| Counting Back From Ten |
[09 Apr 2009|08:46am] |
The Collector’s station wagon was dark green with wooden panels on the sides. When it was bought used from a family in Indiana, it had two rows of seats and a space in the back for storing groceries and a baby stroller. These days, the back seats were gone and the windows were tinted a dark bluish color, so that no one could see the malformed faces of men crouched in there, silent passengers holding onto straps that hung from the ceiling, gripping tighter whenever the car hit a bump. Today, it pulled to a stop on a residential street. The brakes made a terrible squealing noise, like swine being herded into a cramped place, and as the engine idled, hot, gray exhaust puffed from the tailpipe.
The radio inside the station wagon had a dial and an orange needle that crept back and forth, picking out songs from static. The Collector tuned it to a station that played the Carpenters and Simon and Garfunkel. Only one speaker worked; the others fizzled and popped, a percussive accompaniment keeping time with the music. Karen Carpenter’s vocals were a faraway lullaby when he slowly bent down between the seats and retrieved a leather case from the floorboard. Inside it, there was a tranquilizer gun. He loaded the darts with swollen, arthritic fingers, taking his time because if dropped, the darts could be lost under the seats.
( The Drive-By )
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| Come to Grief |
[09 Apr 2009|06:09pm] |
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mood |
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 sad |
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When Oliver was a child, he and his grandmother would take long walks together, both on the grounds of the Jerzyck estate and on the afternoons when she would window shop in Augusta. He could still remember the noise her bracelet made as she held her arm out to him, the way her wedding rings felt against his fingers as their steps took them down the sidewalks in town. Sometimes she would buy him candy, the sour kind she kept in a bowl in what she called her library, a place of comfortable furniture and soft colors where a small boy could read and drink the tea she poured for him from a silver pot she'd gotten from her mother as a bridal gift. She was the only one who'd ever held his hand.
Now as a man, the spellcaster was holding Amelia's hand again, only this time her bracelet was in the nightstand drawer and her wedding rings no longer fit. He could feel the way the gold band wobbled back and forth on her ring finger as he clasped the birdlike palm between his hands as if to keep it warm. The skin guarding her knuckles was papery, almost translucent. He could see the veins beneath it. He had been in college when Nathe died, had arrived in time for the funeral and had attended as a matter of course. He wasn't going to miss Amelia's passing. He wasn't sure if he felt relieved at that or not.
( Slipping Away )
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| Almost 18, going on 28? |
[09 Apr 2009|11:06pm] |
As she strolled offstage to the scattered applause Juliet rolled her eyes at 'Ginger', shaking her head. "Double doses of V needed tonight," she told her, slinging her jacket over her arm and taking the hat off she'd popped back on her head at the end of her performance. "Most of them would probably drop dead of heart failure if they even looked at it though," she added, throwing a glance back over her shoulder before heading into the change rooms.
( It was her last performance for the night,... )
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