Small Magic Collected Short Stories

by Aaron Polson

  Sometimes the books come back, but sometimes they don’t.

  So yes, we look. We search. We make every effort to find our missing books. I’ve scoured abandoned houses, located volumes tucked in furniture at Goodwill, and tracked down a particularly valuable copy of Alice in Wonderland in a bowling alley bathroom. A few years ago, I found a few volumes of Dickens, torn into strips and shreds and stuffed into a dog kennel behind old man Bernard’s place. He had used early illustrated copies of David Copperfield and Great Expectations with a gilt pressed covers for dog bedding, and he only raised mutts.

  Some of those volumes are so battered and stained, even destroyed, recovery becomes a symbolic act.

  But even worse than the stains, even those dark smudges which just might be human blood, is when I can’t find the books at all. Sometimes they disappear without any trail, and those…those are the ones that really bother me.

  Chapter 32: The Thing about a Haunting

  Some people swore that the house was haunted. Because of this, the children were afraid. Their father requested a haul-away dumpster, bringing his sledgehammer and pry bar, gloves and safety goggles. With these tools and free weekend hours, he aimed at the heart of the myth. It was a tiny house, after all, and they wanted the land more than the building.

  The man grunted under the work, cut his knuckles, coughed mouthfuls of dust and splinters and stale air. Sweat cut channels down his face. He wrenched doors from their frames, shattered the remnants of windows, and pried siding from the walls. The dumpster filled once, and the service brought an empty one.

  “Don’t you want some help?” his wife asked.

  He studied the cuts and calluses on his hands. “No,” he said. “I’m fine. It’s good to work again. To really work with my hands.”

  The sledgehammer broke bedrooms into fragments. Blonde splinters rained down. Gypsum powder clouded his goggles as he worked, fine and white and powdery. Voices echoed. People lived there, once. The walls whispered snatches of conversations. The floorboards squeaked and groaned with the memory of footsteps. The man heard only his ragged suck of breath and the work prodded rattle of his heart. His bones shook with the work; his muscles sagged like lumps of baker-stretched-dough.

  Even a small house bares its teeth and fights when it must.

  The man cried as he worked. Big, barbaric tears.

  The house surrendered in the afternoon, and the man knelt on the packed earth amidst the ruins, head bowed, and his skin soaked and sticky with grime and sweat. He closed his eyes. Perhaps he prayed for the house and its former occupants and the dreams, loves, and heartaches he destroyed with metal and muscle and blood. Perhaps he merely found his breath and summoned the strength to go home, call the county to haul away another full dumpster, shower, and eat dinner with his family.

  Either way, he staggered, weary and aged, to his truck, shoulders stooped and low. His body had become heavy with the demolition, with the freeing of the house.

  A haunting, it seems, is not rooted to a place.

  Chapter 33: Smoke

  When Ernst woke, he smelled the smoke first, even before he felt the rough cord wrapped around his wrists. His eyes began to water, burning from the ash in the air.

  "Hallo?" he called.

  Shapes shifted in the darkness. Ernst tried to move his head, but stopped as nylon rope scraped his throat. At his back, a square post, the corners digging into his flesh despite his woolen jacket.

  The shapes came forward. Books. The cover of each speckled with morphing yellow and orange firelight...each having sprouted arms and legs of black shadow. One volume of dark green leather plucked its cover open with a shadow-hand. On the open page in front of Ernst, words stood out in the flickering light.

  He began to cry. The rope at his throat constricted as he gasped for air, cutting into the soft skin. "Ich bin traurig," he gasped and closed his eyes, remembering the bonfires in Berlin, the piles of smoking pages. He understood the heat that began to sting his toes.

  Chapter 34: To Make Things Right

  The fat man approached with a package wrapped in a blanket under his arm. Mick took one more drag, dropped his cigarette, and ground the butt into the pavement with the heel of his shoe. He moved his head slightly, just a light nod, and the fat man joined him at the edge of the shadows.

  “You’re him? Mr. Jenkins?” The fat man patted his forehead with a stained handkerchief.

  Mick nodded. “Is it,” he looked at the parcel, “healthy.”

  “Yes. A clean specimen…from a car accident this morning. Tragic really, but fortunate for you, eh?” The fat man chuckled before catching himself and returning to a more serious tone. “For a family member?”

  “Someone close, yes.” Mick pushed one hand into his jacket and pulled it out with a stack of bills. “Enough.”

  The fat man’s eyes swelled. “Yes.” He took the package in both hands. “Don’t you want to check, make sure I’m not scamming you?”

  Mick stepped closer. “You wouldn’t do that.” His eyes, rimmed in red as dark as blood in the shadowed alley, narrowed. “Think of the consequences.” He took the parcel.

  The fat man smiled—a nervous, trembling smile, and snatched the money from Mick’s hand. “Thanks…if—” He caught himself before saying more, turned quickly, and waddled back the way he came, head wavering from side to side.

  Mick slipped the thin blanket aside and drummed his fingers on the white Styrofoam beneath. “God, another car wreck…”

  ~

  Mick Jenkins entered his bungalow through the back door, the door facing the alley. The kitchen light flickered as he flipped the switch. When the light came to life, Mick sloughed off his hard demeanor and slumped his shoulders with a sigh. He tossed his keys on the counter, nearly toppling a crooked tower of unread mail, and dropped the small cooler next to the sink. Cupping his hands under the faucet, he ran some cold water and splashed his face. The house carried a faint odor of decay—something rotten lurking in the silence.

  Next to the sink, posted on a cabinet door, a series of newspaper clippings caught Mick’s eyes. Finding the oldest article, he touched the yellowing paper with one damp finger, tracing the headline. “Goddamn car wrecks,” he muttered.

  Taking up the Styrofoam box, he started down the stairs to the cellar. The old wood groaned and protested, and the temperature dropped like Mick had stepped into a walk-in cooler. Unlike the rest of the house, the cellar was clean and devoid of anything except an old upright freezer and a stainless steel work table—the latter purchased from a restaurant second-hand when they remodeled their kitchen. He moved toward the freezer.

  The door opened with a sucking pop, spilling tendrils of frosty air onto the floor. Mick set the cooler on the ground and flipped off the lid. He lifted out a plastic bag—a human liver floating in a thin layer of dark, syrupy blood, and held it in both hands. It felt cold and quite heavy. Healthy. He pushed the liver into the freezer and stashed his new purchase on the bottom shelf next to other plastic wrapped parts—a slender upper arm and two delicate hands. He clicked the door shut and turned to leave.

  Halfway up the stairs, Mick stopped and tilted his head as though listening to something. Slowly, he descended the stairs, returning to the freezer. He hesitated before pulling the door open again. This time, his eyes met hers—her severed head resting on the top wire shelf with bluish, nearly translucent skin and eyes frozen open in a look of surprise. He reached into the freezer and touched her stiff lips with a trembling finger.

  “Almost have everything I need, babe.” He fidgeted with his wedding ring. “Then I’ll make things right.”

  Chapter 35: The Revolution

  Janice woke to a loud crack and tinkle of broken glass. Her eyes opened and fell on the shelf above her desk--the shelf on which she kept her words.

  One jar was missing.

  Janice slipped her legs from under the warm blankets. Her feet pressed against the cold hardwood as she delicately shifted her weigh
t and stood. Outside her window, trees brushed their leaves together. A car moved down the street in front of the house. But something else, a scratching sound, pulled her attention away from the other night whispers.

  She moved toward the doorway, stepped on a bit of broken glass, and let out a yelp. Pain danced through her shin, up her thigh, and across her back as she tip-toe danced to the doorway and the light switch, hoping to avoid another shard.

  The light flickered. Tiny shadows scurried for shelter under her bed, the desk, anywhere the light wouldn't reach. She looked at the mess on the floor.

  "Shit."

  The words were gone.

  Janice sat down on the floor, pulled her knees to her chest, and grasped the slick piece of glass, wincing as she pried it from the thick callous on her heel. Blood smeared across the bottom of her foot like finger paint.

  Then a smell. Ink.

  Janice blinked, unsure of her eyes. Like waves of ants, the words came. They mounted an assault, driving their tiny, sans-serifed feet into the soft flesh of her ankles, calves, and the back of one hand as she leaned on the floor. The pain burned, a thousand pinpricks of fire, and she slumped back, cracking her head.

  They blotted her eyes, swarming toward her mouth, and she could scarcely hear the other jars as they struck the floor, one after another, as the rest of her words joined the onslaught.

  Chapter 36: Fuzzy

  The bright wreaths, teddy bears, and colorful drawings were out of place in the somber décor of the Kurtis Brothers’ Funeral Parlor, but a child’s funeral was never a normal affair. At the front of the chapel, flanked by flowers and mourners, sat the open coffin of little Tommy Bellinger, age three and a half, his face yellow wax, his hair too orderly, and his expression too dour. A small, sky-blue blanket rested under his folded hands.

  “What’s with the blanket?”

  Kyle Kurtis, always respectful in his black suit and conservative tie, placed a hand on his junior partner’s shoulder, led him a few steps toward the back of the room, and bent to his ear. “The mother insisted. Said the kid never went anywhere without it. Said he was holding it when the truck—well, you know.”

  “Oh.” The younger man glanced at the coffin and then to the sober couple in black at its right.

  Kurtis shrugged. “The customer is always right.”

  Later that night, after the wake was over and all the relatives were tucked neatly into motel rooms across town, Jacob Bellinger woke to the clanging of trash cans being dumped outside his bedroom window. He half-rose from bed and leaned on an elbow, kneading his forehead with the other hand. “Shit.”

  “Jake?”

  “Sorry to wake you, Mags.”

  Another crash.

  “Ah hell,” he muttered. “Gillespie’s dogs are at it again. Or one of those damn raccoons I’ve been reading about in the paper.”

  Maggie Gillespie rolled off the side of the bed, tucked wisps of brown hair behind both ears, and shuffled around the footboard toward the window. “I wasn’t sleeping. I couldn’t sleep.” She stopped short of the window and wrapped her arms over both shoulders in a self-hug.

  Jacob closed his eyes and nodded his head slowly. He rose and caught his wife, squeezing her gently with his long arms. “I wish I could—”

  Another muted crash from outside the house interrupted him.

  “Those goddamn dogs. I’ll have to chase them away. Maybe call the cops.” He pushed his naked feet into a pair of plaid slippers.

  The phone rang, startling them both, and Maggie scanned the alarm clock on Jacob’s dresser. “11:14. Who would be calling now…with the funeral tomorrow?” She drifted to the phone and lifted it from the cradle.

  Probably Gillespie telling me those god-forsaken mutts are loose again. Jacob started for the door, wondering whether he should grab his broom or air rifle this time, when another sound, almost like the sob of a child, wrenched his attention to the window.

  “Mr. Kurtis?” Maggie’s voice was as and pale as her cheeks. “What…I don’t understand…” She began to shake.

  Through the window, Jacob Bellinger watched a shape, a dark shadow too tall for a dog, rummage through the strewn trash. The side of the house was dark, but he could see the form, the size of a child, flit around in the gloom.

  “Maggie…it’s a burglar…I think. Definitely a person. A short one.” Jacob’s voice was hushed and serious. He turned to face his wife, her face sucked white save for the heavy bags of faded purple under each eye. “Mags…what is it?” Fear pressed against Jacob’s back.

  “The funeral home.” She spoke as a robot. “Tommy…they called the police…this has never happened….”

  Jacob clenched his fists against the cold fingers walking his spine. “What is it?”

  “The body is gone…Tommy is gone. Missing.”

  Another almost-human cry sounded outside followed by a thud. The cold fingers wrapped around the back of Jacob’s neck. It’s impossible. Impossible. He shivered. A terrible realization coiled in his brain. “Oh god…he’s looking for it…”

  Maggie stumbled to the bed and sat on the corner; tears skated down her cheeks. Her eyes, wide and lost, burned toward her husband. “Who? Jacob, what are you saying?”

  Jacob staggered to the window, his back pressing against the cold glass. “I—I replaced Tommy’s blankie with a new one. Fuzzy was dirty, Mags. Stained. I threw it away. I—I didn’t think—”

  Maggie, fueled with grief and horror, sprang from the bed and shoved past her husband to the window. Her eyes searched the shadows outside and saw it moving below, something the size of her son, hunched over the spilled trash, searching. “He never goes anywhere without his blankie,” she whispered.

  Jacob slumped to the floor, shaking his head. “I…I didn’t think he’d know the difference…”

  Chapter 37: Words Per Minute

  The man with nine fingers leans forward, his face cut with shadows and light under the lamp. "You got 'em, Manny?"

  "Sure." Manny places a crinkled paper sack on the table, reaches inside, and produces a rag. He unwraps the first layer of the rag, revealing dark stains on the folds underneath."Five choices this time...hope one works."

  The man with nine fingers slides his right hand under the lamp. The pinkie is severed at the second joint, a clean cut with little scar tissue.

  "This one ain't gonna work," he says, lifting one finger from the cloth. "Too short. They'd snipped it at the wrong knuckle."

  Manny nods and dabs his damp forehead with the back of his arm.

  The man with nine fingers proceeds to try each remaining pinkie next to his stump, scrutinizing them under the harsh lamplight, comparing skin tone, size, fit. With a grunt, he tosses the last on the rag with the others and pushes away from the table.

  "No good?" Manny asks even though he knows.

  "No."

  Manny collects the cast offs in his paper sack. "I'll see what I can do...but really, is it worth--"

  "Yes, it is." The man with nine fingers frowns. "I don't mind the quotation mark so much--I don't write a lot of dialogue. But the return. The return key is a stretch. Slows me down."

  Manny fidgets with the paper sack, crinkling it in his fists.

  "It's NaNoWriMo, Manny." The man with nine fingers knocks on the table. "I gotta get my WPM up there. 50K ain't gonna type itself."

  Chapter 38: Everything in its Place

  The mail boxes were labeled wrong. That was the first hint that Lucey should have canceled her reservation at El Hotel de la Trampa. She wasn’t too fond of other aspects of the lobby, either: cheap candy in gaudy foil wrappers sat in a glass fish bowl on the counter, the strange man on the sofa who kept looking at her…

  “Can I help you?”

  Lucey’s attention shifted to the clerk.

  “Oh. Sorry…I was,” Lucey forced a smiled, “I need to check in.”

  The man opened the guest book and pushed a pen across the counter. “Reservation?”

  “Yes. Ha
rrison. Lucey Harrison.”

  He turned to the mailboxes, but looked over his shoulder. “What is it you do, Señora?”

  “Oh...I’m not married. Why do you…” Lucey’s eyebrows knit together. “Well, I work with books.”

  The clerk’s brown eyes burned into hers. “A teacher?” His hand slid into one of the boxes, fishing for the key.

  “No. A librarian. Only an assistant, really.”