by David Scott
Shirley gave the usual pause, before continuing, “Of course, I still love her. I don’t think you can get over a relationship so quickly. It has only been three months. I think she will come back and, to be honest, I would take her. Let her have her wild fling, I’ll be waiting. I do worry that I maybe should have told her how much I loved her, but I’m sure there’ll be plenty of chances in the future. And, in the meantime, I want to show her what she’s missing!”
There was an awkward silence. None of them ever quite knew what to say at this point. Lucy, who had been sitting relatively quietly until now, decided to fill the space.
“Shirley, you are an amazing woman. Anyone would be lucky to be with you. I know I feel lucky to have you as a friend. I won’t say anything against Dora, as I know how you feel about her, but maybe you should move on? Whatever you decide, we will all be here for you.”
“Thanks Lucy.” Shirley said, looking genuinely touched, “I know what you are saying makes sense, and maybe I will move on in time but, right now, I need to believe Dora will come back. I feel lost without her. And, I know, that is not a politically correct thing to say in this century but, really, I cannot bare to be alone. I need someone to be with me, to need me, to love me.”
“Oh, honestly! You should turn that into a song, Shirley.” Margie said, shuffling in her seat, bored with the conversation.
“That’s easy for you to say Margie, you’ve got Jack.” Lucy said, finding the courage to stand up to her.
Margie glared back at her judgingly; Lucy started to fidget, becoming conscious of her weight. Suddenly the on-trend red polka dot dress she was wearing felt like a mistake, and she felt certain Margie would make fun of it later. Lucy cast her eyes downwards to the floor of the mountain far below. When she was younger, she hadn’t been this large but, gradually over time, she had gained weight, and now did not have any real incentive to lose it.
Lucy knew she shouldn’t care what other people think, but she did. Lucy was unhappy but the quick highs of over-sugared confectionary, while watching others live their lives on television, was an easy fix. As Lucy looked at the spectacle of nature around her, she felt emboldened and resolved to make a change; not for anyone else but for herself.
“And with that, I rest my case your Honour. If Jack is a prize then, really, I despair!” Margie chimed, suddenly responding to Lucy’s last comment about Jack, scratching her arm with her perfectly manicured nails, always needing to have the last word, and genuinely believing that she was wittier and cleverer than the rest; generally, better.
Margie’s prettiness had served her well in life, and she had married into shallow, but dependable, wealth as a reward of it. Her collar bones protruded to make a pleasing clothes hanger for designer dresses. Now that her looks were fading, and her hair was artificially coloured, thickened and set with some sticky secret serum, she fed her vanity by fattening herself on the buffet of her delicate friends’ emotions. Margie was adept at creeping into people’s minds to know what they were thinking, and using it to manipulate. Devouring their confidence and maintaining control over them with the words coming out of her shocking-rouge painted lips. She stroked down the inverse sides of her narrow waist, straightening her white city-slicker blouse.
“Oh, look we are nearing the top.” Margie said, welcoming the opportunity to escape the uncomfortable confines of their conveyance, “Shirley, can you pass me my umbrella? It’s just down there by your legs. Never know when it is going to rain. I certainly don’t want to get wet with this flimsy outfit on. It would go see through and that is a sight no one wants to see!”
Shirley blushed and felt a heat rise in her neck, betraying a long-held physical attraction for Margie. Shirley felt sure the others would see this reaction, and judge her with their secret prejudices. In fact, the others didn’t seem to notice, or care. Maybe the world has moved on past sexuality, Shirley thought to herself, soon we will all be pansexual.
Shirley quickly jumped out of the car, being nearest to the opening doors, and then Lucy followed. Margie gave an unnecessarily dramatic leap out, followed by Jennifer, who was playing mum and checking they had left nothing behind.
“So, where is the bar? Let’s go ladies.” Margie commanded, as she marched towards the neon green, exit sign, pointing her umbrella forward; steed-less but nevertheless ready to charge, lance in hand.
Just outside of the exit door, standing in the spluttering lamplight, Margie discerned a tall person standing alone; unmoving but staring towards her. She moved forward to get a closer look, and noticed that, beneath its dark jacket, it seemed to have almost reflective, pale skin. Beside it appeared to be a pile of bodies. Various shapes and sizes, all heaped together; a culled crowd. Margie closed her eyes for a second, before reopening them, convinced the shadows were playing tricks on her, or perhaps it was just a result of the thin mountain air suffocating her mind.
Margie stopped, and stared on as it approached her. As it got closer, it seemed to have no defining characteristics, other than its mask. Nowadays, there are so many oddities in society, Margie expected this was simply some new age, androgynous youth.
The other ladies were still re-arranging themselves under the shelter of the cable car exit. Margie could hear them but couldn’t quite make them out as she looked around for them. On turning her head back, the masked presence was standing right before her. Wide-set, cold, dark eyes; almost shark-like. Its face mainly covered by a leather mask, with a protruding, sharp-curved nose. A frightening sight to behold.
Margie went to call out, pushing back on the smooth, hard white plastic with force, but it was too late. Pulcinella’s eyes glowed red as it pushed a knife into her open mouth, all the way through, until it protruded out of the back of her head. Margie’s eyes stared ahead, unmoving, wide with surprise at the sudden affront. She slumped to the ground, with an ungainly thud. The blood mixed with the muddy ground, like a syrup topping on a messy chocolate pudding. Pulcinella hoisted her up, and flung her body on top of the pile, to become the pinnacle of the human iceberg.
It walked on towards the cable car station. Its heat sensors showed that there were three others, so it stood with its back against the wall aside the exit, and waited.
“Margie! Wait up. We have got all night, you know. Are you that desperate for a drink, or are you just trying to run away from us?” Shirley said, as she came out of the bright exit, and moved into the shadows.
Pulcinella did not reveal itself. It simply grabbed her forcefully by the throat, and smashed her head against the brick wall with unhuman force; instantly crushing her skull and bringing an end to any hope of reconciliation with Dora. Pulcinella did not discriminate. Her sex and sexuality meant nothing to it. Human is human, and on this night as many as possible must be killed.
Lucy and Jennifer came out arm-in-arm, Jennifer in full anecdotal-android mode. Pulcinella slashed out with a knife and brought an end to her tedious story about her concern over one of her children’s freckles, and their over-sensitivity to the sun.
Lucy was covered in blood, merging the polka dots on her dress into an horrific red blur, as though something had burst out from her stomach. She screamed and tried to run toward the café. Pulcinella charged at Lucy, ramming her to the ground. Its beak scratched her face. It pressed one of its fingers methodically to her temple, and silently transmitted ultra-high voltage into her brain, as has been the fate of many livestock destined for the abattoir; a deathly shock.
Pulcinella went back to the power station, and saw three more heat signatures left in the cars; a couple and a singleton. It would await their ascension before turning off the power to prevent any further arrivals.
Brad and Lola sat opposite one another in the car, her knees resting gently in-between his. Brad gently squeezed his legs together, and Lola pushed back, laughing.
“Hey! Stop it!” Lola said, “That’s not fair, my legs are on the inside, I can never win this.”
She smirked, and then quickly combined t
he strength of both her legs and her hands to push his legs quickly apart.
“Woah! You’ll tear my jeans apart if you’re not careful.” Brad shouted out.
“Well, they are too tight anyway.” Lola sang out, teasingly, before giving him a quick peck on the lips.
Lola moved across to sit adjacent to Brad, so that they both were now going backwards up the hill, and took out her camera phone.
“Shall we take a selfie?” She asked rhetorically, stretching out her arm as far as she could, adjusting and angling the phone’s picture lens to get the best shot.
Brad put his arm around her, and they both instantly composed themselves into well-rehearsed poses. Lola took several shots, the young couple missing most of the scenery around them in favour of the perfect picture for social media; the endless quest to get more “likes”.
They immediately reviewed the images, after applying a filter to smooth away any imperfections.
“Hey, what’s that in the background?” Lola questioned, pointing to a red glare shimmering in the top right corner of the screen behind them. They both looked over their shoulders to look, as the car decelerated and the door started to unlock, sliding open graciously to let them out.
A hand moved in, and pulled Brad out by the neck, holding him aloft. Brad squirmed and wriggled, and grasped at Pulcinella’s hand, desperately trying to free himself.
Lola pushed forward, hitting and kicking the tall being in front of her with all of her might.
“Get off him! Let him go! What are you doing? You’re going to kill him!” Lola screamed.
Pulcinella raised his arm towards Lola’s chest. A steel spear sprung out of its forearm, plunging through her chest, and out of the other side. Lola fell silent. The spear retracted, and she dropped onto the concrete floor. Her warm blood spurted out all over the grey stone, leaving Lola cold and lifeless.
As John approached the end of the line, he had almost achieved an acceptable inner-calm, and was starting to even convince himself that this wasn’t so bad; maybe the anticipation was worse than the actual ride itself. And everything ends after a time.
John looked ahead, he could see the cable car station but he also saw something else. A cloaked figure was holding the young man, who he had seen earlier in the cable car queue with his girlfriend, up in the air by the neck. In the other hand, it was holding some kind of knife or sword. And then, without pause or hesitation, the head was cut away from the body, and the figure let the neck slip through his hands with the body landing limp on the floor. It discarded the head, throwing it aside like a piece of trash, and looked forward at John.
John could not believe what he had just seen. Terror arose within him, and surged through his whole being. Such was the strength of emotion that John struggled for breath, and felt his body freeze in panic, like a child just awoken from a nightmare.
John knew he only had a moment to decide what to do, and forced himself to focus. The masked killer was watching, and waiting for him to arrive. Another empty car slowed nearby, only a few more to go, and then John would be alongside. He had to act now.
John looked around the carriage. There was nothing obvious to help; no sharp, steel friend to come to his aid, or heavy plank of wood to bat away the aggressor.
Looking down, the tree tops were still some distance below but they might break his fall. It was his only chance; John knew what he had seen, and equally knew he would likely be killed if he waited in the car.
He leant back against one side of the car, pulled the emergency release lever, and kicked the door away with all of his might.
The cold wind whipped at his face, as he moved forward towards the open door. He wasn’t sure he could do this. Brilliant red eyes glared at him, much closer now.
What terror to choose? If he jumped, there was a chance. If he stayed the death seemed certain. And, if he was to die now, John decided that he would much rather welcome the pull of gravity and natural embrace of Mother Earth over whatever creature was lurking in the shadows above.
John waited a little longer, as a myriad of thoughts entered his head. The wind whispered words of soft encouragement, promising to help support John, and he then lurched forward, leaping towards a tree-top; surely, this kind fir would help to break his fall?
The tree was not as close as John had anticipated; spatial awareness had never been one of his strong points. He fell, unmoving, paralysed with fear. For a split-second, John realised that this was it. He was going to die. He closed his eyes, and thought of his mum. And then the ground met his heavy body, and could offer no support to his fragile bones.
Pulcinella’s audio tracts heard the snap of John’s neck, and the breaking of numerous bones. Heard his last gasp for breath, and registered the moment of death.
The whirring of the cable car continued. There were no more passengers on the deathly conveyor belt. It was time for Pulcinella to cut the power, so that it could move on to the café to continue its monthly massacre.
Bernadette took another cigarette out of the packet, and went out front to check if anyone else was coming; the excuse of smoking shielding her desperation to see an advancing crowd. But there was no one on the horizon, only the amber hue from the lights hanging over the footpath, leading up from the cable car to the entrance.
John’s fear had obviously got the better of him. So much for love conquering all, Bernie thought to herself. He couldn’t even bring himself to come up a hill to see her sing. Bernie knew John was afraid of small spaces and heights but, if he was that bothered, he could have always walked up.
A lazy lover, in so many ways. That was not fair she thought, and duly reprimanded herself. It was not his fault that she found it hard to climax. Sex had never really interested her but she would go through the motions to please. A capable, if somewhat unconvincing, actress. Perhaps that is why she knew every love song written; she was desperately trying to drain and absorb the emotion from the words to awaken her own feelings.
It was turning out to be another disappointing night. Bernie stumped out her cigarette, promising herself that she would give up smoking soon before the treacle-tar stuck to her organs, or the deadly mutations conspired successfully to take her life.
Bernie’s legs were covered in goose bumps, as her denim shorts and red-checked, short-sleeved shirt, afforded little protection from the cold, night air. A breeze was picking up, and some dark clouds were creeping over the nearby mountain tops, threatening a downpour of rain, or perhaps even some early snow.
After rolling her neck around to release the tension, and to quell her anger, Bernie went back inside. She sang a few scales, preparing to sell false-feelings to about 20 people in return for her 50 bucks fee; cheap emotion to seduce a simpering crowd.
Bernie mounted the wooden stage and looked down at the small, round tables below. Each with a candle in a glass jar in the middle; glowing faces surrounded each one, watching her in anticipation.
As though the volume button was being slowly turned down on a radio, the mumbling crowd finished their conversations, and gradually fell into silence.
Bernie looked across at Rod, her guitarist, and gave a definitive nod. It always amazed Bernie that his straggly, ginger beard did not get caught up in the strings but this had not happened yet; the frustrated death metal fantasist rocked-on, prostituting his talents, by playing elevator love songs, to pay the rent.
The main lights dimmed, as the purple spotlight focused on Bernie. The moody shimmer was too strong for Bernie’s liking, and she found it distracting. The slow ballad allowed her to look down, as though she was contemplating her emotion, to avoid the glare. The background crowd faded away, as her inner songbird took flight.
There was no noise in the room, except for her ethereal vocals. Hers was the sort of voice that you would expect to be discovered by some music mogul on a talent show, and it was not uncommon for people to ask Bernie after the show whether they had seen her on television, certain that her gift would have been unwrapped
by now.
Like other celebrated talents, the competition to get to the top was overly fierce. Bernie feared rejection, preferring the safety of local crowds, with low expectations. Bernie was a singular speck of sand on a coast with little chance of being unearthed, but it was enough that she could make a living from her one, true joy. It did not matter that she wasn’t rich or known worldwide, her thirst was sated, and anything more might risk her drowning.
Bernie held the final note of her first song longer than necessary, to show off her technique, and then lapped up the applause; albeit, it was more a polite pitter-patter than a cacophony of whistles, claps, and cheers.
Bernie looked at the tables near the front of the stage. A family of four sat around the nearest, with the two adults trying to keep their teenagers’ attention away from their phones. A middle-aged couple sat staring at her, hiding behind two very large glasses of red wine; not speaking to one another and repeatedly picking up their glasses, taking a gulp, and then putting them back down again. A couple of old men were nursing small beers while playing checkers, struggling to see in the flickering candlelight. A drunk couple were shuffling from side to side, badly mimicking some sort of waltz, right in front of the stage, seemingly unaware that the music had stopped.
This was not the kind of audience Bernie had hoped for, preferring not to share the limelight with an obsolete board game, or wasting her talents on uninterested youths and louche lovers, but at least they were all paying for the pleasure.
She continued to scan the room, looking out for John, but Bernie could only see so far due to the blinding illumination. She turned her head from the microphone and let out a heavy sigh. Then on to the next song. She struggled to muster the energy to emote another break-up song, although it could be prescient, given her disappointment with John.
Half-way through there was a clatter from the back of the room, near the bar. Heads turned but, seeing nothing, quickly turned back, assuming it was just another broken glass dropped by an incompetent bar tender or clumsy inebriate. Sounds that would disturb anywhere else but had come to be expected in a place such as this, where alcohol pacifies souls or ignites passions, fuels a suitor’s courage or numbs a forgotten lover’s pain; always disabling sensibilities, and causing breakdowns in human mechanics.