Puppet

by Ed Kightlinger

  “Bing – Bing – Bong. Bing – Bing – Bong.”

  There are nine sets of bing, bing, bongs.

  The time is nine o’clock in the morning. Except the tolling of the bell is too loud like it is right beside me in my bedroom!

  The street noises abruptly come to a halt. Deadly silence, unmitigated, curiously unsettling, utterly eerie silence prevails. It is like she can hear a pin drop. Instead, all she catches is the rapid pounding of her anxious heart. She is dreadfully afraid the horrible, bodiless hands trailing strands of frayed twine will reappear on her bed!

  Goodness, this is weird not to mention frightening!

  Although all of her senses are wide-awake, she does not want to open her lovely blue eyes for fear of what she might see.

  Nonetheless, she knows that now is the time to escape the eerie place between still asleep and fully awake. Thankfully, Limbo Land soon will end!

  She manages to compel her eyes to open. Slowly. Bit by bit. Ever so cautiously.

  When at last she snaps her eyes open, she recoils in terror!

  I am not in my bedroom! Noooooo!

  *****

  Part II: The World of Puppets

  Chloe is lying on her stomach near the edge of the sidewalk a few feet from the fire hydrant. She is precariously close to the side of Marigold Avenue. Her long hair is draping over the curb. She is staring directly at what should be Mulloy’s Pharmacy and the corner grocery store across Leroy Avenue.

  Holy cow! How is this possible? The pharmacy and grocery store are gone!

  She glances at her wrinkled pajamas sleeve.

  What is worse, I am wearing my pajamas – she makes a face – the childish ones with the cute, pink panda bears! How much more embarrassing can it be than this? I hope no one who knows me sees me wearing these ridiculous pajamas!

  She cautiously raises her head a little from the sidewalk. She brushes the dirt and blades of grass from her face. She anxiously glances at her surroundings. She stares in disbelief at what she sees, or, more accurately, at what she does not see. She begins to tremble.

  All that remains of my familiar neighborhood surroundings are the maple trees lining the street! Sure, there are patches of greenery here and there, and there are a few street signs and the fire hydrant mere inches from my nose. But that is all!

  She glances up at the road sign. It reads “Marigold Avenue” on one sign and “Leroy Avenue” on its perpendicular sign.

  Yes, I am lying here in the dirt next to the fire hydrant on the corner of Leroy Avenue and Marigold Avenue. Of that, I am relatively positive! But everything else has disappeared. My house has disappeared! The school across the street has vanished! The church across the street has disappeared! But I heard the tolling of its bell. It said it was nine o’clock! Mulloy’s Pharmacy and the grocery store also have disappeared!

  She glances down the street.

  All the houses on Marigold Avenue have disappeared! My entire neighborhood is gone! Gone! Gone! Gone! What I am seeing is insane!

  I have to be still dreaming!

  She slams her eyes shut and screams at the top of her lungs.

  Unlike when she was in Limbo Land, this time her screams seem to work very well. Not only are her cries loud, but they also echo up and down the avenue and everywhere in between like distressing calls of rabid coyotes in the spooky moonlight.

  After what seems like an eternity to her, but probably is less than a minute, she slowly reopens her eyes one by one. She is hoping – no, not hoping – praying! She is praying with all her heart and soul that what she perceived a few moments ago is nothing more than a ridiculous, fearsome nightmare, a continuation of the fantastic visions of Limbo Land.

  In spite of everything that has disappeared, I could have sworn I heard people up the street talking. Neighborhood kids were playing. Jay was inline skating. My neighbor, Nelson, was playing hoops. Diana Jane was practicing her Peter Pan lines. There must be people somewhere around here.

  And where there are people, there is hope!

  She sits up, rubs her eyes, and then she looks down Marigold Avenue once more.

  Yes, thank goodness! Some people are coming this way. They are way off in the distance. Perhaps those are the voices that I heard.

  But wait a minute here. These aren’t people. They are puppets, marionette puppets hanging by strands of twine that come from the sky! There are all shapes and sizes of creepy puppets dressed like humans. About twenty maybe more! Now that they have seen me, they are running like a frenzied mob. Toward me!

  She scrambles to her feet, turns to run, and then she notices her slippers on the sidewalk. She quickly slips them onto her feet. She rounds the corner to her right and runs up Leroy Avenue toward Cheaply’s Food Shop. Her brother, Jim, works at Cheaply’s, so she knows there are plenty of hiding places in the store’s cellar. She is reasonably sure she will be safe in the basement among row after row of canned goods, recyclable cardboard, and seemingly endless stacks of neatly tied, recyclable newspapers.

  Jim and I used to play hide and seek down there for hours on end. Sometimes we would never find each other, so I should be able to hide safely!

  So she hopes.

  While she runs to the shop, her heart sinks even lower. Cheaply’s Food Shop is nowhere to be seen nor are the surrounding stores and houses. Even the cars usually parked on the right side of the highway are gone! Like her immediate neighborhood, the shop and its surrounding community have disappeared! Then she notices something even more bizarre.

  The further up Leroy Avenue she runs the more that houses and stores in the distance gradually disappear. She slows her pace to glance over her shoulder. The mob of puppets is nowhere in sight. They are still on Marigold Avenue. Thankfully, they have yet to turn the corner onto Leroy Avenue. She figures that is not surprising since they have little legs and short strides.

  What am I saying? They may have legs, but their legs are not running! They are marionette puppets dangling from strands of twine! Something else is propelling them, making them chase me!

  Wait a minute here! From the direction from which I just came, my house, Mulloy’s Pharmacy, all the rest has reappeared! But everything in front of me on the path I am heading disappears from view the further I run! What in the devil is going on here?

  Chloe turns around to gawk at what had earlier vanished. She is out of breath and needs to gulp in mouthfuls of air. She bends over and places her hands on her hips. Her all but hyperventilating gasps for air are due to the inexplicable weirdness she has been experiencing since the moment she opened her eyes. What is more, she is awkwardly running which causes her to exert more effort than usual. Her oversized panda bear slippers are causing her to stumble as they try to slip from her feet with every other step. She looks over her shoulder.

  Hooray! If this morning’s goings-on isn’t strange enough, Cheaply’s Food Shop has miraculously reappeared! Thank goodness!

  She turns around to run up the avenue toward the shop. She immediately is disheartened once more. Cheaply’s Food Shop has disappeared yet again! She stops in her tracks, turns entirely around, and then she looks over her shoulder. Miraculously, the shop has reappeared!

  Oh, now I get it! Things only disappear if I am facing them. Maybe if I walk backward and I do not look behind me, everything will reappear! Oh, these stupid, oversized slippers! I am sorry pandas, but you have to go.

  She removes the slippers from her feet and tosses them into the bushes. She begins to walk backward on the sidewalk. Every so often, she nervously glances over her shoulder to make sure Cheaply’s Food Shop is still visible. She keeps a steady eye in the direction of Marigold Avenue for any sign the mob of puppets has turned the corner onto Leroy Avenue.

  Must I walk backward merely to find a safe place to hide in Cheaply’s cellar to escape the puppets? It is a full city block to Cheaply’s! If I continue to walk backward, the mob of creepy puppets will quickly overcome me! They are facing forward as they advance while I am
nearly tripping over myself and the cracks in the sidewalk. My bare feet are killing me! These sharp pebbles and broken pieces of concrete are murder on bare feet!

  Chloe suddenly winces with terror. The mob of puppets has turned the corner from Marigold Avenue onto Leroy Avenue! While they have little strides, she knows they can quickly catch up to her if she continues to walk backward. She screams once again, the sound of her voice eerily echoing in the vacant lots of what used to be her happy place, her friendly neighborhood full of houses, cars, backyard swing sets, stores, her family, and all of her friends.

  What I am experiencing has to be something right out of Twilight Zone! Everything in my neighborhood comes and goes and goes and comes depending on which way I am facing! How crazy is that? When is it going to end? Will it end?

  As she stumbles backward on the sidewalk, she yells, “Help! Somebody help me, please! Anybody. Help! I am in the middle of a nightmare, but this is no dream. It is real, shockingly real!”

  She notices that the puppets seem to be gaining on her! At the rate she is stumbling backward over her own two feet, she is confident they will catch up with her before she can reach the shop.

  Why are they here? Why are they chasing me? I love puppets – at least I used to. I haven’t done anything wrong. I haven’t even broken a puppet no less accidentally drop one in my entire life. Goodness! Have the puppets somehow replaced people? If they have, this is like super crazy horrible! What is happening to me is terrifying!

  Distracted by her thoughts, she trips over a large crack in the sidewalk. She turns her ankle and falls onto all fours. The puppets off in the distance, perhaps one-half city block away, are now laughing madly. Her heart sinks and tingling tremors race up and down her spine.

  The puppets are not only chasing after me. They are taunting me! They are laughing at me and sneering contemptuous looks. Some are even pointing their fingers at me and doubling up with hysterical hilarity because I fell! Why do they scorn me?

  She staggers to her feet and resumes stumbling up the avenue to Cheaply’s. It comes as no surprise to her that the shop has disappeared yet again as she runs toward it face forward. Fortunately, the stop sign and fire hydrant outside the shop are still visible. The scraggly tree to the side of the shop she and her brother used to climb is also visible. Consequently, she knows approximately where the shop itself should be under normal circumstances. However, she knows in her heart and mind that these are not normal circumstances, so anything is possible.

  She races across Richlawn Avenue. She stops beneath the tree, crosses her heart, and places her hands in front of her face in prayer. She lifts her face to the sky.

  “God, I don’t have much time. Help me, please! Tell me what I should do!” She crosses her heart once more. “Please, God, let Cheaply’s shop be visible when I turn around!”

  She closes her eyes, and then she slowly turns around, her back facing what should be Cheaply’s Food Shop. When she opens her eyes, she glances over her shoulder and yells in an exuberant voice, “You are here! Thank goodness!”

  She walks backward toward the front door, reaches behind her, and then she tries the doorknob. A sickening feeling grips her stomach.

  The door is locked!

  She groans loudly as grave panic seems to overwhelm her entire body. She begins to shiver for the umpteenth time. The horde of puppets is now less than fifty feet from Richlawn Avenue. They are advancing toward her at full speed ahead. What is worse, the strands of twine that disappear into thin air are now vibrating noisily. It is if the strands of twine are frantically trying to propel the puppets at a faster pace than previously.

  Oh, no, I completely forgot! Mister Cheaply does not open the shop until ten o’clock on Sunday mornings! I heard the tolling of the church bell, so it cannot be but a few minutes past nine o’clock. But wait! His daughter, Claudia, sometimes stocks goods on Sundays before the shop opens. Whenever she does, she enters through the back door. Maybe she is inside. Perhaps the back door is unlocked. I hope so!

  Chloe carefully walks backward toward the shop’s alleyway. When she looks over at the puppets, she is panic-stricken. The mob is moving crosswise as they go across Richland Avenue. They are trying to cut off her escape!

  When, at last, she enters the alleyway, she hesitates but only briefly. All sorts of putrid-smelling garbage nearly overcome her sense of smell. Discarded cans, wooden boards, and cardboard litter the enclosed space making it difficult to walk backward. There are wooden Coca-Cola cases filled with bits and pieces of broken glass bottles. She gingerly tiptoes so she will not cut her bare feet on the glass.

  It does not surprise Chloe that broken instead of whole bottles litter the wooden cases. Mister Cheaply would never allow even a single returnable pop bottle to remain outside of the shop where someone could steal it.

  Mister Cheaply is the epitome of stinginess. To be even more precise, the word cheapskate defines Mister Cheaply’s bizarre personality from tip to toe. Returnable glass bottles are worth lots of money, at least to him. Returnable eight, twelve, and sixteen-ounce glass bottles are worth two cents. A thirty-two-ounce glass bottle is worth five cents. To Mister Cheaply, those pennies and nickels are worth as much as a pot of gold.

  Mister Cheaply does not trust anybody – his employees or even his daughter, Claudia. She has to stock shelves, scrub floors, and wait on customers every weekend for a measly allowance of ten dollars a week. Then again, Mister Cheaply himself is the neighborhood’s ultimate crook.

  Chloe’s brother, Jim, has said that a couple of times a week Mister Cheaply orders him to “keep the system honest.” That is what Mister Cheaply likes to call the illegal process of jilting his vendors.

  A couple of times a week, Jim has to remove the bottle caps of three or four, sometimes ten or more, bottles of Pepsi and Coca-Cola products. All the while he has to be very careful not to bend the caps. Mister Cheaply demonstrated on more than one occasion how to perform the technique just right.

  After he removes a bottle cap, Jim delicately uses a small hammer to chip off tiny pieces of glass at the top of the bottle. He carefully replaces the cap, firmly pushing it into place. Finally, he relocates the broken bottle to a special shelf in the back room. The back room is where Mister Cheaply argues with customers and vendors and berates his three employees, to include his verbally abused daughter, Claudia.

  When a targeted soda pop vendor arrives at the shop to update his stock, Mister Cheaply blatantly tells a lie. Each lie is different, more outrageous, and, astonishingly, more convincing than the other lies. As an example, he will say to the vendor that an angry customer returned the broken bottle to the shop. Sometimes the myth is exaggerated, such as the customer almost swallowed the broken pieces of glass or cut his finger as he opened the bottle.

  Of course, he, Mister Cheaply, the self-professed, evidently magnanimous and “honest as the day is long” owner of Cheaply’s Food Shop, lies through his teeth. He always says he kindly gave the customer five bottles of pop for free in exchange for the broken bottle. He emphasizes that this noble act is essential for his neighborhood business and to help the vendor’s company look good. At least that is what Mister Cheaply says. There never is a single, solitary customer involved in his unlawful scams or even one free bottle of pop given away as repayment for the made-up customer’s troubles. His two unwilling minor employees, Jim, and Bob Smith, and perhaps Claudia as well, are responsible for the behind-the-scenes actions of Mister Cheaply’s cheating scams.

  Sometimes heated, verbal arguments ensue between Mister Cheaply and the vendor. That is because the vendor knows in his gut that Mister Cheaply is lying and trying to cheat him. Nevertheless, Mister Cheaply always triumphs. He may threaten to discontinue stocking the vendor’s brand of soda pop. He may say something along the lines, “Besides, it makes your company look bad,” or, “I will call your boss and tell him you are trying to cheat my – let me restate that – trying to cheat our valued customers!” Mister Cheaply even g
oes so far as to encourage the vendor to contact the non-existent, complaining customer. Naturally, the vendor doesn’t do so. To even think about doing that would bring the vendor to a level of crookedness that only Mister Cheaply can stoop.

  Indeed, all of this is an illegal charade that could result in Mister Cheaply being arrested and his business shuttered. However, as fate has it, Mister Cheaply, the well-recognized neighborhood crook, triumphs over decency in the end. Thanks to his dishonesty, he usually gets a few dozen bottles of pop for free from the duped vendors each week, thereby increasing his profit margin significantly.

  As Chloe continues to walk backward through the narrow, eighty-foot long, cluttered alleyway, her thoughts continue to focus on Mister Cheaply’s crooked shenanigans – anything to keep her thoughts from her current, shocking predicament.

  As a store clerk, Jim, at seventeen years of age, uses the hand-cranked meat slicer to slice cheese and bologna, salami, pepperoni, those sorts of things. When it comes time to weigh a product that the customer has ordered, Jim is required by Mister Cheaply to place one of three magnet weights on the side of the metal scale, thereby cheating the customer.

  Mister Cheaply says Missus Ferguson is a “special” customer. She is rewarded with the heavier four-ounce weight because, as Mister Cheaply reminds Jim over and over, she is the biggest crook in the neighborhood. It should come as no surprise that Mister Cheaply considers her to be a crook. Missus Ferguson has complained to the Better Business Bureau about Cheaply’s Food Shop on more than one occasion.

  Naturally, Jim must do what is required of him, especially when Mister Cheaply is working in the shop or sweeping outside. Money is hard to come by for a seventeen-year-old.

  Whenever Mister Cheaply is not around, Jim never attaches the magnet weights to the scale. He even secretly gives the customers a few cuts of deli meat or cheese for free.

  At this juncture, you may be wondering, “Why is there so much attention on Mister Cheaply’s cheating ways?” You will be able to answer this question for yourself as the story progresses.