Interview From Hell
The City of Hell Chronicles anthology is almost upon us.
But the Great Maurr hath no mercy and put to us the Interview From Hell. Will my fellow contributors and I make it out alive?
Pet from Hell
Colin Barnes:
All my pets have been great. But in the theme of the question I did once have a dog called Satan. He was a rescue dog from an abusive owner. When we first had him he would try and bite us, but eventually he turned into the cutest, loveable beast you could imagine.
Victoria Griesdoorn:
I was visiting a friend once who had ferrets. They were lovely looking creatures but absolutely evil! They roamed the house free and had a habit of pouncing on your hands when you weren't looking, and not gently without using teeth either!
Ren Warom:
None. I've had awesome pets. But I used to keep snail farms when I was a snotty nosed, knock-kneed, geeky little pre-teen. Yeah… snail farms. Yum.
Kendall Grey:
We had three ferrets, Puck, Pan, and Joy. They were the coolest pets ever, but Pan had a bit of a foot fetish. Our roommate was once the unfortunate victim of Pan's obsession. She lifted her foot, and he held on by this badass carnivorous canines, dangling like the furriest toe bling you ever laid eyes on. After that, we called him Shark Boy.
Anne Michaud:
I had a hamster, he liked to bite but I didn't find out until I put it under my sister's shirt as a prank. Yep, she didn't like that at all.
Belinda Frisch:
I am an animal lover. We have two Shetland Sheepdogs and two sugar gliders (marsupials.) Now, a glider is only weighs a few ounces. They're sweet and tiny and normally not an issue unless it's after 9 p.m. at which point they become a flight risk and impossible to catch. I'm going to have to segue here because I'm small. 5 ft tall and I wear size 5 shoes. Women's shoes do not come in size 5 almost ever. Seriously, try to find a nice pair of heels in that size. I ordered a great pair of patent leather Steve Madden's to wear with dress clothes. This is where the pets come in. My family and I took a trip to Virginia, but on the way home, hit some hellacious Washington DC traffic. I was starving for a snack and my husband buried the 'travel food' under a pile of other things. My son rummaged for snacks and inadvertently opened my shoe box. By the time we got back to NY, the tiny little few ounce critters had EATEN the shoes. Now, they didn't devour them, but I did have to throw them out and only got to wear them a handful of times. I still miss them.
Amy Overley:
One of my ex-boyfriends owned the Dog-From-Hell. Her name was Zuki, and she was a pug. He would pull her onto his lap and talk to her in baby talk as she snorted dog snot all over him in adulation. Because of her smashed nose, she breathed like Darth Vader. The dog could do no wrong in the eyes of my ex, even when she dragged my underwear out of my suitcase and chewed it to pieces under the bed at night. Have you ever tried getting in the mood with a furry goblin lurking under the bed, plotting to snag your intimates at the first available opportunity? She was a pint-sized manipulator in a dog suit. She would do the most awful things when he wasn't looking, then give him giant puppy eyes in feigned innocence. And he fell for it! Our relationship was over the day he accused me of shredding his favorite tie in an attempt to frame the dog.
Car from Hell
Colin Barnes:
I've had many of these, the worst being a crappy Rover 200 sport. I had it for just two days and the head gasket blew on Xmas eve while I was doing 80 in the outside lane of a motorway. Luckily I paid by cheque. I phoned the bank and cancelled the cheque and let the dealer go pick it up from the roadside. If it was busier that day I could have been in a serious accident. My current car isn't much better and seems to cost a fortune every other month for parts and repairs. I hate it.
Victoria Griesdoorn:
My dad works in vehicle salvage. Guess what happens when a truck breaks down? An even bigger truck shows up to tow it! I once got to sit in that truck tow truck (say that 10 times fast) and paled when my dad told me how many gears it has. 32! It's a multi-layer gearbox and the first 8 are used just to get it to pull up.
Ren Warom:
I've only had the one. Ron Burgundy. He's falling apart and I love him too much to say he's the car from hell. But when his front number plate recently fell off I did turn to my eldest and say 'well, at least it wasn't the doors, or the engine' in one of those cheerful voices you get when you're about to go all Jason Vorhees.
Kendall Grey:
My first car. I was sixteen. My parents paid $200 for it. Some Pontiac piece of shite. White with red interior. It broke down every other week. Transmission, overheating, tires—you name it. This was before cell phones too, which totally sucked because I had to knock on strangers' doors and beg to use their phone so my dad could rescue me. Hated that busted-ass vehicle.
Anne Michaud:
It started with this unhealthy love for my old Volvo until the shock-absorbers died and with every pothole (and Satan knows how many we have up here in Canadaland), I felt like I was in a rap video as the car went up and down, up and down. Word.
Belinda Frisch:
The car from hell wasn't mine, it belonged to my high school boyfriend. It was a Renault Alliance, blue with hideous interior "custom decorated" by his friends who burned their names into the backs of the seats with cigarettes. The floor was rotting out of it and it didn't have reverse. Literally, it did not go backward. I had to borrow this gem one day while my own was completely out of commission (as kid cars will be) and got stuck because I couldn't find a pull-through parking spot. Needless to say, reverse consisted of putting the car in neutral, opening the driver's door and pushing off with your feet. I've mentioned I'm short, so this was QUITE a spectacle. Said ex-boyfriend crashed this car into a utility pole some years after we split up. Oddly enough, THEN reverse came back.
Amy Overley:
When I was a teenager our family car was a minivan. My mother loved it. I hated it. Being hauled around in a minivan the color of mud did serious damage to my credibility as a cool teen. It was even equipped with a car phone, the latest model that was as big as your head. One night as I was driving home from my summer waitressing job, I was hit by an oncoming Cadillac. I was fine, but the minivan was totaled. My mother still claims that I did it on purpose.
Check out the rest of the City of Hell crew's Interview from Hell:
November 14: Colin Barnes – Ride from Hell; Boss/Coworker from Hell
November 16: Ren Warom – Day from Hell; Illness from Hell
November 17: Kendall Grey – Vacation from Hell; Family Member from Hell
November 18: Anne Michaud – Kid from Hell; Friend from Hell
November 21: Belinda Frisch – Binge from Hell; Book from Hell
November 22: Amy Overley – Meal from Hell; Bug Bite from Hell
Find out more about the City of Hell and its inhabitants here, or like us on Facebook!
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Victoria is a scientist by day--reluctant writer by night, Clarion Write-a-Thon survivor, slush reader for Dark Fiction Magazine, and founder and editor of the 'of Altered States' anthology series.
Victoria has short fiction published in the upcoming City of Hell Chronicles and 100 Horrors anthologies. She's also writing her first novel; a tale of magical realism.
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