by L Neil
The loose, clay tiles beneath me clatter as I turn to look behind me. I’ve been chained to an upright piano with white, peeling paint.
Squinting at the sunlight again, I rest my hands upon the closed lid of the piano. I wonder how long I’ve been out and when the effects of the drugs are going to wear off. But mostly, I wonder...why? Why is this happening?
When my eyes adjust to the brightness once more, the last wall of the greenhouse is revealed to me.
A dozen or so pairs of wide, glassy eyes stare back at me. They are set into the faces of young men and women who are dressed like dolls.
Just as I am.
I look at their faces. Yes, these were people – real people. I recognise at least two of them from the news. They’re missing, believed dead.
Well, they’re certainly not breathing anymore.
I know that I should be terrified – and maybe I am – but perhaps it’s a good thing that I’m not losing my ever-loving shit just yet.
While I seem to be numb to the situation, perhaps from shock, I study them, sitting upon their shelves.
How are these people so...intact?
The Taxidermist. It’s gotta be.
But Sam is too young, isn’t he? He would have been about fifteen when the first victim of the Taxidermist was put on display. Surely, he wasn’t capable of this at such a young age.
Fuck. Does it even matter who is responsible?
Halfway between the back of the piano and this wall of horrors is a small set up of surgical equipment, gas cylinders, tubes and power cords. A sheet covers something that lays atop the longer stainless-steel trolley. If I had to take a guess at what it is...
Yeah, I think it’s a human body.
This finally seems to trip some wiring in my mind, and I begin to panic. Trembling, I begin to imagine what’s going to happen to me.
No. No, I won’t let him do this to me. No fucking way.
I take a deep breath, planning to exhale slowly but the stench is suddenly up my nose, down my throat. Instantly, my stomach churns but, stubborn as I am, I refuse to let myself throw up.
There isn’t time for that. I need to get practical. I have to get out of here.
I sit on the floor again and try to break the wooden post on the piano that I’m chained to. I kick it with my feet, but despite how fragile the piano looks, it’s too strong. If I pull at the chain, that would only hurt my ankle.
Plan B, then; pick another lock. I just need something to use…
I look towards the metal table. Surely there’s something on or around it that I can use. I just need to get over there somehow.
To my relief, the piano has wheels. However, moving it proves to be difficult in my groggy state. But I can’t not try.
I power through, pushing as hard as I can and... nothing happens.
Not about to give up, I try again and just when it feels useless, impossible, the piano rolls forward slightly. But then it catches on the uneven tiles and rolls back.
Fuck!
I pull it back further and roll it sideways, to the right and... progress! The next line of tiles is more even, and I have now managed to get close enough to my target.
Exhausted, I reach out to the small metal table. But I stumble and my hand automatically reaches out to the other, longer table – the one with the sheet on it.
I don’t want to see what’s underneath. I don’t need to. Nothing good could come of it.
I lift it anyway.
The first thing that registers in my mind is that it’s a young male. Dead, like everyone and everything else in here.
Then, the world seems to move in slow motion, or at least I do, because it takes longer than it should to realise that I’m looking at a familiar face.
When the realisation hits, I swallow the overwhelming urge to scream. Staggering backwards, I forget all about the shackle and I trip and fall to the floor. The pain doesn’t register – only the horrible guilt that rips through me.
Through wet eyes, I look back up at the table. From down here, the side of his body is only visible, but I still know who it is and that it’s my fault he is here.
His skin is severely mottled, and he looks more dead than the others, somehow.
I look back at the wall of victims. Now that I’m closer, I can see that they have makeup on their skin, their eyes and their lips.
Will he end up with them?
Will he be made beautiful again?
A sob escapes my lips, but I cut it off. I would scream for help if I knew that it wouldn’t be the pointless. There are no neighbours nearby and if anything, I would be alerting Sam to the fact that I have awoken. I need to think, to get back to the job at hand.
I need to get the fuck out of here.
With shaking, weak arms, I push myself back up. I shuffle over to the body upon the table, knowing that there’s nothing I can do to make it right but wanting to apologise all the same.
With a hand upon his cold chest, I say softly, “I’m so sorry, Josh.”
“The dead can’t hear you.”
I turn my head quickly to see a man in the doorway. He’s older, probably in his sixties or seventies and he’s wearing a navy, pinstripe suit and brown leather shoes. The briefcase he carries matches his shoes and when he takes off his tan fedora, his balding head is revealed.
“Who are you?” I ask, lifting my chin. He seems frail. If I somehow manage to free myself, I have no doubt that I could overpower him.
He doesn’t answer. Instead, he enters the greenhouse and places his suitcase on the empty space of the metal table. Then, he takes his jacket and hat off and drape them on a hook on the wall.
Still ignoring my question, he grabs the long, plastic apron from the hook beside it and ties it to his body. The apron falls all the way down to his shoes, covering his entire body, except for his rolled-up sleeves.
My eyes widen. Sam isn’t the Taxidermist – his “friend” is.
He proceeds to open his suitcase and snap on some gloves, seeming to prepare himself for messy work.
Fuck.
“Please,” I beg, “don’t do this to me.”
“I’m not here for you,” he says, gently. “Not today, anyway. I’ve got to work on this young fellow.” He casually points to Josh’s body.
“No,” I reply, shaking my head. I mean to say more but I can’t find the words, I just continue shaking my head and say again, “No.”
He studies me for a moment. I get the impression that he is sizing me up. I am likely to be his next project, after all.
Then, he begins to unpack his suitcase. Laying his tools out on the table, he seems to be getting ready to do some dissecting.
“You can’t,” I say, weakly. He can’t. He can’t do this in front of me. No way.
I back away but can’t go far, due to the chain. When he pulls out a small saw, I sit down on the floor and slide myself around to the front of the piano so that I can’t see what he’s doing.
Seconds later, I hear a terrible squelching sound. I scream now, partly in horror, partly to drown out the sound.
I squeeze my eyes shut, cover my ears with my hands and continue to scream. I can’t seem to stop, even when I’m sure he must be finished by now.
But then something touches my face, startling me and cutting me off.
Sam is crouched before me, close and concerned.
Without a second thought, I head-butt him in his stupid, beautiful face.
He staggers back, shocked and then furious. But then he smiles, the trail of blood dripping onto his perfect teeth. And it’s not one of those evil or patronising grins of his. If the circumstances were different, I would say it was a genuine, friendly smile.
“I love how feisty you are,” he chuckles, wiping the blood away with the arm of his light beige suit jacket. The red is very stark against the obviously expensive jacket, but he doesn’t seem fussed about ruining it. Again, very strange for him.
He drags a piano stool over the tiles t
owards me. He must have brought it in with him.
When he places it in front of the piano, he pats the bench and says, “Here. Sit. Play something for me.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I seethe. For some reason, there isn’t even a small part of me that wants to cooperate, no matter how badly that could turn out for me.
“No,” he replies, still so happy. If his nose hurts, he doesn’t show it. “All my other dolls are kind of useless now that I’ve dressed them and made them pretty.” He looks up to the wall of bodies and beams. “I did a great job, didn’t I?”
Other dolls?
The old man clears his throat.
“Oh sorry,” Sam sighs, “I suppose I should give Stanley here some credit.” He smiles in the direction of the man but now it’s one of those smiles that I recognise. He doesn’t much appreciate or care for him.
“Anyway,” he stares back down at me, “I suppose my father did us both a favour by chopping off those golden locks.”
His hand softly touches the piano lid, but he pulls it back when he realises how dirty it is. Straightening up, he says, “You will be my little musical doll until that hair grows nice and long...and then you can join the others.”
Standing once more, I quickly grab the stool with both hands and throw it at him.
He dodges it easily - piano stools are heavier than they look, and I knew I would be too slow. I had to try though - had to at least let my anger out. I’m long past being terrified now.
When his laughter finally dies down, he says, “We are going to have so much fun.”
I want to ask why he’s doing this, but the answer is that he’s obviously insane. I would appeal to his good nature...if he had one. I would threaten him, if I had any sort of leverage over him.
My only option would be to befriend him or at least make him see that I’m just like him – broken and used by other people. Perhaps if he believes that we are alike, that I might be the only person who understands him, then I might have a chance at surviving this thing.
A sound draws my attention to the old man and it’s too late by the time I turn back away – I saw the blood, the...pieces of Josh on the table before him.
The need to throw up is overwhelming but I’m going to need to convince Sam that I’m not repulsed by him, so I keep it contained. I look at him now as he says, “You’ll get used to it, I plan on making my collection much bigger.”
He smiles at me and I know right then that he believes them to be real dolls, inanimate objects. Not knowing how to respond, I look away.
The Taxidermist speaks again, “You and your brother do keep me quite occupied.”
Brother?
If Cristian is here, my chances of escaping would be impossible. I would have to fool them both. And from what I hear, Frank’s eldest son is smarter and less friendly, too.
“Is Cristian here?” I ask Sam, trying not to sound afraid. “I don’t believe I’ve ever actually met him.”
I glance towards the old man to find that he is watching me suspiciously now. Does he know my angle already? I might have to wait until he’s not around before I try to manipulate Sam.
Sam replies to my question, finding nothing odd about it. “Not today. Perhaps next week. I think he will be in the lab for quite some time.” His grin now is wicked, devilish. There is no doubt that Cristian is up to something nefarious, especially if the Taxidermist is involved. But how much worse can it get than this? I don’t think I want to know.
The Taxidermist must not want me to know either, because he clears his throat again and says, “That’s enough, Samuel.”
A sudden look of distaste passes over Sam’s face but so very quickly that I doubt the old man saw it from the other side of the space.
But then he smiles again and tells me, “Hel, you don’t need to worry about Cristian. He doesn’t care for you; he pays no mind to my toys.”
I want the old man to go away, to leave us alone so that I can begin to convince Sam that he doesn’t want to turn me into one of his “toys”, but he seems to have only just begun his work on Josh.
Involuntarily, I look back over to see him scooping Josh’s insides out. The red, slopping mess falls into a big white bucket that has been placed on the floor at the man’s feet.
I try to hide my terror when Sam walks over to me. He tilts my face up by my chin, but I keep my eyes lowered, knowing that I cannot play it cool right now. The distinct smell of blood and creeps up my nose but there’s more than that. I have never smelled the insides of a body before and I don’t think there is a worse smell that has ever existed.
“I know you must feel guilty. Don’t. I would have found him eventually, anyway. I am very patient.” He waves his hand, moving my face around to get me to look at him. When I do, his eyes are soft and kind once again.
“Just as I would have waited a very long time to have you. I’m just lucky my father fucked up so badly that you ran into my arms.”
A tear slides down my face. Frank was really trying to protect me. Yes, he did it the wrong way but… oh God, I have never wanted to see him so badly.
Surely, he will find me. If anyone can, it would be him. I just need to bide my time.
When Sam releases my face, seemingly unhappy by the fact that I’m upset again, I open the lid of the piano and play some mournful chords. I realise there’s literally nothing else that I can do while I wait to be rescued.
Because I will be rescued, won’t I?
The piano stool scrapes on the tiles as Sam places it behind me. I sit and lift my other hand to compose a song to accompany the chords.
I don’t look back to see if he is pleased. And I sure as hell don’t peer over the piano to see if the old man had reacted either.
Eventually, I hear the door open and close as Sam leaves me alone with the most twisted serial killer in the history of New Orleans.
I cease playing to talk. “How…” I want to ask so many questions that they all want to come out at once.
Stanley looks to me, cocking a brow. “You have a question?” He drawls, cleaning a silver hook with a cloth.
“Mmm,” I say. “I have a few.”
But I don’t want him to talk over the pieces of Josh’s body and it must be obvious because he drapes the sheet back over him.
“You get two,” he says, eyes not leaving me.
The first is a question that has been burning in my mind since I first saw them: “How do you get them to look so…lifelike? No, not just lifelike… they’re perfect. Shouldn’t they look…bruised, discoloured like… like Josh?”
I exhale deeply. Jesus, do I really want to know this?
He snickers. “Trade secret.”
He said that I get two questions – I suppose he didn’t say anything about me getting any answers.
“Okay, maybe you could answer this one.” This is the one I’ve been wanting to know the longest. “How do you know Frank?”
A long, petrifying grin spreads across his face, wrinkling his cheeks, his eyes.
“The Skinner?” He asks. He picks up another tool, wipes it and then roughly drops it into his suitcase, making a loud, clanging noise. He sneers and pure hatred shines in his eyes. “Such a scary name for a weak, dull man.”
“He’s not weak. And he’s not dull,” I say, feeling defensive.
“What would you know!” He yells, furious now. “You weren’t there.
“He had no imagination – and no balls. He could never do what needed to be done. Unlike his father – now he was a ruthless leader, that’s for sure.”
“What do you mean?”
Wiping yet another tool, he says, “Frankie never had a problem with my methods. Or my victims. Frank junior – he is too soft.”
“You worked for him?”
He pins me with a hard, unfriendly gaze. “You’ve had your two questions.”
CHAPTER 21
The Visitor
It’s night again by the time Sam and I are finally alone.
I played songs for most of the day, even when I was left unaccompanied for short periods of time. It was all I could do to keep my mind off the fact that I am going to be killed, stuffed and put on display, like some animal.