Granma raised her weary body and hugged me, explaining that Mr. Baker was not a student, as he said, but an official of the government who intended to attack our friends and family in Innsmouth. He was an investigator. Papa showed some documents that proved it. I turned to Mr. Baker but he didn’t notice me, he was just kneeling with bowed head before the Lucky Mouth.
I didn’t know what to say. I still liked Mr. Baker, but I had already been disrespectful by speaking to my elders out of turn. Granma showed me a place where I should kneel and gave me a smiling, understanding look that also clearly told me to be quiet and only follow instructions. I smiled back but I was worried about Mr. Baker.
While my brothers kept a tight hold on Mr. Baker, Granma started to chant in the old tongue, and Papa responded in the same language. I had an awful feeling in the pit of my stomach, uncertain as to what was going to happen to my friend. I was stunned by the occasion, and what I was seeing, and I was subdued by the powerful family compulsion to obey.
The smoke from the incense started to thicken and my head got a bit light. My eyes widened when I saw the frieze move slightly and the mouth began to open. I gasped, but my Granma held me around my shoulders, indicating for me to keep quiet. Mr. Baker started to cry. I really felt sorry for him.
The majority of the frieze remained a lifeless stone carving, but its mouth stretched open until it was big enough for a man to walk through. It was dark inside the mouth, but I thought I saw a faint orange glow, like the fire inside our steam engine when it isn’t in operation. I felt a warmth from its breath, and yet I also smelled the sea air.
Granma lowered her face near mine and whispered that I should stay put. She said that the Lucky Mouth would punish me if I pay no respect. I was scared and nodded that I understood.
I saw Mr. Baker tremble and try to break free, but my brothers were strong and held him fast. Granma stood and cried out in a tongue that I never heard before—in a way that couldn’t have come from a human voice—and yet it seemed familiar to me. The orange light burst into a flame, and then as quickly it turned a dark blue and the mouth changed into a window to an underwater world. It reminded me of Papa’s aquarium where he keeps his fish and crayfish for cooking.
Mr. Baker started shouting and screaming in English, begging to be released. He swore on his mother’s grave he would never say anything about what he saw, but my family ignored him. I looked to Granma, and she shook her head solemnly. Again, her eyes told me to be quiet and still.
Mr. Baker was dragged a few feet closer to the Lucky Mouth and suddenly his screaming stopped. His body jerked violently for a few seconds, and then he knelt still, gazing at something in the murky depths of the water world through the maw. I couldn’t see his face, but I sensed, by his relaxed muscles, and the slight inclination of his head, that he was paralyzed, or so shocked he lost his sanity.
Two pearl-white tentacles burst through the mouth, splashing water into the chamber, drenching poor Mr. Baker. One tentacle whipped around his shoulders, pinning his arms to his torso, while the other wrapped around his waste. I wanted to stand up but Granma kept her frail hand on my shoulder, and then to my horror, the tentacles ripped Mr. Baker in half, and dragged the two pieces into the water. Blood sprayed my face, contrasting with the paleness of my shocked face. For a fleeting moment I thought I saw in the water a giant eye, the size of an automobile, glowing a sickly yellow; blinking.
I pulled out a handkerchief from my sleeve to wipe away the blood, but my Granma stopped me. She pointed to the mouth. It slowly closed and all that was left were puddles of sea water and blood on the chamber’s floor.
Granma hugged me again and everyone smiled and nodded with satisfaction. I looked in Granma’s face and saw, where there were splatters of blood, there were also light colored scales underneath them. I desperately felt my face, and where there was wetness, there were also the unmistakable outlines of scales.
I now knew. I suppose I always did, deep down inside, but this was my life’s lesson. The Lucky Mouth was no human god, but a god of some other race, whose blood in part coursed through my veins. Maybe the veins of others in Arkham, and especially Innsmouth. I realized that Mr. Baker had to go as he was an enemy of me and my kind. I no longer felt sympathy for him.
I noticed my fingers covered in Mr. Baker’s blood. I enjoyed licking them clean.
HOLDING HER HAND
by
Anthony Bell
Monday feels so long ago, much more than a few days. I didn’t notice the effects until later, but looking back, I’m sure I was first affected that morning.
I was at my kitchen table, which I found on craigslist; it’s a bit warped and ugly, but serves its purpose. The stool I sit on is a bit high and leaning over my bowl of cereal chapped my ass at times, but Cindy always made me feel better in the morning.
She was the anchorwoman. Cindy “big tits” Merchant. Gorgeous smile, big eyes, and bigger twins barely shadowed by an extra button left undone. Men are simple creatures to please, and I know I watched the morning news less for info than for enjoyment.
She was relating a story about orphaned children in Bolivia. They had footage from earlier that day of one Ronald Burgess, finely dressed and clean, interviewing the caretaker as the destitute kids played off to the side. He asked about the conditions and what the children did for fun.
A dark brown boy, made darker by a layer of dirt, walked across the background. Ronald asked the caretaker, Eva, who spoke both Spanish and English, what the little boy’s name was.
“Enrique,” she said.
“Would you call him over here, please?” Ronald said, and favored the camera with a smile, so viewers knew his motivation stemmed from the kindness of his heart.
Eva did, and little Enrique walked over, looking from Eva to Ronald and the camera beyond. He took hold of Eva’s dress with one small hand, bunching it between his fingers. His cheek rested against her thigh, hiding half of his face.
Ronald asked Eva how old Enrique was, and she said five. Reporter extraordinaire that he was, Ronald squatted—careful to keep his pants from touching the muddy ground—so that he was about the same height as Enrique. He smiled wide at the boy to ingratiate himself, but half-turned so that the camera couldn’t miss it. He looked up at Eva.
“Would you ask Enrique if he’d like to have a teddy bear?” From off camera a hand extended and placed one into a palm he held behind his back.
That pissed me off—Mr. Burgess: worthless uncle offering gifts to win affection. There was a stinging feeling on my nape, so I slapped at it. I didn’t feel any bug fall down my back; I stood and flapped my shirt against my body, but nothing fell out. I turned back to the TV.
Eva asked the boy if he would, and Enrique’s eyes brightened and he grinned to show missing teeth and puffy, red gums. But his smile faded and his eyes dulled, as if thinking the question a trick.
Seeing the distrust, good man Ronald pulled the teddy from behind his back before Enrique could worry himself too much, at which point the boy’s eyes became bright again. He looked up at Eva and she nodded her permission. Enrique grabbed the bear from Ronald and giggled.
The camera focused in on Enrique for a moment while Ronald rose and explained the visible delight of the child as though viewers were, indeed, dumber than dog shit.
“Eva,” Ronald said. “Would you ask Enrique what he would want more than anything if he could have anything in the whole wide world.” Yes, he said it, not just the world, folks, but the whole wide world.
After being asked, the camera rested on Enrique; the boy looked into it, eyes glazed as he sought his heart’s desire. He dropped his head and spoke…
Eva translated. “Food,” she said. “Enrique says he’d want food, because he’s—” her voice caught, “he’s hungry.” She brought a hand to her mouth as tears started. She grabbed Enrique by his free hand and hurried away. “I’m sorry,” she said, her mouth muffling the words.
Ronald, conscientious and ca
ring man that he was, had a furrowed brow. “A simple request…such a simple request. Truly a sad situation these kids endure every day.”
Then he wiped a speck of unseen dirt from his coat and smiled at his lover. “I’m Ronald Burgess, down here in Puerto Heath, Bolivia, signing off.”
I think I said, “Wow,” out loud, but forget. For some reason that I fully regret now, I was so mad at Ronald for putting on a performance, more so because of its transparency. The asshole didn’t even care. He waltzed onto the scene of the orphanage, probably counting down the minutes until he could get his two-hundred-dollar shoes off of the filthy ground and back on a plane headed to the States. He walked on with a smile of orthodontist-straightened, bleached teeth, a generously gelled comb-over, and an insensitivity that nearly seeped through his pores like sweat. He had no sympathy for those kids. And by the pompous look of him, sure as hell no empathy. The forced smile proved he’d never experienced a tenth of their situation.
What a prick. What a world-class, sorry-excuse-for-a-person prick. Watching the kids in the background, with their ragged shirts hanging over their shoulders and their bare, blistered feet and faces of dirt makeup, I had felt a pure type of horror, a sympathetic disbelief that seemed to poke at my heart with branding fingers. Seeing those kids made me feel ashamed of what I have and gave me a vigilante type of perspective. At that moment, when rash indignation flowed through me and I was consumed by a do-gooder attitude, I felt that I should sell my meager belongings and send the money to those unfortunate kids. I should fly down there to be with them. I should join some humanitarian group that was surely sewing blankets together for the poor bastards, do my part and make a change.
But the clock said I had to be at work in fifteen. I shoveled two more bites of cereal into my mouth, tossed the bowl of milk into the sink, where it clinked and sent up a spray of good old two percent. Then I grunted because I had to spend another minute wiping off my textbook and the borrowed paper that sat on the counter.
I turned off the TV and forget about my altruistic crusade.
~*~
I worked at a CD store in the mall, sandwiched between an ice cream shop and a shoe store. Across from us were a toy store, a candy store, and a full-of-everything-mothers-don’t-want-their-children-to-know-of store. I clocked in seconds before I would be late, which is pretty consistent for me because I ride my bike and watch the morning news.
I got behind the counter and fished out my safety pin name tag so that all who could read would address me properly. I am nobody’s son, boy, homie, dog, or lad—my name is Gardner, but it’s my name.
I said “morning” to Melissa because she never says hi first. She dresses as if life were a perpetual funeral, but she nodded my way, so she must have been in a decent mood.
Randy, the manager, clapped me on the back like idiot older people do to younger people. “Just in time, as always.” He was smiling, kind of like Ronald Burgess.
“Yep,” I said. “Always here for the dough, sir.”
Randy stared at me for a moment as though he’d confused himself with Medusa. “You know, there are a lot of people that would enjoy working here.”
“I know, sir. That’s why I’m never late.”
He favored me with one more long look, until I thought snakes might actually start popping out of his head, then he walked off, muttering. I caught something that sounded like casserole.
I pinned my name tag to my shirt and thought up a bunch of nasty words I would never actually say to Randy’s face because afterward I would be unemployed. The thought was nice, though, because it made me feel as if I’d one-upped him.
Teresa, another coworker of mine, joined Melissa and me behind the counter. “Hey, Gard.” She’s the only one I tolerated calling me Gard, because since the first day we met and she did, it sounded natural.
“Hey, Teresa.”
She isn’t sullen like Melissa, but also not one of those perky-comes-across-like-a-ditz girls, either. She’s what I think of as “normal.” No great secrets motivating an attention-grabber style; no crazy parents giving her a woe-is-me complex; no neurotic tendencies or delusions about the Big Game of Life. I figure she grew up in a stable enough household and learned to read, write, and speak the eccentric expletives of the American language at customary ages.
I slid a piece of cherry gum into my mouth and got the radio going for the store.
Teresa was spacing out, looking just over my shoulder. I whistled two notes which brought her back. “What’re you thinking about?” I said.
“Mackenzie,” who was her cousin. “I can’t believe she got her nipples pierced.”
“When was this?”
“Last night. Can I get a piece of gum, Gard?”
“Sure,” I said, retrieving the pack from my pocket. I held it out to Melissa after Teresa had grabbed a strip.
She shrugged a what the hell and joined the conversation. “My brother has his nipples pierced.”
“Really?” I said, wondering why a man would want to pierce his nipples.
“Yeah, but he has about twenty other piercings, so it was coming.” She leaned against the back counter next to Teresa and crossed her legs. “Wonder what that would feel like.”
Melissa is big on makeup, dark colors, that is, but a puritan when it comes to piercings. She doesn’t even have her ears pierced.
I scratched my chest because my nipples began to itch.
Teresa grinned. “Got yours done, too?”
“Show me yours, I’ll show you mine,” I said, returning her smile.
“In your dreams, Gard.”
“I’d rather do it while I’m awake, if that’s fine with you.”
“We work together,” she said, dropping her eyes to fiddle with her tank top, over which she wore a maroon shirt. “It’s unprofessional.”
“Randy seems ready to fire me…”
“Close, but no cigar.”
Through the entrance I saw a mother and son walking hand in hand into the ice cream shop next door. The boy held a white teddy bear. My stomach growled. On a whim, I decided to try my luck with Teresa.
“How about I take you out to dinner, for a start?”
Melissa rolled her eyes and made a loud pop with her gum before leaving the scene.
Teresa quit fiddling with her tank top and favored me demurely. “Where do you have in mind?”
~*~
Being the romantic I am, I borrowed my mother’s car and took Teresa to a local pizza place.
It was a lot of fun, to tell you the truth. Much more so than I thought it would be. Up to a certain point, that is. When Teresa had agreed to dinner, I’d immediately began to think of where in the world I could take her, not where in the world I would like to take her. Money, money, money, my friends. I was apprehensive about my decision. To top off borrowing my mother’s car, a pizza joint for dinner didn’t sound too impressive, but I was relieved when Teresa hopped in and smiled.
“I’m disappointed,” she said, appraising the interior.
My cheeks reddened and in my mind I stammered an excuse. I knew the night would be terrible, would royally suck and that I should never have asked her out in the first place, because if it did royally suck, I would have to face her tomorrow at work…and the next day, and so on.
I swallowed. “Why?”
She smiled again. “I was hoping to get a ride on your bike.”
With that my cheeks began to regain their normal color. I chuckled.
Teresa watched me as I drove for a moment. “So, you got the car but didn’t feel like dressing up?”
She wore tight blue jeans and a small jacket over a v-neck top. A necklace with a hanging gem I thought emerald hung just above her breasts and gave me a reason to stare for several seconds. Her long hair was slightly curled and resplendent earrings hung from each of her lobes.
I wore what I had all day: shoes that could use a wash, jeans, and a white tee.
“I would’ve wore my spandex suit,”
I said and shook my head as though I’d never experienced a great regret in life, “but my dryer broke and I’m stuck with this.”
She laughed. “Really?”
“Hell yeah, ‘really.’” I slapped my forehead. “And because I don’t have my spandex suit, I couldn’t wear my neon bow tie or floral-patterned high tops.” I tsked several times as she continued to laugh. “I mean, seriously, what the heavenly father!”
That got her laughing even louder, and I felt good.
At the pizza place, we sat across from each other in a booth with a medium meat lover between us. I drank Coke; she drank lemonade. She was amazing, and I hoped I didn’t look totally recycled next to her.
“Wow, Gard, you don’t play around.”
A quarter of the pizza was left in the grease-stained box; I had eaten over half of it. “Yeah,” I said. “I’m really hungry for some reason.” I was, too, and it was weird because I kept seeing that little boy with his mother walking into the ice cream shop. The image had stayed with my mind all day and with it brought an empty feeling to my stomach, as though I hadn’t eaten in days.
“Well, that’s fine with me because I don’t know how much more I can eat.”
“Can or will?” My stomach felt as if it were imploding upon itself. I practically inhaled another bite of pizza.
“Can,” she said. “I’m lucky that way; I’ve got a fast metabolism. It seems that sometimes I have to eat and eat just so I don’t lose weight.”
A couple entered, looking to be in their twenties. The girl wore a cast on her left foot and walked with the aid of crutches.
I swallowed my previous bite. “You look good, anyway, whatever you secret is.”
“Thank you,” she said and brushed some stray hair away from her face. “You look good, too…even without your spandex.”
“Oh, you’re funny,” I said, and turned at the sound of the Cast Girl, who bumped into a table and dropped a crutch.
Anthology of Ichor III: Gears of Damnation Page 22