by David Wood
And I don't want to care.
Have I told you how much I hate cities?
Cities are ugly places, cold and uninviting, and more than anything, lonely. They don't care if you sleep on their streets or in their ivory asylums. They don't care about the insects that swarm all over them selling their days for money and their bodies for warmth. They don't care because they endure. They pass on their guilt and their crimes to someone like me and absolve themselves of the blame. Wash their hands and walk away.
But now it’s my turn to walk away.
Walk over the bridge and find out what's on the other side for me because there's nothing I want here.
Let someone else carry my burden.
Let someone else care and crumble away to fine grains of dust and sand and drift away on the next cold, cold wind.
Cold. . .
So cold. . .
Too cold for my rags, but who cares about another tramp? The wind is biting, its voice another scream to haunt my ears, but maybe, if I make it to the other side, to the gates of heaven, I will be free of this city and its miracles, free of the voices that won't stop laughing inside my head, free of the memories that won't leave me to be lonely, Aimee and Chaz and all the others, and if I don't make it, if I dissolve into the netherworld of shades and ghosts, if I join my dead, will that be so bad?
I don't think so.
The End
If you enjoyed Laughing Boy’s Shadow, try Parallel Lines by Steven Savile.
Steven Savile has written for Doctor Who, Torchwood, Primeval,Stargate, Warhammer, Slaine, Fireborn, Pathfinder, Arkham Horror, Rogue Angel, and other popular game and comic worlds. He won the International Media Association of Tie-In Writers award for his novel, SHADOW OF THE JAGUAR, and the inaugural Lifeboat to the Stars award for TAU CETI (co-authored with International Bestselling novelist Kevin J. Anderson). Writing as Matt Langley his young adult novel BLACK FLAG was a finalist for the People's Book Prize 2015. His latest books include SHERLOCK HOLMES AND THE MURDER AT SORROWS CROWN and PARALLEL LINES a brand new crime novel from TITAN, as well as GLASS TOWN and COLDFALL WOOD, forthcoming from St Martins Press in 2017.
PIERCING THROUGH BY R.J. FANUCCHI
Piercing Through appears in this collection by permission from Caliburn Press.
Kelly Page, a piercing purist, finds comfort in adorning her body with studs, barbs, snakebites and much more. Kelly becomes interested in the use of extreme piercing in an attempt to access other dimensions. Her hope is to escape into a world free from the pain that torments her adolescent life.
On the other hand, William Hendricks, a tattoo enthusiast, is repulsed by anything linked to piercing. When Kelly’s pursuit of other worlds releases a pair of pierced wraiths, William knows the only thing that can save her are the black magic tattoos covering his body. But how can he unlock their dormant power?
Chapter 1: Close Your Eyes
In dreams you open your eyes to escape. To escape reality you close them. The problem facing Kelly Sage was she could not determine what category her current circumstances fell under. It felt somewhere in between.
She remembered slowly rising towards consciousness from the deep slumber of a late afternoon nap, one she desperately needed after a typical high school day that had subjected her to three written tests and an oral book report. Exhausted, she immediately collapsed on her bed upon arriving home and when she started to awaken a half-hour later she fought it with every fiber of will power she could summon.
She craved another hour or two. No matter how hard she resisted, she continued ascending to the cursed world that awaited the awakened. Her eyes opened and she heard a cold voice that induced immediate panic. Although mechanical in tone, like computer generated speech, it contained a dash of emotion. It sounded both human and inhuman.
“Yes we can. She summoned. We came and we will not leave empty handed.”
Kelly looked around for the source of the voice but saw nobody. The bright afternoon sun shining through the window illuminated her bedroom, leaving no shadows for somebody to hunker down in.
Kelly tried to leap off her bed but couldn’t do so. She remained on her back, her mind prompting her to run, but her body refusing to do so. She thought of Jeremy Cash, a classmate who had wrecked his 1967 Mustang drag racing and now spent life in a wheel chair, paralyzed from the neck down. So this is how he must feel.
Not a single muscle responded to her brain signals. Her legs stretched out in front of her, stiff as pier posts. Her arms remained pinned to her side, her fingers curled and her head slanted to the right where a slight stream of drool dampened the pillow.
She questioned the reality of the events. She couldn’t imagine she had awakened from an innocent nap to suffer the fate of a paraplegic. However, this heightened state of awareness felt so real it couldn't possibly be a dream, could it?
She moved her eyes, the only part of her body she could control. She observed all the familiar details of her room, details that weren’t so clear and defined in most dreams. She smelled the flowery fragrance from the folded pile of black jeans and t-shirts on her black dresser. From her angle on the bed she could see the slow rotating dusty blades of the ceiling fan. Beyond the foot of the bed her scarlet opera curtains were pulled back and fastened to the wall on each side with hooks.
Again she heard the voice, or rather two voices seeming to converse with each other.
“What do you want?” This voice sounded different, more gentle, more human.
“The girl.” The course vocals grated Kelly’s nerves.
“You can’t have her.”
“Oh yes we can. She summoned. We came. We do not intend to go back empty handed.”
Kelly’s eyes sought the source of the voices, but they remained hidden, like stage actors behind a curtain. As Kelly searched, the light rapidly poured from the room as if miraculously the earth's rotation had significantly sped up. Soon, a vast darkness enshrouded her room.
The scene transitioned in a blink of an eye, the way they do in dreams. She no longer believed this to be her room. She felt strapped to a chair. Two colorful arms reached around her torso, tightening the straps. They were manly arms that boasted a mural of colors, as if someone had decided to use his skin as a watercolor canvass.
“We can stop here if you want.” The words came from the man standing behind her and they seemed to be directed at her.
She couldn’t answer. Her lips remained frozen shut like every other part of her body except her eyes.
Surveying the new scene, her mind dived into a pool of fright as she located two pairs of glowing eyes floating a few yards in front of her. She could not make out any other details but the four eyes. The orbs emitted a white glow. Inside the white luminescence tiny black dots bounced around like ants scavenging scraps of coconut flesh. Static buzzed in the air.
Her immediate thoughts turned to alien abduction. Had she been whisked away to some galactic space ship? Were they about to perform embarrassing experiments on her? Perhaps a rectal probe?
“You still with me?” The kind human voice behind her filled her with reassurance. She latched on to it, hoping it would not go away. She had no way of responding. Every muscle remained tight and rigid, keeping her paralytic.
A whirring sound erupted behind her ears with a high pitch. It took her a few seconds before recognizing the sound. A drill. Sudden pain shot through her skull as intense pressure bore down on her head. She wanted to scream but her vocal cords were wound as tight as a tourniquet. Hot liquid, probably blood, cascaded behind her ear and across her forehead. The drill continued its screeching wail as it tore through the skin of her head and tunneled through the hard bone constituting her cranium.
Why was the man with the gentle voice doing this? She had thought him an ally, a partner to stand against the two pairs of static filled eyes. So why was he drilling holes in her head?
The walls keeping her mind intact began to crumble. Terror coated her mouth with a nasty metal
lic taste and her skin prickled with fear.
She looked to the luminescent eyes. Perhaps they would save her from the drill. The horrible static tore through her pupils, erupting in her mind. The static hummed in her head with the intensity of jet engines. She felt her brain shutting down, her volition giving way to the terrible noise.
In dreams you open your eyes to escape. To escape reality you close them. That obscure line was from an unknown author whose vampire story she had read in a long since defunct fanzine. It seemed strange she should recall it now.
Perhaps the author was right. Maybe all she needed to do to escape this haunting scene was shut her lids tight. She did. The roaring static in her head ceased. She no longer heard the high pitched whirring of the drill. She opened her eyes. No glowing pupils floating in the air. The bedroom once again filled with sunlight, establishing the warm cozy atmosphere she had grown accustomed to.
What of the paralysis? She tested her toes and delighted to see them wiggle. She willed her leg to move and was gratified to see it bend at the knee. However, her breathing remained erratic. She panted like an overheated dog and her heart raced like late commuters fighting to get to their jobs on time. She remembered her gym teacher, Gina Renwick, giving them a lesson on Yoga. She had told the class that breathing is the cornerstone to a restful soul.
Kelly recited those words in her mind as she lay on the scarlet comforter. She took slow deep breaths, forcing her hurtling mind back to tranquility. As she reached a state of calm, she felt exhaustion creep over her.
She still couldn’t determine if what had just happened was real or all in her head. She lay on her bed thinking about the strange events and felt an unease creeping back into her mind. It seemed the danger was over, but she couldn’t stop dwelling on it. Reality as she knew it had been altered in a manner she could not explain. She only knew that as long as she stayed awake she would suffer from a compromised world, one in which a dream, but for a moment, had apparently leaked into the real world.
To escape reality, you close them. That obscure author’s words seemed overly appropriate today. She closed her eyes again and fell back to sleep.
Chapter 2: Gothic Lolita
When Kelly awoke a half-hour later, she turned her head to the bedside stand and saw the digital clock. Immediate panic ensued. Her breathing tightened up, becoming shallow and quick. So much for Gina Renwick’s wise advice.
Kelly's heart beat at her chest like a war drum. Alma would be home any minute, barring any stops at the liquor store or Rattigan’s Tavern and she didn’t want to be caught without her defenses. Her survival depended on it.
All thoughts of the paralysis and strange vision during her first nap were supplanted by a more immediate danger; her stepfather.
Wondering how it had come to this sad state of affairs, she retrieved her striped stockings out of her dresser drawer and pulled them up over her knees. She fetched her faux leather boots from the closet and pulled them over her calves, completing the outfit with a black blouse and ruffled miniskirt. A pink lacy petticoat extended a couple inches beyond the hem of the skirt.
Inspired by the Japanese fashion craze, Kelly had done the best she could do with her current wardrobe. It wasn't genuine Lolita attire but it would suffice.
Staring into the dresser mirror, she applied white foundation to her already pale skin. She complimented this with a coat of corpse blue lipstick.
She continued gazing at her features. On the best of days she viewed herself as ordinary as toilet paper with her page boy eggplant dyed hair, anemic skin and slight build. However, dressed like this made her downright hideous. She could blend in with any of the young runaways roaming the streets of downtown Portland.
Kelly moved to the door then remembered the petite pink parasol. She didn’t want to forget it as she had yesterday. For some odd reason the parasol drove him over the edge. It had become one of her chief weapons.
All this to tame the beast, her stepfather. She liked to refer to him as the ogre for reasons that had started years ago. Several times she had caught him watching her with a look on his face that bordered on lust tempered with a dash of guilt. Sometimes, as she stood at the stove, scrambling his morning eggs she could feel the weight of his stare. She would turn around and he would direct his gaze back to the newsprint. Or she would come out of the bathroom, freshly showered and wrapped in a towel to find him perched against the hallway wall, a lurid leer twisting his mouth into something obscene.
However, the covert stares and perverted sneers weren’t the only reasons she referred to him as the ogre. The real inspiration came from her genetic father, Stephen. By no means was Stephen the perfect dad. After his nasty split with her mom she had not seen hide or hair of him. The least he could have done was come to her mother’s funeral three years ago.
It was as if he had vanished off the face of the earth, which was entirely possible given his occupation as a cryptozoologist. He spent his career tracking down wild creatures of legend. Perhaps a Chupacabra or a Yeti had claimed his life at some point. What else would explain his lengthy absence without so much as a letter, email or a simple phone call?
Her memories before his departure were bliss, especially sitting in his lap as a young child as he read to her numerous picture books, his favorite being Where The Wild Things Are. Specific details about the first reading of the classic tale came back to her, including their conversation.
She recalled running a finger across one of the illustrations. “What are all those animals?”
“They’re monsters.”
“They look mean.”
“They’re not.”
“So these monsters are nice? Are all monsters nice?” She rubbed her scratchy drooping eyes.
Stephen looked down at his sleepy daughter curled up in his arms. “No. I suppose not. Ogres are particularly nasty. You never want to cross paths with an ogre. If you do, I’ll be there to protect my little angel. Don’t you worry.”
The image of a slobbering devilish ogre had remained with her into her teen years when Alma had taken Stephen’s place as the man of the house. Her step-dad had been cruel from the beginning. She realized fast that just as there were different types of monsters, some nice, some mean, there were different types of dads.
“You never want to cross paths with an ogre.” Her dad’s words seemed quite poignant when it came to dealing with Alma.
She now wondered who was more of an ogre; Alma with his hints of molestation but who still provided for her material needs, or Stephen who had abandoned her to suffer a tyrant’s reign?
It scared her that she had nobody to turn to for advice. Oh how she wished for her mother. This wouldn’t be happening if her mom was still among the living. Kelly proved to be a quick study and she had figured out how to cope on her own.
She went down the creaking stairs of their two story 1920’s Victorian home and found the living room empty. Alma had not yet arrived. She took the opportunity to brew a cup of chai tea.
Pausing at the ornate mirror above the fireplace mantle, she nodded approval at her reflection. All her defenses were in place. She sat on the sofa, picked up her copy of The Book Your Church Doesn’t Want You to Read, sipped hot tea and waited.
By the time Alma came through the paint chipped front door Kelly had drifted back to sleep, her feet propped on the lacquered coffee table. His entrance woke her with a start.
Alma grunted a greeting and headed straight for the kitchen.
Rubbing sleep blurred eyes, Kelly followed. She paused in the entrance and watched her stepfather rummage through the refrigerator. He pulled out cold cuts, bread, cheese and mayonnaise, tossing them onto the table.
“Would it be too much for you to cook a meal once in a while?” Alma asked, fishing around in the silverware drawer. “You used to cook.”
Kelly didn’t grace him with a reply. She observed his yellow stained tank top, dirt plastered Wranglers and the logging boots that dropped clods of mud onto the
tiled floor. He repulsed her.
“Not talking to me? What did I do now?”
She kept her mouth shut and waltzed into the kitchen. She worked her way between Alma and the table, keeping her back towards him.
“Why don’t you step aside and let me make your sandwich.” Her heart continued its war drumbeat. She knew the risks. One of these days her strategy might backfire. She held her breath and picked up the table knife, dipping it into the jar of mayonnaise.
She felt Alma step back as his stare raked across her body, up and down.
“Not the Goth Lolita thing again. Why, Kelly? I mean, every night? Really?”
Ignoring his protest, she lathered the white sandwich spread onto pieces of whole wheat bread. She heard the refrigerator door swing open and the crack of a beer can tab being pulled.
“You know, it really pisses me off how much you’ve changed,” Alma said. She heard greedy gulps as he emptied the beer down his throat.
Kelly dropped the knife and turned. “Why should it matter to you what I look like? I can dress any way I choose. This is who I am. Deal with it.”
“Seriously? I don’t have a say in how my own daughter should look?” Alma crumpled up the aluminum can and hurled it into the sink.
“Stepdaughter. Don’t forget that important detail.”
Alma shook his head. “You used to be so much prettier when your mom was alive. That creepy makeup makes you look like a stiff on a mortician’s slab. Do you like looking like you’re dead?”
She snickered. Didn’t he understand the point of dressing like she did? There were many reasons to pursue alternative attire; chief among them to make her appear as unattractive to him as possible.
Moving towards him, she opened her arms wide as if to put herself on display. “What’s the matter? You don’t like to look at me anymore?”