing sounds from behind him; the sound of the toilet thing flopping out of its nest.
The watery “plop” that followed, broke him out of his paralysis. He got up and ran toward the door, but slipped on the slippery surface, and fell headfirst onto the flooded floor.
Pain radiated from his forehead to all sections of his head, as he fought to keep from passing out. He propped himself upon his hands; just in time to see that the box that was holding the door open, was oh-so-slowly being pushed out of the way, by the weight of the door. One corner of the box managed to hold on for a second, but lost its grip.
The door slammed shut, leaving him in darkness.
He tried to get up, but was hit with waves of dizziness. All he was able to accomplish was to turn himself onto his back. His clothes were now entirely soaked; but his head felt a little better.
He decided to try to sit up, when something suddenly grabbed his feet.
He shrieked, as the toilet-thing propelled itself on top of him. Screaming he tore at it, feeling his fingers go through its awful, mushy flesh. It wrapped cold, wet tendrils around his neck, and dropped a mass of itself on his face.
Having just screamed, Maclendon inadvertently sucked in air, and got a mouthful of foulness instead.
He turned on his side and vomited.
Still gagging, he forced himself to get up and stand. Once up, he started tearing the toilet-thing off of himself. It was still trying to wrap itself around him, but it tore as easily as a wet napkin. He tore it off his face, neck, limbs, and body; until he was sure it was all off him.
He walked over to the door, opened it, and stepped out into the light. He started to walk away, when he felt something in his mouth that made him throw up all over again: a long wiry hair.
After the heaving subsided, he walked out through the swing doors, and back into the produce section.
He was cold, wet, and in pain (not to mention foul-smelling). All he wanted to do right now was go home, gargle mouthwash intensely, take a long bath, take some aspirin, and go to sleep.
He ignored his cart, and walked off in the direction, he was sure, would lead to the exit. He never even noticed that all the produce in the produce section had gone to rot.
He pressed on, passing aisle after aisle; stubbornly sure that he would find the way out. This wasn’t a labyrinth dammit, as much as it felt like one; sooner or later it had to end somewhere.
He ignored all the signs, which were not only wrong, but were now complete gibberish. Nor did he pay attention to the increasingly alien and disturbing products on the shelves; or notice that the store music had become dissonant and jarring.
He just pressed on: aisle after aisle, until at last he reached the check-out lanes. Empty, of course; but beyond them were the exits.
For one chilling moment, it seemed like the doors would not open, but to his relief, they sluggishly yawned apart, and he stepped outside.
It was dark.
Had it been dark when he arrived? He couldn’t recall.
He walked out into the parking lot. It seemed to extend forever in all directions, under a starless night; the parking lot lights providing the only illumination. It was empty, except for his car. Far off, in the distance, something wailed.
He sprinted over to the car, while removing a keychain from his wet pants. He unlocked the door, and got in.
On the dashboard was a slip of paper. He picked it up, and looked at it. It was a shopping list. He scanned the list; nowhere did it mention either dog food or ground beef. He crumpled it, and threw it away.
He slipped the key into the ignition, brought the car to life, and started driving.
He looked at the fuel gauge, and hoped he could find his way out before he ran out of gas.
She had, however, had the foresight to provide him with a shopping list. A list which, he now realized after rummaging through his pockets in a panic, he had forgotten to bring with him.
So now, what?
He considered calling home, but remembered that Vera had just taken her medication when he left, and was no doubt sleeping like the dead, and snoring like a foghorn. Going back home was also unpalatable; Vera would just chastise him for forgetting her list, and use the incident as a further example of his ineptitude.
No, he would just have to try and remember what he could of what had been on the list.
As always, when nervous, he felt a need to pee. He decided to ignore this feeling, and push on. The sooner he was done here, the sooner he could be back home, in his comfy chair; where the noise and speed of the world could be safely ignored.
He walked toward the racks of shopping carts and attempted to wrestle one free. The cart seemed welded to its rack, but finally wrenched free with an unpleasant metallic screech.
“There, damn you.” Mr. Maclendon muttered under his breath.
A tall woman standing beside him gave him a glaring look.
“Are you talking to me?” she asked.
“No Madam, I was swearing at the cart.” Mr. Maclendon replied.
The woman looked at him as if he were bonkers, and retrieved a cart with barely any effort.
Mr. Maclendon looked up to the heavens for solace; finding none, he turned his cart and maneuvered it through a glut of loitering shoppers. This wasn’t easy, as the cart’s wheels kept skewing him to the left.
His first stop was the produce section. He couldn’t recall if there had been any fruits or vegetables on the list; the tinkle of supermarket music from the tinny speakers made concentration difficult.
Just to be sure, he put a pound of grapes and a bunch of bananas in the cart. Vera loved grapes, and he was fond of bananas, so it was a safe bet that both were on the list. He moved on.
He lingered awhile in the frozen foods aisle, but nothing rang a bell.
The meats section was practically deserted, but it reminded him of something that had been on the list: ground beef. He went to the cold counters and picked his way through the shrink-wrapped packages of meat and poultry, until he found the ground beef.
The sudden growl of machinery startled him.
He looked up. Just beyond the meat counter, three large windows looked into a white room, where the butchers sliced and packaged the meat. There was only one butcher there now, operating the meat slicer. It was the roar of the slicer, as it was switched on, that had startled him.
Mr. Maclendon looked into the room. He couldn’t make out what the butcher was slicing, but whatever it was; it was spraying out a profuse amount of blood. The butcher’s whites were smeared with it, and his beard was dripping with it.
The butcher felt himself being looked at, and looked up at Mr. Maclendon. He smiled with his red teeth, and waved.
Mr. Maclendon dropped his ground beef into the cart and scurried off.
He turned a corner and nearly collided with another cart being pushed by a small foreign woman. She was old and bedraggled, and her cheeks seemed spotted with mold. Her cart was filled with packages of poultry atop many cans of creamed corn.
“Pardon me, Ma’am.” he said, as he pushed his cart past her.
She mumbled something unintelligible under her breath, as she turned the corner and vanished. Mr. Maclendon tried to shake the notion that he had seen the old woman’s poultry struggling against the shrink-wrap.
He began to notice that there were less fellow shoppers than when he had entered, and as he traveled down the aisles, the less he saw. Perhaps it was a slow night.
Another thing, the plaques above the aisles were all wrong. The one above the hair treatment products read: Beverages; the cereal aisle read: Dairy Foods; and so on. Perhaps they had changed the layout of the store, and hadn’t gotten around to resetting the signs.
As he puzzled over this, Mr. Maclendon entered what seemed to be the pet food aisle (the plaque read: Snacks).
Bells rang in his head: dog food!
Of course, dog food. He remembered seeing it on the list, a big sack of dog chow; how could he have forgotten?
He pushed his cart past the canned chow and chew toys, and towards the end of the aisle, where the big sacks were stacked.
At the end of the aisle, there sat a boy of about five or six, hunkered down on the floor, and eating from a small bag of cat food.
Mr. Maclendon was appalled.
“WHAT are you doing?!” was all he could get out.
The boy looked up at him, and smiled sheepishly. He was drooling, and his drool contained flecks of cat food in it. He did not answer, but instead offered a handful of cat food up to him.
Mr. Maclendon waved it away. “Where are your parents, son?” he asked, in his best “grown-up” voice.
The boy giggled; a high girlish sound that cut through Mr. Maclendon like fingernails on chalkboard.
“Are you lost, son?” he asked.
The boy stopped giggling, and his eyes darkened.
“You’re lost.” he replied.
“Son, I think we should go find your parents---“
“Asshole…” the boy muttered.
“WHAT DID YOU SAY?!” Mr. Maclendon gasped.
The boy started laughing loudly now, in a wild and deranged fashion, louder and louder; his face expanding and distorting beyond any semblance of sanity. Mr. Maclendon backed his cart out of the aisle, and hurried away; dog food be damned.
He decided right then, to just get the hell back home. He would deal with Vera’s recriminations if he had to; nothing was worth this level of discomfort and unsettlement.
He soon realized, after some time walking through deserted aisles, that he was, indeed, lost. The directional signs were no help; they were as useless as the aisle plaques. To make matters worse, his bladder felt like it would explode, if he didn’t urinate soon.
It took some time, but he managed to find his way back to the produce section quite by accident. Like everywhere else, it was empty.
Mr. Maclendon’s eyes fell on something he hadn’t seen before: two aluminum-plated swinging doors with round porthole windows at the far corner of the produce section with the words EMPLOYEES ONLY stenciled over them.
The first thing that popped into his mind was: the employee’s restroom! Sure, there had to be one! Just thinking of a restroom made his bladder ache all the more.
Abandoning his cart, he sprinted over to the swinging doors, pushed them open, and walked in.
Inside it was dark, but dimly lit somehow; and everywhere he looked, there were piles of boxes. Many of the piles went very high, to a ceiling he could not see because it was beyond the range of the light.
“Hello?” he yelled, “Anybody here?”
No answer, but the weird echo of his own voice.
Up ahead was a door marked RESTROOM. He walked over to it, and opened the door.
It was dark inside, and stank of urine. He tried the light switch, but the light didn’t come on.
He did not want to have to pee in the dark, but such was his need that, he would if he had to.
He considered using his pocket penlight, but remembered that its battery was nearly dead. He found, though, that by keeping the door open, some of the light from outside it would spill through, and illuminate (somewhat) the restroom.
The door, however, resisted all attempts to keep it open. Mr. Maclendon ended up having to use a box of canned beans, from one of the smaller piles, as a doorstop.
He looked inside. The light was slight, but at least it was no longer pitch dark. The restroom was unusually long, but sparsely furnished: one sink with mirror, one paper towel dispenser with trashcan below, and at the far end of the room, one toilet.
He noticed two things when he stepped inside.
The first thing was that the restroom floor was lower than the store floor by about three or four inches. The other thing was that the restroom floor was flooded by about an inch. That was why it stank to high heaven. The floor was slippery because of it.
He carefully sloshed his way toward the toilet; his bladder approaching critical mass. He reached it, unzipped, unfurled, and cut loose.
Relief felt so damn good, it was like Heaven.
The sound coming from the toilet, though, was odd. It did not sound like he was pissing into standing water; it was more like a tippity tappity tippity tappity sound, like the stream was hitting a wet rag.
Perhaps someone had dropped something in the toilet?
It was not unheard of; who has not come across a public toilet stuffed with paper beyond its capacity to handle?
It would certainly explain the flooded floor.
Mr. Maclendon leaned forward, but could see nothing; the light was too dim to show what was in the toilet bowl. It was a pool of darkness.
He finished his business, and zipped up.
Out of curiosity, he took out his pocket penlight. Sure, the battery was near dead, but since he had not used it in a while, it might yet give one good last beam of light.
He flashed it at the toilet bowl, and found he was right.
For about one or two seconds, bright light illuminated the bowl, and he saw what was in there.
Inside the bowl, almost to the rim, there floated a thick mass of what seemed to be pale, mottled flesh, with tufts of long wiry hair.
In the moment before the light died out; it jerked around violently, splashing water, as if startled out of sleep.
Mr. Maclendon gasped.
He turned away and started to run, but tripped on his own feet. He avoided falling face down into the filthy water by landing on his hands, but his pants got soaked.
He started to get up, but was frozen in place by sloshing sounds from behind him; the sound of the toilet thing flopping out of its nest.
The watery “plop” that followed, broke him out of his paralysis. He got up and ran toward the door, but slipped on the slippery surface, and fell headfirst onto the flooded floor.
Pain radiated from his forehead to all sections of his head, as he fought to keep from passing out. He propped himself upon his hands; just in time to see that the box that was holding the door open, was oh-so-slowly being pushed out of the way, by the weight of the door. One corner of the box managed to hold on for a second, but lost its grip.
The door slammed shut, leaving him in darkness.
He tried to get up, but was hit with waves of dizziness. All he was able to accomplish was to turn himself onto his back. His clothes were now entirely soaked; but his head felt a little better.
He decided to try to sit up, when something suddenly grabbed his feet.
He shrieked, as the toilet-thing propelled itself on top of him. Screaming he tore at it, feeling his fingers go through its awful, mushy flesh. It wrapped cold, wet tendrils around his neck, and dropped a mass of itself on his face.
Having just screamed, Maclendon inadvertently sucked in air, and got a mouthful of foulness instead.
He turned on his side and vomited.
Still gagging, he forced himself to get up and stand. Once up, he started tearing the toilet-thing off of himself. It was still trying to wrap itself around him, but it tore as easily as a wet napkin. He tore it off his face, neck, limbs, and body; until he was sure it was all off him.
He walked over to the door, opened it, and stepped out into the light. He started to walk away, when he felt something in his mouth that made him throw up all over again: a long wiry hair.
After the heaving subsided, he walked out through the swing doors, and back into the produce section.
He was cold, wet, and in pain (not to mention foul-smelling). All he wanted to do right now was go home, gargle mouthwash intensely, take a long bath, take some aspirin, and go to sleep.
He ignored his cart, and walked off in the direction, he was sure, would lead to the exit. He never even noticed that all the produce in the produce section had gone to rot.
He pressed on, passing aisle after aisle; stubbornly sure that he would find the way out. This wasn’t a labyrinth dammit, as much as it felt like one; sooner or later it had to end somewhere.
He ignored all the signs, which were not only wrong, but were now complete gibberish. Nor did he pay attention to the increasingly alien and disturbing products on the shelves; or notice that the store music had become dissonant and jarring.
He just pressed on: aisle after aisle, until at last he reached the check-out lanes. Empty, of course; but beyond them were the exits.
For one chilling moment, it seemed like the doors would not open, but to his relief, they sluggishly yawned apart, and he stepped outside.
It was dark.
Had it been dark when he arrived? He couldn’t recall.
He walked out into the parking lot. It seemed to extend forever in all directions, under a starless night; the parking lot lights providing the only illumination. It was empty, except for his car. Far off, in the distance, something wailed.
He sprinted over to the car, while removing a keychain from his wet pants. He unlocked the door, and got in.
On the dashboard was a slip of paper. He picked it up, and looked at it. It was a shopping list. He scanned the list; nowhere did it mention either dog food or ground beef. He crumpled it, and threw it away.
He slipped the key into the ignition, brought the car to life, and started driving.
He looked at the fuel gauge, and hoped he could find his way out before he ran out of gas.