What Lies Beneath The Flowerbed

by D. M. Thornton

  Are you wondering how I manage to take out these fucktards? It’s easy really. They come willingly, and if they don’t, I have a special sauce in a syringe that I use. However, if things go as they are supposed to, they participate of their own free-will, which leaves the only thing I need help with is getting their lifeless bodies from the inside of the bunker to the garden. But that’s why I have Jaz. She’s a fucking ox. Damn that girl, she has the strength of He-man, and I wouldn’t mess with her ‘cause she’ll fuck you up. She’s a brute force, that one. Andi...don’t underestimate her either. She might seem sweet and friendly, but if you fuck her over, she’ll go complete psycho on your ass. She’s into some real crazy, torturous shit. Imagine Kathy Bates in Misery meets Elizabeth Bathory. Andi likes to tease and play with her victims, but she’ll give them pleasure, if they behave. Although, if you cross her...you’ll be begging me to kill you because she’ll make you pay, long and very painfully slow.

  We each have our own style, our own demons that lie dormant within our bones. Maybe that’s why we’re the best of friends. We all share a common denominator—we’re all a wee bit crazy.

  Chapter 3

  Gray

  Thank God, it’s Friday. For some reason, I’ve been extra antsy this week. I just need to find a new toy and have a little fun. I have one more class before the last bell rings, and all I have to do is keep my fake smile planted across my face and act as if I actually like these kids. What? I used to be in this gig to help the kids, but that was fourteen years ago. Now, between the politics of the public school system and the kind of dumbasses this world is producing, I’m burnt out and only in it ‘cause I have to pay my bills.

  The second bell rings and I wait patiently as the last few kids take their seats. I turn my back to write something on the whiteboard, then spin to face the room. “How are we all today?” I ask the class.

  There are some moans and groans, and woot and hollers. By Friday, the kids are strung out spazballs. They can barely keep their asses in their chairs, and if I’d let them loose, they’d tear my room up like the rabies-infected raccoons that they are. I slap a smile upon my face and chime, “Well, as much as we’re all ready for the weekend, we have an hour and fifteen minutes left of school. Which means we have work to get done. Now, I was going to surprise you all with a pop-quiz...”

  “Are you kidding me?” a punkass kid in the back row barks, slamming his pencil down on top of the desk in an echoing snap. Thomas Anderson. He’s a fucking jock that thinks he’s God’s gift to women. Blond, blue-eyed, cocky sonofabitch douchebag. I can’t stand him and, one day, when he’s older, I’ll give the whole world the gift of one less Thomas Anderson.

  “Ah, Mr. Anderson, it’s your lucky day.”

  He sits up in his seat with a grin. “It is?”

  “Yep!” I say cheerfully, walking over to my desk. I snatch a piece of paper from the top stack. “While everyone else gets to mummify a chicken, you sir, get to take that pop-quiz.”

  “What the...”

  I raise an eyebrow and press my lips together in a tight smirk, eyeing him, challenging him to say it, but he doesn’t, though it’s right on the tip of his tongue. He slams his hands onto the desk as he stands. He walks by me and swipes the paper from my hand, and as he heads back towards his desk, he mutters under his breath, “Such bullshit. Bitch.”

  When I said the students respect me, I meant ninety-eight percent. The Thomas Andersons in the world will never like me. That’s because I know what they are. I break them down slowly. Why? Because I can. And childishly, it’s fun. Though I try to keep my bullying to these types, such as Mr. Anderson, subtle and casual. I can’t get out of character when I’m at work.

  “I’m sorry you feel that way, Thomas. I suggest you take your quiz to the office, that way the class won’t disrupt you.” Thomas clenches his jaw and glares at me as he jars his hip into the corner of my desk, scooting it out of place and knocking a few things over, then walks by me with a snicker. “Oh, and Mr. Anderson,” I call out to him before he leaves the room. He stops and turns his head to stare me down. “Next time, I recommend that you don’t talk out of turn. And you know cursing is strictly prohibited in my classroom.”

  Yep, take your dagger eyes and get the fuck out of my classroom, punk.

  I take in a deep breath to compose myself after he storms off. I glance at my table from the corner of my eye and inhale, then release the air from my lungs slowly.

  It will have to wait.

  “As far as everyone else goes, grab a chicken and the bag next to it from the back table. Take it to your seat and wait for my instruction.”

  As everyone rushes to the back room, I quickly turn to my desk and position it back into place then shuffle my hands across the top to put items neatly back in their specific spots. Hey, I like order. So, if I don’t correct the chaos that suffocates me, I’m likely to spin my head around like something out of a horror movie. “You can grab your supplies quietly,” I say over my shoulder. The noise is deafening...fucking kids don’t know how to use indoor voices. They’re worse than three-year-olds. My chest is tightening, there’s something off about my desk, and I can’t put my finger on it. I fight the urge to bang my fists against the top of it.

  Pull it together.

  Before I turn back to the class, I need to check myself. One last deep breath and I spin around with a huge smile across my face.

  “Everyone ready to stuff a chicken?” I ask, my voice light and cheerful. The only thing keeping my sanity in one piece is the fact that we’re mummifying these dead birds. It’s not the real thing, but it’s close enough, and there’s no better way to learn than getting to do hands-on experiments. And this one is my favorite...for obvious reasons. I took an Ancient Egyptian History course in college and fell in love with the process in which a body was preserved. But it wasn’t until my very first kill when I tried it firsthand that I became obsessed. And a great teacher is one that teaches something that they have a passion for. I suppose it’s a good thing no one knows how deep my passion runs.

  I take my own chicken in one hand and hold it up to the class with my scalpel in my other hand. “First, we need to take our scalpel and make an incision to the side of the chicken’s belly.” I place the chicken back in its tray as the students watch intently. Most of the boys have their mouths open, intrigued, while some of the girls whine and wrinkle their noses. I shove my hand into the bird and pull out its organs. I refrain from gasping, but it doesn’t stop me from closing my eyes and rolling them behind my lids. The feeling of the organs slipping through my fingers is something that never gets old. The silky, raw feeling squishing between my fingers sends me to a happy place. I could seriously have an orgasm just by having the smooth innards in my hand.

  I open my eyes, almost forgetting where I am. Thankfully, my students are too enthralled by the guts that are in my opened palm. “Now, if we were back in the Egyptian period, we’d take a hook and stick it up the nostrils and extract the brain.” I plop the organs in the bottom of the tray, ignoring the gasping groans. “I want everyone to make their incisions and remove the organs. When you’ve completed those steps, I want you to remove the items from your bag. Of course, we don’t have all the ingredients that were once used, but we can pretend. Once the innards were removed, they were washed and rinsed out with spices and palm wine. We won’t wait for the parts to dry, but back in the day, the organs would have been left to dry then wrapped in linen and placed in canopic jars. Can anyone tell me what a canopic jar is?”

  The teacher’s pet in my class, Amber, raises her hand, but before I call on her, she barks proudly, “Jars that were made out of limestone or pottery. They stored and preserved the viscera of the owner for the afterlife.”

  I nod my head, not surprised that Miss-Know-It-All answered correctly and even used the term viscera.

  I hate brown-nosers.

  “That’s right, Amber. Thank you. The viscera, or organs, would be placed in these jars
. When the body was ready, each organ would then be individually wrapped and placed back into the chest cavity. Sometimes, the bodies would be painted or rubbed down with certain oils and decorated with amulets, then the fingers and toes would be wrapped individually before the body was given a layer of resinous paste and wrapped in layers of linen. We won’t be able to do all that, so I want you to use the salt and spices provided in the small Tupperware to preserve the organs. Wrap them in the linens then stuff them back into the chest cavity. Rub the chicken down with oils, paint it if you’d like, then wrap that baby up. Your very own mummified chicken,” I say with a grin.

  Oh, just got a chill down my spine.

  I can’t wait for tonight.

  While the students are working on their projects, I quickly wash my hands and sit down at my desk, organizing and rearranging what’s in front of me. I stare at it for a moment, trying to pinpoint what it is that’s missing. I know there’s something missing because everything I do is precise and orderly. I shift the pencil holder slightly to the left, tap the corner of the wooden calendar so it moves the tiniest bit to the right, and rotate my coffee mug so that the handle is facing the window...not the door. The papers in front of me get a good smack on the desk to line them back up before going into their “To Grade” slot in the organizer, and I count the paperclips in the dish—seven...my lucky number. My fingers drum on my desk as I bite my lower lip.

  What the fuck is missing?

  Ah, that’s it!

  “Ms. Knight, is this what it’s supposed to look like?” Adam asks, interrupting my train of thought.

  Fuck.

  I glance up at Adam, a total nerd, and nod my head. “Yes, sir, it is.” I unwillingly ignore the need to get down on my hands and knees to look for my charm bracelet, and pry myself away from the desk so I can walk around the classroom. I kindly praise the students that are close to being done. Looking at all these chickens wrapped in linen makes my mouth water. I see that Julie, who sits towards the back of the room, has yet to touch her bird, so I stroll over to her and stand next to her table. “Is there a problem, Julie?”

  She looks up at me with a nauseated expression. “I can’t do it, Ms. Knight.”

  I think she’s about to cry, so I take the scalpel and grab the chicken by its neck, slicing a clean cut in its side then reaching my hand in. “It’s not that difficult, Julie. See?” I remove my hand, showcasing the organs heaped in a pile in the middle of my palm.

  There’s a weird sensation between my legs. A tingling. I drop the organs onto the tray on a sharp inhale of breath and back away.

  “There, now you need to finish it,” I snap. I make a beeline to the sink and wash my hands clean of the bird’s juices. It might seem odd to you that I get the feeling of coming in my pants when I slice open flesh and stick my hand into its warm body. But for me, it’s the thrill of it. It’s a reminder of what I do...what I am. It gets my heart thumping and my blood pumping, and that tinge of delicious buzz at the apex of my thighs has me anxious to get out of here. Tonight’s gonna be fun.

  Chapter 4

  Gray

  “Glad you decided to show up,” Jaz shouts over the loud music. She sips on her water and eyes me over the rim of her glass as I take the chair across from her and Andi.

  “You and your goddamn water. Get a real fucking drink,” I bark. Jaz is hardcore into her workout regimen. Not a day goes by that she doesn’t do some form of biking, jogging, or hiking. She takes things to the extreme, but it works for her. I mean, she didn’t get the nickname Ox for no reason. At least Andi can let loose. She does CrossFit, but fuck, she’ll have a drink once in a while.

  “Someone’s pissy,” Jaz mumbles, eyeing Andi with a grin.

  “Shut it. I had some asshole kid mouth off, and when I sent him to the office, he pushed my desk...” Jaz and Andi both exaggerate a gasp and an, “Ooh!” at the same time. I’ll never hear the end of my obsessive compulsiveness from these two, but they just don’t get it. I can’t help it. “Shut the fuck up.” I take a gulp of my Moscow Mule and wince against the bitter, sour taste of the alcohol as it burns the back of my throat.

  “What happened?” Jaz asks.

  “Fucking Thomas Anderson, that’s what happened. I can’t wait ‘til that prick’s older.”

  “He’s only a kid,” Andi reminds me.

  I shake my head. “They don’t change. Once an asshole, always an asshole. This coming from the bitch that likes to tease, toy with, and torture her prey.”

  Andi smirks.

  “Anyway, the dumbass shoved my desk and messed it up. I can’t find my bracelet. You know the one with the elephant charm?”

  I get another dramatic gasp.

  “Whatever,” I mutter. I down my drink and slam the copper mug on the table with a loud clank. Jaz is about to tease me, but I cut her off. “Don’t even think about saying it. You don’t get it.”

  The bracelet was the only thing my mother ever gave me, on the only day that she was ever sober. I like to think of that day as the day my mother acted like a real mother. She left it on the kitchen table, and when I sat down to eat my Frosted Flakes, she strolled into the kitchen and sat down beside me. I kept staring at the silver metal elephant charm with ruby stones for eyes and an embellished carving in its neck that dangled from the red and black beaded bracelet. We sat in silence for the longest time. I was too afraid to touch it...scared to pick it up, but my eyes were glued to the beauty of the tiny charm.

  “I got it for you,” my mother said. Her voice was gravelly from all the years of hard drugs. “It symbolizes strength and luck. I want you to carry it with you. Let it remind you of the strength, honor, power, and dignity that you have. Let it be your lucky charm. You’re my only hope, Gray. Don’t get sucked into this life. Learn from my mistakes. Set yourself free.”

  I wonder if she had any idea of the person I really am. I might appear to be quiet and sweet. The outside world will never hear me say the smallest of swear words. I come across as a bit standoffish, but when you get to know me, we’re friends for life. However, the evilness I call Gray that resides inside me is my true form. The one that walks through life blending in as a law-abiding citizen, a pillar of society...your best friend. A soft-spoken high school teacher. But that’s not who I am. No, I’m a hoax. A fraud. I suppose I couldn’t fully escape the demons of my home life. That is, after all, the base of my existence. So even though I may not be a junkie like my mother or my brother, I still carry with me the Knight tradition of being a monster.

  I’m not the only one. Take my friends, for instance. Andi grew up in an abusive household where she used to cower in the corner and watch her father repeatedly beat the shit out of her mother then turn around and be lovey-dovey. “Baby” this and “you’re so sexy” that. Now, the poor girl gets set off by those two simple words. For fuck’s sake, don’t ever call her baby or tell her she’s sexy. She’ll tie you to an antique torture chair that encompasses your legs and binds them to a wooden rod in-between your thighs. Then she’ll take a large wooden mallet to your kneecaps, crushing your bones. You’ll never walk again, and by then you’ll be begging for me to come in and put you out of your misery. If Andi is really in a mood, she has various torture devices that have been handed down to her from her late grandfather who used to collect odd and grotesque antiques. She enjoys the likes of the heretic’s fork, lead sprinkler, a thumbscrew, tongue tearer, and a head crusher. Maybe you’ve heard of some of these, maybe you haven’t...what I do know is that you’ll never want to experience them. All I can say is that it’s a good thing we have my compound out in the middle of nowhere, ‘cause the sounds that come out of her boy toys are something that one has never heard before.

  Then there’s Jaz. She’s a doll. A real gem and one filthy bitch. She met her husband a few years back. They had a sex filled romance pre-marriage, doing it four times a day. But then they got married, and it went from stiff-dick to limp-dick. If you were to ask me, I’d say her husband is either
cheating on her or is gay, and I’m leaning more towards gay. Come to think of it, he stopped giving it up after he returned home from a fishing trip with his father-in-law. If I had my hand at gambling, I bet that Jaz’s dear ol’ dad popped her husband’s homo cherry. The old man’s been known to swing both ways. Yep, Jaz’s husband is as gay as cum on a pornstache. The dumbass won’t give it up, and she’s a crazy slut. What man turns down a girl that likes it rough and dirty? I’m talking cum squirtin’ in her mouth, down her chin and nipples kinda dirty. Like a cock up her ass, in her twat and in her mouth—simultaneously—dirty. The girl’s a whore, but she has the biggest heart and will do anything for anyone. She’s not a killer, that’s for sure, but don’t let that fool you. She’ll beat your ass to a pulp if you piss her off. At the end of the day, all she wants is a good fuck and someone who will love her unconditionally.

  Are you wondering what Jaz’s role is in this little game we like to play? She uses our li’l friends, or as I like to call them, boy toys. Well, that’s always her plan anyway. Jaz wants so desperately to use our boy toys as her personal sex slaves. She’d give her left tit to be able to get her thrill from riding their magic sticks then pass ‘em off to Andi, who really does tease them. Though, I really think Andi teases them in hopes that they’ll call her baby or tell her she’s sexy just so she can afflict pain to their orifices and extremities. Anyway, Jaz’s intentions are always in her favor, but her conscience has other ideas. And while she wants to fuck our boy toys, she always ends up feeling guilty because she’s married. I get it, I do, but shit or get off the pot. She talks a lot of trash, but never follows through, which I understand. She doesn’t want to be a cheater, which I agree she shouldn’t be. So, as of now, she’s useful being the extra strong arms that we need to transport these bastards.