Mr. Fox and Other Feral Tales

by Norman Partridge

  First, you must become familiar with an editor's product before you submit your work. Read his magazines or previous anthologies. Study his editorial guidelines. Understand the kinds of fiction he's bought in the past and you'll understand what kinds of stories he is likely to buy in the future. I'm not saying that you necessarily need to write to market...but you definitely need to market what you write. If you've written a splattery horror story, you have to realize that a magazine predisposed to traditional ghost stories in the style of M. R. James is probably not the market for you. You'll have to learn to develop an impartial eye when judging your own fiction in order to market it successfully.

  If you're lucky enough to sell a story to an editor, you'll also need to become familiar with his working preferences. Be professional. Pay attention to the editor's requests. Do your job, and let the editor do his. After you've made the trip from sale to final publication, you can step back, weigh the positives and negatives of the experience, and decide if you'd want to work with that editor again. He'll probably go through a similar process when he thinks about working with you.

  Most of all—never waste an editor's time. Most editors don't have much of that particular commodity. If you want to do business as a writer, show editors that you know what being a pro is all about. Follow guidelines. Submit polished manuscripts. If you have a question to ask, ask it. If you have a project to propose, do it in a businesslike manner. But don't expect an editor to drop everything each time you call or e-mail, and don't expect that you're going to be best buddies with everyone in the business. Sometimes you'll get lucky and strike up a genuine friendship through your writing, but most times....

  Well, most times business is just business.

  Many writers don't understand that. They're needy. They look to editors for validation. They offer up their work like an apple for the teacher. If that work is rejected, they take it personally. They act hurt. They play the I thought we were friends game and waste a lot of time feeling sorry for themselves. And hey...we're all human. I understand that. But I also understand that it's best to keep those feelings to yourself in a working relationship.

  Remember, writing is a business.

  In business, it's best to stick to business.

  That's a talent apart from writing, but it's a talent all the same.

  TREATS

  Monsters stalked the supermarket aisles.

  Maddie pushed the squeaky-wheeled cart past a pack of werewolves, smiling when they growled at her because that was the polite thing to do. She couldn't help staring at the bright eyes inside the plastic masks. Brown eyes, blue and green eyes. Human eyes. Not the eyes that she couldn't see. Not the black eyes that stared at her from Jimmy's face, so cold, ordering her here and there without a glint of compassion or love.

  "Jimmy, get away from that candy!"

  Maddie covered her mouth, fearful that she'd spoken. No, she hadn't said anything. Besides, Jimmy was at home with them. He'd said that they were preparing for Operation Trojan Horse and he had to speak to them before —

  "Jimmy, I'm telling you for the last time...."

  A little ghoul clutching a trick-or-treat bag scampered down the aisle. He tore at the wrapping of a Snickers bar and gobbled a big bite before his mother caught his tattered collar.

  "I warned you, young man," she said, snatching away the bright-orange treat sack. "You're not going to eat this candy all at once and make yourself sick. You're allowed one piece a day, remember? That way your treats will last for a long, long time."

  Maddie saw the little boy's shoulders slump. Her Jimmy had done the same thing last Halloween when Maddie had given him a similar speech, except her Jimmy had been a sad-faced clown, not a ghoul.

  And not a general. Not their general.

  Maddie raised her hand, as if she could wave off the boy's mother before she made the same mistake Maddie had made a year earlier. She saw lipstick smears on her fingers and imagined what her face must look like. It had been so long since they'd allowed her to wear cosmetics that she'd made a mess of herself without realizing it. The boy's mother would see that, and she wouldn't listen. She'd rush away with her son before Maddie could warn her.

  Defeated, the boy stared down at his ghoul-face mirrored in the freshly waxed floor. His mother crumpled his trick-or-treat bag closed, and the moment slowed. Maddie saw herself reaching into her shopping cart, watched her lipstick-smeared fingers tear open a bag of Milk Duds and fling the little yellow boxes down the aisle in a slow, scattering arc. She saw the other Jimmy's mother yelling at her, the boxes bouncing, the big store windows behind the little ghoul and the iron-gray clouds boiling outside. Wind-driven leaves the color of old skin crackling against the glass.

  And then Maddie was screaming at the little ghoul. "Eat your candy! Eat it now! Don't let them come after it!"

  She paid for the Milk Duds, of course, and for all the other candy that she had heaped into the shopping cart. The manager didn't complain. Maddie knew that the ignorant man only wanted her out of his store.

  He thought that she was crazy.

  Papery leaves clawed at her ankles as she loaded the candy into the back of the station wagon. She smiled, remembering the other Jimmy, the ghoul Jimmy, gobbling Milk Duds. Other monsters had joined in the feast. Werewolves, Frankensteins, zombies. Maddie prayed that they'd all have awful stomachaches. Then they'd stay home, snuggled in front of their television sets. They wouldn't come knocking at her door tonight. They'd be safe from her Jimmy and his army.

  Maddie climbed into the station wagon and slammed the door. She pretended not to notice Jimmy's friends in the back seat. It was easy, because she couldn't see them, couldn't see their black eyes. But she could feel their presence nonetheless.

  Slowly, Maddie drove home. Little monsters stood on front porches and watched the gray sky, waiting intently for true darkness, when they would descend on the neighborhood in search of what Jimmy wanted to give them. Maddie glanced in the rearview mirror at the grocery bags in the back of the station wagon. Even in brown paper, even wrapped in plastic, she could smell the sugar. It was the only smell she knew anymore, and she tasted it in the back of her throat.

  God, she'd been tasting it for a year now.

  "Mommy," Jimmy had cried, "you said my candy would last. Now look at it. Look at them. They ruined it. I want new candy. I want it now!"

  But Jimmy's whining had been a lie. Maddie knew that now. Jimmy hadn't wanted the candy. They had wanted it, and they'd coaxed Jimmy into getting it for them. And they scared her, even if they didn't scare her son. They'd always scared her.

  Because they were everywhere. In the cupboards. Under the floor. In the garden and under the rim of the toilet seat. Maddie's house swelled with them. And when she went to work, they were there, too, watching her through the windows. Black eyes she couldn't see, staring. Through the winter cold, through the summer heat, they were always there. Studying her. Never resting.

  They had her son, too. He had a million fathers now, all who cared for him more than the man who'd given him his face and his last name before disappearing beneath a wave of unpaid bills. They nested in Jimmy's room and traveled in his lunch box. Jimmy took them places and showed them things. He taught them about the town, and they told him how smart he was. They made him a general and swore to obey his commands.

  Maddie pulled into the driveway and cut the engine. She sat in the quiet car, dreading the house. Inside, Jimmy's legions waited. Jimmy waited, too. But Jimmy wasn't a sad-faced clown anymore. Now he was a great leader, and he was about to attack.

  The sky rumbled.

  Heavy raindrops splattered the windshield.

  Maddie almost smiled but caught herself just in time. She glanced in the rearview mirror and pretended to wipe at her smeared lipstick, but really she was looking for Jimmy's spies.

  She wished that she could see their eyes.

  Jimmy was in the basement, telling the story of the Trojan horse. They stood at attention in o
rderly black battalions, listening to every word. Maddie didn't know how they tolerated it. Jimmy had told them the story at least a hundred times.

  "The candy's upstairs, Jimmy. I left it on the kitchen table."

  Jimmy thumbed the brim of a military cap that was much too large for his head. He'd made Maddie buy the cap at an army surplus store, and it was the smallest size available. "I'll grow into it." That's what he'd said, smiling, but he wasn't smiling now.

  Maddie managed a grin. "The candy, Jimmy. You remember — "

  "Of course I remember! I only wish that you'd remember to call me the right thing!"

  "I'm sorry. General." Maddie straightened. "The candy — the supplies—are upstairs in the mess hall."

  Jimmy seemed pleased. "Very good. Bring the supplies down here, and we'll begin Operation Trojan Horse."

  Maddie stared at the black sea on the cement floor, imagining a million eyes focused on her. She wouldn't walk among them. Not when she could see them clearly, not when she could feel them scuttling over her feet.

  "I don't want to do that," she said.

  The boy's lips twisted into a cruel smile. "Maybe you'd rather have me send a few squads to your bedroom tonight, like the last time you disobeyed a direct order. You won't get much sleep with a jillion little feet crawling all over you...."

  "Jimmy!" She stared at him, revolted by his black insect eyes, and then turned away.

  She got the candy.

  Jimmy used a penknife to make tiny holes in the packages. His troops climbed inside, listening to their leader talk of conquest and the Trojan Horse and the birth of a new order. He told them the best places to hide in a house and reminded the scouts that he must be kept informed at all times concerning the progress of their mission.

  And when they were all in place, why then....

  Silently, Maddie climbed the stairs. Rainwater ran down the front window, drooling from the rusty gutters above. The street outside was slick and black. The sidewalks were empty, gray; a flotilla of fallen leaves swam in the cement gutters. Maddie watched the leaves and imagined hundreds of little monsters washed into their homes by a great wave.

  She looked down and saw her son's face mirrored in the window. His reflection was smeared with rain, sad, his straight lips twisted into a dripping frown, his black eyes deep pools overflowing high cheekbones. He exhaled sharply and the image fogged over.

  "They just told me," he whispered. "It took them a long time to get out of the car. I guess you think that was pretty smart, closing the vents and all."

  Maddie said nothing. She stared at the foggy spot on the window. Just a glimpse, she thought. Just a glimpse, but it was a clown’s face I saw.

  "I never thought about this." Jimmy stared out at the rain. "They aren't coming, are they?"

  "Not tonight."

  Jimmy whispered, "Not tonight, troops. Operation Trojan Horse is scrubbed."

  Maddie took a deep breath, hating the air, hating the stink of sugar. She thought about the little clown she'd seen mirrored in the rain-washed window, and she thought about the other Jimmy, the little ghoul, safe and dry in front of a TV set.

  Tiny antennae probed Maddie's heel. Tiny feet, sticky with chocolate, marched over her toes.

  The rain came harder now, in sheets. Jimmy brushed his troops away from his mother's feet. He rose and took her hand. Mirrored in the window, his lips were straight, his jaw firm.

  God, it's been so long since he touched me, she thought, but she said, "Jimmy, let's watch television."

  He nodded, studying the rain, not really listening.

  His eyes narrowed until Maddie couldn't see them anymore.

  "Next year," he said, his grip tightening.

  Writing For Them & Writing For You

  I wrote "Velvet Fangs" in hopes of cracking an anthology of young adult vampire fiction[50] edited by Jane Yolen, but she was closed to submissions by the time I submitted the manuscript. The story ended up in a small press magazine called Haunts back in 1993, and it's one of a handful of pieces that has never been reprinted until its appearance in this book.

  The reason for that is simple: I really didn't think of "Velvet Fangs" as a Norm Partridge story. It appeared in Haunts under my byline, but I'm pretty sure that I originally submitted it to Ms. Yolen with a pseudonym firmly attached (mostly because of the YA slant).

  Early on I tried to do some work in that market. I wrote this story, outlined a few others, and started a couple YA horror novels. My plan was to invent a pseudonym, crank out some slam-bang stories that would be fun to write, and maybe make a little money while I was at it.

  I know a few writers who've managed to do that kind of work successfully. They accept work-for-hire projects (say, a book that's part of a young adult or western series, or maybe a stand-alone movie novelization). Often, they write those books under another name, or—in the case of some series work—a house name provided by the publisher.

  Many writers have a different set of standards for that kind of work. Sometimes they'll even talk about their pseudonym as if he (or she) is another person. Either way, work-for-hire can be a real grind. Usually writers won't earn much beyond the original advance they receive from the publisher. The lion's share of the money (if the book is successful, which isn't always the case) goes to the publisher and whomever licensed the rights to the publisher—a movie company, or a comic book publisher, or the creator/owner of the series.

  Anyway, writers who take on work-for-hire projects might make a little money at it—if they can write fast enough. As I already mentioned in a previous essay, the income from such work might even make the difference between working a joe job and being able to write full time. For some, that makes it worthwhile.

  It wasn't that way for me. The last thing I needed to do was to carve out a separate career as a young adult writer. Work-for-hire projects didn't usually find their way to the top of my list, either. I've already discussed the pitfall of that kind of work, so I won't belabor the point here. I'll just say that in my case, experience has taught me to be very careful about accepting such projects.

  Take for example the Crow novel I wrote for HarperPrism. They were looking for original novels that took place in the movie series' universe, and they asked me to do one. The way I saw it, a Crow novel might bring some new readers to my own books. The series was a notch above most others in quality, and some fine writers had already contributed (Poppy Z. Brite, Chet Williamson, and David Bischoff). Lastly, the money was good.

  I figured I could write the book fast, bank the check, and get back to my own novel projects. Boy, was I wrong. The way it turned out. The Crow: Wicked Prayer took me longer to write than any other novel I've done...and for a few very simple reasons.

  Mostly, the book was just plain, old-fashioned hard work. My twists on the Crow mythos were complicated, and I was constantly trying to reduce the expository writing they required so I could keep the story moving. Apart from that the book was written as sort of a road trip, and as a result there were several set pieces that were pretty involved. Lots of action, lots of setups.

  When I finally finished Wicked Prayer I felt like I'd burned rubber and paid the price. My creative engine was down to fumes, and it took me awhile to refill the gas tank. But by the time I got my energy up, I found out that I really wasn't finished with Wicked Prayer at all. Those who oversaw the Crow universe were asking for revisions to square things up with their vision of same.

  If I remember correctly, Wicked Prayer went through three rounds of revisions. That took a few months off the calendar that I hadn't counted on. Plus, I'll be the first to admit that I wasn't used to doing revisions. In fact, the total editorial input on my previous four published novels consisted of a request to drop one paragraph from The Ten-Ounce Siesta... and, yes, I'll admit that I argued with my editor about that.

  Still, I made the changes as requested. As far as I was concerned I'd been hired to do a job and I wanted to do it to the satisfaction of those who were pa
ying me. The way I saw it, the Crow was their bird... not mine.[51]

  So I finished the book. I got paid. Wicked Prayer saw publication. Then a funny thing happened: it turned out that the people at Pressman Films were impressed with the final product, so much so that they adapted it for the fourth film in the series. Wicked Prayer filmed last summer down in Utah with a cast that included Edward Furlong, David Boreanz, Tara Reid, and Dennis Hopper.

  As far as I know, what happened with Wicked Prayer was a first. No one I've talked to can think of another time a series novel has been adapted for the screen. So maybe my extra work paid off in the creative department. It certainly paid off financially. I walked away from the novel with a nice check, and I walked away from the movie deal with a nicer one... and my first Hollywood credit.

  VELVET FANGS

  I couldn't look at that last photograph of Rob. Not for another second. I took it off my bedroom wall and asked Mom to give me a ride out to the cemetery so I could leave it at his grave.

  "Janice, why do you want to do that?" she wanted to know. "It's such a gruesome shot. Rob looks so strange wearing that cape, with his hair slicked back like Bela Lugosi or Vincent Carfax. I don't think...."

  I turned down my hearing aid and her words trailed off. She knew then that I didn't want to debate the issue, and she shook her head and wiped tears from her eyes. We walked to the car in silence. Once again I felt awful, but I just couldn't bear another discussion about Rob.

  I tried to focus on a People magazine that I'd brought along, but the country road that led to the cemetery was bumpy and the words swam across the glossy pages. Or maybe the problem was my new glasses. I smiled in spite of myself, suddenly understanding why Gramma always complained about her bifocals.