He looked up, his chewing finally slowing. ‘Hemlock?’ He cast a disdainful look at me for what he considered to be my inane chatter. But then he saw my gaze, fixed on his plate.
‘Tastes a little like parsnips, I believe?’ I asked, smiling. ‘That’s the nice bit. Next, you’ll start to shake, violently. Then you’ll lose the feeling in your hands and feet. Finally you’ll start to asphyxiate. It’ll last several minutes. You’re going to die, Lou, and it will not be pleasant.’
He frowned and made to lift his legs, his fists clenching and unclenching in doubt, his eyes narrowed as if looking into the sun. ‘Gina, what the hell is this?’
There it was again - the lost schoolboy. On and off like a tap, though only dripping these days. I batted my eyelashes, swirling his confusion swirl like fog. ‘I hope you enjoyed your last bout of rutting with her?’
The accusation barely registered; his breath was growing shallow as panic overcame him and he coiled and uncoiled his fingers and clutched at his throat, his eyes darting around, first to the door, then to the phone.
‘Oh, I wouldn’t bother trying to get help. The authorities are already on their way.’
‘Gina?’ He looked up, his face pale, his voice wavering.
‘The police know what you and your slut have been doing. The pictures of those girls you swapped with your group, they know about it all. Don’t worry though; perhaps you’ll suffocate before they arrive.’
‘Gina!’ He warbled, clawing at his throat, eyes bulging as, in the distance, the wailing of a siren started.
At that moment, I reached down and slowly, gently, raised my skirt, up and over my thighs, then slid the revolver from my stocking-top. He was panting heavily now, pupils dilated in shock.
‘One bullet,’ I said, handing him the weapon.
The wailing of the siren grew louder, faster.
He looked at the weapon, looked to his violently trembling hands and then looked to me.
‘You b...bitch!’
I smiled, eyelids drooping seductively, and leaned in towards his ear, cupping one hand over his pulse, then whispered; ‘This is where the pain begins.’
He pushed me back, panting hard, eyes wild, and then thrust the gun into his mouth, his roar muted as the sirens screamed outside.
Click... boom!
In a puff of blood and grey matter, he was silent, the top of his head gone like a half-shelled egg, pieces of bone, blood and oozing eye matter dribbling from the edges. I stared at his still form for what felt like an eternity. My eyes stayed dry.
Humming a tune I couldn’t quite place, I gathered up our plates and took them to the kitchen as the sirens of the fire engine whizzed by, their wail dropping sharply as they passed on through our street. Then I took to tidying away the ingredients; supermarket arrabiata sauce and a jar of crushed chilli flakes. Nothing more, nothing less. Yes, the self-induced panic had been adequate, I smiled.
Then the doorbell rang. I snapped from my thoughts and glanced to the gory mess in the corner of the dining room. I had thought my most immediate neighbours were out, but it seemed someone had heard the gunshot. Unnerved, I strode through the hallway to the front of the house, then clutched at the handle, took a deep breath and opened the door. My blood froze. This, I had not anticipated.
‘Hi, Gina!’ She said with a chirpiness that would suggest to passers-by that she was my best friend. She wore a short, tight dress and killer heels, her face was plastered in makeup that my mother would definitely describe as ‘slutty’, and her cloying scent once again offended my nostrils. ‘Is Lou around?’ She asked. ‘He... left some papers at the office and I need to speak to him.’
‘No, he’s not around right now... ’ I hesitated, then a grin crept across my face. ‘But why don’t you come in and wait,’ I stood back from the door, gesturing towards the sitting room by my side.
She barely disguised a frown of confusion at this. ‘Ah ... okay,’ she replied, stepping in.
‘Take a seat,’ I said, ‘then we can talk.’
I sat next to her, watching as her eyes darted nervously to the door. She was gloriously uncomfortable. It’s about to get a whole lot worse... slut!
‘Now,’ I placed a hand on her knee, ‘you must be starved if you’ve been working till this hour. Would you like a little pasta?’
***
Gordon Doherty lives in Scotland just by the Antonine Wall, a perfect setting for inspiring his novels set in the late Roman Empire and Byzantium. You can find him on twitter @GordonDoherty, or visit his website at www.gordondoherty.co.uk
Sisterly Love
By Robert Brooks
My twin sister, Erica, had it all. She was 5 feet 11 with supermodel legs going up to her armpits, the type of legs you would see in a commercial for silk stockings. She had golden blonde hair so straight it looked like she had styled it with a ruler, and her bright, blue eyes shone with an understated intelligence. Beneath those eyes she had a cute, button nose and thick, pink lips that had guys begging for a kiss.
Her face was perfectly symmetrical and though I never tried, I am sure that if you placed a mirror in the centre of her nose the reflection would be exactly the same as what lay behind it. I guess that is the definition of symmetry, so I apologise if that description was unnecessary.
So Erica, though it pains me to say it, was drop dead gorgeous. Not to mention her body, which was naturally what women all over the world pay thousands to replicate; womanly hips, a big, pert bust (though in perfect proportion to the rest of her body of course) and not an ounce of fat on her. Lucky cow. And she acted as if she didn’t know it, though I think she did, and she used it to wind the guys around her little finger.
Making up the other half of these twins, almost as an afterthought, was me. Jane. Plain Jane Castlebeck, as different to Erica as an identical twin could be. Oh, don’t get me wrong, from a distance we really were identical, two flaxen haired peas in a pod. It was when you looked closely at us that you could see the difference.
My flowing locks are more straggly than straight and are dull, like shoes worn off their polish. My eyes, though blue, look like stormy seas rather than tranquil lakes and the skin on my face is slightly pitted, years of picking spots leaving it scarred. So you see; I am a supporting actress to a starlet, never to take a place under a spotlight. Well, apart from the spotlight that shone down from the Police helicopter that chased me through the fields of Montana.
It was cold that night and dark. Dirty clouds covered a crescent moon and the stars were hiding, unable to bear witness to the night’s events. It had been much like any other Friday night, me sitting at home reading while Erica went out on a date with some guy. I was reading my favourite book, Moby Dick, and was lost in the swell of the ocean when I heard a car pull up.
I poked my nose out of the curtains to see who Erica had come home with tonight, and with a shock I saw that tonight it was not just a random guy. It was Dale Varney, my one and only love.
Dale was a big guy, not quarterback big but more Big Bird big, though less yellow. He was kind, intelligent and understanding but better yet he always took the time to have a conversation with me while everyone else fawned over Erica. He was the one person that made me feel like I mattered as much as Erica, and now she was stealing him from me.
Tears of anger burned my face as I watched Erica lean in through the passenger window, her perfect ass pointed skywards, and plant a kiss on hunky Dale’s cheek. I thought she probably let him have a feel of her tits too looking at the smile on his face, and at this I hurled Moby Dick at my vanity mirror and watched it smash into a thousand pieces, just like my heart.
I must have cried myself to sleep because I woke at 2.30 a.m. to find my pillow soaking wet, and my eyes were red raw in the shard of mirror that I held. A trickle of blood ran down my palm where I had held it too tightly in my tortured dreams, though I felt no pain from the cut it had made.
In the weak light of the bedside lamp I could see a note sitting on my
bedroom floor, as though it had been pushed under the gap between the door and the plush carpet. Written on the envelope was my name in Erica’s handwriting (perfectly neat) and in a cold fury I kicked it under the bed. Then, looking at the jagged piece of mirror I still held, I opened my door and walked into the hallway.
Even now I don’t know whether I set out to go to her door, but I found myself standing in her tidy room, a shaft of light from the hallway bathing her beautiful face, making her look angelic.
I didn’t snap. There was no frenzied attack, no outward show of anger at all. I calmly walked over to the bed, and seeing the face that I had always wanted for my own, sat upon the down comforter and softly stroked my sister’s hair. It felt silky smooth to touch and smelled faintly of eucalyptus from the shampoo she used. In the light it looked like liquid gold or perhaps a halo for the perfect little angel, and looking at her I felt nothing. Numbness clogged every pore in my body and though goose pimples covered my skin, I did not feel the cold.
I stopped stroking her hair, and with a detached calm I sat upon her body, covering her mouth so that she could not scream, and I drew that shard across her cheek. I could feel the skin and muscle reluctantly part as I scarred her perfect features with a bright red furrow, and I watched her blue eyes shine with pain and fear. I could smell urine and I looked down to see a wet patch spread beneath her sheets as she soiled herself in her terror.
Disgusted at her, I realised that scarring her was not enough, and I plunged that silvery dagger deep into her throat, jealousy and suppressed rage lending me strength as I forced it deeper. They said I nearly severed her spinal cord, but all I remember is my blood mixing with hers and my tears dripping to merge with those leaking from her eyes.
Now, sitting in my room, I can still smell that piss and fear, though I think the room has that odour anyway. I have just eaten my favourite meal, meatloaf that tasted nothing like my mother’s and green vegetables that were hard instead of crunchy. And now that the leftovers sit cooling upon the end of my bed, I read the note that Erica left me all those months ago, which they just gave me.
“Janey, I just saw Dale and when he dropped me home he talked about how much he likes you! I hope you don’t mind, but I told him you would go to the movies with him next Friday! Talk to you tomorrow about it.
Love you lots sis!”
I laugh hysterically at this, and my tears drop upon the scented paper to blur the ink. Or maybe it is just my eyesight that is blurring. They told me that the injection doesn’t hurt, but it doesn’t matter. I haven’t felt anything for years.
***
Robert Brooks is a young father, husband and sometimes writer of fiction and poetry! A lifelong Londoner he can be found making witty observations on twitter @robbrooks2 and blogs his poetry at www.rbpoetry.blogspot.com
You’re My Baby
By Shirley Blane
They’d been married for sixteen years and for all that time she had longed for a baby. But Ron didn’t want children.
When they married, he said, ‘You’re my baby. You’re all I want. Just you and me. No-one else.’
Marjorie had had an abortion before she met Ron and knew this was her retribution. She accepted her fate, but the empty gap in her heart remained. She would have made a good mother as well as a good wife.
They scrimped and saved and bought a cottage, a mile or two out of town. It needed renovation and they worked on it between them. Now it was a home to be proud of and Marjorie kept it as clean and pretty as Ron expected.
Marjorie worked in a newsagents and Ron in the bottle processing plant. Although he worked shifts, they were used to the odd hours and enjoyed their time together.
The shop took on a girl to do one of the rounds. The first girl among the other paper boys. She was fifteen, pretty and vivacious and Marjorie was drawn to her. This is what my daughter would have looked like, she thought.
One day, she found the girl, Sandra, crying in the back room of the shop.
‘What’s the matter?’ she asked, wanting to comfort her. The girl shook her head and wiped her nose on her sleeve. Marjorie dug a tissue from her pocket and handed it to her.
‘My parents want me to move out.’
‘Why?’
‘I stay out late sometimes. Play truant from school. Stuff like that.’ The girl shrugged her thin shoulders. ‘They don’t care about me, they’ve never wanted me.’
‘But surely they don’t mean it? Where would you go?’
‘I don’t know. Foster care, I s’pose. They’ve talked to Welfare about it.’
Marjorie put her arm round the girl and hugged her. ‘Perhaps it will all blow over. Come on now, I’ll help you get your round together or people will be ringing to complain they haven’t got their papers.’
Ron was on late shift that night. Marjorie usually enjoyed those quiet hours to herself, but tonight she found herself pacing round the cottage. She turned on the television, flicked through the channels and turned it off again. She climbed the stairs and looked at the room in the loft. With little porthole windows at each end, it was light enough to be used as a spare bedroom. They had fitted it out as a hobby room but never used it.
Ron greeted her cheerily when he arrived home, kissing her cheek before taking off his coat. He patted her backside as she put a late supper in front of him.
‘All right, then, Girl?’
‘Mmm.’ She didn’t know how to broach the subject, not wanting to spoil his good mood.
‘You’re a bit quiet. No trouble at the shop?’
She shook her head. It was the opening she needed but she hesitated. She drew in a deep breath and willed herself to go for it.
‘We’ve got this new paper girl, pretty little thing and I found her crying her eyes out in the back room this morning. I’ve been thinking about her all day.’
‘Can’t take on other people’s troubles. Too kind-hearted, that’s your problem.’
‘Mmm.’ She moved the condiments around the table and sat in the chair opposite him. Her lips trembled and she made a determined effort to look him in the eyes. ‘Her parents are going to turn her out. She’ll have to go into foster care.’
‘So?’ He looked down, cutting his meat, a frown on his face. ‘That’s none of your business, is it?’
‘Well….I just wondered…’ She noticed she was twisting her fingers together and put her hands firmly in her lap. ‘I wondered whether we could offer her a home. Only for a little while,’ she said hastily, watching his darkening face.
‘No.’ He pushed his plate away and stood up. The chair scraped across the kitchen tiles. ‘No. We don’t want any stray kids here. We decided from the beginning, didn’t we? Just you and I, no-one else.’ She saw him make an effort to smile, to control his irritation. ‘After all, you’re my baby, aren’t you, Girl? We don’t want anyone else coming between us.’
He went into the sitting room and she heard the sound of the television. She bent her head and clasped her hands more tightly. Then she got up from the table and cleared the supper things away.
Sandra didn’t turn up for her paper round the next day. Marjorie worried all morning, before deciding to ring her home number. A man answered.
‘It’s the paper shop here,’ she said, trying to keep her voice from trembling. ‘I wondered if Sandra was okay. She didn’t turn up this morning.’
‘She’s not here.’
‘Oh.’ She hesitated. ‘Can you tell me when she will be back? I need to know if she is going to continue with her round.’
‘I don’t know and don’t care. She no longer lives here.’ Her father, if it was he, banged down the phone.
Marjorie spent the rest of the day trying to concentrate on work but finding her thoughts going back to Sandra. Where was she? Was she sleeping rough? After work, she rode around the town centre, looking for the girl. Finally, telling herself not to be so stupid, she rode home.
She couldn’t sleep that night and Ron sighed several times in exaspe
ration at her twisting and turning before dropping into a deep slumber himself. His snores enforced her sleeplessness.
To her relief, Sandra was there the next morning, putting together her round when Marjorie arrived at the shop.
‘Where were you yesterday?’ she asked. ‘I was worried about you.’
The girl was red-eyed, her hair a tangled mess. ‘Yeah, I’ve already had a telling off from Jonesy.’ Mr. Jones was the morning manager, inclined to irritableness and often short with the paper boys.
‘I phoned your father,’ Marjorie confessed.
Sandra looked at her in amazement. ‘What did you go and do that for? What did he say?’
‘That you didn’t live there any more. Where did you sleep last night?’
Tortured Hearts - Twisted Tales of Love - Volume 2 Page 4