Flash Fiction #14: Mab

Bad dreams become something you live with.  Like insomnia, they are a sickness that invade your waking life, fraying the edges of everything around you.  They make colours duller or too bright, noises become so high that you wince and flinch at the slightest sound.  Shadows seem to move of their own accord in the corner of your eye.  Christie could pretty much write the book on the subject.

She's not always been this way.  Up until a few months ago, she'd slept like a baby most nights.  The nightmares began gradually; at first she put it down to stress.  Then they became more and more frequent.  Christie would wake every night drenched in sweat, her chest tight with terror.  Specific details evaded her - what little memory she had was of a pair of eyes always watching her.  Hazel eyes that should have been beautiful, but weren't.

This last week, it's got worse.  Christie has woken sobbing.  Angry red marks on her arms and legs show that she has been scratching herself in her sleep.  No amount of makeup can counter her deathly pallor or the shadowy bags under her eyes.

She dreads coming home each day.  The house itself has become a part of the disease; her unmade bed is like an albatross in the back of her mind, waiting for her to lie down and close her eyes each night so it can torment her until sunrise.  And always, they are there - the eyes that should be beautiful, but aren't.

Tonight, Christie takes more sleeping pills than the bottle advises.  Not enough to harm herself, she's no idiot, but hopefully enough to take her down deep enough, below the night terrors.  Darkness and silence, for just a few hours, are all Christie wants.  Sick of all the herbal teas that have failed to work, she washes the pills down with a glass of whiskey.  There.  A deep, restful sleep should be no problem now.

When she collapses onto the bed, still in her clothes, the mattress feels more comfortable than it has in months.  The sheets are softer, more inviting, than ever before.  Christie allows herself a smile as the ceiling fades above her.  Her eyes drift closed.  The beams and floorboards which occasionally creak in this old house are silent tonight.  Christie exhales quietly, feeling weeks of tension and anxiety leave her body.

She feels something cold against her cheek.  Her eyes snap open.  Another woman kneels over her on the bed, leant so far forward that her face is level with Christie's.  When she sees Christie's eyes open, she claps her hands silently.

Black hair.  Hazel eyes.  Thin lips, so pale they are almost white.  What Christie had felt on her cheek were long, slick-looking fingernails, painted black.  Christie thinks of the scratches on her arms and legs.  This creature, this woman - she was responsible.  They were never dreams.

She is unable to cry for help; the breath freezes in her throat.  All she can whisper is: "Who are you?"

"Mab," the woman says, stretching her thin white lips into a smile.  It is the unkindest thing Christie has ever seen.  "I'm your faery godmother."

"I don't believe in faeries," Christie rasps.

"Oh, you beautiful thing," the faery laughs quietly.  "You beautiful, wretched thing.  What difference does that make?"

Christie tries to move, but it is as if she is paralysed.  Sitting atop her, Mab weighs nothing at all; but beneath her she is powerless.

"I'm scared," she says.

"I know," answers the faery.  "They always are.  But I'm going to make your wish come true."

Terrified before, now Christie is puzzled.

"My wish?"

"Darkness and silence," Mab whispers in her ear.  Her ice cold breath makes Christie shiver.  Then; "Wish granted."  She smiles, and kisses Christie's cheek as gently, as lightly, as if she were made of gossamer.  "I'll take you down, sweetie.  Deep, deep down."

Christie opens her mouth to scream, but Mab's white lips are on hers.  The room around her vanishes into blackness.  The bed seems to drop from beneath her until she is falling, or floating, no shapes or sounds around her - just the cold impression left by Mab's kiss.

~

Flash Fiction #13: Battle Cry Of The Ginger Stepchild

"If ever there were an argument for strawberry blonde," my mother opined, "it would be you, my dear."

She was being kind. Unfortunately, we both knew that 'strawberry blonde' was just a white lie other parents told their kids. I was undeniably ginger, and therefore, in mortal danger.

When the first body was found in one of the fields between Telford and Bridgnorth, a young woman of twenty, the region had gone into shock. The papers called it a local tragedy, and everybody moved on with their lives. After a second body washed up on the banks of the Severn, a man this time, nobody dared voice their fears. But when a young couple walking their dog in the woods discovered the third red-haired corpse, word spread fast. Somebody was killing gingers.

Living in Shropshire, I'd never found myself in the path of a serial killer before. Part of me felt flattered. Of course, the rest of me just didn't want to die. If I'd been born in another time, they might have drowned me at birth for my hair colour, presumed me evil. Lucky then, one could say, that I had reached nineteen at all.

The three dead gingers - they'd had their throats cut. When it became apparent that somebody was targeting individuals of the auburn persuasion, the papers had a field day. Every combination of the words "red" and "dead" were used to the point of exhaustion.

I was the only ginger in my family, by the way. My mother was fair, my step-dad dark. My father, the out of the picture one, he'd been the one to pass on “the curse”. Every family photo made me look like the result of a fling with a flame-haired milkman.

“Stop thinking, darling,” my mother drawled whilst applying lipstick. “You'll get lines.”

“I can't help it,” I told her. “How am I to know I won't be next?”

A look of genuine concern flitted across my mother's usually impassive, impeccable countenance. Only for a second, mind. She'd just applied foundation.

“There must be hundreds of redheads in Shropshire,” she said after a moment's thought. “Thousands, even.”

“Your reassurance warms my chilled heart.”

“Oh, sweetie.” She looked up from her compact mirror and smiled. “What is it you want me to say? That everything is going to be just fine? I firmly believe that it will, but I've not been able to shut you up that easily since you were twelve.”

This was true. Compared to my older brother and sister, I was considered “difficult”.

“Where are you off to again?” I asked her.

“Theatre,” she said, lost in her mirror once again. “With the girls.”

“You mean he's going to be in all night?”

“Yes, your stepfather is going to be in the house all evening with you. Try not to think of it as a punishment, sweetie.”

I hated him. I couldn't even pretend any more that I didn't. And the feeling was deeply, irrevocably mutual. I kissed my mother on the cheek, wished her a pleasant evening, then sat down to simmer. If only there was some way I could get rid of him. When he first married my mother, I had tried all kinds of tricks to get him to leave. I'd told so many lies, pulled so many stunts, that nothing I attempted now would be credible.

Unless...

No, I couldn't. Could I?

At that moment he came into the living room, walking past me on the way to the kitchen. His aftershave, something that would smell awful even on a man half his age, made my nose wrinkle.

“Alright, ginge?” He asked casually.

“I'm strawberry blonde,” I muttered under my breath. Then, even quieter: “Bastard.”

And I knew what I was going to do. But I'd have to plan it properly first. Get it all straight in my head before I acted. The devil, after all, was in the details.

***

From the front page of The Shropshire Star, Friday 27^th May 2011:

RED KILLER DEAD

After a reign of terror that lasted four months, the identity of the slayer of three young people in the county of Shropshire has been discovered by the authorities. We can reveal that the killer, who can not yet be name publicly, died in a struggle with his intended prey. In a shocking twist, a source close to the West Mercia Police has informed us that the fourth would-be victim was, in fact, the killer's own stepchild. Although an official statement is pending, it is believed that they acted in self-defence and will not be penalised for their actions. Quite the opposite, in fact: this unnamed teen will likely meet with the support and gratitude of the community for bringing the killer of three to justice. Considering the tragedies through which the people of Shropshire have lived recently, a hero with red hair could not be more appropriate symbol of better times to come.

~

Top 5: Stephen King and the "Final Girl"

In the same way that Joss Whedon's feminist beliefs compel him to imperil beautiful girls in order for them to fight their way to freedom, so Stephen King brings us tale after tale of ordinary women (and plenty of men) who find themselves in the most nightmarish of scenarios and must risk everything to survive.  This Top 5 post is dedicated to that classic horror trope, the "final girl" - the female who, through cunning or skill or sheer virtue, stands triumphant at the end of the tale.

Spoilers may lie ahead for readers not familiar with all of Stephen King's work - so, you know. Beware.

5. Lisey
LISEY'S STORY
There's a tiny clue in the title of this novel as to which character might last to the final page.  As everything in the book is from Lisey's perspective, one might suspect that there is no feeling of danger - but King still manages to make the reader fear for Lisey as she discovers the unreal world that her late husband spent much of his troubled life in.  More than any other King novel, Lisey's Story is about empowerment.  Having long been the supportive wife, Lisey is forced to walk into hell alone, and come out the other side.

4. Sue Snell
CARRIE
It would be easy enough to remember the ending of Carrie, which we all read a long time ago, as one where everybody ended up dead.  Not quite: Sue Snell, the popular girl who tried to do something nice for outcast Carrie White, survives to witness the destruction her own actions caused.  If she hadn't encouraged her boyfriend to take Carrie to the prom, then the unfortunate pig's blood incident would never have happened, and all those cruel teenagers who tormented her would still be alive.  Actually, come to think of it, it sounds like an unconventionally happy ending to me.

3. Wendy
THE SHINING
Motherly love never came stronger than it did in Wendy Torrance.  A large, uneasy portion of The Shining is spent watching her walk on eggshells around her recovering alcoholic husband, all the while being eaten up inside with fear and anger at what might happen to their son Danny if Jack falls off the wagon.  Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation did nothing to convey the lioness-defending-her-cub strength of character that Wendy embodies in the book - shattered bones and a head injury do not stop her dragging herself, inch by painful inch, to Danny's aid.

2. Rosie
ROSE MADDER
This story is one of numerous trials.  Rose Daniels suffers for years at the hands of a violent, abusive husband.  When she finally works up the courage to leave him, an even more terrifying journey begins, as she finds herself drawn into a dream-like painted world, where her fearsome doppelänger holds the key to vengeance.  Rose's survival is a triumph, but is shadowed by an epilogue which reveals (SPOILERS) she has inherited her former husband's bloody rages.


1. Jessie
GERALD'S GAME
Personally, I think the word "harrowing" is overused, especially when describing books.  But in this case I find it incredibly apt - I was as attached to Jessie's ordeal as she was to the bed.  When a simple sex game goes awry and Jessie is left naked and alone, it is not death that poses a threat.  It is the voices.  The madness.  And the misshapen face that keeps emerging from the shadows.  Gerald's Game is not a supernatural novel, making the unlikely peril Jessie faces feel all the more real.

"Little Death" Extract 5: Sleeper

The entire room seems to rock but they know it’s just them, just the cheap headboard clattering lightly against the wall.  Their lovemaking is electric – or is that the static hum of the light bulb that hangs naked over them?  When he comes, her whole body seems to tighten around him, her arms wrapped firmly around his shoulders, her legs intertwined with his until it feels like he's falling into her, becoming swallowed whole by her embrace.  Then the euphoria clears and he realises he is merely lying on top of a hooker, and a bored one at that.  She looks up at him, as if to query whether they are done here, and the unflinching eye contact makes him queasy. 

Out in the hallway, Eli exhales heavily, his itch scratched.  A familiar glow settles under his skin, but the satisfaction he feels is as empty as that of the man on the other side of the wall.  Sometimes you eat simply to keep going.  It unsettles him, the frequency with which his hunger has been surfacing these last few weeks.  It seems that every time he passes a building where somebody inside is indulging in personal fantasy, or two lovers are grabbing a moment of urgent pleasure, he is drawn to it.  The energy created in such an instant has proven irresistible, and Eli has known for a long time now that other people do not feel such a pull.

For most, sex is about the physical sensation, the gratification of the self.  Eli learned the appeal of this as an adolescent, just like everybody else.  But he learned at the same time that what he felt on the surface wasn’t necessarily what nourished him.  It was during somebody else’s release that he sensed their soul open, and felt something inside himself reach out and grab at their essence like a greedy child.

Eli’s early lovers, following a night in his bed, always awoke with a feeling of fatigue, of faint illness.  As if a tiny portion of their life force had been diminished.  Of course they would dismiss this thought with an empty laugh, and a day or so later the memory of it would fade as they were restored.

There are no lasting effects.  The mantra that Eli mouths to himself day and night, to abate the guilt and to justify doing it again.  And again.  They always recover, so long as it only happens the once.  Eli has never been bold enough to attempt feeding on the same person more than a couple of times; the after-effects become more pronounced, take longer to shake off, and God only knows what after that.  Until Jerome, he’d made a habit of not staying around for long enough to find out.

Of course, Eli sleeps with Jerome.  They make love; they do insane things to each other in the shower; they have dozy and stale morning sex.  But Eli has never reached into him and taken what he needs.  Doing that, treating Jerome like someone he could use, no different from any of the others, it would sully the only pure thing Eli has ever had.  He would sooner die.

It’s colder tonight than it has been in weeks.  The night air gets under the thin cotton of his shirt and stays there, chilling him to the bone, his heady afterglow already dissipating.  The guilt will seep in faster this time, he can tell.  Like floodwater under a door.  At least there was no actual physical contact on his part this time.  Although a petty justification like that falls flat against all the other times that there were.

He is only a few streets away from home when he passes Anna.  For a while he’d had a theory that she was like him.  Some nights he’d see her in the bar alone, pale and languid.  Other times, her complexion would have a healthy flush and she’d be laughing with her companions.  And for somebody who spent so much time in a restaurant, she didn’t eat a lot.  Hungry for other things, perhaps.  But Eli hadn’t even been able to begin to think how he could broach such a subject with anyone, much less somebody like Anna.  And so he’d said nothing, and after a while his theory fell by the wayside.

The high has completely worn off by the time he reaches the apartment block.  Back to reality.  He feels his belly growl, and he tries to remember the last time he ate.  The entire day had been spent painting, and Jerome had taken the lunchtime shift so as soon as he got home they’d shut the bedroom door and not opened it again for hours.  His boyish mouth twitches into a dirty smile.  He wishes that could be enough.  More than anything.

He knows something is wrong as soon as he opens the door to the apartment.  He feels it in the pit of his stomach, and elsewhere.  The sense that tells him when he needs to feed, now it’s telling him there is something in the bedroom.  Something sick and malignant that doesn’t belong there.

Eli races across the living room and through the bedroom door.  Jerome lies on the bed, fast asleep.  At first, Eli mistakes the shadow on his chest for a trick of the light.  Then it moves, and a pair of yellowed eyes fix on him.  Eli realises he has disturbed something, and whatever that thing on the bed is, it doesn’t appreciate the interruption.  How the fuck did he think it was a shadow?  Perched on Jerome’s torso like a cat might be, only three times the size with long spindly arms and squat hind legs, it is more solid, more visible than it was a moment ago.  While at first its body had seemed shadowy and insubstantial, now it glistens like tar.  Eli’s first thought is of a gargoyle, or a gremlin.  A broad grin exposes a mouthful of crooked teeth the colour of charcoal.  A stretched, misshapen nose further distorts its wretched face.

He wants to scream.  He wants to yell his head off, to wake Jerome and call for help, to run back out of the bedroom as fast as he can.  But he stays rooted to the spot.  Not entirely from terror, but rather out of curiosity.  What in hell is it?  Its narrow amber gaze has not strayed from Eli, as if it is just as fascinated and repulsed by him as he is by it.

“Get out,” Eli says, more calmly than he would have thought possible.  “Get away from him.”  Jerome’s expression is one of pain, and fear.  Unconscious or not, he is suffering at the hands of this creature.  Eli takes a step forward, then another.  The closer he gets to the thing, the more his right hand itches, closing into a fist and then opening, fingers outstretched. 

Kill it.

Where did that come from?  He doesn’t have time to ponder the question; the creature has turned back to face Jerome, as if it knows it is only a matter of moments before Eli reaches the bed, and it needs to finish its unholy business.  It places a gnarled, slick hand on Jerome’s chest, and the gesture is so familiar to Eli that he feels sick to his stomach.

It is feeding.

Any trepidation he’d felt up until now vanishes.  He bolts over to the bed, arms outreached, ready to throttle the creature if necessary.  Anything to stop it from taking from Jerome what he had been so careful all this time to honour.  Its eyes snap back to him and it lets out a hideous, eldritch shriek.  By the time Eli’s hands close around the air where its body had been, it has vanished.  It simply isn’t there anymore.

“No,” Eli barks.  “No!” 

“Wha...?”  Jerome is waking up.  Eli sits down on the mattress beside him and pulls him into a hug, one that is tighter than is comfortable for either of them.

“I’ve been having some fucking weird dreams,” Jerome gasps.  “Some pretty twisted stuff, actually...”  He is short of breath.  Eli can’t meet his eye.  Jerome’s skin is pallid, drenched with sweat.  Eli has seen this before, has been the cause of this in others.  His cheeks flush with shame, and he buries his face in Jerome’s bare chest.  His boyfriend’s arms close around him, then he feels Jerome lower himself back onto the bed.  Eli pulls his feet off the floor and lies down next to him, even though he has never felt more awake.

“Sleep,” he says, as if Jerome is the one who needs reassuring. “It was just a bad dream.”  Jerome grunts something non-committal in response.

You didn’t tell him.

Eli ignores that thought, and tries to expel the other one, the one from earlier.  The impulse he’d felt to beat whatever life remained in that creature right out of it.

He’s never seen anything like it before.  Something that ugly, that inhuman – it can’t be real.  And yet, he had not panicked, or reacted with terror.  He’d been curious.  Because as grotesque as it was, it was the closest he’d come to anything even remotely similar to himself.  And just like that, the thought crosses his mind.  The hunger he feels, the need he gets.  The possibility that he’s just seen its true face.

“That’s not me,” he whispers to himself, so quietly that a dozing Jerome does not hear him.  “Not even a little bit.”

Then why, when it looked at him, did its eyes flash with something akin to recognition?

  

Book Review: Apartment 16 by Adam Nevill

Some books you love.  Some books you hate.  And then, there are some books that you struggle with.  For me, Adam Nevill's Apartment 16, a tale of otherworldly suspense, began as a joy, then became a labour to finish.  And here's why:

 

The story is told from two perspectives; that of Seth, the nightwatchman at Barrington House, and Apryl, the girl just off the plane from America, here in London to claim her late aunt's estate.  The opening is promising, with both narrators providing a compelling account of their experiences in Barrington House - Apryl discovers that her aunt banished all picture frames and mirrors from her walls, while Seth is at first drawn to, and then obsessed by the sounds coming from behind the door of the abandoned Apartment 16.

 

Then events move from the sinister to the more explicitly unnerving.  Seth is approached by a young boy who nobody else can see, who seems to know a lot about Seth's life and the apartment.  Apryl becomes convinced somebody is watching her while she sleeps, and decides to research the history of the building.

 

Without giving too much of the plot away, the second half of the novel is almost unbearably tense as the author slowly reveals layer upon layer of detail.  The former occupant of the apartment was a troubled genius, the building may or may not house an ancient consciousness, and both Apryl and Seth are more constantly plagued by horrific, Lovecraftian visions.

 

Minor Spoilers Ahead!

 

My main problem with this novel (apart from the occasionally clunky dialogue on Apryl's part) is the denouement.  I had begun the story rooting for all of the characters, only to find that one of them has been transformed into a villain.  Also, following the climactic scenes in Apartment 16, I was left with the feeling that nothing had been resolved.  This could well be Adam Nevill's plan, either setting the scene for a sequel or simply leaving the reader with a bleak sense of terror, as good has not triumphed over evil, but merely retreated.

 

This is definitely a book for lovers of the horror genre, with several moments of genuine suspense and mostly excellent prose that never descends into hokum or cliche.  Its city setting, and often depressing depictions of central London as an urban hell, ground the story in reality and make it all the more affecting.

 

I'll give this one 4 out of 5, as I really liked Nevill's writing style, but felt that he made too obvious an effort to get the reader to empathise with Apryl, when Seth was by far the more interesting character.

Teaser Tuesday (15th Feb 2011)

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by MizB ofShould Be Reading. Anyone can play along! Just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

My teaser:

Seth gritted his teeth and felt the comforting glow of anger replace his fear and panic.  Soon, a great molten power coursed through his every limb.

- From page 98 of "Apartment 16" by Adam Nevill.