 
Train Ride

(and other chilling tales)

Pen

©2014

Smashwords Edition

©2000-2013 by Pen

All Rights Reserved

All intellectual property herein is protected by Copyright Law. Any distribution, use or plagiarism is subject to prosecution.

ISBN: 9781310685736

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

Thank you for downloading this ebook. This book remains the copyrighted property of the author, and may not be redistributed to others for commercial or non-commercial purposes. If you enjoyed this book, please encourage your friends to download their own copy from their favorite authorized retailer. Thank you for your support.

This work is cat-approved.

For my beloved Clairee

I miss you more each day

Table of Contents

Train Ride

Fear

What do They Call Us?

Ghost in the Garden

Extra Storage

Ravings

Snow

Summer Storm

It Takes One to Know One

Ghosts

Alien Rights, Indeed

Rough Night

About the Author

From the Author

Train Ride

Cheryl Rainesford glanced at the clock on the wall as she wiped down another table tucking the dollar tip into the pocket of her apron as she did so.

"Fifteen minutes to go, kiddo," Julia said. The redhead leaned idly on the counter before the cash register.

Cheryl grinned. "Being transparent again, am I?"

Julia shrugged and popped the gum in her mouth. "If I'd been here since seven o'clock last night, I'd be checkin' that clock every two minutes, too."

Cheryl stepped through the swinging doorway that led behind the counter and placed the damp towel beside the sink before emptying her apron pocket of bills and change.

"Ready to change out?" Julia asked as she hit the NO SALE button and the register drawer flew open.

Cheryl quickly counted out her handful of bills and change: $22 in tips.

"Not bad for a weeknight," Julia commented as she exchanged the ones and change for a twenty.

"It'll put some gas in the tank."

Cheryl caught a glimpse of herself in the chrome of the dessert refrigerator. There wasn't much to look at as far as Cheryl was concerned. She wasn't pretty, she wasn't ugly. "Pretty plain" was how Cheryl described herself. Her hair was the color of a field mouse and her facial features followed suit: two milk chocolate brown eyes set too closely together separated by her elongated nose.

"It's those lips, honey," Julia said.

"What?"

"You know what I'm talkin' about. No lipstick but those lips look like strawberries puréed in whipped cream."

"Yeah, they're my finest asset," Cheryl said as she wiped down the counter.

"They're enough to get you tipped decent. And you know what I always say."

Cheryl stated the slogan with Julia, "Use whatever you got to get a tip."

They both laughed and Julia waved her hand. "Especially here. Happy Joe's OneStop Quik Shop isn't exactly on the main thoroughfare."

Cheryl shrugged. "No, but it is close enough to Interstate 75 to bring in some travelers."

"Mmm," Julia grunted. She allowed a beat or two of silence to lull before asking, "Think your mother will still be awake when you get home?"

"I'm sure she will," Cheryl sighed.

"Guess she's afraid something'll happen to ya."

"Sure," Cheryl said brightly. "If something were to happen to me she'd have to take care of herself, wouldn't she?"

"I'm sorry, Cheryl."

"No, no. That's okay, Julia."

"You know, your mother's not an invalid. She could take care of herself if she had to."

"My mother has always had someone to take care of her. First her parents. Then her husband. And now me. That's why she had me."

"Now you don't know that, Cheryl. Besides, what are you going to do when you don't have your mother to take care of anymore?"

"Celebrate." Cheryl immediately regretted the word. "I don't mean that literally."

"Oh, I know that. But you shouldn't have to wait for your mother to die for you to have a life, Cheryl. You've already waited, what? Ten years? You should think about moving down to Atlanta, going to school."

"Oh, I think about it, all right," Cheryl sighed. "But then I think about my mom, all alone in that house, no one to call, no one to come around." She shook her head. "I just can't, Julia. I don't have the kind of heart it takes to leave my mother alone like that. My dreams don't matter. They've all evaporated. Right along with the coffee sitting on those back burners." She smiled and nodded her head to an almost empty coffee pot behind the counter.

Julia followed Cheryl's nod. She looked back at the young woman standing before her; a young woman whose eyes were tired, tired beyond tired. Julia realized that she couldn't remember a time when Cheryl's eyes weren't tired. "Guess I'd better fix some fresh coffee, huh?"

***

Cheryl rolled down the window and allowed the cool autumn air to flood the car. It was a pleasant night; the air was just brisk enough to whisk away the cobwebs and dust of her thinking. The moon was full and its light cast an eerie glow inside the lone car on Gloucester Road.

Underneath the briskness of the autumn air, Cheryl smelled the sawdust from the lumber mill beside the railroad tracks. This odor was mixed with the faint smell of oil and grease that permeated from the machine-truck repair shop beside the lumber mill. It wasn't a wholly unpleasant odor and not one to which Cheryl gave conscious thought. It was an odor she had grown up with.

The headlights of the Ford Escort reflected off the crossbars as Cheryl rounded the curve. Moonlight gleamed off the steel of the tracks in the road, reflected off the road like silver glitter from a Christmas ornament. Splinters of glass twinkled along the sides of the road in the sidesplash of her headlights.

Cheryl stopped before crossing the tracks. Three-fifteen in the morning, the crossbars up and no one around but Cheryl stopped and looked and listened.

The green light was on down the tracks. Cheryl gunned her little Escort onto the tracks. She wasn't sure if the green light meant a train was coming or not.

Whatever insecurities Cheryl had about the green light, those insecurities were not shared by her car. It stopped dead in the middle of the tracks. She stared, wide-eyed at the car. It didn't sputter or choke. It simply stopped.

Cheryl shook her head. "C'mon, old Bess," she muttered. "I know you can do it." She tried the ignition, switching it calmly at first, then more severely. The only sound was the jangling of keys against each other on Cheryl's Mickey Mouse key ring.

Cheryl sighed. "Okay. I know I've been putting off a tune-up. But if you'll just start for me, I promise, I'll get you one this weekend. Please?" She tried the ignition again.

When the warning bells clanged she thought it was her car. She listened for a moment, unable to believe such a sound could come from her little Escort. As she watched the crossbar lower in front of her, she felt the harsh realization of what was happening become an adrenaline rush of fear.

The reflection of the red warning lights on her car hood set Cheryl into motion. She floored the gas and turned the ignition. "C'mon," she breathed through clenched teeth. "You can do it." Cheryl felt panic rising within her; a tingling sensation in her lower abdomen that crawled down and between her legs. She thought she was going to pee.

She pumped the gas pedal and flipped the switch continuously. "C'mon! C'mon, give it to me! Give it to me, damn you!" The little car had nothing to give.

The light hit her. Cheryl snapped her head to the right and was paralyzed; a small helpless animal trapped in the lights of an oncoming car. The oncoming light illuminated Cheryl's pale, oval face, the interior of the car; it glistened on the tracks that lay before it.

Cheryl snapped herself out of her frozen state. She grappled for the hook of the seatbelt, hot, sweaty palms slipping and sliding over the cold metal of the hook. She felt the vibrations of the oncoming train, heard the clickety-click-click-clickety of the wheels on the track and she couldn't find the release button.

"Dammit! Damn these seatbelts! Dammit! Dammit! Dammit!" Cheryl's heart sledge-hammered so loud and hard within her ears she couldn't hear herself cursing the one object that could make the difference between life and death.

Cheryl was panting now, alternately crying and screaming. Without thinking, she tried the ignition before looking to see the light almost upon her and to hear the long low drone of the train's whistle.

With that glimpse into the light, Cheryl resigned herself to the inevitable. She inhaled deeply and raised her hands to shield her eyes from the impact.

There was no impact. No crunch of steel and flying glass as the train went through her as if she weren't there. Cheryl was suspended with her head thrown back, hands up, lungs filled with air ready to scream, eyes and mouth wide open.

Cheryl Rainesford felt a cold rush of air as the engine of the train passed through her. She felt she was dreaming or watching a movie in slow motion where she couldn't move. She felt the vibration of the train's wheels on the track. She heard the clickety-click-click-clickety rattle of the wheels rolling beneath her.

She saw the conductor - a skeleton in a pair of denim coveralls, a red plaid kerchief around his bony neck, a conductor's cap atop his skull. He was shoveling coal into the fire-bin. When he saw Cheryl going by, he kindly stood and tipped his hat to her revealing straggles of wispy white hair and long, grimy fingernails extending from the bones of his fingers. Cheryl saw the conductor-skeleton bend over and resume stoking the fire. She felt the acrid taste of burning coal on the back of her throat.

In the dining car, skeleton waiters in black pants, white starched shirts, and black bow ties served skeletons seated at tables. Each patron was dressed differently, but all had straggles of wispy white hair and long grimy fingernails.

As each table passed by Cheryl, the seated skeletons slowly turned their heads toward her. Some nodded in her direction, their empty sockets seeming to actually see her, their teeth locked into an eternal grin. Some raised their bony hands in a wave and some pointed to her, looked at their companions and threw their skulls back in mock laughter.

The clink of china cups, the mixture of voices in intermingled conversations, even the sounds of mock laughter all reached Cheryl's ears; muffled, sounds coming from a coffin six feet under hard blackened earth. Those sounds, coupled with the aromas of coffee, after-dinner cigars and brandy, followed Cheryl as the dining car gave way to the sleeper cars.

Most of the occupants in those sleeper cars were wrapped in their bedsheets resembling, to Cheryl's horrified eyes, death shrouds.

One skeleton was propped up on its pillows, its hollow sockets focused on an open, yellowed newspaper.

One skeleton was seated on the john.

One skeleton lay upon a bed, its legs bent at the knees. Between those legs was another skeleton. Their pelvic bones thrust against each other, clicking in rhythm with the clicking of the train wheels. They turned their eyeless sockets to Cheryl, their lurid grins mocking the grotesque rendition of the human sexual act.

Cheryl longed desperately to vent the pent-up scream locked within her lungs.

She tasted the smell of cow dung. She wanted to close her glued-open eyelids.

The teeth of the cow skeleton munched aimlessly on the dried hay in its cargo car. Its empty sockets looked Cheryl's way. A cat skeleton gnawed its bony paw in a corner.

A hobo sat against the far wall; tattered jeans and plaid shirt billowed about its slender frame. Its bony knee was propped up with a bony arm cast across it. A yellowed, hand-rolled cigarette dangled from its tobacco-stained teeth.

Its eyeless sockets turned to Cheryl. "Got a light?" it said, its voice as old and raspy as the white wisps of hair on its skull. As the car with the hobo pulled away, Cheryl heard the hobo laughing.

The red caboose with its lone occupant rumbled through Cheryl. The skeleton waved as it passed by Cheryl.

With the passing of the caboose, Cheryl was thrown forward in her seat and the air was pushed from her lungs so all she uttered was a small cry. Whatever force had gripped her was done with her and had cast her aside like litter.

Cheryl's forehead was covered with a thin sheen of cold sweat. Her blouse and work smock were soaked with her own perspiration. She held her pale and shaking hands in front of her face. Beads of sweat stood out on the palms.

Cheryl looked down both sides of the track. Nothing was there. Not even the green light down the tracks was on.

The clanging of the warning bells stopped and the crossbars lifted.

Cheryl sat in shock, gasping for breath.

When the car started of its own volition, Cheryl screamed.

***

Cheryl glanced at the clock on the wall. Ten minutes to go.

As she returned her attention to the table she was wiping down, her hand brushed against a water glass sitting there, filled with water and a few ice chips. Cheryl watched as the glass tipped over.

Julia caught the falling glass in her hand. Water and one or two ice chips escaped the glass.

"Honey, are you okay?" Julia asked. She replaced the glass onto the table. "You've had a case of the dropsies ever since I came on shift."

"I'm okay. Really." Cheryl didn't sound convincing, even to herself. "I think I may have a cold or the flu coming on. I've been kind of fog-headed all night."

"Maybe you should drink some orange juice." Julia walked through the swinging doorway behind the counter. "I'll get you some."

Cheryl didn't protest. It was best not to say much.

"Here ya go, hon." Julia stood holding the glass to a Cheryl whose eyes were someplace else. "Hey, Cheryl?"

Cheryl snapped out of that place and looked at the glass of orange juice. "Drink this, honey." Julia's voice was compelling. "Maybe it'll make you feel better."

Cheryl gulped down the orange juice, its bitter taste coating her tongue and throat. She handed the glass back to Julia. "Thanks."

Julia noticed Cheryl's eyes. They didn't have their customary tired look. There were many things Julia saw in those eyes, but it wasn't that bone-tired weariness she was accustomed to. Maybe Cheryl was coming down with something.

Julia placed the glass onto the countertop and looked at Cheryl. "Maybe you should go on home. You look a little pale."

"Do I?" Cheryl was barely conscious of her surroundings. She could think of nothing except the train. The train. The train.

"Yeah. Go on home. Stop by the store and get yourself a gallon of orange juice and drink as much of it as you can before you go to bed. Then put an extra blanket or two on the bed, bundle up underneath all that cover and sweat it out."

Cheryl smiled to herself. Sweat it out. Wasn't that what she had been doing all these years waiting for her mother to die?

Cheryl shivered from the chill the thought sent down her spine.

Julia saw that shiver. "That does it. If you don't leave right now, I'm going to personally drive you home."

That thought was as frightening as it was ludicrous to Cheryl. If Julia drove her home, she just might miss her train.

***

Cheryl gunned the little Escort down Gloucester Road. The autumn air was brisk, the moon illuminated everything in its path, the odors of sawdust and oil lingered in the air. Cheryl's mind raced clickety-click. It had been real. Of that fact, she was certain.

The headlights of the Escort reflected off the crossbars and the moonlight gleamed on the steel of the tracks in the pavement. Cheryl stopped at the crossbar and looked both ways. The green light was on down the track.

She maneuvered the car onto the center of the railroad tracks. She put the car in PARK and turned off the ignition.

And she waited.
Fear

fear

covers these streets

like a blanket

on a cold winter's night,

walks these streets

in black cape

avoids the light;

stalks its prey

by light of day;

no immunity to this

ancient predator

no question that

it lives among us

the oldest of us all.

We cope.

We hope.

We cannot will it away.

Both friend and foe

we accept it.

What Do They Call Us?

Lisa immersed her hands in the hot dishwater. Perspiration plastered her dark hair to her forehead and against the back of her neck. The sports bra she wore clung to her small breasts and was soaked with sweat beneath her arms and where it clung to her cleavage.

She looked out the kitchen window. The setting sun was a red ball of fire three-quarters above the treetops. She opened the window with one dripping hand. Not a single leaf stirred, not a whisper of air entered the cramped kitchen to offer respite from the summer heat.

Lisa closed her eyes against the inferno on the horizon. Green and yellow images danced across her field of vision; prisoners behind her eyelids.

Were these afterimages? Or premonitions?

"Roger! Can you take a look at the air conditioner?"

Roger's voice, muffled as from a distance, answered, "Later!"

Lisa sighed. She had tried every trick she could think of to pry him away from the television set.

A single bead of sweat popped out on the nape of her neck. It trickled down her back following her spinal column. Goosebumps skittered along her flesh. She opened her eyes and shuddered despite the ninety-eight degree heat.

Lisa began washing the supper dishes as Jennifer skipped into the kitchen. Blond ponytails trailed down the back of the lithe nine year old. Stephanie, gangly and dark-haired as her mother, lumbered in behind her younger sister.

"Isn't it great, Mom?" Jennifer asked. She opened the refrigerator door and peered in.

"It's boring," Stephanie said. She reached around her sister for a soda.

"It is not boring! It's exciting." Jennifer took three sodas from the refrigerator.

"Exciting is hardly the word I would use to describe it. What are you doing?" Lisa eyed the three sodas Jennifer balanced in her hands. "I thought your father wouldn't allow you to leave the tv."

"Daddy and Mark wanted something to drink and Mark refused to move." Jennifer hummed the "Star Wars" theme under her breath as she left the kitchen.

"Kids," Stephanie muttered. She stood beside her mother and peered into the dishwater. "Can I help with the dishes?"

Lisa laughed softly. "Whaddya mean, 'kids'? It wasn't that long ago you were a kid yourself."

"Mom," Stephanie moaned. "I'm thirteen." She placed her soda onto the counter and wrinkled her nose. The scent of cooked spaghetti lingered in the kitchen. Spaghetti sauce glued dishes and pots and pans together.

"You know how your father is, Steph. If you don't watch, he'll rib you about it for months."

Stephanie took a dish from the clear rinse water and placed it onto the drainboard. "Won't he rib you?"

Lisa shrugged. "I'm used to it."

"I could get used to it, too, Mom. I'd rather be in here than in there."

"Stephanie!" Lisa's voice came out sharper than she intended. She was acutely aware that Stephanie stepped back. Lisa regained her self-control.

"Stephanie, I'm sorry. I know you'd rather be in your room looking at your teen magazines, drooling over Leonardo DiCaprio or whatever hunk is in vogue this week." This remark elicited at least a smile. "But the truth of the matter is that if you don't watch the broadcast, your father will accuse me of keeping you from it. He'll just make me miserable later. You know that, don't you?"

"Yeah. I know." Stephanie knew her mother's words to be true. Her father's ribbing, albeit playful in his eyes, was oftentimes cruel and downright unmerciful. "Okay, Mom." There was still hurt there but Lisa was half-forgiven.

Only half-forgiven as Stephanie left the door open between the kitchen and the den. Without trying, Lisa heard every word of the broadcast.

"For years, man has scanned the skies for evidence of alien life forms; proof that we are not alone in the universe. SETI — the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence Institute — must have been asleep at the wheel yesterday because it was amateur radio operator Juarez Domingo of Mexico who received an unknown signal on his radio satellite dish. Mexican officials immediately contacted SETI which then picked up the signal. Amazingly enough, the signal was sent in Morse Code."

Roger had arrived home only an hour after leaving for work that morning. The story had broken on the six a.m. news. By 6:10 a.m., it was proclaimed a national — virtually worldwide — holiday. Little had changed since the initial broadcast.

"We know they live on a planet called Serophades in a system several hundred light years away. Due to their advanced technology, we receive their signal at virtually the same time it is being sent. These aliens require organic food, oxygen and water just as we do. They have monitored us here on Earth for some time which explains their knowledge of our language and the use of Morse Code."

Goosebumps skittered along Lisa's flesh without the bead of sweat.

"I wonder what they look like," Jennifer mused.

"I hope they look like E.T.," Mark said.

Roger barely contained his own exuberance. "It's doubtful they look anything like E.T., Mark. E.T. was a fictional character in a movie. This is the real thing! We've actually made contact with aliens from another planet."

"Will we ever get to see them?" Jennifer was caught in the wake of her father's enthusiasm.

As though the anchorman on the television heard Jennifer's question, he said, "The only questions remaining are: now that contact with an alien life form has been made, what comes next? Will they visit planet Earth? Will we, somehow, be able to visit their world one day? Top officials from around the world are meeting at this very moment to discuss the endless possibilities."

"Dad? I have a question."

"What is it, Stephanie?"

Lisa cocked her head to one side to better hear Stephanie's question. "We call them 'aliens.' What do they call us, Dad?"

In the utter silence that followed — even the television set was quieted for a moment; muted, no doubt, for a commercial break — Lisa felt suspended in time, pondering the question itself as was everyone else in the den.

Lisa muttered under her breath, "Hopefully, they're not calling us 'dinner'."

Once again she shuddered from the cold chills up and down her spine. She placed the pan she held in mid-air during the question onto the drainboard.

Lisa looked through the kitchen window into the blood red of the setting sun, now merely a tip of a paintbrush above the trees. It painted surrounding clouds with rose and purple hues. She closed her eyes again.

The broadcast was back. Above the chattering voices in the den, Lisa heard the anchorman say, "Just think, ladies and gentlemen. From this day forward we live in a world where we know we are not alone in the universe. Someone else is out there."

Lisa opened her eyes. "And let them stay out there," she muttered as she placed the last dish into the drainboard.

Lisa gazed into the sky as the last rose of the setting sun faded to leave the clouds purple and ominous; the color of old bruises.

"Oh, God," she said. "Please don't let them come here."

***

The suns barely peered above the tops of the mooyal trees. The mooyal trees were admirable, particularly at this time of day with both suns casting rays through the large five-pronged leaves. Tall and sturdy, there was not a part of the mooyal tree which was not put to good use. The bark of the mooyal tree, thick and leathery, was a staple food. When broiled, it became sweet and tangy, producing its own syrup. The leaves of the mooyal tree were tough enough to use for writing messages and thatching the roofs of huts, yet soft and supple enough to use as placemats or napkins or even window coverings along with a variety of other daily tasks. When stripped of its bark, the white wood within the mooyal tree constructed sturdy huts; fine shelters from the hot morning sun and the Haunted Winds which occasionally blew in from the valley.

The morning sun would quickly make its way across the sky, baking the ground in the few short hot hours of its existence. The evening sun, farther away from the planet, followed the path of her sister, cooling the baked ground along the way. The evening sun would linger its way across the sky until it caught up with the morning sun awaiting its arrival just above the horizon opposite that from whence their rotations began. Once they were parallel to one another, they would then set together to rise together on the morrow.

How wise we are to control the rotations of the suns, Loült thought.

Loült sighed. Try as he might, he could not distract himself long enough from the news on the wallscreen to suit his pleasure. He turned his attention to the business at hand.

On the countertop was placed the dishware from the morning meal. Clay plates, cups and pans and ivory utensils were all placed on a rectangular silver pan with raised edges. From beside this silver pan, Loült picked up a small silver cylinder, roughly four inches long by about a quarter-inch in diameter. He pointed this object at the clay dishware and pressed a button on the end of the cylinder. From the tip of the object came a thin blue beam. In an instant, one of the plates, along with the leftover food particles on it, was a pile of dust. Soon the silver pan contained nothing but dust from the dishware. Loült replaced the disintegrator onto the countertop. He then placed the powder into a large rectangular floor unit through a tiny-holed grate in the top.

"May I help you with the dishware, Caj-caj?"

Loült looked down at his youngest child, Dolarn. Loült tried to smile at him.

"I would love nothing more than to teach you to do the dishware, Dolarn. After all, it will be your chore someday, being the male of the family. But your mother wishes for you and your sisters to watch the wallscreen."

Dolarn's eyes matched his father's in their color of violet; the sadness in them a direct reflection of his father's eyes. "May I at least switch on the processing unit? I know how to do that, Caj-caj."

"Very well. But be quick about it so that you may return to the wallscreen. I do not wish any part of Koloptua's wrath this day."

"Koloptua's wrath, indeed." Taller than Loült's five feet seven inches, Koloptua struck an imposing figure in the doorway.

Heart pounding in his ears, Loült bowed slightly to her. "Forgive me if I have offended, dear one."

Koloptua waved a tentacled, three-fingered hand. "Nonsense. I am more amused by your apprehension than I am angered by it today."

"It was my fault, Mamon," Dolarn said. "I am bored by the wallscreen and asked if I might help with the dishware."

Koloptua smiled at her offspring. "I admire your shoonka, your honesty, little one. But it is important that you are aware of what is happening. Just as it is important that your sister, Priedt and Ekka are aware. Now switch on the processing unit for Caj-caj and return to the wallscreen."

Dolarn placed one of his tentacled digits onto a small square pad atop the processing unit. The square pad began to glow a soft amber hue, then dissolved into a deep red. The processing unit issued a soft hum and white-blue glow. Inside the unit, clay particles and food particles were already separating. The food particles would be flushed from the unit and would join a larger processing system. This larger system would process the leftover food particles into fertilizer for fields of vegetables. By the evening meal, the dishware would be clean, sanitary and whole, ready for use again.

"Loült, you, too, must come and watch the wallscreen."

With a slight tilt of his head, Loült said, "I do not understand why it is so important for me to keep up with current events. I have no say in these matters."

"Nooshka!" Electricity flashed behind the violet eyes of Koloptua. "What happens now affects us all. We must help this primitive alien species." The storm in Koloptua's eyes passed. "Finish in here and join us at the wallscreen."

Inwardly, Loült breathed a sigh of relief. He had tested the ire of Koloptua and received only a gentle reprimand.

He did not test the ire of Koloptua often and with good reason.

In the viewing area, the wallscreen cast a yellow glow to the room and its occupants. Loült did not wish to be here. He was not interested in the aliens. He needed only to be interested in them to have compassion for them. And compassion for them was something he could ill afford.

But he caught Koloptua's watchful eyes and remained in the viewing area.

"What does it say?" Dolarn asked.

Ekka read the message for him. "It says, 'At long last we have contacted the aliens we have monitored. They are a somewhat primitive species, subject to war, violence, famine and hate. We were correct in using Morse Code to contact them.

"The 'humans' as they call themselves, are only too ecstatic to learn of our existence. They are eager to communicate with us and to learn more about us. And we are only too eager to learn more about them'."

"How do you know what it says?" Dolarn asked.

"I can read it, Dolarn. See, you begin in the lower right hand corner, reading up. Then you read across and down, across and up, across and down, until you come to the middle where the message ends."

Dolarn pouted. "I'm never going to learn how to read."

"Oh, you will learn, Dolarn. Someday," Koloptua assured him.

Ekka turned her attention to Koloptua. "What do they look like, Mamon?" she asked. She and Priedt looked to their mother for answers. Dolarn occupied himself with his pet miptoo.

Another message scrolled across the wallscreen, repeated several times: "All Tasheedas are to convene immediately for the purpose of determining how next to proceed with the aliens."

Koloptua rose from her chair.

"Please, Mamon," Ekka pleaded. "As a Tasheeda of the Supreme Council, you are one of the few Serophids to have seen these aliens on the monitoring screen."

Koloptua looked fondly at her two young females. Ekka, at fourteen mecs would be old enough to reproduce soon. Priedt at twelve mecs gave her older sibling stern competition when it came to beauty and intelligence. Dolarn at eight mecs could not be expected to take an interest in the world around him. Not that it would matter. Like other males on Serophades, Dolarn was destined for a life of domesticity.

Koloptua shook her head. "I am not supposed to speak of what I know."

"We understand that, Mamon," Priedt pleaded. "But Ekka and I will serve Supreme Council one day. Should we not know about these things?"

Koloptua laughed. "It is impossible to argue with such logical reasoning, Priedt. Very well." Koloptua returned to her chair. "I will tell you but a little, then I must go. One must not keep Council waiting.

"The skin of this alien species is soft and smooth, not leathery and tough as ours is. We know their skin is thinner. They have only one sun and do not need the extra protection."

"How do we know what kind of skin they have?" Ekka asked.

A look passed between Koloptua and Loült. "Never you mind that. We just know." Koloptua looked back at her offspring. "They have two eyes, as do we, two ears, as do we. Their eyes are different colors: brown, blue and green mostly. Their heads are round, as are ours, but the tops of their heads are covered with hair instead of hairless, as are we. Their noses protrude from their faces instead of recessing inward as do ours. Their ears are a different shape. The biggest difference is that they have five fingers where we have only three and this species has no tentacles."

Ekka shifted her position. "The message said they are a primitive species, Tropki. How can they be so primitive and survive?"

"This is a good question, Ekka. And one for which I have no answer at this time. But isn't it amazing they have survived?"

Once again, Ekka shifted her position. She did this when nervous. "Now that we have made contact with them, Mamon, and they know we are here, what happens next?"

Koloptua looked out the uncovered window of the hut where the morning sun shone brightly. Shimmers of heat waved up from the baking ground. "Now we must try and help them."

"Help them how?" Priedt asked.

Koloptua returned her attention to her offspring. "Oh, there are all sorts of things we can help them with. We can teach them quantum physics, which will enable them to make extensive space travel as we have done in the past. We can help them to end hunger and poverty, hatred and violence. We could be most beneficial to them." Koloptua glanced out the window once more. "But I must go now. We will talk more later."

Loült followed Koloptua to the door. Quietly, so the offspring would not hear, he asked, "Must we do something about these aliens?"

Koloptua whispered, "What do you mean?"

Loült shifted from one foot to the other. "Maybe they are better off without us."

Koloptua's eyes narrowed into this slits in her face; a warning sign.

"Nooshka! It is our purpose to help others. And they desperately need our help. We must determine a course of action."

"But what if they do not want our assistance?"

Zbat! Electricity, white-blue from Koloptua's ire, shot from her eyes to tap Loült's shoulder. Loült cried out more in surprise than in pain and grasped his stinging shoulder. He looked up at Koloptua towering over him.

"They will have our assistance."

Loült had no choice but to agree. Male Serophidians had no defense against the ire of the females. Likewise, there was no retaliation.

In Koloptua's wake, Loült found himself afraid. Not of Koloptua. He was accustomed to the storms in her eyes and the occasional zbatting.

But he was afraid. He was afraid that, not only was there no hope for this alien species; he was afraid there was no hope for any of them.

"Oh, Moptöömbîka*," he muttered, "please do not let them come here."

Ghost in the Garden

A ghost lurks in the garden,

that overgrown patch of weeds

where once vegetables grew.

I feel cold eyes upon me

each time I peer at those bushes;

sense the presence of some brute force

not of this world.

A malevolent intent?

I dare not question.

I do not think about the ghost at all

except to know that it is there

As aware of me

as I am aware of it.

Extra Storage

Amy slid the key into the lock and turned it.

She needn't have bothered. The door was already unlocked.

She should have known. After all, the black Mercedes was parked right outside the front door.

"Mum!" Amy called as she stepped inside the door. "I'm home!"

"Amelia!" Her mother's voice trailed down the hallway from Amy's room. She called the girl's name again, her voice preceding her up the hallway. "Amelia, darling! You're looking so well!" she said as the two women kissed the air beside one another's cheeks.

"Of course I am!" Amy said brightly, waving an envelope she'd pulled from the stack in her hand in the air. "The gallery sent another check!"

"Wonderful!" Mum cooed clapping her hands.

Amy stepped back and gazed at her mother. She sported an old pair of blue jeans and a grungy sweatshirt; something she would never wear in public. She had tied a rag around her head to keep her platinum blond hair from falling into her face even though a few wisps of it had escaped. If that weren't enough of a clue, there were those hideous yellow rubber gloves on her hands.

"Mum," Amy said, "are you cleaning again?"

"Well, of course, darling! I always know when your flat needs cleaning!"

Mum was from jolly old England. Though she'd been an American citizen for the better part of thirty years, she'd never lost the accent, still had afternoon tea complete with scones, of course, and continued to use quaint colloquialisms such as 'flat' instead of apartment.

"You know you don't have to do that, Mum," Amy chastised.

"Oh, I know that," Mum said, dusting off the coffee table. "But I want to do something for you and this is the only thing you'll allow me to do."

"That's because you do it without asking," Amy said without malice. She tossed the remaining stack of mail onto the freshly dusted coffee table.

Mum winced and grabbed up the mail. "You really should have a place for this, Amelia."

"I do," Amelia laughed. "Right there."

"Oh, bother," mum said as she walked into the kitchen to drop the mail onto the counter with a loud plop. "I really wish you would let me help you reorganize the place."

"But I like my place the way it is, Mum."

"You know your father and I would be more than happy to help you find a better place to live."

"I know that, Mum," Amy said with affection. "But you know I want to succeed on my own. Besides, I like my little flat, thank you very much."

"I understand you're wanting to succeed on your own and it's admirable. Truly it is. It's just such a small place, darling."

"But it's big enough for all of my needs, Mum."

"Well, maybe with the extra storage you'll be able to spread out a little more. Maybe even make it into an art studio -"

"Extra storage," Amy repeated. "What extra storage, Mum?"

Mum raised her eyebrows. "You didn't know you have extra storage, darling?"

Amy shook her head.

"Come. Let me show you."

The kitchen and living room area were side by side and of equal length, though the kitchen was not as wide as the living room. Amy had divided the living room into half. On the one side were the sofa, coffee table, and chairs. One chair had been placed into a corner as though in a time-out though not flush with the corner walls. Amy had once had a cat who had insisted upon sharpening her claws on the back of this one chair and Amy sat it there so the sagging, scratched back wasn't evident.

The other side of the living room Amy had set up as her art studio. Various lamps stood in one corner and these Amy used to light her subjects for portraits or still life paintings. The easel stood in the center of the space with a stood before it and another tall free-standing lamp to the right of it which Amy used to light her easel while painting. Also to the right of the stool was a table which held Amy's acrylic paints, paint brushes, several paint-crusted towels and a few empty cups.

The relatively short hallway which led to Amy's bedroom had a bathroom on the left and a linen closet on the right.

The bedroom was what Amy had really liked about the apartment. Its width was the entire width of the apartment making it a rather large room. Being the last apartment in a line of such apartments, it was also slightly longer than the rest.

The bedroom itself allowed for plenty of space for Amy's meager belongings: a queen-size bed and night table, bureau, chest of drawers and an exercise bike, yet it still allowed plenty of room for Amy to store even more of her paintings.

But the best feature of the bedroom was the large walk-in closet space.

It took up a little over one-third of the bedroom, but Amy didn't mind. Two sets of fold-out doors revealed a very large and organized closet.

On the far left Amy had hung her coats and sweaters. Beside the hanging bar was a stack of shelves for shoes. Only a few of those shelves were dedicated to tennis shoes (two pair), a pair of boots, a pair of sandals, a pair of flip-flops and a pair of fuzzy black bedroom shoes. The remainder of the shelves held a few belts but the rest were empty.

On the far right hung the rest of Amy's clothes: jeans, t-shirts, a few dress slacks and nice blouses and a few blazers. This side also had shelves but these were completely empty.

The center of the closet recessed inward. Mum had dubbed this space the "staging area" because it reminded her of the dressing rooms in the back of the theater where she had been acting in a play at the time she had met Amy's father in London on business.

To the left was a large lighted mirror with counter space and drawers to hold make up and accessories. To the right was a full-length mirror and, beside that, yet another area, though much smaller, in which to hang clothing.

Usually this space was empty.

Today, it was not.

In the space there hung three wedding dresses. Three very old wedding dresses.

"Uh, Mum? Where did these come from?" Amy asked, eyeing the dresses warily.

"Well, they were in the extra storage, darling."

"What extra -?" Amy stopped. She had turned as she spoke and there her mother stood, pointing at a door that had never been there before.

At least, not that Amy had noticed in the four years she had lived there since graduating from Georgia State with a major in Art History.

Amy quickly scanned her memory but found no recollection of noticing a door at the back of the staging area tucked between the small closet space and the lighted mirror. Nor could she call to mind any mention of an extra storage space at the time she viewed the apartment or signed the lease. Nor was there any mention of additional space at any of the subsequent lease renewals.

Yet, there it stood, open about a foot, her mother standing at it, a look of triumph on her face.

"You didn't know this was here, Amelia?" Amy shrugged and gave her mother a goofy look. Mum laughed. "Oh, love. You really should spend less time up inside your own head."

Amy chuckled nervously and walked over to get a closer look at this mysterious door.

She pushed on it, but it moved no further inward.

"Something's blocking it," Mum said.

"Then how -?" Amy asked, pointing to the dresses behind her.

"Oh, see?" Mum pointed to the left inside the door.

Just inside the door stood one end of a portable metal clothing rack. It was the only thing the light from the staging area illuminated.

"Mum, why did you take these dresses out?"

"Well, darling, I thought maybe I could squeeze my way in and see what all is in there. But it seems to be packed tighter than a drum in there."

Amy looked her mother's svelte frame up and down. "Mum, I don't think even you could squeeze through that opening."

Mum laughed softly. "Well, of course not! I took the dresses off the rack so they wouldn't get damaged but the bloody rack won't budge! Besides, did you see those dresses? They must be antique!"

Mum bristled past Amy who rolled her eyes. Her unattachment was always a point of debate between her mother and herself. Amy wouldn't doubt it for a moment if displaying the wedding dresses in the staging area was not a subliminal reminder of Amy's singleness.

"Just take a look at these, Amelia!"

Amy winced inwardly and, before going to stand beside her mother, she pulled the door firmly shut.

"They were probably stark white at one time," Mum said, "but they've been exposed to the air. That's why they're this dingy off-white color."

"It's a wonder they're not reduced to threads," Amy said wondrously.

Though she hated to admit it, her mother was right. The dresses were, indeed, very beautiful. They were all satin and retained their lustrous shine despite their discoloration.

One dress was covered in an intricate design of pearls along the bodice and neckline. A trail of pearls ran down along the arms. Little loops of cloth were at the end of each arm of the fabric: obviously, the loop went over one of the woman's fingers on each hand so that it was almost as though she were wearing gloves. The fabric which would cover the top of the hand also had smaller pearls in an intricate design.

Another dress was accentuated with lace all over the bodice and along the shoulders. The lace gave this gown an almost feathery, airy appearance.

The last dress was embroidered with rosebuds along the shoulder, over the bodice and along the neckline.

Though Amy was in no rush to get to any altar, the artist in her admired the painstaking craftsmanship of each dress. The fact that each dress was still intact - not one pearl missing, not one single stitch snagged despite their apparent age - was testimony to the pride, quality and integrity of the maker.

"Mum, what on earth am I going to do with these wedding dresses?"

Mum raised her eyebrows, looked at Amy. "Wellll," she said.

"Surely you don't expect me to wear one of them someday?" Amy teased.

"Oh, heavens, no!" Mum laughed. "Your dress will be brand new. You can donate these."

"To where? The Smithsonian?"

Mum shrugged. "A yard sale?"

Amy laughed. "I'll take care of it, Mum."

"Actually, maybe you could use one of them in a painting?" Mum suggested hopefully. "Say, maybe a self-portrait?"

Amy laughed outright. "Mum, self-portraits don't pay the rent."

Mum sighed, looked dejected for a moment, and then brightened. "Oh, come on, Amelia. We can figure out how to get into that room. There's no telling what treasures might be in there. We could have it cleaned out in a day -"

"No, no, Mum. Not today. Celia's coming over tomorrow for her portrait and I have to prep the canvas this afternoon."

Mum looked so disappointed that Amy felt sorry for her.

"Tell you what, Mum. Come back on Friday and we'll tackle that storage room."

***

Swishhhhhhh. Swishhhhhh. Swishhhhhhh.

The soft rustle of fabric against fabric. A mere whisper of movement.

Swishhhhhhh. Swishhhhhh. Swishhhhhhh.

Amy awoke with a start. She expected to still hear the swishing noise as though it were external rather than something she had dreamed.

But she awoke to silence. A silence weighted with waiting. As though something had just stopped and was waiting to start again.

Amy sat up in her bed, listening. There was no sound. Not even the whirring of the refrigerator. The air itself was stuffed with cotton, so thick was the silence.

Amy shook her head and roused herself out of bed. She padded her way to the bathroom, flipping on the hallway light on her way. It was enough light to illuminate the bathroom as well as light the way to the kitchen.

Amy drank cold milk right out of the jug.

Only one of the advantages of being single.

She stepped out of the kitchen, headed down the hallway back to bed, glancing into the living room on her way.

She flipped off the switch to the hallway light. Took two steps. And stopped.

She'd just taken three swallows of cold milk. And now her mouth was bone-dry.

She took a few deep breaths. Straightened her spine and convinced herself she didn't see what she thought she'd seen.

She turned the hallway light on again and back-tracked up the hallway. She cautiously looked around the wall of the living room, curving her head so she could look into her studio.

Her eyes had not betrayed her.

She stepped slowly into the living room and turned on the lamp she used when painting. It lit up the easel. And the canvas upon it.

Amy gasped; a quick intake of breath which she held.

She had prepped the canvas for Celia's portrait, painting the background in readiness for the portrait itself. Knowing Celia's dark russet-colored hair and peaches-and-cream complexion, Amy had used a pale peach for the background color and feathered it to blue around the outer edges. She had instructed Celia to wear a deep blue blouse and she'd planned on painting her friend holding a glass of deep red wine.

But that wasn't on the canvas she was looking at.

Had she been painting in her sleep? Was that where the swishing sound had come from? She'd heard of sleep-walking. But sleep-painting?

The canvas on her easel had a background of complete ebony. But the ebony background worked. The beautiful pale, blond blue-eyed woman looked radiant against the dark background.

Amy released the breath she'd been holding and approached the canvas for a closer look.

The woman's heart-shaped face was a little on the pale side, as though a bright light had shone upon her face. Deep blue eyes accentuated with crow's feet sparkled, though Amy knew the sparkling effect was the expertise of the painter.

Whoever that may be.

The full red lips stretched into a wide euphoric smile, revealing even pearl-white teeth. Her face was smooth, rounded cheeks with a pale rosy hue, accentuated by a small straight nose. Blond tresses cascaded past the woman's round shoulders and curled along the front of her chest.

There was an ethereal glow about the woman: this was obviously the happiest day of her life. But the glow gave her something of a surreal effect.

Even more surreal was the wedding dress she wore.

Each pearl was meticulously painted, white against white with small hints of shadow to accentuate each pearl. And each pearl was dotted with the most minute trace of luminescence so that it caught and reflected the light upon it.

Amy knew exactly which paint was used for that effect. It was a titanium paint but it was called pearl essence: almost a metallic paint it was created for the effect of reflecting light to give some paintings a shine wherever the paint was applied.

Amy felt an uncontrollable giggle making its way up her throat. She swallowed it back down. The last thing she wanted to do was give in to a fit of hysterics.

Heart pounding in her ears, Amy made her way down the hallway to the bedroom. She turned on the overhead light in the bedroom and opened the doors to the walk-in closet. She turned on every light within, including the lighted make-up mirror.

Amy looked at the closet space across from the make-up mirror where her mother had hung the wedding dresses.

Where she had hung three wedding dresses.

Where there now hung only two.

Though her hands trembled, Amy pushed one of the dresses back along the hanging rod to get a better look. The lace-covered dress looked just as it had when she'd first seen it.

So the dress with the embroidered rosebuds looked the same.

The dress with the pearls was gone.

Without knowing why, Amy looked at the door at the back of the closet; the door that led to the extra storage.

It was slightly ajar. Maybe an inch. Maybe a little more.

A cold chill ran the length of Amy's spine and forced her to shudder.

She held her breath as she approached the door. When she was close enough, she grabbed the doorknob, slammed the door shut and locked it.

Was it her imagination or had she seen movement through that door crack? A bone-white withered hand reaching for the door from the other side?

And how odd the door should lock on Amy's side.

Amy backed her way out of the closet, turning off lights along the way. She closed the closet doors but left the bedroom light on as she made her way back to the studio.

The painting still stood upon the easel.

Amy didn't want to touch it.

She realized now that there was no way in hell she could have painted this portrait. First of all, she didn't know the woman in the portrait, nor could she recall seeing anyone who looked like her.

Second of all, she couldn't have painted the portrait in her sleep. She'd only been asleep for about seven hours. Portraits took days, sometimes weeks, to paint, not hours.

So where had this portrait come from?

Amy looked around her studio area. Nowhere did she see the canvas she had prepped for Celia's portrait. With a sinking feeling, she suspected she knew where it was.

With trembling hands, Amy picked up a scraping knife from the table. She willed herself to hold the painting still by the upper left corner while she scraped a small amount of the black background paint.

Underneath was the pale blue Amy had painted around the outer edges of the peach background.

Amy tossed the knife onto the table and wiped the sweat from her upper lip with the back of her hand.

She could paint over the portrait with some white primer paint and reuse the canvas.

But something told her that wouldn't work. That if she simply painted over it, it would just.

Just what? Amy wondered. Return?

That thought was crazy.

But so was this portrait.

And the wedding dresses. And a storage room she didn't know she had.

Amy stood still for a moment, unable to take her wide-open eyes off the painting, trying to determine what she should do.

***

Celia knocked on the door at nine sharp.

Amy had recovered by that time, tucking the painting behind the chair in the corner and prepping another canvas for the portrait.

She had also brewed a pot of strong coffee so she wouldn't go back to sleep.

After the formalities of two friends greeting each other, Amy offered Celia a cup of coffee.

"No, no. I'm all coffee'd out," Celia said. "Besides, klutz that I am, I'd probably spill it all over the place. All over me. Just show me where you want me to change."

Amy led her to the closet where doors were wide open, all lights on.

"Wow," Celia said. "It never ceases to amaze me how much closet space you have, Amy."

"Yeah. It does come in handy," Amy said. But her attention was focused on the door at the back of the staging area. It was still shut and locked as Amy had left it only a few hours before. "You get dressed in here. Just come on into the studio when you're ready."

"Got it," Celia said.

Amy went back into the kitchen and poured herself yet another cup of coffee. She wasn't quite certain she was up for this. She had practically mainlined caffeine since she'd pulled herself together. She felt nervous and jittery, even though the caffeine wasn't completely to blame. She couldn't get her mind off the portrait. Or the closet. Or the wedding dresses.

She was hoping that doing this portrait for her friend - who was willing to pay as it was a gift for her father - might be able to take her mind off all that if only for the duration of the painting.

"Wow!" she heard Celia's voice from the studio. "Who's this?"

With trepidation, Amy turned to see Celia standing before the easel. She didn't have to see the easel to know what was on it.

Amy slowly walked into the living room but kept her distance from the easel.

Celia took a few steps back but kept her eyes on the portrait. "She's beautiful. Who is she?" she asked again.

Amy was at a loss. She didn't want to lie to her friend but wasn't sure how Celia would react when told the events Amy had undergone the night before.

"Amy?" Celia said. Her friend had gone extra pale upon seeing the portrait and this alarmed Celia. "What's wrong, Amy?"

Amy looked from the portrait to the concern on Celia's face. She began shaking her head. "I have to tell somebody."

***

They sat at Amy's breakfast nook in the kitchen, neither of them having touched their coffee.

But it was not from fear or horror that prompted Celia to lose interest in the beverage. There was a light of excitement in her eyes and on her face: a radiance that was equivalent to the look of dread upon Amy's.

"This is so exciting," Celia said her eyes almost feverish.

"Exciting isn't the word I would use," Amy said morosely.

"But don't you see?" Celia said. "You're experiencing a paranormal event."

"Well, I would much rather someone else experience it, thank you very much." She got up from the table to pour her cold coffee down the drain.

"Oh, come on, Amy!" Celia said as she got up from the table to do the same with her coffee. "Someone from the other side may be trying to tell you something."

"Or drive me crazy," Amy countered as she refilled her cup.

"Show me the room, Amy," Celia said with an exuberance which grated against Amy's nerves.

"No!" Amy said a little too sharply. "I'm sorry," she said when she saw the crushed look on her friend's face. She poured more coffee into Celia's cup. "It's just that I don't have any desire to explore that space."

"Look," Celia said, setting her coffee cup onto the counter and placing a hand on Amy's arm. "I understand that it's scary. The unknown usually is. But all my life, I've wanted to witness or experience something paranormal. And now I may have a chance to."

Amy closed her eyes and sighed deeply. It was hard to resist Celia when she had that pleading look on her face. "You won't let this go until you've seen that room, will you?"

"Probably not," Celia said brightly. "So you may as well not fight it."

Reluctantly, Amy said, "Okay. Come on."

Celia did her best to contain her excitement though she didn't do so well. She followed closely on Amy's heels as they entered the walk-in closet.

Amy stopped at the lighted make-up mirror and pointed straight ahead of her. "There's the door," she said without any enthusiasm.

Celia glanced at the door, then quickly to her right. "Oooh, these must be the wedding dresses," she cooed as she pushed them back along the rod to get a better look. "Beautiful," she muttered.

"Yeah. There are only two now."

"But there were three, right?"

"Yeah. They were hanging on a portable clothes rack just inside the door."

Celia eyed the door. "And you said the door wasn't there before?"

"I said I don't remember the door being there before," Amy said as she turned to place her coffee cup onto the make-up counter. She pulled out a drawer, took out a Scrunchie to put up her hair. She heard Celia open the door behind her. "Something's blocking it from the inside," she said. She turned. "It won't open -"

Amy felt the world tilt just a little.

Celia, smiling, her eyes bright with curiosity, stood before the wide-open door.

Amy was incapable of thought or speech.

The door stood wide open. Open upon a blackness that was empty but was not empty; a blackness whose silence screamed in Amy's ears; punctuated her heartbeat with a staccato Morse code; a blackness that Amy felt reaching for her; a blackness she heard calling for her; a blackness she knew would be bottomless were she to give herself over to it.

A black abyss: bottomless, endless, tireless.

It wasn't just the absence of light. It was the absence of life itself.

Celia reached inside the door and flipped a switch several times. "Well, there's a switch," she said, "but no light."

Amy said nothing because her throat and mouth were dry.

Celia looked at Amy. "It's okay, Amy. All we need is a light. And I know you keep a flashlight in your nightstand table."

Amy blinked and looked at her friend as though she were speaking a foreign language.

"Hey! Amy!" Celia snapped her fingers a few times. "It's just a room, Amy." Celia glanced through the doorway. "And from the looks of it, an empty room." She looked back at her friend whose face was more pale than usual. "Hey, Amy," she said more gently. "I don't think there's a boogeyman waiting in there. We'll go in and have a quick look around. Maybe we'll find something that will give us a clue about what's going on. Ya know?"

Amy forced herself to swallow. Looking wide-eyed at Celia she said, "All right," barely above a whisper. She cleared her throat and said, "But if there's anything weird in there we get the hell out. Agreed?"

"Agreed," Celia said.

***

There was nothing weird in the storage area. Unless emptiness could be considered weird.

The walls, the floor, the ceiling were all painted black. Fluorescent light fixtures hung from the ceiling though they were void of bulbs.

"See?" Celia said. "Nothing here."

"But there was something here, Celia," Amy said, her face contorted with worry. "I couldn't open the door past a portable clothes rack yesterday."

Amy and Celia walked to the center of the room until Amy stopped. She stood still and silent.

"Do you feel that?" she asked.

Celia's brow furrowed. "What?"

Amy stood perfectly still. They weren't strong. Strong enough to feel through the soles of her shoes, but not strong enough to shake her.

Still, Amy was shaking.

"Vibrations," she said, barely above a whisper. "In the floor."

Celia stood perfectly still, focusing her attention upon her feet. After a few moments, she looked at Amy. "Sorry. Don't feel anything."

Amy merely stood. She'd had some electrolysis thingy years ago when she'd sustained a back injury. Little electrical impulses had stimulated the muscles surrounding her spine, forcing them to relax in an effort to decrease the spasms that had plagued her.

The vibrations felt similar to that: little electrical impulses that traveled up through her legs and then along her spine, sending goose bumps skittering along her skin.

"Can we leave now?" Amy asked her voice small and shaky.

Celia started to protest but she saw the look on Amy's face. She couldn't remember the last time her friend's face had been so pale, or her eyes so clouded with fear.

"Okay," Celia said. "We'll go now."

Amy breathed a sigh of relief. She turned, her flashlight illuminating the far wall.

"Wait!" Celia cried out. "Shine the flashlight back over there."

In the backwash of the light, Amy saw her friend pointing to the far corner of the room. With trepidation, Amy slowly shone the light in the direction Celia was pointing.

There. In the far corner. Something small. Something shiny.

Before Amy had a chance to utter a word, Celia was across the room.

"No, don't!" Amy whispered hoarsely.

But Celia had already picked up the object. She walked back to Amy, her eyes as sparkly as the object she was holding.

"It's a ring," Celia said, barely above a whisper.

Amy was as captivated by the ring as Celia was.

A large square setting sat atop a silver band. Centered in the setting was an elongated diamond-shaped, sparkling, brilliant blue sapphire. Each of the four sides of the sapphire was surrounded by a single diamond.

"It's beautiful," Celia breathed.

"Yes, it is," Amy agreed. "No, don't!" she protested as Celia slipped the ring onto her finger.

Celia held out her hand. "Shine the light on it," she said.

Reluctantly, Amy shone the light out in front of Celia. Celia extended her arm, turned her hand this way and that, the gems capturing the light, reflecting back small, brilliant sparkles.

It made Amy queasy. It was a beautiful ring, no doubt about that. And it complimented her friend's hand quite well.

But there was something about the way the ring sparkled; almost blinding, it was. Each time one of those sparkles caught Amy's eye, a feeling of portent welled up within her: an almost precognitive sense that something was wrong.

This ring belongs to another woman. But who?

Why wouldn't the door open with her mother yesterday? But it opened wide today?

Amy looked back over her shoulder. Yes, the door still stood open.

But she had a feeling it wouldn't be open much longer.

***

Amy paced back and forth beside the breakfast nook. She had finally convinced Celia to take off the ring and place it onto a spinning lazy susan in the center of the table between the salt and pepper shakers.

Celia couldn't take her eyes off it.

I don't understand what you have against the ring," Celia whined.

"It's not that I have anything against it," Amy said. "It just makes me feel uncomfortable, that's all."

"But, why?" Celia asked as she picked up the ring. As she was about to slip it onto her finger, Amy said, "Please, don't."

Celia winced but put the ring back where she had gotten it from. "Why does the ring make you uncomfortable?"

Amy stopped her pacing and looked at Celia. "Well, let's see. We found the ring inside a room whose door wouldn't open all the way yesterday. A door I wasn't even aware existed until yesterday. And a room which was empty today. And, according to the measurements we just took, shouldn't exist at all!"

Amy resumed her nervous pacing.

After finding the ring, they had measured Amy's room on the inside, all the way from one side of the room to where the door to the storage room stood. Then they had measured Amy's room from the outside.

The measurements matched perfectly.

That suggested the room did not even exist. There was no room for the room.

Celia chuckled. "Apparently that room breaks a few laws of Quantum Physics."

Amy stopped pacing again and gave her friend a downcast look.

"Okay. Okay. I'm sorry. I'll admit there are some odd things going on. But I don't think you have anything to be afraid of."

"Oh? A portrait I didn't paint of a woman I don't know wearing a wedding dress that was in that room and has now disappeared?"

Celia opened her mouth, closed it. Opened. Closed. She finally said, "Okay, I'm at a loss to explain that, but I still don't think you have anything to be afraid of."

"Easy for you to say," Amy muttered.

***

Swishhhhhhh. Swishhhhhh. Swishhhhhhh.

Again, Amy awakened to the feeling that something had just stopped. The air was filled with the anticipation of something about to begin.

Just like the night before.

Except that Celia was here.

Celia!

Amy jumped up from her bed and ran down the hallway, turning on the light as she went.

"Celia!" she called out.

There was no answer.

Amy switched on one of the lamps in the studio. Its bright light flooded the studio and provided enough light for Amy to make her way to one of the end tables beside the sofa.

"Cel -" She stopped as she switched on the lamp on the table beside the sofa. The pillow was there. A blanket was tousled around on the sofa.

But Celia wasn't there.

She had convinced Amy to allow her to stay the night. Amy could almost see Celia pleading her final argument to stay.

She was wearing one of Amy's old Scooby-Doo t-shirts.

"Look," Celia had said, "if something happens in here," she opened her arms wide to indicate both the living room and studio areas, "I'll know about it. Keep your cell phone on the table beside your bed. If I see or hear anything, I can call you and maybe we'll both witness it."

Though Amy wasn't too thrilled about witnessing anything paranormal, she had finally relented and agreed to allow Celia to stay and sleep on the sofa. Not because Celia had made such a compelling argument, but because Amy didn't want to be alone.

And now it looked like Amy was alone again.

But Celia had to be here somewhere.

"Celia!" Amy called as she rushed into the kitchen and turned on a light.

Celia wasn't in the kitchen.

Amy whirled around and ran the few steps up the hallway to the bathroom, knowing it was empty.

She stopped one step shy of the bathroom door, her heart pounding, a cold sweat breaking out on her brow.

She'd seen something in the studio. Something she didn't want to acknowledge. Something she had to look at, but didn't want to see.

She stood in the hallway, taking deep breaths, steeling her nerves against the inevitable.

She turned and slowly walked back down the hallway, her heart thudding in her ears, a lump growing in her throat.

There. On the easel.

Another painting.

Celia was breathtaking in the wedding dress. The lace on the bodice and along the neckline was finely detailed: every stitch stood out. The background had darkened. A darker shade of peach, almost coral, but it was much more suitable for the pale wedding dress.

And there was something else.

The ring that Celia had found.

But it was not on Celia's hand.

It was on the hand of the pale blond whose painting stood against the wall of the studio.

Amy felt faint. How could any of this have happened?

Though she was filled with dread, she ran down the hallway, crying and gasping. She ran into her bedroom, turning on lights along the way.

She jerked open the sliding doors of the walk-in closet, turning on those lights as well.

There was the door at the back of the staging area. It stood ajar.

Amy walked slowly to the door, glancing to her right as she did so.

There was only one wedding dress left. The one with the embroidered rosebuds.

This knowledge chilled Amy to the marrow. She shuddered as goosebumps lined her flesh and skittered along her spine.

Amy pushed on the door. But it wouldn't open. As before, something from the inside blocked it.

In the wash of the lights, Amy could see the portable metal clothing rack standing there slightly to the left inside the door.

Quickly, she reached out and grabbed the door handle. She pulled the door shut and locked it.

***

Amy wandered her apartment, trying to figure out what to do next. She considered calling the police, what would she tell them? I think my friend is trapped in a painting? I have this room that appears not to exist and I think ghosts are living in there?

Should she call her mother? But mother was a pragmatic. She didn't believe in such nonsense.

So Amy paced the apartment like a trapped cat.

Celia's cell phone still lay on the coffee table. Her car was still parked outside.

And her painting had joined that of the blond woman behind the chair in the corner.

Yet, each time she left the living room or studio area, there would be those paintings: Celia's on the easel, the blond propped against the wall.

The more Amy pondered the situation, the further away from answers she seemed to be.

She did realize that the two paintings had occurred while she was asleep. They must have, because neither of them had been there before she had gone to sleep.

Amy vowed to remain awake until she could figure out what was happening and what she needed to do about it.

She made one pot of strong coffee after another. She watched television. She walked around outside.

Drank more coffee. Checked the door at the back of the staging area. Sometimes it was ajar, even though Amy had closed and locked it. She would always close and lock it again.

She talked to herself. She listened to music. She danced.

She made it through the day. She made it through the long night. And most of the next day.

But the human body cannot maintain this way.

Amy slept.

***

Swishhhhhhh. Swishhhhhh. Swishhhhhhh.

***

Mom put her key in the slot and unlocked the door. She could not quell the growing sense of excitement she felt. She'd always loved finding treasures and sensed the extra storage room in Amy's apartment might be chock full of undiscovered gems.

"Good morning!" Mom called out as she entered the flat. She winced when there was no answer. Amelia knew she was coming over today to help her tackle the storage area. Today had been Amelia's suggestion.

Of course, Amelia was probably still in bed asleep.

As she breezed through on her way to the hallway to Amy's bedroom, Mom stopped.

There, on Amy's easel was the self-portrait Mom had been practically begging her for years to do.

"Oh, how lovely," Mom breathed as she approached the painting. She grasped it by the edges and picked it up for closer inspection.

Amy had painted herself on a dark blue background which gradiated to black. The dark background gave Amy an ethereal glow.

Her dark auburn hair was beautifully coiffed with ringlets touching her milk white shoulders, a veil tucked into the top of her hair.

Though Mom was puzzled as to why Amelia would paint herself in a wedding dress, she was nonetheless pleased by the portrait.

Then she realized it was one of the wedding dresses she had found in the extra storage room, and the one Mom had personally liked best: the embroidered rosebuds along the neckline and bodice, so full of hope and promise.

"Breathtaking!" Mom said, loudly enough for anyone to hear her. "I can hardly wait to get this framed and hung on the mantle above the fireplace, Amelia!"

Mom simply couldn't take her eyes off the smiling young bride. It occurred to her to wonder if this may be Amelia's way of telling her she had met someone and gotten engaged? Could it be that computer genius she had met several months ago?

"Amelia!" Mom called. "Do get up out of bed and come into your living room at least!" Mom replaced the painting onto the easel. "Oh, I mean your studio!"

She noticed the painting of Celia on the floor behind the easel, propped against the wall, as well as the painting of a blond woman she didn't recognize sitting next to it. Amelia had truly done a magnificent job on the portraits: both women exuded a preternatural glow that shone from within. Her daughter had captured that light and it oozed from those canvasses.

Mom also noticed that each woman wore one of the wedding gowns she had found in the extra storage room.

Mom smiled. So Amelia had been inspired by those wedding dresses after all.

"Amelia?" Mom called out happily. When there was still no answer, Mom winced and walked into the kitchen, calling out her daughter's name.

But Amelia wasn't there.

Mom walked down the hallway, glancing into the bathroom along the way. As she approached the door to Amelia's room, she said, "Amelia, darling, it's way past time to be getting out of bed, don't you think?" She pushed open Amelia's door only to find an empty room.

"Amelia?" Mom surveyed the room. For once, it was clean, with bed made, clothes in the hamper and carpet vacuumed.

Almost instinctively, Mom opened the doors to the walk-in closet. She flipped on the lights in the staging area.

Though it would have been strange if Amelia had been sitting there in the dark, it would have been no surprise to Mom. The girl was, after all, an artist; creative by nature and subject to an artist's whims. It wouldn't surprise Mom - not in the least - to have found Amelia sitting atop the apartment with easel, paints, brushes and stool, painting whatever she could see from up there.

But Amelia wasn't in the staging area. She wasn't sitting before the mirror in the dark, wearing the wedding gown or anything else.

But the door to the extra storage room stood ajar.

Mom walked up to the door and uttered a small cry of disappointment.

The wedding gowns were hanging on the portable metal rack inside the storage room door. Mom pushed on the door but it wouldn't budge. It was still blocked by something inside the room. She started to reach inside the door and remove the wedding gowns as she had done before.

She sighed. "Oh, bother," she muttered. "I suppose she put them in there for a reason." She sighed again and pulled the door shut. "I just wonder where the girl could be?"

Mom walked the apartment from the bedroom to the living room area. She noticed Celia's cell phone on the coffee table and the tousled blankets on the sofa.

Celia must have stayed over and the two women were probably out for a morning stroll.

Apparently Amelia had either forgotten her promise to her mother or she simply wasn't up to the task.

Mom sighed. "Oh, well. I'll just leave her a note."

My Darling Amelia -

What a beautiful and unique self-portrait. I'm taking it, darling. Father and I will pay you for it, but I must have it. I am going to have it properly framed for display and then put it above the fireplace. You must come and see it when you get the chance, love.

Celia's portrait is equally beautiful. You have truly outdone yourself. But who is the blond woman? I've never seen her before and I don't think I recall your mentioning a blond friend. Oh, well. I'm just curious. All right. I'm being nosey.

But do please let me know when you are ready to tackle that extra storage room, darling. I've no idea how large the room may be, but wouldn't it be better to have an art studio unto itself? Then you can spread everything out.

Call me, darling.

xoxoxoxo

Mom.

Ravings

There is a face

in the oak tree;

its eyes are hollow black,

its mouth a cold slit

and it is watching

watching.

Is it the face of a guardian

protecting us from harm?

Is it that of a vagrant

lost and looking for home?

Or is it an entity

with cruel intent?

I cannot tell.

The face hides there

within the leaves

and moves

each time the wind blows.

Wait!

The face has gone.

I swear to you

it was there.

Snow

I stood on tiptoe to find Bonnie. There she was, halfway down the meat case headed for the dairy section. Those blond spiral curls were spottable in any crowd but were not necessarily the reason Bonnie was easy to see. Nor was it Bonnie's height towering her over surrounding patrons. She was flamboyant in carriage and demeanor. She was surrounded by an aura of natural beauty, an aura which exuded an enjoyment and fulfillment of life even as it consumed an enjoyment of life.

"Wait up, Bonnie!" I called out. Shoppers scowled at me as I maneuvered the shopping cart through the obstacle course of elbows, knees and shopping carts.

I received less positive attention when I was with Bonnie. This attention resulted from the very fact that I was with Bonnie: a droll, ordinary woman tagging along in the shadow of the Goddess Athena. Most of the attention directed towards the two of us together was the perplexed and questioning glances of people wondering about the contradictions in our personalities. Bonnie and I were equally perplexed by the reactions of people towards us.

I caught up to Bonnie, leaning over the egg case for the eggs, her bottom half protruding into the aisle. I leaned over so only Bonnie could hear my wisecrack. "Stick that thing out far enough, somebody's gonna grab it and throw it in their grocery cart."

Bonnie came out of the egg case laughing. It was not a ladylike laugh; it was a laugh that traveled up from her diaphragm and burst forth from her. The laugh was neither undignified nor unpleasant. It was a rich, throaty sound echoing Bonnie's obvious exuberance in everything around her.

"Yeah, well, I'd just like to see 'em try and scan this!" Bonnie slapped her ample bottom as I trembled with quiet laughter. Bonnie always claimed she was five pounds overweight. The only place I ever saw it was in the rounded curve of her backside.

As Bonnie opened the lid to inspect the eighteen eggs within, I said, "We haven't seen the first snowflake yet. What are all these people doing here?"

"They're stocking up on bread and milk." Satisfied that no eggs were broken, she placed the carton into the front section of the shopping cart.

"Like they could subsist on bread and milk for three days," I scoffed. My exasperation mounted as a woman reached around me to grab a gallon of milk from the adjacent milk case.

"According to the weatherman, it may be longer than three days, Tyger." Only Bonnie called me Tyger.

"You know the weathermen in Atlanta. They're right about one percent of the time."

Bonnie reached around me for some milk. "Yeah but that one percent is a real doozy. Remember the blizzard of '93?"

"Okay. Except for that one doofus who said it wouldn't stick, the weathermen were right about that one."

Bonnie laughed and grabbed the front of the cart to maneuver through the throng of people. "They say this blizzard will make that one look like powdered sugar."

"What's left on the list, Bonnie?"

Bonnie grinned. "Anxious to leave, Tyger?"

I shifted in my leather jacket. "You know how I feel about crowds, Bonnie."

"Just some sugar for Mom and some sodas for the boys."

"Mara isn't going to have the boys for the weekend?"

"What? And be snowed in with her own kids?"

"What about your brother?"

Bonnie rounded the corner of the sugar aisle almost colliding with a harried male shopper. The man was about as tall as Bonnie with salt and pepper hair, beard and mustache. Judging from the fit of his winter coat he was, as Bonnie would say, "pleasantly put together." As I watched the two exchange apologies the expression on the man's face was one of sheer delight at speaking to this attractive blond woman exuding such positive energy. Bonnie barely gave him a passing glance. She was more concerned with completing her grocery errands. As Bonnie maneuvered us up the sugar aisle, the man ogled after her. That is until his female companion caught up to him.

"Watch where you're going," she snapped. She noticed he didn't respond right away and followed his gaze as it followed Bonnie's attractive figure. This woman's face, too, carried an appreciative expression. Many women would trade their bodies for Bonnie's attractive pear-shaped one. This woman, short and plump, dour of face and negative in thought judging by her actions thus far, would have traded her own body and everything in her grocery cart to have Bonnie's shapely figure. It was no surprise when this woman's admiring look was quickly replaced by envy. "Watch where you're going," the woman repeated, "and not where she's going."

This was the typical reaction of people upon encountering Bonnie. Her good looks brought to one's mind a fresh spring morning in a rustic log cabin beside a lake. Her oval face was not unblemished but there was an ethereal glow about it. The glow that most women could not attain with the use of makeup came naturally to Bonnie. Her positive attitude in the face of adversity enhanced the luster of her appearance. Both sexes admired and appreciated her beauty even though the female of the species harbored a twinge of jealousy for it.

As we continued up the aisle, I glanced back over my shoulder. The man was now watching me, a look of bewilderment on his face.

This, too, was a typical reaction. I had once been likened to a street hood by someone with not so favorable a disposition towards me. Oddly, men were jealous of me. They could not understand why someone like Bonnie would rather be good friends with the likes of me than lovers with the likes of them.

"Hey, Bonnie, where's your brother going to be during this big blizzard?"

Bonnie elbowed her way between people and carts to grab a five pound bag of sugar. "He said he got some work to do out of town."

"You don't believe him?"

Bonnie shrugged as she resumed guiding the cart. "Why should I? He's no better parent than Mara."

"So just you, your mom and your nephews."

"That's about it."

"At least you know they'll be safe with you and your mom."

Bonnie's stride skipped a step. She didn't respond or turn to look at me, but I knew the expression on her face. The sadness in her eyes and grim countenance were familiar to me.

"I'm sorry, Bonnie."

Bonnie turned and smiled at me; a smile that didn't reach her eyes. "It's okay, Tyger. I just still miss her."

Bonnie maneuvered our way up the soda and chip aisle. She grabbed two two-liter bottles of soda and placed them atop the pile in the cart. "Done."

"Great! Think you guys will be able to survive on this?" I waved my hand over the stuffed cart.

"If not, I guess we'll cook up one of Mom's cats."

I laughed. "Cat stew, for sure!"

Bonnie's feigned light-heartedness pierced my skin.

"If it's okay, I'll go outside for a smoke while you check out, Bonnie."

***

I tapped my cigarette against the flip-top box in my hand. The slight chill in the air was enough to soak through my faded blue jeans. An unexpected gust of winter air tossed debris across the shopping center parking lot creating a whirlwind in the corner of the l-shaped building where the grocery store met with the video rental store. In addition to these two businesses there was a locksmith, a pizza place, a Chinese restaurant and a nail salon. The small video store appeared to be as busy as the grocery store. Two people walking around the far corner of the store to the woods in the back caught my attention. I watched as they rounded the corner, and then cupped my hand around my lighter as the flame kissed the end of my cigarette.

I opened the driver's side door, leaned into the car and flipped the ignition switch to the auxiliary position. It wouldn't go any farther without the keys. I dialed the radio to a rock'n'roll station.

As I stood against the back of the big older model Mercury Cougar, I caught my reflection in the glass front of the video rental store. My figure lacked the attractive attributes of womanhood, resembling, instead, a matchstick. There I stood, my faded jeans flapping slightly about my frame in the winter breeze; a black cable-knit sweater beneath a black leather jacket; black leather boots; my short-cropped brown hair tossed in whatever direction the wind blew and a cigarette dangling from my mouth. The description of street hood was not only apt; it was well-deserved.

My mind's eye conjured a likeness of Bonnie standing beside my own reflection. I barely reached the chin of her five foot ten inch frame. The scenario before me summoned a cloud framing my own projection while Bonnie's image was bathed in the winter sun; a sun which enhanced Bonnie's natural glow while casting the merest backlight upon my own self-deprecating image.

I shook myself out of this reverie and stood beside the driver's door. I couldn't see my reflection from there.

It was amazing that Bonnie and I got along. I was the town bully in third grade when this new little blond girl challenged and overthrew my authority.

We'd been there for each other ever since. Bonnie stuck by me through my two year stint in jail for selling cocaine. I went with Bonnie to the funeral of her three month old niece.

It was an accident. That's what the report said. The truth of the matter was that Mara was doped up and driving. She spent six months in jail for the death of her infant daughter. Mara's father bought time off for her. It was the way things worked in Mara's family.

Bonnie hated it when her nephews spent time with their mother. They always came back home with cuts and bruises and cigarette burns — accidents. Sure, kids are always falling down, falling off of things, applying lit cigarettes to their arms. Happens all the time.

The trouble with someone like Mara is that there's lots of suspicion, but little proof. Bonnie once consulted a lawyer about getting custody of her two nephews. The lawyer informed her she would need to prove Mara an unfit mother and the court system needed more than a few cuts or bruises or cigarette burns to make a case stick against the natural mother.

"Snowdrifts as high as nine feet in some northern and midwestern states. And that weather front is headed our way. Overnight lows in the lower teens. Bundle up, y'all."

I switched off the radio as Bonnie walked out of the store.

"You know you can smoke in the car," Bonnie said. "It's too cold to be standing out here smoking."

"You don't smoke," I said. "So you know I won't smoke in your car." I squatted down and rubbed my cigarette butt out on the pavement and put the butt into my cigarette pack. I helped Bonnie put the bags of groceries into the trunk of the car.

"Ya ever feel like we're a married couple, Tyger?" Bonnie teased as she slammed the lid of the trunk.

"Ya mean we're not?" I shot back. "I thought there was something funny about that judge that married us."

Bonnie laughed as she slid behind the steering wheel. It was good to hear her laugh, even at an old joke.

As I slid into the passenger side of the car, Bonnie switched on the ignition. From the radio blared Murder By Numbers by The Police.

"Aw, Tyger," Bonnie groaned as she laughed and changed radio stations. "You and your rock'n'roll."

"Aw, Bonnie," I groaned back as Mary Chapin Carpenter's "I Feel Lucky" filled the interior of the car. "You and your dang twangy country."

Bonnie laughed and put the car in gear. "Do you know them, Tyger?"

I followed Bonnie's gaze. The two people I had spotted earlier going behind the store walked across the parking lot.

"Nope. Not familiar to me."

Bonnie pulled the car out of the parking space. "I'm glad you don't go back there any more, Tyger."

I shifted my position in the seat. "Yeah. Me, too."

***

I hung my leather jacket in the closet off my foyer. My apartment was small but neat. The small kitchen across from the closet was rarely used. The living room contained a sofa, two chairs, a thirteen-inch color television set, a coffee table, a stereo system and two full floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. Off of the living room was a bedroom with attached bath.

I switched on the stereo for some music.

"This weather front isn't just going to pass through. It's going to pull up a chair and stay for a while. And it's going to get cold, folks. Temperatures are expected to dip into single digits with wind chill factors in the negatives before it's all over with."

The voice of the announcer was smooth and silky but I was tired of weather reports. I switched off the stereo and sat on the sofa in my living room.

The saving grace of my apartment was the sliding glass doors which opened onto a balcony. The granite edifice of Stone Mountain was framed within the glass of the doors. On clear days with the azure blue sky behind it, the mountain loomed monumental; a spectacular homage to the cooperation of man and nature.

Today, the mountain dissolved into the granite-colored clouds looming behind it.

I lit a cigarette and guilt fell like a stone against my heart. I hated lying to Bonnie. But I hated even more the thought of shattering the image she constructed of me.

My mind meandered to the beginning of our friendship. It was a few days after the little blond girl got the better of me on the playground. We were in the school lunchroom. She walked over to my table and placed a carton of chocolate milk in front of me.

"This should help your bruised ego," she said and proceeded to sit directly across from me. I scowled at her but she was undeterred. "My name is Bonnie. What's yours?"

"Trish."

"Short for Patricia?"

"Nope. Just Trish."

Bonnie wrinkled her nose.

"What?" I said. "You don't like my name?"

"It doesn't fit you. You don't even look like a Trish. And you don't fight like one, either."

"So what do I fight like?" I was both amused and annoyed.

Bonnie thought for a moment. "A tiger. You fight like a tiger." I laughed. "That's what I'll call you."

"What?"

"Tiger. Tiger, Tiger, Tiger, with a 'y'."

"Why with a 'y'?"

Bonnie shrugged. "To be different."

Fast-forward to three a.m. several years later The phone call. Bonnie crying at the other end of the line. "Bonnie? Bonnie, what is it?"

Bonnie, alternately hiccuping and crying, stuttering words. "It's-it's Emily."

"What's wrong with Emily?"

"Oh, Tyger. She's dead. That bitch was coked up and had an accident with Emily in the car. Emily's child seat wasn't even buckled in!"

That memory transformed the stone of guilt into a lead weight. Of course Mara was coked up when she had the accident. I sold her the cocaine.

I turned myself in after the funeral.

Bonnie forgave me.

I didn't.

I couldn't.

I quit dealing cocaine altogether once I got out of jail. It was a promise I had silently made to myself and openly made to Bonnie. Now I only sold weed.

I couldn't stop dealing altogether. Dealing was about the only thing I was ever any good at. Truth was, it was the only thing I knew.

I had it organized down to a science, keeping tabs on all my customers' needs. I inherited some of the customers from my old man when he passed on. He was a tough old bastard, outlasting the doctors' cancerous predictions by at least a couple years. But as he always told me, death levels the playing field for everybody. Once you're dead it doesn't matter how you lived your life because dead is dead.

"Ya see," the old man lisped without his fake front teeth in, "If you're rich when you die or if you're poor when you die makes no difference. When you're up there, standing in front of your maker, He don't care if you're rich or poor." The old man hesitated here to take a swig of his beer. "The maker is gonna judge you just how he wants to judge you. And nothing will bring you back. Not the money you've earned or the friends you've made. It just doesn't matter. So you may as well do what you're best at and let death take care of the rest."

He usually gave me a quick slap upside the head after that little gem of wisdom. Not for any reason other than he just felt like it.

I wasn't the town bully for nothing.

By the time the pager in my belt loop vibrated a couple of hours had passed. The granite clouds had almost swallowed Stone Mountain whole. Or maybe it just appeared that way through my tear-clogged eyes.

I wiped my face on the sleeve of my shirt and looked at the code flashing across my pager. Each of my customers had a code telling me who, what, how much, where and when. It was an old code flashing there. I told this person not to contact me again, they'd have to get coke somewhere else.

I sighed and put my head against the back of the sofa. I thought about ignoring the page. Let 'em wait there in the woods behind the grocery store all night. Let 'em freeze to death for all I cared.

I took a long drag off my cigarette and blew the smoke out slowly. The gray cigarette smoke melted into the grayness of the mountain which dissolved into the grayness of the clouds.

In all that grayness, I began to see something. A solution to a problem. A light glimmered within the murkiness of both the weather and my thoughts. An idea, morbid and somehow intriguing, began to form in my head.

I turned on the stereo. Maybe there was something to those weather predictions.

***

In the woods behind the grocery store there was a dried-up creek bed, about four or five feet deep with banks on both sides. In the middle of this creek bed was an uprooted tree stump. It was on this tree stump where I sat and waited.

My breath billowed in clouds from my mouth. The temperature had plummeted since Bonnie and I went to the grocery store just a few short hours before.

I pulled my leather jacket tight around me. I had a flashlight in one pocket and a brown paper bag in the other. Both felt like leaden weights pulling at the collar of my jacket.

Some would interpret this for guilt. But this was no more nor any less than any other transaction. I wasn't thinking about morals or issues or guilt or blame. I thought about the long shot I was playing and my newfound faith in weathermen. I thought about Bonnie, working so hard to take care of her elderly mother and her two nephews, keeping them fed and clothed, warm and sheltered. I thought about forgiveness and marveled at people who doled it out as easily as candy.

I thought about the night Emily was born. I was there at Bonnie's request. She put the bundle into my arms and I held a newborn baby for the first time in my life.

I don't know — I guess no one does for that matter — what babies think or how they feel about people when they are held. But as I held this little baby and cooed and purred to her, she looked at me and smiled.

I know babies can't see things clearly. But maybe this strange new creature felt something about me that few people do. Few people tried to get past my defenses. That little baby girl did it with just a smile.

And now she was gone.

That stone of guilt weighed heavy on my heart again and I wondered who was the more to blame: myself or Mara?

It didn't really matter. Either of us accepting blame would never bring Emily back.

I heard a rustle of leaves in the woods. I turned my flashlight on and pointed it in the direction of the approaching footsteps.

"Hey! Dim that, will ya?"

I aimed the light onto the ground in the creek bed. My customer walked into the circle of light until she stood in the backwash.

She looked whacked. Dark circles beneath her eyes stood starkly against her pale skin. Dressed in tattered blue jeans and a faded pea-green Army jacket, she was drawn and thin, a hyped-up junkie too involved with her habit to eat, too busy snorting to comb her tangled mass of mouse-brown hair. Her eyes swam in her head, unable to focus, concentrating just enough to know the business at hand. Oddly enough, despite the haggard, desperate look of a wired-out junkie, she maintained her smug attitude. She held fast to her façade of defiant victim, even as she slurred her speech and swayed from side to side, incapable of standing straight at this point.

"You got the stuff?"

"Whaddya think, I stand in the woods for my health?" I looked her in the eye. "You got the money?"

She hesitated. Perhaps a brief flash of cognizance penetrated the haze covering her brain. But the flash was gone and she pulled some bills from her pocket.

I pulled the bag from my pocket and handed it to her.

She handed me a wad of bills which I put into my pocket without counting.

"What's with the gloves?" she asked. Her eyes wavered in and out of focus as she eyed the black leather gloves covering both of my hands.

"It's cold. Or haven't you heard?"

Her attention returned to more important matters. "This is the good stuff, right? I don't want any of that cheap crap."

I watched her fingers twitch as she contemplated opening the bag. "It's the good stuff, all right. Have I ever steered you wrong?"

"You sure?"

I shrugged. "You're welcome to try it. You don't like it, I'll take it back."

"Money back guarantee, huh?" She eyed me with a touch of suspicion — as well she should have — even as she opened the bag. She took one of the small plastic bags from within, removed a straw from her jacket pocket. She plunged the straw into the white powder. She inhaled deeply. She sighed. She inhaled again. Sigh. Once more.

There was a look of ecstasy on her face. She had her fix.

Her ecstasy was short-lived as panic crossed her face. She dropped the bag and clutched her throat. Her eyes bulged and focused sharply with the realization of what was happening to her.

Dry heaves issued from her throat. She began foaming at the mouth as her body twitched uncontrollably. A thin strand of blood trickled from her nose. A sheen of sweat covered her forehead.

She reached out for me but I took a step back. She fell to her hands and knees, gasping for breath on the way down.

I searched my heart for sympathy or compassion for this person on her knees before me, looking up at me, beseeching me for help. I found none.

"Something . . . in . . . the coke," she gasped.

I bent down so that I could look her in the eye. I wanted her to have a good look at my face. Her breath stank; it smelled putrid like a corpse lain too long in the sun. She dry-heaved as more spittle escaped her mouth. I didn't back away an inch. Her eyes focused on me, imploring me to help.

My voice was low and rasped with every ounce of rage I felt in my body. "I'd tell you to give my love to Emily," I said, "but you're not going where she went."

Her eyes widened in recognition, a full cognizance that was interrupted by her heaving blood on the ground in front of her, over her hands and Army jacket.

I stood and took a few steps back as she tried to crawl towards me, reached for my feet, made an attempt to hang on to something, anything, to keep from dying. She lay face down upon the ground, her body spasming. After a few moments, the convulsions lessened in degree until there was one final gurgle.

I took the wad of bills she had given me from my pocket and tossed it carelessly toward her inert body. I watched as they caught the air and swirled down around her like lazy snowflakes.

I turned and walked away.

I know two wrongs don't make a right. That's what my mother always said. I know it won't take long for forensic specialists to figure out what chemicals were in that cocaine. I know I had no right to do what I did and I will never be able to justify my actions. I know it was murder. But I also know I'll pay for it someday, whether in my lifetime or after death has leveled the playing field for me.

Those little boys won't hurt any more. No more cigarette burns. No more bruises. No matter the price, for better or worse, what's done is done.

I only regret not doing it before Emily died.

As I stepped out of the woods and into the parking lot of the grocery store, snow began to fall.

Summer Storm

With a flourish

he brandishes his hand across her face,

his weapon, leaves a red handprint

on her cheek and cuts her mouth inside

against her teeth, a drop of blood trickles from the corner

of her mouth, the handprint will disappear - it always does -

never realizing it is the last mistake he will ever make

in his life.

She had told him

she was not a punching bag,

she was not here to be used or abused

for anyone's amusement.

She stands beside him as

he lies sleeping during a storm:

a summer storm,

so likely to strike any time, any place.

She shoots him once through the eye

and melts into the thunder.

It Takes One to Know One

"I don't care how you do it, just get it done!" Seline's voice sizzled and her eyes flashed fire.

Sheila cowered beneath the vehemence of the spoken words. She quickly scuttled to her paste-up board on the other side of the room to do the job Seline wanted done.

Maureen stuck her head around the corner of Seline's paste-up board, her eyes wet and wide with anger. "How many times have I asked you not to yell at my people?"

"I did not yell. I didn't even raise my voice." Seline didn't look up from the story she was pasting up on the grid sheet before her, but the careful enunciation of her words carried the weight of her anger.

"No, but the tone you used was uncalled for."

Seline tossed the paste-up knife she was using into the gutter of the paste-up board and placed a hand on her hip. "I'm not about to stand here and beg or sweet-talk anybody to do my paper right!"

Now Maureen stepped around the corner of the paste-up board so that she faced Seline with her entire body and put her hands on her hips. Maureen was short, round and full of sound and struck a formidable sight when she did that. "Well, you know just as well as I do that the only reason we do your paper is because we have to!"

Seline took a step closer to Maureen. "I am all too aware of that, Maureen, since you insist on reminding me at every opportunity. But just because you have to do my paper, doesn't mean you can do a shoddy job on it!"

An Xacto knife rattled as it hit the carpet and a few people jumped at the sound.

"Does anybody know another way outta here?" I asked from the paste-up board in the corner next to Seline's paste-up board.

Bobbie laughed. "Kinda trapped back there in the corner, ain't ya, Jodie?"

Nervous laughter filled the empty void.

"I like working back here in the corner," I said. "I like it when the setting sun shines in the window." I looked from Maureen to Seline and back to Maureen again. "But if you guys are gonna start hurling Xacto knives, at least let everyone else get out of the line of fire."

"Fine," Seline said curtly to Maureen. "It won't happen again."

Without another word, but with a dirty look my way, Maureen huffed back to the paste-up board on the backside of mine where she was working on the daily paper.

I didn't appreciate the dirty look, but it told me Maureen had gotten the underlying message. We each had been given the "give Seline the proper respect and professionalism" speech.

Every Tuesday night, the battle of wills provided a good show. Being the pre-press supervisor, Maureen was responsible for completing the daily metro paper as well as Seline's small local paper by the same deadline. Regardless of how they got done.

Seline was the editor of the small local paper and she enjoyed pushing Maureen, and the other paste-up artists, to the very edges of their limitations of patience and stamina. Which made it difficult for anyone to show her any respect.

When Seline finished with the page she was working on, she brought it over to me. "Tell me something, Jodie." She held up the grid sheet, a thin piece of cardboard roughly the size of a newspaper page, for me to view. "Do you think the photo looks better where it is or would it look better in the upper right hand corner?"

Bobbie joined us as Seline finished her question. "I think it's fine just where it is," she commented. She placed the grid sheet she had just completed on top of a stack of other completed grids.

"No one was asking you," Seline said tartly. "Jodie?"

"Actually, I agree with Bobbie. It does look fine where it is."

Seline looked at the page for a moment. "Yeah. I guess you're right. Is that one ready, Bobbie?"

"Uh-huh," was all Bobbie could say. Bobbie watched as Seline signed several pages out on the roster and walked them to the adjoining camera department. Bobbie shook her head and looked at me. "What kind of hold do you have over her, girl?"

"Look," I said as I trimmed a galley of copy. "I've been proofreading and editing Seline's pages while I paste them up. I've got quite a few errors that way. I guess she appreciates it."

"I guess," Bobbie said.

"Ya know, if Maureen would let me do all of Seline's pages on Tuesday nights, it would take the heat off everybody else."

"It sure would. Have you asked Maureen about that?"

"I did. But she wants all the pages evenly distributed to get it done quicker."

"I'll talk to her about that," Bobbie said. "I'll get her to do it."

I chuckled. "If anyone can, you can, Bobbie." Bobbie and Maureen had worked together at this paper about eight years. Bobbie was one of the few people to have any influence on Maureen.

I was still chuckling when Maureen shot around the corner of my board.

"Okay, look, Jodie." Maureen spoke fast and out of breath as though she were afraid that time would run out before she finished what she had to say. "Since you work so well with Seline, we're gonna go to lunch and leave you here with her. I think you can finish up what's left and then you can go to lunch."

"Sure. I'd be glad to," I said. I could feel a sly grin cross my face as though I knew something they didn't. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a look pass between Bobbie and Maureen and Bobbie just shook her head. Maureen disappeared to the other side of the board. "Lunch!" she boomed out. No one in the room needed a second announcement.

"I feel better now," Seline commented when she returned after everyone had left.

"You should," I grinned. "You got your weekly dose of flirting with the camera guys.

Seline grinned back as she picked up a page that I had just completed. "Brash."

"That's what you like about me," I retorted.

"One thing I can say for you, Jodie," Seline said as she bent over the paste-up board to edit stories, "is that you don't get bent out of shape over things like Maureen does."

"Maureen's hyper. Besides, since the new manager arrived, she's been afraid that her job's on the line."

"Who? Mike? I think he's kinda cute."

I shrugged. "He's arrogant. No matter how good a man looks, I think that definitely takes away from them."

Seline laughed. "Yeah, but when you look as good as Mike does, you can afford to be arrogant."

"Yeah, I suppose."

"I think that's what I like best about working with you, Jodie." I looked at Seline. "We can have a difference of opinion but we don't have to fight about it."

"You mean like you and Maureen?"

"Something like that." Seline tapped a page with her Xacto knife. "Don't forget the Abby photo for this page."

"Right." I turned to the filing cabinet behind me to search for the photo, otherwise known as a sig in newspaper lingo. As I searched through negatives, old house ads and cartoons, and other sigs, I thought about how everyone else thought of Seline as a bitch, which she could be, but how amazing it was that she and I got along.

"Maureen's filing system," I muttered under my breath. "Toss it in a drawer until further notice. Aha! Here it is."

I turned to continue working on my page.

Seline was still at her board, but she was bent over it, her hair falling down around her face and her face only inches away from the board.

"Taking a nap, Seline?" I asked lightheartedly. When there was no response, I became alarmed. "Are you okay, Seline? Seline, are you all right?" I took a step toward her.

Seline's body began moving jerkily; first, the shoulders, then the arms, then the hands. My first thought was that Seline was having some kind of seizure or convulsions or something and that I should get help.

But then she threw her head back and let out a long, guttural scream. Her eyes had changed: they had no pupils or irises; they were a hideous yellow color, like that of a spoiled custard.

Upon seeing Seline's eyes and hearing the scream, my legs turned from flesh to water. I was at that point of fear where my brain was sending urgent messages to my legs to RUN! but my legs were not receiving any messages at the moment, thank you very much.

Seline began to undergo a transformation even as I watched. Her face grew longer and the skin began to sink into her face and turned a dark, leathery brown. Her mouth became longer so that the lower jaw jutted out.

The rest of her body spasmed as it, too, began to undergo changes. But when Seline turned those custard-yellow eyes to look at me, my legs woke up and received the startled message from my brain: RUN!

The paste-up boards were lined two back-to-back, two rows of three sets. A space wide enough for a person to walk (or run) through was between each set of back-to-back paste-up boards. I forced my feet to move to the end of my board to within a few feet of Seline, and I shot in between the two boards.

In my panic to get out, I raced into the camera department. There was no way out into the hallway through the camera department. I turned around and flew back into the pre-press department. I shot across the room and made for the door. I glanced Seline's way and stopped in my tracks.

All evidence of human form was gone.

The entire structure was covered by brown, leathery skin, wrinkled, like the face of a prune. The upper part of the body was a large rib cage with a spinal column descending from it. The lower part of the torso resembled hips but they were wider and more flat than human hips. There were now six appendages, long and thin, extending from the rib cage and each appendage had three sharp claws extending from it. The brown hair once worn by Seline had been replaced by thin, silver wiry strands. And it was tall. Seline was only five feet, two inches tall. This thing had grown at least two feet in the last few seconds.

A thick, yellow mucous flowed from the yellow eyes and clear, thick mucus dribbled from the mouth. Those eyes focused on me and the Seline-thing took a step toward me.

My fascination for this unknown creature was replaced by pinpricks in my abdomen as the adrenaline of fear pumped through my veins and that message RUN! began flashing in my brain again. My legs answered.

I plunged through the door and raced down the hall in elongated stumbles, my mind crazy with terror. I could hear myself crying, laughing, laughing, crying. The absurdity of the situation brought bouts of nervous laughter but the reality brought the tears.

I heard the Seline-thing burst through the door behind me, issuing a high-pitched screech that echoed down the quiet hall.

I didn't look back, but flew blindly down the stairs. I could hear the Seline-thing as it approached the stairs; stairs that went down a half-floor, then turned so that it was possible to look down upon someone on the bottom half of the stairs from the top half. I felt it when it looked over the top half down at me; felt its glare of hatred through those yellow mucous-filled eyes. One drop of yellow, thick mucus landed on a stair in front of me and I practically jumped that stair to avoid it. I didn't dare look up at the Seline-thing, too afraid that I would be frozen to the spot with paralysis and just be too easy of a prey for the thing.

I hit the door at the bottom of the stairs with the full force of my body and stumbled out into the hallway. The time clocks were at the end of this hallway. The security guard was at the end of this hallway. The exit door was at the end of this hallway. A way out of this nightmare was at the end of this hallway.

It was such a long hallway.

I heard the Seline-thing screech behind the closed door, its clawy appendages grappling for the push-bar to open it. There was no time to think about my aching legs or my lungs that felt as though they were at the bursting point. I lurched forward, forcing my legs and body to obey the command now flashing urgently in bright neon in my brain: RUN! RUN! I heard the door open behind me and that Seline-thing screeched again. One stumble, one fall, old girl, and that Seline-thing will have you for a snack.

One foot in front of the other. One foot in front of the other. That's all you have to do. Get to the end of this hallway and you're safe.

I hadn't the faintest idea why I felt that way. After all, if I could get to the end of the hallway and out the door, so could the Seline-thing.

The security guard. The security guard would know what to do. They were trained just for this sort of thing.

Right. I bet they even have classes in it: How to Deal with Employees who turn into Strange, Unearthly Creatures. I'm sure.

My legs were beginning to fail me. Fear had eaten away most of my adrenaline and I felt that my pace had slowed to a crawl. And we were only halfway there.

I felt the hot breath of the Seline-thing on the back of my neck. I could smell the stench of it; a smell like old wet autumn leaves when something has crawled in them for the winter and died there. That one hot breath and that one putrid smell were enough to give me my second wind and I took off down the hall in a burst of speed.

At long last, the guard's station came into view. He was sitting there, in the darkened room with a reading light on, calmly reading another of his spy thrillers, no doubt, oblivious that anything was amiss.

He looked up upon hearing me plunder down the hallway. I uttered a faint, hoarse, "Help me" before plunging for the exit door. I hit it with the full force of my body and fell face-first on the pavement outside.

I gasped wildly for a few breaths before willing myself to crawl a few more feet.

I heard the exit door open behind me and I thought, this is it, it's over. The Seline-thing has got me.

But it was only the security guard.

"Are you all right? What's wrong?"

What did he mean what was wrong? Hadn't he seen it?

The exit door burst open, swinging all the way back and popping the top hinge. I must have found a third wind because I was up on my feet and trying to run again.

"Wait!" the security guard yelled.

I stumbled against the wall and leaned there. I turned around to see if it was all really true.

The Seline-thing was there, large as life, standing in the doorway as if it owned the place. The brown leathery skin was pulled back from its grimy teeth in a maniacal grimace and the security guard was facing it.

The Seline-thing was breathing heavy, its breath rattling around in that expansive rib cage. It eyed the security guard, the mucous running from its yellow eyes and dripping onto the pavement.

The Seline-thing took a step outside the door, its eyes never leaving the security guard and the security guard never taking his eyes off it. It edged along the side of the wall, clearly making me its destination. For every step it took toward me, I took a step back along the wall myself.

The Seline-thing took its eyes off of the security guard for a moment to look at me.

A moment was all it took. The security guard took something from between the pages of his book. Something shiny. Something gleaming. Something metallic. Something that caught the brightness of the sun and reflected it. There was a blinding flash of light, not from the reflection of the setting sun. A laser? A starburst? The Seline-thing was plastered to the wall for several seconds, that high-pitched screech echoing throughout the parking lot, over the top of the building, down the hallway from which we had come.

The screeching ceased. It didn't drone on or fade away. It ceased. The creature we had all known and loved to hate as Seline slithered down the side of the wall and onto the pavement.

I looked from the Seline-thing to the security guard as he replaced the object between the pages of his book. From where I stood, it looked like a bookmark. No longer shiny, no longer gleaming. Just a plain, ordinary bookmark.

The Seline-thing hissed and sizzled and melted away into a thick, slimy mucous lying there on the pavement. I unglued myself from the wall and walked over to the security guard, carefully avoiding the growing mess.

"Don't worry about the mess," he said. "I'll clean it up before everybody gets back from lunch."

So calm. So cool. So collected. As if someone had spilled coffee or soda there on the sidewalk instead of this hideous thing melting there.

"But what? How? What?" Cripes, I still couldn't think. I took a deep breath and burst out with the question, "But how did you know?"

And this security guard, this fellow who walked us to our cars each night, this fellow who read his spy thrillers by a reading lamp in a darkened room, this fellow whose name I didn't even know, but whom I suddenly felt that I should know better, looked at me and smiled.

"It takes one to know one," was all he said.

Behind the irises and pupils of his blue eyes, I swear I could see the faintest hint of custard-yellow.

Ghosts

A ghost in the corner

watches me with hollow eyes;

a shadow within the darkness

it waits, to see what I will do.

Once was a time

this room was filled

with demons and souls

fearful of the light;

outcasts they were,

and I lived among them

without the slightest

bit of hesitation.

One by one they left

to seek refuge elsewhere

tired of conforming to the laws

of my self-condemnation.

Now it is down to me

and a few hollow ghosts.

Alien Rights, Indeed

"There is this alien rights meeting this evening," Makar said from the doorway to the kitchen.

Modlovia glared at him from the comfort of her recliner. "As if there were such a thing," she spat. Makar flinched at the tone in her voice. "Don't you have work to do?"

Makar muttered under his breath and backed into the kitchen.

Modlovia muttered to herself and returned her attention to the visual screen on the wall.

"Thousands today gathered to mourn the loss of Kadeechee, our Revered Leader," the announcer on the screen lamented. "Kadeechee suffered these last months from a bacterial infection which affects the nerve endings of the brain." The announcer hesitated a moment. "Just a little something we've picked up from our new 'friends'."

The communicator on the table beside Modlovia's recliner rang.

"Yes?" she said into the receiver while muting the visual screen.

"Modlovia," a strained voice said on the other end. "This is an emergency."

"Prija, remain calm," Modlovia said.

"It is most difficult to remain calm with this wild thing trying constantly to get loose," Prija said, her voice ending in a high-pitched squeal.

Modlovia sighed. "Must I come, Prija? Can you not handle this yourself?"

"No, Modlovia! I cannot. Besides," Prija's voice took on a triumphant tone. "I have already called the High Priestess. She is on her way and she insisted I call you and have you come as well."

Underlings! thought Modlovia. They were damned annoying at times. "Very well. I am en route."

Modlovia returned the receiver to its cradle. She shook her head and scoffed. "Alien rights, indeed," she sputtered.

"Makar!" she bellowed, dreading the moment she would have to arise and enter the motion apparatus. Makar wasted no time appearing at the kitchen doorway. "I am off to Council meeting," she said. She maneuvered the handle of the recliner and sat upright.

"Did you not attend a Council meeting just last evening?" Makar timidly inquired.

"Yes." Modlovia moved her ancient form slowly from the chair. "But another has been called tonight."

"What do you do at these Council meetings?"

At the question, Modlovia stood at full attention, towering over her mate. Her eyes flashed red, forcing Makar to take a step back into the kitchen. "How many times must I tell you it is none of your concern what we do at Council meeting!" she spat.

Makar backed into the kitchen, leaving Modlovia to sputter about the living room in preparation of her departure. She took one last look back towards the kitchen. "Human rights, indeed," she spat under her breath.

Modlovia squeezed her sizeable frame into the small motion apparatus. She detested the things: small metal boxes that assaulted her highly-developed sense of smell. Scents such as old socks, moldy cheese, and wet dogs forced Modlovia to open a window, even on this cool of an evening.

They littered the streets by the thousands, the apparatus. At times, it was difficult to maneuver, but Modlovia knew the way so well she had memorized the trouble spots and could find her way even though the setting sun stung her eyes.

As the motion apparatus took her to the meeting, Modlovia allowed herself to think about where she had come from, where she had been and what she, along with the Councilmembers, had done. She did this without emotion, allowing her analytical thinking processes to look at each item, see where mistakes were made and where improvements were possible.

She left the motion apparatus outside the large white building with the columns in front and the dome on top - no doubt homage to the architect.

The guards at the gate and at the front door gave her a cursory nod. They were trained not to question any of the Councilmembers.

Debris of a bygone era littered the interior of the building. Skeletons lay amidst the scattered wood, glass and concrete. Vines of ivy grew down the walls. Cockroaches skittered away from Modlovia's footfalls as she stepped around large portraits of every president the United States had ever had. Some portraits remained whole within their frames but desecrated by dust. Most of the portraits had been slashed away from their frames and bits and pieces remained among the debris.

Modlovia entered a large hall, redesigned for more efficient use than its original purpose. Half the hall was lined with cages along both sides. The far end of the hall had been reconstructed as a room.

Prija stood before one cage in particular. The expression of relief on her face was unquestionable as she watched Modlovia approach.

"I am so glad you are here," Prija said. "This one has been tormenting me all day long."

Modlovia turned slowly to view the creature within the cage.

When their eyes met, nothing less than hatred passed between them.

He spoke first. "You are about the ugliest bitch I have ever seen!" He stood just a few feet from the bars of the cage; close enough that Modlovia could have reached in and choked him.

"You are not such a handsome fellow yourself," she responded.

The man easily stood six feet tall and was still no match for Modlovia's seven feet four inches. Her head was large; the skin covering the brain was clear so that every crevice was visible. Her eyes were the shape of flowers - dogwoods, as a matter of fact - with black pupils with a tiny yellow iris in the center. Her elongated jaw drooped; the skin covering the face was brown leather, folded and creased so that her facial features resembled a prune. There was no nose: just two holes in the center of the face above the jagged slit in the prune which served for a mouth.

The man was a new capture: not yet gaunt like the others. Pale skin covered his chiseled muscular torso. Dark hair covered his head, face, chest, legs and pubic area. His green eyes were not yet afraid to meet those dark dogwood eyes.

When the captor did not respond, Modlovia continued: "but you are a fine specimen."

"I am not a specimen!" the man spat.

Modlovia smiled but the smile did not touch her eyes. "But you are a belligerent one."

"What do you expect?" he spat again. "After what you've done."

Prija coughed. Modlovia turned to look at her. "Are you all right?"

"It's the stench, Modlovia." Indeed, Prija's eyes were beginning to water. "It is almost unbearable."

"I quite agree," Modlovia said with a sigh. "And it seems to be everywhere. In this building, even." She turned and glared at the man. "But especially on you."

"Yeah, well, you don't smell so sweet yourself," he said.

The door at the end of the hall opened and Modlovia and Prija both turned to face the High Priestess and bow.

In spite of himself, the man's eyes widened at the sight of this creature and an inexplicable calmness overtook him. She was easily eight feet tall and, if possible, even uglier than Modlovia. But the High Priestess carried herself with dignity across the threshold and to the cage in which the man was housed.

"Modlovia. Prija." The other two stood. "What seems to be the problem?"

"A new capture, your Highness," Modlovia answered.

"Ah, yes," the Priestess glanced at the man in the cage. "They always fight at first, don't they?"

"Yes. They do." Modlovia sighed. "One thing we must credit them for at least, is the courage to do that much."

"Even though it is futile in the end," the Priestess finished.

"We were just discussing their smell," Prija said, her dogwood eyes wrinkled in disgust.

"Ah, yes," said the Priestess. "It does seem to permeate everything, doesn't it? But by the time we finish reconstructing the ozone, we shall have eliminated the odor entirely."

The man looked at the High Priestess in disbelief. "Reconstructing the ozone? Lady, allow me to use the term loosely, that is not possible."

The High Priestess looked at the man with amusement. "Oh, but it is. As a matter of fact, we are capable of correcting many digressions your," she hesitated, looked him up and down, "species has committed against nature. Reconstructing the ozone layer. Replenishing the water supply. Disintegrating miles of concrete structures to replace it with trees and foliage."

She eyed the man with a mixture of contempt. "We can even harness the energy of the sun for clean power. Among many, many other things that would be most beneficial to this planet that your kind wouldn't even consider."

"Will we be able to kill all the poisonous bacteria?" Prija asked. "Like the one that killed my sister, Kadeechee?"

Modlovia and the High Priestess shared a moment of silence with Prija in memory of their Revered Leader.

Finally, the High Priestess answered quietly, "We will do our best, Prija."

The man in the cage smiled crookedly.

"Why do you smile so?" Modlovia asked.

"So the bacteria may be what wipes you all out," he said smugly.

"You underestimate our intelligence and our technology," said the High Priestess. "We have the ability to discern between helpful and harmful bacteria. And the means to destroy the bad and put the good to use."

"So if you've got all this high-falutin' technology, why did you leave your own planet? Why come here and kill off all of us?"

"What is this ... 'falutin'?" Prija asked quietly to Modlovia.

"That is not important," Modlovia said aside to her.

The High Priestess answered the man. "Our planet was dying. Rather, our star was dying. It seems our ancestors chose to colonize a star which has a much shorter lifespan than a planet. We needed a new home."

"So, instead of finding a new planet someplace else, like, say, maybe one that wasn't already inhabited, you decided to mass murder everybody and take this one over."

The High Priestess looked sadly at the man. "We did you a kindness."

The man raised his eyebrows and stared through the bars at her. "Excuse me?"

"Your species was on the verge of obliterating itself. You had been on that verge for some time. And while I would have had no objections to your species extincting itself, what I could not withstand was watching you destroy your home.

"Do you not understand?"

The man shook his head. "Not gettin' it, lady. Again, I use the term loosely."

"Here we were, honoring our home by not disturbing a single leaf or grain of sand upon it. Yet it was dying. A time would come when it would no longer sustain us.

"And then, here you were, with a relatively young planet compared to the vast expanse of the universe. And you were destroying it as quickly as you could, instead of honoring it as you should have."

The man stared at the Priestess for a few moments. "Then tell me why," he began slowly, "in the 'vast expanse of the universe' as you said, why did you pick this planet? Why here? You couldn't find a planet that didn't have anybody living on it already?"

The Priestess looked the man in the eye. "In the vast expanse of this universe, there are extremely few planets capable of sustaining life, let alone sustaining different species requiring the same or similar circumstances in which to survive. Your species and ours have the same requirements: we breathe the same air, need water and your atmosphere is close enough to ours to allow us to survive. Once we have cleaned up your mess - your air, your water, your dirt - it will be so close to our old home we may no longer miss it."

"But why did you have to kill us all?" The man began to pace around the cage. Modlovia, Prija and the Priestess took cautionary steps back from it. "Why couldn't we co-exist? Why did you have to wipe out six billion people?"

"Do you honestly believe your species would have tolerated us?" the Priestess asked.

The man stopped his pacing and took a good, long look at the three tall matrons. He ran his hand through his dark hair and sighed. "No. They wouldn't."

"It may surprise you to learn that we did attempt to do just that," the High Priestess told him.

The man looked up at her in surprise.

"We approached what you called, what was it?" The Priestess wrinkled her eyes in concentration.

"Government," Prija told her.

The Priestess looked at Prija in pleasant surprise. "Yes. That's it. That is the word I am searching for. We approached your government with just such a proposition that we be allowed to co-exist among you."

"What happened?"

"Unfortunately our emissaries were captured and suffered, what do you call it? Experimentation?"

The man's eyes opened wide and his face turned a lighter shade of pale. "Look. I had nothing to do with that. I don't care if you wanna live here. Really. I don't. Look, just let me go and I'll never bother you. I swear."

The three exchanged knowing looks.

"Yes," said Modlovia. "That one we have heard before."

"When our emissaries were captured," said the Priestess, "that was when we realized that, in order to ensure our survival, your survival must be eradicated."

Fear was replaced with anger.

"You bitches!" The man lunged forth and grabbed through the bars of his cage.

Three pairs of dogwood-shaped eyes turned bright red.

With a scream, the man was thrust backward onto the floor where he writhed in pain. All three of the matrons stepped forward to focus their attention on the form.

It's as if every fiber of his being was on fire. He twitched and turned, attempting to escape the onslaught but there was no escape. His body was covered in sweat and he began to convulse.

Even after the eyes had returned to their natural black color, the man in the cage continued to whimper and moan in pain.

"Have him taken him into the room," said the Priestess.

Modlovia smiled. Now it was their turn to experiment.

"Alien rights, indeed," she whispered savagely.

Rough Night

The wind plays kick the can

a mournful sound

at an hour such as this;

the wind chimes join the can

as do the cat's bells,

the fridge clicks on

humming its low bass in accompaniment.

These harmonious melodies

should be light and cheery;

yet there is something ominous

in their haunting tune.

Then,

a sound I cannot identify

reaches me through the window.

I eye the curtain

with distrust:

it would be easy to thrust

the curtain aside

to peer outside

and find the source of the noise.

Somewhere in the house

a clock strikes the hour.

I count the chimes

numbering thirteen.

My legs refuse to move.

I am weighed down by fear;

the acrid taste of stale cigarette smoke

at the back of my throat;

but see I must and find

the source of the noise.

I creep to the curtain

heart racing like

a cracked piston.

I reach for the curtain

swiftly jerk it aside —

outside

the security light

bathes the yard

in a bilious yellow light

until the woods take over -

the dark and impenetrable trees

in which anyone can hide

in which anything can hide.

I sweep the yard with my eyes

and find the source of the noise:

a pie plate, tied

to the bottom of a wind chime

slap-slap-slapping

against the porch banister.

I survey the yard once more

then allow the curtain to drop;

more afraid of the face which might appear

than relieved at the face which is not there.

I return to my bed and the cat

with his tinkling bells

leaps upon the windowsill

to stand guard for the night.

As I lull myself into sleep

I make myself one solemn promise

One to keep and mark -

no more reading the novels

of Stephen King after dark!

About the Author

Bitten by the writing bug at the age of ten, Pen is an avid reader in addition to being a prolific writer. A native Georgian she lived in Hollywood, California for a year and a half (pursuing Film Studies – an interesting distraction) and six weeks in Asheville, NC (attempting to get herself together).

Influenced by the world around her, Pen writes whatever comes into her fuzzy little red head (currently Vidal Sassoon Merlot Vibrant Red). She writes in no specific genre as she has a variety of interests and passions about which to write.

Pen has suffered from Hidradenitis Suppurativa most of her adult life. However, she was not diagnosed with this affliction until 2012 due to the ignorance of the medical profession. She hopes to receive medical treatment soon for Stage 3 HS.

Pen resides in the Atlanta, Georgia area where she spends as much time as possible writing. She is currently awaiting adoption by a new feline/felines.

She may be contacted via the contact form on her website www.pensen.wix.com/neros-fiddle. You may also visit www.penspen.wix.com/hswarrior.

Respectfully,

Pen

From the Author

Dear Reader:

I suffer from an affliction known as Hidradenitis Suppurativa, also known as HS or Acne Inversa. You've probably never heard of it. That's okay. Neither have most doctors.

HS is a foul skin condition where huge lumps form beneath the skin in sensitive areas: beneath arms and breasts, along the groin and buttocks. These lumps can grow to be as large as golf balls. They drain constantly and are painful to the point of limiting mobility and debilitation.

HS is not contagious. The cause is unknown and there is no cure. Currently, there is no research being conducted into finding a cure.

This malady not only attacks on a physical level, it assaults a person's emotional and mental states as well. Embarrassment, shame, guilt, depression, isolation, loss of self-worth and self-esteem prevent many people from even discussing their illness.

Conservative estimates state that between 1% and 4% of the world's population suffers from HS. That doesn't sound like much, until you crunch the numbers: anywhere from 74,000,000 to 296,000,000 people. To put this into perspective, the population of the United States is 318,000,000.

Theoretically, HS has the power to cripple an entire nation.

I state the estimates are conservative because many people are misdiagnosed due to doctors not understanding or even knowing about Hidradenitis Suppurativa. And there are people too embarrassed or ashamed to discuss this condition with their doctors.

There is no test to determine HS because there is no research. There is no research because there is little awareness of HS among the population and little compassion for HS patients in the medical community.

And it is a vicious cycle.

Despite the debilitation of this illness, many of us HS sufferers do our best to maintain some semblance of a normal life. We go about our daily routine despite the pain, not only from our own determination, but because it is expected of us. For whatever reason, many people refuse to believe how painful and debilitating these lumps are. They don't understand how we may not appear sick but inside we are exhausted and in pain.

We call ourselves Warriors because we fight daily to have as normal lives as possible.

There is a good chance, dear reader, that you know someone who suffers from HS. And yet you may not even be aware of it.

Please learn about this affliction. And if you do know someone, please offer them compassion and understanding for what they are enduring.

And be thankful you yourself do not endure it.

Because I wouldn't wish HS on anyone.

Thank you.

Respectfully,

Pen

www.hsawareness.org

www.hssupport.org

www.penspen.wix.com/hswarrior

Check out these titles and more at

www.penspen.wix.com/neros-fiddle

www.penspen.wix.com/hswarrior

A little something for Everyone

T-shirts, sweatshirts, tote bags, journals, mugs, teddy bears and so much more! Original art and writing by Pen. Check it out!

www.cafepress.com/ontheqteez

www.cafepress.com/penspen

To learn more about Hidradenitis Suppurativa (a debilitating affliction I and millions of others struggle with daily), visit

www.hsawareness.org

www.hssupport.org

www.penspen.wix.com/hswarrior

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