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Post by darkharbinger on Apr 27, 2023 6:22:35 GMT
One for the road
By Joseph Burdette
“May I refill that for you, sir?”
Nathan Coffman looked up from his empty glass in the beaming face of a bartender, wondering where he was and how he had got there. Wasn’t I just at work? He wondered. His boss, a P**ck of a man named Stevens, had once told him – with the air of someone who knew what he was talking about – that the moment you get so drunk you forget where you are, it's time you stop drinking.
Good advice. Nevertheless, Nathan heard himself say, "Sure."
The bartender refilled his glass with the practiced skill of one who has done this a long time, not spilling one drop of the precious amber fluid. Nathan watched him pour with the strange detachment he could only associate with watching something boring on TV.
“There you go, sir. Enjoy.”
Nathan looked into his glass, semi-hypnotized by the tiny swirling whirlpool caused by the pouring. As it played out, he fancied he could see eternity. His grandmother had always told him that the world started that way, a swirling, watery abyss …
“Something on your mind, sir?”
Nathan looked up at the bartender. “Just wondering why I am here.”
“Alcohol does tend to make one philosophical, doesn’t it sir?”
For a moment, Nathan's confused mind refused to translate that. "No, I don't know how I got here. To this bar."
The bartender frowned. “The same way everyone does. You came through the front door like everyone else…”
Nathan turned on his stool, fighting a feeling of nausea, and looked around. The bar was a nice one – which probably explained the "sir" the bartender kept throwing around – but it seemed too posh for his taste. He couldn't imagine what prompted him to come here, yet the place seemed familiar…
“Kinda dead in here tonight, isn’t it?”
“Customers come and go, but we stay busy enough.”
Sure enough, he saw people go in and out of the front doors, their low conversations competing with the borderline-annoying muzak playing overhead. Something about this seemed familiar, but he knew he had never been in this bar before.
“May I refill that for you, sir?”
Nathan looked down and saw that his glass was empty again. He didn’t even remember drinking it, a definite sign that he’d had too much. And yet he replied, “Sure.”
The bartender refilled the glass with skilled competency and then went back to wiping down the bar. Nathan started to ask him if he'd drunk the previous glass before or had maybe he'd spilled it, but the tiny whirlpool in the glass caused by the pour held his attention. He could remember when his grandmother used to talk about creation and how the world had been a watery abyss, and then…
“Something on your mind, sir?”
A lot was on his mind, like how he seemed to be reliving the same five to ten minutes over again, but the essential questions he wanted to ask escaped him. So instead, he asked, “Just wondering why I am here.”
“Alcohol does tend to make one philosophical, doesn’t it sir?”
He just said that a moment ago. Nathan felt panic start to wrap its cold fingers around his mind and gently begin to squeeze. “I’m not sure what is going on…”
“You are deviating from the script, Mr. Coffman.”
“What?”
“May I refill that for you, sir?”
Nathan looked down and saw that his glass was empty again. "I didn't…"
“You didn’t what, sir?”
Nathan looked at the empty glass. “I don’t know.”
“Know what, sir?”
Nathan didn't know how to reply. So instead, he looked into his empty glass.
“May I refill that for you, sir?”
Did someone slip me a mickey? He was having trouble focusing on the here and now, a feeling he didn't associate with alcohol. Once, when he was younger, he had experimented with the synthetic marijuana everyone called spice and tripped hard. He had felt like he was reliving the last few moments over and over, a sensation that had lasted for only a half hour in reality but had felt like an eternity in his own head.
“Sure.”
The bartender refilled his glass. “I think we need to talk, Mr. Coffman.”
“What?”
"This happens every so often, even on the tightest loop," the bartender said, wiping the same spot on the bar he had earlier. "Do you remember why you are here?"
“To get a drink, I guess. This is a bar.”
“More specifically, Mr. Coffman.”
“I don’t know…”
“You are here because, as your venerable old grand-mère used to tell you, there is a special place in Hell for people who abuse the bottle…”
Had she said that? Nathan couldn’t remember.
“So sit back down and have a drink,” the bartender said, refilling the glass that was somehow empty again. “One for the road, on the house.”
“I…I don’t think I should have anymore.”
"Oh, you must," the bartender told him. "One more before you leave and drive home."
“I don’t think I can drive…”
The bartender snickered. "An important observation; a pity you didn't think of that one long ago…"
“What the f**k is that supposed to mean?”
"If you had only thought about that on the night in question we wouldn't be here now. Well, I would be here, but you wouldn't."
“What night?”
“May I refill that for you, sir?”
Nathan looked down, and his glass was empty again. "Stop that…whatever you are doing, you need to stop...what night?"
The bartender sighed. "The customer is always right, or so they say. The night in question, as I phrased it, was the night you got smashed on whiskey and decided that you could still drive home to that bitch of a wife, perhaps to fornicate with or, perhaps, to piss in her shoes before passing out in the foyer of your house."
Slowly, memories started coming back to Nathan. Memories he suddenly realized that he didn’t want to remember.
"Only you didn't make it home. You drove in the wrong direction and ran over a group of teenagers waiting for the afterschool bus…"
He wanted to tell the bartender that was a lie, but he knew it wasn't. He could remember heading down what he thought was the right street (which, in fact, had been a one-way street going the opposite direction) and then…
“Such a horrible tragedy,” the bartender said, wiping the bar. “So many young lives snuffed out before their time.”
"Let me guess," Nathan asked, his mouth suddenly dry. "They were all honor students that were going to go out into the world make scientific breakthroughs that would make life better for all mankind…
“No, most of them would have graduated by the skin of their teeth and lived off government-funded subsidies for the rest of their lives. But is that any reason to kill them?"
“I didn’t kill them!”
The man smiled. "If you pushed a car off a roof and it landed on the people below, would you agree that you were responsible for their deaths?"
Nathan didn’t answer.
"Silence gives consent, Mr. Coffman, so I'll take that as a yes. Regardless of your intent, you slammed several tons of metal into them at a very high velocity. I'm no juror, but I would say that you have a certain culpability in their deaths."
“Who…who are you?”
The bartender nodded toward Nathan's glass. "That really isn't important, now is it? Drink up; you have places to be and people to meet...so to speak.”
Nathan looked down at the glass of whiskey like it was a glass of liquid Ebola drawn straight from a waterfall in the dark heart of Africa. “I don’t want it.”
"Of course you do; that's why you came in. You'd had a long day at work and didn't relish the idea of going home right away, so you stopped in here for a drink…only that drink turned into more than just one, didn't it?"
That was how all of his drinking bouts started; he popped in for a drink to calm his nerves before he went home to the bitch he called his wife, and soon he'd have so much alcohol in his system that his piss should have been flammable. And that night…
“I’ll change things this time,” Nathan declared, standing up on wobbly legs. "I sit in my car and sleep it off; I'll call a cab or my wife…."
"This isn't a time travel scenario, Mr. Coffman."
“I will change this…”
“Of course you.”
“I will!” Nathan yelled, surprised at the vehemence in his voice. “Who are you to stand there so smugly and suggest that I won’t?”
"Just a bartended, friend. The bartender you come to see every time this particular loop gets played out, I pour the first glass you drink before you go out and run down those children, and I pour the glass you drink while you sit here and wait for the police."
"That makes no sense!"
"It isn't supposed to," the bartender replied. "But here we are again, God only knows how many times it's been, but I don't because I don't count. I do so enjoy the conversations we have each time this particular subject is brought up."
Nathan’s mouth worked slowly. He wanted to ask how long had it been, but the words wouldn’t come. Deep down, he didn’t want to know.
"Normally, you are a good boy and go about reliving your loop like you are supposed to," the bartender answered. "But every once in a while, you notice, and we have to have a little heart-to-heart about your situation."
“Situation?”
"You are being punished, Mr. Coffman."
“For what?”
“Aside from running over the children?” The bartender asked, waving a saucy finger at him. “Because you were a naughty boy, Mr. Coffman. Killing yourself like that rather than face your day in court, we simply can’t tolerate that sort of behavior.”
“I wouldn’t have…”
"Oh, but you did," the bartender informed him firmly. "I don't blame you for it, nor would I have punished you for it…but that really isn’t my call to make.”
“You are wrong.”
He was getting so loud that the other patrons looked up at him from their drinks. "Please don't disturb the rest of our patrons, Mr. Coffman, they have their own loops to play out, and all this yelling is distracting them."
Nathan looked into the eyes of the other customers and was shocked by the emptiness he saw reflected there. "I don't understand any of this!"
"That isn't compulsory," the bartender replied. "Now, either sit down and have a drink or go for a drive; the management doesn't like it when the patrons get too loud."
“f**k you and your management,” Nathan yelled. “I’ll change things this time…”
He ran out of the front door into the night. The bartender picked up his glass, tried a sip of the whiskey inside, and then frowned. It was a sin to waste good booze.
Everything was quiet now, save for the muzak and the occasional snippet of conversation as one of the patrons would get up and go about whatever they had to continue their particular loop. The bartender kept an eye on this as he wiped down the bar.
A few moments later, Nathan Coffman came back through the door and walked up to the bar on unsteady legs. "Is everything alright, sir?"
“I just…I don’t…”
“Shall I pour you a drink, sir?”
Nathan looked back at the door as if he expected someone to follow him. The warble of sirens could be heard in the distance, even over the low muzak. The police were right on his tail; he probably wouldn't even have time for a drink…
And yet there was one, right before him. He drank it as fast as he could, expecting the city's finest to burst in and bust him. Those kids, those f******g kids….
“May I refill that for you, sir?”
Nathan Coffman looked up from his empty glass in the beaming face of a bartending, wondering where he was and how he had got there. Did I just hear sirens? He wondered. Wasn’t I just at work?
“Sure.” He replied.
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Post by osnafrank on Apr 27, 2023 15:54:31 GMT
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Post by darkharbinger on Apr 27, 2023 17:56:09 GMT
Thank you
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Post by wolf on Apr 28, 2023 1:51:32 GMT
As Frank said, that is tremendous! Great stuff JB, worthy of being a Twilight Zone classic! 
It’s really nice seeing your work posted here, it get’s lonely down here sometimes, lol.😊
I’ll get back on to reading ‘The 13th Hour’ soon, I’m running behind on a few
things and got a story in my head I just gotta get out, lol.😊
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Post by darkharbinger on Apr 28, 2023 1:58:45 GMT
I'll try and post more
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Post by wolf on Apr 28, 2023 13:50:18 GMT
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 9, 2023 13:19:43 GMT
Remember When
By Joseph Burdette
“Can you believe it’s been eleven years?” Philip asked.
Doris lifted her glass of champagne. "Darling," she said. "Fill me up with enough of these, and I’ll believe anything you say.”
Philip chuckled and raised his glass to clink with hers. All around them, the restaurant was full of the usual chatter, people talking, people eating, waiters asking questions, and a low but pleasant muzak underneath. It was a pricey joint, but today was a special occasion, an anniversary. It was not their wedding anniversary, which was still a few months off, but rather the anniversary of the first meeting.
"Eleven years," Philip mused. He was not a man to dwell on the past, for some memories were too painful to recall, but he let his mind wander at this moment. "Can you believe it?"
“You just asked me that.”
“So, I did.”
They sat in the comfortable silence that two people can have when they’ve said all that needs to be said. Rather than talk, they took turns feeding each other from their identical lobster dinners, chuckling softly when they'd miss each other's mouths. Occasionally, they took a moment to kiss each other. The two of them had run the gauntlet during their time together and faced the good and bad times as a team.
“Do you remember the night we met?”
Philp looked up from his plate. "Of course I do.”
"I'm glad you do," she laughed. "Because I don't."
“You were pretty drunk,” he admitted.
"I was plastered," she laughed. "My friends wanted to visit that ghetto dive and then ditched me for some boys.”
“Some friends.”
"They were just young girls," Doris laughed. "I can't blame them for being young and full of life, not to mention beer."
"Fine, I'll blame them. That was a rough neighborhood."
“Yes, it was,” Doris said thoughtfully. "Just what were you doing there?"
Philp looked away, uncomfortable. "I wasn't in the best place back then."
"I know," she said, quickly squeezing his hand. "But darling, that was a long time ago. I'm not looking at the same man I met that night."
Philip nodded. It had been a long time, and he definitely wasn’t the same man he’d been back then. Through the lens of years, he gazed back at his former self, a pitiful scrap of humanity that had lost everything meaningful in his life and had been reduced to scrounging for anything he could use to find a fix. A fix, affix, he thought ruefully, my kingdom for a fix.
"What was it?" Doris asked, noticing the pause. "Were you thinking I was a sexy young thang all alone?"
“I don’t really want to talk about it.”
“Tell me,” she said, half-jokingly, half-serious.
“When I saw you…”
“Yes?”
“I was going to…”
“Yes?”
Philp looked away for a moment and then back at her. "I was going to steal your purse."
“Oh really?” She asked coyly.
“Yes, really.”
The playful look left her face. "You're serious."
"Sadly, I am," he said, hoping that his revelation hadn't ruined things. He'd held on to this secret for years, feeling shame and guilt that wouldn't go away. "I had done it before. I was a junkie with a monkey on my back, a monkey that needed to be fed. Stealing a purse now and then was a quick way to make easy money."
“I’m sure it was,” she said dryly.
“I wasn’t brave enough to hold up a store or mug anyone, but I didn’t have any money and needed my fix. If I saw a purse neglected by its owner…"
The image of Doris staggering down the street came to him in vivid detail. He'd been sitting on the curbside remains of a couch so dirty that bed bugs wouldn't call it home when he saw her, a pretty brunette wearing a black dress and denim jacket. Her hair was down over her face, but he didn't need to see how she looked to know she was drunk. And dangling from her shoulder was a red leather purse.
“I was lost,” Doris remarked, speculatively looking at her champagne glass. "Whoever said wisdom was to be found at the bottom of a bottle was full of sh*t."
From the way she had staggered down the cracked pavement, Doris had been in search of the wisdom of the ages. Lone females separated from their friends and wandering alone made easy targets for a competent thief. He'd fleeced several purses from them.
“I thought to myself there is an easy mark," Philp said softly. "A woman alone on the street, very noticeably drunk…you were practically begging to be robbed. I figured I'd walk you someplace safe, proving I was a good guy deep down, and keep your wallet as a well-earned reward. Only I…"
“Only instead, you sat with me at the bus stop and told me your silly stories until I started to sober up," Doris finished for him. "After that, we went for breakfast at that seedy diner and have been pretty much inseparable since. I think you made the better choice."
Philp couldn't deny that. Instead of a fat wallet, he’d found a friend who’d become a lover and then his wife. Doris had stuck with him when he broke, during his struggles to get clean, and helped introduce him to the people that helped launch his career. Now they were married, had a child, and were respected members of the community. All because he decided to befriend his potential mark rather than rob her. To this day, he couldn’t explain what had changed his mind that night.
“Are you mad at me?”
Doris took a bite of her lobster. "About something you didn't do over a decade ago?" She asked. "We were both very different people back then."
Philp was both surprised and relieved. "I make no excuses," he remarked. "But I was in a bad place, and sometimes bad places make bad men…"
"You are not a bad man," Doris told him firmly. "You've done bad things, but we are not the sum of our experiences. It was the drugs that made you steal."
"No," he said, shaking his head. "I took the drugs because I was weak, because of the pain. The pain made me steal.”
“Because of Lena?”
Philp flinched as if struck. "Darling, we don't have to talk about this," Doris said. "Let's just finish this lovely meal and drink our champagne." A devilish glint twinkled in her eyes. "If you're a good boy, I'll let you snatch my purse on the way to the car."
He shook his head. "I have to talk about it…I have to talk about her.”
"No, you don't. Not if it is going to hurt you."
“The pain is how I know it’s real.”
Doris frowned. "That's a weird way to put it."
"I need to know it was real," Philip stated. "Otherwise, it all could have been a dream or a nightmare.”
“Those tend to be the same thing.”
"No," Philip said firmly. "There is a difference."
“I’m sorry I opened this door,” Doris sighed. Philip agreed; he wished they could have just finished their meals peacefully, like the others around them. But some doors, when opened, had to be walked through…
Lena had been a skinny, clever little thing that loved poetry and weed. She and Philp had grown up together and had eventually fallen in love. They left their rural hometown for the big city, hoping to make their fortunes, only to find that the outside world held more distractions than advancements. Still, they had been in love, and sometimes that was enough. Philp and Lena had planned on being together forever; the only reason it was Doris and not Lena across from him now was that she had been murdered.
One night, nearly twelve years ago, they had taken the night off and had gone out with some friends to see an arthouse play. The acting and dialogue were terrible, but the seats were good, and the atmosphere was welcoming. They'd smoked and drank more than they should have, so they searched for a taxi rather than risk driving home.
As they approached one, a figure lurched out of an alley. At first, Philip had assumed it was just another soul experiencing a better through chemistry, but then the figure rushed at them. It wasn't uncommon for thieves to linger outside the playhouse, but whoever this was didn't go for Philp's wallet or Lena's purse, but rather for her throat.
"I struggled with her killer, but it was like fighting a live wire," he sighed. "No matter what I did, I couldn’t keep hold…”
"You're not a superhero or some martial arts wizard," Doris interrupted. "I’m sure you did everything you could to save Lena.”
"No," Philp said softly. "No, I didn't."
“What?”
“Later, when they asked me to describe the person…I lied.”
“What are you talking about?”
He didn't know. Even after all this time, Philp really didn't know. How can you explain the unexplainable? “He…she…it…there was no face.”
Doris frowned. "What?"
“The…thing that killed Lena had no face.”
"This is…what are you talking about? You said you couldn't see the killer's face."
Philip took two large sips of his champagne. "Yes, and it's true. But not because I was high but because the killer had no face."
“You aren’t making any sense,” Doris remarked.
"It looked like a mannequin that sold hair," Philp burst out loud enough that a few people at the next table over nervously looked his way. "You could see where there should have been features, but there was nothing but a smooth surface."
“Lower your voice,” Doris half-hissed, half-whispered. "This isn't funny."
“I’m not joking.”
Philp watched as his wife, the love of his life, pondered that. “So, what do you think it was then?” She asked.
“I can’t answer that,” he answered. "They go by hundreds of different names around the world, and there still isn't an accurate word to describe them."
“All this time, you’ve been sitting on this secret and didn’t tell a soul,” she mused, sounding sad. "You saw…whatever it was you saw and kept it a secret. Why didn’t you tell anyone the truth?”
“Who would I have told?” He laughed defensively. "If I'd told the cops or my parents, they'd have put me away. If I'd gone online, they'd categorize me with those cooks who claim to see Skinwalkers or the black-eyed children…”
“No one who knows you would ever think that.”
"I know," he admitted. "But a part of me always thought that if I told anyone, I'd have to pay some sort of price for it. Secrets are secrets for a reason."
“Then why are you telling me?”
"Because…" Philp stated, then paused. "Because I’ve kept it buried for so long…”
Doris noticed the pause. "And?"
“Because this has bothered me for years, and you are the only person I trust.”
Doris reached across the table and took his hand. "I love you," she told him. "So much, in fact, that I'm not going to turn you in for your attempt at petit larceny but rather throw you on the bed and ride you till neither of us can walk.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
He smiled at the thought, glad their daughter stayed at a friend's house tonight. The fires of passion sometimes didn't always blaze brightly, but Philp was sure that he'd be able to give Doris everything she wanted and then some. Not even the champagne would stop him. But first, he was going to finish this lobster.
They chatted amicably for a while, letting the restaurant's ambiance surround them. But no matter how good the conversation or how good the muzak was, Philip found his mind drawn back to the night Lena died. There are reasons the past was meant to be left behind. The rational mind can only deal with so many bad memories before it, in self-defense, puts them away somewhere safe. Bad memories are like knives; they lose their edge over time.
Well, some bad memories do. Others keep their edge for all time and cut you when you least expect it. And now that he’d taken those memories out, they seemed determined to make him bleed.
“What’s wrong?” Doris asked.
"I don't know," he sighed. "I think bringing all of this up is like tap dancing on the grave of my past. Who knows what I might stir up?"
“Then maybe you should stop while you're ahead," she advised. "You are letting your delicious and expensive lobster dinner get cold."
Philip laughed and started eating again. Doris was right. She was always right. Who knows why he couldn't remember the killer's face? Maybe it was supernatural, or just his brain refusing to deal with something it simply couldn't. Just let it go, he told himself. Let this meal be the wake for those memories, let Lena rest in peace, and let that thing… whatever it was, go away. The world has moved on since then.
But, as many a soul who tried to escape their problems might have told him, the world was round. It might move on, but eventually, you'd end up right in the same place.
“You aren’t eating,” Doris noted.
“I just…”
“You just what?”
Philip took a half-hearted bite of his lobster. "I just wonder why…"
“Why what?”
Philp hesitated. "For the sake of argument…"
“No one is arguing,” Doris interrupted with a smile.
"Let's say the thing was supernatural," Philp said, frowning. “It had to have known I saw it for what it was…”
“Maybe it didn’t.”
“I know that it did!”
People looked towards their table. Doris smiled, raised her glass in a mock salute, then turned her gaze toward her husband. "You're going to get us kicked out."
"I'm sorry," he muttered. It was true; he was sorry, but like the old, drug-abusing version of himself might have said, being sorry and a nickel gets you five cents.
“Didn’t your grandma ever tell you not to question the universe?”
"No," he said. "But my grandpa did tell me not to look a gift horse in the mouth."
“Sounds like a wise man.”
"No," Philip sighed. "He was an a**h*le."
“Those two things aren’t exclusive, you know?”
“no, I suppose not,” he said with a sigh.
"Be logical," Doris said. "If the things didn't have a face, how could it have seen you?"
That comment startled a laugh out of him. "I have no idea. But I do know it saw me.”
“So, what if it did?”
“I read up about these things,” he defended. "Like I said earlier, they go by hundreds of different names across the world and civilizations. Situations may vary, but there is one universal truth about them: they always come back for you if they see you see them."
Doris stewed on that for a moment. "Would you want to know if it did?”
“What?”
“Would you really want to know?”
“Yes,” he said after a moment of thought.
“Maybe your creature did come back looking for you,” Doris said, taking a drink. "And maybe, just maybe, mind you, when it saw what it had done to you, it felt pity for you.”
He’d never considered that. "Can creatures like that feel pity?”
"Of course they can," she answered with a strange tone. "You should know that yourself, Philp. Didn't you once take pity on me?"
"What?" He asked, shocked and surprisingly hurt. "But you said…"
"I said you weren't a bad man," she interrupted. "And I meant it. But you were once a creature of the night, looking for prey."
Looking down at his drink, Philp supposed he deserved that. "Exactly," he said. "So, if I did come back for me, why would it show me any pity?”
“Maybe it was just as lost as you.”
Philp looked at his reflection in the champagne, wondering if he could see a lingering trace of the man he used to be. Could he have been so low that, at some point, an eldritch evil had actually had sympathy for him? The concept couldn't be any more ludicrous than the rest of the story, but something about it didn't seem right.
"I just don't…" he started, then paused. "I just don't understand."
Doris laughed. Philp looked up to see her beautiful face was gone. In its place was a smooth piece of flesh where her features should have been. It was the creature that had taken Lena from him all those years ago. “Oh darling,” she said, speaking loudly despite her empty face having no mouth. "After all this time, I wouldn’t worry about it now.”
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Post by osnafrank on Jun 9, 2023 17:02:10 GMT
Wow, that was awesome darkharbinger 
What a terrific, thrilling story,
and the ending gave me goosebumps.
Reminded me of The Bogeyman.
Excellent work, JB. 
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 11, 2023 3:57:45 GMT
Might have had a little Boogieman in it, but it was largely inspired by Lover's Vow from Tales from the Darkside the Movie
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Post by wolf on Jun 11, 2023 18:24:28 GMT
JB darkharbinger , “Remember When” is another great story! Love that ending! 😄
Thank you! 
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Post by wolf on Jun 11, 2023 18:29:30 GMT
Might have had a little Boogieman in it, but it was largely inspired by Lover's Vow from Tales from the Darkside the Movie
A highly entertaining and creepy read. I like this story even more than the Tales from the Darkside story.
I’m imagining the haint falling in love with Phillip. 😄
…but….did she before? Or after? killing Lena? 😊 |
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 11, 2023 18:57:40 GMT
In my head canon it came back to finish the job but when it saw how much of a wreck Philip was and that, in a moment of compassion, he helped her rather than rob her, Doris feel for him then.
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Post by wolf on Jun 11, 2023 20:10:57 GMT
In my head canon it came back to finish the job but when it saw how much of a wreck Philip was and that, in a moment of compassion, he helped her rather than rob her, Doris feel for him then. |
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 11, 2023 20:29:10 GMT
I'm a sucker for a happy ending lol  |
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Post by wolf on Jun 11, 2023 21:23:58 GMT
I'm a sucker for a happy ending lol 😄  |
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 11, 2023 22:04:38 GMT
speaking of which i may post another story soon
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 11, 2023 22:05:54 GMT
Might have had a little Boogieman in it, but it was largely inspired by Lover's Vow from Tales from the Darkside the Movie
A highly entertaining and creepy read. I like this story even more than the Tales from the Darkside story.
I’m imagining the haint falling in love with Phillip. 😄
…but….did she before? Or after? killing Lena? 😊Although always remember, I leave stories vague at time so you can fill in the blanks yourself. So your theories are as valid as mine |
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Post by wolf on Jun 12, 2023 18:55:51 GMT
speaking of which i may post another story soon |
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Post by wolf on Jun 12, 2023 19:01:04 GMT
Yes! I remember that! Artist James Remar and wife Rae Dawn Chong! That is exactly what I thought of when I got to the end. 😊❤️
A highly entertaining and creepy read. I like this story even more than the Tales from the Darkside story.
I’m imagining the haint falling in love with Phillip. 😄
…but….did she before? Or after? killing Lena? 😊 Although always remember, I leave stories vague at time so you can fill in the blanks yourself. So your theories are as valid as mine
(but with the last one I’ve been writing, I went into more explaining if things…because in the back of mind I kept thinking that if diobolic Dio ever reads that I’d have to go through all the disgruntled “who, what’s, where’s, how’s and why?why?why’s!?” )
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Post by darkharbinger on Jun 12, 2023 22:36:31 GMT
The Best Laid Plans
It was on the corner of 3rd and Michele street that Cody Blankenship decided to kill his wife.
Although it caught him by surprise, it was hardly a new thought. The idea of killing his wife had loomed over Cody’s mental landscape like distant storm clouds waiting for just the right breeze. But, as with many things in his life, he had never been decisive enough to follow through. Following through required a strength of will that he simply didn’t own.
Yes, Willow Blankenship had to die.
But why? It wasn’t just one thing she had done, but the accumulation of a million small things over the years. Small, petty things from a small, petty woman unhappy with her lot in life. The spirit of some men is like stone, they can withstand the storm with only a little weathering. Other men, however, have spirits like tree branches infected with dry rot. They can only take so much before they break. Cody was the latter.
Kill your wife. Kill Willow. The thought was strangely soothing…
HONK!
Cody realized he was standing in the middle of the street. “Sorry,” he muttered with a wave to the driver and then hurried on without waiting for a reply.
Kill your wife. Kill Willow. Kill her NOW.
Yes, he thought as he stood safely on the sidewalk, she should die.
If you had asked Cody Blankenship what his idea of heaven was, it would have been a clear moment of anxiety free decision. His entire adult life had been one massive battle of wills with himself. But now, for once, his conflicted nature was at ease. Cody had made up his mind to kill his wife with definite finality without one moment of indecision. This realization afforded him a genuinely peaceful moment.
At least until he realized he didn’t know how to kill her.
The Mountain Sized Café was much smaller than advertised. It was little more than a mom-and-pop dinner that had managed to survive despite the looming number of fast-food joints in the area, but it was cheap and within walking distance. Cody only got forty-five minutes for lunch (although his break was still maddeningly called a lunch hour), so he didn’t dare waste a second to catch a meal. This was while he wanted to ponder more on the idea of killing his wife, he didn’t dawdle in finding a seat at a table across from the counter.
Cody stared at his menu, hoping it might bring some revelation. Unfortunately, all it could bring him was lunch. Not wanting to waste his precious lunch break Cody waited until he’d ordered his food before thinking about killing his wife again. It wasn’t easy to pick back up where he’d left off, the dinner was full of sights, sounds, and smells that kept distracting. Maybe I should with killing the people here, he thought and then dismissed the idea quickly. The customers and waitresses had done him no harm, in fact he barely knew them. Murder was a personal thing; it should involve people you know.
Cody was peaceable by nature, never using his hands for violence. The idea of striking anyone, especially a woman, was anathema to him. But now that he was determined to do this thing, he was determined to do it right. If he had to hit her or choke her, he would, although deep down he’d rather keep it simple. If there were only a manual for murder. Maybe he would write one. Or not. He could decide that later. If there were a later, that is.
A sweet young waitress came to collect his order. If he’d been ten years younger or she ten years older…odds were Cody still wouldn’t have done anything. It took a lot of nerve to ask a pretty lady out, more nerve than he possessed. Also, he was not the world’s most passionate of men, an issue that caused problems with Willow. Their individual flames of passion never seemed to sync, leaving them both unsatisfied and unhappy.
The waitress came back with a BLT and soda, adding a pickle on the side and some wiggle in her walk, likely in hopes for a big tip. Her antics were noticed, but unsuccessful. Cody was a firm believer in tipping, fifteen percent exactly, but not a penny more. He wasn’t a greedy soul, but he did believe that you got what you earned. That extra wiggle was nice, but it and five cents got you exactly a nickel. She’d have to try someone else. What you got was what you earned… that was certainly the thought for the day, Willow had earned what was coming. How hard was it to make a simple man like himself happy?
As he sat there looking at his BLT, Cody tried to remember the last time he and Willow had been happy. When was that? Furthermore, when was the first time? His recollections brought him no revelation on the matter, even memory was a bitter one. Their marriage had been a dry, loveless affair compounded by years. They had few things in common, generally argued every time they talked for longer than five minutes, and rarely ever went anywhere together. Even their lovemaking was a passionless, perfunctory thing done mostly out of habit. How had they never filed for divorce Cody couldn’t answer. Some people would rather be unhappy than alone; sometimes, the devil you knew was better than one you didn’t.
But that ended today. After Cody finished his sandwich and soda he was going to get up and walk home instead of work. When he got there, he would kill his wife. If he got away with it, great, if he didn’t, well…he’d deal with that when he had to. West Virginia didn’t have a death penalty, so if he was destined for three meals and a cot for the rest of his life then the state could pay. They’d certainly taxed his income enough over the years.
All that was left was the how. How would he do it? Cody went back to his previous notion of beating or chocking Willow to death. Neither option seemed good, doing something like this hands-on seemed too personal. Also, she was a bit bigger than he was, so trying to wrestler her to death might turn against him. But what did that leave? Stabbing her? Bashing her head in with a ball-peen hammer or the business end of a claw hammer? Did he wait till she was asleep and smoother her with a pillow or garrote her with an old piece of coaxial? Too many options made Cody nervous, and he began to sweat.
What did that leave? Could he get his hands on poison? That would be easy, almost everything they sell to clean your house or car carried a level of poison, but how would he get her to eat or drink it? Willow famously denounced his cooking, so the idea of lacing her steak with Drano was out the door. Maybe he could spike her evening drink, she liked mixed drink involving whiskey or vodka while she watched television. Could he get close enough to put something in it? Maybe he could try to seduce her while he did it…but no, she’d get suspicious the moment he tried to put the moves on her.
Why was this so hard? Why couldn’t he think of a simple way to end her? He wanted her dead, that was for sure, and Cody knew he had to do it. Although he was no whiz at math, he knew that if you had a point A and a point C you had to have a point B. Point B was the means in which she died, and just like finding X, point B was every elusive. You are making this harder than it needs to be, he told himself, just go home and let nature take its course.
He had killed once, a long time ago. Back when he was a teenager, he got drug along on deer hunting hikes with his father and uncles. Cody liked being out the woods and the sound of snow under his boots, but he didn’t want to kill anything. Regrettably, in West Virginia if you didn’t hunt people gave you funny looks. Most of these outings ended up with the mighty hunters passing out drunk in their hunting shack, leaving Cody bored, but one such trip left him within firing range of a majestic buck.
“Kill it!” His dad hissed. “What are you waiting for?”
Cody had raised his gun and hesitated.
“Shoot the damned gun!” One of his uncles ordered.
The buck turned, its eyes staring straight into Cody’s soul. Somehow, he felt himself fire, but the shoot was bad. His bullet hit the deer, but it didn’t kill it.
“You’re useless,” his father snapped, jerking the rifle from Cody’s trembling fingers. “Now get up there and finish it!”
Someone, likely one of his uncles, pressed a knife in his hand. Cody walked over to the deer, trying to ignore its cries and his tears, and slit its throat. Much like the shot he made a bad job of this as well and the deer struggled to survive.
If Cody learned anything from this experience it was that killing was hard. Life, no matter how seemingly fragile, had a habit of holding on.
He mulled on that thought while he finished lunch. Robotically he got up, paid his bill, and left his tip, then left the restaurant without a look back. It was time to do this before he left his nerve, so, rather than head back to work, Cody headed home.
Something was off, something was wrong.
Cody imagined sneaking back home to find it empty with Willow off on some shopping spree or lunch with the idiots she called friends, but their car was in the driveway. He had planned to lie in wait for her to come home, pretend to be a burglar, and kill her as she walked in the door. He’d take some jewelry and her purse to add needed details to the crime. Now he’d have to come up with something else…but…
If Willow was home, he should hear the television blaring, fans whirling, and his wife calling for one of her overfed house cats. Only silence met him as he walked through the front door of his house, a modest home unwelcome in the cul-de-sac just down the street. What is going on? Where is she? Cody started to call out to her and felt foolish. Instead, he picked up a heavy statue of the Buddha that Willow had bough years ago, deciding to brain her with it when he found her. If was only fitting given that he stubbed his toe on it often.
Cody wandered through the empty rooms of the house he was still paying for, looking for his wife. She wasn’t in the living room or upstairs, so where could she be? The statue was starting to get heavy and before long he wasn’t sure he could manage to strike her with it hard enough to really do damage. Finally, he went to the last place he expected to find her.
The Blankenship kitchen was neat, narrow, and seldom used. Willow rarely ate anything other than microwave meals and take out, leaving the stove to sit like the forgotten relic of a vanished people. What meals Cody produced for himself were simple affairs that produced little or no mess to clean up. His wife forbade messes in the kitchen. This made it ironic when he found Willow propped up against the dishwasher, a gaping wound in her temple. On the floor beside her was the .38 he had purchased for home protection. It’s very presence seemed out of place, like an actor on the wrong set. In every gruesome scenario Cody had imagined he had never once considered just shooting her.
“Damn you,” he yelled, dropping the Buddha statue. “The one time…THE ONE TIME I decide to take matters in my own hands you just couldn’t let me, could you?”
Nothing answered him but the ticking of the clocks scattered through the house. He stood there looking at his wife, completely bewildered. How could this have happened? It was almost like she knew and had done this to spite him. Cody briefly wondered how none of the neighbors heard the shot, then realized that most of them would be at work. A .38 was a powerful gun at close range, but it wasn’t loud.
“You…you…YOU!” Try as he might, those were the only words he could manage. It was probably for the best, less he spoke ill of the dead.
There was a partially crumpled note in Willow’s left hand. He pried it from her stiffening fingers and read it three times before dropping it to the floor. It was written in her childish scraw with a few parts reconsidered and crossed over.
Cody, it started. Of course, no dear Cody, he thought sourly.
Cody,
This morning I decided to leave you kill myself. I’m tired. We fight so much that I forgot can’t remember how to be happy. I don’t want to keep living like this. I thought about divorce but why bother? I’m too old and not bold enough to start over. I hope you are happy. I hope you burn in hell. This is as much your fault as it is mine, but that don’t matter anymore.
Yours truly
I love you
f**k off.
She didn’t sign it, the blood droplets were signature enough.
With a sigh, he sat down beside of her and looked at the sunlight coming through the kitchen window. Cody had never considered the idea that Willow was unhappy. She got everything she wanted, everything he did was to please her. Why hadn’t she said anything? Good question, but then why hadn’t he? Hindsight was said to be 20/20, but Cody couldn’t see a satisfactory answer.
“You just had to make this about yourself, didn’t you?”
Of course, she had, that was Willow’s modus operandi. Life was her play and the whole world had to be her stage. If only she could have shared that spotlight with him…or at the very least let him read the script to know what she was thinking. Cody looked at the hole in the side of her head and sighed. He’d had often wished that Willow had been a bit more open minded, but not like this.
Oh no, a voice in his head muttered, weren’t you on your way here to kill her? He shook his head, unsure how to respond. Yes, he had come home to kill her but now that she was dead…he just felt empty. He had planned out the path of his life this day only to find he could no longer take that path. Willow had cheated him one last time.
No, not really. She was dead and he had caused it. Perhaps not directly, but his actions had led to the death of his wife. In an act of kindness unnatural for her, Willow had even managed to do the hard part for him.
Surprisingly horrified at the thought, Cody did his best to try and drive the concept away from his exhausted mind. It was then that he noticed that there were chunks of gray matter congealing in Willow’s drying blood. Cody stuck the tip of his middle finger in the substance and considered tasting it. Mortified, he quickly rubbed it off of his finger with her shirt sleeve. There had been times he’d wanted to know what was on her mind, but not that much.
So now what? He could call the police, report her death, and then try to find a way to go on with his life. People might blame him because of the note, but that wouldn’t cost him his freedom the way doing the job himself would have. Cody could make a new life with himself at the center, he could travel the world, try new things, maybe even see if that sweet young waitress would do something for a larger tip…
“Damn it, Willow,” he sighed, picking up the gun. “You would do this, wouldn’t you?”
She didn’t answer, she didn’t have to. As in most instances, his wife had known she would win this round. Cody simply didn’t have it in him to change his whole world with such sweeping measures. He was too old and not bold enough to start over either.
“Last time pays for all,” he said, putting the gun to his temple.
Cody found, much to his relief, that killing wasn’t so hard after all.
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