I looked down at the tattered and blood-soaked cuffs of my shirt, realizing that fortune and happiness aren’t off the rack ready-to-wear. You need designer style and a want to do desperate things. She was a wreck — all snarled hair and thin skin rubbing against bone — sipping gin from a teacup, and it had been over two hours, and my canvas was scrawled with rage not paint. “The rain washed my makeup off,” she’d said when she arrived, shaking her umbrella as she walked in from the cold. Her feet were bare, and she giggled as the sleet slicked from her toenails to the creaking floorboards. I’d been waiting. For what, I do not know. Maybe her, when I think about it now. She was an unexpected talent, and the bugs in my stomach squirmed against the whiskey and bacon I had eaten earlier for breakfast. The hunger shone in her. Her teeth looked like miniature marble pillars when she smiled, and she had a distance in her eyes — livid — like sex dipped in gunmetal and chocolate. She was a collision with cutlery, and I just had to paint her. Had to. Her filthy flesh was a feast awash in the fell light of the moon. I felt a velvet hollowing in the center of all things, felt the paint as it congealed around the flattering silhouette that was she, who graced the dark corners of my mind. She was a secret … 
 
And when she giggled again and lifted her scars into the moonlight for me, I knew I would have to keep her that way — for ever, and ever, forever.

By Cheryl Anne Gardner

http://apocryphaandabstractions.wordpress.com
http://twistedknickerspublications.wordpress.com

His first show was the live mutilation and desecration of a dead fish. Contact microphones inserted into gill slits, the diamond sheen like tin foil jelly. He mashed mics into guts, into black eyes, minced meat until his own screams of splendor matched the applause of the Chinese audience.

He released a seven inch record. Instead of artwork printed by traditional means, he used strands of black woven hair, glued in thick clumps by an unknown grey substance. The record is “Formaldehyde Drip, Charred: for Manami.” The limited run record, all fifty copies, sold quickly to his European fans. He still lives in town, has a few private copies not for sale. I’ve heard it. He shared.

For the second performance, he dumped a bucket of leeches into a sliced open severed arm. It was not his own arm, but a larger arm, muscular and pink, veins highlighted by black marker. Steel strings had been attached to the leeches, strings that, with every movement and slurp of leech to flesh, produced a different tone. The strings were routed to a box of effects pedals, distortion and delay, fed into a small mixer and manipulated by hand to the delight of the audience. Someone lit one of the club’s sofas on fire, the crowd let it burn.

We sat in his studio and listened to his newest piece, “The Broken Anatomy of  Man’s Interior Sloth.” He turned off the lights, passed me a lit cigarette. We smoked in silence.

The piece begins with what sounds like a chair being scraped over wood complimented by a muffled moan (female, I presume). Then, an abrupt crack of skin or leather striking flesh. He keeps a black rod by the stereo, woven horse hair. The crack is followed by a series of tape loops, pitch-shifted growls like groaning wolves underwater. The cracks escalate. I can feel him smile through the black. A voice, his own, is chanting through a low-pass filter, but not in his native language. The growls, the cracks, and the chant pan to the left. A wall of static, more brown than pink, and certainly not white, fills the right speaker. The two sides rise, meet in the middle of the room. He moves, cigarette in mouth, and asks me to stand in the center of the room, says the album demands willing participation. My help would be invaluable.

His third show was a private venue. I was fortunate enough to be in attendance. His assistants, three foreign women in black gowns, stood hidden and unmoving behind strung up carcasses, affixed to the ceiling by meat hooks, blood dripping into wooden buckets. A shrill tone, the smell of vinegar. There were waterproof microphones inside the buckets. The drips were amplified, fed into a sampler, where he proceeded to edit the drips in real time, chopping them up, delay, filter, layer, and loop. With the snap of his fingers, the women raised right hands, brandished cleavers, and tore into the meat, jab upon jab, the sound of ripping flesh. No one noticed the wireless microphones glued to the women’s teeth. Every chop, a distorted and breathy grunt. The spattered blood dried on the floor, some on my shirt. The wooden buckets were in the studio, near the black rod.

I stood in the center of the room. He told me to wait, came back with a plank of wood, sharpened at the tip. A stake. The scraping and chanting, moans melded into shrieks. The static, deep like cars crashing in slow majesty.

The snapping sharpness of the plank slamming into my stomach, the noise felt from inside, and his fists to my teeth, the pliers and the glass shards he used to poke holes in my thighs to make fountains of red. I was leaking. Liquid in my ear and his boot stepping down cracking finger bones—each crack a compliment of aural perfection. “The plank, “he said, “when inserted into the prostrate, bursts the sac, an exploding squish, shattering any preconceptions of the real meaning of intimacy.” It will not be recorded.

Blood gushed from my ears in that moment of contact, the startling revelation of pure artistic genius.

By Jamie Grefe

Jamie Grefe currently lives and works in Beijing, China. His work appears or is forthcoming in Emprise Review, Bartleby Snopes, Untoward Magazine, Mud Luscious Press and elsewhere. Please, give him black coffee or read more at: http://shreddedmaps.tumblr.com

Rick backed the car up into the garage. He pulled the key and the machine shuddered, falling still. He reached into the back seat to pull out his blazer and briefcase, settling the latter on his lap. He ran his fingers across the smooth top, along the crevice where the halves met. He waited for a moment, rubbing the tips of his fingers together and staring at them.
 
The sound of the porch door closing on the other side of the house. A dog barks. Breathe, swallow, spit.
 
Rick checked the handle, the spinning lock still set to 1-2-3-4. He spun the tumblers, up and then down, running his thumbs across them left to right and bringing his fingers up his face again and inspecting them.
 
Opening the briefcase, he brought it up to his nose and inhaled deeply. He pressed the jacket out across his lap and ran his hands down each sleeve, into the pockets, behind the lapels, rubbing his palms into the fabric. He folded the jacket back up and placed it inside the briefcase, set both carefully down in the backseat.
 
He left the garage and opened up the side door in the fence, walking around the back of the house to the screened porch. As he walked, he watched the long, arrogant patches of yellow grasses growing around the foundations.
 
Rick opened the screen door and walked inside, the cool shadows inside the house touching the skin of his face, his palms. He ran his hands along his hips and walked into the living room, where he approached his wife from behind, the iron-tinted highlights in her blonde hair looking prickly, abusive.
 
“Oh, I didn’t hear you come in,” Teresa turned on the couch and looked at him. “I was waiting for you.”
 
“I know. How was your day?”
 
She sighed, crossing and then uncrossing her legs, fighting with what to say. He watched the pale, purple-spotted skin of her ankles. I hate those damn short pants, Rick watched her dangle her flip-flops off of her toes. I fucking hate them.
 
“The office burnt down.”
 
“What?” She rose from the couch and came towards him. He couldn’t help but flinch. “What happened? Oh my God, is everyone okay?”
 
“I guess so. I wouldn’t know. I just… left.”
 
Teresa walked out of the room, where he knew she was dialing the phone to talk to Jack and his wife, to pool all the salacious details into one “made-for-TV” script to chew over. Rick felt his teeth crawl.
 
The office, all the large, airy rooms and cramped cubicles with the felt walls and the spreadsheets and the smiling picture of kids pinned up in those gaudy plastic frames with the balloons or worse: those haphazard, scrawled drawings with “I love you, Mommy,” and some mutilated figure drawn in purple and the sun in a corner with a shit-eating grin on its face…
 
She came back into the living room, “Oh my God, honey, they say the fire started in the basement and somebody set it with gasoline and could you imagine?”
 
“Did anyone die?”
 
“I forgot to ask.”
 
“Why don’t you call her back?”
 
She didn’t say anything, but got up and left. Rick grinned, pleased with himself. She yelled from the kitchen, “Oh my… Rick, there were three people in there!”
 
Rick shrugged, craning his neck around to watch as the front door opened, “Hey, Dad.”
 
“Ben.”
 
Ben peered around the living room sheepishly, “Is she in the kitchen?”
 
“Yes.”
 
“Good, I don’t really want to hear about fighting the crab grass or what is it now?”
 
“Sciatica? Or is it eczema?”
 
“Alicia will be home in a minute. They cancelled practice. I saw your work burned down. I passed it on my way back.”
 
“It did.”
 
“What happened?”
 
“I don’t know. Something in the walls. The fire got in walls? In the insulation?”
 
Ben shrugged and dropped his backpack and leapt up the stairs, “Will you be here for dinner?” Rick asked.
 
“Yeah.”
 
“I’ll let your mom know.”
 
　
At around 2:00 A.M., Rick padded softly down the stairs into the living room. He parted the drapes with a few fingers and sat staring out into the deserted road: the cracked asphalt, the sidewalk planks, listened for suspicious sounds and heard thousands, though none of them made a direct threat.
 
He went out to the garage. As he unlocked the car, he felt a wave of horror; that this day and all the days before it must’ve belonged to someone else. Someone who had agreed to this: the solid, ranch-style house, the green shutters nailed in place, the holes in the storm windows.
 
Rick twisted the cap off one jug and began to soak the foundation of his house with the gasoline.
 
He soaked the front hallway, the floor of the living room, the kitchen with the porch door. He tore a match from the book, wrenching it free from the root, and held it in between his ring and little fingers.
 
In his hand, he held a tough stem with a bright red bloom that would hiss and tickle his ears like an insect’s dull hum. The seed, the firey bush waiting to be born, a vast red plain that would feed, spread outward and reach up into the sky with its long, spindly arms, killing everything it touched, curling and charring all those hard edges, all the lies and half-truths and lonelinesses; a vengeful, blood-red demon consuming his entire life, a million eyes of fire staring straight up into the moon.
 
That’s the best part about fire. It can save you from anything that’s flammable. And you know what’s flammable?
 
Everything.
 
“Five,” he laughed, giddy, moving the match in between his ring and middle finger.
 
“Four.” Rick whispered to himself, “Three.”
 
In between his middle and first finger, “Two.”
 
In between his pointer finger and thumb…
 
“One.” A shower of fireflies into the darkness; released now, go forth, go forth and multiply.

By Samantha Ducas

http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/samanthaducasatymaildotcom

ATTENTION CARNAGE CONSERVATORY!!! HERE’S YOUR CHANCE TO LET THE BEAST OUT TO HOWL!

THIS MONTH CARNAGE IS TAKING OVER BLACKALCHEMY’S HOWLING SECTION WHICH MEANS . . . . SHOW ME YOUR TEETH!

CARNAGE WANTS YOU TO WRITE YOUR BEST WEREWOLF STORIES, POEMS, FLASH, AND HAIKUS! NO WORD LIMIT NO RULES (except standard Carnage Guidelines).

SUBMISSIONS WILL BE POSTED ON THE DAY OF THE FULL MOON FEBRUARY 7TH, I WILL BE ACCEPTING STORIES UP TO AND INCLUDING THAT DAY.

A PRIZE WILL BE GIVEN TO ONE OF THE SUBMITTERS THROUGH A RANDOM DRAWING OF THOSE WHO PROVIDE US WITH HAIR RAISING TALES! AND REMEMBER TO CHECK OUT OTHER HOWLINGS AT http://blackalchemy.wordpress.com/howlings/,  BUT THIS IS OUR MONTH SO YOU KNOW HOW I LIKE IT, THE BLOODIER THE BETTER! GIVE ME YOUR BEST HACK AND SLASH WEREWOLF!

SUBMISSIONS CAN GO THROUGH BLACKALCHEMY’S ASSIGNED EMAIL ACCOUNT lycantails@gmail.com OR AS ALWAYS THROUGH YOUR BELOVED EDITOR, DEADENDEMILY HERSELF emilysm737@gmail.com 

IT’S TIME TO GET HUNGRY LIKE THE WOLF

your heart is blacker than the night;

it cuts in the waves of a knife, it’s

oceans splattering the world in ruby

droplets of cardinal feathers; every

place I look has your stain, your fangs

have torn holes into every fissure to

be seen with the naked eye; you tear

a world of apathy to her very core —

your lips hold the lies everyone dies

to hear and you know how to spread

them on the wings of your ravens —

I wonder if one day, you’ll come back

to haunt even more painfully than you

did whilst you were still breathing black.

By Linda M. Crate

All that could be heard was the dull clacking of teeth as Johnny sucked away during the simmering silence. Clack-clack-clack. Red and blue lights flashed through the blinds and seemed to highlight the unconscious woman taped to the armchair. Her head covered in a helmet of gray tape to keep her tight in place.
A man’s voice through a scratchy megaphone called his name from down on the street. He ignored it. Clack-clack-clack.
–Fucking hell Johnny, spit it out.
He did. The tooth hit the wooden table with a sharp sound. White and triangular, like a fat icicle covered in spit. He gave a blank look and then defiantly reached into the stoneware salad bowl, fished out a molar with a nerve end still attached, tubular and sticky and red with a dark line inside it. Almost black, almost translucent. He stuck it in his mouth and started sucking again with a smirk.

–I don’t know why. Aha, ha! I guess I do. I just love the way she brushed them. I don’t even know her name.
–So we still don’t know her name?
–No, saw her in the bathroom across the street. Kept the blinds open, I always thought she wanted, wanted someone to see her there.
–Oh you just up and glanced at her huh? You trying to tell me you have 50/50 vision and I don’t? Saw her from across the alley? You trying to say you didn’t…
–Yeah I used binoculars, why do you have to be like that?
–Be like that? Be like what, Johnny.
–You’re the one asking me, you’re the one who wants me to tell my story. Everyone out there on the street, they’re all shitting marbles for me! They want to know my life story. You, you don’t mean jack.
–Oh they want you, Johnny; they want to see you smoke.
–Us smoke. Us. If you hadn’t called the cops, this wouldn’t be happening.
–What the hell was I supposed to do, seeing her taped up like that on the chair?
–Anyway, I saw her in the bathroom, and she would lean in, bend her head over the faucet and brush like a kid, you know, like she couldn’t do or think about anything else while she brushed.
–Like a kid, huh? I bet you liked that.
–Her mouth would froth and it would dribble down and she’d make this face like a cat that resigned itself to getting a bath.
–Why not skip the foreplay, Johnny?
–She’d do this in her camisole, you know, after washing off her makeup. I love that, love the way…
–Johnny! Cut it. You promised me we wouldn’t do this again.
–Well, I get this idea, while I’m looking out across the alley, that no one really goes there, you know, no one goes there at all when it’s dark.
–Is that why you kept taking Skip for a walk at night?
–Yeah, how’d you notice?
–He’s seemed tired during the day lately, and never had to piss when I took him out in the morning.
–So I would walk him in the alley, and look up at the buildings, and never noticed any lights on except down at the end, streetside, and it always looked well covered.
–Are you trying to tell me you went in through her bathroom window?
–Yeah, through the window, up the fire escape.
–Fuck Johnny, no wonder we’re pigeonholed in here. That metal BANGS when you step on it. You should have consulted me at least.
Clack-clack-clack.
–We’re trapped because you panicked, not because I wasn’t careful. It doesn’t matter now, anyway, I got by the window, jacked it with the screwdriver I filed nice and sharp and climbed in. Flashlight in my mouth, felt like I could be on television.
–Stick our head out the window, and you’ll get your wish along with a sniper bullet.
–I squeaked down her hall and opened the bedroom door. What a pit, she had used laundry all over the floor smelling like sweat. She had this bag of Christmas cookies on the bedstand, in a Ziploc, just like mom used to do for us. I really, I really hope she brushed after she ate them.
–I guess she didn’t bring a lot of guys home.
–I got this idea then, that I had to take her back, take her home to our place. Make sure they weren’t crooked.
–You’re incredibly stupid, Johnny.
–So I needed to keep her quiet, I grabbed some of her clothes off the floor and shoved the screwdriver at her neck and when she woke up and screamed I shoved it in, shoved in deep down her throat. The vomit bubbled up, up around the socks, ahaha! Stomach acid is horrible for teeth, did you know?
–You’re sick.
–Hit her with the butt end of the screwdriver before taping her up. Hit her hard, think I gave her a concussion. She didn’t say anything while I dragged her down the escape, dropped her in the alley. Her eyes were open and she just kept moving her head in circular motions, like she was doing something, like a grey taped worm, hahaha!
–Hold on Johnny, she’s waking up.

 The pounding in her head almost had a rhythm as her eyes creaked open. She felt a tremendous pain in her gums. Instinctively, her tongue went to probe them.
“Oh goss, oh goss, my teese! My teese! Where are my teese!”
“Listen, we really want to know, what’s your name?”
“Uuu goss, uuu Jusus.”
“Relax, relax! It’ll be OK, don’t worry. Really, don’t worry. Johnny says he can fix it.”
A lone man stood in front of her silhouetted in red and blue police lights, leaking in behind the closed blinds, a bloody screwdriver in his hand.
“The important thing, important thing is that you had all 32. I was worried you wouldn’t.”
Clack-clack-clack.
“Oh goss, less me go, please, please.”
“Listen, just make it better, Johnny. I’m not spending my thirties in jail with only you and some tattooed freak. I’m leaving now.”
“Wuu, wuu sare you tlassing too?”
“No one, sweetheart, no one at all. He’s gone now.” Johnny walked over to the sink and pulled out a clean metal vise grip and a small metal hammer.
“Plea, nuu, plea–”
“Shhh, hush now. You see, your teeth were crooked, they were crooked. White and beautiful, but crooked. This will make them better.”
The man shoved the vise into her mouth and screwed it open until it wouldn’t go anymore.
“Uuun, whus uoo doiis uu mee?!”
“I said be quiet!” For an instant his face changed, angry and mean, then collapsed into white smiles. “Just be quiet, sweetheart. This is finicky work.”
He spit out her molar from his mouth, now sucked clean, and positioned it in front of her open gums. The hammer slipped out of his pocket and he pulled back, back, back behind his shoulder.
“The important thing, dear, is that you had all 32.”

Deep inside the synaptic flashes of Johnny’s prefrontal cortex a memory played on loop, separate from the hammering and splashing and the blows and screams inside the apartment and separate from his begs for her to stop swallowing, it’ll make you sick, it’ll make you sick dear and separate from the parade of pounding boots crashing up the stairs–separate, the memory played; first, yellowy darkness. “You think it’s fun to spit, boy, think it’s fucking fun to spit? You like to use your mouth boy, like to use that fucking mouth, huh?” Pain and knuckles and other things in an adolescent mouth and then suddenly white heat. Light, shinning down. A dental office and mother, pushing her hips against the smiling man in white with her cool hand on Johnny’s forehead as she bends over right in front of the man, and gives him a sultry look, right in front and he’s bald. He’s bald. “It’ll be alright dear.” Needles, needles and the light made so sharp Johnny could see the reds of his eyelids and if he closed them tight enough he could see the red puddles in his gums and he could hear the man in white’s gentle crooning. You don’t want them to be crooked, dear. You don’t want that.

By M.D. Joyce

http://mdjoyce.blogspot.com/

Christmas Plays Itself: The Island of Misfit Toys

Criselda’s leather mind was twisted. Twisting spasming back and forth cracked leather tongued by snow demons. Life was becoming exceedingly rare. It was December 24^th at 4 pm. The sun was dying slowly – she could see it heave outside her dirty windows. She had just left that room again, the room of 1000 fantasies where she performed for a forum of depraved women who paid her money. Threw it at her and she was supposed to display gratitude. They had liked her last show – a nice big bonus – $100 and mystical drugs to burrow deep into her veins. Christmas was almost here and she had gotten them nothing – no gifts, no cards. Her show gave them numerous pleasures, made them feel whole again – not broken and jaded.

“But they are jaded. Jaded and disgusting. I perform for their pleasures and they feel me up, touch my sweaty albino skin and fondle and taste and smell my long ebony hair. I’m finished. The stink.”

She slowly undulated to the scratchy 45 of Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” in the distance. Her room was bare – only a chair and a blanket for the floor- a dark oak floor stained occasionally with her blood. In the corner were her meager luxuries: a half-empty bottle of Maker’s Mark, a glass syringe (so old), and a hot plate to boil water for her doses and to make syrupy thick coffee from the freeze-dried coffee she loved. She relished taking a couple of shots of bourbon which pushed her into a gentle haze then supercharging the buzz with the coffee. Thoughts of her childhood Christmases started to trickle in and tell her what went wrong. A Mitch Miller sing along thump thump splat. Mommy and daddy fighting throwing a Christmas tree to the ground. Christmas trees were burning in the distance. It was always her fault. That’s why they are gone. Criselda smiled. She boiled some water and made the coffee, then took a shot of Maker’s following it quickly with the coffee. After having her bourbon and coffee she decided to cook up another shot of her favorite drug with the left over water. She continued humming carols to herself as she slammed the syringe into her vein. Pulsations touched the walls.

“Fast. Fast.”

“It’s all your fault.”

“I know mommy.”

As these last thoughts flew out of her brain in rapid death sequence like the rantings of a masturbating idiot, she shuddered and climaxed. Slowly she cracked the door of her room open and stepped out into the hall. She was stunning. She had done her hair up all pretty swith Bettie Bangs. She had put on her favorite elf-green corset which clung to her like another dead skin, her red Santa hat placed on her head in a jaunty manner, and black shiny pumps vintage 1935. Her shiny shoes gently click-clacked on the spent linoleum as she made her way. The symphony in her head complimented the ecstasy of her body: green, red, albino and black. Their room was at the end of the hall. She slowly and carefully walked down the hall, stepping over the 8 dead reindeer that lay festering under the green fluorescent light bathed in blood and flesh odor. She fought back a gag reflex and soon regained her composure.

She entered their room yet again, this time carrying an antique Gladstone doctor’s bag that had belonged to her father, a pediatrician. She recalled he would be carrying it when he arrived at her bedside to give her the adrenalin shot for her childhood asthma. The first of many fixes for a wheezing child. She relished the lightening jolt.

They were still in attendance: three women basically shadows – only glowing eyes burned in the dimly lit enclosure. The decaying flesh smell made her gag. She dropped the bag to the floor and the sound of metal on leather gave her a slight thrill. She flipped the latch on the bag and reached inside. When her hand emerged it was holding a plastic Santa mask. The women smiled. Criselda placed the mask over the face of the old hag in the center. The women laughed – Criselda was so funny. The were delighted at the prospect of more entertainment from a member of the lower class. Crisleda next produced a spike and a hammer. Slowly she nailed the mask to the middle woman’s forehead. Nail pierced plastic. Bone cracked – a happy sound – and purple – maroon fluid oozed – slowly at first, then more quickly – then stopping as the heart ceased pumping. Criselda zoomed in close for a look and a taste.

“That is delicious baby. A new dolly. Oh dear my corset is stained now.”

The other two women just watched.  A surgical saw was the next to appear from her bag of magic.  Criselda sawed off the hands, arms, legs, and feet of the old bitch on the left. It was a laborious task once s he hit bone. When she was done she pulled out some fishing line and a needle and sewed the appendages back together making a life-sized marionette.

The babbling bag of bones on the right was decapitated with the same saw. With great care Criselda re-attached the head whose eyes were still moving and tongue still wagging with a spare bedspring she had in her bag.

“A new jack-in-the-box. Dance for me.”

Her victims’ flesh was burning and raw. Chests heaved and fluid drooled.

The 3 women were caught in spasms as life slowly left; their nerves ached -neurons were stretched and broken. Gurgling noises and wooshing flesh noises echoed all around Criselda. The steel floor buckled slightly and the holiday lights outside sputtered and then glowed brighter. Criselda wiped the blood and perspiration from her face. Another Christmas tree exploded and she could hear several of the reindeer carcasses popping from decay.

“Bled white – a good color for all of you – just like me. I am rhythm and I got the beat. A boogie – woogie slaughter. All reet. Compleet.”

As Criselda stepped back and admired her work she heard a faint Ho-ho-ho coming from behind her in the velvet darkness. The floor length mirror displayed a familiar figure with a red suit and white beard – a jolly old elf. Santa approved.

She later phoned in her story to the newspapers and local cable news stations. It was a virtuous choice clothed in despair. She had been re-educated by human nature. The story was buried. Outside people moved quickly through the New York City streets on their way to a peep show. It was 1 am December 25^th.

By Peter Marra

Red Lights and Jade Paint

He wanted that dragon, wanted to feel its breath in flame and in ash, but he never would … never could.

He pressed her hard up against the chilled brick building; she felt her arms scratched by the sandpaper surface. He was moving in fast for the kill, pulling at her thick red wool dress, aching to get underneath it. She loved Christmas time and these labored love affairs in cold air. She loved that the colors of the season matched those of dried blood and infected mucus. She loved how deeply he was breathing, trying to keep the icy air out of his lungs because it made the vein on his neck bulge with the effort, and she loved that vein.

They’d met at a party, of course, where it was warm and smelled of cinnamon and pine, dank with apple cider and sweet breads, wafting up through the air. But she also scented desperation, sweat and terror. That was when he crept up and gently placed his big hands on her shoulders.

“I haven’t seen you before,” he whispered into her hair. “Are you a friend of Chris’s or Judy’s?”

“Neither,” she said. “I came with my friend, but I can’t seem to find her. I think she might be occupying one of the coat closets with a Christmas lover.”

“What a wonderful idea,” he complimented. “Why don’t you and I try that?”

“I prefer the snow.”

That led them outside the townhouses, twisting through backyards until she found the perfect aisle of temptation, and the brick wall. They were far away now from the warmth of the fire and the gleaming sparkle of the tree, yet still she could smell the cinnamon, the cakes and eggnog; it was pumping through that vein. And when she clasped her pointed canines onto it, she tasted the holiday season coursing through her mouth, rolling over her tongue. There were the flavors of every Christmas this man had ever had in that bite: the fruitcakes, the chocolate Santas, the candy canes, the assorted cookies, the presents opened, the kind words of friends, the love of family, the enduring prime rib feasts, and the spent relationships. She drank his memories through that vein, drank until the last drop.

Letting him go, his body sliding down into a dead slump, and she noticed the arterial spray from his vein had left a fine mist of red blood cascading over the crystalline snow. She had managed to only spill a little of him on her dress, but no one would ever notice, since the stain matched the fabric perfectly. There had been time taken and lives lost in an attempt to find the perfect red to hide blood shed, but she succeeded and her dress was none worse the wear. She blew her Christmas romance a kiss, as she stepped over his quickly cooling form. No one would find his body until the morning, any passersby would think he was a drunk stumbled out from a party, which he kind of was only a lot more dead. She was off to find her next holiday meal in the comfort of the lights that spelled out Peace on Earth. Merry Christmas, she smiled to herself, hearing the trumpet blasts of Joy to the World echo through the streets from a nearby gathering. Joy to the World, indeed, she laughed, and vanished into the heavy powder flakes.

By Emily Smith-Miller

Red Christmas

“So she won’t let you do Christmas – at all?”

“No.”

“Not even cards?”

“Nope.”

“Presents?”

“No way.”

“Huh.”  This obviously bothered him.  I tried not to let it bother me too.

“You’ve got to have some presents – seriously, none?”

I shook my head, fat white snowflakes mixing with the dandruff on the back of my neck.  At least they cooled the pus-pearls of acne as they melted.  Streetlights cast an orange glow over the path and meant we missed the worst of the dogturds underfoot.  The ones on top of the snowfall, anyway.  The ones beneath it were long frozen solid and as such were nothing to worry about.  Not till the thaw, anyway.

“Man, that’s seriously shit.  I gotta have a word with her.  That’s child abuse.  Deprivation.  People should serve time for shit like this.”

I shrugged, half hoping he got the worst of his outrage out of his system before we got back to mine, half hoping he didn’t.

“But… why, man?  What possible reason could she have?  Did an in-store Santa slip her the finger when she was little?  Did she get coal in her stocking?”

I didn’t want to answer, it could only make it worse.  Or could it?  Tom liked me.  Maybe he was it, a Best Friend.  Maybe he’d understand.  Maybe.  I looked at him, taking in his feathered black fringe and scowling face.  Scowling on my behalf.  I opened my mouth and out it came.

“She thinks Santa’s real.”

“So?  She’s a bit old for that, isn’t she, but still, so what?  Doesn’t that make Christmas even better?”

I held up a hangnailed finger, indicating I wasn’t quite finished.

“She thinks… she thinks it’s no coincidence that the word Santa can be rearranged into Satan.  She thinks the reindeer are vampires and are trying to get in.  She thinks the red in his suit is to hide the blood from the children he maims every year – and that the gifts are just an excuse so people will let him in.”

Tom’s eyes boggled and I could see the red lines, like razored cuts through the whites, that showed when we’d been anywhere smoky.  Like Ivan’s room, above the record store.  A no-go area, according to my mum; a home from home for me.

“Vampire reindeer?  I suppose that has a creepy kind of logic – no offense, but your mum’s really weird.  Like, Tim Burton weird, but without the cool Hollywood contacts.”

I shrugged again.  How could I defend her when he was right?  She even had the same kind of finger-in-socket hair.

“I s’pose they do only come out at night.  And they have odd names.  And they’re ageless.  Yeah, I can see where she’s coming from with that.  Okaaaay.  But Santa as Satan?  Nuh-huh.  No way.  We’d have heard about those kids.  Wouldn’t we?”

I couldn’t tell what he wanted to believe, so I raised my eyebrows, noncommittal.

We rounded a corner, passed a graffiti’d grey wall, and that was it: we were home.  The poorer the area, the brighter the decorations, the keener the need for a wonderful time.  My mum’s place was a black hole of Humbug amongst the pzazz of our estate.  She salted the path regardless of the weather, her hatred of slugs and snails meaning the path was clear of both them and snow no matter what mistakes the weather lady made.  Candles flickered in the window.  We’d run out of electric again.

“It’s more like Hallowe’en than Christmas here.”

I smiled at him, his tone had been positive, not nasty.  This might just work.

The place stank of garlic.  Tom wrinkled his nose at me as I shut the door, the key turning easily in the lock.  I could have mentioned to him that his room smelled of damp trainers and dogfood, but the etiquette of friendship forbade it.  My very soul ached for a friend.  I did NOT want to fuck this up.

Something was dripping in the kitchen.  We headed toward the source of the smell.  I was so thrilled Tom was here, so glad of company, finally, that I forgot to warn him.  I forgot to say.  Not that it mattered, in the end.

“Did I tell you I got a tree out of her this year?”

His mouth made an ‘o’ like the blow-up doll Curly had smuggled into school last year.  “That’s progress, mate – well done you!  What’d you say to her?”

I opened the kitchen door, ushering him into the darkness as I fumbled for my lighter, sparking it between shivering fingers as I muttered:  “Well, it wasn’t so much what I said as what I did…”

I touched the flame to the nightlight on the table, just as Tom’s eyes grew accustomed to the darkness and he filled his lungs with Italian air, panic and disbelief.

“WHAT THE FUCK?!”

What the fuck indeed?  I thought the tree had turned out quite nicely, but apparently not.

My mother was a small woman, all skin and sinew – though I’ll admit she had great guts, too.  They looked quite good, looping in fat pink tubes instead of tinsel round the damp red walls.  I’d had to use a few nails every time the intestine threatened to sag too low – I’d found to my annoyance that just one would make it tear, and I’d wanted to make the place just right for my new found friend.  He was very pale, wheezing at my side.  Asthma was making him her bitch.  I’d picked the inhaler from his pocket on the beanbags at Ivan’s before.  His eyes had bugged out so far they looked as if they might burst out of his face any minute now.  If they did, they did – plenty more room for baubles on the tree.

I’d nailed her to the mantelpiece, ready for Santa, crucifixion-style.  There was just enough flesh on her bones to keep them together, but I’d pared it back along the uppermost stretches of bone to give an impression of snow to the casual observer.  White strips sloped up to her lolling head, the sockets dark and staring.  Flesh and skin draped in swathes round her feet, tied together with twine and the filleted skin from her shins.  Her knees bowed out to the sides, her legs secured in a diamond shape against the wall.  Those big long nails had been expensive – but when I looked at her, I knew it was worth it.

Her shins were all red, but her thighs glistened white on top, the bones again serving as snow.  Quite well done, I thought.  Especially the ribs.  I’d splayed them out like straightened fingers, hooking an eyeball from one on each side.  They were so slippery, but beautiful, and again totally worth it.  I’d never noticed how blue her eyes were till I’d clawed them from her still twitching sockets.  Tom’s were green, and starting to roll back, the red tracery still vivid against the whites.  Very festive.

I nearly slipped on the red-puddled floor.  Tom was slowly sagging against the wall.  All I could hear was the drip-drip-drip from what was left of her chest cavity, his throat must have totally closed.  Oh well, on to the piece de resistance!

It had required the last of the hairspray and the use of her hairbrush for something other than spanking my bottom.  But I’d left her scalp intact for a purpose – and it looked fantastic!  A flick of the lighter and boof! up it went.  A flaming star atop my terrible tree.

I turned back to my friend, crouched beside him to lift his head, giving him a better view.  He had much better skin than I did.  It would look great on my wall.

Then – disaster.  I’d forgotten about that knife.  The cheese knife with the manky wooden handle I could never quite get clean, and the forked swoop of prong at the end.  The one that I’d chucked over my shoulder so carelessly when I was looking for the bread knife to saw the sternum of what had been my mother.  That one.

I’d never experienced such pain before.  He got me right on the chin-rest, as we’d called after school.  Talk about ripping me a new arsehole – now I had another two!  I kicked him over, throwing myself backward, yanking the bastard knife out as I did.  My fingers fumbled at my fly for ages till I finally managed to yank them down.  The room was darker despite mum’s flaring hair and stank of burnt hair and sweet meat.  Better than the bloody garlic.  I couldn’t get up from the floor again, and my jeans stuck at my ankles: I just didn’t have the strength to toe my boots off.  The cloth was sodden with blood, and it warmed me where I lay.  Tom was still.  Not even a quiver.

Something gave within me, and I laughed.  A new scent filled the room as stars sparkled near my eyes.  Another item off the wish-list: finally, a Yule Log.

By Gill Hoffs

This year The Carnage Conservatory has been extra naughty, and we want to fill your holly jolly Christmas with tales of holiday horror! Featuring stories from Carnage veterans such as Cheryl Anne Gardner, Gill Hoffs, Peter Marra and MORE!

So you better watch out, and you better not cry because we’re going to bring you some festively gruesome cheer . . .

walk with me soft on dark
green grass the bright green blades
stick in between the pads of
our fur-covered hands and feet just beyond the row of trees
the village sleeps we’re not afraid not
you not me running with me softly swiftly snarling
deep down in our throats a tiger’s purr a
woman’s scream blood smears my face my lips and sweat
shines on our flanks and we so beautiful
we find the child leap through the window climb in
his bed rip out his throat before he screams I always
save you the best pieces
lie with me soft on dark green grass kiss my lips
kiss the monster goodbye

By Holly Day

Short bio: Holly Day is a housewife and mother of two living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her poetry has recently appeared in Hawai’i Pacific Review, The Oxford American, and Slipstream. Her book publications include Music Composition for Dummies, Guitar-All-in-One for Dummies, and Music Theory for Dummies, which has recently been translated into French, Dutch, Spanish, Russian, and Portuguese.

Hugo sat watching the late night re-runs. His eyes were glazed and the stark light from the television made his flesh look anemic as he slumped in the lounge-chair. He looked at the clock on the wall and rubbed his tired eyes, 2.30 am. Hugo stifled a yawn and looked at his wife who was propped up with cushions in the centre of the couch. Her eyes rolled in the back of her head and an audible snore came from her inflamed nostrils perched above the duct-tape covering her mouth.

Hugo looked back at the 20/20 program with renewed interest as a story came on about a local surgeon who had successfully separated conjoined twins. The gory footage of the operation showed the surgeon meticulously separating the cranial flesh, bone and then the blood vessels and other viscera surrounding the two exposed brains. Mary-Beth murmured as Hugo turned the volume up. He glanced back over at her and noticed the blood had now coagulated at the end of her bloody limbs where he had crudely cauterised the wounds.

The story continued as the journalist interviewed the surgeon after the operation in his opulent downtown office. Hugo was sure he had seen the surgeon before somewhere. He realized that the medical insurance company he had worked with for the last two decades probably had the good doctor on their books. Hell, he’d probably even sold the surgeon some expensive public liability insurance. That must be it, Hugo concluded and looked back at Mary-Beth again. He had tried to dress her in her own clothes but had settled for an old bathrobe that kept her warm enough. He had cut the sleeves off to stop the blood soaking into the material where her arms had once joined her shoulders. He envied the skill of the surgeon but was happy he had effectively removed Mary-Beth’s limbs without losing her during the operation.

 ***

Hugo had been spending a lot of time recently in the large basement of their ample house. He had taken annual leave and had used the three-month vacation to set a few things straight in his otherwise mediocre existence. He had been awake four nights straight and was finally ready for sleep now that the operation had succeeded and he knew he would never lose Mary-Beth again.

He stood and stretched his tired body, making his way to the bathroom to piss and brush his teeth. He looked in the mirror and saw a stranger looking back at him. Short but messy black hair. White, pasty complexion; black rings circling his staring eyes beneath expensive glasses. He looked gaunt and far from the tanned, healthy, young executive, he had been a month ago. He took the spectacles and placed them on the edge of the sink as he brushed his teeth.

Hugo, now dressed for bed, went back to the lounge to kiss Mary-Beth good night. He didn’t notice the petrified look of fear in her eyes or the shivering of her body as it passed through the final stages of shock. He kissed her gently on her clammy brow and whispered, “Love you Mary-Beth, beautiful wife. I love you forever.” With that he turned and made his way down the hall to the bedroom, failing to notice that his once beautiful wife had toppled sideways, before landing on the plush rug in front of the couch, head first.

*** 

Hugo stayed awake for a while, waiting for sleep to take him away to a dark place. He thought about Mary-Beth and couldn’t help feeling a deep anger and resentment at the way she had deceived him. He had found out that she was planning to leave him through a mutual friend that worked at the office. A night out with the guys from work led to drunken conversations and then one of them had told him directly that Mary-Beth was ‘fucking one of the other reps from the competing Medical Insurance Group across town.’ He dismissed it as rumor at first. After all, they had only been married six months and that kind of thing only happened to other people after years of marriage. However, he had been wrong. As soon as he could, he checked her phone while she was out and found the revelatory text messages from STEVE.

He confronted Mary-Beth and she bluntly told him that she wanted to move out of their new house and that she was going to seek an annulment, failing that, a divorce. He hadn’t handled the news well, maniacally reciting their wedding vows as she hurriedly packed her bags. She ignored him as he continued to plead with her, asking her “why?” The final straw had been when she had dragged her suitcase down the steps to the front door, turned and told him that she had never loved him. That she had been banging STEVE since their engagement party and that STEVE was twice the man Hugo would ever be.

Mary-Beth was his wife, no-one else’s and he would be damned if he was going to let her get away from him so easily. Hugo decided that she would not leave him, ever.

*** 

Sleep hit Hugo hard. The blackness came but with it marched the nightmares. He dreamed of Mary-Beth. Flashes of her beautiful smile, slow motion visions of her curvaceous body twisting seductively, and then torrents of blood flooded his thoughts. He saw Mary-Beth bound to the workbench in the basement, the fluorescent light above illuminating her naked body, bound with ratchet tie-downs. He could see the rise and fall of her breast slow, with the effect of the strong sedative he had given her. Hugo started to sweat profusely in his sleep as the dream replayed what he did next to Mary-Beth. He remembered the intoxicated numbness he felt as he fired the Black ‘n’ Decker electric handsaw to life. He held the vibrating saw with one hand and took a giant swig of the expensive cognac he held in the other. He remembered putting the bottle down slowly as if trying to delay what would come next and then, it was as if he fell into a dream, a very bad dream, as he began to remove Mary-Beth’s thin limbs one by one.  Dark blood gushed from the fresh wounds, covering Hugo and the workshop, in a visceral spray of warm fluid and flesh.

He briefly worried about electrocution but recalled plugging the saw into a transformer before he began. He also recalled the tension in Mary-Beth’s body as the angry saw bit into her soft flesh. He watched her smooth skin turn from mocha to chalk as her body slipped into shock. As he put the saw down, Hugo felt the first wave of nausea hit him and he threw up violently on the floor as he picked up the glowing iron resting on the shelf above the workbench. He forced himself to push it hard on the bloodied stump of her shoulder, where once her arm had been. He threw-up again as her flesh sizzled and popped as the crude but effective method cauterised Mary-Beth’s horrible wounds. One by one, he completed the process and with a final application of antiseptic cream and bandages, Hugo finished the task and woke from his nightmare.

He sat up in bed trembling as he tried to convince himself the whole thing had been an elaborate nightmare. No matter how hard he tried to convince himself, he knew it wasn’t a bad dream. He got out of bed and made his way into the lounge, finding Mary-Beth facedown in the shag-pile rug. He quickly, but gently, picked her up and took her back to the bedroom, laying her carefully on her side of the bed, before climbing in behind her and falling into a deep sleep. This time, he dreamed a different dream than before.

 ***

Days passed and Hugo knew he had to do something. Mary-Beth was no longer drinking the pureed food that he had been giving her through a tube. She felt cold and he began to panic. “I won’t lose you again my love,” he repeated to her as he lay by her side on the bed and stroked her delicate features. “I won’t ever lose you again.”

The seed of an idea began to germinate in his mind as he paced the basement that night. The basement was as clean as the day they moved in. He had spent the better part of a week cleaning it from top to bottom. A ten-litre pail of disinfectant and another of bleach were used to mop down every surface. He had carefully wrapped Mary-Beth’s limbs in newspaper before binding them with masking tape. The next day he spent the morning sweeping fall leaves into a pile in the middle of the backyard.

As soon as night fell, he poured an accelerant on the leaves and stoked the pile with various pieces of timber and flammable rubbish he had found around the house. He placed the wrapped limbs carefully in the centre of the pyre and struck a match. The flames rose high into the air and he was sure he could hear Mary-Beth’s screams as the fire crackled and burned ferociously.   

Hugo headed back inside and took Mary-Beth down from her perch in front of the window overlooking the back lawn. A faint smell emanated from her and he realized she had relieved herself. He cleaned her up in the bathtub, careful not to let her slip under the murky water. He towelled her dry and slipped the wedding ring on a gold chain over her bowed head, he had made sure he salvaged it from her hand before he got rid of her useless limbs in the fire. He sprayed her with some deodorant, failing to suppress his disgust as he noticed she was still leaking from various wounds and her skin had the color and sheen of an avocado. He wrapped her in a clean towel, knowing what he had to do now.

Hugo put her back to bed and went downstairs to the garage. He backed the shiny-black BMW out of the garage and headed downtown. It had been easy enough to find out the surgeon’s work address, all Hugo had to do was have a quick look online and he had all the contact details he needed to track him down. He spent the following week driving back and forth, spending hours monitoring the surgeon’s movements outside the plush downtown office where he worked while not in surgery.

 ***

Philip Binder Snr, MD was on the homestretch of a successful career in Paediatric neurosurgery and was looking forward to a very comfortable retirement. The last successful operation he’d performed on the Chinese conjoined twins had been the crowning glory of a forty-year run as the principal Neuro-Surgeon at the Portvale Municipal Hospital. He had won various accolades and awards for his pioneering work in the field and was considered by many to be the best. 

Hugo had done his research, spending days in the library reading the various publications written by and concerning the surgeon. Hundreds of different medical news archives provided the background of the man via Google and the Internet. The most important part of Hugo’s research was the 20/20 story that he’d recorded, when it replayed a few days after the initial broadcast. He’d sit there at night trying to battle his insomnia by watching the feature story repeatedly. Hugo knew exactly what he needed to do so nobody would ever take Mary-Beth away from him again and the good doctor would be the one to help him achieve his goal.

Hugo tried not to notice the slightly rancid perfume as he wrapped Mary-Beth in a blanket and placed her in the boot of the BMW. He swallowed and took a breath of the afternoon air as he opened the garage doors and let sunlight flood in. He tried not to think too much about the damp dark stain on his shirt-sleeve, where he had cradled Mary-Beth before wrapping her, as he gingerly brushed some residual flesh from his arm. He went to the rear of the garage and took down the Mossberg shotgun from the gun rack mounted above the workbench. It had been a wedding gift from Mary-Beth’s father along with big plans to go hunting in the fall. Hugo had never used it before and lamented the fact that he would never be going hunting with his father-in-law now. He packed the two boxes of shells that came with the gift into an overnight bag and wrapped another blanket around the Shotgun, before placing them both in the boot next to Mary-Beth. “I love you my darling,” Hugo said, as he gently closed the boot.

 ***

Hugo waited in the car with the window down as the end of the day approached. The heat from the afternoon sun made the interior of the car rank with the smell of purification but Hugo remained focussed on the mission ahead. He watched the surgeon’s staff leave the small but exclusive office on the town-belt, only a short walk away from the Municipal Hospital. As the last staff member left, Hugo backed the car up to the side exit of the office block and turned the engine off.

He cradled Mary-Beth in one arm and with the other, levelled the shotgun at the doorway as Binder opened the door to leave work. The look of shock on the surgeon’s face propelled Hugo forward, bundling the older man back into his office and locking the door behind him. Hugo placed Mary-Beth upright in a chair in the Surgeon’s waiting room and the blanket fell away, taking with it most of the decomposed flesh from her face. “I want you to meet Mary-Beth, doc,” said Hugo with a too-large smile.

 ***

Hugo lay naked on the floor of the office and motioned with the shotgun for the surgeon to approach with his surgical tool kit. Mary-Beth lay beside Hugo naked also. Binder Snr’s hands trembled as he removed various instruments: scalpel, sutures, forceps, and needles, laying them on a cloth next to Mary-Beth’s decomposing corpse. Hugo smiled up from the floor where he lay. “You know what to do Doctor – local anaesthetic first, right?” The surgeon shook his head, still reeling in shock at what was happening in his office. He considered running but looked in Hugo’s crazed eyes and knew the man was completely insane. He knew if he did not do exactly what the thin man said, he would be very dead.

His fingers shook with fear as the muzzle of the shotgun jabbed his mid-section, encouraging him to administer the anaesthetic with a syringe into various junctures along Hugo’s right side, from the ribs down to the hip.

“Where you goin’ doc?” slurred Hugo, as Binder Snr. rose to his feet slowly.

“I need to get some antiseptic wipes,” said the surgeon as he made his way to his desk and removed the sterile wipes from a glass wall cabinet behind his leather chair. He looked over his shoulder briefly and saw Hugo grinning at him from the office floor, holding the shotgun at arm’s length, pointing directly at the surgeon’s head. As he turned back to the bizarre prospect in front of him, the surgeon pressed the small record button on the remote sitting on the edge of his desk. He knew the office security camera would be whirring into life and would at least capture what was happening, even though he felt that he might not get to see the footage or enjoy his coming retirement.

 ***

The Senior Investigating Officer leaned over and puked into the waste-paper bin next to his desk. The other officers looked away in disgust as the security camera footage replayed the grim surgery. “I just kept doing what he told me to do,” explained the surgeon, choking back tears. The monitor buzzed with the low-res footage as the bizarre scene showed the surgeon, hunched over the bodies of Hugo and Mary-Beth.

The sound was barely audible apart from an occasional scream from Hugo, as the Surgeon cut and clamped, sutured and stitched. The officers watched as the surgeon rose quickly from the floor, scrabbling out of camera range to reveal the torso of Mary-Beth joined just above Hugo’s hip with a blackened wound laced with tight stitches. Hugo’s head rolled back and forth and a blood curdling scream emanated from the computer monitor, flashes of white exploded from the barrel of the shotgun as he fired wildly around the small office, writhing on the floor. The officers continued to watch the footage in silence, as Hugo appeared to lose consciousness. Nothing stirred onscreen and then the sweat-soaked back of the surgeon appeared and bent down over Hugo and Mary-Beth’s prone forms.

“I’m administering adrenaline and more painkillers at this point,” explained Binder Snr MD, wiping sweat from his forehead with a bloodied handkerchief.

The footage kept playing, the surgeon clearly recoiling from the now-conscious Hugo who had the shotgun levelled at the surgeon’s bald head.

“I should’ve taken that damn rifle off him when I had the chance,” sobbed the surgeon. One of the officers patted him on the shoulder and reassured him that he ‘did all he could’ve done.’ Binder Snr MD looked far from reassured, as the camera footage continued.

Hugo tried to get to his feet and fell sideways with the dead weight of Mary-Beth’s attached torso. His face opened with obvious pain a high-pitched scream exploded from the monitor speakers. He dropped the shotgun on the floor, a flash erupting from the muzzle as it discharged involuntarily. The surgeon quickly darted out of camera range once again.

“This time I ran. I ran out of there as fast as I could and called you guys straight away.”

“You did the right thing sir,” said the grim-faced Senior Investigating Officer.

The younger officers watched open-mouthed as the monitor now showed Hugo holding himself up on the edge of the surgeon’s desk, his arm wrapped around Mary-Beth’s naked torso, blood leaking profusely down his thigh from the now-gaping wound which had split open. Hugo seemed to be talking to his grim appendage, kissing the decomposed face, wiping the rancid flesh from its lips. He was also visibly paler, as he started to slip in the dark pool of blood at his feet.

He let go of Mary-Beth to steady himself and the wound visibly split, her limp body tearing away in a spray of blood as the stitches burst where they joined the bodies. As Hugo tried to regain his footing, Mary-Beth’s body seemed to twitch and then the limb-less corpse reared up. Hugo’s face twisted with terror as he tried to recoil from the swinging corpse attached to his thin frame. Mary-Beth appeared to launch herself at Hugo, the skeletal face animated visibly in rage, black rotting hole of a mouth stretched wide, teeth snapping at his neck.

Hugo collapsed on the floor in the middle of the black pool of blood, the thrashing corpse on top of him, their separate bodies barely discernable now, both covered in slick gore.

Two of the younger officers tried to choke back vomit as they continued to stare numbly at the screen. An arm flailed underneath the heaving mass of flesh and blood, then a thin shiny sliver of steel appeared from under the desk, clasped in Hugo’s clenched fist. The surgeon’s scalpel slashed into the back of his wife’s corpse, hacking and cutting at the mutilated wound that half-joined the two together. As the bodies separated with each slicing cut and Hugo pushed the dismembered corpse away from his own eviscerated body, the camera faltered and started to judder as the recording ended.

“What the fuck just happened?” asked the Senior Officer, a shocked look on his face that offered no hope of any understanding. The surgeon sat in his chair, his sweaty bald head clasped between his bloodied hands. Some of the other officers excused themselves and left the office, while the remaining few shuffled uncomfortably and looked at each other for an answer. The coroner, who had been watching proceedings impassively from the doorway, took two steps forwards and dropped the autopsy report on the Senior Officer’s cluttered desk.

“Two deaths, one by homicide, one by misadventure. The female’s time of death, at least one to two weeks before the male’s. Male neck wounds unexplained, although clearly bite marks correspond with the female dental records and the footage you have just witnessed.”

“How the hell am I gonna write this one up?” asked the Senior Officer to no-one in particular, shaking his head, hypnotised by the folder on the desk in front of him. He picked up the coroner’s report and looked at the folder blankly. He placed it back on his desk amidst the surrounding clutter of forms, case files and reference books, then placed his hand on top of it as if he was about to swear on the good book. The coroner leaned across the desk, picking up one of the rubber stamps heaped in a basket next to the ‘in-and-out’ trays overflowing with paper. He rolled the stamp in the red inkpad next to the phone and bought the stamp down hard on the cover of the report.

‘CASE CLOSED,’ declared the imprint, now emblazoned diagonally across the cardboard folder.  The Officer picked up the folder, waving his remaining colleagues from the room before heading to the filing cabinet. He opened the bottom drawer and filed the report at the back of the other copious files marked ‘Case Closed.’ Slowly shaking his head, he repeated, “Case closed,” as he took the half empty bottle of scotch from another drawer, unscrewed the cap and drank half of its contents in a single mouthful, not giving a fuck if anyone saw him do it.

By William Cook

http://3cagency.blogspot.com/