Alphabet City

Alphabet City

            Along every boulevard, every lane, ally and street – from the relatively tourist free thrifty neighborhoods of Soho to the flooded hub of Time Square—are hundreds upon hundreds of drainage ditches covered by a thin sturdy layer of steel grating. Big grates of cross hatched metal, bearing the weight of hundreds of bodies trotting across them; grates all over the city—grates that you, no matter your age, walk across with trepidation, always fully expecting to fall into the pit below.

            Carefully, I treaded across these grease covered masses of twisted steel for my first two years living in the Loisaida, most often preferring to walk around them despite the fact that these holes can sometimes blow warm air up like a city wide radiator during the chilly winter months. Dozens of times – ok, maybe only the half dozen times—when I would embolden myself and force my feet to cross the girded pit-like domains I never really believed that I could actually fall through into the cage below street level—it was, I told myself, a childlike irrational fear—but ice is a funny thing: Apparently, there is an angle at which, if you hit the grate with just the right amount of force and in just the right spot, the grate will flip on itself, leaving you landing in a sludgy rat infested hole, brimming with dog refuse and all kinds of animal piss. Even as I tumbled backwards through the steel bars, I could feel the peculiar absence of eyes on the street: I had managed to fall through the only deserted street in all of Manhattan. Fortune did not smile on me that day; it chose to take a crap on me instead.

 Gradually I awoke from my landing feeling the lightest sprinkling of rain on my face. How long I had been down here, in the bowls of 26^th street, only the ambient sounds of cars honking along the FDR drive pervading the stale air, I had no idea; all I knew was that I was lying on my back, smothered in a sticky foul smelling slime, and that the only street light I could see sat burning directly above my prison in the ever increasing darkness.

I tested my legs and back gingerly for any breaks or sprains before hoisting myself up; I was lucky in that at least—nothing seemed to be out of place: I had only given myself a goose-egg that throbbed to a painful and steady beat. Just when I had found my bearings, the drizzling rain morphed into a veritable downpour and water began to trickle down the edges of my enclosure and pool on the dirt caked ground.

“Kill me now,” was all I could think to say when I saw the growing river at my feet wash a nearby rat carcass out from behind the remains of a cardboard pizza box. Luckily for me, I had not yet noticed that this was the only New York City grate in existence without a spillway for the water to flow down. Moments later, I realized all to quickly. No drain, nowhere for the water to go. Only up. Perhaps that was when I started to panic— to panic from trying to avoid the scruffy rat—which turned out to not be dead, only asleep, as it swam ferociously around my knees in the ever increasing water—ever increasing because, as it turned out, though the pit did not have a drain, it apparently was the drain for every other grate found in the Tristate Area; water not only flowed from a two inch pipe near the top of the wall, but also oozed, with the smell of faintly green, toxic sludge from a rather large crack in the concrete. Quickly the water rose past my thighs as the roar of the waterfall made even the sounds of the city impossible to hear.

Reasonably, with the water already reaching belly button height and with a rat clinging to the leg of my new jeans squeaking for dear life, I lost it. Sure that I was going to die in this hell hole, next to a rodent and every washed out takeout menu this side of China town, I shrieked curses and prayers to that stupid lamp blazing stoically above my head until the lamp went out all together, leaving me in half lit city darkness. To some, the newly acquired darkness would have been the end all of the situation, but for me, it was a blessing. Unlike a lot of people, if I can’t see what it is I’m touching, it becomes much easier for me to touch. Very carefully avoiding the rat that I knew was thrashing nearby, I swam over to the nearest wall and clawed carefully over its rough surface until I found the crack from which water was still pouring.

 Without my vision, unable to see the crusty slime I was touching, I was able to pull myself up to the top of the concrete and out of the maelstrom below: my fingers, raw from the effort of pulling up my entire body ached when curling themselves around the bars of the grate above me. Xanadu it was not, but it was still a better place to be than the choppy waters below; with my current position, I could not move the grate, but by placing one foot against an opposing wall and flipping my entire body around I was able to attain the leverage necessary to force the steel up and drag myself out.

You don’t always feel how tired you are until after you’ve finished doing something really difficult, but this was not one of those times: as I clawed my way back up onto the street I could feel every sinew and tendon in my arms straining for more oxygen; when I had finally gotten out and said a small eulogy for my furry friend, claimed by the sea, I staggered, wet, bedraggled and smelling of a subway terminal, back to my apartment on Avenue A: It was all I could do not to fall asleep on the welcome mat outside my door; I only barely made it to my bed… before…

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz…  

©2012-2014 Lex Vex

Love and War on a Playground

Love and War on a Playground

“No, nothing big, more like a minor… ruffling of feathers.” I felt myself smile, my pale thin lips curling up at the ends though the woman on the phone couldn’t see the gesture. The harsh breath of a stressed parent, sparked by the word ‘incident’ continued to crackle across the phone line. I readjusted the sunshine yellow phone onto my opposite shoulder and gazed out of the finger-smudged window to the empty playground. The kids were at lunch. Though the phone still buzzed with electric sound, I became momentarily distracted: Someone had stuck play dough on the right hand corner of the window, where, in the sun, it had begun to crust over and shrivel into the unfortunate shape of a man’s privates. It would take me at least a half hour to scrape the gunk off later. The phone had gone silent.

“Veronica is fine,” I said, registering the silence as an expectant one. “She hasn’t done anything wrong. She’s just… She got a bit carried away with Valentines day.”

I brought the offending piece of paper up to my face and studied it. It was the one of the worst hearts I’d ever seen. One of the worst ones after 20 years of teaching first grade: The poor lopsided mess fluttered pathetically from where it had been crumpled by the little boy who had received it. The smudgy crayon stained the page in cramped letters that shrank down the page until it was unintelligible. The backside was smothered in rainbow glitter still drying over a deranged sharpie smile and flat eyes. It was the kind of thing a mother would keep forever.

“…. What did Ronnie this time?” asked the mother, her voice wavering with impending doom.

“Well, actually, she sent a love letter, to one of the quieter little boys, Aaron. And Aaron… well, he had to be picked up by his mother because he couldn’t stop crying. The whole thing embarrassed him greatly.” I heard a nervous chuckle through the phone, and the tension I always got when speaking to anyone over the age of 15 lessened slightly.

“I am so sorry about that, Linda.” Said the woman.

“I’ve already had a talk with her about the whole thing, but really, when you come to pick her up today… I kept the letter for you. You have got to see it.” I turned over the sparkly crumpled scrap of construction paper in my hands, carefully smoothing out its rough surface. “ It’s a keeper.”

***

“What’s he got that I haven’t got?” Brandon said, nudging me in the ribs as he picked up a green tray from the towering stack at the right edge of cafeteria. Turning in the direction Brandon had indicated, I watched, out a window, a tall wiry lady escort Aaron down the sloping hill, still dotted with flecks of gray, dirty snow. His face was still red and blotchy and he was holding his mother’s hand, like the baby that he was, all the way to the parking lot. 

“He reads a lot,” I supplied in a bored voice. I’d never understood Brandon’s need to be cool to girls. Girls themselves weren’t terrible, but they weren’t really worth any interest. They weren’t usually good at soccer, judging by how easy it was to steal the ball from them with a simple fake out; they bawled the minute you teased them, landing you in timeout before you could say, “Just kidding"; they chickened out of doing anything even a little dirty: ask them to roll around in the dry dust, ask them to scoop up a sludgy mound of muddy goo to chuck at teachers when they weren’t looking, ask them to pick up a stinking nightcrawler and the answer would always be a silly scream and a giggling “Ew, no!”

“Who cares if he reads, Ben? He’s a stupid nose-picker.” Said Brandon, frowning at the crusty mashed potatoes that had landed on his plate with an audible thump. “It’s all he does: Reads under his desk when no ones looking, and picks his nose. I don’t pick my nose, and I don’t read. I bet when he picks his nose, he eats it—ow!”

While Brandon had been ranting, the line in front of the dessert rack had cleared without his notice, so I took the opportunity to shove him along. As Brandon studied the options, unable to decide between the Chocolate pudding and what we assumed to be some kind of butterscotch custard, Ronnie strode past. She held her dirty blonde head defiantly high, keeping her gaze consciously ignorant of our existence.

“Look,” said Brandon, shoving a bunch of red, white and pink papers into my already occupied hands. “I got cards from Gina, and Cloe and Carrie and even Natasha—she must have just meant that one for me and missed my basket, right? Aaron thinks girls are stupid, so why bother giving him one, especially when I can actually do cool stuff, like play soccer—have you seen Aaron try to kick the ball? No? You know why? Cause he just sits around on the swings and reads. He doesn’t even like girls!”

Personally I thought Aaron had the right idea: but there was no stopping Brandon’s tirade now: Whenever he started in on something he actually cared about, he was hooked like a four year old eating their first pixie stick: He would indulge until everything was good and finished, or till he got sick. Sometimes both. We reached the circular table by the window that we’d been assigned to last week. Already sitting at the seats nearest the window sat Ronnie and her friend, who clung to her more like an extra head than a person, Emily. Though, I guess you could say the same about Brandon and me.

Before spotting us, they had been whispering together in a way that reminded me of the way my mother and Aunt Furgie had at my cousin’s wedding, when the bride had failed to show up at the church for five hours. When the girls saw us approaching, they hushed up and were as silent as a busted walkman.

“Hey there, Ron,” Brandon said, putting on that stupid smile he only uses when girls are around or he’s been caught taking a few dollars out of his mom’s purse. He snatched up the chair next to where Ronnie sat. “So how did little baby Aaron take the proposal? Should we be expecting a wedding any day or did you decide to put it off?”

This snapped Ronnie’s attention towards Brandon and I swear I saw her eyes crackle with lightening even as her cheeks reddened. “For your information, Brandon, it’s none of your beeswax. Aaron is very sensitive. Besides, you don’t understand anything about love. He just needs a day or two to get used to the idea.”

For some reason, this wiped the smile off of Brandon’s face. “So love, is it?” He retaliated with a fresh sneer. “So you love Aaron, huh?”

Ronnie’s glare deepened. “Yes. I’ve loved many boys but I love him the best. I would do anything for him.”

I noticed Brandon’s back stiffen at that. He sat up a little straighter in his chair. “Really? Anything?” he snickered. “I doubt it.”

“Oh yeah?” Ronnie said, defiantly. “You don’t know anything, cause you’re too stupid to know what its like to want someone. You’re just a tiny little boy who only kisses his Mommy just to say he’s kissed a girl.”

“Oh, and you think you would’a kissed Aaron?”

“Yeah, I would have. I kiss boys.” Ronnie growled, looking away from Brandon.

“Sure you do.” Brandon said. Behind Ronnie, Emily caught my eye for a second. We shared a glance at the ceiling and a shake of the head.  

“Fine,” Brandon was saying, “You. Me. Recess. In the fort and bring a witness.” He chuckled lightly, and I had the horrible feeling this meant I wouldn’t be kicking the ball around the blacktop today. “We’ll see if you’d actually kiss a boy.”

“I’ll kiss you anytime, anywhere, Brandon.” I thought Ronnie looked more ready to pummel Brandon than kiss him. I wouldn’t have put it past her.

***

I always hated going outside for recess in the winter. The air chilled my lungs to my very heart, and with today’s letdown, my heart couldn’t really handle much more chill. It was nice in the fort though. Even without the leaves, it was set back far enough in a cluster of trees that it sheltered us from the gazes of the teachers huddled  in the gazebo at the center of the playground.  The brown dead branches of the willowy tree and the dry yellow grasses of winter were enough to shield those inside from the wind, wandering eyes and interruption. It was the perfect spot for a dare.

“Don’t you think this whole thing is kind of dumb, Ron?” Emily asked in a muffled voice; her purple down jacket covered the whole lower half of her face, including her mouth. Only her pale blue eyes and strands of strawberry blonde hair were visible with her hood pulled down.

“It’s not a matter of it being dumb, it’s a matter of principal!” I said. “He thinks I’m a chicken, and I’m going to show him and his fat head that he doesn’t know anything. He doesn’t know me and he doesn’t know what he’s talking about. “ Emily sighed, visibly exasperated. Ben and Brandon clambered through the brush after a few minutes.

“So you’re actually going to do this?” Brandon said.

“You better believe it.” I said, not returning the grin he flashed me.

“Fine, lay one on me then.” Brandon stooped to the ground and sat back against the trunk of the raggedy little tree that created the fort’s ceiling. I kneeled next to him on the ground. Leaning foreward, my eyes met his briefly, and I was shocked to find them wide with nervous energy ringing his grey irises. He wasn’t even smirking.

“You ready?” I asked, unable to keep contact with eyes and concentrating instead on the charred wooden log resting under his back. He nodded slowly. My chest hammering, I began to close the gap between our lips. I almost faltered but the image of Brandon’s triumphant grin if I failed flashed in front of me like the blistering beep of a 6:00 am alarm clock. Emboldened, I kept going. Our faces were hardly an inch apart.

“Wait!” Brandon cried in a hushed voice. “One more thing: No tongue.”

I blinked at him in confusion. Tongue?

“What would I do with my tongue?” I asked, completely bewildered.

Brandon looked back at me blankly. “I have no idea.” We broke into nervous giggles, and with our faces so close, I could smell the peppermint from the candy cane he’d been eating during Math on his breath.

“Can you guys hurry up? I want to go kick the ball around a little before recess is over.” Came Ben’s voice from behind them. “You know, have some real fun.”

“We’ll be done in a sec,” Brandon said, waving his friend off and sharing a significant glance with me. This time, it was him who leaned forward to close the distance. I felt a soft warmth touch my lips for barely a second; and then it was gone. Wasting no time, Ben grabbed Brandon by the wrist and dragged him towards the blacktop at the top of the sloping playground, leaving me alone with Emily in the fort.

“See you around, Ron,” Brandon said before he was tugged away, leaving me with nothing but a smirk, a wink, and a muddled warmth in my stomach. Turning towards Emily, I sat back down in the hideout and gazed out over the sloping overgrowth at the view of the sparkling city in the distance.

“You know, Valentine’s day is a stupid holiday.” I said, biting my lip. “I bet Brandon regrets he ever suggested this dare.”

“Yeah, I bet. I dont think he thought you’d actually do it. You showed him though!” Said Emily, cheerfully.

“Yeah.” Without turning my head far enough to be noticeable, I glanced across the woodchips. Ben and Brandon were running to the blacktop where a full soccer game was already in progress. Brandon never turned his head back towards the grasses of the fort. Our eyes did not meet momentarily before he turned back around to catch up with Ben. We never kissed again.

“I guess I did show him.”

Though what I’d shown him, I was never quite sure. 

© 2012-2014 Lex Vex

If Only a Movie

If Only a Movie

The Superstitions are flat

Against an almost cloudless Sky.

From where I Lie,

 half shelved against two ribs

of iron. They are also

upside-down and trembling

with the braces to which he bound  me 

that rock and shake.

Through the iron I can feel the sound

Of the rumbling, crunching, crushing,

Wheels mated to the tracks

Coming straight for me. Kidnapped

For a ransom, one they wont get

— the only reason for murder now to rid

Their whole county of yet another witness—

Like it’s my fault that the mine flooded

Since last I came. The sun streaks

 past the hazy rock tombs,

and the whimpers of my own throat

Hum an old folk song

 I could’ve sworn I never knew.

Even I can barely hear the strum

of each parched vocal

Node over the chalkboard screech of

wheels ten years past turning.

All I can see is up.

 Blazing sun. Blaring Heat. Broken

Ridges extending down

 into my sky.

Rock so muffledAnd so hazy

 I would almost take them

For a film set. 

©2012 Lex Vex

An Epitaph Of

There is a tombstone of
love marking a garret of
boulders.
I go back and visit, hoping I must
never lay flowers to grieve
whittled letters.
An epitaph of

©2014 Lex Vex

Exquisite Corpse 4. Made by Spring Creative Writing Class

I always hated her for it:
She had everything I wanted
except for my bright red bicycle
that I couldn't ride outside.
or fly a kite
watch out for the stars
be careful what you wish for
be careful to go after what you want
be wary indeed, for it is often teeth disguised as tongue.
That fear owned the human race, with paper mache for the skin on its face
A mask of skin and bones and rhyme pulsing-
waiting, for something to come alive
and it does and we were scared at first
but we pressed on, determined.
Go slow to go fast
but know you won't get past the Drive-thru at Wendy's
settle for sizzling - like you've never known better
soda fizzing, tickles my tongue
burning my nostrils.

©2014 Lex Vex et al.

She was Marked Absent the Next Day

She was Marked Absent the Next Day

A Short story by Lex Vex

“No! Don’t even think that!  You’re horrible!”

            Martha Smote leaned forward on the crisp, immaculate countertop, one hand tucked under her chest for support, the other holding a cordless phone to her ear.

            “That’s not something to kid about. After what she—she still probably should be going in but I can’t force her to keep her appointments. No, yeah, I agree; she should be taking this worse.” Martha smiled disdainfully as she listened into the earpiece. She examined her fingernails for dirt; finding none, she turned herself around and leaned her back against the cabinets.

            “She seems better, but she won’t go near a car. I can’t say I blame her. The only trouble is, she wont take the bus either, so now, I get calls every other day about how she walks into first period five minutes before the bell rings! Frankly, Alice, I don’t know what to do.”

            Martha walked a few feet to the family bulletin board. She studied the dark calendar with mild interest. It had been sent in the mail by Elvington Mortuary and depicted grainy pictures of suburban greens where you could, if you chose to call the 800 number, deposit your remains. She had hung it because it was free. Martha glanced from the picture to a date circled in red sharpie.

            “Almost to the day. She has it marked on the calendar, can you believe that?”

Martha scowled into the phone.

             “Jesus, why are you so interested? Are you some kind of sadist?” Martha paused to check her yellowing teeth in the hall mirror. “What do you want to know that for anyway?”

            She listened for a second and replied, defeated, “Tomorrow. Nothing to worry about. I heard her the other night, on the phone with one of her friends. Heard her say she’d been flirting with some boy at school, and, when I was cleaning her room the other day, I found this love poem under her bed.”

            Martha walked over to the entrance of a small bedroom. She peered in before continuing.

            “I don’t remember exactly. She hid it somewhere after I picked it up and put it on her bed. Must have been embarrassed because I found it. I know. I’ve done it—I am a snoopy snoopy mother.” Martha smiled, satisfactorily. “It was really gushy though. One line in particular caught my eye—something about a sweet, constricting embrace.”

            The woman turned on the lights of the room, then wandered around it, picking up and putting away the things on the floor. A black blouse. A small stuffed dog with only one eye. A pile of folded papers next to the bed.

            “I don’t know. Could have been a different word. I think it means he’s an older man. HA. Like older like 16 older.”

            Straightening up, she laughed heartily into the receiver, and only stopped after she’d folded the blouse in front of her on the bedspread.

            “Not at all. I would more if I wasn’t so relieved she’s finally found a boyfriend. She’s a pretty girl. Get’s calls every Saturday from this boy or that, but she’d turned everyone down. I tell you, I was just waiting for her to tell me she was a queer.” She paused. “I can’t wait to meet him.”

            She listened for a second, swept the room with her eyes, turned off the lights and closed the door.

            “How are my nieces anyway? Can I speak to them? Hello, sweetums!—”

                                                            *      *     *

            Two miles away, the girl in the middle row, on the left side of the classroom, finished organizing the messy papers into a pile, while others continued to scribble frantically on their own sheets. Walking up to the desk at the front, she stapled the mess together and handed the stack to Mrs. Hayford, who took it gently without glancing up from her crossword puzzle. The girl had turned and begun walking back to her desk before hearing Mrs. Hayford call her name.

            “You forgot your name,” she said, thrusting it towards the girl, again without looking up. Blushing, the girl picked up the page and quickly scribbled, Sydney at the top before handing it back.

            Sydney walked back to her seat and slumped down, pulling the long sleeves of her sweatshirt down over her wrists. She then tucked them under her armpits as if she were cold and looked around the room. Everywhere others were rushing to finish before—

            BRRRRRRNNNGGGGG!

The bell grated. Life stirred around the room; people were handing in papers, running out the door or chatting easily with friends. Some were rushing to finish so they could get in their last two cents.

            A few seats down from where Sydney sat, two girls stage-whispered animatedly to one another.

            “Yup! Steve drove by when it happened. Saw the whole thing.”

            “Ew! Did he get anything on his car? Weren’t he and Russell like, close friends?”

            “Yeah- the best. Course at the time, he couldn’t tell who it was. It was worse for-” The girl lowered her voice a granule. “You know…”

            “Apparently she saw the whole thing happen right in front of her.”

            “Yeah. Steve said that the look on her face is going to haunt him for the rest of his life.”

            “Wasn’t he her…”

            “Yeah. Since they were in kindergarten.”

            Sydney felt eyes boring into the back of her head. She glanced toward the feeling, then stood and began packing up her things. She stared vacantly at the desk as she swung her swollen backpack over her knotted shoulders. Sydney edged her way past a couple of last minute essay writers and started out of the classroom.

            “Sydney!” The two girls from class were walking beside her in the hallway. Sydney smiled kindly at them.

            “Hey. What’s up?”

            “We were just wondering if… if you wanted to hang out before the dance this Saturday—do hair, make-up, that kind of thing,” said the first girl. They waited for a response.

            Looking at the carpet, Sydney nodded her head slightly. “That could be fun. You could help pick out my dress and stuff.”

            “Oh! Perfect!” cried the second. “My dress is sexy as hell. Dark green with gold trim and this funky urban Africa pattern. They only have it at the specialty store in New York. What are your options?”

            “Black. Just black. They’re all a little hard for me to put on by myself though. I bought them especially for the occasion.”

            “Ooo, edgy, I like it!” Nodded the first, approvingly. “All the boys will be lookin’ at you!”

            The second girl elbowed the first. She rubbed her arm as the second girl interjected, “Do you have a date yet?”

            Sydney chuckled mirthlessly.

“Not yet. There’s this one guy I’ve been flirting with for a while now, though. He’s asked me several times but I had to turn him down. Though it’s more like I backed down, really.” She smiled. “If he asks again though, I think I’ll accept. I heard a rumor that he’s going to ask me tonight.”

            The other two girls looked at each other in confusion. They had heard no rumor about this at all. They knew everything. The group halted in front of Sydney’s locker, where she started collecting her things.

            “Who is he?” They asked, nosily.

            Sydney raised and eyebrow and laughed, this time with feeling.

“I’m not telling. If he knows I’ll accept, he might not ask.”

            She placed the in the last of her unneeded books before tucking a small, plain envelope between the shelves. Swinging her locker shut, she turned towards the two bewildered girls and said goodbye.

            “You’ll be the first to know tomorrow if I get my date.” Sydney smiled and trotted happily out of the door and into a gust of swirling autumn wind before the other two could reply.

                                                                        *   *   *

Mrs. Hayford shook the wet umbrella out in the mudroom. The teacher took off her rain boots in one swift motion without disturbing a single globule of water.

            “That you, honey?” called a voice from the kitchen.

            “Yeah, just got in.” She walked through the door-less entryway to the kitchen and over to the young man standing with his head in the refrigerator. “You?” she asked, pulling out the carton of cider hidden behind a pickle-jar on the door.

            “I got in about an hour ago.” He pulled his head out of the fridge long enough to give his wife a fleeting kiss. “How does lasagna sound?”

            “As long as it doesn’t take four hours like last time. Do I have to help you?”

            “Its probably better if you don’t, Babe.”

            “Good. I have to read through the short stories I gave my sophomores.”

            “Ah, the head case crowd. Have fun.” Mr. Hayford looked out the window where light raindrops were wetting the parched ground. “When did it start to rain?” he asked his wife.

            “About five seconds after I left the school building. It was heavier a little while ago. The weather report says it’s supposed to get worse through the night.”

            “Ah,” said Mr. Hayford knowingly. “The calm before the storm.”

Mrs. Hayford rolled her eyes but stuck out her tongue at her husband. He returned the silly face.            

            “Start cooking, chef. And call me when dinner’s ready.”

            Mrs. Hayford walked over to her work desk, spread out her things and began to read.

            Each story was more depressing than the last. Some were about war, others about deadly diseases, and more than a few were sad treatises on that bitch who stole my boyfriend. They almost always involved someone’s head exploding or guts flying everywhere. Half of them did not use grammar, punctuation, spelling or even format correctly, and plots or character development was a beautiful dream that never seemed to come to fruition. By the time she got halfway through, she was ready to blow her own brains out. Finally, she reached a story that looked harmless. It was about a dog and a rabbit. Written in a cursive hand, it read:

           

Billy was a jackrussel. Jessibelle was a jackrabbit. Billy was a carnivore with a quick temper and black fur, while Jessibelle was an herbivore gentle as could be with fur as white as snow. Though they were so different, they found themselves friends faster than the speed of light. Everywhere one went the other one came along. They sometimes brought each other with them, all the time. Sometimes they went alone. They grew up far quicker than they could have imagined and soon all of their rabbit and dog friends were pairing off. Walking around together became more and more the topic of gossip amid the other animals and soon they could not go anywhere without someone suggesting they were together. At first this troubled Jessibelle. But after a time, she too began to wish that they had a special relationship. After they saw a movie one time, while they walked home down a sidewalk, she asked him if he liked the idea. She wouldn’t look at him and waited for him to speak. She waited for a long time but he never said anything. Looking up she was surprised to see him smiling at her. She was happy. Very happy. As she was about to ask again what he thought he leaned foreward and bumped their noses together. He whispered to her, his tail wagging because he was so happy.

“I think its a great idea”

Then he licked her forehead. They snuggled for a little while on the side of the road. It was sunset before thejack Russell realized he had to go. Leaping to his feet he licked her forehead one more time. Then he backed slowly out into the road; his new house was just across the street. Billy smiled at her and ecstatically repeated “I love you”. He stood in the middle of the three way intersection. She, facing the middle road saw it coming before either of them could react. It did not happen in slow motion. The car, moving too quickly down the street to be stopped saw Billy just before it hit. The breaks shrieked as it tried in vein to halt the cars progress. Jessibelle closed her eyes tight and felt warm flecks of something rain over her body. The smell of iron invaded her nose. Opening her eyes, she found her white coat stained with polkadots. To her right, she noticed the empty face of Billy, staring at her from blank opaque eyes. His body was contorted, his flesh ripped open from the inside out. Foam and bile and drool and blood dripped from his mouth but he was not dead quite yet His hand was twitching and in his one eye that hadnt clouded over, you could see red goo oozing from where a scrap of car had punctured it. He was still looking at me and he still whispered I love you I love you I love you.

            “What in the hell?” Mrs. Hayford turned the page, her mouth open a little. “Well that escalated quickly…” There was one final paragraph written in constricted handwriting.

Jessibelle wandered aimlessly for the next few years seeing Billy in unexpected places. Every time she did, he would beckon her to come with him but afraide, she would stop herself just short of grabbing his paw. Then one day she was no longer afraid. She swore that the next time he appeared she would follow him. She did.

            Mrs. Hayford rubbed her temples. She was done for the night. Flipping to the first page, she reread the heading to see whom it was by. Something clicked when she saw the name at the top of the paper. She paused for a moment. Then, with a quicker and clumsier movement than she had intended she jumped towards the phone fast as a rabbit. Grabbing the directory, she looked through the lists, and when she found the one she sought, dialed the number with numb fingers. The first brrrrrringgg grated when Mrs. Hayford looked again at the paper in her hands. Then she glanced over to the stack of other demented stories, with their gore and mayhem and lack of subtleties. Then back to the paper again.

            Mrs. Hayford quietly slammed the phone back into its cradle and set the story on top of the other finished papers. She sat staring.

            “Babe?” Questioned a feathery voice from the kitchen.

            “Yes?” Mrs. Hayford replied, not dropping her gaze from the phone.

            “Dinner’s ready.”

            “Be right there.”

                                                            *   *   *

            “You are soaked!” Mrs. Smote stared at her daughter dripping on the fresh tile floor. “I mean really, Sydney, I just cleaned.”

            Sydney shrugged. “I didn’t have an umbrella.”

            Outside the sound of thunder boomed.

            Mrs. Smote sighed with resignation “Go get a shower. You’re going to catch your death if you stay out here all wet.”

            Again, Sydney just shrugged, but she did as she was told and took a shower while her mother mopped up the flood of water that now covered the floor of the room. Midway through her shower, a particularly close lightening bolt caused the power to go out. Feeling around in the dark, Sydney found her towel. She stood in front of the mirror taking in her nudity as she wrapped herself in a terrycloth robe. Lightening lit the room for a moment, and as it did, Sydney gazed into the mirror and pretended she saw a figure next to her; it leaned its head against hers. A split second later, it was dark again. Sydney finished tying the robe, shook open the door and talked above the storm in the direction of her mother.

            “Mom?”

            “Yes, dear?”

            “I don’t feel very well.”

            “Do you think you’re going to throw up?” The thunder and lightening were taking place at shorter intervals.

            “No. It’s more like a headache.”

            She heard her mothers exasperated sigh from somewhere by the fireplace in the living room.

            “Then take a Tylenol or something—You know where I keep the meds.” With permission, Sydney headed back towards the hallway.

            “And get to bed early.”

            “I will.”

Sydney darted back into the bathroom. Opening the medicine cabinet, she grabbed a bottle of pills, and carefully picked up the full glass of water she had left out before her shower. She carried them to her room and locked the door as a lightening bolt shook the house next door. 

©2014 Lex Vex

AN: My goal was to take four short scenes that, by themselves, have little to no meaning, but when paired together create something subtly disturbing. No clue if I failed or not. Enjoy!

Exquisite Corpse 3. Made by Spring Creative Writing Class

The cracked window wouldn't let the sunshine inside.
We're not made for tragedies or rainbows
sit back and watch in order to understand
it's a hard thing to do when you don't know what you're watching
What are you watching?
I don't know about you, but I love screens filled with fuzz;
its like trying to make sense of grey matter. When you look at it
the  clouds keleidescope and suddenly the color spectrum splits and there is
nothing but white fading fast amongst
tree tops and ladybirds and hungry ghosts
devour my soul in colors and light
watch me glow throughout the night
like a flashlight in your mouth
you choke on metal light beams.

© 2014 Lex Vex et al.