A chill crept over her, even though she had no idea what he meant.
The girl tapped at Noel’s door until he opened it.
“What?” He was dressed in the T-shirt she had given him last Christmas and his favorite grungy gym shorts.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I should never have hit you. I’ll never do it again. Please, forgive me.”
“Sweet, but not necessary.”
“Your nose looks okay.”
“And yours is running.”
“Smart ass. Aren’t you going to let me in?”
Noel raised his eyebrows. “Bossy, aren’t you?”
“Hey.”
“Do I know you? Are we in Kehoe’s class together?”
“Noel,” she said quietly, “…it’s me.”
“Hi, you,” he said as he looked her up and down.
“Stop it and let me in.”
“Thanks, but I already have a girlfriend. She gets very jealous.”
Her smirk withered.
“Look, I don’t want any trouble,” he said.
The way he looked at her, she knew it, her boyfriend did not recognize her.
“Go away.”
“I… must be… mistaken,” she muttered bleakly.
“Look, go pester Mike next door. He needs a new girl.”
“I didn’t mean to disturb you.”
Noel shut his door. She heard him turn the lock.
The girl went silent as a mouse, although she ached to bang on that door until it split in two. Something went soft inside her. Her head had been pounding all day and she was exhausted.
She did not want to fight with anyone again.
It walks in your own image, she remembered and shivered.
She turned away and drifted back to her sublet.
She slept for two whole days. On Thursday, she woke at dawn, packed a bag and took the train back to Braintree. She hopped on a bus headed home to Plymouth.
From the bus stop, she walked the four blocks to the neighborhood she grew up in. The Colonial-style homes looked warm and inviting. A heart-shaped wreath still clung to the front door of her house, and she breathed a sigh of relief as she stepped onto the porch.
The door was locked, so she rang the bell. Her mother answered, looking dazed and ill. There was no sign of her terrier, Bugga. He should have been barking his head off in the entryway. Her mother’s eyes were bloodshot and a scarlet wound bloomed on her neck. She stared blankly at the girl and asked, “Can I help you?”
“I’ve got it, Mutter,” a peculiar voice said from the hall. An ashen hand slithered across her mother’s shoulder and pulled her away. The fingers were spindly, its overgrown nails yellowed.
A sparkling engagement diamond adorned its ring finger.
The girl on the porch took a step back as she locked eyes with the Fetch who stood in her home.
“Happy Valentine’ssss Day,” Narissa-the-Fetch sneered. Its voice was sibilant, the breath smelling of rancid almonds. Its skin was parched and torn, sloughing off the cheekbones and neck. The slimy hair was infested with fluttering insects. Both eyes were like orbs chipped from coal. It grinned broadly, and bared fangs filed thin, sharp as nails. A trickle of blood speckled its chin.
In the hallway behind the intruder, the girl spotted her mom and dad standing with Noel. All three of them swayed to some hypnotic tune buzzing in their minds and they all looked pale and sickly. None of them recognized her.
The girl backed away from the door, from her own family.
Narissa-the-Fetch seemed delighted. Its torso undulated as it shut the door and bolted the lock.
The true Narissa did not know what to do next. She looked down and a small sound escaped her parched lips.
Her hand had gone transparent. She could see the boards of the porch clearly through the hollow of her vanishing skin.
The following Monday, a ghostly girl watched Narissa as she left her apartment, running to catch the subway to Huntington.
Narissa looked rapturous in the early morning sun; her skin rejuvenated and lice-filled hair gleaming. Her smile spread wide and her fangs were clenched. Not one person she passed on the street seemed to see her as anything but beautiful, happy, one-of-a-kind Narissa.
She seemed full of life.
But the girl, a shadow now, watched the Fetch and saw through its glamour. The girl lived with eternal, wintry chill now, and regrets for the life she so carelessly let slip away.
A life that might have been hers.
The girl dimmed to a wispy apparition. She shimmered and billowed away, across a crowd of students rushing to class at various colleges in Boston.
Floating along until she was no more.
* * * *
Beauty Ritual
John Grover
It was after 2 AM. when the chill slithered into Chad’s bedroom and woke him out of a dead sleep. Gooseflesh broke out over his arms and chest as he sat up in bed, his eyes adjusting to the inky darkness.
Chad’s gaze searched the clutter of his room. Something wasn’t right. Simple cold shouldn’t have woken him, especially after all the mixed drinks he’d downed at the Paradise club that night. He turned to the window behind him. The streetlight outside illuminated the glass in amber, revealing a layer of glittering frost.
Frost? In June?
He was almost out of bed when the tap on the wall stopped him. Chad forgot the window as the tap grew louder. His bed was pushed up against the wall, insuring he would never wake up on the wrong side, or so he liked to think.
The strange thing was his apartment was a corner unit and there was no one on the other side of that wall, nothing but the outside of course.
Chad placed his ear to the wall, listening attentively. A smirk formed on his lips as he figured he was probably just suffering from the effects of a hangover that would undoubtedly render him useless when the sun came up.
Suddenly, the wall shook violently. Chad fell back, stunned, his mouth agape. A fissure formed, shooting right down the length of the wall, splintering like a spider web. Debris shot over the bed and Chad leapt to the floor.
A roar pealed through the room as the wall crumbled, and a creature hurled itself to the floor in a giant ball. It rose slowly to a towering height, its body covered in razor-sharp quills.
Azure eyes pierced the gloom and focused on the terrified Chad, who refused to believe what he was seeing. A scream died in his throat, but his legs sprang into action and he dashed for the bedroom door.
The creature howled and he could see it writhing out of the corner of his eye. Intense pain washed over his back and he fell to the floor, his skin ripe with the quills that lanced his back and buttocks like acupuncture needles.
To his horror, Chad realized he couldn’t move as a poison pumped into his flesh. The pain diminished as his entire body went numb.
He heard the creature scale the nearest wall, then drop to the floor beside him with a thud. It turned the helpless Chad over with spindly claws, leaned its grotesque face into him, and thrust a blunt, wet snout towards him. In the meager light, he could see a lipless mouth open, revealing massive tusks and rows of tiny teeth covered in black foam. The creature took hold of his shoulders and climbed atop him.
Unable to move, Chad watched as hundreds of teeth sank into his chest. Not a sound escaped him, but inside he prayed for death and shut his eyes as the beast ate him alive.
Daniel’s eyes popped open and he reached for Jeremy’s side of the bed. “Jeremy?” Where’s he gone to now? He rose from the bed and stepped into the small bathroom just outside the door. After relieving himself, he downed a glass of water and headed down the stairs.
The dining room and kitchen were dark, so Daniel strolled through the living room and stepped into the narrow back hallway. A single door to his right was closed. It was never closed. The room behind it was a small, oddly shaped room that Jeremy used as an office. A lot of these old two or three story houses had whacky little rooms that could barely ser
ve a purpose.
Dim light flickered under the door and Daniel heard a groan on the other side. “Jeremy?” he called, thinking his boyfriend was in some sort of distress until he heard a giggle.
He pushed the door open in time to see Jeremy extinguish a candle and close the glossy cover of a rather large book. “Jeremy, is everything alright?” The faint scent of sulfur wafted past his nostrils.
“Everything’s good, Danny.” Jeremy turned and smiled. He held out his arms and Daniel went willingly into them, the embrace warm and comforting. Over his lover’s shoulder he spotted the book, the title read: Queer Magick. There was a subtitle but Daniel couldn’t make it out.
“Where did you get that book?” Daniel asked with a chuckle. He thought the title was absurd and knew it had to be some kind of joke Jeremy was conjuring up.
“On the internet,” Jeremy replied. “I thought it was very fascinating. I didn’t even know we had our own magic,” he laughed out loud.
Daniel returned his playful mood with his own. “Sounds really hokey to me.”
“Well, it’s just for fun. You know how I like weird and mysterious things.” He tussled Daniel’s hair.
“Cut it out and come back to bed.”
Jeremy ran his fingers down Daniel’s cheeks and stared into his eyes intensely. “You are so beautiful, Danny. I wish I was too.”
“Don’t be silly,” Daniel kissed Jeremy on the cheek. “You are beautiful to me.” He really did believe that. For an older man, Jeremy was in very good shape. So what if his skin was beginning to show signs of aging with a few stress lines? So his chestnut hair had more strands of gray than any gay man he knew. It didn’t matter. He only cared about what was inside, having something real and lasting. That’s why he gave up the scene and the parties to move in with Jeremy six months ago.
“You’re sweet, my love.” Jeremy pulled Daniel to him again and they kissed, deeply. “Okay, let’s go back to bed.”
The morning sun was rejuvenating. Daniel basked in it momentarily before fetching the newspaper off the front stairs and heading back up to their second floor apartment.
He straddled a stool at the kitchen countertop as Jeremy poured himself some coffee, who planted a peck on his cheek before searching for something to eat.
Daniel unfolded the paper and his eyes widened. A flood of emotions rushed through him. His heart fluttered. “Oh my God…” the words tumbled out of him.
“What, sweetie,” Jeremy stopped what he was doing and turned to Daniel. “Danny, what is it?”
“It’s your ex… Chad, he’s… he’s been murdered.”
“Good riddance I say.”
Daniel’s heart dropped, shock nearly crippling him. The newspaper slipped from his hands and for a moment he stared speechless at Jeremy. “How can you say that? Chad was one of my best friends. We were so close before I started dating you. For God sakes he introduced us.”
Jeremy slammed the refrigerator shut. “You have no idea how hurtful he was to me. How he treated me. He told me I was ugly. He left me because he didn’t find me attractive anymore. How do you think that made me feel?”
“I know he hurt you, babe, but Chad wasn’t a horrible person. He didn’t deserve this. No one does.” Daniel’s bottom lip trembled as he finished the sentence.
An awkward silence swallowed the room until Daniel felt his lover’s hands ease gently around his shoulders. “You’re right,” Jeremy whispered in his ear. “That was a bit cold. Sorry, sweetie.”
“It’s okay.” He glanced up at Jeremy noticing how deep the bags under his eyes suddenly appeared. It’s like I don’t know him sometimes.
“I’m going to eat out for breakfast,” Jeremy said. “And do our food shopping. I’ll catch up with you later.” He tussled Daniel’s hair and headed for the front door.
Daniel got up and shuffled over to the living room window. He watched Jeremy get into his car and check his face in the rear view mirror, running his hands over his cheeks again and again as if he was trying to smooth the skin. He ran his hands through his hair a few times then started the car.
What is he doing? A chill slithered up Daniel’s spine despite the growing humidity. A creak caught his attention and he turned to see the office door slightly ajar.
Daniel took the orange line subway to Chad’s neighborhood, where rows of brownstones loomed over him like ruined castles. They all looked the same, silently guarding their secrets. He stopped in front of Chad’s building and took a deep breath before entering.
“I’m not supposed to be doing this,” the elderly landlady said. “The police told me not to let anyone in but I know you and he were so close. Chad adored you. The two of you were inseparable. How could I not let you have one last moment here?”
“I really appreciate this Mrs. Bennington. You don’t know how much this means to me.”
The landlady unlocked the door to Chad’s apartment. Daniel ducked under the yellow crime scene tape and slipped into the room, but as soon as he was in the apartment he wanted to leave. An overwhelming feeling of dread filled him.
Everything looked in its place. Daniel could find no signs of a break-in or violence of any kind. He moved his way to the bedroom and immediately saw the remains of the crime scene. They’d done their best to clean up all the blood but the faded image of crimson still marred the hardwood.
He wanted to vomit, but fought the feeling off as he looked around. Everything looked just as he remembered it. He wandered over to Chad’s dresser and stared at pictures, keepsakes, the retro lava lamp and the baseball cap Chad wore every time he went to the local clubs.
Daniel reached down and touched the cap. “Oh Chad…” his eyes welled up and before he knew it, tears stream his cheeks. He recalled all the nights they spent drinking and dancing until dawn. God, if it wasn’t for Chad, Daniel would have never survived his coming out.
He knew he had to go, he couldn’t stay in the apartment any longer; the feelings came like a tidal wave. He turned to leave and spotted something strange behind the bedroom door.
He closed it and set eyes on what looked like three or four porcupine needles. Daniel bent to his knees for a closer look. They were long quills, impaling the wall and doorframe. What the Christ is this? He tried to pull one out but it wouldn’t budge.
Danny…
Chad’s voice called his name and he gasped, jumping to his feet and looking around the room. There was no one there.
Dusk painted the sky in shades of umber and red. Morgan entered his studio apartment overlooking Tremont Street just as the sun died. In his arms he carried a huge bouquet of flowers he’d bought himself at the corner market.
His breath formed frosty puffs in the air. “Damn, did I turn the AC up too high?” He started over to the air conditioner when the flowers wilted in his hands. “What the…?”
A rattling noise caught Morgan’s attention. Behind him the coat closet door shook. “Okay, is this some kind of joke?” He dropped his bouquet to the floor and stomped to the closet, throwing its door open.
Two azure pinpoints glowed in the darkness. A low growl rose and Morgan’s heart slammed against his chest, his pulse raced and his feet froze. A roar reverberated as a cluster of quills shot out of the closet.
They caught Morgan in the face and he stumbled against the wall. Another bunch soared across the room, pinning him in place. The creature lurched from the closet in a fury and the last thing Morgan saw before his world went black were those azure blue eyes.
Daniel reached the top of the stairs, digging out his key for the front door. As he entered the apartment, he saw Jeremy come out of the office in the back hall and run up the stairs to the bedroom.
Daniel eased the door closed and crept into the living room, and through to the back hallway. He noticed the office door was half closed. He peered upstairs—the bathroom light was on, but everything was quiet. He slipped into the office and saw the book on the computer desk across the room. He shivered as he made his way to
the desk; the room seemed colder than the rest of the house.
One of the pages in the book was dog-eared so he flipped to it immediately, the section titled The Darg. He read on: Patron of jilted gay men. A creature of vengeance. Champion of the shunned.
Daniel couldn’t believe what he was reading. It was ignorant and superstitious, none of it could possibly be real. The page went on to describe a ritual involving a summoning beside a drawing of the creature, a hulking beast with pale skin and a body covered in quills. Daniel thought back to Chad’s apartment and what he’d found there. He looked over his shoulder at the second floor stairs. God, who am I living with? No! Impossible! None of this can be true. It’s insane. He would never…
There was more at the bottom of the page about driving the creature out. If the beast should see its own—
“Danny, is that you sweetie?” Jeremy called downstairs.
“Yes, I just got in,” Daniel called and slammed the book shut. He left the office and started upstairs.
“How was your day?” Jeremy asked.
“Uneventful.” He stopped in the bathroom doorway to see Jeremy slathering his face and neck with skin cream.
“I know you think this is silly but I need to do this. I’ll just get even uglier than I am already. I’m only four years from fifty.”
“Oh, Jeremy stop. You’re not ugly. No one thinks your ugly.”
“You’re sweet to say that love, but it’s not true. They all said I was ugly. All of them.”
“Who?”
“Everyone that left me. They refused to stay with me. Even now they still talk about me behind my back. Like I’m just a year away from being hideous.”
“Jeremy, I think you’re overreacting.” In the light of the bathroom, Daniel thought his lover’s hair was a little grayer than it had been in the morning.
“That’s easy for a twenty-six year old to say.”
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