Gerald Dean Rice's Blog, page 81

Welcome!

Hello and welcome new visitors.  My name is Gerald Dean Rice.  I’m an author, editor, publisher, book and movie lover, and proprietor.  This website is all about everything Razorline Press.

After my first novel was published in 2010, I decided to become my own publisher.  It’s been a love-at-first-site experience and I’m learning more every day.  I started small, publishing a short called 30 Minute Plan (free on Kindle) and moved up to a novella last year, Fleshbags.

But this website is the first real voice of Razorline.  Here you’ll be able to read about anything done, upcoming, or current.  Like my new novella, The Zombie Show, published last month for Kindle, Lulu, Smashwords, and Nook.  You can also catch up on the story Dethm8, with a new installment 8:30 PM EST every Friday.  It’s only 4 installments in so far, so it should be pretty easy to catch up.  By August I’ll be reviewing books and movies on video and vlogging whatever else comes to mind.

I hope you find something of interest on my site.  At least check out 30 Minute Plan andDethm8. If you like what you read, peruse the other titles and pick one.  I’m doing a giveaway on my site for people who’ve signed up for my newsletter (DM on Twitter or PM me on Facebook for details).

Dethm8, ep 4

Dusty hadn’t felt anything like that in a long time.  She slowly picked herself up off the floor, bumping her head off the chin of man who’d wanted to escort her to the back a little earlier.  He wasn’t leering at her now and she really looked at him, suddenly realizing she knew him.  She mentally erased the walrus mustache and a couple line around his eyes and between his brows and was certain of it.

The name didn’t come immediately, but it was something to do with in or around school.  It had to have been.  Dusty had never gone to her parents’ church and outside of the Evil Motherfucker, she’d had no outside interests.  She couldn’t be sure, but a younger version of the panic-eyed man had definitely attended a football game during her high school years. 

“Everybody… everybody okay?”  That was a weird thing to ask.  Well, a weird thing for who asked it to ask.  It was the guy with the gun.  What did he care if everyone was all right?  Weren’t they all here to rob the Spoon or something?  Dusty began to get the distinct impression there was something else to these guys.  Sure, they wanted to take something, but this was no ordinary stick ‘em up.  Dusty had caught glimpses of the eyes of a few of them and they seemed… almost desperate.

She climbed up off the floor and was surprised the guy she recognized helped her.  They came close enough for her to catch the scent of sandalwood and old cigarettes on him.  She got a synesthetic feeling like leather beneath her and realized she was remembering the back seat of a car.  No, she’d been in the back with plenty of boys in her heyday, but definitely not this one.  It had been a double date.  Suzy Lee Hayes and him, The Evil Motherfucker and her.  Odd, that she would remember Suzy Lee’s name but not his considering she’d been a vapid bitch since third grade, but there was the connection: he’d been friends with the Evil Motherfucker.

“What?” he whispered, noticing she’d been staring.

“Nothing.”  She looked over at the man on the floor lying mostly still.  “He okay?”

Two of the bikers approached tentatively, but quickly, grabbed an arm, and dragged the big man away from the door.  There was a big silver car facing the entrance of the Spoon, rocking with each rev of the engine.

“What kind of car is that?” someone asked.  A couple people mumbled something about a Chrysler, someone else said it was definitely a Chevy.

“It’s a Ford,” the vaguely familiar man with the handlebar mustache said, twirling the tiny cross at his neck between his fingers.  “It’s tricked out some kinda crazy way, but my daddy had one just like it.”  He looked at her.  “Y’know, ‘cept red instead of silver.”  Dusty didn’t know a thing about cars, but she knew she’d never seen anything like the thing outside on the road.

“Jesus, it hurts so bad!”  She looked down at where the big guy was.  He was alive, but not for long.  He had his hands clutched around his middle and thick, black blood was gouting from his mouth.  His eyes spun in his head as if there was nowhere for them to comfortably rest.

“What the hell happened, Roscoe?” the man with the gun asked.

“The car… it was… the car.”  Then his head fell back and his hands fell to his sides. 

Dusty had seen dead before and this guy had it down to a science.

“Whoa. Roscoe?”  The other man at his side shook the dead man’s shoulder.  He tapped his face and looked over at the man with the gun.  “I didn’t sign up for this, man.  I just wanna get back—

“Stifle that,” the man with the gun said.  “You know why we came here and ain’t a one of us outta this ‘til it’s done.”  He fixed the other man with a stare until the other man wilted from the weight of his gaze.  In the movies when something like this happened, the bad guys turned tail and ran or killed everybody.  They weren’t doing either. 

“First order of business is we go out there and put a bullet in the driver of that car.

“Gentlemen, if I may be so inclined.  Dusty’s and several other heads turned to see who had spoken.  Arnie was pouring the contents of a flask into the remains of his coffee.  He put down the flask and picked up the mug.  “Going outside is the absolute worst thing you can do.  You will most assuredly be killed.”

“What are you talking about, man?”  The man with the gun sounded annoyed.

Arnie gestured with his cup toward the door.  “Out there, waiting in that car is no man.”

“What do you mean—like that car is on auto-pilot or something?” somebody asked.

“No.  The car has a driver.  We all saw him get up and leave.  What I’m saying is ‘he’ is no human being.”

The man with the gun sneered and stood up.  Dusty noticed for the first time Arlene was gone.  Her instinct was to call out to her, but that might have been asking for trouble.

“That demon or monster or alien or whatever THING you want to call it is exacting some sort of vengeance upon us.  Maybe not all of us, perhaps some of us are just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but for the most part, we are gathered her to make recompensation for some sin so egregious it will require we forfeit the rest of our lives.”

“You got two seconds to make sense before I pistol-whip you into oblivion.”

“That thing has come here to kill us because we have done something to deserve it.  We are going to die unless we are granted some sort of absolution or we defeat it.”

“And how the hell do you know that?”

“How the hell I know that is exactly how the hell you know that.  Obviously, you are not both… together.”  Arnie took a deep sip off his cup.  “I have been having lunch here for nigh on twenty-seven years—not for the cooking, no offense Fred—and on the very first afternoon a group of thieves who don’t want money arrive at approximately the same time as some crazed leather and helmeted killer?

“No, you need not convince any of us here of your lack of complicity now that your Roscoe has met a sour end.  What you do need is to put your collaborative ideas with ours so we may collectively figure the safest means of extricating ourselves from such a dire situation.”

“Arnie,” Gladys cut in, “what in the hell are you goin’ on about?”

“My apologies, Gladys.”  He took another swig.  “When I’m in my cups I have a tendency to pontificate.”

“If somebody doesn’t shut that drunk up, I’m gonna feed him face-first into the garbage disposal.”  The man with the gun stood away from Roscoe and was staring at Arnie.

“Wait-wait-wait,” the other man said.  “I know, I’m annoying.  Occupational hazard, but hear me out.”  Everyone held their positions.  “As sure as the day is long, that thing intends to kill every one of us.  And it clearly has the means to do so.  We have all transgressed or at least, have been perceived as having transgressed and that—”  he pointed outside— “is the mitigator of our transgressions.”

“Anybody wanna translate what Einstein just said?” the man with the gun asked.  “Or should I just smash his face in now?”

“What he means is…” a new voice jumped in.  Dusty looked over at the new guy.  He looked like he was coming down off something bad.  Maybe she could get some off him.  The man turned on his stool to face the group.  “We’re all going to die and that thing outside is going to kill us.”  He looked like he was about to cry.  “Your friend Roscoe was just the first.  Well, second, if the blood all over Arlene belongs to someone else.”  There she was again, one stool over.  Why had she moved and when did she?  “By the end of this day he will have killed us all.”

“Who the fuck are you and how do you know so much?”

“Because I had been following him until he started following me.  I’m writing this book—was writing, anyway.  It was on urban folklore and about eight months ago I stumbled across the story of-of this driver.  He stalks people in his car and kills them.  Except everybody he kills disappears.”

“So then how does anybody know about him, genius?” Dusty asked, annoyed.  She was going to need something soon to take the edge off.  She hadn’t meant to say it that way- she hadn’t even meant to speak at all.

“For the same reason no one has thought to use their cell phones—nobody will believe you.  Go on, try it.”

No one moved, but they all looked at the man with the gun as if waiting for his approval.

“I got my cell—” one of the hoods reached into his back pocket and pulled out a cell phone.  By the time he had it flipped open the man with the gun had it shoved in his face with the hammer cocked.  “Yeah, okay, we could wait on that.”

“Why don’t you call someone?” the man at the counter said, looking at the man with the gun.  “Someone who wouldn’t have cause to believe you’re lying.  Tell him you need him right away.  See what he says.”

The man with the gun seemed to consider this.  Dusty could see his wheels turning.

“GImme the phone, kid.”  The teen handed it over and he quickly thumbed in a number and put it to his ear.  “I’m keeping this,” he said to the boy.  After a few minutes his expression changed.

“Hey, Charlie.  How are you?”  The man let the gun drop and meandered around.  Was he talking to a child?  “Your mother isn’t around?  What are you doing?  Oh, REALLY?  Well, can you put her on for me?  No?  Why not?  H-hello?  Hello?”

He took the phone away from his ear and stared at it.

“He hung up on me.  He’s never hung up on me before.”

“See?” the man at the counter said.

“That doesn’t prove anything,” Dusty said.  “He’s a kid—he could’ve just hung up.”

“Yeah,” the man with the gun said.  “He’s only four.”  Fred and Gladys shot her a look.  Even though she’d defended him, she was just as puzzled as to why she did it.  Dusty supposed that, despite the bikers being the bad guys here, she knew at least something about him, whereas the man at the counter was a complete stranger.  And he gave her the creeps more than anyone else by far.

“Call someone else,” the stranger said.  “Anybody.”  The look in his eyes spoke volumes.  He had called someone.  Whoever it was hadn’t believed whatever he’d said.

“You know what I think?” the man with the gun said, looking at the stranger.  “I think you know something about that dude out there.  Cully, grab this guy.”

Nobody moved.  The man with the gun looked at the biker sitting closest to the stranger.  The biker looked at him and pointed to himself.

“You mean me?  Cully’s in the van.”

“Yeah, you.”

The biker stood.  He was very tall and looked even taller because his leather pants were a few inches too short for him.  He threw his arms out like he was adjusting the ill-fitted vest.

“You put your hands on me and I’ll kill you,” the stranger said.  “Nobody touches me.”  He said it so plainly, it could hardly qualify as a threat at all in Dusty’s mind.   The tall biker’s confidence wavered and he looked at the man with the gun who promptly walked over and conked him on the top of the head with the butt of the gun.

The stranger fell off his stool and crashed to the floor.  Gasps floated around the Spoon and people half stood to see the man with the gun point it at the stranger.

“Cut the shit and spill.  Who are you and who is that out there?”

The stranger dabbed his fingertips to his head and stared up into the barrel of the gun on him.  There wasn’t an ounce of malice or fear in his eyes.  If anything, he looked exhausted.  Dusty realized that was what she’d mistaken as high before.

“I’m nobody.  I was writing a book.  I had the bright idea to come out here and write about local folklore when I found out about him.”

“Him,” the man with the gun said.  “Him who?”

“I don’t know.  I came out here only a couple months ago.  And one day… I came to a place just like this and he killed everyone with that car.”

“Not quite everyone,” one of the other biker’s said.

“Yeah,” the man with the gun jutted it in the stranger’s direction.  “Why’d he let you go?”

“I don’t… it’s difficult to explain.”

“Try.”

Before he could speak again, the constant hum of the air conditioner suddenly cut-out, leaving the Spoon in an even deeper silence.

“Oh, what the fuck was that?” the man with the gun said as several other people gasped and grumbled.

“It’s the a/c,” Fred said.

“I thought it was something serious.”

“Uh, it is.  It’s—” Fred looked over his shoulder at the thermostat—“seventy-two in here right now and at least a hundred outside.  I guess we have an hour at most before we’re all sweating buckets.  And as you can see we have a few seniors.  Unless you mean to… y’know, we gotta get that going again.”

“So you gonna take a stroll out there and fix it?”

“Well, it’s not out there, it’s up,” Gladys chimed in.  “It’s a rooftop unit.  And I’ll be going.  Husband worked his own heatin’ and coolin’ business twenty-seven years before he… he passed and I learnt a thing or two from him.” 

“So what do you need to do the do?”

“Just some tools in the back.  Won’t take me more’n twenty minutes.”

“All right.”  The man with the gun shrugged.  He pointed to two bikers sitting next to each other.  “You two escort Ms. Gladys to her tools and then take her up to the roof.  I’m sure we don’t have to tell her not to try anything funny.  Matter-of-fact, everybody, donate your cell phones to Jeff over there.”  The man with the gun pointed to a squat, gray-haired man who looked more washing machine repairman than biker.  He unfolded his spindly arms and leaned off the counter, glancing around before taking the glass lid off the pie. 

“What do we do about Roscoe?” the fat man asked, walking around collecting cell phones.  His voice was several octaves deeper than Dusty expected.  She sighed, pulling hers out and plunking it in the lid.  People began to grumble, but complied.

The man with the gun considered, nodding his head.

“Freddie, you got a cooler in this place, right?”

“Oh, no.  You can’t.  I got patties in there!”

“Well, you’re gonna have flies in here if we don’t put poor Roscoe on ice.  I wasn’t really askin’.”

The two men eyeballed each other before Fred wilted.  Poor guy, Dusty thought.  Poor all of us.

The Grey- Review

Saw The Grey last night.  I loved it.  Just when you think you’ve seen every permutation of the survival movie, one comes along and blows them all away.  Neeson isn’t saddled with an American accent so he can actually emote without restraint which enhanced his character to be much more than a typical action hero.  I felt for each person who died because I was placed firmly behind Neeson’s eyes and never felt like they were just going through the motions.  Even as their numbers dwindled I kept rooting for them to survive, even the jerk who went on about the wallets.  And that ending was just perfect.

Dethm8, ep 8

“—don’t know exactly,” Fred was saying.

“Then how do you get in contact with her?” The biker was leaning in, like he was really interested in what Fred had to say. “How do you keep this place running? Who takes care of payroll?”

“Well, I run the place for the most part. And we only have about a dozen employees, but there’s a service that takes care of payroll.”

“How do they get paid?”

“I don’t know.” Fred threw his hands up and immediately apologized. “And all I have is her phone number. I know she’s my aunt and all and she gave me the run of the place, but that’s really the extent of our relationship. We’re not really close. I mean, I haven’t even seen her in… I don’t know—seven months or more?”

The biker stroked his mustache and nodded.

“So if you called her she’d pick up?”

“Probably. Aunt Bedelia is weird. Paranoid—she’s always thinking people are out to get—” Fred bit his lip and leaned back. The biker smiled.

“Yeah. That’s the idea, friend.”

Gladys put her hand to her chest. In her near thirty years, she’d never met the woman, but what these armed men wanted with a little old widower couldn’t come to any good.

There was a yelp from near the rear of the restaurant that took everyone’s attention and a moment later another biker-type came in with three teenage boys. One was that slow boy, Kelly Martin, who’d been sitting in a booth by himself a moment ago, the other two Gladys didn’t recognize.

Found these two lingerin’ outside and this ‘un tryin’ to sneak out the back way,” the new biker said. He gave the taller new boy a shove, propelling them all forward. He didn’t appear to be armed, but they all looked frightened enough.

“Everybody come on in,” the man with the gun said. He turned and raised his voice to speak to everyone. “As a matter of fact, everyone come on in. Nobody next to a door. I want one area to watch.”

A couple people grumbled, apparently Saul Kent was still enjoying his soup despite the goings on. The big man by the door watched on with interest as everybody was herded together.

“You ladies come on around and have a seat over here.” The man with the gun knocked on the counter, looking at Gladys and Dusty.

“Can I—” Dusty jumped in. “Can I clean her up?” Everyone looked at Arlene.

“Sure,” the man with the gun said. Dusty looked at the man who’d just spoken to her then looked at him. “Uh, Bobby,” the biker at the counter said over his shoulder, “why don’t you escort the lady to the medicine cabinet?”

The one standing next to Dusty snarled at her and followed Gladys from behind the counter.

“—never get to have any fun,” she heard him mumble. He switched spots with the other Bobby sitting on the stool, who went in the kitchen with Dusty. They came out a moment later with the Bucket o’ Band-Aids. Dusty set it on the counter in front of Arlene and took out the small bag of cotton balls and the hydrogen peroxide. She doused several cotton balls and began swabbing Arlene’s face with them, one at a time.

“Close your eyes.” Arlene obeyed. She’d stopped chanting, but her mouth kept moving silently.

“Would she take your call?” the biker asked Fred. He seemed to consider this a moment and shrugged.

“I don’t know. I’ve never called her. I mean, anything the Spoon needs I can buy myself. I have access to money. Do you want money?”

The biker rolled his eyes.

“Did we come in here and ask anyone to empty their wallets? If you hadn’t noticed by now, we’re no ordinary thieves here.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I want… your aunt. How do we get a hold of her?”

The biker was spinning the gun on the counter, almost absent-mindedly. It would have been simple for Gladys to reach over and take it, but she somehow sensed he expected someone to try. But the threat was implied. Cooperate or someone would die.

“I have a number,” Fred said. “I can try.”

The biker smiled.

“Good.”

Another biker accompanied Fred into the kitchen and the main one turned his eye to bloody Arlene.

“What the hell is your story, sister?”

In truth, Arlene had come out of shock a few minutes ago. It had been a fog, clouding her mind, but had gradually cleared. As she returned to herself, she sensed this other danger posed by the half dozen or so men who had come into the Spoon either before or after her—she wasn’t sure which. Dealing with the greater danger outside was less immediate than what was going on around her.

She’d begun devising a plan without realizing it. There were currently twelve patrons—no, eleven in the Spoon and she estimated high at eight bad guys. There were four at the counter, one over near the back, one in the kitchen with Fred and—she took a chance and spun slowly around on her stool to look briefly behind her—two more; one by the door and one standing in the middle of the floor. She mentally added a ninth for good measure.

They were even, so far as Arlene could see. Gladys was like a hundred years old and so was Arnie or whatever his name was at the end and the senior citizens on the opposite side. Even if they’d all been just as able-bodied as these bikers, the problem was there was no way to coordinate an effort. To devise a plan, put it in place, and fend them off. People naturally gave in. It was how Arlene got to take the tail end of Dusty’s shift nearly every day. Or how Gladys had at least halfway given in to the seating arrangements.

No. If there were a plan to be had it would have to fall on Arlene to put it together and execute it. Maybe—maybe she could enlist Fred and another person. She would have to neutralize the main one. He looked about her size, but was at least in his late forties. Arlene was active. She was five-seven and a hundred thirty-five pounds. She didn’t look it, but she was lean muscle and could hurt someone if it became necessary.

But as for everyone else… Dusty was too skinny and Arlene had grabbed her arm once and felt nothing but bone and pillowy muscle. She’d probably never thrown a punch in her life.

There were three teenage boys but two of them looked like they might try to hook up with the bikers. The other… maybe him. If there were time and she was able, Arlene would attempt to enlist him and Fred.

Fred was saying something and she inclined her ear.

“…must not be home,” he said.

“Don’t gimme that, man. She’s in a wheelchair. Homebound, if I hear it right. You know where she lives?”

“No.”

“Hm. Gonna have to talk about that. Hey, Rocco, what’s that car doing? Look out!”

Everyone turned around, Arlene included, in time to see some kind of silver car charging the front door. It was coming so fast it looked like it would punch through. The big man at the door was the last to turn and he flinched when the car was no more than a few feet away, but instead of crashing through, the car stopped instantly. There was a sound like the breaking of a pane of glass and the big man bowed, throwing his arms forward.

Almost everyone stood. There were several gasps and a couple screams and as a string of a few seconds seemed to stretch on forever. Arlene stared at the big man, who seemed frozen in place. He blocked out a significant portion of the car, but from what she could see of it, she knew she’d never seen anything like it. It was low, no more than five feet at its highest point. The wheel hubs were wing-like, almost like a Corvette, but these were much too sharp. Almost like they’d been constructed for slashing as they passed by other vehicles. Or maybe other people. Arlene’s mind flashed back to the instant she’d seen the woman in the brown business suit and how the low front end had sliced through her legs just before the rest of her bashed into the hood and exploded.

She didn’t remember the color then, but saw it was a brilliant silver she’d never seen before. Then the car reversed quickly, peeling out of the lot and the big man cradled backward, landing on the floor with his legs up and arms curled around his middle.

Everyone gasped again and people shuffled back as if they would charge the back door. Only Arlene remained where she was. Almost everyone stood. There were several gasps and a couple screams and as a string of a few seconds seemed to stretch on forever. Arlene stared at the big man, who seemed frozen in place. He blocked out a significant portion of the car, but from what she could see of it, she knew she’d never seen anything like it. It was low, no more than five feet at its highest point. The wheel hubs were wing-like, almost like a Corvette, but these were much too sharp. Almost like they’d been constructed for slashing as they passed by other vehicles. Or maybe other people. Arlene’s mind flashed back to the instant she’d seen the woman in the brown business suit and how the low front end had sliced through her legs just before the rest of her bashed into the hood and exploded.

She didn’t remember the color then, but saw it was a brilliant silver she’d never seen before. Then the car reversed quickly, peeling out of the lot and the big man cradled backward, landing on the floor with his legs up and arms curled around his middle.

Everyone gasped again and people shuffled back as if they would charge the back door. Only Arlene remained where she was. Maybe she was still in shock, she supposed. It seemed to her the normal thing to be at the moment would be panicked and frightened instead of detached and rational. Up until this point, she’d supposed the bikers were with the mystery man, but considering he’d just killed one of them, that probably wasn’t likely. But they weren’t exactly together to begin with. She’d suspected a hang-looseness about them, a lack of practice for a better word. Almost like the group of them had been rag-tag thrown together. Maybe now that one of them was dead by the hand—or car of the mystery man their group would break down and be all the easier for her to eliminate.

She begin to take mental stock of the kichen cutlery. If it weren’t on his hip, Fred kept a good-sized knife in a small drawer just off the side of the grill. If she could mortally wound one of them that would demoralize them even more, but she’d have to do it in a way as to not draw suspicion to herself. Arlene swiveled her head until she locked eyes with the only other person in the room who hadn’t stood. The man-child who came in every day from four to six.

Why not? She figured. He was a man like all the others. While everyone was still frozen in shock, she got up and walked to the kitchen.

Dethm8, ep 3

“—don’t know exactly,” Fred was saying.

“Then how do you get in contact with her?”  The biker was leaning in, like he was really interested in what Fred had to say.  “How do you keep this place running?  Who takes care of payroll?”

“Well, I run the place for the most part.  And we only have about a dozen employees, but there’s a service that takes care of payroll.”

“How do they get paid?”

“I don’t know.” Fred threw his hands up and immediately apologized.  “And all I have is her phone number.  I know she’s my aunt and all and she gave me the run of the place, but that’s really the extent of our relationship.  We’re not really close.  I mean, I haven’t even seen her in… I don’t know—seven months or more?”

The biker stroked his mustache and nodded.

“So if you called her she’d pick up?”

“Probably.  Aunt Bedelia is weird.  Paranoid—she’s always thinking people are out to get—”  Fred bit his lip and leaned back.  The biker smiled.

“Yeah.  That’s the idea, friend.”

Gladys put her hand to her chest.  In her near thirty years, she’d never met the woman, but what these armed men wanted with a little old widower couldn’t come to any good. 

There was a yelp from near the rear of the restaurant that took everyone’s attention and a moment later another biker-type came in with three teenage boys.  One was that slow boy, Kelly Martin, who’d been sitting in a booth by himself a moment ago, the other two Gladys didn’t recognize.

Found these two lingerin’ outside and this ‘un tryin’ to sneak out the back way,” the new biker said.  He gave the taller new boy a shove, propelling them all forward.  He didn’t appear to be armed, but they all looked frightened enough.

“Everybody come on in,” the man with the gun said.  He turned and raised his voice to speak to everyone.  “As a matter of fact, everyone come on in.  Nobody next to a door.  I want one area to watch.”

A couple people grumbled, apparently Saul Kent was still enjoying his soup despite the goings on.  The big man by the door watched on with interest as everybody was herded together. 

“You ladies come on around and have a seat over here.”  The man with the gun knocked on the counter, looking at Gladys and Dusty.

“Can I—” Dusty jumped in.  “Can I clean her up?”  Everyone looked at Arlene.

“Sure,” the man with the gun said.  Dusty looked at the man who’d just spoken to her then looked at him.  “Uh, Bobby,” the biker at the counter said over his shoulder, “why don’t you escort the lady to the medicine cabinet?”

The one standing next to Dusty snarled at her and followed Gladys from behind the counter.

“—never get to have any fun,” she heard him mumble.  He switched spots with the other Bobby sitting on the stool, who went in the kitchen with Dusty.  They came out a moment later with the Bucket o’ Band-Aids.  Dusty set it on the counter in front of Arlene and took out the small bag of cotton balls and the hydrogen peroxide.  She doused several cotton balls and began swabbing Arlene’s face with them, one at a time.

“Close your eyes.”  Arlene obeyed.  She’d stopped chanting, but her mouth kept moving silently.

“Would she take your call?” the biker asked Fred.  He seemed to consider this a moment and shrugged.

“I don’t know.  I’ve never called her.  I mean, anything the Spoon needs I can buy myself.  I have access to money.  Do you want money?”

The biker rolled his eyes.

“Did we come in here and ask anyone to empty their wallets?  If you hadn’t noticed by now, we’re no ordinary thieves here.”

“Then what do you want?”

“I want… your aunt.  How do we get a hold of her?”

The biker was spinning the gun on the counter, almost absent-mindedly.  It would have been simple for Gladys to reach over and take it, but she somehow sensed he expected someone to try.  But the threat was implied.  Cooperate or someone would die.

“I have a number,” Fred said.  “I can try.”

The biker smiled.

“Good.”

Another biker accompanied Fred into the kitchen and the main one turned his eye to bloody Arlene.

“What the hell is your story, sister?”

 

In truth, Arlene had come out of shock a few minutes ago.  It had been a fog, clouding her mind, but had gradually cleared.  As she returned to herself, she sensed this other danger posed by the half dozen or so men who had come into the Spoon either before or after her—she wasn’t sure which.  Dealing with the greater danger outside was less immediate than what was going on around her.

She’d begun devising a plan without realizing it.  There were currently twelve patrons—no, eleven in the Spoon and she estimated high at eight bad guys.  There were four at the counter, one over near the back, one in the kitchen with Fred and—she took a chance and spun slowly around on her stool to look briefly behind her—two more; one by the door and one standing in the middle of the floor.  She mentally added a ninth for good measure.

They were even, so far as Arlene could see.  Gladys was like a hundred years old and so was Arnie or whatever his name was at the end and the senior citizens on the opposite side.  Even if they’d all been just as able-bodied as these bikers, the problem was there was no way to coordinate an effort.  To devise a plan, put it in place, and fend them off.  People naturally gave in.  It was how Arlene got to take the tail end of Dusty’s shift nearly every day.  Or how Gladys had at least halfway given in to the seating arrangements. 

No.  If there were a plan to be had it would have to fall on Arlene to put it together and execute it.  Maybe—maybe she could enlist Fred and another person.  She would have to neutralize the main one.  He looked about her size, but was at least in his late forties.  Arlene was active.  She was five-seven and a hundred thirty-five pounds.  She didn’t look it, but she was lean muscle and could hurt someone if it became necessary. 

But as for everyone else… Dusty was too skinny and Arlene had grabbed her arm once and felt nothing but bone and pillowy muscle.  She’d probably never thrown a punch in her life.

There were three teenage boys but two of them looked like they might try to hook up with the bikers.  The other… maybe him.  If there were time and she was able, Arlene would attempt to enlist him and Fred.

Fred was saying something and she inclined her ear.

“…must not be home,” he said.

“Don’t gimme that, man.  She’s in a wheelchair.  Homebound, if I hear it right.  You know where she lives?”

“No.”

“Hm.  Gonna have to talk about that.  Hey, Rocco, what’s that car doing?  Look out!”

Everyone turned around, Arlene included, in time to see some kind of silver car charging the front door.  It was coming so fast it looked like it would punch through.  The big man at the door was the last to turn and he flinched when the car was no more than a few feet away, but instead of crashing through, the car stopped instantly.  There was a sound like the breaking of a pane of glass and the big man bowed, throwing his arms forward.

Almost everyone stood.  There were several gasps and a couple screams and as a string of a few seconds seemed to stretch on forever.  Arlene stared at the big man, who seemed frozen in place.  He blocked out a significant portion of the car, but from what she could see of it, she knew she’d never seen anything like it.  It was low, no more than five feet at its highest point.  The wheel hubs were wing-like, almost like a Corvette, but these were much too sharp.  Almost like they’d been constructed for slashing as they passed by other vehicles.  Or maybe other people.  Arlene’s mind flashed back to the instant she’d seen the woman in the brown business suit and how the low front end had sliced through her legs just before the rest of her bashed into the hood and exploded. 

She didn’t remember the color then, but saw it was a brilliant silver she’d never seen before.  Then the car reversed quickly, peeling out of the lot and the big man cradled backward, landing on the floor with his legs up and arms curled around his middle.

Everyone gasped again and people shuffled back as if they would charge the back door.  Only Arlene remained where she was.  Almost everyone stood.  There were several gasps and a couple screams and as a string of a few seconds seemed to stretch on forever.  Arlene stared at the big man, who seemed frozen in place.  He blocked out a significant portion of the car, but from what she could see of it, she knew she’d never seen anything like it.  It was low, no more than five feet at its highest point.  The wheel hubs were wing-like, almost like a Corvette, but these were much too sharp.  Almost like they’d been constructed for slashing as they passed by other vehicles.  Or maybe other people.  Arlene’s mind flashed back to the instant she’d seen the woman in the brown business suit and how the low front end had sliced through her legs just before the rest of her bashed into the hood and exploded. 

She didn’t remember the color then, but saw it was a brilliant silver she’d never seen before.  Then the car reversed quickly, peeling out of the lot and the big man cradled backward, landing on the floor with his legs up and arms curled around his middle.

Everyone gasped again and people shuffled back as if they would charge the back door.  Only Arlene remained where she was.  Maybe she was still in shock, she supposed.  It seemed to her the normal thing to be at the moment would be panicked and frightened instead of detached and rational.  Up until this point, she’d supposed the bikers were with the mystery man, but considering he’d just killed one of them, that probably wasn’t likely.  But they weren’t exactly together to begin with.  She’d suspected a hang-looseness about them, a lack of practice for a better word.  Almost like the group of them had been rag-tag thrown together.  Maybe now that one of them was dead by the hand—or car of the mystery man their group would break down and be all the easier for her to eliminate.

She begin to take mental stock of the kichen cutlery.  If it weren’t on his hip, Fred kept a good-sized knife in a small drawer just off the side of the grill.  If she could mortally wound one of them that would demoralize them even more, but she’d have to do it in a way as to not draw suspicion to herself.  Arlene swiveled her head until she locked eyes with the only other person in the room who hadn’t stood.  The man-child who came in every day from four to six.

Why not? She figured.  He was a man like all the others.  While everyone was still frozen in shock, she got up and walked to the kitchen.

Editing & Reviews

As this site is gradually filled out, you’ll begin to see videos I’ll be doing on book reviews, boxing (I’m a huge fan), and other things that strike my fancy.  Also, there’ll be a page added for my editing business.

Dethm8, ep 2

“Shit.” Dusty needed a hit. She didn’t of care what, but anything to get her through the rest of this day would’ve suited her. The way Arlene just charged into the kitchen with that ill look on her face, she knew the girl was about to go home. Arlene was driven, focused, and had a gameplan for the rest of her life, in effect, the exact opposite of Dusty. She’d been just like her—well, kind of—once upon a time. All shiny with a future and whatnot. But fuck that, Dusty had decided to blaze her own path—or rather, to not blaze her own path. She was kind of… sputtering in place..

She mumbled to the couple at the booth she’d meandered over to and the man said something over a mouthful of food in return. The woman nodded and smiled politely while jabbing at a salad coated in a gallon of ranch, cucumber, tomatoes, and croutons held. Dusty about-faced and saw a man settling onto a stool two seats away from the older couple.

Hm. From the back he almost looked like Evil-Devil-Motherfucker. She shrugged. If Dusty was going to be here any longer than absolutely necessary, she was going to need to get high. Sooner than later too. She spotted a group of four biker types heading in and considering there were no more than three barstools available in a row, she was about to get another table.

Hopefully, Fred had something on him. She’d blow him again if she had to. Dusty saw the weirdo guy in the motorcycle helmet look left, right, then abruptly get up, spin around and head for the door. She turned her head to see the bikers eyeball the much smaller man, but the big one took a big step back, sweeping the two behind to the side as well, creating a wide enough berth motorcycle helmet a to walk out with his arms spread had he wanted.

As she strode into the kitchen, looking for Fred, Arlene breezed past her, a ghostly look on her face. What had happened her? If anyone had ever appeared unflappable to Dusty, it was Arlene. She half didn’t care, but could help but ask.

“The fuck is wrong with you?” Dusty momentarily forgot about Fred. She didn’t expect Arlene to turn around, but surprisingly, the girl did. Arlene cast a single blue eye down, then up the length of her. Her hair hung around her face in stringy clumps; she’d run water over her head, leaving only a column of face exposed.

“Don’t,” Arlene said. She shook her head once and for a moment, Dusty thought she wasn’t about to say anything more. “Don’t go near him.” She turned and headed out. Dusty followed her, curious for some reason. She wasn’t wondering who the girl was talking about, that was obvious. Weirdo motorcycle guy. Didn’t need a rocket scientist to figure that one—he was wearing a motorcycle helmet inside a restaurant on an eighty degree plus day. And until those bikers had come in, there weren’t any motorcycles in the parking lot.

The skirt at the counter snatched up her purse and cut in front of Arlene, heading to the door a few steps ahead. The bikers remained parted for the two to pass. Arlene pulled out a cell phone while the business woman dug in her purse for something, not presumably keys because she had them clutched in her other hand. Her head came up and aimed toward the street and then something happened.

Dusty didn’t know what it was and blinked several times before she realized the woman in the brown business skirt was gone. In her place was a great cloud of dust as if a vehicle had just done a donut across the unpaved lot, but she hadn’t seen anything.

Arlene pressed her back against the glass and began slapping at her face as if she were being stung by bees. Dusty had felt that way once after some really funky meth. All meth was funky as far as she knew, though. She’d only tried it the once. But just as quickly as Arlene had begun hitting herself, she stopped, turned to the door and came back in.

She was saying something really low. Dusty couldn’t make it out at first, but she could hear enough to tell it was the same thing over and over. Dusty noticed for the first time the bikers had not sat in her section. They’d disbursed throughout the restaurant, two sitting at the counter, one hovering in the back in her section, one who had ducked into the men’s room, and the big one leaning against the glass window in the front, watching a red-spattered Arlene walk in with particular interest.

Dusty finally heard what Arlene was saying a couple seconds after realizing the bikers had come here to rob the place.

“Shit,” she said again, wishing she hadn’t bothered following Arlene out of the kitchen. “I shouldda gotten high while I had the chance.”

“What are you goin’ on about, Dusty?” Gladys asked. To tell the truth, she didn’t so much care at the moment. That man had left and that squeeze-feeling was just starting to let up on her chest. With the giant horse of a pill her doctor had prescribed for her heart, the last thing she needed was anything constricting in that whole area. Arlene sat down at the counter, her eyes large as a cat’s. Something else about her looked different, but Gladys didn’t see it at first.

“You okay, girl?” That’s what young ladies called each other when they were trying to connect on a feminine level. Arlene was saying something and Gladys took a step closer to hear. That also served the purpose of bringing the girl close enough in focus for her to see exactly why she looked different. She looked like someone had taken one of those spray-paint majiggers and sprayed her with read paint.

“Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God,” Arlene was saying low over and over again.

“Arlene, girl, what is that all over you?” Gladys was starting to get more than a little worried.

“C’mon, Gladys,” Dusty chimed in, “it’s blood.” Gladys turned to her in the way that wouldn’t aggravate the disc in her neck. That was the way she thought of the herniated disc somewhere along her spine. The disc, as if her spine weren’t comprised of many more discs. Doctors hadn’t found it, but she’d been sure to hound them all until they’d given her pain medication. She fixed the other girl with a disapproving stare and Dusty took a step back and shoved her hands into the big pocket on the front of her pink apron. “Well, it is.”

“You all right little lady?” one of the bikers who’d sat down at the counter just moments before asked. Arlene didn’t answer him, either, just kept repeating those same three words. Dusty leaned closer to Arlene and plucked something out of her hair right at her hairline.

“Gross, it’s a piece of bone.” Lord, but the girl was so morbid. As if the dark make-up and the green hair weren’t enough—Gladys had spoken on her behalf when Fred had warbled on hiring her and there was hardly a day when Dusty didn’t make her regret it. She slapped the little scrap of something out of the girl’s hand.

“Sweetie, you feelin’ sick?” Gladys asked Arlene with another cup of coffee for the other biker. She made sure she served all people the same. Why back in ’72 she’d served two colored fellas herself just as promptly as anybody else. Not that she hadn’t served more than a handful in the years since, sure she had. But back then Afro-Americans were just on the TV and hardly ever then. No, Gladys didn’t see color. She saw people as people first. Gladys had already set a cup in front of the man who had spoken to Arlene and was in the process of filling another for the other man farther down with the whole side of his face pierced with rings. She went to give it to him and Dusty stopped her.

“Don’t give him coffee,” Dusty said and went to picking more bits of white stuff off Arlene. Gladys gave an even more confused look. Obviously, she wasn’t as evolved as Gladys, which was weird considerin’ they were both Goths when you really thought about it. Dusty was a smart girl, misapplied, but smart. Did she think she knew something Gladys didn’t? As if exasperated, Dusty rolled her eyes and huffed at her. “They’re here to rob the Spoon.”

“What?” Gladys drew back. How ridiculous. Gladys was for certain a good judge of character and she’d served many people who’d looked just like these and they’d all left as paying customers. Except for that one time in ’83 and those two times in ’94. She turned to the biker who already had the steaming cup in front of him and smiled. “She does drugs,” Gladys said right in front of her.

“S’alright,” the biker said and flashed a straight-toothed smile beneath a thick black mustache. He actually was a weird one. It was the clothes. They didn’t look right on him. Despite the mustache, he seemed the type who’d be a lot more comfortable in a sport jacket and a pair of pressed jeans with an open-collared button-up shirt. His eyes were a deep, soulful blue. He slid his steaming coffee over in front of Arlene who snatched it up and gulped it down. “She ain’t right.” He pulled out a huge gun out of a holster beneath the leather vest and set it on the counter, his finger on top of the guard. Dusty yelped and jumped back. “But she ain’t wrong, either.” For a moment, she was just as stunned by his poor grammar as the silver hand cannon a few feet away from her. She hadn’t seen one of those in person since Phillip had called her into the living room to have her witness him blow his brains out in his E-Z chair.

The biker’s brilliant blue eyes danced back and forth between Gladys’ until she shook herself out of her semi-stunned state and understood she was in the middle of something bad. “Get this little lady another cup, wouldja... Gladys? I think she’s in shock or something?”

“How’d you—” she began dumbly.

He tapped an index on his chest, reminding Gladys she had a nametag on.

“What do you want?” A chill poured over her.

“We want to speak with the proprietor.”

“Well, Mrs.—she’s ill,” Gladys forced herself into focus. “Very ill. Her nephew—” She cut off, feeling like she had ‘thrown him under the bus’ as the kids said these days.

“Fred, I believe his name is. He here?”

“I’ll… I’ll go get him.” Gladys saw no other recourse. She was about to turn to go into the kitchen when the double doors swung open.

“No need,” a man behind her said. She turned to see Fred, arms half raised, the lip of a plate pinched between thumb and forefinger, a cheeseburger atop it. A skinny man about half a head shorter than Fred stepped out from behind him and plucked the burger off the plate and took a bite out of it. The man with the gun at the counter slapped the stool next to him and cheeseburger man ushered him over.

“Folks,” the first man said, raising his voice. He stood. “This is a simple transaction that should take no more than a few minutes of your time. Sorry about this minor inconvenience.” He sat again and eyed Fred. Fred looked back, wide-eyed, for what felt like five minutes.

“So where’s your aunt?” the man asked, crossing his leg. His hand was far away from the gun on the counter, but Gladys wasn’t going to touch it. She hated guns. Instead, she rolled her head slowly over to Dusty and inclined her head slightly to the counter. Dusty’s eyes followed her invisible line and then jumped back to Gladys.

Hell no, those eyes said.

Gladys looked over at the biker who came out of the kitchen with Fred. He had a mouthful of burger tucked into his cheek and was giving Dusty the up and down with a smirk on his face.

“How you doin’, girl?”

Dusty glanced at him and locked eyes with Gladys for a moment. The older woman didn’t know what to say and turned back to the conversation between Fred and the biker with the gun.

Dethm8, ep 2

Dusty needed a hit.  She didn’t of care what, but anything to get her through the rest of this day would’ve suited her.  The way Arlene just charged into the kitchen with that ill look on her face, she knew the girl was about to go home.  Arlene was driven, focused, and had a gameplan for the rest of her life, in effect, the exact opposite of Dusty.  She’d been just like her—well, kind of—once upon a time.  All shiny with a future and whatnot.  But fuck that, Dusty had decided to blaze her own path—or rather, to not blaze her own path.  She was kind of… sputtering in place..

She mumbled to the couple at the booth she’d meandered over to and the man said something over a mouthful of food in return.  The woman nodded and smiled politely while jabbing at a salad coated in a gallon of ranch, cucumber, tomatoes, and croutons held.  Dusty about-faced and saw a man settling onto a stool two seats away from the older couple.

Hm.  From the back he almost looked like Evil Motherfucker.  She shrugged.  If Dusty was going to be here any longer than absolutely necessary, she was going to need to get high.  Sooner than later too.  She spotted a group of four biker types heading in and considering there were no more than three barstools available in a row, she was about to get another table.

Hopefully, Fred had something on him.  She’d blow him again if she had to.  Dusty saw the weirdo guy in the motorcycle helmet look left, right, then abruptly get up, spin around and head for the door.  She turned her head to see the bikers eyeball the much smaller man, but the big one took a big step back, sweeping the two behind to the side as well, creating a wide enough berth motorcycle helmet a to walk out with his arms spread had he wanted.

As she strode into the kitchen, looking for Fred, Arlene breezed past her, a ghostly look on her face.  What had happened her?  If anyone had ever appeared unflappable to Dusty, it was Arlene.  She half didn’t care, but could help but ask.

“The fuck is wrong with you?”  Dusty momentarily forgot about Fred.  She didn’t expect Arlene to turn around, but surprisingly, the girl did.  Arlene cast a single blue eye down, then up the length of her.  Her hair hung around her face in stringy clumps; she’d run water over her head, leaving only a column of face exposed.

“Don’t,” Arlene said.  She shook her head once and for a moment, Dusty thought she wasn’t about to say anything more.  “Don’t go near him.”  She turned and headed out.  Dusty followed her, curious for some reason.  She wasn’t wondering who the girl was talking about, that was obvious.  Weirdo motorcycle guy.  Didn’t need a rocket scientist to figure that one—he was wearing a motorcycle helmet inside a restaurant on an eighty degree plus day.  And until those bikers had come in, there weren’t any motorcycles in the parking lot.

The skirt at the counter snatched up her purse and cut in front of Arlene, heading to the door a few steps ahead.  The bikers remained parted for the two to pass.  Arlene pulled out a cell phone while the business woman dug in her purse for something, not presumably keys because she had them clutched in her other hand.  Her head came up and aimed toward the street and then something happened.

Dusty didn’t know what it was and blinked several times before she realized the woman in the brown business skirt was gone.  In her place was a great cloud of dust as if a vehicle had just done a donut across the unpaved lot, but she hadn’t seen anything.

Arlene pressed her back against the glass and began slapping at her face as if she were being stung by bees.  Dusty had felt that way once after some really funky meth.  All meth was funky as far as she knew, though.  She’d only tried it the once.  But just as quickly as Arlene had begun hitting herself, she stopped, turned to the door and came back in.

She was saying something really low.  Dusty couldn’t make it out at first, but she could hear enough to tell it was the same thing over and over.  Dusty noticed for the first time the bikers had not sat in her section.  They’d disbursed throughout the restaurant, two sitting at the counter, one hovering in the back in her section, one who had ducked into the men’s room, and the big one leaning against the glass window in the front, watching a red-spattered Arlene walk in with particular interest.

Dusty finally heard what Arlene was saying a couple seconds after realizing the bikers had come here to rob the place.

“Shit,” she said again, wishing she hadn’t bothered following Arlene out of the kitchen.  “I shouldda gotten high while I had the chance.”

“What are you goin’ on about, Dusty?” Gladys asked.  To tell the truth, she didn’t so much care at the moment.  That man had left and that squeeze-feeling was just starting to let up on her chest.  With the giant horse of a pill her doctor had prescribed for her heart, the last thing she needed was anything constricting in that whole area.  Arlene sat down at the counter, her eyes large as a cat’s.  Something else about her looked different, but Gladys didn’t see it at first.

“You okay, girl?”  That’s what young ladies called each other when they were trying to connect on a feminine level.  Arlene was saying something and Gladys took a step closer to hear.  That also served the purpose of bringing the girl close enough in focus for her to see exactly why she looked different.  She looked like someone had taken one of those spray-paint majiggers and sprayed her with read paint.

“Oh my God.  Oh my God.  Oh my God,” Arlene was saying low over and over again.

“Arlene, girl, what is that all over you?”  Gladys was starting to get more than a little worried.

“C’mon, Gladys,” Dusty chimed in, “it’s blood.”  Gladys turned to her in the way that wouldn’t aggravate the disc in her neck.  That was the way she thought of the herniated disc somewhere along her spine.  The disc, as if her spine weren’t comprised of many more discs.  Doctors hadn’t found it, but she’d been sure to hound them all until they’d given her pain medication.  She fixed the other girl with a disapproving stare and Dusty took a step back and shoved her hands into the big pocket on the front of her pink apron.  “Well, it is.”

“You all right little lady?” one of the bikers who’d sat down at the counter just moments before asked.  Arlene didn’t answer him, either, just kept repeating those same three words.  Dusty leaned closer to Arlene and plucked something out of her hair right at her hairline.

“Gross, it’s a piece of bone.”  Lord, but the girl was so morbid.  As if the dark make-up and the green hair weren’t enough—Gladys had spoken on her behalf when Fred had warbled on hiring her and there was hardly a day when Dusty didn’t make her regret it.  She slapped the little scrap of something out of the girl’s hand.

“Sweetie, you feelin’ sick?” Gladys asked Arlene with another cup of coffee for the other biker.  She made sure she served all people the same.  Why back in ’72 she’d served two colored fellas herself just as promptly as anybody else.  Not that she hadn’t served more than a handful in the years since, sure she had.  But back then Afro-Americans were just on the TV and hardly ever then.  No, Gladys didn’t see color.  She saw people as people first.  Gladys had already set a cup in front of the man who had spoken to Arlene and was in the process of filling another for the other man farther down with the whole side of his face pierced with rings.  She went to give it to him and Dusty stopped her.

“Don’t give him coffee,” Dusty said and went to picking more bits of white stuff off Arlene.  Gladys gave an even more confused look.  Obviously, she wasn’t as evolved as Gladys, which was weird considerin’ they were both Goths when you really thought about it.  Dusty was a smart girl, misapplied, but smart.  Did she think she knew something Gladys didn’t?  As if exasperated, Dusty rolled her eyes and huffed at her.  “They’re here to rob the Spoon.”

“What?” Gladys drew back.  How ridiculous.  Gladys was for certain a good judge of character and she’d served many people who’d looked just like these and they’d all left as paying customers.  Except for that one time in ’83 and those two times in ’94.  She turned to the biker who already had the steaming cup in front of him and smiled.  “She does drugs,” Gladys said right in front of her.

“S’alright,” the biker said and flashed a straight-toothed smile beneath a thick black mustache.  He actually was a weird one.  It was the clothes.  They didn’t look right on him.  Despite the mustache, he seemed the type who’d be a lot more comfortable in a sport jacket and a pair of pressed jeans with an open-collared button-up shirt.  His eyes were a deep, soulful blue.  He slid his steaming coffee over in front of Arlene who snatched it up and gulped it down.  “She ain’t right.”  He pulled out a huge gun out of a holster beneath the leather vest and set it on the counter, his finger on top of the guard.  Dusty yelped and jumped back.  “But she ain’t wrong, either.”  For a moment, she was just as stunned by his poor grammar as the silver hand cannon a few feet away from her.  She hadn’t seen one of those in person since Phillip had called her into the living room to have her witness him blow his brains out in his E-Z chair.

The biker’s brilliant blue eyes danced back and forth between Gladys’ until she shook herself out of her semi-stunned state and understood she was in the middle of something bad.  “Get this little lady another cup, wouldja… Gladys?  I think she’s in shock or something?”

“How’d you—”  she began dumbly.

He tapped an index on his chest, reminding Gladys she had a nametag on.

“What do you want?”  A chill poured over her.

“We want to speak with the proprietor.”

“Well, Mrs.—she’s ill,” Gladys forced herself into focus.  “Very ill.  Her nephew—” She cut off, feeling like she had ‘thrown him under the bus’ as the kids said these days.

“Fred, I believe his name is.  He here?”

“I’ll… I’ll go get him.”  Gladys saw no other recourse.  She was about to turn to go into the kitchen when the double doors swung open.

“No need,” a man behind her said.  She turned to see Fred, arms half raised, the lip of a plate pinched between thumb and forefinger, a cheeseburger atop it.  A skinny man about half a head shorter than Fred stepped out from behind him and plucked the burger off the plate and took a bite out of it.  The man with the gun at the counter slapped the stool next to him and cheeseburger man ushered him over.

“Folks,” the first man said, raising his voice.  He stood.  “This is a simple transaction that should take no more than a few minutes of your time.  Sorry about this minor inconvenience.”  He sat again and eyed Fred.  Fred looked back, wide-eyed, for what felt like five minutes.

“So where’s your aunt?” the man asked, crossing his leg.  His hand was far away from the gun on the counter, but Gladys wasn’t going to touch it.  She hated guns.  Instead, she rolled her head slowly over to Dusty and inclined her head slightly to the counter.  Dusty’s eyes followed her invisible line and then jumped back to Gladys.

Hell no, those eyes said.

Gladys looked over at the biker who came out of the kitchen with Fred.  He had a mouthful of burger tucked into his cheek and was giving Dusty the up and down with a smirk on his face.

“How you doin’, girl?”

Dusty glanced at him and locked eyes with Gladys for a moment.  The older woman didn’t know what to say and turned back to the conversation between Fred and the biker with the gun.

DethM8

“You want me to freshen that for you, dear?” Gladys’ hand shook. She knew she shouldn’t be talking to the man. Her instinct told her so, but it went against her nature just the same. He was just sitting there, had been just sitting there for the last twenty-three minutes. Not moving, not talking, not even taking a sip of the now tepid cup setting uselessly between his leather-clad forearms, quietly anchored to the edge of the counter.

She’d given him the coffee out of reflex. Everyone who made it way out here wanted coffee. In fact, it was the only halfway decent thing on the menu. But the man had made no attempt to thank her or even acknowledge she’d set the cup down in front of him.

After a few minutes of awkward quiet, Arnie had politely folded up the Classified section of his newspaper and moved away from the stool next to the man all the way down to the next-to-last one at the counter, surreptitiously eyeing him the whole time. Arlene, the new girl, on one of her vigilant patrols through her section, had spotted Arnie’s abandoned pie, furrowed her brow as she swooped down on it and retreated to the kitchen. Neither the man on the stool nor Arnie had complained.

So Gladys had gone back to her other customers, which consisted of a woman in a power suit, Arnie, whom she’d refreshed with a new wedge of blueberry pie, and an older couple on the opposite end of the L of the counter. After Arnie’s pie, no one needed anything and Fred had abandoned the kitchen to have a smoke in the alley, so she’d busied herself with cleaning imaginary crumbs off the counter to keep herself from dwelling too much on the man with the coffee.

At least, she supposed he was a man. Gladys didn’t know anything for certain. He’d bellied up to the counter while she was serving the couple their shared plate of ham omelette and hash browns and thus, hadn’t been able to gauge ‘him’ by his walk. He must have had a motorcycle or else why would he be wearing the helmet?

Why would he still be wearing the helmet? Was a more likely question. It had gone beyond plain old rudeness and had crossed squarely into the territory of weird. But Gladys had taken on all customers falling in the wide expanse between annoying and strange and despite the fact she could feel the constant weight of him no matter what she was doing—currently sweeping up the imaginary crumbs she’d brushed onto the floor while wiping the counter—she could bear it. At the end of the day, she’d prop her toesies up and watch The Real Housewives of Atlanta with a nice cold beer and Doyle curled up tightly at her side.

It had been Arlene’s bright idea to divide the floor up into sections. She’d explained to Gladys, the Spoon’s matriarchal waitress, how it was fairer. She’d divised a simple seating system that would distribute patrons throughout the restaurant that wouldn’t require them to run like racehorses to make sure everybody was served. Besides, the Seat Yourself sign wasn’t very welcoming and they should all have a hand in greeting the customers as they came in.

It had been slow-going at first. Nobody likes change, especially customers, but Arlene had been persistent, gently reminding the folks who had seated themselves that they should wait by the door until someone could usher them to a table or booth. Always with a smile—on her face and in her voice and always in a sing-songy tone of voice followed up with a ‘it’s not a big deal’ and a small wrist wave-off.

But it was a big deal. Despite the tone she’d used with these people, Arlene had been militant in enforcement and had given her speech to people regardless of whether or not they’d been coming in for years or they were first timers and even after the other waitresses had already begun waiting on them.

She was set to begin her first semester at the community college in the fall, using her summer to earn extra cash to save up for the car she would inevitably need to carry her to the job she would have to work to pay for everything else scholarship and student aid couldn’t pay for. Arlene had known Dusty would fall into step with her right away and with little explanation and she’d enlisted her before going to Gladys to tell her of the changes she’d made.

The much older woman had eyed her from above her considerable breasts, but known she’d already been defeated even without the help of timid little Dusty. Arlene had a not-so-secret weapon that she never hesitated to use to her advantage: she was pretty. Blonde and blue-eyed, full-lipped, and round-hipped, Arlene was used to getting what she wanted ever since Bobby Ferguson had given her his entire lunch in the seventh grade simply because she’d asked. He’d gotten a blank lust-look in his eyes when she’d spoken to him that she’d realized a short while later most boys and some men got when she spoke to them, and thus had created a habit of asking in her most pleasant voice for things that she didn’t necessarily always want; simply to build upon a newly realized muscle.

Women, for the most part, were immune to Arlene’s Pretty, and she supposed that included Gladys, but that was also part of the fun to changing things around at the Spoon. On those rare occasions when she couldn’t bat her eyes and smile to get her way, she circumvented that person and took even more joy in crushing the stalwart. This was fun for her in two ways: she got what she wanted and she got to show whomever the speed bump was on the path to her way that she got what she wanted.

There were other girls who no doubt could and did do what Arlene did, but for one keen difference. Those other girls had to rely on their Pretty because they were completely inept at doing anything for themselves. Girls who were pampered by mommy and daddy and never told no for anything up unto the point of murder. Arlene had had the benefit of being an ugly duckling until she was twelve added to the fact her daddy had gone rogue and shacked up with some sweet thing in Maine of all places. After he’d left and was decidedly not coming back, Arlene had vowed to be something so significant, so powerful that the next time her daddy heard anything from her that it wouldn’t be from her directly. She would do something so significant she would reach him by reputation alone. Someday, a by-product of her fame would be her daddy knocking on her door.

But Arlene would have to make sure Gladys first.

Sure, she’d come at the older woman with Dusty in tow, wielding the threat of ‘But Fred said it was okay’. Fred was chief cook and the owner of the Spoon’s nephew. Gladys had been waitressing here for a hundred years or so and needed to be brought down a peg in Arlene’s opinion. Besides, the system was to her benefit, really. She got to stay behind the counter instead of swooping all over the floor to wait tables. Under Arlene’s system, waitress A opened and handled the whole floor for two hours until waitress B came in. Waitress A rotated to the back, while B took the front and waitress C ‘floated’, coming in an hour before the lunch rush. Gladys was always waitress C in Arlene’s scenario and rather than floating she manned the counter. It was really for her own good because she had really bad feet and had to wear orthopedic shoes.

If there had been an actual dinner rush then Arlene would have devised a system for that too. But as it stood, by the time lunch was done the Spoon had probably seen at least eighty percent of its patrons for the day and A and B, or rather, Arlene and Dusty would leave around one o’clock and three, respectively. The system worked perfectly with the three other part-time waitresses. The only hold-out had been Gladys. But hold-out was the wrong word—agitator was more like it.

Arlene was vigilant about keeping the floor as tidy as possible. She had a personal philosophy of no table remaining unbussed for more than five minutes after a customer had left. But she was hesitant in enforcing such a rule because Dusty was as slow as molasses and if anything, when her dirty tables piled up that meant her having to shuttle her overflow of customers to Arlene’s section.

And Dusty had almost always asked Arlene to take the front section, expecting it to be just too much for her and Arlene would either accept or deny the switch depending on whether or not she felt like it while keeping her own shift, which meant she still left first and had the better section for the rush.

Arlene had just passed by the man in the leather jacket with the little plate of half-eaten pie. She hadn’t known whose it was and had spotted Gladys glowering at her for some reason. The man in the leather jacket was weird. She’d seen him just sitting in the exact same position a half dozen times with the cup of coffee Gladys always insisted on pouring for people before they even ordered it. She reminded herself to speak to Fred later. But the man in the leather jacket still hadn’t taken off his helmet. And worse still was the leather. It had to be at least eighty-five outside and not only was the jacket zipped all the way up, but he had on leather gloves to boot.

When she came out of the kitchen her mind was already made up to use her Pretty to get the man to leave. If he were creeping her out, what must he be doing to the other customers?

“Excuse me, sir?” she slid up alongside him, not touching but clearly a few inches inside of his personal space. The coffee must have been ice cold because all she could smell was the leather material of his jacket and the copper of the metal zipper. “Any minute now we’re going to start getting a flood of customers coming in and maybe I might be able to get you cashed out so you can go ahead and go before we get too busy for ya?

He didn’t answer. He didn’t even turn his head to look at her. Another man sat at the counter a few stools down.

Maybe he hadn’t heard under that helmet. Maybe he’d fallen asleep? Arlene didn’t know, she’d never ridden on anything requiring a helmet. Didn’t you wear those things with motorcycles? Arlene stole a peek outside before looking at the man again. Nothing in the parking lot but cars.

She chanced a step closer and reached to tap him on the shoulder to get his attention when Gladys in her peripheral vision caught her eye.

The old woman shook her head, pulling a towel taut between her hands as if she could vanish her considerable bulk behind it or she was anticipating a charging bull any moment. Whatever she wanted, it seemed urgent. Arlene was hesitant at first, but seeing Gladys wanted something immediately—wanted her for something immediately—all the more reason for Arlene to ignore her and continue her current course of action. “Excuse me,” she said again with a little more force. The man continued ignoring her and Arlene saw Gladys gesticulating from the corner of her eye.

Arlene relished a challenge and this particular customer had just been upgraded to one rather than a fish to be catalogued and abruptly ignored from the ocean of the annoying Arlene dealt with on a daily basis. In moments like these, she became even more charming. She leaned in, opened the floodgates of Pretty, batting her eyes as she laid a hand on a leather-clad shoulder.

Arlene immediately pulled back, swiping her hand on her apron. Something was wrong. She frowned, looking down at her palm at something wriggling there, but was so far invisible.

“I’m sorry,” she said to no one in particular, for reasons she didn’t know and retreated. A wave of nausea passed through her and her bowels clenched. She felt decidedly unpretty at the moment. She glanced up briefly at Gladys whose worried look had a decidedly different tone to it suddenly.

“I think I need… I think I need to go home.” Arlene’s brain had configured the words and she’d made conscious effort to speak them, but they were foreign constructs coming out of her mouth. She had a detached, miles away feeling, the smell of a burger on the grill growing closer as she weaved behind the counter and pushed through the double doors to the kitchen. She studied the scent in a curious manner, not because she didn’t know what it was, but because she found herself able to focus in on it with complete clarity.

“You okay?” Gladys asked, stopping her just inside the kitchen with a hand hooked into the crook of her arm, turning her a hundred eighty degrees. It took Arlene a moment to focus on the words and the woman in front of her. Again the words were familiar, but she found herself working to translate them into something she understood. Arlene nodded slowly.

“I just… wanna go home.” Gladys nodded.

Arlene realized with utter certainty she was in shock. She’d never been in shock before, but knew it in the same way might recognize the word ‘ubiquitous’ upon first reading it. Now that that was out of the way, she turned away from Gladys, sliding her arm easily out of the older woman’s loose grasp and looked at the burger Fred was currently mashing down to a fine patty. Smoke squirted out of the sides and the scent of it blossomed even greater in her nose. He turned to grab a bun to and Arlene had to resist the urge to reach out with her bare hand and scoop it off the grill and eat it.

“I wanna go home.” Arlene fled to the breakroom.

The Ravin

I am proud to announce that The Zombie Show will have an exclusive excerpt of Mark Tufo's upcoming novel, The Ravin.  Tufo is also the author of the smash hit Zombie Fallout series and you can read the first ten pages of it after you finish The Zombie Show.  I'll be interviewing Mark here and on Razorline Press about this and upcoming stuff.