Alphabet Soup for the Tormented Soul

by Tobias Wade

  There was still a little wrapping to do, but we watched a movie until the kids actually fell asleep around 9. Once we confirmed the sugar plums twerking in their heads, we went to work in our bedroom, door closed to hide the sound of crinkling paper and the rip of tape.

  We were interrupted mid-wrap by the sound of our doorbell.

  "Shit," I hissed, praying the kids wouldn't wake up and assume "wow! Santa wants to visit with us!"

  "I'll get it," I told my wife, walking out of the room. Who the hell rings a doorbell after 9 on Christmas Eve?

  A strong gust of snow-filled wind assaulted me when I opened the front door. My bare toes recoiled from the cold, and I peered between the door and the frame.

  "Hey!" Uncle Rob and Aunt Kay stood in the doorway, gift bags and suitcases filling their arms.

  "Whoa! Hi!" I laughed, throwing the door open. They stomped in, kicking the snow off their shoes in the entryway. I shuffled around them to shut the door.

  "What're you guys doing here?" I asked. They were supposed to be on vacation in Hawaii for the holidays.

  "Delivering presents! Ho-ho-ho!" Rob chuckled.

  "Keep it down," I laughed. "The kids are asleep and waiting for Santa."

  I gave quick hugs to each of them and helped unload some of the bags from their arms.

  "You can stick those under the tree," Kay said, putting down her suitcase.

  My wife came out of our room to see what the commotion was about.

  "Marla!" Kay squealed, opening her arms to my wife for a hug. Rob was Marla's brother, and our two families were close.

  The two of them hugged and Marla asked the same questions I did.

  "We decided we would spend Christmas Eve with you guys and then go on vacation," Kay explained. I nodded, happy they were here.

  "We were just wrapping presents, if you want to get settled," I suggested, pointing a thumb to the spare bedroom.

  "Nonsense! We can unpack later! We'll help you wrap," Rob said, tossing his suitcase unceremoniously into the spare room.

  Marla was already ducking into our room. I could tell she wanted to finish wrapping and go to bed. It would be an early morning, after all. Their help would make wrapping go faster, so I accepted Rob's offer.

  All of our work combined made the wrapping go quickly. Before we knew it, the job was done.

  "How did you guys even get here through the storm?" I asked while we stacked presents under the tree.

  "My truck made quick work of the snowstorm" Rob smiled, setting a sled with a bow behind the tree.

  Kay was unpacking a few of their gift bags and lining our fireplace mantle with a whopping 26 snow-globes.

  "You guys brought a lot of presents! Why didn't you mail some?" I asked.

  "And trust the Post Office around the holidays? We were scared half of them would go undelivered. Instead, we decided to deliver them personally!" Kay exclaimed, setting the last snow-globe on the mantle.

  I walked over to inspect the globes further. Kay moved in my way with a smile.

  "Not so fast, peeker! These are still presents and so you need to wait until tomorrow."

  I laughed and threw up my hands.

  "Okay, okay! I never knew you guys collected snow-globes, that's all."

  "We don't, but you do now," Rob winked. I chuckled. The snow-globes were a gag gift, obviously.

  We said goodnight, parted ways, and went to bed.

  Marla rolled over in bed a few minutes after we got in.

  "Steve."

  I grumbled some unintelligible reply.

  "I don't... know how to say this..."

  Her tone concerned me, so I flipped around to face her.

  "What's wrong? Did I do something?"

  "No, no," she said. "Rob is just acting... too... happy...?"

  "Too happy? What do you mean? I would think they should be happy, hanging out with us for Christmas."

  "Something feels off, I just can't place it."

  I'm not an idiot. I know what "something feels off" means. It means you better go investigate because something is going on.

  Without explaining, I got out of bed and headed into the living room. Marla hesitated, then followed. I slipped into the lit room, Christmas tree glistening.

  My first stop was the presents under the tree. I dug through the presents as quietly as I could, pushing our kids presents aside to look at Rob and Kay's for us.

  The gift bags were tucked far under the tree, and I had to really stretch to reach them. Why had they tucked them so far away?

  When I fished one out by one finger, I sat up and peered inside. Marla looked over my shoulder.

  A single snow-globe stood upright at the bottom. I pulled it out, only to find it empty. There was water in the glass orb, but no scenery or glitter or anything. The base was simple: just some polished metal making tripod-style legs.

  "The snow-globes must be their joke gift," I said, telling my theory to Marla. There wasn't much else to say.

  I slowly lowered the snow-globe back into the bag. There were still 3 more bags under the tree to inspect. Marla wandered to the mantle and skimmed her gaze over the snow-globes that were lined there.

  "Steve," Marla whispered. I looked up and set the bag down. Marla motioned me over to the mantle, and I stood up.

  The snow-globes on the mantle had the same kind of simple, metallic, tripod legs. The orb was empty except for a three or maybe four inch-tall waving spire at the bottom.

  I squinted, and that's when I saw it. The spire wasn't a structure: it was a... person. A tiny person—a man—walking forward without going anywhere and his arms wrapped tightly around themselves, as if he were freezing.

  I reached a hand out and softly lifted the snow-globe. The man inside continued walking, even when I turned it upside down.

  I looked along the mantle, trying to understand. Marla watched me, I could tell she was wondering what we should do.

  "What are they?" She asked.

  "I don't...know."

  Should we wake them up and confront them? Why? Maybe these were animatronics or something similar?

  Our decision was made for us. I turned around and suddenly Kay was between us and the tree. I yelped, then caught myself.

  "I told you not to peek," Kay frowned. Marla instinctively moved behind me.

  "We needed a drink so we came out here and ended up talki—"

  I interrupted myself when a man walked into the room. I had barely caught a glance, but I knew. It was the man from the snow-globe I held. Somehow, I knew it was "Rob".

  "Who the hell are you guys?" I asked, with more bravery than I felt.

  The two of them looked at each other. I knew before they moved that they were going to rush us. I tossed the snow-globe I held at them, hoping to distract them so I could grab the fire poker next to the fireplace.

  They both scrambled after the globe, catching it before it fell to the wood floor. I reached the poker just as Marla grabbed another globe and threw it onto the floor, shattering it.

  Kay burst into screams that turned into inhuman shrieks. She put her hands to her face, fingernails being pulled back into her fingers with the sound of elastics being pulled taut. The hair on her head began to retract into her scalp, her arms grew shorter. The skin and mass of her body began to swallow them up, as if packing her body up to be smaller.

  When she moved her hands away from her face, her eyes had been sealed behind skin, and her mouth was no longer there.

  That was all the view I had before the man rushed me. He was so fast that I didn't process the attack in time. He punched me or kicked me, I'm not sure which, and I flew into the hallway, landing straight on my back but still clutching the poker.

  Marla screamed and tried to shove every last globe off the shelf, but the man was on her in milliseconds and tossed her into the Christmas tree.

  I got to my feet and ran into the room, brandishing my weapon. Yelling, I ra
n at the man who stood in a ready stance, frowning at me.

  I swung, and he moved out of the way so fast that there was never a chance that I'd hit him. Instead, my poker hit the mantle and bounced away. Recoiling from the vibrating collision, I looked at the row of globes. I made my decision and pulled back my arm to swing.

  The iron was yanked out of my grasp by the man, who had sped over behind me. I was thrown off balance and took a few steps forward. I put a hand on the mantle, then grabbed a globe and spun around, holding it out and ready to drop.

  "STOP!" I yelled.

  The man was gone from where he had been, but the patter of quick footfalls that had been filling the air suddenly stopped. The man was near where Kay fell. The only sounds left were the sounds of a balloon being stretched and snapped, and my wife struggling to untangle herself from the Christmas tree.

  "Get out of my house," I growled, emphasizing the threat to drop the globe.

  The voice that emanated from the man was malformed, like trying to talk mid-swallow.

  "Give... me," he gurgled.

  "Get OUT!" I yelled, my legs starting to shake.

  "Steve!" Kay suddenly screamed in terror, and I looked down to find her wriggling out of what can only be described as an elastic, skin colored bag. She wriggled free, completely soaked, and tossed the bag across the room where it hit the wall.

  She tried to stand, but couldn't and just crawled my way. I pointed the globe in her direction.

  "Get back!" I threatened. Kay wasn't bothered by the threat to the globe.

  "Steve!" She sobbed. "It's me! It's Kay!"

  My body shook as I didn’t know who or what to trust.

  The bag against the wall answered my question. It began to rise up and wriggle. Kay shrieked and crawled behind me. The bag was close to where Marla was hiding behind the Christmas tree, so she leapt out of hiding and also got behind me.

  The bag grew an arm, which reached towards us while making that gurgling sound. The stretch of balloon latex material became louder. Another arm started to grow.

  I didn't know what else to do. I dropped the snow-globe.

  The man rushed forward, but he was too late. The globe shattered, and the elastic bag let loose another shriek, despite not having a mouth. This time it sounded like a man.

  The guy was still charging and tackled me full force. I flew back into the brick of the fireplace and went out like a light.

  Marla was the one to wake me up. The two... things... had left. All of the snow-globes, even the pieces, were gone. She said the man had stared them down, daring them to move, while he gathered all of the globes into the same bags they had arrived in. He even took the ones under the tree.

  The bag had regurgitated someone else when I broke the second globe. A man I didn't recognize. His hair was pasted down and soaked, and his clothes dripped with a saliva-textured fluid.

  The bag reformed into another person while the man packed the globes away. Apparently it was a man this time. He helped intimidate Marla and Kay and the regurgitated man until the two ran out the door with incredible speed.

  Kay kept crying and sobbing, blubbering about never making it to Hawaii but not remembering how she had gotten here. Just a sudden pierce of light and she was crawling around in our living room.

  The kids had been woken by the commotion, but thank God they were too scared to come and investigate. Marla held them tight while we decided what to do with two kidnapped but what seemed to be unharmed people. The back of my head was bleeding, so at the very least, I had to go to the hospital.

  Marla was about to drive me there, taking the kids with us in case they came back while we were gone. Kay insisted on coming too, scared to be alone.

  The new guy said he was going to find his own way home, and thanked us for getting him out. We shook hands as if we'd finished a business deal. It was a surreal feeling, already starting to not believe what had happened.

  After the hospital visit, we came home to a package on the porch. I hefted it, and Kay recognized it. It was all of our Christmas presents from Kay and Rob.

  It's so strange that one late package could have helped us so much if it had arrived on time. It was supposed to arrive a week before Christmas. The note inside told us that they were sad they couldn't spend Christmas with us and the kids. If only we had read that before "Rob and Kay" had shown up, we would have been a lot more suspicious.

  I'm sharing this story because others may have had something like this happen. I already know it happened to the new guy, and the 24 other globes they escaped with

  V is for Venom

  The Custer Wolf

  “Virtually no idea, Sweetheart?” the man asks, caressing a lock of my hair with his finger.

  I heave, trying to control my sobs, my knuckles nearly white as they grip the steering wheel. If the car were moving, I’d be careening off the road right now.

  “I-I-I’m s-sorry,” I gurgle “I can’t see anything.”

  He sighs and lets his fingers slip slowly down the sleeve of my blouse. “Veronica, we’ve picked you for this special task precisely because you can see things. If I could do what you can, do you think we’d be wasting our time here?” His voice is silky, smooth, snakelike. The words come out like sweet poison, friendly at first, but full of malice once consumed.

  I take a deep breath. I try to sound in control, even if I am having an internal meltdown. “I’m sorry,” I say steadily. “Sometimes, I do – see – things that I don’t understand entirely. But they’re rare, I can’t control them, and I don’t know what you want me to-”

  “Shhhh, calm yourself, sweetheart, calm down.” His teeth are perfectly white when he smiles. His hair is jet black. He looks like a used car salesman. “I believe in you, Veronica, I really do. I would not be here otherwise.” He slips his hand into the small of my back and pulls me closer to the passenger seat. I recoil, my eyes transfixed on the gun in his right hand.

  My breaths come shallow. “Maybe you’ll just have to kill me. Maybe I can’t be what you need.” I try to look him in the eye, and find it impossible. Instead, I stare down at where his light blue shirt is tucked into his white pants.

  “Tsk-tsk-tsk, Veronica, that’s not a winning mentality!” He squeezes my waist, pinching a roll of fat. A tear drips down my cheek. “We like winners, don’t we? Just help me with this one teensy little task, and you can be a winner too.”

  I close my eyes and shake my head.

  He pulls his left hand back and uses it to lift my chin. “Open your eyes.”

  I obey.

  “Now. Veronica. You can see my face. I’ll tell you my name: it’s Damien Grace. Do you know why those facts are important?”

  I shake my head again. Tears fly from my face.

  “It’s because this will end one of two ways. The first is that your body will rot in a grave that no one will ever find.”

  I cringe. He pushes forward.

  “The second way that this ends, Veronica, is that you act like a good little girl and help me out. I leave without worrying about you talking behind my back, because all of the evidence shows that you’re the culpable one.”

  Here he drops his hand from my chin.

  “There is no third way, Veronica.”

  My lip trembles. I try to keep it together, but it’s like trying to stop the rain. “I can’t, I can’t, I’m sorry, I can’t,” I say as the sobs begin.

  He waits to see if I will stop.

  I don’t.

  He waits one moment longer before getting out of the car and walking around to my door. “Get out,” he orders as he rips it open.

  I’m too slow. When I’m halfway out of the car, he grabs my arm forcefully and yanks me forward. I stumble, but don’t fall. He slams the door and walks me around to the back of the car. I’m nearly paralyzed with fear. “All things, Veronica, are possible with the proper motivation.” He opens the trunk.

  The bound and gagged boy la
ying there is so terrified that he looks years younger than his eight-year-old frame. I try to say some comforting words, but they would all be lies, and he would hear through the lies. My mouth is too numb to say anything anyway.

  “You won’t be alone in that grave, Veronica,” Damien says calmly. “Your son will keep you company forever.”

  His grip on my arm is the only thing that keeps me from collapsing to the floor. I try to eke out some words. “You – you – you wouldn’t, you wouldn’t-”

  “Hmmm?” he asks, pulling the side of my head next to his mouth. He breathes in my hair. Deeply. “You don’t believe that I would?” His whisper is gravelly. “Is that what’s holding you back? Is that what you need to overcome?”

  He lets go of me and I struggle to remain standing. I would reach out for Robby, just to hold him, if Damien weren’t standing in between us. I tremble.

  Damien produces something from his pocket. I wish someone would come and see us, but we’re pulled way off the highway, and the moon is so obscured by clouds that I cannot even see past the trunk. The rare passing headlights are barely enough to illuminate trees around us.

  Damien is holding a syringe in one hand, and a small bottle of green liquid in the other. He fills the syringe, puts the bottle back in his pocket, and points the needle menacingly at me. “Do you know what we have here?” he asks me, still calmly.

  I shake my head.

  “This is a synthetic venom, Sweetheart. Very potent. 26 milligrams would be fatal in, say, a boy of about eight.”

  My knees buckle, and I nearly fall. I am wearing flats, but they feel like high heels on a boat in a storm when I am drunk and things are spinning and sinister.

  I stare as he reaches out to Robby. ‘He won’t do it, he can’t, so he won’t,’ my mind tells itself. It seems impossible that he would poison my son, so I believe that he will be safe. He is still safe.

  Damien plunges the needle in Robby’s neck. It rips through his soft skin, and the vibrant green liquid is pulled into my son’s bloodstream like he’s thirsty, and my son is filled with venom.