But You Scared Me the Most

by John Manderino

  Copyright © 2016 by John Manderino

  ll rights reserved

  Published by Academy Chicago Publishers

  An imprint of Chicago Review Press Incorporated

  814 North Franklin Street

  Chicago, Illinois 60610

  ISBN 978-1-61373-478-0

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Manderino, John.

  Title: But you scared me the most : and other short stories / John Manderino.

  Description: First edition. | Chicago, Illinois :

  Academy Chicago Publishers, [2016]

  Identifiers: LCCN 2015033052 | ISBN 9781613734759

  (softcover: acid-free paper)

  Classification: LCC PS3563.A46387 A6 2016 |

  DDC 813/.54—dc23

  LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015033052

  Cover design: John Yates

  Interior layout: Nord Compo

  Printed in the United States of America

  5 4 3 2 1

  This digital document has been produced by Nord Compo.

  To Marie

  I saw a vampire,

  I saw a ghost,

  Everybody scared me,

  But you scared me the most.

  —Randy Newman,

  “Last Night I Had a Dream”

  CONTENTS

  Too Old to Trick-or-Treat, Too Young to Die

  A Certain Fellow Named Phil

  Nessie

  Bigfoot Tells All

  Otto and the Avenging Angel

  Wolfman and Janice

  Kukla

  But You Scared Me the Most

  Saint Fred

  Self-Portrait with Wine

  No Place Like Home

  Bob and Todd

  Made for Each Other

  The Mummy

  A Matter of Character

  Nancy Drew and the Case of the Missing Slipper

  Jamey’s Sister

  Abduction

  Dracula’s Daughter

  Killing Carl

  The Creature from the Black Lagoon

  Frankenstein and His Mom

  Oscar

  The Weary Ghost of Uncle Doug

  186,000 Miles per Second

  The Witch of Witch’s Woods

  TOO OLD TO

  TRICK-OR-TREAT,

  TOO YOUNG TO DIE

  When I was eleven I wanted to be a bum, for Halloween I mean. Eleven was a little old for trick-or-treating, I realized, but I was quite small for my age, so it wouldn’t look too bad, and I wanted the candy.

  No, that’s not true.

  I wish to be honest here.

  I wanted to go as a hobo, like all the years before—with burnt cork smeared on my face for a beard, a broken derby hat, a shredded shirt, patches pinned to my pants, a red bandanna full of crumpled paper at the end of a stick over my shoulder, chomping on a stubby rubber cigar—so when people, especially big, round mothers, opened their doors and saw me they would tilt their heads and say “Awwww” and want to give me a great big hug, and some even would.

  But my mother insisted I go out there this year as someone more “dynamic”—her word—than a derelict asking for a handout. Here’s what she had me wear: white shirt, white bow tie, white vest, black pants, and this long black silky cape with a shiny red lining and high, pointy collar. As she straightened it on my shoulders she told me Dracula was actually a very sophisticated person, very self-assured, a count after all, who fully owned his own castle.

  I’d seen the old Bela Lugosi movie and his castle didn’t look very appealing: cobwebs, shadows, and rats.

  “An accomplished man, Kevin,” she added. She herself was an accomplished advertising executive and bridge player, who looked like Lauren Bacall. “Close your eyes,” she told me, and began applying eyeliner with a little pencil from her black-beaded purse.

  My dad stood nearby in his tweed jacket with elbow patches, puffing on his pipe, reading glasses on his forehead, informing me that Dracula was the eponymous character from the 1897 novel by Irish-born writer Bram Stoker. “One of the most fascinating fictional creations of all time, Kevin.” Dad taught high school English. The kids gave him a horrible time, but at home in the evenings he sucked on his pipe and thought of himself as a professor.

  As Mom started darkening my eyebrows, Dad assured me that the model for Dracula was a powerful medieval ruler known as Vlad the Impaler. “What about fangs?” he asked my mom.

  “Those are for children,” she said. “Now, I’m going to put a little bit of this on,” she told me, showing me the tube of lipstick. “So don’t fuss.”

  “Oh, I’m not so sure he wants to be wearing lipstick—do you, Kev?”

  “Please keep your mouth very still,” she said.

  “Whom are you addressing?” he asked her.

  “You’re going to look very striking,” she promised me.

  “By the way,” Dad added, “he was called Vlad the Impaler because of the manner in which he customarily—”

  “There,” she said, stepping back from her canvas. “Go look at yourself in the bathroom.”

  Dad called out after me, “Don’t be alarmed if there’s no reflection—I’m kidding, of course.”

  He meant about vampires and mirrors.

  I stood in front of the mirror above the sink. There was definitely a reflection. I nodded in approval at it. Spreading open the cape, I tilted my head back and bared my teeth. Then I dropped my arms, turned around, took a step, whirled, and faced the mirror again. Slowly I spread the cape, slowly smiling.

  “Kevin?” my mother called. “Let’s go. Time to get out there.”

  When I came back she handed me a black waxy shopping bag with handles, telling me to keep in mind: “You’re not some cute little hobo asking for charity. You’re Count Dracula. Demand a piece of candy: trick or treat. In other words—”

  “An ultimatum,” Dad explained.

  “Look them deep in the eye,” Mom told me, hands on my shoulders, looking me deep in the eye.

  “Actually,” Dad pointed out, “the phrase ought to be ‘Treat or trick,’ the idea being—”

  She turned to him. “Will. You. Cease?”

  It was a warm evening. I walked the dark, tree-lined side streets: alone, alone. I even tossed away the shopping bag. It wasn’t candy I wanted. I didn’t know what I wanted.

  Something.

  Whenever I saw other trick-or-treaters coming I would hide behind the nearest tree until they passed, because I knew what they would see: some creepy kid too old for Halloween, wearing lipstick.

  But as I hid, pressing my back against the hard bark of the tree, with my face turned away, I began feeling more and more secretive, nocturnal, furtive—more and more, that is, like him.

  Wanting to try myself out on someone, I went up to a house and rang the doorbell. An overweight woman in a dime-store witch’s costume opened the door, holding a plastic jack-o’-lantern full of candy. I spread the cape, tilted back my head, and opened my mouth, wide. “Oh no,” she cried, “it’s Dracula! Help, help!” Then she smiled and held out a miniature Tootsie Roll. “Here you are, dear. Where’s your bag?”

  Shielding my eyes with my caped arm, I backed away from the Tootsie Roll as if from a crucifix, then turned and ran off.

  “Don’t you want your candy?”

  I was running home. I felt ridiculous and ashamed and wanted to get out of this silly costume and into the shower as quickly as I could.

  But two guys I recognized from school—eighth graders—were coming up the sidewalk, and I slipped behind a tree.

  One of them saw me.

  “Check it out,” he said, coming over. “It’s fuckin’
Dracula!”

  The taller one joined him and told me I suck. “Get it? You suck?”

  “Whoa,” the other one said, “is that lipstick you’re wearing?”

  “What’re you, a fuckin’ queer?”

  “Suck on this, homo,” the shorter one told me, punching me in the stomach, not that hard, but I went down moaning and holding the place with both hands so he wouldn’t feel the need to hit me again.

  They stood over me:

  “Fuckin’ faggot.”

  “Fuckin’ fairy.”

  “Fuckin’ fruit.”

  “Fuckin’ freak.”

  They finally ran out of things to call me that began with the letter F, and went away.

  I sat there. It was quiet, just the wind through the dry leaves overhead, whispering horrible secrets, and in the distance two dogs serenading one another across the darkness. Listen to them, I thought in a Transylvanian accent, the children of the night. What music they make!

  I stood up. I rose. I spread my cape. I ran after those bullies, holding out the cape like rippling wings, keeping to lawns so they wouldn’t hear my approaching footsteps. When I got close I hid behind a tree, catching my breath, and watched them enter a vacant lot.

  Perfect.

  I sucked a lungful of air, raced up behind them, and leaped on the smaller one’s back, my legs around his waist, arms around his neck. “Fuck,” he hollered, and carried me a few staggering steps before falling forward into the weeds. I held on. He managed to flip himself over, still under me but facing me now, and I quickly pressed my wide-open mouth to the salty skin of his neck, bit down hard as I could, and broke through, blood coming warm and sweet, and as he laid there—stunned, I suppose—I could feel his heart beating with mine:

  Thump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump . . .

  Then his buddy was kicking me in the ribs and I rolled off, onto my back, and didn’t care what they did to me.

  Afterwards, I managed to stand up and make my way home. My ribs ached, one eye was already closing up, my balls were throbbing, both ears ringing loud, and there was blood in my mouth.

  His and mine.

  I told my parents a gang of trick-or-treating hobos mugged me and stole my bag. Then I held up my hand to indicate I wasn’t taking questions and went to my room. I laid on my back in the dark, a wooden stake embedded in my heart:

  Oh God . . . oh fuck . . . oh love . . .

  I wanted to see him, just see him.

  So after school was finally out the following day, I waited by the buses, once again behind a tree. I spotted him. He was with some others, laughing and carrying on—with a large Band-Aid on his neck! That thrilled me so deeply I followed him to his bus. Keeping my face averted—he might have recognized the shiner he gave me—I went and sat in the very back. I wanted to see where he got off, to see where he lived. I watched him sitting there yakking and laughing away with his pals.

  Which hurt. Clearly I was the furthest thing from his mind.

  He got off alone. I watched out the back window to see which house he walked towards. By the time the bus turned the corner he was heading up the walkway of a two-story brick house with a fake deer on the lawn.

  I faced front again, excited by an idea.

  That night after dark I slipped out, in my cape, and walked all the way there. I stood along the side of the house, next to a large bush. There was a lighted window on the upper floor. From this angle all I could see was pale blue ceiling, but somehow I was certain, absolutely certain, that this was his room and that he was there, lying on his bed reading a comic book. I spread my cape and stared up at the window, concentrating with all my might:

  Come to me.

  I pictured him looking up from the page . . .

  Come to me.

  Pictured him getting up slowly . . .

  Come to me.

  Crossing the room in a trance . . .

  Come to me.

  Up to the window . . .

  Come to me.

  To the window . . .

  Come! To! Meee!

  I dropped my arms and hung my head.

  Mom was still at her bridge club when I got back, Dad in his office grading papers, classical music playing. Standing at attention in front of the mirror above the bathroom sink, still wearing my cape, I watched myself place into my mouth and swallow down, one after the other, all seventeen remaining Tylenols in the bottle. Then I went to my room and laid there in the dark, arms crossed on my chest.

  But I started feeling sick. It grew worse. I hurried back to the bathroom and knelt over the toilet, embracing it. When I was through I wiped my mouth with a corner of the cape and sat back on my heels:

  If only I could have remained a cute little hobo.

  Nevertheless I was glad I wasn’t dead, glad to still be around, I honestly was. I got up and threw some water on my face. Then I happened to look in the mirror. Imagine, if you can, my amazement when all I saw was the other side of the bathroom.

  I moved to the left, to the right, but I still wasn’t there.

  Back from her bridge club, my mother came to the door and tried it, then knocked. “Kevin? Are you in there?”

  Staring into the empty mirror I touched myself all over. “I’m not . . . sure.”

  She asked me what in God’s name that was supposed to mean.

  I kept silently begging the mirror: Please?

  She knocked, rapid and hard, “Kevin, answer me.”

  My father joined her out there. “Say something to reassure your mother and me, son. The statement itself needn’t be reassuring but simply the fact that—”

  “Damn it, Kevin, answer!”

  I said, “Mother . . . Father . . . I have good news and bad.”

  My mother asked for the bad news first.

  “I seem . . . to have turned into . . . a vampire.”

  They were quiet for a moment. Then my father said, “And the good news, son?”

  I flung open the cape and threw back my head. “I’m a vampire!”

  A CERTAIN FELLOW

  NAMED PHIL

  It’s over. I killed her. I’m not sorry. There was no other way.

  Her name was Veronica. I called her Ronnie. Ever hear that old song? How’s it go? I’m gonna buy a paper doll that I can call my own. Well, what if instead of a pitiful little paper doll we’re talking life-sized, with amazingly realistic skin, beautiful blue eyes, the lids a bit lowered—bedroom eyes—the mouth pronouncing Oh. As in, “Oh yes, oh yes, oh yes!”

  Ronnie’s turn-offs: mean people, TV commercials, pointy objects. Turn-ons? The Tijuana Brass, long rainy afternoons, a certain fellow named Phil.

  I’m that certain fellow. I’m Phil.

  But you know what the really great thing about Ronnie was? In addition to being a wonderfully accommodating sexual partner, she was an extremely good listener. I told her everything, my hopes, my dreams:

  “Someday, Ronnie, I would like to invent something.”

  “Oh, Phil, yes! Oh yes!”

  “Something that would benefit all mankind.”

  “Oh, Phil, when you talk like this, it turns . . . me . . . on!”

  “Does it, Ronnie?”

  “Oh yes!”

  And yet, I must confess, in spite of Ronnie’s many wonderful qualities, I often found myself wondering what it might be like to have an actual woman instead of a merely inflated one. But here’s something interesting. Do you know a woman who’s even more inflated than Ronnie ever was? Barbara Larson, in Payroll. And she’s not even all that attractive. Ronnie put her to shame. Nevertheless I went ahead and asked her out and she agreed, so I took her to a movie, afterwards dinner, paid for everything, had what I thought was a very successful evening, at one point even making her laugh a little. Three days later I call her up and ask her out again. She’s very sorry.

  I said, “Didn’t you have a nice time, Barbara?”

  “I have to go now.”

  “I thought we had a very nice time.”

>   “Byyye.”

  Couple days later I call and ask her if she’d like to have a really good time and go bowling. She tells me to please leave her alone. So tonight I call and ask her again if she’d care to go bowling. She tells me if I don’t leave her alone she’s going to inform the police. That was the word she used, “inform.”

  I took Ronnie back out from under the bed. She was very glad to see me, if you know what I mean.

  Afterwards we got to talking, like we do. I ended up telling her about Barbara. Big mistake. Ronnie was furious. She called me an asshole and did it ever occur to me that she might like to go bowling once in a while?

  I told her I was pretty certain that wasn’t actually possible.

  “Oh, I’m real enough to have sex but not to go bowling, is that what you’re saying? I’m just something to stick your dick into?”

  “And talk to. We talk a lot, Ronnie.”

  “No, Phil. Not really.”

  “We’re talking now, aren’t we?”

  “No, Phil. Not really.”

  “How can you say that?”

  “I can’t. That’s the point. You’re the only one talking. In fact, this is you talking right now, saying these very words.”

  Ronnie would sometimes do that when she was upset, throw it in my face about her not being real. But tonight she got downright cruel. Said she wasn’t surprised this Barbara woman didn’t want to go out with me again.

  “Don’t,” I told her. “You’re just upset.”

  But she wouldn’t stop. “I know I act fascinated when you talk to me, my mouth open like ‘Oh, how fascinating!’ But do you know the real reason my mouth is open like that?”

  “Don’t, Ronnie.”

  “Because I’m yawning, that’s why. Because I’m bored, Phil. Because you are so . . . incredibly . . . boring!”

  I grabbed her long, scrawny throat and brought my hands together, and now her mouth was open like that because she was trying to breathe.

  “Die, bitch, die . . .”

  Then, all of a sudden, I saw myself.

  I got up and hurried out to the kitchen and stood there naked in the dark. “My God,” I thought, “what have I become? What . . . have I . . . become?”