by Frank Lesser
EXT. DILAPIDATED HOUSE
The camera slowly pulls out on the house, and we see in the yard a FOR SALE sign advertising an OPEN HOUSE TODAY. Below: FREE COOKIES! Dozens MORE PEOPLE are streaming toward the open door.
INT. DILAPIDATED HOUSE
Helen shakes her head back and forth silently and tries to back away from Karen—–but the humans have finally made it through the door. The first human enters. It’s Harry.
HARRY
There you are, Helen! Would you look at this place? It’s amazing!
Helen backs away in horror. Harry draws nearer, as the other humans messily devour the cookies, crumbs oozing from their chocolate-smeared mouths.
Helen runs up a creaky stairway, and Harry gingerly follows her.
HARRY
We could fix it up, move in, finally start our lives over.
INT. BEDROOM
Helen slams the door behind her, fumbling as she locks it. She’s in a shabby bedroom: peeling wallpaper, moth-eaten drapes.
The doorknob jiggles—–then it turns, the door opens, and Harry walks in.
HARRY
We’d have to fix these locks, of course. I’m thinking a complete gut renovation.
Helen tries to move away—–but she’s backed up against the wall.
HELEN
Harry . . . no . . .
HARRY
What’s wrong, Helen? Why, you’re shivering. Give me your hands, let me warm them . . .
He reaches toward her as she screams . . .
INT. DARKENED ROOM
Helen wakes up screaming. She’s lying in bed beside Harry.
HARRY
Helen, it’s okay, I’m here. What’s wrong?
HELEN
Oh, Harry, I had a terrible dream. We were in a park, and then we were being chased through an old dilapidated house by all these people . . .
HARRY
Well, of course we were being chased—–this was the perfect starter home!
Harry turns on a lamp . . . and they’re both in the same bedroom as before, only now the grimy walls are painted a delicate shade of ecru, the tattered drapes have been replaced by blinds—–and Helen and Harry are both humans!
Helen screams.
HARRY
Don’t worry, darling. The credenza from Pottery Barn should get here tomorrow.
Slow fade-out over a shot of the lamp from page 47 of Crate and Barrel’s fall catalog.
THE END
The Werewolf Whisperer
[The following fragments were found among the unpublished manuscripts of the late Nicu Sgorzny, known professionally as “The Werewolf Whisperer.” Nicu’s own fragments were found strewn about a Romanian glen the morning after a full moon.]
So your buddy went hiking alone in the woods, got bit by a werewolf, and now once a month transforms into a bloodthirsty beast. Don’t worry: You haven’t lost a friend, you’ve gained an amazing pet.
Who cares if your neighbor’s dog can fetch the paper? Your werewolf will fetch the paperboy. Plus, women love seeing a guy with a dog, so won’t you make an even better impression if you’re with a guy who is a dog? When that lucky lady sees your werepet’s sleek coat and snarling mouth, she won’t just give you her number, she’ll scream it.
Don’t be dissuaded by the myths about pet werewolves. For instance, some people believe the wolfman is an inherently vicious breed of animal-man hybrid—not playful like the goatman, smart like the horseman, or hypoallergenic
like the Labradoodleman. But the advantages of werewolf ownership far outweigh the dangers, except arguably the danger of being torn apart by a werewolf.
Remember—you can’t spell “werewolf wound” without “fun”! Follow this advice and before you know it, you’ll be your wolfman’s best friend. If you don’t find these tips helpful, the book comes with a 100% money-back guarantee, which can also be redeemed by your surviving relatives.
Now, let’s have some fun!
[ . . . Text obscured by bloodstains . . . ]
. . . is important to establish dominance. All canines respect the pack leader. Unfortunately, werewolves also respect tearing the throat out of the pack leader, so don’t overdo it. You may find it easier to employ the harsher training techniques when your werewolf is in his human form. Just invite your friend out to coffee, and right before the barista gives him his mocha latte, flip him onto his back and clutch his throat in what is called an alpha roll. He’ll still subconsciously remember this training when he’s in wolf form. It’s called “conditioning.”
Ultimately, you’ll want to build a strong owner-werewolf relationship based on trust, respect, and the .44 magnum loaded with silver bullets that YOU MUST KEEP AT YOUR SIDE AT ALL TIMES. Be sure your pet knows the gun is loaded by firing it in his direction EVERY TIME YOU SEE HIM. This is the werewolf version of “stay.”
You will probably run into problems with “teething,” which can ruin cherished possessions like furniture, moldings, or vertebrae, so be sure to get your werewolf a chew toy he’ll want to play with, such as a Barbie, an American Girl doll, or if you can afford it, an actual American girl.
You’ll need to establish a routine. Limit his feedings to no more than two screaming innocents at a time. Take him out for at least three nightly walks and at least one nightly walk-that-turns-into-a-run-because-oh-God-you-forgot-tomake-sure-the-gun-was-loaded-and-now-he’s-after-you-oh- God-oh-God-oh-no-the-door’s-locked-where-are-my-keys.
On a related note, ALWAYS MAKE SURE THE GUN IS LOADED.
[ . . . Text obscured by claw marks . . . ]
. . . so you’ve probably already discovered that your werewolf is a natural at performing fun tricks such as “Attack” and “Bite” and “Biting Attack.” Here are just a few more tricks you can teach him:• Sit
• Roll Over
• Stop Attacking
• Play Dead and Transform Back into a Naked Human
• I Said Stop Attacking
• Rob a Bank Using Your Werewolf Stealth and Don’t Remember a Thing in the Morning
If you want to learn more about that last trick, I recommend reading the late Milos Manzursk’s book Half Man, Half Wolf, All Profit.
Remember, these aren’t rules, just guidelines. Each werewolf is as unique as the obituaries attempting to explain the strange deaths of his victims.
However, almost all werewolves tend to be excessively “frisky.” It’s bad enough when a pet tries to hump your leg, but it’s even worse when he tries to sever it first.
It’s a delicate subject. For instance, I recently had my werewolf, Gregori, “fixed,” and even today when we go out for a run through the woods, I sometimes get the feeling that he still hasn’t forgiven me. That feeling is often Gregori clawing at my throat.
That is why for the rest of this book, I will deal with practical methods of neutering your wer—
[ . . . Illegible; remainder of manuscript clawed to shreds . . . ]
On-Again, Off-Again, Alive-Again
Imhotep, please put down the mummifying salts for a second and just listen to me. I know you waited countless centuries for my soul to be reborn in a human body, but I’m just not ready for eternal love right now. It’s not you, it’s me, and more important, it’s me not wanting to be mummified alive.
Please don’t be upset. And please cut the ropes tying me to this sarcophagus. God, you never listen to me! This is exactly why it didn’t work out five thousand years ago.
Look, we already gave it a shot during Egypt’s Old Kingdom, when I was chief maiden of Isis and you were the pharaoh’s most trusted vizier. But it’s neither of our faults that the pharaoh caught you gazing upon me and sentenced you to be buried alive; sometimes in a relationship these things just happen.
Don’t look so glum. Oh, that’s just the way your face was mummified.
I know this isn’t easy for you, Imhotep, but it’s not my fault my soul wasn’t reincarnated until now. You don’t always get to choose who you fall in love w
ith, or in what century your spirit is once more made flesh.
Can you at least stop your moaning? That’s better.
Yes, yes, I know, I get it—you conquered death for me, you witnessed the unspeakable horrors of the Afterlife for me, you dreamt for sleepless eons of seeing me again. But you realize that telling me all that makes you come across as kind of desperate, right? I mean, it was cute five thousand years ago when you made the Nile flow backward for me, but now it’s a little stalkerish.
Maybe you should have played it a bit cooler. Here’s some advice for your future relationships: Ladies like mystery. And not the “how could that Bedouin tomb-raider have been strangled to death when no one was in the room but a mummy” kind.
Wait, what’s in that canopic jar? Bitumen? You’re serious about this? Don’t you think mummifying me is kind of shortsighted? I mean, do you really want to be entombed for Eternity in this secret chamber in the Valley of the Kings with someone who doesn’t love you anymore?
I had to say it. Yes, I used to love you—thousands of years ago. You didn’t think I might have met someone else since then?
I didn’t want you to find out this way. Please stop moaning. If you really must know, his name’s Nathaniel, and we’re engaged.
No, he’s not grand vizier to the god-king Pharaoh Djoser, or possessor of the names of the gods of the Upper World and Under World. No, he hasn’t conquered death for me. No, he’s never given me an expensive bouquet of gilded crocodiles. He’s an archaeology grad student. This is kind of awkward, but—he’s actually the one who discovered your tomb.
Oh, don’t be childish. That’s not why I’m dating him!
It doesn’t matter how you feel. I’m in a relationship, and that’s just the way it is. Sure, things might change, and maybe that mummy curse of yours will finally take effect—although based on your follow-through on past promises, I’m not holding my breath. But who knows what the future holds?
Oh, right—you do. Star charts, ancient magic. Well, somehow your Egyptian astronomy failed to predict Nathaniel Klein, PhD candidate in Egyptology at the University of Chicago!
Why, no, Nathaniel’s never given me a giant ruby. I don’t see what that has to do with—you have a surprise for me? Pick a hand? Okay, the one that’s not shriveled and wrapped in bandages.
Wow. That is one really giant ruby.
Wow.
But I’m sorry, Imhotep—I can’t accept this.
No, not even for old times’ sake. To be honest, even though you keep talking about them, I don’t remember all the good times you say we had. It was five millennia ago, and I don’t know if I can really trust those visions you showed me when I was under your hypnotic trance. All I vaguely recall from my uneasy dreams is you forgetting our anniversary because you were too busy sacrificing oxen for the Feast Day of Thoth. Honestly, Imhotep, being locked in an airless tomb isn’t the only reason a relationship with you would be suffocating.
Please don’t cry. The moisture is just going to make your bandages deteriorate.
I’m sorry if I hurt you five thousand years ago. And I’m sorry if I hurt you with that torch when you tried to strangle my fiancé. If things don’t work out with Nathaniel, maybe we can meet up for coffee in another lifetime and talk, but otherwise I need some space. Yes, I understand this is a spacious burial chamber, but that’s not what I meant.
But we should totally stay in touch! What’s your e-mail address? Here, untie me and hand me a pen. Even if we can’t be immortal lovers, maybe someday we can be immortal friends?
To Sleep, Perchance to Drain
A Suicide Note from a Claw-Foot Bathtub
To whoever finds my body (probably the cleaning woman),
Prospective renters may see me as nothing more than “original detail,” but here’s a detail no one’s ever bothered noticing: For the past twenty years, I’ve suffered from crippling depression. More often than not, I am filled with equal parts self-loathing and warm soapy water.
It’s gotten so bad I never leave my room anymore.
But it doesn’t matter. By the time you read this, I’ll be dead. The current tenant dropped a pair of nail scissors behind me a week ago, and within the hour I plan to fill myself with warm water and slit my claw-feet. If that doesn’t work, I’ll swallow a bottle of Drano.
I’ve experienced everything the world has to offer—the towels, the bubbles, the faucets (both hot and cold)—only to finally realize that life is nothing but a meaningless series of showers, baths, and the occasional foot rinse. And it always ends the same way: mildew.
When I was younger, I felt I had a purpose. Nineteenth-century bathroom-goers were sensitive enough that the mere sight of a single clawed foot could reduce a Victorian toddler to tears.
But I haven’t eaten a bather in years. The same thing always happens: I wait motionless as they undress, planning the exact right moment to lunge, but as soon as they fill me up with warm water I fall asleep, and by the time I wake up they’re toweling themselves off on the bath mat, just out of reach of my cursedly stubby claws.
It’s pathetic. Worse, whenever I cry about it, the tenant calls a plumber to fix the leak.
I’m sick of suffering one indignity after another. Ever have two people make love on top of you? It’s humiliating. The only thing that makes it bearable is that at least I’m not the round guy with the lid next to me. I’d tell you what his day is like, but you’d never believe me.
But the final insult was when She rejected me. After waiting years to muster the courage, I finally professed my love to Her, the mod little medicine cabinet the previous landlord installed in the late seventies. But she just stayed affixed to the wall, saying nothing. Not even, “I’m flattered, but I prefer bidets.”
She may not have noticed, but the next time the landlord tries to refinish me, he’ll find that the white enamel around my heart has cracked.
Good-bye, cruel, tiled world . . .
. . . Well, it didn’t work. Just as I was finishing my note, the tenant came in and filled me up with warm, relaxing water. Then—and my claw-feet are trembling as I write this—he poured in lavender bath oil, and all my troubles just melted away!
There’s so much to live for. Sometimes the door is open and I can hear muffled music, or a friendly cockroach crawls out of the gap by the piping and scurries all over me. (It tickles!) Plus there’s a cute new wastebasket beneath the sink, and unless I’m misinterpreting her signals, I think she’s totally into me. She wouldn’t change her lining bags so often if she wasn’t trying to impress someone.
When Bad Things Happen to Good Mer-People
Today’s sermon may be difficult for some of you, as it lacks the feel-good message of my popular parable, “Two sets of fin-prints in the sand.” But what I have to say is important for you to hear, so I’m serious this time, no splashing.
My fellow mer-Christians, too many of you are being lured away from the mer-Bible by secularism, hedonism, and sometimes actual lures. Which reminds me, please pay your respects to our late congregant Mervin, who was tragically reeled up before his time, by joining us this Tuesday for a combination open casket funeral/clambake.
We are facing a crisis. Due to dwindling attendance, the church has had to start converting manta rays. No offense, Mr. and Mrs. Mobula. I’m glad you and your lovely pups joined our congregation, and I hope you stick around after the service for some complimentary coffee, plankton, and mer-doughnuts.
The world above the waves seems to offer so much: sunlight, dancing, food that isn’t sushi. But assimilating into human society is no fairy tale. I would tell you to ask the Little Mermaid, but you can’t, because as we learn in the Gospel of Hans Christian, when her love married someone else, the godless mer-whore disintegrated into sea foam.
You must not give in to this earthly temptation. It may seem we swim blindly in a sea of chance, mere bubbles buffeted about by rough currents, but as the missionary our forefathers rescued from that sinking boat taught us, we
were created in half of God’s image.
Our mer-Lord has a plan for us. I’ll admit, not everything we are asked to do makes sense. There’s the redundancy of baptisms, plus it’s kind of obvious that we’ll be eating fish on Fridays during Lent. And then there’s the irritation of having to mark our foreheads with ash on Ash Wednesday and having to reapply it constantly.
But there is more to the world than what we see in this life. As the Bible that Father Harper translated into our language tells us, “Mer-man does not live by bread alone.” Whatever bread is. I think it’s like algae-loaf. We must surrender ourselves to the transformative nature of religion—as mer-Jesus said to Simon and Andrew as they cast their nets into the sea, “Come, follow me, and I will make you fishmen.” And we must never forget the final sacrifice of mer-Jesus, who was crucified on two planks of cedar and then grilled. He died for our fins.
The mer-Bible is the foundation of our lives, and we must not question it, or we shall be cast down to mer-Hell to be battered and deep-fried for all eternity. This is why I want to talk to you about mer-traditional values. Without the church, there can be no mer-moral foundation for our lives, and without mer-al law, we’re no better than manta rays. Again, no offense to the Mobulas.
Tragically, it is these mer-ditional values that are under assault by the liberal mainstream mer-dia, which is leading us into a Sea World of sin. We must dispute the godless mervolutionists’ theory of evolution because there is no evidence that mer-people descended from fish. Where is the transitional fossil that’s half mer-person, half fish?