Shock Totem 7: Curious Tales of the Macabre and Twisted

by Shock Totem

  Gothic scenery and Danny Elfman-like music add to the dark whimsy. When this was created, 3D games were new. There are a few ticks and bugs that make MediEvil a little difficult, especially when it comes to gameplay. A tiny controller nudge here or there sends Dan flying off a cliff or into lava. I was occasionally irritated by how carefully I needed to line up my jumps (across rocks, onto floating caskets, etc.), but it certainly didn’t dampen my enthusiasm for overall gameplay.

  There are several secret areas to discover, and plenty of incentive to replay game levels. Bosses easily reveal their attack patterns, and are fun but not too challenging. There are several amusing details, too, like sticky-fingered imps that steal your swords and sell them to greedy gargoyles (I literally ripped Dan’s arm off of his body and used it as a melee weapon until I bought my sword back) and chilling, singing little possessed girls.

  As I mentioned above, MediEvil held up, and beautifully. It’s 15 years old, of course, and that needs to be taken into consideration. But it’s also funny, enjoyable, and as satisfying now as it was back then.

  –Mercedes M. Yardley

  THE HORROR THAT ET MY PAP—AND OTHER SWAMP STUFF

  by William F. Nolan

  This here account is bein tole by me in the First Person. That’s when nobody else tells it. That’s me, the First Person. I could have tole it in the Second or Third Person but these other two ain’t intimate enough. I learnt all about these three Persons in school, so if I have to use em I got em in my head, all proper fer the usin.

  Guess I oughta start with how a gator we call “Big Boy” et my Pap. He’s a real horror, Big Boy is. Got long toothy jaws fit fer chompin. Pap, he liked to likker up on weekends an what I’m telling happened on a weekend. Pap was skunk drunk and couldn’t walk steady. Fell flat ass inta the swamp offa the ole rotty wood dock we fish from, which is when Big Boy slid up and et him. You could hear Pap’s bones snappen as Big Boy chomped him up real proper. A rare sight ta see.

  Now Pap’s bein et was no loss at me an that’s a fact. Pap was mean as a sow on Sunday. He’d whup me on my rosy butt with that leather belt that held up his britches. Ma, afore she passed on, usta try an calm Pap down, but it never helped none. He’d back hand her alongside the head. Smash her silly, then go right ahead with the beatin of me. Hurt like blue blazes.

  Pap was one mean son of a bitch, that’s fer sure.

  Then there was my first cousin Elford who drowned in the Sabine River. Thin as a starved goat with bug eyes and no hair on top. Bald as a bean. Anyhow, Elford usta fancy a late afternoon swim in the Sabine. On this particular day he got snake-bit an then a undercurrent grabbed him. My goddies, but he was a pure mess when we finally drug outa the river—all swole up like a pufferfish with his eyes rolled up white as eggs. When we tole his mud-ugly common law wife, Letty May, how we found him she threw a fit. Tore her hair like them Injun wommen back on the plains. Hollered like a stuck hog.

  As I stated previous, cousin Elford was a real mess when we drug him ashore. Looked like God’s wrath fer sure. He’d been there in the river fer quite a spell an he was all blue an smelt something fierce. Take my word, you don’t never want to smell like what cousin Elford smelt, I guarantee. No sir, never.

  Well, I got me plenty more to tellya bout life here in swamp country, but I’m tuckered out, so I’ll save it fer another time. So here I am, sign’n off.

  In the First Person.

  William F. Nolan writes mostly in the science fiction, fantasy, and horror genres. Though best known for coauthoring the acclaimed dystopian science fiction novel Logan’s Run with George Clayton Johnson, Nolan is the author of more than 2,000 pieces (fiction, nonfiction, articles, and books), and has edited twenty-six anthologies in his fifty-plus year career.

  Of his numerous awards, there are a few of which he is most proud: being voted a Living Legend in Dark Fantasy by the International Horror Guild in 2002; twice winning the Edgar Allan Poe Award from the Mystery Writers of America; being awarded the honorary title of Author Emeritus by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America in 2006; and receiving the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Horror Writers Association in 2010. Nolan resides in Vancouver, WA.

  Shall I Whisper to You of Moonlight, of Sorrow, of Pieces of Us?

  By Damien Angelica Grintalis

  Inside each grief is a lonely ghost of silence, and inside each silence are the words we didn’t say.

  • • •

  I find the first photograph face down on the mat outside the front door. In a rush to get to the office, I tuck it in the pocket of my trousers, thinking it a note from a neighbor. An invitation to dinner maybe.

  I pull my car onto the highway, into a mess of brake lights and angry horns, and shake my head. Morning traffic is always the same. Not sure how anyone could expect otherwise.

  When I reach for my cigarettes, I pull out the photo instead—you, with a lock of your hair curling over one cheek, the trace of a smile on your lips, and your eyes twin pools of dark, a touch of whimsy hidden in their depths. Beautiful. Perfect. A spray of roses peeks over your shoulder, the blooms a pale shade of ivory. Far in the distance, a faint strain of music, your favorite song, echoes away.

  The surface of the photo is slick beneath my fingertips, and when I lift it to my nose I catch a hint of perfume. Sweet and delicate, but with an undertone of some exotic spice. I will never forget that smell.

  I close my eyes tight against the tears. Yes, tears, even after all this time. I knew you’d find me. I’ve always known.

  • • •

  Please let me go. Please.

  Never.

  • • •

  In the middle of the night I wake to the smell of flowers. I move from room to room with a dry mouth and a heart racing madness, turn on all the lights, and check the windows and doors. Locked or unlocked, it doesn’t matter. If you want to come back, they won’t stop you. Nothing will. The photographs are proof of that. Still, the locks are a routine that makes me feel as if I’m doing something other than waiting.

  I peer through the glass to the back yard where moonlight is dancing across the grass. The tree branches sway gently, like a couple lost in the rhythm of a dance. I whisper your name, my voice breaking. Only house noise answers. I rake my fingers through my hair. I don’t know if I can go through this again, but I also know I have no choice.

  I never did.

  • • •

  The next photo appears face up on the coffee table in the living room. Same smile, but with your hair pulled back in a ponytail. A thin silver chain circles your neck; the fingertips of your right hand are barely touching the small medallion hanging below the hollow at the base of your throat. A trace of dark shadows the skin beneath your eyes.

  Baby, those shadows say.

  Yes, I still remember the sound of your voice.

  I fumble a cigarette free from the pack; it takes three tries before I can hold my lighter still enough to guide the flame where it needs to go.

  When my job transferred me from one coast to another, I thought the distance would be too great for you. Even when I still lived in the old house, it had been over a year since you left the last photo. I’d thought you were gone.

  I know it won’t be any different this time, no matter how much I want otherwise. This hope is a strange thing, a wish wrapped in barbed wire. Or maybe delusion.

  • • •

  The smell of flowers again in the middle of the night. I stay in bed, the sheet fisted in my hands. Heart full of chaos; head full of images.

  • • •

  My coworker catches me at the end of the day when I’m slipping into my coat. “Hey, a bunch of us are going to happy hour. Want to come?”

  “No, maybe next time.”

  He raises his eyebrows and shakes his head. “That’s what you said the last time.”

  “Sorry. I already have plans.”

  “You said that, too.”

  I shrug one shoulder and step away before
he can say anything else.

  • • •

  I sit with the television on mute, listening to the silence. A book sits unread on the sofa beside me; a glass of iced tea, long gone warm, rests on the table. Condensation beads around the base of the glass like tears.

  The minutes tick by. The hours pass. I listen to nothing. I wait.

  • • •

  Another photograph. On the bottom step of the staircase this time. You, captured on a blue and white striped blanket, shielding your eyes from the sun. Even in the frozen bright, the shadows under your eyes are visible and your skin is too pale. Next to you on the blanket is a crumpled napkin, a plastic cup on its side, a bit of cellophane wrap holding a rainbow’s arc on its surface, a few grains of sand. I hear the rush of a wave as it touches the shore, then another as it recedes. The salt tang of the ocean hovers in the air, but only for an instant.

  • • •

  I smell flowers in the night. Maybe it’s my imagination, but the scent is growing stronger. A promise or recrimination?

  • • •

  The landing at the top of the stairs. The next photo. Your face half in shadow, half in light. The almost-smile is still there in spite of the pallor of your skin, the hollows beneath your cheekbones, the scarf wrapped round your head. I hear the last breath of a laugh. Smell honeysuckle drifting on a cool breeze.

  Always the same photographs in the same order. I don’t know how, but the how doesn’t matter. And I already know the why.

  (Please let me go.

  Never.)

  It will be the last photo, just like the last time. I know it will, but I check the locks anyway. Everything is as it should be. It’s too cold to leave the windows open or I would.

  • • •

  A throat clears. I look up to see my boss standing in my office, a small frown on his face. “Are you okay?”

  “Yes,” I say. “Why?”

  “You look a little tired, that’s all.”

  “Just a bout of insomnia,” I say. The lie slips easily from my tongue.

  “You have my sympathies. My wife’s had that for years. Try a glass of wine before bed. That helps her.”

  “Will do.”

  He lingers for a few moments longer, and for one quick instant I think of telling him everything. I tried that once with your sister; she told me I should talk to a doctor, and then she stopped answering my calls.

  • • •

  I unlock the windows, as always, but my hand remains on the lever. I am so tired of waiting. I’m wearing shadows under my eyes now and I have a knot in my chest that won’t go away. Maybe I could learn to forget about you. To move on. Throw away the photographs, let time fade the memories. Lock the doors and the windows instead of unlocking them. Go out with my coworkers. And maybe you’ll stop.

  I flip the lock, sigh, and turn it back. No, I want you to come back. It’s what I’ve always wanted. Maybe that small sliver of doubt is the reason you haven’t yet.

  • • •

  And then I find a photo in the hallway just outside the bedroom door. I sit with my back against the wall. I’ve never seen this photo before. You’ve never made it this close.

  The smile is no longer a smile, but a grimace. The shadows beneath your eyes are now bruises of dark. I taste the bright sting of antiseptic. Hear the ticking of a clock winding down and down and down.

  “Please, baby, please,” I whisper, my voice hollow.

  I take that tiny trace of doubt and shove it away. Hold the photo to my chest. This time will be different. I know it will.

  • • •

  I toss and turn for hours, listening to the quiet. The distance between the hallway and the bed seems so small, yet miles, worlds, apart as well.

  Please, baby. Please.

  The last words you said to me.

  • • •

  The next door neighbor is outside watering her plants when I get home. She waves. Smiles. I return the gesture, but not the expression. When she starts to head in my direction, I hightail it into the house. Rude, I know, but she caught me when I first moved here and kept me outside for an hour, her voice flitting from topic to topic like a bee out on a mission for nectar. She doesn’t pick up on any of the signs that I want to be left alone, or maybe she does and just chooses to ignore them. The way she ignores the ring on my finger.

  • • •

  Another photo, left on the foot of our bed. It shows only clasped hands. Matching silver bands. Fingers entwined. One hand is hale and hearty; the other frail, the veins standing out like mounds in a field of fresh graves. I feel the paper skin beneath my palm. I hear a whisper of words, promising lies, promising everything. I taste a kiss laced with despair and loss.

  I can’t stop the tears. I can’t stop my hands from shaking. But I run to the florist and buy three dozen red roses, long-stemmed with thorns, the way you like them. On the way back, I brave the mall and buy a fresh bottle of your favorite perfume.

  • • •

  But one day becomes two. One week turns three. No trace of flowers in the air. No new photos. I’m still alone with empty arms and a knot in my chest. I smoke cigarette after cigarette. Pace footprint divots in the carpet. Choke back tears as the hope leaks out, a little more with each passing day.

  My boss was wrong about the wine. It doesn’t help at all. Nothing does.

  • • •

  After two months, I slide the photographs into an envelope, tuck the flap over as best as I can, and pull a battered shoe box out from under the bed. Nine sets of photos. Ten envelopes, the last one sealed. The paper clearly reveals two small circular shapes. The saint on the medallion never offered assistance; the ring is only a circle of empty without your skin to bind it.

  When I close my eyes, I recall every plane and curve of your face, before illness turned you pale and hollow; but I wonder...if not for the photographs, would I? Would time have turned my heart to scar instead of open wound?

  I shove the box back under the bed, my mouth downturned. I should’ve known better. You’ve tried nine times in five years. All the want in the world can’t bring you back.

  • • •

  The next time my coworkers ask me to go to happy hour, I say yes. I say yes the second and third time, too. By the fifth time, I don’t have to force a laugh at a joke or fake a smile when someone catches my eye. I feel a loosening in my chest. An ease in my breath.

  I take the box of photographs and put them on the top shelf of my closet. I make sure all the doors and windows are locked before I go to bed. And, finally, I take off the silver ring. My eyes burn with tears, but I blink them away before they fall.

  • • •

  “Please let me go,” you whispered through cracked lips. “Please.”

  “Never,” I said, arranging the scratchy hospital blanket around your shoulders.

  Your bare scalp was hidden under a yellow scarf, but nothing could hide the matchstick legs, the grey tinge of your skin, or the pain in your eyes that morphine couldn’t touch. No amount of perfume could mask the shroud of illness and breaking hearts.

  I held your hand and told you for the thousandth time about that night, our first date, after I dropped you off. How I turned and saw you standing with your hair full of moonlight and your lips full of smile. How I knew I would spend the rest of my forever with you.

  “Please, baby, please.”

  And then only silence. I sat with your hand in mine until your skin began to cool. I didn’t cry until a nurse led me out of the room.

  • • •

  I wake on a cool morning in early autumn to find the photograph on the mat outside the front door. The lock of hair, the little smile, the pale roses. I stand with my hands in my pockets for a long time, but eventually I carry the photo back into the house.

  I’ll leave the windows open every night, weather be damned. I’ll put flowers out every day. Because you were so close the last time. So very close. That has to mean something.

  I s
lip the ring back on my finger. It was a mistake to take it off in the first place. I won’t make it again.

  Please, baby, find your way back home to me. I’ll wait for you no matter how long it takes. I promise I will. If you make it all the way this time, I’ll say the goodbye I should’ve said in the hospital.

  Maybe then I’ll be able to let you go.

  Writing as Damien Walters Grintalis, Damien’s short stories have appeared in magazines such as Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Strange Horizons, Interzone, Fireside, Lightspeed, and Daily Science Fiction, and her debut novel, Ink, was released in December 2012 by Samhain Horror. Her work is forthcoming in Shimmer, the anthologies Glitter & Mayhem and What Fates Impose, and a collection of her short fiction will be released in spring 2014 from Apex Publications. She’s also an Associate Editor of the Hugo Award-winning magazine, Electric Velocipede, and a staff writer with BooklifeNow, the online companion to Jeff VanderMeer’s Booklife: Strategies and Survival Tips for the 21st Century Writer.

  You can find her online at www.damienangelicawalters.com or follow her on Twitter @dwgrintalis.