Flash Fiction Challenge: At Large in the Monkey House

At Large in the Monkey House

By Patricia Abbott

“I am interested in having a cape made. Do you do that type of work?”

The fellow across the counter, wearing a handsome dove-grey morning coat, looked familiar, but the tailor couldn’t place him. He spoke with an accent—one that Joseph’s Neapolitan wife, Vincentina, shared. But no relative of his wife dressed like this man.

Joseph Valentino made capes for women on occasion but never one for a man. But work was work even if Mulberry Street was slumming. Why not an uptown tailor?

“An opera cape, Sir?”

“No. It would be for outdoors.” The man wiped his brow with a large white handkerchief. “Perhaps something in fur. I like to walk in the park in fine winter weather.”

He walked to the door and stepped outside, pulling a tiny case from his breast pocket and putting a lozenge in his mouth. The humidity from Tina’s laundry business in the back of the shop took some getting used to.

Joseph reached for his pad and began sketching. After a few minutes, he signaled to his client, sliding the pad across the counter.

“Something like this perhaps?”

The man looked at it carefully and nodded. “And the fur?”

“Mink, I think. And a dark red lining would be elegant,” Joseph told him.

“There’s just one other concern,” the man said, turning the pad back so it faced Joseph. “I will need openings for my hands.” He drew a finger along the sides of the sketched cape. “About here, I think.”

“Normally a cape ties at the neck, allowing complete mobility for your hands, Sir.”

The man shook his head. “No. I’d need an opening on either side—at the bottom of the pocket.” He looked Joseph right in the eyes for the first time. “You can do that, I assume.”

“Certainly. A slit bound in silk would satisfy that requirement.”

“But not in red. A more discreet color, I think.” The man fairly hummed with pleasure.

“As long as I can acquire the proper materials, it shouldn’t take more than a few weeks.”

In truth, Joseph was a novice with fur. He used no regular furrier. Nor did he know what working with mink would entail. Perhaps his machine would need a special needle for the job—even a particular needle foot. But he would learn quickly because the price of this assignment would keep his family in coal for the winter and put red meat on the table. Perhaps there would be money enough to purchase Mr. Hoover’s new machine for Tina’s precious carpets.

The job went quickly despite the handwork needed. The cape was ready in less than a month.

As he made the final adjustments, Tina stood over him, breathless with wonder. “For a man, Joseph?”

“Yes, yes. And one I have seen before if I could just remember where.”

“This cape will make you famous.” She ran her hands through the fur again. “But why these silly slits?” She poked her fingers through the openings and wiggled them.

Joseph shrugged. “Rich people. Who can understand them? Something to make them stick out at the theater.”

“Stick out indeed,” Tina said, wriggling her fingers through the slits again.

Enrico Caruso walked into the zoo in Central Park in November, 1906. Over the summer, he’d taken his exercise at the Bronx Zoo uptown, but the recent commotion over Benga, a pygmy who slept in a hammock in the monkey house brought him here. John Verner’s exotic find brought riff-raff into the quiet of the monkey house. Benga, famous for shooting arrows into the bull’s-eye of a target set up amidst the primates, also marauded about the zoo on a hot day. On one distressful occasion, he followed the tenor himself, pretending to steal his cotton candy to please the crowd. Caruso would allow no more of that attention.

The zoo in Central Park was far less impressive but would do for Caruso’s purposes and save him the long carriage ride.

The cape was more glorious than he’d even anticipated. He strolled toward the monkey house, taking in the chill air. Once inside, adjusting his eyes to the darkness, he spotted her. He preferred blondes, and this woman was ideal for his game in her thin winter coat. She stood in front of the orangutan cage and watched a female nurse her baby.

Enrico looked around. Although his fur cape allowed him to blend into the dark enclosure, he had to be sure that pesky zoo guard had not spotted him. Only last week, the man had tapped him on the shoulder with his nightstick, warning him about standing too close to the women. He couldn’t identify himself in such circumstances, so he was forced to accept such treatment.

In a flash, Caruso stood behind the blonde, his knees pressed against her thighs. His fingers darted through the slits, grabbing a handful of the woman’s bottom. Just as quickly, he stepped away. Her scream echoed through the empty monkey house.

“Sir,” she said, spotting him in the dark.

He looked around, implying another person might be guilty of the crime. It was then that the same guard stepped out from behind a pillar fashioned with plaster of Paris to look like a tree. He gestured to the famous tenor.

“Joseph, Joseph,” Tina cried, waking him. “You’ll never believe who bought your cape.”

“Who?” he asked, throwing the blanket aside. His bare feet hit the chilly floor in a rush.

Tina was standing at the kitchen table with the New York Post spread open.

Joseph saw the face first—the face that had haunted him.

“It’s Enrico Caruso,” his wife said, before he could read the caption. “He’s been arrested for fondling a woman in the monkey house in Central Park.” She giggled and then covered her mouth. “He told the zoo guard a monkey did it. The police want to know where he acquired a fur coat with slits for his wandering hands.”

Joseph’s heart sank. Was he now to be part of a criminal case? Would he be ruined by conspiring with a masher?

“He’s going to have to go to court.” Tina told him, unwilling to let him read a word of the story himself. “But they’re permitting him to meet his obligations at the Met.”

Joseph made noise with his tongue. “The Met’s patrons run City Hall.”

“Why would a man like Caruso need to find his fun in the monkey house?” Tina asked.

Joseph shrugged.

“They’re talking about closing it down,” Tina read on. “There’s a petition by a women’s group.”

“The Met?” Joseph said, scanning the article for further mention of his cape.

“No, Joseph, the monkey house.” She paused, and then giggled. “Where will he ever find a place that dark?”

“The subway is finished,” Joseph said. “And it’s dark down on those platforms. Darker than a monkey house.”

“What upper-class gentleman would take the subway?” his wife asked him.

“What society gentleman would pinch a woman’s bottom in a monkey house?”

Caruso was found guilty and fined $10. Neither patrons of the Met nor the Italian community believed the charges. No one ever discovered the origins of Caruso’s cape.

Other stories centering on a zoo can be found at the following links.

Al Tucher

Cullen Gallagher

Fleur Bradley

K.A. Laity

Thomas Pluck

John Norris

Todd Mason

Loren Eaton

Rob Kitchin

John Weagly

Sandra Seamans

Kathleen Ryan

Yvette Banek

William Morgan

Greg Rossi

FLASH FICTION CHALLENGE: A Day at the Zoo

I am really excited that in a few weeks, I will be able to take Kevin to the zoo again. With that thought in mind, I thought a new flash fiction challenge might be fun and would also force me to write a story I have had in mind for a few weeks.

The challenge is this: write a story that is set in a zoo. The zoo can be incidental to the plot, but that's the setting.

I am thinking April 2, 2012. How about a story not longer than 1200 words?

I know there are more sites that take flash than ever so if I write alone, I write alone. Let me know.

Flash Fiction Challenge: Reginald Marsh's New York

If any more are out there, please let me know.

Incidentally anyone who would like to make a contribution to Union Settlement in lieu of writing a story, here is their address. Union Settlement is one of the oldest organizations to provide social services to its neighborhood in the country, beginning their mission in 1895.

Union Settlement
237 East 104th Street
New York, NY 10029-5499

Usherette

Daniel Moses Luft

Robin Hood had started half an hour earlier and the last of the stragglers had come in and paid their tickets. I saw Betty leave the ticket booth with Charlie as he cradled the cash drawer in his arm. They were talking quietly to each other and she was laughing. I liked Betty.

I knew they would be upstairs together for a few minutes while he rolled the quarters and bundled the ones and smoked a slow cigarette. Then Betty would leave and it would just be Charlie and me until the last show let out. Maybe we would go to his house or maybe back to my place.

I was staring as Errol Flynn made eyes at Olivia de Havilland when I saw the three police uniforms walk out of the darkness and up the aisle. They must have come in the exit from the alley. The front doors were all locked. They brushed by me without a word and headed for the stairs straight up to Charlie’s office.

I knew he would still be up there with Betty and I wondered if this was for Charlie. If the police had finally caught up with him. For the five years I’d worked for Charlie he’d been reporting half-full houses as the money from big movies had rolled into the safe upstairs and another one in his house.

It had been great, it was money to pay off his house and car and money for my apartment. Money that took us to dinner on the east side while Hal, Charlie’s assistant had covered the slower, Monday closing shifts. It was money that added up daily from rolls of quarters and dollar bills that had made me feel safe for the first time since my Johnny had died on the construction site in Queens.

I really hated the stupid yellow and blue uniform and the flashlight but I loved the movies. And it didn’t take long before I loved Charlie and his house and his car and his steaks and his cocktails. I loved falling asleep in his big bed and I loved waking up and strolling downstairs to his refrigerator full of food.

I got scared for him up there with those officers. And what about Betty? She was just a kid in school. What would those cops do to her with her hands momentarily on the money too. Charlie had only hired her a month ago and she was lousy with the money. Charlie said her cash was never even. She was honest and didn’t know a thing about money. Charlie liked that.

I ran upstairs and opened the office door without knocking. Charlie was tied up to his chair with a bloody nose while Betty was in the corner wearing only a slip, shear and short. Her uniform was lying in a pile in the middle of the room along with her stockings. The men in the uniforms looked at me and I saw their unshaven faces. They didn’t look much like the police at all. These were a couple of Paul Munis and and Edward G. Their guns looked real though.

“What’s going on?” I nearly whispered I was so scared.

Edward G. grabbed me by the arms and shoved me into Betty. She was crying.

“What have you done to her?”

“Done to her?” the bigger Muni said. “Hell lady we been making her put her clothes back on. They were both bare naked when we come in.”

I looked at Betty again as her little body got even smaller as she cringed in the corner. I looked back at Charlie and saw how messy his pants and shirt were, like he got dressed really fast.

The three men ignored me as they turned to Charlie in the chair.

“Last time Charlie,” the little Muni said.”Give us the combination.”

Then I knew.

“Go to hell,” Charlie said before the little guy hit him in the stomach.

Edward G. turned to me. “Hey lady you spend a lot of nights with Charlie and he won’t give us the number to the safe. Do you know it?”

I could open that safe with my eyes closed I’d done it so much, and I knew that it had more money in it than they’d ever expect.

Then I saw the look in Charlie’s eyes, he was never going to give them the money. Thousands, at least five and maybe ten thousand were in that steel box. I knew that Charlie would never give up the combination. I looked at his face, his bloody broken face and I thought of little Betty with her uniform in her hands.

I pulled out my best Jean Harlow innocent girly voice: “I don’t know the combination. Only Mr Walters knows it.” They all sighed. Big Muni said: “We’ll find out.”

Little Muni continued. “We been watching you for weeks and you’ve only gone to the bank once. Now there must be around a thousand or fifteen hundred in that box and it’s ours now. I don’t care how long you last, it’s ours.”

The big guy snapped open a knife. “This is gonna hurt you Charlie.”

Edward G. walked over to us and nearly picked us up off the floor. He dragged us to a closet down the hall. At least it had a light in it.

I looked at Betty and was pretty sure she didn’t know the combination. Charlie loved a lot of women in his life but he’d never trust a girl as young as Betty. Could he? I figured that when they were done with Charlie they’d come for me next. I’d give them the combination and head straight to Charlie’s house and empty the safe there. If they came for Betty first, well I wasn’t sure how long I’d go before I give it to them.

But then something strange happened. When Betty was finished dressing she looked very calm, tough, almost smug. Like Barbara Stanwyck.

The Ohrbach Girl

by Patricia Abbott

I was eating creamed spinach at the Horn and Hardart’s on 8^th when Dave Lombardi walked in looking snazzy in a gray drape-cut suit topped by a soft fedora. His shoes looked new too. I pushed my scuffed tee-straps farther under the table.

”Maria Batista, you gotta be kiddin.’ All the chow in those slots and that’s what you gave up your dime for. Who are you—Popeye? ”

I didn’t even look up. Dave Lombardi and my pop had been partners once—buddies in small-time schemes. Pop was always lookin’ for a soft mat to land on, and Dave kept one ready. My trouble was I was outta work and Dave—well— maybe he could help me. Ma had gotten herself on relief but not enough to buy the kind of rags I liked. At 23, I was getting too old to live off her anyway.

“Still outta work?” Dave asked.

Ma must’ve been flappin’ her jaws about me losing my millinery job. I shook my head and shoveled more spinach into my mouth.

“Listen, kiddo, I might have a lead.”

I rolled my eyes. “Hard to warm up to goin’ to jail, Dave.” I pushed the empty plate away, my stomach protesting at the disappearing dish.

In a few slick moves, Dave tossed the plate in the bin, fed the slot, opened the window and presented me with a lemon meringue.

“Piece of pie’s not gonna buy many favors,” I said. We had some history—him and me.

“Can’t I be a nice guy?”

I licked the meringue. “Sure. Whenever you get the urge.”

“Got your Dad’s smart mouth.”

“Pop wanted to leave me somethin’ more than his bills.”

Dave sighed. “Okay, quit the patter and I’ll tell you about the job.”

Putting a small piece of pie in my mouth and savoring it, I waited.

“Guy down at Orhrbach’s wants a reliable girl to make hats. Girl that won’t talk union. Chatter is, there’s gonna be a strike. Heard about it?”

I hadn’t. And a job at Orhrback’s sounded pretty okay to me. I couldn’t afford to be sweet on unions.

“You’ll really be workin’ for me. Figure the crowd watchin’ the picket line is a good place to pick some pockets. We could just tumble onto the subway things get outta hand. There’s gotta be an opportunity for mischief with all the bedlam.”

“It’s not a pick it line,” I said. I shoulda known no job from Dave would be legit.

“Enough with the smart aleck routine. Wanna job or not?” His voice had a curl in it.

“So how do I fit in?” I put down my fork to concentrate.

“Get to know the dames that shop there. Which ones carry a lotta dough Maybe we’ll need you to create a ruckus. Have to see how to play it.” He paused. “I like havin’ a man, or in your case a girl, on the scene. May take a week or two to find the best hand to play.”

Ohrbach’s sat on Union Square and every Saturday there was some kinda strike or protest. Place was Red Central with the subway lines and buses spewing out jobless people with time on their hands. I usually took my sandwich outside to see what was goin’ on. Sometimes people from up on Broadway put on a play. Other days writers shouted their angry poems. Meanwhile, the clerks from Ohrbach’s marched around holdin’ their signs. Even when Orhrbach got himself an injunction from some judge on his payroll, the workers found ways around it.

The job was A-OK s'long as you didn’t mind back-breakin’, poor-payin’ work. Guy I worked for was nice enough, but jeez, that Ohrbach was a cheap bastard. Livin’ with Ma, I could make out, but some of ‘em supported a family on eight bucks a week. Fifty-seven hours for chicken feed. And Ohrbachs wasn’t no Bonwit Teller’s. It was a crummy crowded store—damp and stuffy. After a while, I wanted to carry a sign myself. Dave and his scheme began to eat at me.

“This is the set-up,” Dave told me, on the phone in the building's vestibule one night. “Create a disturbance on the square. Somethin’ that'll pull security out of the store. Maybe accuse someone of being a Red. Or a thief. Get into a brawl.”

“I weigh 100 pounds. Think I can take on some of them bruisers millin’ around?”

“Just cause trouble. Monkey Business—that’s what the newspapers call it when the Commies do it. Guards are waitin’ for it since some noodle head opened a crate of mice in Notions last week. Ohrbach beefed up the force and I got two guys inside now who are just waitin’ to empty the tills and jewelry cases.”

“What if I say no?”

“Milliners are a dime a dozen.”

Saturday was a nice day and the crowd was the biggest yet. Someone gave kids balloons that read, “Don’t Buy at Ohrbach’s” and the cops were wrestlin’ them away. Kids were crying like Santa had forgotten to stop at their house. One kid had a bloody nose, another broken glasses. Oh, that Ohrbach. He had every crooked pol in his pocket.

As I puffed up with rage, it suddenly came to me how to make a disturbance—though probably not the one Lombardi had in mind. I grabbed a picket sign from the nearest girl and dashed into the center of the square where a statue of George Washington riding a horse sat. Putting the sign in my mouth, I mounted that statue and stuck the sign under George's arm.

A cheer went up, and a thousand people rushed the statue, stickin’ their signs around the base forming a barrier from the cops. We got our picture in the Daily Worker though none of the other newspapers touched it—chicken shits.

Things worked out okay for Dave too. His guys cleared all the first floor tills and the jewelry counter before the cops came. My take was enough to buy Ma a new radio.

‘Course Orhbach fired me and dozens more the next day. You never can win with those guys.

#

Please visit the following blogs for more stories based on Reginald Marsh paintings. And thanks to all.

Kieran Shea

Loren Eaton

Thomas Pluck

Peter Rozovsky

Dana King

Chad Eagleton

Gerald So

Sandra Seamans

Katherine Tomlinson

Rosemarie Keenan

Ron Scheer

Yvette Banek

Caftan Woman

John Norris

Rob Kitchin

Gill Hoffs

Todd Mason

Todd Mason 2

Marylinn Kelly

William Morgan

Damyanti

Three Days to the Flash Fiction Challenge.

If you have a blog, I will post the link to it. So if you can give me a heads-up by Monday and your blog address if you are new to me, that would be great. It really does work out better if I don't post too many stories on my blog. Since this blog is not a zine, my skills in making your stories look good are minimal.

If you don't have a blog, I'd need the entire story by Monday. And if you identify the picture or send it along, I will post it with the story. I'll do my best to make it look good. My email is on here, I think.

I found this a hard story to write. I always do though. 1000 words is not my favorite speed of travel. I wrote half a story about one picture before deciding it was the most depressing story I'd ever read. So I started over and I hope this one is a bit jollier.

PUNISHED IS NEVER PAST TENSE, Stephen D. Rogers

PUNISHED IS NEVER PAST TENSE
by Stephen D. Rogers

On the corner of Main and Church, I finally caught sight of
the man who raped and left me for dead.

The fact that he didn't recognize me as I strolled the night air towards him came
as no surprise. Years had gone by since that night, and the trauma of the event
had been sufficient to change me forever. Even I wasn't so sure I recognized myself.

Before being attacked, I never would have prescribed revenge as a healing process
and yet I had so self-medicated. I'd thought about him every single day,
and every single day I planned what I'd do when I finally found him.

And then I did find him, pausing two feet away on the corner of Church and Main.

I licked my lips. "Looking for a friend?"

"I don't think so."

My nose never healed right, and no amount of cover concealed the damage he'd done.

"Nobody says you have to keep your eyes open."

He chortled, taking me in with one slow rake. "I'm not sure I know what you mean."

"Sex for money." I rippled my body. "Name your flavor and I'll name a price."

He nodded. "Can't get much plainer than that.

"Or safer. I have a room if you're willing to pay."

A smile. "I'm sure that can be arranged."

I smiled back. "Then why don't you follow me? We can work out the details once
we arrive."

I turned and started walking before he could answer.
I'd seen the hunger battling arrogance in his eyes. He wasn't about to decline.

No, he would follow me wherever I led him, and where I led him was through the
dark alley between the empty warehouse and the office building closed for hours.
I led him into the trap that I entered as though unaware of the danger.

As was he.

The streetlights didn't quite penetrate and nobody who owned either building
had bothered with surveillance cameras. We were alone and likely to remain that way.

He placed a hand on my shoulder.

I spun as if I couldn't wait to be near him. "Or we could just save the price
of a room."

"Is that what you want?"

"I want whatever you want."

"Good." He backhanded me, his ring tearing my cheek as the blow sent me reeling
but not to the ground. "You think I don't know you but I do.  You're a bad girl who
wants to be punished."

My momentary panic retreated as I recognized the words that inflamed him as words,
only words.

He slammed me against the brick wall, and I failed to get my arms up in time
to keep from hitting the rough surface.

"Your body aches with the desire to be hit by me. You're wet with anticipation of
being taught a lesson. I am your master and teacher."

I rolled against the wall in order to face him.

He backhanded me a second time. A second time he gouged and tore.

I reached for the knife I'd kept warm with my flesh all these years.

"You are my teacher and this is what I've been taught." I moved towards him with
hunger and arrogance as I swung my hand up and under, the knife piercing
skin and organ and stopping only when hitting bone.

He screamed, and I twisted. Withdrew and plunged into him again and again.

I'd been a medical tech when he attacked me. No more. I'd been involved
with someone who had the potential to become my spouse. No more. I'd been happy.
No more.

Until now.

He dropped to his knees, wrenching the knife from my hand.

Falling forward, he grabbed my legs for support.

I felt his warm blood drench me. I leaned over so he could hear me over his
blubbering. "You taught me that --"

He slumped to the ground, dead or near enough.

I stepped away from him and waited for him to stop breathing.

Eventually, he did.

I raised my hand to the ragged tears on my cheek, unaware that they would never
heal properly. For all that it matters.

I've lived longer avenged than I did seeking revenge and that ratio will
only increase in time. I still think about what he did to me.
I still think about what I did to him.

Not a day goes by that I don't picture him dying at my feet.

I really don't mind the scars.

A LOU FORD STATE OF MIND, Christopher Grant

A LOU FORD STATE OF MIND - CHRISTOPHER GRANT

"I don't mind the scars." Those were the first words she said to me after I
had rolled off of her and lit a cigarette.

Her name was Petra. She was originally from Russia and her accent was still
there, though you could tell she had tried to get rid of it in the worst
way.

I propped myself up, slid the back of my hand down her spine. Ridges of
roughness mingled with silky smoothness.

"How'd you get them?" I asked her in a low voice, as if they could hear my
every word.

"Men," Petra said.

"What kind of men would do that to an angel like you?" I admit that I was
coming on a bit thick. Petra was a whore, pure and simple, and definitely no
angel, as she'd just gotten done proving in spades.

"Men like you, maybe," she said, a smile twitching and then breaking wide
open. Her teeth were some of the whitest I'd ever seen. I really wish she had
just kept her mouth shut.

"Men like me, huh?" I asked and smoked my cigarette. "What's that s'posed
to mean?"

Petra didn't answered and instead got up and went into the bathroom. I
could hear her peeing in there and then the flush of the toilet. She came out a
minute later, had on a black robe.

"I shouldn't ask," she said, "but..."

She slid her thumb against her forefinger, the international language for
money.

We'd worked an arrangement out. I "visited" Tuesday and Friday and
sometimes I gave her money and sometimes I gave her a break. See, I could easily
haul her in for prostitution if that's what my heart decided on doing. But
Petra's such a nice girl, such a nice lay, really, no two ways about it, that I
give her whatever my heart feels like giving her.

"What about the three hundred I gave you last week?" I asked, putting the
cigarette out in the ashtray on the bed stand. I hastily lit another one.
Chain-smoking. Nasty fucking habit.

"I spent it," she said. The way she said it, I knew she was lying.

"Spent it, huh?"

She nodded and smiled again. I wish she hadn't done that.

I can't recall what I did first. But I do know that, at some point, the
cigarette got put out and I know that I found a used condom and some extremely
white teeth in my jacket pocket the next morning.

I also remember reading a couple days later about a whore named Petra being
beaten into a coma by an unknown assailant and how there had been no
fingerprints left at the scene. The story also mentioned an ashtray full of
cigarette butts that the police were testing for DNA.

"Knew I forgot something."

*************************************************************************************

Burnt the Fire, Patricia Abbott

Burnt the Fire

By Patricia Abbott

“Coming out with us tonight, Pearl?’ Sam asked hesitantly, poking his head inside her trailer.

He caught just a glimpse of her in the faint moonlight before the gauzy curtains blew inward, obscuring her. The candle on her dressing table shivered, but she cupped it in time. Her hand looked unusually white, but then he realized she was wearing gloves.

How long had it been since he’d seen her without special makeup, long-sleeved blouses, covered legs, and large veiled hats. He blamed himself for what happened last week. It’d been he who found Ray in Miami and brought them together. Ray wasn’t like the others; he had a hair-trigger temper and acted on it. But Pearl liked his volatility, insisting it complimented her more docile manner.

“I don’t have the heart for goin’ out tonight, Sammy. But tell the gang to have one on me.” She reached for her handbag, but he waved it away.

“Come out with us for a little while. Raise the glass.”

Her gloved hand rose and fell in a mock cheer.

“Let me see that mitt,” he said, his voice shaking. “Let me see all of you for once.”

“It’s just between Ray and me.”

“You shouldn’t be defending him.” Bile rose in his throat.

“We had a lotta good years. A few bad times can’t change that.” She looked around for signs of it, reminders of Ray, but someone—Sam, perhaps—had cleared all his things away.

“Showing me what he did might help. When did we ever keep the bad stuff from each other?”

“Maybe tomorrow—when I’m feeling better. I’ll get dolled up and we’ll walk the boards. Ride the Ferris wheel. After dark—when it’s magical.”

“Not foolin’ me. You ain't been out in the sunlight in years, Pearlie.”

She laughed, lighting her gas lamp. “Some people say too much sun ain’t so good for you. All those bathing beauties letting their faces burn.” She shook her head. “I’ve never liked the sun.”

“You’ll always be beautiful to me.”

She reached out to pat his cheek, but the distance was too great. An imaginary line separated them—a line that kept her in the shadows.

They listened as their friends began to assemble outside her door. “Are you two comin?’” someone yelled.

“Go ahead with ‘em, Sam. I got things I need to do.”

“You’re putting salve on those wounds, right? You don’t want more scars.”

“I don’t really mind the scars. They’re my war wounds.”

Sam stepped outside and closed the door behind him, and it was only then that she raised the light on her lamp and stripped down to her naked fifty-year old body, still as slim as on her eighteenth birthday. But there the resemblance ended in a frightening show of ruined flesh.

Ray, and the ones that came before him, had made a mess of her all right. The older scars resembled tattoos. Raised tattoos where flesh had been sewn back together inexpertly: sometimes by her own hand, sometimes by a nearby surgeon. Once, when there was no one else, by poor Sam. But never like this. She was raw meat.

Ray had gone crazy in Iowa City last week. It wasn’t really his fault—this time. She’d slipped on the mud brought on by a week’s worth of rain and fallen on top of him in the ring. In a rage, he almost ripped off her leg, lacerated her in a dozen places, nearly tore her left eyelid off.

He’d been shot on the spot. A man in a straw hat stood up in the bleachers, let out a roar to rival Ray’s, and fired the gun. She’d hear the screech of that bullet from some faraway place where the pain had taken her. Their ten years together came to an end in an instant as Ray slumped to the muddy earth. The crowd cheered, then booed, and then a low keening began. It was her as she looked at her cat. The last tiger she’d ever have. The last cat that would share her trailer, the ring, her life.

The one possession of Ray’s she's salvaged was his pearl-studded collar, which she put around her waist. Reaching out, she flung the gas lamp over and threw the candle into the now still curtains. In seconds, fire rushed across the small room.

She didn’t mind it when the fire began to nip at her. Ray had prepared her well.

Trophies by Liam Sweeny

Trophies by Liam Sweeny

"I really don't mind the scars," Kimmy said to Dr. Jameson.

They were in his office, long after hours. If anyone at the clinic knew he was having an affair with his patient, he'd be out of a profession. His rise to become a therapist sat atop a heap of bills, and private practice was a whole new summit of loans away. He never meant to fall for Kimmy. She was a sixteen year-old prostitute with borderline personality. She'd had such a troubled life, his reassuring voice, the sense of security he exuded, made her feel love. His libido, maybe his egotism, made him feel lust. But she'd attached too quickly, and he couldn't risk hurting her. She was a cutter, releasing her emotional anguish with a buck knife. She was a worse case; facial scarring. She had five pronounced scars across her face. If her body hadn't compensated, he wouldn't have fallen for her. But the maintenance guys were talking, and he'd just told her, as gently as possible, that they had to return to a "therapeutic" relationship. She had to be told what that meant.

"Therapeutic..." Kimmy said listlessly.

"Yes, therapeutic... the way we were before we became... intimate."

"But we were intimate the whole time I've been coming here." She said.

"I mean, not sexual."

Kimmy stood up. She looked out the window. "But... I thought you loved me!"

Dr. Jameson shifted in his seat. The consequences he threw to the wind when he first touched her knee, sliding his hand up her thigh as his words, so gentle, lulled her into the calm he needed to make her feel it was right; he was right. All the consequences – the loss of his license, his marriage, the prospect of helping rapists deal with their inner children in a maximum security prison were lost in the vigor of her youth. He wasn’t thinking of Kimmy’s health; he’d done it to enough unstable patients, and it would come down to his word against theirs. He had an allegation once, but he sweet-talked the stupid cops with words like “transference” and “obsessive-compulsive disorder,” “borderline personality” – He was not bothered again. He knew how to be subtle… So far.

"I do love you," Dr. Jameson said. "but it went too far. We need to rewind..."

"You mean pretend it never happened!?" Kimmy was starting to shout. She began to scratch her face.

"Kimmy, don't..."

Kimmy pulled out a knife. It was a small, three inch buck knife. She slid the side along her lips.

"Put that down, Kimmy. Please." Dr. Jameson said as he got up. "This is not the answer..."

"So what is, Jack? I just accept one more man manipulating me for sex? Just walk out the door without showing you what it does to me?"

"Kimmy...."

"I really don't mind the scars." She said. "You must have been too busy trying to get in my pants, you never asked me why I did it."

"You're a cutter, Kimmy. I did my dissertation on cutters."

She headed for the door. Jack wanted to stop her, but he thought it might be in his own interest if she left. His freedom itself might be on the line.

She walked over to the door.

"You won't have to worry about me anymore." Kimmy said.

She grabbed the door... and locked it. Then she turned the knife on Jack.

"You thought I was a cutter. But, even though you've seen every square inch of me naked, you've only seen five scars. Did that strike you as odd?"

"Kimmy, what are you-," His words were halted by the searing pain in his gut as Kimmy stuck the knife in just above his belt-buckle. Blood gushed out, staining her hand, his pant, the floor, and he felt faint, powerless against this little girl.

She sliced him up to the sternum, unzipping his pants with her other hand and pulled the knife out. His pathetic attempts at a struggle amounted to keeping his entrails inside his body. She was careful not to pierce his lungs. She'd let him bleed out. She waited until the maintenance people left for a reason.

"I'm not a cutter, Jack."

She wiped the blood off her knife and started to slice her left cheek. She held up the cloth to catch her own blood.

"The scars; no, I don't mind them," she said as Jack bubbled blood from his lips, slumped in the corner of his office.

"They're not repressed pain." She said. "They're trophies. Every time I give an abuser what's coming to him, I give myself a trophy I'll never forget."

A HISTORY OF WHAT HAPPENED. Grant Jerkins

***********************************************************************************

A History of What Happened

Grant Jerkins

“I really don’t mind the scars.”

Kellee’s words caught Mitchell DeFreise off guard. Déjà vu.

“I do. I mind them,” Mitch said.

“Gives it character, don’t you think?”

“Character?”

“The scars are like a map. A history of what happened to it in life.” Kellee ran a painted fingernail over the textured, darkened spot. “Barbed wire. Maybe a kid with a pellet gun.”

“Probably some villager in India with a wire brush and a Magic Marker gets paid to add “character” to the leather.”

“Try again.”

“What?”

“Cows are sacred in India. Holy. Pretty sure they don’t do leather.”

Mitch felt his face flush. Kellee was always making him feel stupid. It was like she had a gift for it. Like it was her mission in life.

“Is a leather couch really worth six thousand? Even if it has character?”

“Is price really the issue?” Kellee shot back, one perfectly sculpted eyebrow arched just so. Her patented Arc de Triomphe.

“That’s not what I’m saying.”

“Then what are you saying? Exactly?”

Goddamnit, she did it to him again. He wanted to rip that taunting eyebrow right off her smug face. Instead, Mitch pursed his lips and shook his head.

And then he remembered. The first time they slept together, Kellee had used those same words. I really don’t mind the scars. That was when things were still good between them. Before her eyebrow de triomphe had started making regular appearances. Back when she still viewed him as a kind of rebel. Dangerous.

The ringing of his cell phone cut the memory short. The same number. Déjà vu all over again. He’d only had the Palm Pre a couple of days (Kellee had insisted he replace his old StarTAC,) and this same number kept calling. Unsure how to silence it, Mitch waited for the call to go to voicemail before he crossed to the other side of the showroom where Kellee was now talking to a salesman wearing a navy blue blazer.

“Kenneth here says he’ll hold the sofa for us while we look at the bedroom and dining room sets.”

Mitch shook the salesman’s hand. It was soft. And he had the palest complexion Mitch had ever seen. Like his face had been dusted with flour. God only knew how many years good old Kenneth had been hawking high-end furniture under these fluorescent lights. Kenneth was a family man though. Mitch knew that. And a family man does whatever it takes to put food on the table, to keep his eyebrow-arching wife and attention deficit kids safe and happy.

Mitch sometimes wondered if Kellee wanted to turn him into a family man, pop out some defective offspring of her own.

He followed Kellee through the store, and salesman Kenneth shambled along right behind them, nothing more than a Dawn of the Dead extra, making note of each item Kellee picked out, his waxy forehead taking on a sheen as the potential commission kept ratcheting up. And God bless you, brother, Mitch thought. You deserve it.

Mitch nodded at every choice Kellee made. No matter the extravagance, no matter the questionable taste. Not a word of contention did he utter.

Once the items were tallied, Kenneth beamed at the young couple, his skin like glistening dough, rising and ready to burst with yeasty gas. He wheezed out the grand total, a sum so ridiculously high that Mitch thought he’d misheard and asked Poppin' Fresh to repeat it. That’s a new Escalade, Mitch thought. Way to go, Kellee.

“What card will you be using, Sir?”

Mitch held up a finger and pulled the Palm Pre out of his pocket. He fumbled with the buttons for several seconds. He needed to find the photos he’d taken that morning at Kenneth’s house. He could feel Kellee watching him. Making him feel stupid all over again. Surely to God she wouldn’t humiliate him in front of the salesman. He looked around to see if other people were watching, but nobody was close by. Just Kellee. And Kenneth. Like a tag team. Each of them waiting. And then sonofabitch the phone rang again. That same number.

It couldn’t be the man he’d stolen the phone from. No, that man was dead. Probably it was the police.

Finally, Mitch’s searching fingers pressed the right combination of controls. He held the display screen out to the salesman. Kenneth’s face went hard.

“Want them to live? Do what I say.”

Kellee was standing behind Mitch, peering over his shoulder, and he felt her hands encircle his bicep. He heard her painted nails click together as they met over the bulge of unthinking muscle. He flexed.

“U-Haul out front. Call the stockmen.”

“Is this some kind of joke?“

The reality of the situation wasn’t sinking through old Kenneth’s noggin. That was a problem. Luckily, Mitch had an app for that. Shock and awe. He took out a tiny pocketknife. No bigger than a fingernail clipper. He grabbed Kenneth’s hand and slid the blade through the gummy flesh of the palm. Blood oozed.

“It’s no joke, Kenneth.”

Now there was color in the salesman’s face. Bright red indignant circles high on his cheeks, the way a child might apply rouge. Mitch made two more deep cuts. Blood was dripping to the floor now, and for a second, Mitch thought Kenneth was going to faint. Too much shock, not enough awe. End of shopping spree.

“Your wife? Your children?” The words brought Kenneth back into focus like a crushed ammonia ampule.

“I’ll call the stockmen. Now. I’ll call now.”

Mitch pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and tossed it to Kenneth. He watched the salesman wrap his wounded hand, and he realized that those cuts would probably leave scars. Like a map. A history of what happened.

Special Days-Randy Rohn

SPECIAL DAYS

by Randy Rohn

I really don't mind the scars.

I don’t.

Most of them have healed. They’re just little red marks now. Or, maybe, a dimple or two. A jagged line. Or, a splotch of whiteness surrounded by tan skin.

When I see the scars, it makes me feel good. Clean. Like life itself is a little cleaner.

I like things to be clean. I wear a lot of white.

I wash my white clothes in hot water and four cups, or more, of chlorine bleach.

Two or three times an hour I use Purell.

I wash my hands before I go to the bathroom and after. I sing the “A, B, C” song, the one to the tune of “Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star”, all the way through as I lather my hands. Then, I rinse to the count of 10 using 1-Mississippi, 2-Mississippi, and so on. If I’m not at home, I never touch anything in the bathroom after I’ve washed my hands. I know which bathrooms to use. The ones with the motion detectors. If I’m ever in situation without a motion-detector paper towel dispenser, I shake my hands dry and use my elbows to open the bathroom door.

Sometimes, if I don’t use cocoa butter at night, the skin cracks open. I use triple-antibiotic ointment and Band-Aids. Keeps the scarring to a minimum.

On special days, at the end of the day, I pour Hydrogen Peroxide over my hands.

And then I scrub and scrub with a brush and antibacterial soap. I used to use hexachlorophene until I ran out. Long ago, I had hoarded cases and cases of the stuff when I heard they were going to ban it. But, eventually, unfortunately, I ran out. Now I use antibacterial soap which probably isn’t as good as hexachlorophene, but hopefully all the Purell makes up for it.

The special days are when “they” become too much. Too unclean. “They,” being the old people. The smelly ones.

They make me sick. Give me the chills.

But, I put on fresh latex gloves every time I enter their rooms. And I wear disposable scrubs, which I burn after my shift.

Sometimes I wear a disposable surgical mask.

So most days, I have no problems. I can stomach the old-people smell and the decaying breath. The weeping sores on the papery skin. And the slobber. Sometimes, even the vomit.

But sometimes, they piss on themselves or crap in the bed. They make the world especially ugly. Dirty. Unclean.

I seem to have been getting a lot of those lately. The really, really unclean ones.

They just have to go. So, I send them on their way.

Their special day. And mine.

I have many methods. Accidental overdoses. The pillow. Gentle pressure on certain arteries.

And no one guesses.

Because the really unclean ones are usually the almost dead ones.

Since I’ve had so many special days lately, the constant scrubbing is tearing my hands up.

The Band-Aids are more frequent. The scarring is more pronounced.

People at work are beginning to notice. Tease me. Say things like, “What’d you do, stick your hand in a thorn bush?” Or, “Catch a cat by the tail?”

And then the other day, the head nurse said she wanted to go over some of my reports with me. I put her off until the end of the week.

By then I’ll be gone. On to another town. I’ll do it before any accusations are made. Before anyone feels the need to investigate. Before anything is put on my record.

I’ve done it before. Six times. There are plenty of hospitals that need nurses. Clean nurses.

And I need to have some more special days.

I feel it’s my mission. My duty.

THE END

FLASH FICTION CHALLENGE- SCARRY NIGHT

And now our Oscar winners for best original story about scars.

I am sure I left someone off because the list got so long. I will keep this up for two days to give everyone a chance to read through them. Thanks so much for playing at my house. I sincerely regret that my formatting might not be up to snuff.

I will post them by nine and try to add any links that come in later.

Every five minutes a new story will post above this.

FAIR WARNING: SOME OF THESE ARE NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART

Eric Peterson
Keith Rawson
Sandra Seamans
Brian Lindenmuth
Todd Mason
Kevin Barker
Alan Griffiths
Eric Beetner
Jack Bates
Dana King
Chad Eagleton
Matt McBride
Paul Brazill
Anita Page
Fleur Bradley
Salvatori Buttaci
Kathleen Ryan
Katherine Tomlinson
Jimmy Callaway
Rosemarie Keenan
Kieran Shea
Absolutely Kate
John Kenyon,
Chad Rohrbacher
John Weagly,
Heath Lowrance
Gerald So
Cam Ashley
Chris Deal
Al Leverone,
Jack Bates
Evan Lewis
Julia Madeleine
Wellesfan
Loren Eaton,
Veronia Marie Louise Shaw
Matthew McBride,
Graham Powell
Rick Robinson
John Norris
Al Tucher,
Malachi Stone
Gary Stevens
Cormac Brown
Rob Kitchin
M.C. Funk
R. L. Kelstrom
Dana Kabel
Jerry House

LA RONDE, Part Five

I HAVE SOME VERY BAD FEELINGS ABOUT TODAY SO BACK TO BED TO PULL THE BLANKET OVER MY HEAD ONCE I READ ROB'S PIECE.

Part Five "It's a Dog's Life" on Rob Kitchin's blog can be found here.

Part Four, "Enter the Fat Lady" can be found on Sandra Seamans blog. Right here.

Part 3 "Provocateur" was on KA. Laity's blog.

Part 2 "Blinded by the Brilliance of His Own Reflection" was on Dana King's blog.

And here's "The Dish Ran Away with the Spoon" the original story.

Flash Fiction Stories: Sweet Dreams

Here are links to the stories of some fine writers who took the challenge to write a flash piece of 1000 words using a redhead in a blue dress, an eatery of some type, and the song Sweet Dreams. Some of these may take a while to go up, but most are as I post this.
Mine and R2's is at the bottom. Thanks to all.

I FORGOT MY PASSWORD FOR POWDER BURN FLASH " but great stories, Jimmy, Randy and Cam."-
Thanks to Aldo and Gerald for their help in this.

These some terrific stories.

Ron Phillips "On the Sly"

Eric Peterson, "Electra Blue"

Cormac Brown, "Type"

Fleur Bradley, "Strapped"

Sandra Seamans, "Repeat Offenders"

Loren Eaton, "Sum"

Gerald So, "Bad Timing"

John Weagly, "Friday Night with a Femme Fatale"

Kieran Shea, "Bulls"

Katherine Tomlinson, "Dude Looks Like a Lady"

Kassandra, "Beadie and the Blesser"

Richard Prosch "A Paradigm is 20 Cents"

Evan Lewis, "Skyler Hobbs and the Sweetest of Dreams"

Paul Brazill, "Close Up"

Cameron Ashley, "Super Enka Redhead Blues"

Zipper "Looking for Somthing"

Deegan Stubbs

R2, "What He Deserved"

Sandra Scoppettone "Yesterday"

Christopher Grant, "Family"

Wellesfan "Cool Blue"

Kathleen A. Ryan "To Go"

Dana King "Lily in Blue"

Steve Weedle "Blue Dress"

Jimmy Callaway "Everyone's Looking for Elisa Ortiz"

Rob Kitchin "Sweet Dreams"

Keith Rawson "Taking Out the Trash"

David Barber "In an Instant"

"A Good Day for Redheads"

by Patricia Abbott

It took me several foggy-headed seconds to realize the redhead standing in the doorway wasn’t my ex. She was a dead ringer for Adeline circa 1985 though: same body type, same spiky hair, identical vague look in her eyes. Dressed in a shimmery blue dress, the girl couldn’t have been more than twenty-five. I turned away quickly, but her eyes had already latched onto mine, zeroing in the same way Adeline once had.

Was it the music that made me think of her? Sweet Dreams. Who was that redhead who sang it? I turned back to my third Bushmills and shook my head. A good day for redheads—always my weakness.

I felt a tap on the shoulder, but smelled her perfume first. Spicy and sharp, a concoction for sirens.

“Hey, Mister.” The scent rushed up my nose, and my pulse quickened. Damn, if I could help myself.

The bartender, hammering at some ice, looked up and frowned. I got the message—the redhead was trouble. I bore down on my drink.

“Mister,” she said again. Her voice was throaty, irresistible.

A tug on my sleeve, and I turned without thinking. Pretty much how I did everything after a few drinks. Up close, she was even younger. I straightened up a little, “Yeah?”

“Wonder if you’d take a look at my car?”

“I’m no mechanic, Miss.” Her eyes looked silvery-green in the dim light. Fox-like.

“Worked fine yesterday, but now it won’t start.”

“Kimmy, call Bud at the Sunoco!” the bartender said. “This guy’s busy.”

“Don’t look busy,” she said, catching my eye again. “You busy, Mister?”

The bartender sighed, a sigh that said I couldn’t handle Kimmy. Made me stand a bit faster. Never could resist a siren call. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“Name’s Doake if you don’t see me again,” Smiling weakly, I pushed through the door.

“Did you say Dope?” he shouted after me.

Door slammed shut. “Where’s your car, honey?” I asked, blinking in the fierce light. A mosquito buzzed nearby and I slapped on my hat. Seemed to me mosquitoes will hang around all day waiting for a hairless head.

“Out at my house in Shelterville.”

“You walked into town? Why not call a mechanic like the bartender said?”

“I just need a jump.”

I’ll give you a jump alright, I thought to myself. Truth be told, I was thinking of Adeline again—remembering those days when jumping didn’t hurt my knees. But instead I drove Kimmy out to her place. A lop-sided house sat back in the trees, its steps a half-foot off the ground and the door flung open all wild-like. Someone had burned garbage not long ago and my nose stung with it.

“Can see why it won’t start,” I said, peering into the window of an old Escort. A guy heavier than me was slumped over the wheel and dashboard, dressed in a suit that didn’t look like it came from Value City. “Ever seen him before?”

“Sure,” she said. “Mayor Parker. Came out last night for a pick-me-up”

“Looks like he was disappointed.” I opened the door and pried him loose. A hole bullseyed his middle. I looked around. “He walk out here? Lots of people walkin’ in Shelterville, huh?”

She narrowed her foxy eyes in contemplation. “Look, I gotta get to work, Mister. I got a day job at Safeway’s. Can you get him outta there?”

“Well even if I do, Kimmy, I doubt you can just drive off to work. We got us a murder here.” I noticed traces of blood on the gravel. “Looks like someone dragged Mayor Parker from elsewhere.”

I began following the drops. The blood stopped just east of a large hole. I peered down. It was no natural hole. Someone had back-hoed it into being—its sides were sloped, its base cavernous. At that bottom, a huge fellow sat on a stool. At least, I think there was a stool beneath his deep stratums of fat. Had the same red hair as Kimmy—maybe a tad more orange in it. “Who’s that?”

“That’s my brother, Tiny,” Kimmy said. Tiny grinned, showing me his wall-to-wall choppers. Couple or more were missing, but I’d bet it didn’t slow him down much.

“What’s he doing in that hole?”

“Iffin Tiny gets outta there, he does bad things,” she told me. “Stays down there ‘cept when I throw ‘im that chain.” She nodded toward a chain fastened to a huge metal anchor. The links in that chain would circle a bigger neck than Tiny’s.

“You throw that chain down there last night?”

She nodded. “But it wasn’t Tiny killed Mayor Parker. Tiny just tore up his car a little. Drove it into a ditch. Chased him around some. Had hisself some fun.” Tiny roared his approval, and I stepped back from the hole.

“Tiny’s pretty hungry now. Been waiting a long time for his dinner.” She paused. “That’s where you come in, Mister.”

“Who killed the Mayor,” I asked, mesmerized with the chain of events despite my good sense.

“I did. I blew that hole clear through ‘im.”

“Why d’ya kill him, Kimmy?”

“’Cause I needed to get Tiny his dinner.” I felt her hand at the small of my back, no more than a whisper of heft to it. “Seemed like a good way to get some’un out here. Been known to work before.” She shoved, and I slid down into the hole like a Finn on skis.

“Let me get this straight,” I shouted, once I picked myself up. “You murdered that obese mayor so you could put him behind the wheel of your car, come into town, tell me it wouldn’t start, then drag me out here for dinner.” Could this be her reasoning? “Why didn’t you just feed Mayor Parker to Tiny?”

“Tiny’s not overly partial to government handouts. Ain’t that right, Tiny?”

Tiny roared, his mouth two inches from my ear.