Has The Cat Got Your Tongue?

by anita marie moscoso



Daisy Cutting was not normal- her parents knew it, her brothers and sisters knew it and her dog knew it too.

That's why Tarzan lived under the porch instead of above it and if they could have the rest of Daisy Cutting's family would have followed Tarzan under the porch too- but there wasn't enough room for all of them.

So the rest of the family was forced to deal with their world with Daisy in it in their own way. The Cutting Family learned to be invisible- which was easy when all anyone really noticed was Daisy.

She was very hard to ignore no matter how hard you tried.



On the day her parents found out they were expecting a baby their house burned down, on the day Daisy was born the sky above the hospital turned black.

Not from thunderclouds- from birds.

The noise they made was deafening and the smell was bad and then while they were in mid-flight they died and fell with soft wet thuds for miles around.

Mrs Cutting saw the rain of dead birds from her hospital window and she raised her baby to her lips and whispered into Daisy's ear, "what have you done Daisy? "

Of course Daisy couldn't answer because she wasn't even an hour old but she did laugh and that's when Mrs. Cutting saw Daisy already had teeth.

" Well, " Mrs. Cutting said " at least you don't have horns too."

Then Daisy laughed some more.

The funny thing about Daisy is that she never really laughed again after that day- she just smiled.

A lot.



Daisy Cutting had a normal life- she had her own room, she had her own toys and she got two full grown black cats from her family on her 12th birthday.

Her cats, Potato and Chips didn't hide under the porch when they saw her. Everyone including Daisy figured they hung around just to see what sort of odd thing she would come up with next but that was in the nature of cats and the Cutting Family understood that.

That's why they got them for her.

So at least now Daisy had a couple of friends- which is what her family wanted. Daisy, if they had asked, would have told them she busy for a social life because Daisy was always busy working on her collections.

-like her Bug Collection.

To be specific Daisy had a Bug Zoo in her bedroom.

Her bugs were in jars and plastic containers and in front of each little cage was a card with their proper scientific names and dietary habits.

Daisy also collected yo-yos that she displayed on her bookshelf and under her bed was Daisy's Grave Collection- it wasn't as organized as her bug zoo or her yo-yo collection.

Daisy collected those little candy boxes- the ones that 6 different pieces of chocolate come in. She'd buy a box or two a month, toss the pieces to Tarzan under the porch ( he buried them ) and then she'd take the empty boxes to her bedroom.

What Daisy liked about the boxes were the little pictures of smiling cherubs on the lids.

It worked for what Daisy put in them.

At least once a month Daisy took the bus to Morning Ridge Cemetery in Duwamish Bay and she'd go from grave to grave snapping petals and leaves from the Grave Flowers.

She always did it in a way that didn't disturb the arrangements- then she'd take the flowers home, dry them and put them in the little boxes.

Each box was numbered- Daisy had a map of the cemetery in her desk and when she got home she took the numbers and not the names from the Cemetery Map and copied them onto the inside lid of the boxes.

Daisy's room was full of her collections.



One Summer Mrs Cutting was in her kitchen reading the paper and drinking some juice when she looked down into her glass and saw two flies drowning in her lemonade

She took a deep breath because she was about to yell for Daisy- and how fair was that? There were two black blowflies in her juice and the first words out of Mrs. Cutting's mouth weren't going to be "yuck".

She was about to scream, " Daisy!"

Instead she took the glass outside and threw the entire mess into the garbage can.

The next day Mrs Cutting found four blowflies in the refrigerator, two in the toilet and instead of yelling " Daisy" she went to the store and bought some No Pest Traps.

It didn't work.

In fact, it got worse.

Much worse.

By the third day there was family meeting in the Cutting home that didn't include Daisy or her cats but did include Tarzan the Dog.

The result of that meeting was Mrs Cutting was sent up to Daisy's room to see if the newest members of the Cutting Family had something to do with Daisy's Collections.

Mrs Cutting took a deep breath and before she knocked she her her daughter-sounding flustered and a little angry- which was something Daisy never did. Daisy never got rattled- so Instead of knocking she put her ear to the door.

" Hey you guys...give those back this minute...I've got you ...let go of that Potato! Chips you're next hand it over....come out from under there you two- I mean it.

You guys are in so much trouble"

Mrs. Cutting looked back down the hall and almost called for somebody- anybody to go with her into Daisy's room.

But this was her daughter- and Mrs Cutting wasn't about to forget that. To be honest, Daisy wasn't the type of person you could forget even if you wanted to.

So Mrs Cutting took a deep breath and knocked on Daisy's door.

From inside of the room came a meow, a couple of hisses and a lot of growling and then she heard a door slam.

Daisy called, " come on in Mom."

Daisy's room didn't have a few flies buzzing around the way they were in the rest of the house.

There were hundreds of them and when one landed on Daisy's face and crawled around and flew off without Daisy flinching even once or trying to brush it away Mrs Cutting lost her temper.

" Flies Daisy? You're collecting flies now? That's...that's... Daisy that's not interesting, that's just stupid. What were you thinking? Look at your room...look at the rest of the house. Young lady you are in so much trouble!"

Daisy was standing next to her closet door and from the inside Potato and Chips had started to shove their paws out from under the door and were trying to pull it open.

" Let them out Daisy...and answer me, what were you thinking?"

Daisy bit her lip and shrugged.

" What were you thinking Daisy? Answer me or did your cats get your tongue?

" No Mommy, " Daisy said " they don't have my tongue..."

It's All In The Cards

by Anita Marie Moscoso





Idell Galina tells fortunes and casts spells from her little store on Eastlake Road.

Of Course Idell can't really see into the the future and she can't really cast spells but she can tell a good story and she's got a very winning smile and looks good in velvet so none of that really mattered.

Until the night Denae Colquite came in and asked for a Reading- then what Idell could or could not do mattered very much.



Denae Colquite took a seat on the little wooden chair Idell offered her and she kept her purse in her lap. She even kept her jacket on, refusing to take it off when Idell asked for it. " I know this is all- um, subjective. But I'm at a loss Miss-"

" Madam Galina " Idell extended a long hand over the crystal ball that sat on the table between them.

Denae looked down at Idell's left hand and then she looked back up and said, " Miss Galina. "

Idell shrugged pulled her hand back and slumped a little into her chair with her arms crossed over her chest and the air sucked out of her lungs. " What exactly can I help you with ..."

" Denae my name is Denae Colquite and I'll get right down to it Idell- I need to know if one can escape their fate."

Idell felt her Sea Legs come back, and she said " Our fates are..."

" Yes, yes, yes, written on the sands or wind or something like that but Miss Galina the upshot is my fate is about to ruin my life and I'd like to escape that. So, can you help me or not."

It wasn't a question and it wasn't a demand but Denae expected an answer all the same.

And it was obvious she wanted it now.

So Idell reached over to the counter to her left for a candlestick and she placed it next to the crystal ball and struck a match. Then she looked down into the reflection cast by the small yellow flame and as she did Denae put her forehead on the table's rounded edge and started to bang it up and down.

" Yes or no Madame Galina can you change a fate that's been cast. Do you really need to look into the future to answer that question? Because if you're that unsure of your present I don't see how you can help me with the future."

Without raising her head from the table Denae reached into her handbag pulled out a small box of playing cards and dropped it on the table.

" Here, it's all in here. My Grandmother did a reading for me 10 years ago when I got married. It's all there, in those cards. I need to know if I can escape it."

Idell smirked a little and wiped it off her face as Denae looked up. " Our futures, our destiny are constantly being rewritten, I see images, impression of things that could be. That's what I can offer you in the way of help and guidance."

Denae dropped her head back onto the table and mumbled, " Well, damn. It's starting to look like there is no way around this. No way at all. I mean the one person who can really pull this gig off was like a thousand percent right. You know, she was the real thing.I've been to hundreds of you people for the past ten years and all you guys have been less then...er talented then she was. Everyone said Grand was one in a million. I guess that was just the simple truth. She was one in a million."

Denae got up and sighed " How much."

" An offering of 20.00 is appreciated."

Denae got up and and put her jacket on. Then she opened her purse and dropped the offering on the table.

" Oh your..." Idell picked the box up.

" Cards- you can keep them I don't need them anymore. I know what they say. They've been saying the same thing for 10 years now."

And then as Denae walked towards the door the little flap on the bottom of the box slid open and the cards spilled out onto the table and the floor at Idell's feet.

Idell reached down and picked up one of the cards. She could see they were ordinary playing cards with something written in spidery red script across their faces.

She held the card up to the light and she could see written in old fashioned script, " My Granddaughter is going to kill you, run Miss Galina "

Idell looked up in time to see Denae throw the deadbolt on the door. " Don't bother, I told you...it's all in the cards."

Mrs. Beenettle's Garden

by anita marie moscoso



Outside the town of Dewhurst is a little Country Cottage House standing all by itself up off of a long dusty road. There's a rusty mailbox out front leaning over a ditch and a low stone fence that runs for miles along the Cottage's property line.

Within the borders of the stone fence the small white cottage has potted plants on it's porch and at each of it's lace covered windows there are flower boxes full of purple and white and yellow Pansies.

That's where Mrs. Beenettle lives.

People who drive by Mrs. Beenettle’ s House always comment on the old fashioned looking elderly lady with the straw hat and the basket of flowers on her arm.

" I wonder how old Mrs. Beenettle is, " they'll say " she's been out working on that garden of hers since I was a kid and that was over 20 years ago. "

Then they forget all about her until the next time they drive by.

You see, Dewhurst is an up and coming town with streets full of houses called " Mini-Mansions " and roads with names like " Glen " this and " View Ridge" that and the people who live in those developments aren't the sort of people who slow down their cars or themselves for anything.

That includes sweet old ladies who tend Old English Cottage Gardens in the suburbs of Seattle.



Last spring, after years and years of waving to people somebody actually took the time to stop and drive up to Mrs. Beenettle’ s Cottage.

That somebody was named Betsy Ware.

Betsy Ware swears too much and drives to fast and when her kids moved out and left Betsy and her husband with an empty nest Betsy filled their old bedrooms with boxes full of their books and old furniture and outdated clothes and broken toys.

" If they want to move back in they're going to have to haul all this crap away. "

A fool is a woman who doesn't know her own children and Betsy knew her kids would rather live in a dumpster then to be responsible for their own messes so they never did come back-not even for visits.

Betsy was either one step ahead of you or maybe a half a step behind. But she was never far off the mark. That's what made Betsy such a hard person to mess with.

It was a gift she guessed.



One day Betsy just got it into her head to make the drive up to Mrs. Beenettle’s. She wasn't sure where the idea came from; it just seemed like the right thing to do on that nice cool Spring morning.

She got out of her jeep wearing a faded black t-shirt and her hair tied back in a braid and Mrs. Beenettle came from the side of her house with her basket full of flowers.

Mrs. Beenettle smiled her roadside smile. " Well Good Morning!" she said bright as a daisy.

Betsy stood there and smiled back and the thought came from nowhere and locked Betsy's smile into place..." I have no idea why I'm here...no idea at all."



Mrs. Beenettle was pleasant enough, she knew all about plants.

What she said was not exactly what you would read in The Lady Gardener’s Companion Books.

" Flowers are just cool and cunning as any gambler or card shark" Mrs. Beenettle said in her soft warm voice. " They will wine and dine and seduce anything they have to in order to get what they want."

" What is it they want Mrs. Beenettle " Betsy asked because Betsy had the feeling this was going to be a whopper.

" Why, they want to take over dear- simple it truly is as simple as that. I mean, if you think about it the only thing that consumes and reproduces with such blind determination are humans. We're a lot alike, plants and humans."

And Betsy found she couldn't really disagree with that.



They chatted about plants that ate bugs and flowers that smelled like cigarette smoke and Betsy asked, " are there really such things as plants that eat people?"

Mrs. Beenettle laughed and so did Betsy and at that moment they both knew what the answer was-which only made them both laugh more.

The sun was starting to set and it was getting cooler when Mrs. Beenettle said, " All kidding aside Betsy- if you're interested in Man Eating plants this may tickle your funny bone-follow me."

Behind Mrs. Beenettle’ s Cottage there was a grove of Hazel Nut trees. The trees had long thin spidery limbs and they were covered with moss and the bark on the trees was leather like and dark brown.

That surprised Betsy, she thought it would be more fitting if they were bone white, but she was far to interested in what was growing beneath the little trees to wonder why the bark was the color it was.

Under each tree was a large flower.

The petals were black and purple and red and the flowers themselves were as large as the trees themselves.

And they smelled bad; they smelled very, very bad.

" Whoa " Betsy said.

The sound of awe in Bety's voice seemed to please Mrs. Beenettle a lot. In fact Mrs Beenettle smiled wider then ever and then she put a Motherly arm around Betsy's shoulders.

" I am curious about the smell Mrs. Beenettle."

" These beauties are called Corpse Flowers Betsy. In order to thrive they attract blow-flies, and in order to attract Blow-Flies they have to give the flies what they desire which of course is the scent of death."

" Is that all they attract Mrs. Beenettle? The Blow- Flies?

Mrs. Beenettle held her arm out and Betsy took it. " Plants always seem to find the perfect environment to survive in- they're very cunning in that respect.”



Towards Sunset Betsy left Mrs. Beenettle's Garden.

Tucked into the back of Bety's Jeep was a flat box filled with tiny compartments. In each little square were tiny shoots that were coiled and spiraled upwards and each little shoot was tinted black and red purple at their edges.

Next to the flat, wrapped in oiled paper were Betsy's shotguns and in a little plastic envelope under the guns were tags from sweaters and jackets and shirts.

Like Mrs. Beenettle said, plants always seem to find the best enviorment to survive in- they're very cunning in that respect.

The Tacky Ticker

by anita marie moscoso

Inspired by the Soul Food Cafe Prompt

"M" is for Myth



Alstona Kamacho's clock is an Doomsday clock- that's what she told everyone at her office. She also told them on the first day she brought it in that if the clock stops the world will end.

So for the past 20 years everyone she works with goes out of their way to make sure Alstona’s Tacky Ticker doesn't wind down.

At first it was fun to find a way to make it first to avocado green clock with the pink feet and the silver mushroom bells sitting sideways against face so that you could be the one turn the little silver key and save the entire world

Then it got to be serious.

When Alstona’ s six co-workers heard the little gears slowing down and just before second hand made this pop sound when it skipped past the glow in the dark five they’d already be pushing and shoving, tripping towards Alstona’s desk.

One year Barnell Bloss fractured right arm when he tried- and failed to clear Fales Digby's desk to get to Alstona’ s Armageddon clock.

Of course he didn't clear Fales' desk because Fales was sitting at it and when Barnell raced by it was more the Fales could stand.

He'd reached up and slammed Barnell down and Fales had been the one to save the world that day.

In any other office on the face of the Earth that stunt would probably have ended in some sort of legal action.

But Lonsdale and Mead's wasn't like anyplace on the face of the Earth- there wasn't anyplace else on the face of the Earth that had an Armageddon clock sitting on an employee's desk.



Delia Wing was a Courier from All City Express, she had won the Lonsdale and Mead stop in a lunch time card game at All City.

But that was nothing new- drivers at All City had been known to pay each other cold hard cash just for one trip because everyone in the city of Mayweed knew the L & M staff were a bunch of whack jobs.

What can you say? Nothing broke up the day like getting the chance to see a bunch of desk jockeys beat the snot out of each other to get to this cheap and nasty windup clock first.

As you’ve probably guessed by now Mayweed was short on entertainment venues.



Delia' first trip into L & M was on a Friday and there they were- all seven of them sitting at their desks, working on the phones and doing data entry and the entire time they all had at least one eye on the Receptionist’s Desk.

At least that one eye looked alive and alert because the faces they were housed in were pale and all of the worker's hands were twitching and shaking.

Delia decided right then and there she didn't want to go back to L & M- all of those people looked like they already had one foot in the grave and she was afraid whatever they had might be something you could catch.

But first Delia had a job to do.

She went over to the receptionist's desk where the clock was sitting and cleared her throat, " Package for you. "

Alstona looked up and reached for small box a in Delia's hand.

" So that's the clock. " Delia said.

" That's the clock. "

" So, if you're sitting there how come they...." Delia pointed to the rows of desks behind Alstona " race to wind it up? Why don't you do it yourself?"

Someone said from the back of the office, " because she doesn't care anymore...she wants the world to end."

From a little closer to where Delia and Alstona were another voice said, " she's nuts "

And everyone agreed.



Delia never actually saw the L & M people racing to the clock but on some days she thought they looked more nervous and pale then on other days and she figured that must have been at about the time the clock was probably starting to wind down.

Then one day, even though she had nothing to drop off and no one had called in a pickup Delia went into the Office.

" Nothing to pick up? " she asked Alstona.

" No. " the Receptionist said.

Delia didn’t want to leave and she didn’t want to be there but for several nights Delia would wake up to the sound of ticking and she'd have to bite down hard on her lip to keep from screaming out loud.

So she decided to get this over with.

" It's a joke...right? " Delia asked.

" It certainly is " a woman who sat directly behind Alstona said. She had heavy dark circles under her eyes and her blouse was inside out. " It's the funniest joke anyone could have ever come up with and I'm sick to death of it."

Then a man said, " I say we let it go...we just let go."

Alstona turned around and she said, " didn't I say it would come to this?"

The six staffers nodded and Alstona looked up at Delia and nodded, " it's a joke and I'm going to end it. "

Then Alstona reached over picked up the clock and smashed it against her desk over and over until her hands were cut and bleeding and the clock was mashed flat.

" It's over, right? " Delia asked. " The joke is over. "

Alstona said quiet as a Cemetery at Midnight, " it certainly is."

Outside a dark cloud crossed in front of the Sun then the ground shook just a little...

And that was

The End

The Scariest Sound

by anita marie moscoso
Inspired by the Soul Food Cafe Prompt
Late, Late One Night

Late, late last night, when the whole world sleptAlong to the garden of dreams I crept.And I pulled the bell of an old, old houseWhere the moon dipped down like a little white mouse.- Zora Cross

Bartsia Butcherbroom lives alone on Wormbark Road and even though Wormbark is sitting on some prime real estate up there in the Cascade Mountains no one wants to live out there and the reason for that isn't the road with the funny name.

The reason is Bartsia Butcherbroom.

Bartsia lives in this little stone house with no windows and as far as anyone can tell it doesn't have a door either- little details about Bartsia's house are sketchy at best because in the 30 plus years she's lived on Wormbark no one has ever went looking to knock on Bartsia's door.
Catching a glimpse of Bartsia working herb garden that grows wild at the side of her is about all anyone wants to see of her.

If you're unlucky by nature you might see her sitting on her porch rocking on her porch swing.
Bartsia sits there whittling little human shaped figures with a long knife with a bone white handle from the wood she collects from around her property .

When she's done she stands them up along the railing that runs along her porch or she tosses them into the Riversleigh Creek that runs behind her property.

When the little figures wash up along the banks in the city of Hedon the people that find them dig little holes and push the figures in with their feet. They try to use something else other then their hands and then they go home straight home and try to forget those tiny little figures with the rows of "X" marks running across their little eyes.

Maybe you'll wonder how she makes such tiny cuts with such a big knife, but if I were you I wouldn't spend a lot of time thinking about Bartsia Butcherbroom.

Especially if you were one of those people who touched one of those little figures with your hands before you buried it- or if as you passed by her sitting on her porch as she whittled and she caught your reflection in that long blade attached to the bone white handle she carves her figures with.

If you your unfortunate enough to be in either position more then likely you're going to start to dream of her.

Having Bartsia show up in your dreams can only mean one thing.
It means that you're going to be out one night and that you will hear the scariest sound anyone can imagine hearing.

Trust me, there are a lot of things out there in the black night that comes from the Cascades that sound bad. People with small "X" marks running across their closed eyes and pleading as they stumble through the woods " Please wake me up, please wake me up " is pretty bad in itself.

But the scariest sound you 'll ever hear are the words, " What was that? "

You'll be saying them- and they will be the last words you'll ever hear as you turn around and come face to face with Bartsia Butcherbroom who lives on Wormbark Road in a house with no windows or doors.

Grave Thoughts

by anita marie moscoso



Cebu Alacantara buries people for a living.

He digs the graves and puts in the liners, he lowers the coffins into the ground and then he covers the graves and he does it quietly, quickly before the next family shows up for services and of course before the sunsets.

It's at sunset that Leaning Birches Funeral Home and Cemetery closes for the day and opens for the rest of the night and like the rest of the Cemetery staff Cebu has learned that's when visiting hours are over.

For everybody.

Cebu has been at the Cemetery for over 30 years now, and it was on his first day back in November that he and a Mortician were outside the gates waiting for their rides home.

Kousso Eyebright was new to the funeral home too and Cebu liked her right away. He had heard from the other three Morticians that Kousso was good with the families, handy with a needle and on her first case had rebuilt a dead woman's face with a sculpture's hand and a surgeon's skill.

To be honest, that didn't mean a thing to Cebu but he also heard that Kousso knew some wicked jokes and he was hoping to hear a few of them for himself.

Instead Kousso asked, just like you'd ask for the time of day or in the same tone of voice you'd use to order a hamburger and fries, " So Cebu, tell me, what's the best part of your job?"

" I dig graves Kousso, I don't think there's a good part to that. "

" Oh sure there is, you just haven't figured it out yet. I mean, none of us come to a place like this without being invited you know."

" And your point is? "

" Well, if you were invited and you showed up there must have been something that called to you...some little signal that you tossed out that said ' hey, I could really enjoy burying dead people for a living. I could show up in the heat and the cold and shovel dirt all day long'. And that's to say nothing of the fact I'm the last person with the corpse before it's planted."

" Now, I had to embalm a guy today that I could swear had brown eyes, but when I put the eyecaps on they were green. Now that was creepy enough, no way would I wanted want to be with him...alone outside here when he goes into the ground."

" Kousso? "

" Yes? "

" You're weird, do you know that? "

Kousso shrugged and said," as a matter of fact I do."

Then Cebu thought about it a little more and he asked Kousso, " So you think we're called to do this work, is that right?"

" You bet I do."

" Who do you think is making the call Kousso?"

Kousso didn't answer; she was looking across the street.

There was a lot there and in the middle of it was an empty building that over the years housed a hardware store, a pharmacy and until a few months before had been a flower shop.

The Cemetery Grounds Keepers had taken to going over there to cut the grass and keep the place looking halfway decent because they didn't want an eyesore in their otherwise nice and quiet neighborhood.

But today there was someone out in front of the building.

A cat.

It was a small black cat that reminded them both of an owl.

The cat's head was large and round and it's body was plump and compact and it's eyes were a deep dark orange.

And it was looking right at them.

" You don't come to a place like this, you don't just show up. I mean think about it. No one comes to a place like this without being called in...do they?"

" None of us " Cebu agreed.

The little round cat uncurled it's tail and stood up and stretched and then it started to walk towards them.

It crossed the street in the slow easy stride all cats have and when it got to where Cebu and Kousso were standing it sat back down in front of them, curled it's tail back around it's body and looked up at them expectantly.

Kousso, the woman born to be a Mortician said down to the cat, " We close at sunset."

The cat looked up at her and blinked and Cebu who knew this was no joke stayed quiet...but only because he was afraid of what he might do if he opened his mouth.

The Cat could have easily gone under the fence but it didn't. It looked up at Kousso and twitched it's whiskers at her.

Then Kousso reached into her purse and took out her keys, She unlocked the gate and pushed it opened and the cat walked through.

" Take your time, I'll wait. " Kousso said in her Funeral Directors voice.

" We both will. " Cebu said.

And they did.



for more stories by Anita Marie Moscoso
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http://anita64.wordpress.com/

Eye of the Beholder

by Anita Marie Moscoso



Abney Hawkweed taught music for 25 years in the Caswell School District and those were the best years of her life.

Not that she liked teaching; in fact Abney didn't even like kids.

But the hours were good, she got the Summers off and at the end of the day not many people go out of their way to pay attention to plain looking women with wire rimmed glasses who know how to play the violin and trumpet and the saxophone.

Which suited Miss Abney Hawkweed just fine.

In the old days, after school was over and Abney was on her way home she used to roll the windows of her fuel-efficient little car down and she use to turn the radio off just so she could hear the honking horns and screeching tires. Sometimes she even got an earful and eyeful of some road raging driver screaming their lungs out and waving their fingers around in nasty gestures.

People were great and when they were driving and when they were ugly they were even better to watch.

Just for the fun of it Abney would go out of her way on certain days just so that she could drive passed the Great Mall of Felton Hills.

She just loved to watch people dodge buses and trucks and cars and then no matter how many cars were behind her honking their horns she'd drive slow just so she could see the same people sprint, jog or run across the parking lots with baby strollers and shopping carts- all so that they could get into the shops and the food court and consume anything they could lay their hands on.

It all seemed so trivial and innocent and final.

There was no mystery to life in the suburbs.

You worked, you shopped, you watched TV and then you got to die.

Some people, Abney thought, don’t know how good they have it and that's a fact.



Abney's day job paid the rent; what she did at night was who Abney Hawkweed was. She could always find another day job, but there was only one Abney and when the Sunset came she couldn't be anything else.

So just after dinner she would gather her tools into a little black leather medical bag- the one she inherited from her Grandfather and she turn the little gold clasps counter clockwise to lock it.

Then for luck, just like Grandpa taught her, she would touch the little brass plate that said, " Post Mortem Case " three times.

The luck thing was important because she usually needed it.



Like with most family businesses you could either take up the reigns and do the family proud or you could skate by and make them wish they could at least say you were adopted or 'from the other side of the family'.

The worst you could be neither, the worst thing you could be is mediocre.

And know it.

Abney figured she could get the job done- and that phrase pretty much summed up Abney's job performance. She wasn't as glamorous and thin and blond as her cousin Inez and she wasn't as smart or athletic as her Father Dr Setwell Hawkweed had been.

They were impressive figures at work and well respected.

No doubt, Abney could dig up a coffin, pop it open and hammer a stake into the bloated red face of a vampire before it could open it's mouth and spit blood all over her face-which is what they did when they were about to attack.

If they got you it was bad news because that mess could make you blind.

That's how they brought you down.

Anyway...

The problem was it was just plain old Abney Hawkweed in some old decrepit church or over grown cemetery carrying on the family trade.

There was no sense of style about how Abney did her work so she did it quietly and efficiently as possible and then she'd go home feed her cat, listen to a little Mozart and then she'd turn in for what was left of the evening.

She did that for 25 years and she never complained.

She didn't even complain when she had to go into a house on Halloween (of all nights) and take out a family of Vampires who had been sleeping in their basement and then had taken to hanging from the rafters like water logged Piñatas-dripping blood and purge from their hardly working bowels onto the floor.

All Abney figured when she slipped in the gunk and broke her wrist was that they had done that on purpose.

It wasn't like the books and comics and video games you know.

Abney learned the hard way that oxygen deprivation at death and then waking up to find you had been turned into a mosquito was enough to make anyone crazy.

Very Crazy.



On the day Abney retired- both from the Day Job and the Family Trade, her work friends had taken her out for lunch and given her some neat gifts and they had promised to keep in touch.

She doubted they would.

And of course they didn't.

Her family same to celebrate her retirement and of course they promised to stay in touch too- and Abney figured they'd make good on that and of course they did.

Especially when they needed a night off.



As time went by Abney started to play the Violin again for the simple pleasure of it. She never got calls to lend a hand at this Graveyard or that Morgue because the Vampire Problem was a Problem Solved and Abney decided to take up the guitar.

It was at Inez's birthday part last winter that Inez had told Abney, " You know in the old days we could never have all gotten together like this. It'd have been too dangerous. I mean, a couple of nutty blood suckers and a can of gasoline and before you know it we're crispy critters and people are dropping like flies from ' the plague' again."

" You had a lot to do with that Abney. Thank you."

And Abney decided right then and there that she may not have been the sleekest of models to hit the showroom floor but she had made a difference all the same.

That was when Abney really felt it for the first time- her life; her simple quiet life was all she ever was.

And she missed it.



When Spring came Abney had decided to take up sketching. She was pretty awful at it, but she had nothing but time on her hands and if this didn't work she could always try something else.

So one day she's at her favorite park sketching her favorite tree when four teenagers went walking by.

Shoulder to shoulder they looked like a little black thundercloud rolling along on the cobble stone pathway.

Their faces were pale, their lips were black and they smelled like the perfume counter at the Bay Side Department store.

Abney watched them for a moment and then she called out, " You there...are you suppose to be Vampires? "

There was a chorus of snorts and chuckles and someone tried to growl " suppose to be " but his his voice cracked.

One of the little black clouds broke away from the rest and she tried to glide up towards the middle-aged woman with salt and pepper hair " We're Goth " she said slowly with her jaw clenched tight and her black hair falling into her face.

" Is that a new type of Vampire?" Abney asked cheerfully.

" I guess you could say that." the girl with the pointed white teeth said. Then she tried to stare the old woman down. " Why do you want to know? "

Abney shrugged, " just checking. "

And as the little black cloud drifted down the path Abney got up, reached for the black bag under her chair and touched the little brass plate three times.

Then she went to work.

DARK TRAVELS

by Anita Marie Moscoso


Last Summer Mata Dark and her family took a vacation.

Mata was almost 20 at the time and during her entire twenty years of life none of the Dark Family had set foot off of the Olympic Mountain Range in Washington State. They had never traveled further then 40 miles away from their hometown of Leaning Birches.

It's because Mata's Father was a workaholic and he had this thing about being replaced. He was terrified of losing his job.

" Lord Derby, do you really believe there's a line of people waiting for to do your job? " Mata's mom Rue screamed at the top of her lungs while waving around a bunch of travel pamphlets in her hand. Mom had wanted a vacation in the worst way and she felt like if she didn’t get this trip she wouldn’t have the energy to fight for another.

Derby's eyes crossed a little like they always do when he thinks to hard and finally he said, " I'm sure there's a few people who would love to do my job. And do you know what Rue? They're probably a lot younger and smarter and quicker then me. Don't ask me to take a chance on losing the only thing I've ever been good at in my life."

Rue who's eyes never crossed when she thought to hard lowered her voice and said " Derby you are the hardest working man in town and you've earned a vacation. Promise me you'll think about it."

Derby who adored his wife and family as much as he adored his job gave in about a week after that argument. He came home one night from work and out of nowhere asked Rue would she mind if they took a road trip? He had a route and a destination picked out. He even had a leather folder that read “ USA TOURS” full of flyers, confirmation forms and event tickets.

The travel agent he had worked with in town had even got them t-shirts to wear.

Mata's Mom looked through the folder and then she unfolded one of the T-Shirts and held it up. " You've got to be kidding. " was all she could think to say.

The shirt read:

" UFO PALOOZA 2006 "




Derby smiled and shook his head. " Pack up, we leave at Dawn "



Mata's brother 15-year-old brother Wilton not only wore the t-shirt the morning they left he went out to Joker's Galore the night before and bought a set of " Deeply Boppers" to wear on his head too.

The " Deely Boppers " were silver antenna with gold balls at the top that were the size of marbles. When you turned your head something in them shifted and made a crackling sound.

Mata took one long hard look at her brother, walked out the front door and then jumped on her motorcycle and rode at break neck speed into town and bought herself a set too.



Mata and her brother Wilton had agreed with each other sometime during that very long drive that if Mom said the words, ' UFO's? Are you kidding me Derby UFO's? Our one and only vacation as a family is to celebrate something that doesn't exist?" one more time they were both going to jump out of the car and take their chances on the New Mexico Desert, the New Mexico Sun and until they decided it sounded like fun the mutants that were suppose to have been created by the first Atomic Test back in 1945.

" Hey Mom " Wilton asked, " do you think there really are Radioactive Mutants out here? "

" Well I haven't seen any but that doesn't mean they don't exist...am I right Derby? "

Derby reached over and patted her shoulder and said, " That's the Spirit Querida "



The little town was almost full of people dressed up like aliens, there were also a lot of people not dressed like aliens and they all seemed to know a lot about space travel and where you could get " Saucer Burgers ", " Milkway Meals " and everyone wanted to know if you were able to get reservations to stay at the " Station 51 Hotel "

Most of the Dark Family were secretly pleased they were staying at the " Place to Be " for the Festival but they kept it to themselves because of the look on Rue's face.

Rue's face was this mask; she looked like someone had attached strings to her eyebrows and yanked them straight up.

She had speechless since they arrived in town, which was actually a relief.

Finally she opened her mouth, breathed and said " God in Heaven " and then she went back to the hotel and ordered a blood red steak and drank Strawberry Margaritas until she couldn't focus her eyes.

After that she went back out and joined her family.



Derby talked Rue into joining a UFO Watcher's Group and by the time they got back from spending an evening learning to plot their own star charts and joined in on a few debates about the Roswell Incident and watched a video of a genuine Alien Autopsy it was obvious Rue was having a good time.

At least her eyebrows had gone back to their normal spot on her forehead and she had quit saying " God in Heaven " everytime someone walked by.

So it really turned out to be a good trip and on their last night Rue and Derby went out with some new friends to make arrangements to get together for next year’s festival and Mata and Wilton went shopping.

Mata and Wilton decided to go and pick up some souvenirs for their friends back home and they spent a lot of time talking to Mr. Fanshaw who ran the little Museum just around the street from the hotel.

They talked about their Mom and their Dad and their home back in Washington. Small town stuff but Mr Fanshaw was a good audience and he asked lots of good questions.

Mr Fanshaw, Mata and Wilton were pleased to discover knew all about Aliens and he also knew at least an hours worth of top drawer ghost stories and as he packed up Mata and Wilton's purchases he asked, " so tell me about your Mom, in the end she had a good time? Is she a believer now do you think? "

" Doubt it, " Wilton said "she doesn't have much going in the way of imagination."

" Sorry to hear that...its a curse of the Modern Age " Mr Fanshaw said sadly. Then he asked, "and what does she do for a living? "

" Homemaker, " Mata told him " she use to be a Phlebotomist. That's how she met our Dad. See the offices she worked at used to get busted into and vandalized all of the time. One night she got attacked and our Dad actually saved her from being killed. They've been together ever since"

" And what does your Dad do? " Mr Fanshaw asked.

" He's a Vampire Hunter " Wilton said from behind a stack of packages and then he and Mata thanked Mr Fanshaw for all of his time and as the two young people left the Museum he heard Mata say " hey Wilton we should talk to Dad about The Triangle for our next trip..."

belated Happy Birthday, Anita Marie

I found this giant spider's web and in it wove a hundred birthday wishes for you. I hope you had a wonderful day
with love from Traveller

Happy Birthday

Make Kinross take you out on the town to celebrate. It's a full moon so it should be interesting!

Have a Great One!

Lori

Happy Birthday Anita Marie

Bereavement is hard,

but I couldn't forget to

send you a card,

Happy Birthday, Anita Marie.

copyright Imogen Crest 2006.

Happy Birthday Anita Marie

I would have baked a cake Anita Marie
But really darling
It is so much more fun
to have Enchanteur dress up
in her very best web.

The Cry-An Owl Creek Exclusive!

AN ARTICLE by BERNADINE SANTISTEVAN, DIRECTOR OF "The Cry"

Bernadine was kind enough to make a trip to my Owl Creek Bridge (anita64.wordpress.com ) in order to share some stories about making her Supernatural Thriller Based on the Legend of La Llorona.

I hope that you enjoy her story and that you are as inspired by her determination to see her creative dreams realized as I am.

amm



I first heard of La Llorona when I was a kid growing up in a small town in New Mexico. Ever since I can remember, we were told stories of a woman who drowned her kids in the river—basically to get revenge from her lover who had betrayed her. But after drowning them, she realized what she had done and let out a horrifying, heart-wrenching cry. From that moment she was condemned to roam the rivers forever, crying and searching for her children.

As kids, our parents always told us that La Llorona would take us away if we went by the river to play alone, or if we misbehaved. On top of being completely scared stiff that La Llorona was going to get me, the whole idea that a mother would kill her own child absolutely terrified me.

When I decided to make a movie, there was no question in my mind that it had to be about La Llorona. On the one hand, I definitely wanted to do something focused on my culture. And from a more personal perspective, having grown up in a very superstitious environment (a combination of old Spanish beliefs dating back to the time of the Inquisition mixed with Native American beliefs), making a movie about La Llorona was a way for me to conquer my some of my fears/demons, with La Llorona being a big one.

Like most of the more than 28 million people in the U.S. who grew up with stories of La Llorona, I originally thought that this ghost was from my small town. After learning that she’s basically everywhere and has been a strong force in the Latino world for five centuries, I set off on a search for her across the U.S. and Latin America. I dug up historical material on her dating back hundreds of years, interviewed people who believe they’ve seen or heard her, and collected stories, artwork, poems and songs about her from all over the continent. You can see some of my research on my website www.TheCryTheMovie.com. I also went on to explore “Lloronas in other cultures,” and found several similar legends from all over the world like the Greek Medea, the Jewish Lilith and the Irish Banshee. In the end, it took me 5 years to get to a place where I felt as though I knew La Llorona well enough to write a script that would truly capture her essence. Then it was writing, rewriting, finding money, shooting, finding more money, post-production, distribution…what seemed like endless work.

Since it’s Halloween, I want to mention a few creepy experiences that I had while making The Cry—moments where I definitely felt La Llorona’s presence.

The first creepy experience happened one day when I was shooting in Spanish Harlem. Some santeros (traditional saint makers) from New Mexico had carved a wood statue of Death in the form of a woman (Dona Sebastiana). It was quite difficult to transport the santo to New York because it was a large, life-size carving and very fragile. In any case, the day my best friend, Horacio, and I were unloading Death from the vehicle, a freak accident happened where I was hit in the head—just a hair above my right eye—

with something flying through the air. It felt as though a brick had hit me, and I almost lost my eye. I remember grabbing my head and seeing blood pouring into my hand. Horacio ran and caught me just as the world started spinning and I was falling to the ground. The experience totally freaked me out not only because it happened when we were moving Death, but also because in The Cry the way that I physically show La Llorona’s curse on people is through their bleeding eyes. A few months later when I was doing post-production on The Cry, one morning my project manager suddenly had some bloody tears coming out of her eyes. She never did find out why that happened.

Another creepy experience happened when I was shooting some of my flashback scenes in New Mexico. Basically, I had spent several days looking for the perfect river location to shoot La Llorona drowning her kid, and found it months before we shot there. The place had a strange, haunting feel to it that made it perfect for The Cry. What was creepy about this was that a few weeks before we shot there, my sister, Rita, who still lives in NM called me to tell me that a woman named Bernadine—my name, which is pretty uncommon—had gone to the same location and drowned her two kids and herself. When I heard this my stomach fell to the floor. As I was shooting my scene I remember looking out over the river and feeling La Llorona’s presence more than ever.

The last creepy experience that I want to mention happened when I was in the final stage of post-production. In The Cry, I am the voice and cries of La Llorona. It took me quite some time to figure out what La Llorona would say, and this is something that I wrote only after digging deep into my knowledge and “relationship” with her. On the day I was in the studio recording La Llorona’s voice, something very strange happened. All of a sudden, something moved through me, taking control of my body and my voice. It felt as though for that slice of time, I was outside of me, hearing someone else’s voice come out of my body. It was a haunting, yet amazingly experience. The sound team that was recording in the control room was frozen stiff with how scary my voice sounded. You’ll get a taste of it yourself when you see The Cry, and you can read about more creepy experiences on my blog www.TheCry.typepad.com/thecry/.

Making The Cry is definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life. (Details included in my next horror film.) But despite all the unbelievable struggles, if given the choice, I’d do it all again. The film helped me learn so much about myself—my culture, my power as a woman, how to face and fight my fears—not to mention how to make a film. Though I have to say that perhaps the most important thing I learned by making The Cry is that nothing is more fulfilling, empowering and magical than pouring your heart and soul into a dream and making it come true.

As per La Llorona, we’ve been together for many years now, and I know her well—perhaps better than anyone else on the face of the earth. And although I no longer fear her, I am now more certain of one thing than I ever was before: There’s nothing worse than a mother who murders her child…and La Llorona is real.



I hope you enjoyed Bernadine's article.

Please visit Bernadine's Sites and check out her wonderful work:

www.TheCryTheMovie.com

www.TheCry.typepad.com/thecry/

email: TheCry@LaLlorona.com

Inviation To The Danse

Feeling Brave?



Visit Anita's Owl Creek Bridge to learn the Strange History of
the Soul Food Cafe's Chamber of Horrors at:

http://anita64.wordpress.com/2006/10/15/strange-tale-from-the-chamber-of-horrors/

VIOLET DELAFLOTE WAS HERE

by Anita Marie Moscoso





Violet didn't spend a lot of time thinking about the end of the world; it was what happened after it was all over that would keep Violet awake at nights.

She'd would be laying there in the dark picturing a dead and lifeless world with a small yellow sun rising in front of a blood red moon while all around her room on tables and in the windows and on their own special tables were dead and dieing plants in overpriced planters.

There were no starter plants with tiny little roots floating around in plastic fast food drinking cups in this room.

Only the best for her little victims.

Violet figured it was the least she could do for some poor plant that was bound to die once she got her hands on it.

However, what she did to plants was nothing compared to what she did to those colorful fish you kept in wine glasses with the half marbles scattered at the bottom glass.

Violet had come in from work one day and found all that was left of her fish were blue and red scales stuck to what looked like a fish's skeleton.

The day she saw those little corpses floating in the cloudy water she decided it would probably be better if she avoided the live animal route all together.

It wasn’t like she didn’t know any better.

There was the puppy got when she was eight.

Santa had brought the 'sleeping puppy' in the basket with the red bow tied to the handle and Violet had dragged it out to the living room stuck it in front of the Christmas Tree bright and early on Christmas morning and said, " It coughed all night, I don't think it feels well. Can we exchange it? "

There was the kitten four years later that started to bleed from it's ears and not to soon after that the baby brother that turned from pink to dark red right in front of Violet's eyes.

Then she grew up and moved out and started with the plants.

It was like having a bad tooth...your tongue just wants to go to it and poke around. That's the way Violet was with plants; she just kept buying them or planting seeds and they just kept dieing on her.

And Violet kept watching.

So it's not really a shock that she couldn't sleep at nights.

And then it got be too much.

One evening Violet’s dieing and decomposing plants couldn't keep her mind off of the little things that nibbled away at her mind during the day so she reached for her TV remote control and when she pushed the 'on' button the little black and silver box hummed in her hand and she knew the battery was dead.

She reached over and turned her bedroom light on and then she popped the back panel off of the remote.

Along with plant murder she had rotten luck with batteries too. She had guessed that if she bought batteries from someplace other than " Dollar Bonanza" (where all the stock was a dollar or less) they might last a bit longer.

She reached into her nightstand drawer for some new batteries when she saw that the battery in the remote control had split at the seam and the acid had started to ooze out and then before it ran off the side of the battery it had hardened and turned to dust.

She dropped the remote on the floor and reached for the little ivy plant that was dieing in the planter shaped liked an elephant. She touched one of the leaves and felt it turn to power between her fingers.

Now that was a new one.

Violet reached over and turned off her lamp but she didn't sleep.

It wasn't soon after that she stopped sleeping all together.

So instead of sleeping Violet did a lot of thinking; she thought about her dead and dieing plants, her puppy and kitten and little brother. She thought about the way no one ever sat next to her on the bus.

Even if her seat was the last open seat and they had to stand.

She remembered the way her own Mother would wipe her hand against her hip after helping Violet brush her hair and the way her Father would hold his hands out to stop Violet from rushing into his arms the way all little kids do.

It was strange, those little gestures that people used to keep Violet away. They were the same gestures Violet saw when someone had a coughing or sneezing fit and the person standing next to them would turn their head or pull in a long deep breath and try not to exhale until they were safely away.

That's exactly the way people acted when they got to close to Violet.

One morning Violet brushed her teeth and combed her hair and put on a bright yellow t-shirt. Yellow was her favorite color and today she wanted to do something nice for herself.

She walked down to the Lake and watched birds fall from the sky and bees drop from flowers. The trees put up more of a fight. She could hear them creak and groan and she could hear the leaves whither and then curl and crumble right on the braches.

When she got to the lake she put her hand into the water and she watched it thicken and could smell it go bad and then the fish all rose to the surface and tried to jump to land and before they were airborne for more then a second they fell dead back into the water.

Violet got up and walked to a little hill and when she got to the top she sat on a bench and she could see the route she had walked because it was a dead route now and unless you were looking you probably wouldn't notice the narrow trail of death; but Violet did.

That was it for Violet, this was all she would ever do-she would infect anything unlucky enough to get to close to her and then it would die.

Violet looked at the trail she had walked and saw the dead trees and plants she had passed could see the trees and grass and plants further away start to turn brown and curl and she could smell them turn to dust.

Violet Delaflote was spreading.

Violet walked to the lookout spot next to the Lake she had infected (there was no other way for her to think of it) and she figured she could just walk out and keep walking until the water covered her head.

She couldn't swim, she had never learned how...not after watching her swimming instructor drown all those years ago. " She had some kind of Virus, " her Dad told her " and when she dove into the water she got sick and couldn't breathe and she drowned.”

Violet passed the picnic table and walked into the water and she was surprised at how easy this was turning out to be...but what was the alternative?

She was a serial plant killer and she lived alone.

That was Violet's life.

She kept walking and by the time the water was up to her chest she realized what she was doing...she spun around went under and fought her way back to shore.

When she turned around and looked back at the lake...she covered her face with her hands and screamed until her throat felt raw.

Then she ran.

She ran and ran until she came to the Shopping Mall and she collapsed on a bench outside of the food court.

People were eating and laughing and scowling and living...and when it came down to it Violet decided she wanted to live too. She wanted to eat soft pretzels and drink strawberry lemonade and she wanted to shop and be rude to salespeople...just like everybody else.

That was what Violet wanted, she covered her face with her hands and she cried for the life she would never have.

When it came right down to it Violet decided she might only be a germ that had somehow disguised itself as a short woman with okay skin and dry hair but she still wanted to live just like anyone else.

She knew though she couldn’t do that like everyone else and Violet knew that was alright.

So she took her hand away from her mouth and nose....

And she sneezed.

CAN I SHARE MY EVENING WITH YOU?

On Friday 25th Aug 2006
My neighbour & friend Angela & I went out to town for an
8pm start to our City Town Hall
A beautiful heritage listed building
It was the opening night of the Victorian Writers Fesival
It was a cold windy night ,we were rugged up well as we climbed onto the tram

Awards night were in 3 sections
Fiction,
Non Fiction
Poetry
Entries totalled over 400
from all countries in the world.
The majority were not happy stories

One caught my eye ,
the winner of the Poetry Prize
Jennifer Maiden -her book- "Friendly Fire"
She told of her love of Prometheus
the mythical figure who stole from the Gods
to give to humanity
She was intrigued by his assertion against the Gods on
behalf of humanity
He stole fire from them to give to mankind
to keep it alive

She writes a lot about war does Jennifer
Titles like " The Problem of Evil"
about the ethics of the war in Vietnam
" Friendly Fire" is dedicated to the children of Iraq

Jennifer works in torture and trauma rehabilitation
and says......
"Toward the end of my life I just want to write poems".
Her education goes on as she studies humanity
She has a degree in English,Geography and Economics.

I came home on the tram in a sad,depressed way and with a hopeless
feeling of the iminent death of the world as I have known it.
Of the wars and killing of not only children
but the air and the water we breath and drink to survive
She says of the children ,they will be rigid and traumatised forever..

Thank you for sharing my night out at the Writers Festival.
Lois (Muse of the Sea) 26.8.06.

WHEN THE SICKNESS IS YOUR SOUL

When Morgan Gamble was 12 he pushed a classmate over a railing when she was trying to collect leaves on a class field trip for a project. The Project was a little booklet of local native plants and the little girl- Ona Crocata, fell to her death to the rocks below the bluffs.

In the spirit of true American Justice the police talked to Darren Marks, the bad kid who lit fire crackers in the bathrooms and smoked his dad’s cigarettes during recess behind the gym, they talked to Crystal Barker who’s Father was in jail and they talked to the Simon Ledbetter, one of the Park Maintenance staff who spent his weekends at Peace Rallies at the University in Feverfew.

The Police were about to resort to using a Ouija Board if need be to talk to a few of the executed criminals who took their last breath up at the Prison in Fallen (the next town over) because that made more sense then to even think about questioning Morgan Gamble, who was not only seen walking up the path to the cliff tops with Ona, people actually saw him running down the path after Ona hit the rocks below.

Morgan Gamble played baseball and was a Boy Scout and his older brother was a first year Med Student and his high school age sister a cheerleader. His Mom’s name was Betsy and his Dad was named Skip and they had two cars and one of the biggest, newest houses built in the newest and best new town of Ransomville.

Why on Earth would you spend time talking to a boy like Morgan who came from a family like the Gambles about the Murder of a little girl with perpetually tangled hair and socks that didn’t match and clothes that her Mother bought at the Neighbors In Need Charity Shops?

In the end a lot of people thought that, so Ona Crocata’s death was ruled a suicide.

After all, it was decided what else could it have been?

The stars that filled the sky lined up for Morgan Gamble: he got to grow up and get married and have a wife and a home of his own while Ona Crocata, wrapped in a simple white sheet and dressed (the dress had actually been carefully draped and pinned around the little girls smashed and ruined body) in her Mother’s best Easter dress turned to dust and bone in her simple pine casket at the Leaning Birches Cemetery in Larkspear.

Despite the fact the Sun and the Heavens smiled down on Morgan his eyes were closed to all of it. He didn’t see it; you don’t need to have open eyes to look into yourself 24 hours a day seven days a week.

Ona Crocata eyes were always opened.

And they were always looking out.

Morgan’s wife was named Ginny and the only difference between Ginny and his Mother were their voices. Betsy Gamble talked high and fast and Ginny Leonard-Gamble talked high and ultra fast so listening to the two of them at the same time was sort of like listening to a table saw running none stop for hours on end.

Morgan didn’t care as long as that high pitched whine wasn’t heading in his direction.

Only last Monday not only did that high pitched intolerable whine head his way it ran down his throat and he almost choked on it. The Whine was magnified a hundred times over and the sound levels could only be compared to standing next to a jet when it takes off.

God, what was that noise?

Then he remembered- Monday night was The Book of The Month Club night.

On book club night Ginny and her friends sat around in their living room and talked about plot lines and drank some wine, they talked about character motivation and then they drank more wine by the time they got around to talking about what the book meant they were all blasted which was good because the only thing worse then listening his wife’s book club talk was listening to them talk sober.

At least this way they were sort of amusing.

It made up for the screaming headache Morgan got when they were around.

Morgan managed to make it from their indoor garage with minimum pain when two little words drifted up from the living room to the entrance way as he closed the living room door.

“Dog Girl”

His face turned red and he looked up and around to make sure he wasn’t the one who had said those words out loud.

Then he heard it again only much louder this time, “Dog Girl”

He followed those two words into his living room and smiled his best toothpaste ad type smile to his wife and her friends and said, “You all sound like Junior High school girls…what’s this Dog Girl talk?”

“It’s our book of the month “Ginny tried to say “it’s a ghost story.”

“About a Dog Girl? What is that some kind of New Age Hippy Chick in search of her inner animal or something?”

They all laughed like they were suppose to and Morgan preened like he was suppose to and then Mr. Good Humor Man left the room, “No really, what kind of story is it?”

Ginny saw her husband’s face turn to a cold hard mask right in front of her friends for Pete’s Sake, how could he? So she tried to focus her eyes and get serious so she could get him out of the room.

“ It’s about this little girl who was murdered, when she comes back as a ghost she doesn’t know she’s dead and when she figures it out she kills her murderer.”

“Really.” Morgan held his hand out for the book. “Why is it called Dog Girl” was she ugly or something?

Ginny shook her head and the motion almost made her get sick. “No, that’s what he called her before he shoved her over the railing…Dog Girl.”

Morgan looked at the book and on the cover was a Walnut Tree growing over the edge of a cliff. “ No one could’ve known that, what it felt like to put his hand against the small of her back and feel that little push… no one except for Dog Girl and …”

“Morgan!” Ginny shirked as Morgan quoted the book “you’ve done it, you actually read a book!”

“How does she kill him?”

“He starts to see her everywhere, at the Park, playing with his children, in the Mall. She becomes as real to him as anybody and it makes him crazy.”

“Sees her?” he asked

One of Ginny’s friends chimed in, “He sees her everywhere. So he goes out to the Cemetery to find her grave and dig her up and it’s gone. Dog Girl is gone and so are her grave and tombstone and all.”

“ So, “ a high pitched voice grated against Morgan’s brittle nerves “ he goes out to his garage closes the windows and puts rags under the doors and such and starts his car and dies from carbon monoxide poisoning.”

“And just when he thinks he’s finally free of Dog Girl he sees her through the exhaust just outside of the driver’s window and he knows just as he dies it’s only the beginning. Dog Girl is never going to leave him…ever.”

Morgan nodded and for the first time in years, maybe for the first time in his life he looked outside of himself and all he saw was Ona “Dog Girl “Crocata.

He decided it would be best if he got use to it now because he had the feeling that was all he would be looking at for a very long time.

THE 477

We thank with brief thanksgiving
Whatever gods may be
That no life lives for ever;
That dead men rise up never;
That even the weariest river
Winds somewhere safe to sea

-The Garden of Prosperine
by Algernon Charles Swinburne

Clover Boonan takes the bus to work, she's taken the same bus..the 477 for the passed ten years. Before that it was called the "S-4" but it was the same route and much like the town of Larkspear it hadn't changed much in a very long time.

She tries to sit somewhere in the middle and she listens to tapes she recorded herself; they don’t follow any musical style or artist. They’re just sounds and voices and phrases that the Mortician likes to fill her head with before she turns the key to the Prep Room at the Funeral Home she’s worked at for over 20 years and disappears from the world of the living into the home of the dead.

When she was about 12 Clover wanted to be a writer, she wanted to write about demons and ghosts and cemeteries and the living dead. She wanted to dress in black and never smile and she wanted to live in one of those old Victorian style Mansions on Basam Hill.

Then one summer, after she turned 18 her Mother’s friend offered her a job at the Leaning Birches Cemetery in Larkspear.

Had Clover thought it was cool in those days to smile she would have.

Instead she looked up from her book (must’ve been something by Anne Rice…of course) and she shrugged, “Sure.” Was all she’d said from under her heavy black shadowed eyelids. “ I think I’d fit in there.”

That of course turned out to be so far from the truth it was a joke.

The Morticians Clover worked for were two brothers that inherited the Funeral Home from their Father.

Hunter and Calvin liked to sing Elvis and Frank Sinatra Songs while they worked, they attended every single Science Fiction Convention to come to town and they always dressed up as the bad guys from a show called “ Doctor Who”

“ You know Clover, “ Hunter suggested one day “ you’re looking a little pale around the gills. Why don’t you go out and walk through the Memorial Park? All that sun, all that white marble. That’s put some color on you really fast.” “ No thanks” Clover said from the supply cabinet where she was taking inventory.

“ Hey Clover” Calvin said with no room for debate “ why don’t you go out to the Memorial Park and do some maintenance? Rake up the leaves, clean up the dead flowers. That sort of thing. In fact, you should probably hop to it before you loose the Sun.”

Then Calvin opened a package on his desk and pulled out a little toy space ship that hoped you would live long and prosper when you pushed a little button on its underside.

He held the toy up to his brother, “ Score.” He said with awe.

Score. “ Hunter echoed back with reverence.

Clover was odd and pale and wore too much black but in the end it was got hard to be around Hunter and Calvin Larkspear and not end with some color in your life.

It took a few years but Clover made it all the way through Mortuary College, she attended Comic Book Conventions and she even got it into her head that she might start writing some day.Mysteries were her thing now and the only horror books she read anymore were true crime novels.

Over the years she couldn't read or watch a horror movie with out laughing out loud, so she have them up ages ago.

But when she put her headphones on and took that bus ride to work it was music she thought about. She loved the way the notes went together and the stories the songs told and she loved the voices, those lively colorful voices that wanted to tell you their secrets.This was the world she was in the day the lady in the gray linen shirt dress got on the bus.

The woman dropped some change into the fare box and carefully made her way down the aisle as the bus pulled away from the stop. As she walked towards Clover Boonan, something about the dress yanked out of her day dream of rock stardom and to the little black belt that circled the woman’s dress.

It looked like one that Clover use to own.

The edges of the belt were finished off with purple thread and because of that the belt had been considered flawed and she had bought it for less then dollar.And the dress…that dress looked like one of four shirt dresses her Mother had donated to the Funeral Home last winter. They had a closet full of donated clothes that they dressed Jane and John Does in. Jane and John Doe were people the County brought to Leaning Birches, which had some years back devoted at least 20 acres of the Cemetery to the surrounding cities less then fortunate citizens to be buried.
Calvin and Hunter had started the “ Closet” because the idea of burying people in sheets and plastic bothered them. “ I’ve buried Gold Fish with more dignity then this, “ Hunter had mumbled one day as he prepared John Doe 21704 for his casket.

The next day the brothers brought in some clothes and the closet grew from there.

Clover decided it was nothing, the belt and the dress weren’t unique. But the thought raced around her head all the same, “ no they’re not unique but those things are yours Clover. You know it…that’s your Mother’s dress.

The woman took a seat across the aisle from Clover and she smoothed her dress out before she sat down and Clover just knew the woman was going to look over at her and smile.

She snapped her eyes forwards and tried to concentrate on her tape where a man was growling into her ears that he could do dirty deeds for cheap.

Clover could smell the faint sweet odor of Jasmine, her Mother’s perfume. The thing of it was Clover’s Mom has worn that scent for so long she can’t smell it on herself anymore and she has a tendency to wear too much of it now.

So all of her Mother’s clothes, no matter how many times you wash or dry clean them the always smell like Jasmine Delights by Lucia.

Lots of ladies that age wore that scent, Clover told herself, lots of women that age wore that style of dress and lots of them had that hair style too. Clover did hair and makeup at the Funeral Home and of all the things she had to do that was the task that worried her the most.

“ It’s cinchy Clover,” Hunter explained on the afternoon she had finally run out of excuses for not doing hair “ it’s a pretty basic style just take the small barrel curling iron and make three curls on the top, two on each side and brush it out.”

It was called it the Granny Brush Out and even though it turned out it was an easy do Clover usually had to cheat and use bobby pins to hold the waves above the ears to hold the hair up.

Clover’s eyes shifted to her right, and of course right above the woman’s ear were two crossed bobby pins with a tiny bit of cream colored thread to hold them in place.

As the bus slowed down and pulled over to the next stop Clover hoped the woman would do what most of them did when someone got on the bus, the seated passengers looked out the window. And the Grey Lady was no exception. She turned her head too as the next passenger started towards the back of the bus and when she did Clover’s eye went to the woman collar bone.

Just under her white linen collar it was there, just like clover knew it would be because she was the one who put it there.

The little line of puckered skin held together with string.

Clover had made that incision herself and she had gently reached inside of this woman and found the artery .

And then Clover embalmed her.

She was sure of it as the woman turned and looked at Clover and smiled and when she did Clover decided she knew this woman.

Clover after all had shaped the woman’s mouth into a small smile with her own hands and she had brushed her hair and put blush on her cheeks and colored her pale lips with a soft shade of red.

The Gray Lady was a dead Lady and she was riding the bus with all of the other morning commuters like she belonged there. She fussed a little more with her dress and her hair and then she reached up and pulled the yellow cord and the bus slid to a stop.

She got up and before she could pass Clover, Clover reached out and touched her hand, still bearing traces of the power she had dusted on to give the woman’s hand’s some color. “ Where are you going? “ was all Clover could think to ask.

The Gray Lady looked down at Clover and smiled and she leaned towards Clover a little and said, “ I’m just visiting dear, just like everybody else.”

“ Just Visiting. “

INTO AN ETERNAL NIGHT

Inspired By The Soulfood Alphabet Project:

“ D” Is For Descent Into The Underworld

http://www.dailywriting.net/Alphabet/D.html




Tory Devenish was eight years old when his Father married Cascara Pomeroy. Sixteen years later, to the day, Tory Devenish would be sitting in a pale green room eating his last meal and sitting across from him in a chair that was bolted to the floor was Cascara. She didn’t say a word. She just looked at the clock, turned her face back to Tory and smirked.

“It should be you at the end of that rope Cascara not me…it should be you.”

Cascara laughed until tears ran down her face but she didn’t make a sound.

Tory use to enjoy it when Cascara came to the house to visit. Tory would wait for his father to leave the room and then he’d whisper “I hate you Cascara” and then he’d stick out his tongue.

Sometimes he’d even try to spit at her but Cascara would look down at him and smile that dark empty smile and she never said a word.

“I told Cascara I hate her,” Tory would tell his Mother on one of her infrequent visits.

“You did?” Mara Beth asked, her eyes wide and sparkling and with a wider and even brighter smile.

“Yeah, then I did this…” Tory stuck his tongue out and shook his hips from side to side and Mara Beth laughed and swept Tory up in her arms. “You’re a silly boy Tory Devenish.”

Tory looked into his Mother’s face and that’s when the thought came to him for the very fist time. “I think Cascara is a Wicked Old Witch.”

“She’s an ugly old witch!” Mara Beth laughed in agreement.

Tory’s heart warmed and burst and his Mother’s smile flared and burned bright and golden and consumed him until there was nothing left of him at all.



It was after that visit that Tory really let Cascara have it. Cascara’s dog disappeared, her herb garden died over night and the dry soil smelled like liquid laundry detergent long after the dead plants were cleared away and Tory would mouth the word “Witch” when his Father’s back was turned and he’d screech it out at Cascara when he wasn’t home.

“Are you accusing me of being a Witch?” Cascara asked him once and Tory stuck tongue out and sang over and over again, “Cascara is a Witch, Cascara is an ugly Witch.” Cascara never got mad and she never yelled. She looked at him with her slightly crossed dark eyes and smiled at him with all of her teeth and she laughed. She laughed and laughed and she never seemed to take a breath.

Years passed and Tory went from being spiteful little boy to spiteful teenager and one day he turned into a spiteful young man with a nose ring and jet black hair with blue and gold stripes above his ears.

“You know Tory, “Cascara said on that last afternoon he would be a free man “since you came into my life I can’t remember the Sun. Isn’t that funny? It’s like I’ve been locked in a dark room since my Wedding Day.” Cascara seemed to be talking more to herself then to Tory “since I married your Father you have buried me alive in your bile and spite. Why, I’d go as far as to say you’ve killed me with your poisonous nature. I’ll bet there isn’t a court in the land that wouldn’t find you guilty of my murder.” “Now there’s a thought.”

“What?” he snorted.

“You at the end of a rope, twitching away with a hood on your head. Wow, it would almost and I mean almost makeup for the years of Hell you brought into my life.”

“You’re sick,” he said.

Cascara went to the phone and he saw her hit the speakerphone button.

A flat impersonal voice asked for the nature of the emergency and Cascara screamed, “It’s my Stepson…oh my God! He’s got a kni-“Cascara jabbed the off button and walked out of the sunroom and into the kitchen.

Tory could see her lean over the sink and when she came back into the sunroom he saw the knife in her hand.

“ Put that down you crazy old bi-“he started to say.

“You said it yourself Tory, I’m a Witch, and I’m an evil old witch. Who’d have thought that a vapid little worm like you would have noticed or cared about anything outside of himself.” “I’ll be damned.” She said with genuine surprise. “No, “she said “I take that back…you’ll be damned Tory Devenish.

Then his Stepmother pulled the knife across her neck and as the blade whispered against her flesh Cascara was looking at something behind Tory and she winked at it.

Tory spun around to see what it was that her dead eyes where taking in and he saw what she saw. It was her plastic cat clock with the tail that was supposed to move from side to side.

It was 8:25pm.

The Police collected dozens and dozens of statement that seemed to tie Tory to Cascara’s murder. After all, he had spent the past 16 years telling anyone who’d listen he wished Cascara was dead. “ He was preoccupied with Cascara,” a neighbor said “ he couldn’t stop talking about her and how much he hated her guts and he wouldn’t shut up about her being a witch.”

There was a trial and his Father died from a heart attack right before the verdict was read. Tory hadn’t his seen or spoken to his Father since the night he was arrested for Cascara’s murder. He hadn’t seen his Mother either, he hadn’t for years.

So in the end all he really had was Cascara.



Tory is waiting in the pale green room with the stainless steel table bolted to the floor and he’s eating his last meal (cheese pizza and Buffalo wings) and sitting across from him is Cascara Pomeroy.

It’s 11:30pm and the executioner is at the door Tory stands up as the door swings open and Cascara leaps to her feet and she looks back at the clock and smirks. Tory watches the clock flip back minute by minute until it reads 8:25.

Tory looks down into his plate and back up at Cascara and she starts to laugh her dark silent laugh and it descends and echoes forever into an eternal night.