MicroHorror

As Megan held the shiny razor blade near her wrist, she looked around her bedroom for the last time. Her beloved poetry books, a makeup table overflowing with cosmetics. Her floor strewn with sketchpads and CD cases. Shelves full of stuffed animals, ceramics, trophies…

Megan stopped. She noticed her very first rag doll on the wooden shelf.

She stared at it for a moment–its cloth dress faded, one blue button eye slightly hanging from a thread, its yarn hair dirty and matted.

Megan tried to remember back. Yes, it was one her favorites. She smiled about all the moments in her life when her doll was always there to hug, to hold, to comfort her whenever she was sad or lonely.

“My boyfriend left me for another girl,” she said to the doll, as she gazed at the razor blade. “I’m older now.” Her voice trembled. “Your hugs can’t help me with this.”

The doll’s eye appeared to glisten.

“You can’t comfort me anymore.” She shook her head. “I’ve outgrown you.”

She went into her bathroom where she could be alone.

As Megan angled the razor blade against her flesh, she heard a thud from the bedroom.

She quickly hid the razor in a drawer, thinking of her parents. She peeked out into the bedroom, but there was no one.

Just a missing spot on the shelf.

She slowly walked out of the bathroom and around to the other side of her bed.

Megan gasped in horror.

Her old rag doll was lying on the floor next to a pair of small scissors. Its wrists were ripped open, its stuffing spilling out onto the pretty pink carpet.

I first saw him on Monday morning. Just a momentary blur as the train hurtled past, but odd enough to jar. A man in a suit standing in woodland, mouth smeared in lipstick.

Tuesday, he was eating something chunky, scarlet and dripping. Watermelon, maybe.

Wednesday, he was holding a football in a long blond net. It had red and white patches.

On Thursday, he sat down beside me. He had a putrid stink of decay and rancid sweat, like a butcher from a derelict slaughterhouse.

“You saw me,” he said, his voice a whisper of rotting meat. “But I saw you, too.”

I turned and stared. His puffy flesh was grey and sweat-slicked; it looked ripe and ready to burst at the slightest touch. His eyes were worse; covered in a matte film like translucent cataracts, they were the eyes of a corpse. I shuffled away from him, wondering if he had cancer.

He waited for me to speak.

“Who are you?” I eventually asked.

He chuckled. “Your permissible fear. Your secret titillation.”

I didn’t know what to say. In the silence, I noticed that his suit was spattered with mud and other stains.

After a while, he laughed again. “I’ll make you famous,” he said. “When I eat your family.”

No one else heard; his words were lost in the tinnitus discord of countless headphones.

At that moment, we pulled into the next station. He stood, nodded, then left the train. On the platform, he turned and smiled through the window. His teeth were yellow.

No one else saw; their heads were wrapped inside free newspapers.

I dialed home immediately, stabbing the buttons. My wife should have answered. She didn’t.

Outside, the suburban view melted into farmland. We were at the spot where I’d seen him the previous mornings. I leapt from my seat and pulled the emergency stop. No one challenged me; only a sullen teen noticed what I’d done, and he refused to meet my eyes.

The doors unlocked once the train was stationary. I climbed out and headed for the trees where he had stood.

There was so much there, I could only take in peripheral details: indignant crows exploding into the air; a mattress, red with blood and green with moss; enhanced breasts on a woman’s torso; an arm with an angel tattoo, hanging in a tree. And in the center, in the eye of this bloody storm, my son and my wife lay naked and cold.

Finally Friday.

At the back of the bus, Ellen settled in her seat and opened her paper. The headline gave a repulsive little thrill: some nutter had flipped and killed five people, including his family. Ate them, too. It didn’t bear thinking about, but she dwelled on the details anyway. She wondered if he fucked them first.

She glanced up at a creepy-looking guy who’d just got on. Bad skin and funny eyes. He was staring back at her. No one else seemed to notice him.

The man put something red to his mouth, probably an apple, and took a bite.

Daisy’s crying lasted for days.

It was nearly a week before they finally were able to get the wedding dress off her. Her mother stayed a month, much to the delight of her father who, after forty-five years of mostly loveless marriage, finally had some time to himself, some silence. Let the wife care for the broken heart, he never wanted children anyway.

Cindy stopped by every day. Most days she would bring dinner–each night a new bag of one of the hundreds of fast food options found in the city–or a gallon of ice cream. The first two gallons were consumed by Cindy and Daisy’s mother alone, but by the third night Daisy’s spoon was dipping into chocolate goodness even if she never uttered a word.

Friends agreed how terrible it was. Daisy was a wonderful young woman, so caring for others, always willing to stay late and help out when others were in a jam. But did they do more than comment? No. Again, she had her mother to look after her. And her best friend Cindy, maid of honor at the wedding that wasn’t.

Three months went by. Daisy’s psychiatrist held little hope of “fixing” her if she continued to refuse her medication. Mom got sick. Cindy stopped dropping by daily, a new boyfriend the main culprit.

Things turned dire. Mom died in August, only two months after having been diagnosed with stage-four colon cancer. Dad was shacking up with a twenty-two-year-old a month later. Daisy’s savings had dried up, her job couldn’t hold her position after the first six months went by, and so there was no returning to bank employ. Cindy was just another friend lost to the realities of life; she had moved on while Daisy languished in her own hell.

Even the doctor was no help. There was no legal recourse to admit Daisy to the hospital. They had tried committing her after four months of non-speech, but aside from refusing to speak or interact in socially meaningful ways, Daisy was fully cognitive, just withdrawn and mute. There was no way to help her if she did not accept comfort and support.

A year later, Bradley still had not called. No letter, no message, no e-mail. Not the slightest explanation other than seeking her out one hour before they were to walk down the aisle together to be joined as man and wife to say, “Daisy, love. I can’t do this.” About face. Out the door. Gone.

One year to the day. Something had changed inside of Daisy. For the first time in three-hundred-and-sixty-five days, she smiled. Everything was going to be all right. She bathed, put on clothing, and left the apartment by herself for the first time in an age. There was shopping to do.

That night Bradley came home with his new girlfriend of six months. Things had been going progressively well and he never once felt the slightest bit of anxiety he felt when the topic of the future popped into his head. Not like with the any other girls. Not like when he was about to marry Daisy. That was something he always regretted, but he knew had he gone through with it he would have rued it more. They both would have.

Bradley and Trish made love that night, as good as ever. They had been pleasantly dozed off for an hour when something woke him. Groggily he sat up in bed. There she was, clad in the very same dress as one year ago, still waiting for him.

Something wet smacked his face and he realized she had just doused the bed with a bucket of… he sniffed… gasoline?

Daisy smiled at Bradley, her Brad, and spoke the words she had waited a year to say: “I do.”

A match flared to life. Daisy pressed the lit match back into the book taken from the casino she and Bradley stayed at during their first romantic weekend away, and threw it.

As Ryan sat in the patio chair that morning, he remembered the nightmare that happened so many years ago. The year of the fire that had consumed their trailer home. He still retained the image of his Dad’s hand clutching his and his brother’s, quickly lifting them off of their feet as they scurried out. There was no time to take anything but themselves.

He could still see himself standing there, watching the tall flickering flames melt their small trailer and the smell of the black smoke. And the fireman that held him back.

He wasn’t allowed in, but Mama was still in there. He wanted to see her one more time. Ryan didn’t understand what death was at such a young age, only in his mind that the flames had taken her and he didn’t know why. Why would the fire do such a terrible thing to him when he loved her so much?

That’s when Ryan began to start fires. He believed the flames held the secret to her mortality.

“Ryan,” his brother said to him, as he sat in a patio chair nearby. “When are you going to realize that Mama’s dead?”

He stared back at Danny. “Don’t you say that. Mama wants out of the flames and I want her out too.”

Ryan struck several matches and inhaled the sulfur.

“Don’t you know when I light a fire it helps her find her way back out?” He dropped the matches on the pile of cardboard boxes that were stacked next to his chair. “I’m opening a door for her, don’t you understand?”

“No, I don’t understand,” he said, shaking his head as he stood up. “You’ve really lost it.”

He approached his brother, chest to chest. “Well, Danny,” he said as his anger reflected in his eyes. “It’s obvious you don’t give a damn about Mama anymore.”

“Don’t you see?” Danny said, trying to explain. “Out of all these years that you’ve started fires, Mama hasn’t returned.”

Ryan walked away and retreated to his bedroom. No one seemed to understand his actions or dilemma. He sat on his bed, thinking. Everyone in his family, his brother and even his own Dad were forgetting about Mama. He started to secretly light fires in his bedroom. He was the only one that could save her now.

He crumpled up a mass of papers in a metal wastebasket. He lit several matches and threw them in.

“C’mon, Mama, come out,” he said.

He gazed into the colorful flames, searching for her.

Ryan started to cry.

The flames began to attach themselves onto his bedroom curtain but he didn’t seem to care.

“Mama,” he begged. “It’s been so long.” He cried harder. “I can’t take it anymore.”

As his tear-streaked face looked around, he saw that his bedroom was fully engulfed in flames. More flames, he thought, more room for Mama to get out. That’s it. He thought. All these years, he had always made small fires, never big ones.

As he stood in the corner of his room, he realized that he never came this close to fire before and now he could truly experience its power.

But it held something that he wanted back.

He heard a voice yelling at him outside his room but he did not answer.

Suddenly, the shape of her smiling face was floating in the flames before him.

“Mama? You came back for me.” Tears ran down his face. “Come out now and hold me… it’s been so long.”

He waited for her but she did not step out from the flames.

“Mama, there’s nothing to be afraid of.” His voice firm. “I’m here.”

The closeness of the fire made his face sweat.

“Maybe,” his voice trembled, “you can’t come out.”

He paused for a moment, and entered the beautiful flames.

Arms wide open.

A red moon loomed overhead as Christian Fogler scaled the fence and dropped down beside the mausoleum. He was laughing. The sign on the gate always cracked him up. There were two signs, actually. The big one said, Gate of Heaven Cemetery. The small one warned, Gates Close at 4:30. Total bummer for anyone dying after 4:30, assuming they were paradise-bound.

Christian trotted up the hill toward the harvest moon. He didn’t bother to conceal himself. If anyone ever wanted proof that the dead came back to life, all they had to do was show up here at closing time. The workers woke up from their naps, started up their trucks, and cleared out faster than cats chasing one-legged sparrows.

Christian stopped by a hedge row and reached in for the shovel he put there yesterday. He pulled out a plastic trash bag and slung it over his shoulder. The large bolt cutters inside banged into his spine. He cursed and rubbed the spot. He jogged on.

He was going to pay his respects to one Mr. John C. Hobbs, interred yesterday in Section 26, Lot 549. He planned to relieve Mr. Hobbs of both his arms. They were worth three hundred dollars each. You’d be surprised how many companies paid top dollar for human remains. He needed the money so Amanda could go to the clinic and divest herself of their latest sexual faux pas.

Christian stopped by the elm next to Lot 549 and leaned the shovel against the trunk and dropped the bag. He reached inside for the cutters, then froze.

He heard an odd squeaking sound, like kids playing on rusty swings. The noise was coming from every direction. He’d face one way and the sound was behind him. He’d face back that way and the sound was behind him again.

“Wind,” he told himself, “rubbing tree limbs together.” He set the cutters beside the freshly filled grave and grabbed the shovel and started digging. Only the harvest moon watched, hanging above him like a fuzzy blob, oozing red. Except for the wind and the squeaking trees, the only other sound was the snick of the shovel as it cut into the earth.

He soon hit the coffin and cleared the dirt off the top. He pried it open with the shovel and pushed the lid up against the side of the pit. Mr. John C. Hobbs, eyes closed, was nestled in the satin lining of his walnut coffin, the gloss finish glowing red from the moon. His face was red too, as though he had suffered a sunburn on the way to eternity.

Christian reached up and grabbed the bolt cutters. He positioned them above Mr. Hobbs’ left arm and pulled on the handles, opening the jaws.

“Sorry, old sport,” Christian said. He slammed the cutters down just below the shoulder and pushed the handles together, slicing through the flesh and snapping against the arm bone. He gave one last push and found himself face down in the coffin.

Mr. Hobbs, suddenly, had grabbed the cutters with his free hand and pulled Christian down on top of him. His eyes, red and rheumy, glared back into Christian’s with a crinkle of smile at the corners.

Christian felt a cold hand on the back of his head, pushing him toward Mr. Hobbs’ wide open mouth. Christian screamed as his nose disappeared behind the gnashing teeth. First one eye, then the other, disappeared down the vacuuming maw.

The lid slammed shut and the coffin shook for a minute, then stopped.

Across the cemetery, the harvest moon washed the marble mausoleums in red light. The doors were swinging open with eerie squeaks, discharging their tenants. They would dig up their mutilated fellows.

They would all rendezvous at Lot 549. The gates opened tomorrow at 10:00. Until then, they would have their way with one Mr. Christian Fogler.

When I first met her, she looked as lovely as a baby after baptism. Only she had curves that’d cause God to pant and hair as yellow as what drooped off Aphrodite. A lot of men like blondes, but I really like blondes. Or at least, I did before she came to me. She kind of cured my obsession, yet I still look at yellow hair, and still fantasize about yellow hair around my region. I just don’t indulge my fantasies anymore.

What happened was I beckoned her into the tub. After I closed the health spa that had employed me, she and I sat like Adam and Eve, without anyone else on the planet. We had each other to ourselves. She could’ve had whatever she wanted–I wouldn’t have resisted, and truthfully, I didn’t. What man would resist? She sat in the hot tub eagerly, like a lot of women wouldn’t, I need not tell you. After thirty minutes of talk that I can’t remember, she nuzzled me like a baby to her father. Understand when I tell you that a lot of fathers won’t teach their babies what I taught her, or what she taught me. I didn’t resist–why should I? I fantasize about women like that; I always will.

Anyhow, her voluptuous breasts bobbed around my chest (I wonder if they liked what they touched), and her hands raked my hair, as messy and wet as it became. Her fiery nails itched my scalp, yet I still didn’t resist. Who would? Finally, she kissed me, and I kissed back, as sensuously as her voluptuous lips touched mine. Minutes passed that seemed like hours; before I knew her name, she pulled off my shorts, below the bubbly liquid, and her blonde hairdo spread evenly over the top. Her yellow hair curled wetly over my middle. I stood erectly, yet my knees would just bend–understand?

Maybe you won’t believe it yet she still bobbed her head like an animal that couldn’t control itself. My head tossed back, onto the rubber liner like a pillow just for me, and I yelled loudly with pleasure. Subconsciously, I held her head below the bubbly surf. I took her head and forced it to bob quicker, until finally, I yelled too loudly, and her rear, clad in a black bikini, curled. Her back arched like a playful kitten’s. It took a moment before her body went limp. With a lot of adrenaline, I couldn’t control my fluids anymore; I shot prematurely, like I never will again. I didn’t know what to do–what should I have done? Like a jackrabbit, I bounded for the shower and left her alone in the tub. What would you do?

Early the next day, the janitor found a rubbery torso with four disjointed limbs. How could I attend her funeral, after I read the local paper? I didn’t ask her last name; I found her picture in the Obituary. Sure, I cried–wouldn’t you? I bawled as loudly as I had yelled, with her below the water. I tell you what–I still sit in that tub, like I did the night she joined me; I tell you what–every time I do, I can’t feel the warmth. Somehow, I just can’t. Whatever her body did to me, her soul does the opposite. Whenever I sit in our tub, I feel chilly water throb my groin. Oddly, I enjoy myself, yet somehow, paralysis always hits me. Lying in our tub, my knees before me, I wonder if I truly needed her pleasure–I wonder a lot. How could I argue those painful urges? Any man would sell his soul for a body like hers. Mostly, though, if you want the truth, I wonder if that water will ever feel warm again–to me or to anyone. I wonder about that a lot. Personally, I doubt it will, if you want my opinion.

Dark in the cabinet… The hydrogen peroxide is angry.

Morning Routine:

Rick starts with the bicuspids, then the incisors, then the molars.

-Counter-clockwise motion-

Back in the cabinet… The band-aids are conspiring.

Rick is fighting with his roommate again. This time it’s about rent.

Night-time Routine:

Roommate starts with the outside of the toilet, then the rim, then the inside.

-Counter-clockwise motion-

Back in the cabinet… The dental floss feels neglected.

Rick is screaming at his roommate. There’s a loud thud.

Break in Routine:

Rick scrubs blood from between the kitchen tiles.

-Counter-clockwise motion-

Back in the cabinet… The fingernail clippers are bored.

There are sirens outside…

Lightning danced across the late afternoon sky as he pulled his pickup truck into the driveway. He raced up the walk, unlocked the deadbolt and slipped inside. No one was home except for the cat.

Thankful for not getting too wet, he walked down the hall and into the bedroom. He gave a quick pet to the orange tabby that was sprawled out on the calico quilt that lay on their handcrafted bed and threw the cat out of the room, shutting the door behind her. He peeked through the closed blinds to see if his wife had come home early. After a few seconds he felt confident that she would not pull up in the driveway unexpectedly.

He proceeded to the walk-in closet and stepped inside. He gave a hurried glance to the right side of the closet with its supply of business suits, jeans and collared shirts. Ignoring those he turned his attention to the left side of the closet. After a quick examination he found exactly what he was in the mood for.

He stripped off his work clothes and threw them on the floor. Then he fitted his wife’s girdle around his chubby belly. Next he put on some frilly pink underwear and slipped on a sleek pair of white silk pantyhose. He stuffed a lacy bra full of socks to hold it up and then proceeded to put it on his chest. Then he threw on a white cotton dress which was decorated with red and blue flowers. A shoulder-length blond wig completed the outfit, but it looked sloppy because it slid around on his bald head. For the final touch he smeared lipstick on, cautious to avoid getting any paste in the whiskers of his bushy, black mustache.

When all was done he stood in front of the mirror and admired his ill-fitting outfit with a smile full of shining achievement.

Pleased with what he saw he headed to the kitchen for a knife. He could not choose between the meat clever and the butcher knife. Finally he settled on the butcher knife and held it into the light. The knife’s shiny blade and razor’s edge brought a smile to his face. His concentration was suddenly broken when the telephone rang to life. Startled he scampered over to the phone as fast as his tight clothes would allow. He fumbled it to his mouth, staining the mouthpiece with lipstick in the process.

He held the phone to his ear with one hand and in the other he still grasped the knife. After listening for a moment he said, “Oh! Hi, honey, I was just thinking about you.”

“It delights me to see that the find is large indeed, Madam,” said the Earl of Munster while eying the voluminous crate. Two finely dressed servants flanked the still package. “I beg your pardon, but perhaps you would not think me rude to want to have such a treasure opened right here in the meeting hall?”

“No, my Lord, your exuberance for the thing is a gift of joy to me; I would find it very agreeable to share your first gaze upon the wonders of the Western Frontier,” Lady Blackrose responded.

“Fantastic! Go ahead and open it here,” exclaimed the Earl, glancing towards his servants. While two men began opening the three-and-a-half-foot-tall box another servant arrived with tea to offer Blackrose, who sat in one of the room’s chairs. The Lady steadily moved her gloved hands to accept a saucer and cup which she sipped from once.

The Earl remained standing and examined the progress on the crate. “It is a fascinating time we live in, Madam, a fascinating time indeed. I should think there will be many more wonders from the Americas before the whole has been civilized.” His fingers flexed continually into the palms of his hands. “I declare I had thought this impossible before Lord Darenwood told me of your unique connections on the frontier, but since that time I have heard an even more astonishing tale.”

“Do tell, my Lord, please,” Blackrose stated.

“Oh, Lord Ashenby has told me of a sailor he met, a Spaniard I believe, who had sailed the coast on the Western side of the Americas. He has learned that on the Western Coast there lives a kind of fish person.”

“A fish person, you say?”

“Yes, Madam, he called it a mere-maid. That’s right, a mermaid. Apparently they live in various coves along the shore. I don’t believe them cultured; they seem to have the upper torso of young girls and the lower half of a fish,” the Earl said just as the last plank of the crate came off. The four sides fell away with cascading bundles of cloth.

“Good Lord!” he whispered. “It is marvelous!”

Blackrose took in a deep breath, her eyes brightened, and the left edge of her lips raised slightly into a half smile. All in the room gazed upon what appeared to be a person, short in stature, slight in build, of milky complexion, and bearing a beautiful set of large gleaming white wings from its shoulder blades. Like a trophy from an African safari it stood perfectly still on a mount, prepared for display in a private room. The ignorant observer might mistake it for a human boy with wings, but Lady Blackrose had already explained to the Earl that these New World creatures remain young-looking and small their entire lives.

After a clicking from the Earl’s throat he managed, “Regarding the payment, you have received everything in full, correct, Madam?”

“Yes, my Lord. Shall I take my leave now? Perhaps I’ll call again when you’ve had more time to appreciate your treasure?”

Slowly, with determination, and without taking his gaze from the figure he said, “Yes. Thank you, Madam, please forgive my, my, abruptness. I am very pleased and I will be sure to tell my closest friends about how they too can procure frontier curiosities from Lady Blackrose.”

After leaving the estate the Lady visited a downtrodden area of Munster and approached a young street girl with smudges on her face. “Child, fancy earning a shilling tomorrow?”

“Yes, ma’am, I should do anything for a shilling”

“Good, my dear. I will need a helper to visit the fish market and find a fish as big as you,” Lady Blackrose said with lips flat. Slowly and with a curl to the left corner of her lips she said, “Have you ever wondered how much fun it would be to be a fish, child?”

We hurried through the fire escape as quickly as we could. The crush of people was tremendous. Behind Geoff, a mother puked onto her six-year-old boy. Christ, he was so shocked from what he’d seen in the auditorium that he didn’t even notice the hot bile running down his face.

Ahead of us, the young Down syndrome girl who used to water the plants in our garden in summer had fallen. Blood ran freely from her eye sockets, nose and mouth and it was only the morning after that I remembered puncturing her stomach with one of my stilettos.

God, it was awful; I mean it was truly horrific. Geoff told me later that once we’d cleared the doors, he looked back and saw Mr. Clayton from the bakery on Town Street having a heart attack in the doorway. His four-hundred-pound frame was stopping people behind him from getting out, so they punched and kicked him and tore his hair out.

Eventually he went to the ground and they just ran right over him.

The images we saw, the sounds we heard, the words we tried to ignore–they brought out the absolute worst in us all.

We spilled out into the night where the rain fell and the thunder cracked. Those of us left standing shouted out in relief and thumped one another on the back. Out in the rain-soaked car park we felt home and dry.

Christ, the film company went way too far with that picture. There’s no wonder Geoff and four of the other men agreed to do what they did next.