By Maxwell Dudeck

I must have caught the club right in the temple. I remember her pale face against the inky blackness of the room, then a flash of searing white. And then darkness; total and complete darkness for what may have been one second or six hundred. When I remembered that I had a body it felt like it had been sick for days, had died on Thursday, and had been tortured in hell for an extended weekend.

When I could see, it was through a kaleidoscope; the pieces of the room and the shadow of her face ordering themselves through pulses of intense red and neon blue and radioactive green. Then the colors were gone and so was her face; and the gloom of the room shimmered in black and white, like a reflection on a cold lake through a thick midnight fog. It seemed cavernous, emptier than it had been.

And then I felt the floor beneath my skull and shoulder blades and knew that I was lying like a dirty suit on the rough, rotting boards, staring intently and without comprehension at the black void that climbed up the vaulting ceiling.

I lay still for a minute, planning my sit-up, and then pulled myself up with numb paws grasping at my knees. From the coarse-gravel groan that let itself out of my mouth, I remembered my voice. If it sounded like I’d had a rough day, I had.

I crawled to the cobwebbed baseboard of the plaster wall and leaned hard against it, like a sack of so many worm-eaten Idaho spuds. In my jacket I found cigarettes and my zippo, but my Hecate was gone, her holster hanging limp and useless. Two out of three ain’t bad, I thought.

As I lit the Marlboro the pinup on the zippo danced and I thought of the pale girl’s face. I could hold a pretty good picture of her for a few seconds if I concentrated, and then it’d shatter again, the way it had seemed to when I got hit by the golf club.
The Club. I could see what looked like it might have once been a pretty decent 3-wood in the flicker of the zippo, snapped in half like a matchstick. Something black and thick had grown around it in a grotesque slick. I’d seen enough of that particular brand of motor oil to know that it was blood. Blood. My blood. Fuck.

I touched my forehead too hard and felt a bomb go off, and the picture started to go fuzzy again. Sure enough, my fingers came back sticky red. The darker, sweet-smelling stuff that means you’re not just scratched.

The clues to the case: One bloody hand, my own. One broken fairway wood, not mine, in a puddle of half-dried blood; presumably mine. Elementary, my dear Watson. Someone who might have been but was not necessarily a very good golfer had put a hole in my fucking head with a golf club about five minutes ago. Maybe I’d pissed off Tiger Woods. Case closed.

Leaning against the rotting wallpaper I wondered if the girl had hit me somehow, it had been dark and I’d only seen her face. Maybe she was double jointed. I wanted to blame her; she was the only face that I had to blame. That fucking cunt had hit me with a golf club and then she took my lady from me, my Hecate. I almost had myself believing it by the time the Marlboro had burned down to my knuckles. I tossed it into the blood and listened to it hiss. I imagined that it was the blood hissing, and not the cigarette, but I couldn’t tell for sure.

Right now, I’ve got to get out of here. That’s the first move. Then, we’ll see. I can tell you it won’t be pretty. Blood will have blood – Willie Shakespeare wrote that, and he never even met me.

Tune in next week for the next installment of Vigilant by Maxwell Dudeck

By Allyson Castles

The thing that is really hard,
and really amazing,
is giving up on being perfect,
and beginning the work of being yourself.
Anna Quindlen
 
Your perfection is your destruction, he says,
before sneaking out the door,
my scale hidden stealthily under his jacket.
To believe him would be to give in.

In the closet, hard plastic hangers
rest solemnly, oblivious,
and are cradled by blood red, then pumpkin orange
and Steelers yellow.
Blouses and sweaters and tank tops and t-shirts
stand erect and ordered as
sticks of wax in a box labeled “Crayola”.
The door swings open
and I feel an insurmountable urge
to throw out a striped sweater I love,
because where does it fit?
 
My pantry is stocked like this:
Vegetables in watery crimson broth sit
stagnant in their aluminum prisons, next to
salty cardboard wafers, too fibrous and tough
for my intestines to tackle, next to
flimsy trays which house quarter-servings
of brittle noodles and tiny foil packets
of Thai spices. A contact-papered wooden shelf, and
then
bright cans of Folgers, unsweetened sugar in its
many Pepto-Bismol pink envelopes, a height-aligned
row of my friends Duncan Hines, Betty Crocker, Milton
Hershey,
who wait patiently in the tenebrous cupboard
until someone’s birthday calls for a celebration. And
the penthouse
is stacked and stuffed with the most fearsome items—
bags of evil starchy pommes de terre, spaghetti
and lasagna and linguini, innumerable
boxes of cereal that lurk around when the sun
goes down and prey on me.
 
He is gone, and I look through the glass at her
weary and dismayed countenance, at her
flawed skin and awful makeup, at her
strange body, whose cellulite responds to
neither asceticism nor exercise, at her
untoned belly, with its menacing threat to
rebel with one slip-up, at her
eyes, swallowed in an ocean of dark vessels
concealer cannot protect them from, at her
eyes, drowning her cheeks in tiny tsunamis of
salt and black charcoal, at her
eyes.
 
And I tell her, disdainfully,
the line that should have been delivered to her:
Your perfection is your destruction

By Peter Kusnic

It began with the sirens. The twelve-noon whistle on the roof of the high school had wailed that chilly fall day, pierced his eardrums with a spiteful cacophony, and, sitting down to dinner after a long hot shower, he could still hear them wailing—rattling the silver, the China cabinet, the dim-lit chandelier, the empty crystal wine glasses on the table. No one else could hear it. His mother piled the plates with roasted potatoes and garlic green beans, his father scanned the Sunday newspaper at the head of the table, and Victor and Lily, their hands entangled under the table across from him, beamed with conceit. No one knew. He felt giddy when he remembered that no one knew—just him. His heart was pounding, as if any minute the revelation might pour from the silver gravy boat—his lust, his misdeed—splash their faces, scald them, as it had scalded him that afternoon in the men’s room at the high school track when the sirens went off and so did he.
“Looks great, Dolores,” said Victor.
“Eat up,” she said. “Especially you, Edward. You’ve gotten skinny as a twig away at school.” She forked a grease-glistening hen carcass onto his plate.
“But I don’t believe in eating dead animals,” he said, smirking.
“Edward, now you and I both know that that’s not true,” she said.
The paper at the head of the table crinkled. “Edward, eat,” said his father.
“I don’t want to eat it. I’ll eat the other stuff.”
“After I spent all day cooking it.” Her voice thickened in her throat. “You’ll ruin your sister’s birthday,” she said, sitting down, finally, at the opposite head of the table.
“Eat the hen, for Christ’s sake,” his father said. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“Can’t I make my own decisions?”
His father slammed a fist on the table, and Edward jumped. “Eat.” His neck flushed purple. “Now.”
Lily clanked her glass with her fork, her eyes gleaming at Victor’s. “We have an announcement to make,” she said, but Edward zoned out, noticed Victor’s neck as thick and sinewy as a tree trunk, his bicep, peppered with fine red hairs and dotted with freckles, bulging his short-sleeved polo shirt and became disgusted.
The next thing Edward knew his mother was crying. He went for his fork; he did not want her to cry; but then he saw it glinting in the chandlier light. A ring. “A platinum-set, four-carat, princess-cut diamond,” said Lily. She had sprung from her chair, waving her hand before their mother’s hypnotized face. They were engaged to be married.
“Oh, Lily,” his mother said as if about to faint. She cupped her wet face with her hands. “Oh, my baby!”
His father put down the paper and reached over the table to Victor, shook his hand. “Good man,” he said.
Edward was quiet, the expression on his face most certainly one of disgust. Victor was a linebacker turned law student, and since he and Lily started seeing each other four years ago Edward never had anything to say to him. He hated football, detested law, and he knew his sister could do much better.
They passed and poured the bottle of red wine. Edward drank cranberry juice. He had a drive ahead of him back to school.
“Things are shaping up nicely for these two,” said his father as if they were not there, “with Lily’s new job at the accounting firm and Victor’s new position at the Law Review.” He paused. “Edward you should think about law school after next year.”
Lily put her hands together, gasped. “That’s perfect, “ she said. “Victor can help you prepare for the LSAT. And, you know, Edward, you need excellent writing skills to be a lawyer.”
“I’d be glad to help you, Ed,” said Victor. Of all things in the world, being called Ed got him most, seized him at the core and yanked out his entrails. “I know a ton of writers in my program.”
Staring down at the hen, Edward released a hot breath. “That is not the kind of writing I do,” he said, bitingly, and for a moment they sat uncomfortably in silence.
His father raised a glass. “To your children,” he said.
Edward shrunk in his chair, his fork laid on the plate of untouched food; he knew what was coming.
“To our grandchildren. To a promising future,” he continued, and Edward cringed. He hated toasts. He did not raise his glass. He did not say, ‘Here, here,’ with his mother, and he did not smile, he did not glow—not like Lily and Victor across from him, red-faced and exuberant, as they finished their wine with a gulp, leaving what looked like bloodstains around their mouths. The sirens returned, blocked out all that clanking silverware and obsequious conversation as they dug into their hens, breaking bones and slurping juices. He returned to his thoughts, to the lightning speed at which it shot out, struck his cheek, dribbled into his mouth, slid into his left eyeball and tried to impregnate it, to the way it burned and his eye swelled with salty sin. His stomach was turning. It was exhilarating, intoxicating—and no one knew. His left eye began to twitch. He sat up straight in his chair at the dinner table, pushing those thoughts out of his mind, worried his face might give it away. He was ready to go. Take off in the Buick. Head south down I-71 toward Flanders. He needed a cigarette.
His mother was eyeing him. “You know Victor and Lily met their senior year,” she whispered. “That’s right around the corner for you.”
“Right.”
He cut into the hen and released a plume of steam. He sawed off a chunk of meat, put it in his mouth, chewed. It took all of his self control to hold the vomit down.
Once the silver clanked with finality on the plates, Edward was ready to go.
“But your sister’s birthday cake!” his mother chirped. The sun had just set behind the explosive red trees in the picture window and he hadn’t had a cigarette since he sucked one down on his drive back from the track that afternoon.
“Mom, let him go,” said Lily. “He has better things to do, I’m sure.”
“It’s getting dark,” said his father from behind the paper. “Just go.”
Lily sprang from her seat and pattered barefoot into the kitchen. “I have something for you, Edward,” she yelled.
“Something for him,” his father said, “on your own birthday? When he didn’t even get you a birthday present?”
Edward looked down at the frayed ribcage of the hen, dispirited, as Lily pattered back into the dining room with a moleskin notebook.
“He’s poor, dad,” said Lily. “All college kids are poor.” She handed him the notebook. On the inside she wrote, Don’t forget to dedicate your first book to me—Lily. She pecked him on the cheek where it had landed. He felt all the blood rush out of his face, trickle cold into his full stomach. “So when you’re rich and famous you don’t forget your favorite sister.”
Edward laughed. “Yeah, right,” he said. “My only sister.”
“Lester, give him gas money,” said his mother.
His father groaned, peeled a fifty dollar bill from a gold money clip, and held it up between his two fingers.
Edward walked up to him. “This better go in your gas tank,” his father said, and gave it to him in a firm handshake.
When he kissed his mother’s mouth with those lips he had to go; it was too much; it was too close. “Bye, Victor,” he said, clacking down the foyer in his boots. “Good night,” he called, almost out the door, “good night everyone.” And the slam of the front door cut off his mother’s voice pleading him, “Be careful.”

Pete is a student at the University of Pittsburgh. He can be reached at ppk3@pitt.edu

By Amanda Griswold

You didn't applaud between poems but
made affirmative murmurs
Deep in your several throats like
the radiator hum
kicking on mid-October, before
you're used to either
the sound or the cost.

I'm used to neither my
gas nor electric—and savor
the sum of the check every month
the way, as a girl, menstruation in all
its intimate chores was still
blood.

I didn't think much of your poems, although
I kept them—like mail sent here,
to my first apartment, where
it isn't uncommon to find
someone else's
name on the letter. Some previous tenant
who’s left no address.

Amanda Griswold enjoys reading long dead authors and living poets in Buffalo, NY. She can be reached at griswoldam1@gmail.com

By Bethany Brownholtz

When asking for spare change you mustn’t “Maam,”
even though I may seem motherly and kind.
Responsibility has nothing much
to do with trust-fed vagrant, junkie rockstars,
seeking smokes and  bumming sandwiches.
When vaunting cardboard signs you musn’t flaunt
organic sprouts, your Diesel jeans, your dog.
I see father’s funding spread across your
multi-thousand dollar braces, gleaming
fraud beneath misfortune, manufactured.
My son, to place a quarter in your cup
would only serve to validate your quest
to find the self through pseudo-self-denial,
the pirating of others’ misery. 

Bethany is earning an M.A. in Writing and Publishing at DePaul University in Chicago.

Eric Langberg

They are standing quietly in the Classic Fiction section of Goldman and Brown’s Used Books when she laughs. The sound disturbs the air and she realizes at once that she was heard throughout the store. She puts a hand over her mouth and meets his surprised gaze, her own eyes wide. She is amused by the look on his face, a mixture of lust and scorn, and this sets her to giggling again.
“What’s so funny?” he whispers, a leatherbound copy of of A Tale of Two Cities tucked under his right arm, a worn volume of Kidnapped! sitting spine-to-palm in his left hand. His hair is wild, dipping low enough to block some of the view out his square glasses. She likes that.
“It’s nothing,” she whispers, stepping closer to him without realizing it. She doesn’t have anything in her hand, although she has spent the past twenty minutes reading the embossed spines, lined up like schoolchildren on the shelf. She likes to read the titles, to be close to the books. She likes smelling the dust. But she never buys anything here. The canvas messenger bag slung over her shoulder is empty, and it stays that way.
He looks around and sees that they are alone in this aisle. “You were laughing at something,” he says.
“Yeah, it’s just... well, I was reading the titles, over there. That’s the Dickens shelf. But you knew that.” She gestures at the novel tucked under his arm. He looks down at it, surprised to see it there. She smiles.
“Anyway. I was just reading the titles, and I saw Our Mutual Friend right next to Martin Chuzzlewit, and I read them as one title. Which made me laugh.” She looks at him expectantly, and when he doesn’t say anything, she continues to speak.
“And, well I’m not sure if you’ve read it, but there’s a character named Seth Pecksniff in that book. Martin Chuzzlewit that is. And my ex-boyfriend’s name is Seth. Was Seth. Is Seth. He’s still alive. I think.” She pauses. Frowns.
“And anyway, his name was Seth. Seth Groberstein. And I was just thinking about the last time we were together. We were at this carnival, and he took me on the Tilt-a-Whirl even though I told him I didn’t want to go. And he insisted on spinning us as fast as he possibly could, and we just whirled and spun and tilted and went around and around while that corny carnival music played all around us... And I hated it. Isn’t that ridiculous? I hated it. I was so mad at him, because I had convinced myself I didn’t want to ride, but of course I did. I was just too afraid to say so.
“So I broke up with him. We stumbled off of that ride and I told him right then and there that I didn’t want to see him anymore, and that he should stop calling me. And I left him there, still swaying on his feet, and I walked right out of the carnival. I haven’t seen Seth since.” She didn’t look amused anymore. He stared.
“I’m such an idiot,” she said. She was no longer speaking to him. “We always want to ride the Tilt-a-Whirl.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a cotton candy-pink cell phone. She pushed a few buttons, and then closed the phone with a snap and slid it back into her pocket as tears started to roll down her cheeks.
“What’s wrong?” he asked. He slid Kidnapped! back into the bookshelf and reached out for her. He put his hand on her shoulder. A Tale of Two Cities fell to the floor, sending up a cloud of dust.
“I don’t have his number anymore,” she said, and they held each other in the Classic Fiction aisle of Goldman and Brown’s, held each other while the dust swirled around their feet, swirled and spun and went around and around and around, unnoticed.

Would you like to get your work onto WNW? Would you like a basket of free books? Are you trying to kill time at work, but the boss has blocked YouTube?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, here’s the deal:

Art inspires art. Choose one of the two pieces posted below as inspiration for a short story (1000 words or less). It’s sort of like a caption contest, but with an emphasis on artistic inspiration, not witty description.

Send your finished story to editor@writersnewsweekly.com, and we will pick a winner by the end of the month.

THE WINNER will receive a basket of our finest, dry-aged books. In addition, the winning story will be posted on WNW.

THE RUNNER UP will also have his or her story posted on WNW.

Without further ado, your muses:

P.118
Apollo with Cancer, 2008
Jeffrey Katrencik

P.168
Wake Up Moron, 2006
Elizabeth Scott

The inspiration for the first WritersNewsWeekly short story contest comes from the Fe Gallery in the Lawrenceville neighborhood of Pittsburgh. The nonprofit art space opened in 2003 and hosts several shows a year.

These pieces are from the gallery’s 2008 show, In the Making: 250 Years/250 Artists, which celebrated Western Pennsylvania’s rich artistic heritage with the city's 250th anniversary.

According to Jill Larson, Fe’s founder and director, there are more artists per capita living and working in Southwestern Pennsylvania than any other region in the country. Bravo, SW Pa.!

The gallery is gearing up for its new show Boys will be Boys—a celebration of youth and masculinity sponsored by the fraternities of the University of Pittsburgh. The show opens March 20th. Check out their website at www.Fegallery.org.

By Bethany Olson

Beware, book lovers: you might have a harder time finding book recommendations now than ever before. As if the current economic nervousness weren’t biting enough at our pockets—it’s now thinning out a time-honored medium of information, the book review.

With the recent killing of The Washington Post’s Sunday supplement Book World, subscribers to the print edition of the paper will have to look elsewhere to find up-and-coming works. But the epidemic is not new; The Washington Post follows both the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times in reducing book review coverage in their printed pages.

According to a Washington Post article published on January 29, 2009, the newspaper was forced to cut costs because of “declining revenue and circulation.” Book World doesn’t draw in a high number of advertisements, it continued, and the amount of book reviews will drop by 25 percent. The remaining reviews will be adopted out to the paper’s Style and Outlook sections.

Luckily for a reading-hungry public, Book World will survive online at http://www.washingtonpost.com. But a nationwide shift away from the printed word is anything but comforting, whether in the eyes of the publisher, the writer, or the reader. Yes, raw information and numerous opinions abound on the internet, where access is lightning-fast. And yes, artistic content has depended on the alms of money-holders for centuries, from advertising revenue to sponsorships to just giving a tired poet a place to sleep at night. So because of decreasing revenue and the convenience of technology, a shift from the print to the electronic medium seems logical. Unfortunately, however, pulling reviews of printed books from the some of the last print-newspaper-reading consumers still in existence may fail to address a legitimate market. In addition, The Washington Post’s online Book World will still have to compete with the myriad of online book reviewers, including booksellers and book networking sites.

Of course, it’s inevitable for publications to adjust their height to match the depth of their economic roots. It’s no right of mine to criticize the amount a business is able to accomplish with the resources available to it. So I look upon the recent changes with a sympathetic, albeit somber, view. Farewell, children of Gutenberg, and welcome, you next generation of surviving publisher–reader relationships.

Michael sat up in bed slowly and cupped his hands on his face, rubbing away a headache. He had woken from a nightmare and gave a long sigh as he tried to recount its details. His memory was murky but what he could recall were only fleeting images of his girlfriend, Beth, who had died six months earlier. He had been having terrible dreams ever since, sliding him into a deeper and deeper despair. There were times where he thought that he was making progress, or at least, being successful in hiding his grief; but then there were the longer periods of gripping depression. The dreams were so real, though, and sometimes he would wake up, forgetting the whole tragedy and expecting to find Beth lying next to him. He would even wake up to the phantom scent of her perfume or the whisper of her voice. But he would only be reminded of her absence. It was enough, at times, to make him feel insane, and maybe he was. He was having these dreams every night now and the pangs of their realism were getting stronger.

He thought about this briefly and let his hands slide over his stubbly cheeks. The thought occurred to him that maybe he should see a psychiatrist, but he dismissed this theory quickly. He couldn’t tell anyone about this; it was all in his head and he knew this. If he was aware of this, then obviously he could overcome it. At least this was his reasoning. He distracted himself by deciding that he should go ahead and shave and shower. Everyday-life had become the savior of his sanity, and the anchor he looked to in order to ground himself. It was essentially a farce, but he wouldn’t dare allow himself to admit it. It was a comforting lie. Work became an obsession and he would often ask for extra hours, if only to keep busy.

As he stood up, a black Labrador retriever ran up to him excitedly, licking his hands and Michael raised his arms in annoyance. “Alright, alright!” he assured the dog. “Come on, Leo. Let’s let you outside.” Leo and his brother were the only puppies in a litter to survive the abuse of their previous owner. They had been kept under a trailer and the rest of the litter and the mother were killed by fire ants. Beth picked him out at the shelter because of his “sincere” eyes. She said that he had personality. Honestly, Michael thought the animal was a nuisance until now. The dog stomped behind him as he led the way to the back door. Michael hid behind the door from the glaring morning sun, still half asleep. He thought about cleaning up around the house as he brushed away some crumbs on the kitchen counter. His room was a mess too. Clothes were scattered everywhere, making it difficult to discern what was clean and what was dirty. Laziness, in a way, had increasingly crept into his everyday routines the past six months. After a cup of coffee, he continued with his morning routine and got dressed to go to the grocery store. He grabbed his keys and was stepping out the door before he realized that he left Leo outside. After letting him back inside, Michael crawled into his car to head to the store.

The crisp air of a cooling September chilled him from the open window, but he dealt with it until he finished his cigarette and flicked it at a parked car as he drove by. All the flowers of summer had already begun to die away and the trees were looking thinner. The grass even began to brown in some spots. The sky was getting greyer by the day and rain was becoming more frequent. It reminded Michael of life - of growing old - and he marveled at the parallel. The change of seasons fit his mood perfectly; everything seemed withered and dried out. His expectations for the world were used up and hollow. Beth used to ask him what he wanted in life and he would tell her about his goals and ambitions. But what he realized now was that she was what he wanted - what they had shared. He thought about their plans to have child - his ambition to be a father. Suddenly, all the other goals he dreamt of seemed trivial. Now, incomplete by the loss of Beth, he realized what he really wanted and what he would never have. It was a place in life he would never know, almost like a lost sanctuary. This feeling of being robbed drove him to the verge of anger. Being an atheist, he had no one to blame, if not himself. He felt a little guilty about a binge of alcoholism he went through before she had died. Beth hardly ever expressed concern, though, and accepted it. Her eternal patience was so pure and amazing to him at one point. But when he was drunk, it annoyed him to an extreme. In retrospect, he concluded that he felt, for whatever reason, that he had to test her - that when he was drunk, her passiveness made him paranoid about her devotion. It wasn’t so much that he was drunk all the time, though, just that he was getting drunk more frequently and when he did, he became violent. He would smash things and yell, but Beth would only frown and hide away in the bedroom. The next day, she would be smiling like usual and Michael would be utterly disgusted with himself. Even though he tried to stop drinking, the urge was too strong, and he would only return to the bottle. It was embarrassing beyond measure, and as a result of this self-repulsion, he drank more. He started drinking when he lost his job the year before, and the habit stuck with him, growing with sick immensity.

It was the day before she died, that Beth became upset with him. They were sitting in bed and Michael was drinking and making snide remarks to her before she stood up and yelled at him. She wanted him to stop drinking, to trust her, to remember what it was like before. Her understanding and patience had finally given out and she threatened to leave him if he wouldn’t stop drinking. She told him that she couldn’t have a future with someone so destructive. So he broke down in tears and promised her that he would stop and took her in his arms. This seemed like yesterday to him and he could still recall how her nightgown felt, the warmth of her skin and rise and fall of her breathing. He wished that her touch wasn’t just a memory.

He arrived at the grocery store, aggravated to find that the only parking spots were far away. Stepping out of his car, he noticed dark clouds swarming from the distance, showing that it was going to storm later. He shook his head at the thought that the weather was going to get colder. There was no hurry, so he walked slowly from aisle to aisle, trying to decide what he wanted. He didn’t pick anything complicated or that required strenuous preparation, but mostly TV dinners and junk food.

By the frozen foods, he noticed a couple that were friends with him and Beth - Devon and Carroll. They were like a stark contrast to the mood that began his day and the dwelling thoughts that darkened his mind. They were chatting playfully, laughing and smiling. The strangest thing was that Michael could never remember them being so happy. Their energy wanted to be infectious, Michael longing to contract it for himself, even though he knew it wouldn’t really dispel his gloom. Maybe a chat with old friends could be a comfortable distraction. No, he decided, it would be best to keep walking. He didn’t really want to talk to them anyway. It had been too long and he never completely liked them to begin with. So, to avoid the pointless, sycophantic discomfort, he ducked away in the nearest aisle and finished shopping.

He had become more detached from the people around him, especially friends. Everybody just seemed so stale and it was so much work to relate to them now. Every time he would notice this, he would shiver, trying to shrug the thought away. There was even a hint of disgust for people building up inside of him. It seemed as if everyone was so trivial. He felt like a crazy hermit thinking that way. But he knew that ultimately that was how he really felt, so dark now and misanthropic. He didn’t want to feel that way. But it grabbed hold of him like dark hands twisting his stomach. He swiftly grabbed his bags and almost jogged out of the store to his car, looking around the parking lot to keep an eye out for his false friends.

He got in his car, ready to go back into seclusion - to the safety of his home. Before he started the engine, though, he reached into one of the bags and pulled out a bottle of whiskey. He hastily took the cap off and guzzled down a quick gulp and slid it back in the bag. “Well, here we are again, Mike,” he said to himself while he turned the key. He had decided to drink that night and almost felt guilty. But he didn’t have anything else to do. Maybe if he got drunk enough, he could pass out and have a dreamless night’s sleep for once.

He pulled out of the parking spot and started his way down the rows of cars when a woman suddenly stepped out in front of him. Michael slammed on the brakes with a screech from the tires, but he hit her anyway, throwing her to the ground. The blood drained from his face and he froze where he sat. He didn’t move or blink for several seconds, but it felt to him like timeless eons. He thought he recognized who it was at first, but it couldn’t be who he thought she was because she was dead. The woman looked just like Beth with long, curly blond hair and a small, soft face. But what was most striking were her eyes, identical to Beth’s - dark amber but glazed over. He rubbed the goosebumps on his arms and stepped out of his car slowly. None of the other people walking through the parking lot had stopped; they merely gave him a glance and strode on. He craned his neck shyly as he crept up to his bumper. But there was only empty asphalt in front of his car. Chills ran through his body and he looked around again to see if maybe the woman had gotten up, but she was nowhere to be seen. There wasn’t even any sign of damage on his bumper. So he knelt down to look under the car, but she wasn’t there either. He stood up and ran his fingers along the back of his neck, bewildered. Before he got back in his car, he caught the faint scent of Beth’s perfume and the hair on his arms stood on end. He looked around one last time and opened the door and sat there trying to get his nerves back together. Shaking his head, he chuckled under his breath. Maybe he was going crazy.

It started raining on his way home and he luckily got inside before it started down-pouring. The shadows of the raindrops on the window slid down the carpet in front of him as he slouched in his recliner. His living room was gray in the faint light and there was only the white noise of water rushing outside. The water was gushing off of his roof and was flooding his yard with huge puddles. Leo even refused to go outside when Michael tried to let him out. He hadn’t turned the TV on yet, distracted by thoughts of that phantom woman. He really didn't want to accept that he was losing his mind. His stomach churned and knotted up, which led to him skipping dinner. The anxiety twisted there in his gut, giving him a sinking, merciless sense of dread. Was this his manic grief? A light-headed haze slipped in and out of his mind, clouding him with an odd fatigue. It felt like a migraine coming on. The idea of sleep occurred to him but he stood up and said to himself, "Fuck that" and grabbed the bottle of whiskey off the counter. Finding his place back in the recliner, he unscrewed the cap and took a large swig. The warmth travelling down into his stomach conflicted with his anxiety cramps, but he figured that he would burn through them. Grabbing the remote, he clicked on the TV, but the screen did not flicker to life. "Goddammit!" he exclaimed aloud and stood up to check the light switches; but they did not work either. So he grabbed some candles out from under the kitchen sink and lit a handful of them for his living room, bedroom and the kitchen. Slumping back in the recliner, he suddenly felt bored and gloomier than before. The bottle touched his lips with burning relief and he reveled in the solace of the oncoming buzz. He greedily chugged it now, barely setting it down before it he decided for another gulp. But he couldn't help to also feel guilty about it and the anxiety throbbed at his core.

He emptied half the bottle before his eyelids started to grow heavy. He would almost nod off but would drearily come to before his eyes could shut, somewhere between sleep and wakefulness with the world blurring in his stupor. He almost drifted completely into sleep when he heard what sounded like splashing in the distance. His eyes lazily opened and struggled to focus on the dark room around him. It took him a moment to remember the power outage and after checking the light switch, found that the electricity was still out. In his new alertness, he suddenly felt the urge to go to the bathroom, so he grabbed a candle and made his way down the pitch black hallway. His house felt suffocating like the darkness had weight to it, oppressive and crushing like the bottom of the ocean. Leo burst out from the bathroom, making Michael jump. The dog ran to the living room, whimpering with its tail between its legs. Michael stopped for a second, reflecting on how strange this was, but continued into the cavernous bathroom. He set the candle down on the sink and unzipped his pants with a faint stagger to relieve himself.

All of a sudden there was a loud splash from the bathtub next to him and he turned to see Beth sitting up in a pool of dark water. Her face was blank, so terribly lifeless and her eyes shown with the sheen of a cat's at night. Her body was covered in blood, barely red in the soft light of the candle. Flies were swarming around her in a sick hum. Michael jumped back against the sink and froze, the counter top digging into his spine. The air became dense and cold and he could see his panicked breath fluttering before him. Beth's unnatural eyes never left his gaze and for a moment she only sat there. But then she slowly extended her arms and called to him, "Michael." Her voice sounded like sandpaper and was soullessly monotonous. "You don't love me."

He was shell-shocked, but he struggled with his voice before he choked out, "Of course I do. I always have. You know that."

"Liiiiiaaar," she hissed.

He looked surprised. "No! God! Beth, honey, what is this? You're dead."

"Won't you give me a kiss?" she asked, her face never changing or giving expression.

"What?" His stomach curdled.

"Kiss me," she calmly answered.

Michael swallowed a lump in his throat and ran his shaking hand through his hair before he took a quivering step. The bathtub began to run over, blood pouring over its edge and pooling on the floor. He stopped, hesitant and in disgust. He thought that he was going to vomit. But he was hypnotized by her eyes. He took one more sliding step and stopped again for a moment. The blood crept up to his feet and felt sickeningly cold, making his stomach lurch. But he continued to step towards the bathtub. He tried to ignore the wet sound of his footsteps. Beth leaned forward, resting her hands on the tub's edge, a sudden movement that made Michael flinch. He knelt down, in front of her and leaned in slowly. There was an emanating stink of decay mixed with her perfume. The flies were buzzing in his face and their morose harmony grew monstrously loud. He brought his hands up to her face, which was as cold as the blood, and kissed her.

There was a loud screeching and howling and Michael was plummeted into complete darkness, the bathroom disappearing from around him. After a moment, he could feel a cool breeze and became aware of wetness everywhere. He opened his eyes to see that he was laying face down in the darkness of his backyard. He was very weak and had to struggle to stand. His stupor had faded away. The rain had stopped and its puddles from earlier that day still remained. The trees that lined the beach of a lake behind his yard swayed gently in the wind. All of the street lights were off and a full moon hid behind some thin strands of clouds, giving the world an ominous glow. Then he remembered what happened in the bathroom and felt a shiver crawl over his flesh. That sinking anxiety returned to his stomach. He decided that he must have gotten drunk and for whatever reason passed out in his yard.

But then he heard singing coming from inside the house. He turned around, but the windows were pitch black and there was no sign of anyone inside. The voice was steadily coming closer to the back door. The melody sounded so beautiful but eerie like ringing wine glasses. It was a woman singing what sounded like a lullaby of some sort. After a moment the door slid open and Beth stepped out into the yard. She was naked and painted in blood, carrying a young boy in her arms. Her gaze was fixed downwards, at the child, with her matted hair clumping and clinging to her face, hiding her eyes. Michael felt a surge of relief that those soulless orbs were hidden from him. The boy was sniffling and it seemed that she was singing to him. But the boy was staring at Michael, so pitiful and vulnerable. Michael thought he looked familiar, but didn’t know why. "No! Beth, stop!" he tried calling to her, but she made no sign of hearing him. Her movement looked grotesque, slightly stiff and hindered somehow. The paleness of her skin had a ghostly white glow, but looked filthy with the smears of drying blood. She walked slowly through the yard with Michael watching in awe. He wanted to do something, but he couldn't. He was frozen where he stood and every attempt to muster enough strength to simply move faltered. His throat choked when he tried to speak. So, helpless and paralyzed, he watched Beth carry the child through the trees and to the edge of the lake. She knelt down, cradling the child in her bosom and gently rocked side by side. She stopped singing and caressed the top of the boy's head until he stopped sniffling. Then she stood up and walked almost waist-deep into the water and shoved him under the surface. The boy's struggle was futile in Beth's iron, undaunted grip. His arms clawed for air and thrashed around desperately. He didn't even get a chance to scream. Still Michael hoped that someone had heard the commotion and looked to his neighbor's houses, but no lights came on and nothing stirred inside the houses.

Suddenly, the splashing stopped and Michael felt his flesh go cold, a chill he never felt before. The boy floated face down just at the water’s surface. Beth turned around and stared at Michael with her inhuman eyes. She waded back to the beach and walked into the thicket of trees. But a line of clouds passed over the moon, losing her in the shadows. It was only for a second and the clouds passed but then she was gone. Michael scanned the tree line, trying to find her, but there was nothing. Then he heard her singing right behind him and before he could turn around, he felt a hand brush his back and she walked around to stand in front of him. Her stink filled his nostrils like an offensive intruder, and the flies seemed to have gathered around her in greater numbers. She ran her palm softly from his stomach, up to his shoulder and around the back of his neck, and leaned her hips into his. He caught a whiff of her perfume and felt himself become slightly aroused, blushing with indignation. She faintly smiled and brought her face to his ear and whispered, "Why won't you let me go?" Her rotten breath consumed the wisps of her perfume.

He tried to keep his eyes closed - tried not to look towards the lake or at the thing Beth had become. He tried not to think about how this thing, which was supposed to be Beth, just murdered a child. His stomach was knotting up and he could feel himself begin to shake. "W-what?" he stammered in response. It seemed like a strange question to him.

She rested her encrusted chin in his neck and whispered almost inaudibly, "Why won't you let me go, my sweetheart?" Her breath was cold and unsettling.
"I don't know what you mean," Michael answered with a cracked voice. He tried to move again, but he was still paralyzed.

Beth dug her fingernails into the back of his neck and he whimpered, frustrated and helpless. She pressed her nails in slowly, deeper and deeper, and slid them downwards until beads of blood dripped out. She wiped the blood on her fingers and put them in her mouth, savoring the taste. "All children die," she said softly and kissed her way down to his heart and bit down viciously, blood coming down her chin. Then she slid her hands down his torso and into his pants, scratching him along the way, and dug her nails into his groin with searing pain. There was something more to the pain, though. It was more profound somehow, like stinging flames deep inside his body. It even felt like it penetrated him mind and soul - the most dynamic pain he ever felt. He was blinded and everything was a pulsating redness. He saw visions of his childhood - flashbacks of his most painful moments. Then he flashed back to when he met Beth and saw a field of wilting roses. After that, he saw himself in an open coffin at his funeral and then being lowered into his grave (disturbingly enough, he wasn't old in the coffin). Years seemed to go by before Beth let go of him and he collapsed to the ground. He curled in a semi-fetal position and struggled to breathe, spastically coughing. The mud stung the bite mark on his chest and he could feel his groin bleeding and throbbing with sharp pain.

There was a piercing headache and his vision blurred into focus, revealing that he was lying in bed with the sun intruding through the open blinds. He jumped up and felt for the bite mark on his chest, but there was nothing there - none of his wounds were there. Leo somberly strolled up to Michael, and keeping his head low, looked up at him with sad eyes. When Michael tried to pet him, Leo flinched and lazily licked his hand. The dog followed him as he went to the bathroom and flicked the light on - the electricity was back. The bath tub was empty and there was no sign of any blood. He became confused and didn’t know whether or not to be relieved. Was it a nightmare or was he going crazy? That night seemed so real; he remembered distinctly every sensation. Regardless, he thought to himself that he shouldn’t drink before bed anymore and chuckled under his breath. He went to his backyard with Leo following close behind and walked down to the lake. He scanned the water uneasily and thought about calling the cops. No, he shouldn’t do that, he thought. He had been drinking so they wouldn’t believe him. He even thought about jumping in and seeing if he could find the boy’s body, but he shrugged it off, concluding that it was a dream after all. This helped to put him back at ease, but there was a lingering, dreadful doubt. There had to have been some sort of meaning to the nightmare, but he couldn’t imagine what it was. Perhaps it meant nothing and he was just having serious problems with coping with the loss of Beth. Her words were so enigmatic, though. What had nagged him the most was the boy. He couldn’t think of where he saw him before, and wondered why Beth had him in the first place.

Something that alarmed him was that he knew he had a sick desire to see her again, like a morbid and desperate reunion, but a reunion none the less. He wanted to suppress this urge, but it bubbled inside him excitedly, disgusting and enticing him at the same time. He missed her so much for so long and that night seemed so real. The circumstances hurt him though, and he wondered if he could see her again - if only to maybe talk to her, try to find out what was going on. He would have her back. He would take her in his arms and make it better, release her from death. The cure would be his compassion and patience. If nothing else, he had to at least find out what was going on. But he chided himself for these ideas, which spontaneously flowed through his mind. It couldn't have been real. Beth was dead. But this returning conclusion only made his heart sink, sending his thoughts through the ravenous desires all over again. It was a terrible circle of rationality and passion turning so inside of him that it almost made him dizzy.

The wind picked up and Michael could hear the faint crying of a child. A shot of adrenaline hit him immediately and he stared wide-eyed at the lake, expecting to see the boy. But the crying quickly faded away and the boy was nowhere to be seen. The surface of the lake never stirred and all was calm. Michael was disoriented and didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know whether or not to trust his senses and even wondered if that night was a dream at all. “This is it,” he said to himself. “I’ve officially gone schizo.” He hurriedly walked back to his yard, glancing back every couple steps, only to find nothing new. He went inside and sat at the dining room table. Staring at the phone, he questioned whether or not he should call someone. Finally, he decided his mind was obviously cluttered and that he should stop and relax for while - give his nerves some time to mend themselves. He emptied the whiskey bottle into the sink and washed it away, deciding that it was really time to stay sober. A nap was definitely out of the question, for fear of another encounter. In spite of how tired he was, he resolved to stay awake as long as he could.

Leo was staying under his bed, refusing to emerge and even growled when Michael tried to lure him out. “Fine,” Michael said. “Be that way. Come out when you’re ready to play nice.” So, with nothing else to do, it came down to vegetating in front of the TV. He turned on the news to see if there was anything about a missing boy. But hours passed and, reassuringly, there was no mention of a missing child. “Let her come,” he said to himself. “I’ll save her and the boy too.” There had to be reason behind the nightmare. His bolstering sense of rationality made him feel bold. "Either there is a way to fix this or it's not real. Either way I know I'm sane." He imagined himself calling out to her, daring her to show herself; but when he opened his mouth, a reserved doubt stopped him. At the core, he was terrified, no matter what he tried to believe. But he was feeling a little more relieved, he switched to one of his favorite shows. In no time, without meaning to, he slipped into sleep.

Remarkably, he did not dream, but woke to the sound of a child crying. He faded into consciousness slowly before he realized what he was hearing. It was the familiar voice of the mysterious young boy. Night had come and draped the house in impenetrable shadows. The cry was coming from somewhere in the distance, but it was too dark to see. The only light was from the TV, but it was blinding, obscuring the surrounding darkness even more. When his eyes finally focused, Michael noticed that Beth was on the screen, only she was normal - restored to her living beauty. Her face was rosy with a light amount of make up and her golden hair was sleek and shiny. Her gorgeous, amber eyes were as deep as ever and shown with her soul, unlike the beastly orbs he saw the night before. She was wearing a silver necklace and matching earrings he had given her as an anniversary gift. She was talking to someone, looking off to the side, somewhere off screen; but Michael couldn't hear what she was saying. She was laughing, acting as animate and bubbly as she was in life. "Beth?" he softly asked in disbelief. "Beth!" He sat forward, becoming incensed. "Beth!" But she never answered and continued her light-hearted conversation with the unseen audience. He ran to the TV and in front of it on his knees, raising his hands to the screen. He breathed her name again, with a heavy sigh. The picture then flickered with static and she stopped talking to turn and look straight at Michael.

After a moment she spoke with a sweet voice, "You must let me go, my darling."
"I can't. You can't that of me. I love you," he answered frantically. Then the child's crying stopped and the screen turned to static and was blank, plummeting the living room in impossible blackness. Michael felt the temperature suddenly drop and began to shiver.

Violently, all the doors and cupboards in the houses began to slam open and shut. All the furniture shook and scuffled around convulsively. Michael instinctively jumped up and twirled around, assessing the racket. It wasn't long before Beth rose up from behind his thumping recliner. All of his reason left him - all of his proactive plans to communicate with her were gone. He ran to the front door, which was wildly swinging open and shut, before it slammed closed, steadfastly locked. The only clear thought in his mind was to not look into her eyes, or he would become paralyzed again. So he ran to his bedroom, blind in the dark hallway. He hit a wall at first, jabbing his toes and falling to the ground. He staggered to stand and stretched his arms out to feel his way to the room. But the door there was out of control too. He looked back to see the faint haze of Beth's ghostly pale flesh patiently stepping towards him. He screamed. All he wanted now was for the nightmare to stop, to be normal again. He wanted to live. His depression suddenly seemed so foolish. So he desperately threw himself into the doorway and fell, getting his foot stuck in the crushing force of the possessed door. He was trying to yank his foot free but the pressure was like a monstrous vice and he could even feel his ankle begin to bleed and his foot was going numb. By now Beth caught up to him and knelt down at the crack of the door. There was a faint glint of her demonic eyes and Michael threw his hands up to his face to shield himself from her Medusa-like gaze. As he did this, he jerked his leg as hard as he could and he was free of the door. It slammed shut, locking Beth out.

He struggled to stand and limped over to his bed to look at his ankle. The desk light wouldn't turn on so he pulled out his lighter and, under the flickering, orange glow, found that his ankle was gashed all the way around, bleeding profusely. Looking around he didn’t see or hear Leo. He tried to whisper to the dog, “Leo! Leo, come here!” But the canine never appeared. He grabbed a random shirt from the floor and tied it tight around the wound, wincing at the searing pain. But something caught his eye, lying where he picked the shirt up, distracting him from his injury. It was a photo and he picked it up to hold by the lighter to see. It was a family picture from when he was a kid, on some bygone, happy vacation. But chills jolted through his body when he looked at the image of himself, and finally realized where he had seen that boy from; it was him as a child. The knots returned to his stomach and he was hit with serious vertigo. He leaned forward and vomited. Shaking from the shock, he went to the master bathroom and rinsed his mouth out, dazed and weak.

There then came scratching on the bedroom door, vicious thrashing and scraping. The door frame began to shimmy and Michael panicked. He picked the desk chair up and smashed the window. The noise at the door stopped, but before he could limp through, Beth came around the corner. Her whole body was wrapped in winding razor wire, which cut deeply into her flesh, bleeding messily forth and dripping upon the ground in sick splatters. She tightly held the child version of Michael to her chest, cutting into him as well and making him cry out helplessly. She slinked into the room like something darkly eloquent, macabre and graceful. Her footsteps and posture were so stately as if she were marching in some sort of noble procession. A cloud of flies hummed around her and the boy at an alarming volume, distracting him uncomfortably. Her hypnotic gaze captured Michael and he felt himself become frozen in place once more. "You have bound me, Michaaaeel," she hissed. She stopped and stood a couple feet away from him and gave the child a powerful squeeze, making him squeal, and threw her arms open, letting him fall to the floor. Michael felt sharp pain all over his body, as if he were the one that suffered the lacerations.

"All children die," she said coldly and knelt down, over the crying boy and began to ravenously devour him. She slashed at the boy and buried her face in the seeping wounds, fresh and bright red. Michael collapsed and buried his face in his arms, feeling like he was about to vomit again, but only dry-heaved. He wept at the hideous sounds of gore before him. The child's high pitched screams gurgled away and there was only wet smacking and slicing. There was a heavy feeling at his core, like he suddenly weighed a hundred pounds more and his body throbbed and stung all over as he felt the boy’s pain. When the sounds stopped, he still refused to look.

There was an eternity of silence until he felt a caress on his shoulders. He could smell that it was Beth, but he peeked anyway. She was sitting in front of him, restored to life, as she was on the TV. The stench was replaced by her perfume. There seemed to be a warm glow permeating from her, accented by the bright sundress she was wearing. She smiled as she brought her hands to his. But he slid away, backing against the wall. "Come to me, my darling," she cooed.

But he shook his head. "I don't want to be apart of this game."
She looked confused and beckoned again, "Michael, come to me." When he didn't move, her face wrinkled in concern. "Darling, what's the matter? Don't you miss me?"
"No, I don't think. Not you. You're not Beth," he answered, unsure of what he was saying.

"I am. I'm your Beth and you still miss me. I know you do," she assured.

"Please...when will this stop? Please make it stop. I'll do anything," he begged her, breaking down into tears.

"Will you let me go?" Her face suddenly went blank and after a moment she said, "Give me one more kiss."

"Is that all? Will it be done then?" he asked uneasily.

She laughed. "Give me a kiss," she repeated. She got on her hands and knees and crawled to him and sat on his lap. Without hesitation, she embraced him and they kissed.

But when she kissed him, she bit down on his tongue and lashed bestially side to side. Michael felt razor wire slice into his skin and he groaned helplessly. She rocked him back and forth, digging the blades in deeper. He opened his eyes wide and it happened that he looked right at a mirror on the dresser. He didn't see Beth's reflection or any violence in the mirror. All he saw was himself sitting against the wall and staring back, with a blank and unaffected face.

When he saw this, all madness was released upon his mind and the deepest sense of doom fell into his gut like a sack of bricks. He felt dark realizations swarming in his thoughts and he concluded that all he wanted - all that was completely necessary - was to be free of grief again. If he woke the next day, there would only be fear to look forward to. Everyday would be an insane nightmare, something which gave him the gravest despair. He had to be delivered from limbo.

So he hugged Beth tightly and pulled his arms back repeatedly, letting the razor wire rip through his wrists. She let go and stood up weeping until she stepped backwards and faded away into the shadows. He laid back and felt the warmth leave through his arms, and the cold crept around him like a harsh womb. He became calm and his thoughts were slowing down. The pain pulsated away and there was only relief. He smiled lazily as he saw visions from his childhood, until it all blurred away and he slipped into sleep.

But when he woke the next day with no remnants of his injuries, still very alive – or barely so – he broke down. The child’s screams echoed in his head and he realized that he would never escape the nightmare. He felt abandoned and hollow with helpless vulnerability. He stood on a precipice of dark truth and there was nothing he could do, trapped in his insanity. He could only wait for the horrifying and phantasmal mirage to return. There was to be no nirvana or heaven - no peace or salvation of any kind. There was only cold and lonely emptiness in a wasteland of sorrow - a dimension in and of himself, and himself only. He would never meet Beth again, except in his woeful reminiscence. All that would ever hold him company was his desire.

Congratulations to Joshua Barnak, winner of the WNW Horror Short Story Contest! Lamia was chosen by a panel of judges for its creativity, story structure and surprise ending.

Next week’s question: Do you think literary agents should charge fees for services they perform? In 500 words or less, tell us what you think, and your answer can appear in Split Ends. Email editor@writersnewsweekly.com