The Furious Gazelle

Literary as hell.

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Book Review: Nuking Alaska by Peter Dunlap-Shohl

July 14, 2023 /

Reviewed by E. Kirshe

Nuking Alaska is a slim graphic novel that sums up Cold War-era feeling with blunt comedy and chaotic energy. The author, Peter Dunlap-Shohl, spent over two decades as a cartoonist for the Anchorage Daily News. Dunlap-Shohl’s editorial cartooning style combined with his wit make Nuking Alaska an unusual historical snapshot. 

Nuking Alaska is part memoir and part history lesson. Dunlap-Shohl recounts his childhood memories alongside illustrative blurbs surrounding significant events many of which play out in or around his home state of Alaska. If you’re looking for a quick summary of the Cold War in America, a simplified overview of what the Cold War was, and the key players, you’ll get that here. You’ll also find a personalized intimate view of the time period told through the voice of a political cartoonist. 

The book opens with his memory of a catastrophic earthquake. He recalls him and his siblings gleefully playing in their shaking near-collapsing house, before being pulled out by a neighbor. Of course, to a child this was pretty exciting; it’s only later that they realize how bad the damage was. And it’s only way later that people hear about how damaged the nearby nuclear housing sites were and that they had been close to radioactive contamination. 

One thing that Dunlap-Shohl is great at is just focusing on how utterly ridiculous people are. He continuously points out the obvious flaws and even stupidity of the plans of the people in power. Even “brilliant” scientists, like Edward Teller, or Robert Oppenheimer, are shown to be fixated on their nuclear goals with little regard for the world around them. He presents an early US government plan, project “Chariot” (an idea to excavate a new harbor in Alaska by blowing away land with atomic bombs) with a tone that suggests a constant “eye roll”. 

However, as much as he makes fun of political powers’ hard-on for nuclear weapons he never denies the seriousness of the situation. He carefully considers both the environmental effects of nuclear tests and of course, the people who were impacted. He commends people who averted near-catastrophes. He details how many people are believed to have died as a result of cancer from working on former testing grounds and what little concern if any was shown to them by the government that created the problem. He doesn’t let you forget the stakes. 

The constant reminder throughout the book is how close we came to nuclear destruction, and like his childhood self playing in the ruins of an earthquake, many were or are blissfully unaware. And it’s that combo that makes Nuking Alaska a fast-paced intriguing read but also a creepy one.

As Dunlap-Shohl says in the closing pages, multiple disasters were only avoided by the courage of those involved and a good dose of luck, and reminds us that “luck eventually runs out.”

 

Nuking Alaska is available now from Graphic Mundi.

The Furious Gazelle received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Poems by Diane Webster

June 20, 2023 /
BATHROOM SPACES

He props the bathroom door open

maybe to allow odious odors

freedom to assault more noses than his,

maybe a latent move for voyeurism

as he stands in a stall hidden

only by waffled plastic

knowing it’s him by his shoes,

maybe afraid of closed-in spaces,

dreaming of peeing in snow

or a desert highway where

evaporation is almost quicker than he,

maybe the wind banged open

the outhouse door when he visited

grandpa, and he stained his best shoes

in a startled turn around move

exposed for a moment,

exposed for longer as he scuffed dirt

onto a wet shoe on long path back.

 

GOING

As a child, I got up from the couch

and said, “I have to go to the lavatory,”

until my aunt said, “You don’t have

to announce it.  Just go.”

 

What a concept?  That I could get up,

walk down the hall and go

without letting anyone know

where I was going.

 

How brave I became in going,

but everyone knew,

and it made me feel

like going even more.

Will You Love Me If I Give You a Dollar? By Leigh Katharine Camp

May 22, 2023 /

When I was in the fourth grade, I decided I was in love with Cory Schneider.* He was a blond-haired, blue-eyed boy in my class, skinny with a smattering of freckles on his nose. 

And because it was circa 1998 and what I’d learned from 90s sitcom televisions about love up to that point was that you sent secret admirer letters to those you crushed on, I did just that.

I wrote three in total — with each one I became more daring than the last. And, let me tell you, that was the most thrilling two-week period of my entire life up until that moment.

I remember writing the first one. It was short, sweet, to the point. Said something like, “Dear Cory, I think you’re cute. Love, Your Secret Admirer.” 

Then I snuck down to my mom’s room, pulled out a bottle of Chanel No. 5 — her signature scent, which I had to use in a pinch, having not yet acquired a signature scent of my own — and sprayed probably $5 worth of perfume on that piece of paper. I sprayed until the ink blurred a little, but it was still legible.

Then I put it into an envelope, and not having any lipstick to seal it with a kiss, as one must, and not being brave enough to steal any of that from my mother, I grabbed a magic marker, applied what was probably toxic dye to my lips, and then gave the seal a good ol’ SMACK. 

I walked a few blocks down the street to Josh Haydell’s house. He was a friend of Cory’s, so I dropped the letter in the mailbox for him to deliver on my behalf. I think the envelope just said, “To Cory Schneider ” and I assumed Josh would know what to do with it. 

I’d known where Cory lived, too, and could have walked to deliver it to his mailbox, but that seemed risky. Also, he lived a lot farther away, and I guess there were limits to the lengths I was willing to go to for my love. 

That next morning, I didn’t have to wait long. Because it was the 90s and children were still familiar with how standard letter delivery worked, Josh had indeed known exactly what to do with his missive. 

Upon entering my classroom, the room was already abuzz with what had happened: Someone had sent Cory — squeee! — a secret admirer letter.

Giving it to Josh turned out to be an even better plan than I’d originally thought, because it meant that Cory couldn’t pretend to never have gotten it. The deed was immediately very public. 

And the news rippled like wildfire. I even heard teachers talking about it. “What’s all this about a letter,” one teacher asked my teacher. “Oh, just some girl crushing on Cory,” the other one said. 

That was ME! I was some girl!

I waited a few days. The buzz died down. So, obviously, I had to send a second letter. 

I executed and delivered this message in much the same way: wrote it, perfumed it, SMACKED it shut with magic-marker lips, and dropped it safely off at Cory’s for delivery. 

But this backfired on me in the worst way.  

My faithful, unwitting delivery man, Josh Gilstrap, started getting bullied pretty quickly the next day as a result. 

The guys were saying it was weird that he kept getting these letters — was HE the secret admirer?

In the 90s, being gay wasn’t something you talked about freely. It was a shittier time. I felt terrible the other boys were teasing Josh, and knew I had to fix this.

So I did the only thing I could think of: I wrote ANOTHER letter.

In this one, I explained that Josh was most DEFINITELY not the secret admirer, that it was someone else, and that someone really liked Cory. I also put a dollar bill in the envelope this time, because what says love if not cold, hard cash?

Then I mustered up all the courage my little fourth-grade heart could manifest, and I dropped the letter into his backpack when he wasn’t looking so Josh wouldn’t be held culpable for my actions any longer.

That plan may have actually worked, too. And I could have maybe gone on the rest of the year dropping anonymous notes to this poor kid, embarrassing him to no end in my own need to feel important as the new kid at the school after moving to Shreveport, Louisiana, from Austin, Texas, in the wake of my parents’ divorce. 

It was still fresh, the divorce — and I was desperate to ignore the hurt of it, I suppose. So I wrote these silly letters. But if I didn’t want to have to look at it too closely in the midst of this little mess I was busy making, dear reader, then neither should you. So let’s move on.

Where were we? Oh, yeah. I would have gotten away with it, too — except … this last time I sent the letter, I made a devastating boo-boo.

I’d met a new friend at school that week. Nicole Hernandez. She was funny and outgoing and smart and I wanted us to be besties. I wanted it so badly, I was going to will it into being. 

Earlier that week, in an effort toward this goal, I’d asked for her phone number. She’d given it to me on a slip of paper which I then put into my pocket.

As part of my letter production, I always wrote my letter upstairs, put the note into my pocket, brought it downstairs, doused it in perfume, then brought it back upstairs, put the contents of my pocket in the envelope, and SMACKED the envelope shut with pursed magic marker lips.

Efficient? No. But hey, I was eleven. 

This time, though, my methods totally failed me in the worst way imaginable, because … NICOLE HERNANDEZ’s NUMBER ENDED UP IN THAT DAMN ENVELOPE.

And, also, because Nicole — who was, of course, going to be my best friend — was the only person at school who knew I was the identity of the secret admirer! SQUEEE, indeed!

I’d told her in a moment of weakness. And I had probably also hoped the secret would act as collateral in establishing the foundation of a true friendship I desperately craved.

Things happened very quickly after that.

In homeroom, everyone was saying that Nicole liked Cory. How embarrassing.

Then, in the hallway, Nicole cornered me and told me either I could come clean myself and we could be friends, or she’d do it for me and would never speak to me again. 

I explained that it was an accident! And begged her not to make me tell Cory that I was the one who liked him and not her.

She held her ground. (As she damn well should have.) And so it was decided that I would tell Cory in our next class together, art class.

Nicole was in that class, too, so she made sure I did it, practically shoving me over to Cory’s table where he was working on something. I interrupted his concentration to mumble quickly, “I wrote the notes.” He didn’t hear me. “What?”

I took a breath and said more clearly, “It was me. I’m the secret admirer. I wrote the notes.”

Nicole was standing next to me triumphantly. I wanted to die. I wasn’t mad at her, but my God, did she have to smirk like that? This was, after all, the worst moment of my life! I didn’t know what would happen.

Corey simply asked, “Why?”

And this was the moment in the movies where I would have told him it was because I loved him more than anything else in the world and could we please ride off into the sunset together. And then we would. But I was eleven, so I just said, “I don’t know.” And walked away. And left it at that.

Cory was a kind boy and never mentioned it again. Which, honestly, is even more than kind if you think about the politics of the fifth grade. He could have crucified me. He just let it drop.

We remained friends throughout middle and high school, up until we were old enough to laugh about it, I thought. 

But when I brought it up in a moment hoping to clear the air, and just cackle about it together, my timing must have been too soon. Instead of the healthy belly laugh I was yearning for, he just gave me this sweet smile and said, “Yeah, Leigh. That was weird,” and then moved on, resuming our “let’s never talk about this,” contract before I’d gotten whatever satisfaction I’d wanted out of that interaction.

Nice guy. But not enough passion in him for me.

I wonder what he did with that dollar. 

*Names changed to protect the innocent … and the guilty. 

 

__________________

Leigh Katharine Camp is a writer based in Austin, Texas. She’s spent a lifetime learning that you can’t buy love — especially if you only have a dollar. With the high rate of inflation these days, forget about it. You at least need, like, $10. Leigh’s writing has appeared in The Hairpin and elsewhere. Read more of her work on her website, TrySomethingScary.com.

Boat in a Bottle by Courtney LeBlanc

April 2, 2023 /

Who was the first to decide to capture 

a boat in a bottle, to build and string 

together a mast, the sails, to keep 

the bow from breaking against the glass? 

Who tried to contain an ocean in a jar 

that once housed beer or mead or wine? 

Once, I collected sea glass, filled a bowl 

with the muted green and white and blue, 

searched for the coveted red pieces. 

Once, I lived on an island and gave 

a man my salt water heart. He tangled 

his hands in my seaweed hair, pressed 

his ocean mouth against mine. I crashed 

into his shores again and again, beat 

myself blue against his rocks. When 

I left, he smashed the bottle, set 

the small boat adrift. On the deck 

of the ship, a sliver of red, the glass 

of my heart, set to sea.

 

_______________

Courtney LeBlanc is the author of the full-length collections Exquisite Bloody, Beating Heart (Riot in Your Throat) and Beautiful & Full of Monsters (Vegetarian Alcoholic Press). She is a winner of the Jack McCarthy book prize and her next collection of poetry will be published by Write Bloody in spring 2023. She is also the founder and editor-in-chief of Riot in Your Throat, an independent poetry press. She loves nail polish, tattoos, and a soy latte each morning. Read her publications on her blog: www.wordperv.com. Follow her on Twitter: @wordperv, and IG: @wordperv79.

Flat White by Gavin Turner

March 15, 2023 /

Mike watched the electronic boards flicker round to the inevitable delayed notifications. Not only was he now going to miss the first hour of the conference, but he also knew he would be forced to hang around in a ridiculous coffee shop for an hour whilst the rail network corrected itself and provided the transport he had paid for. There was a collective sag of shoulders on the platform. Mike sauntered out of the station amongst the other dejected commuters in search of the nearest place to get a drink.

Standing alone, tight up against the embankment wall of the train station, he spotted a glinting metal building, with a dark cobalt roof. Through the long glass window he saw what appeared to be a stainless steel counter. Just outside, a black sandwich board wobbled slightly in the morning breeze. In simplistic writing the word ‘Coffee’ had been emblazoned in blue chalk. This was enough to entice him in.

The Peoples ‘ethically sourced coffee’ he read in monochrome arch above the doorway. He saw most of the commuters wandering away in other directions, which suited him just fine. Why would he want to spend the next hour awkwardly exchanging glances with people who believed they had a common late commuter cause or worse still, tried to engage him in pointless, mind-numbing conversation.

‘Peoples coffee’ was remarkably quiet for an early morning. In fact, there appeared to be only one other customer. As the door closed with a click, the noise seemed to prompt the bearded chap at one of the tables to spring into action. It turned out the presumed customer was actually the staff, even better.

‘Morning’ the bearded chap chirped, and welcome to Peoples coffee. What can I get for you? he said moving round to the other side of the counter. The newly identified barista looked to be a hipster type, with a smart black and silver apron. He had a sallow complexion and piercing eyes. His sad clothes on the other hand looked like they may well have been rescued from a skip.

Mike reviewed the chalkboard behind the barista. It was difficult to focus on. The writing seemed too small to read and was jumping around all over the place. He knew at some point soon he was going to have to give in to age and get glasses, vanity would push him to hold off for now though. Forcing his hand he knew he would just have to ask for something and hope it was on the menu. Surely coffee was coffee though? Giving customers every possible combination or version of the same drink always seemed a bit pompous and unnecessary. You make a coffee, maybe you put in too much milk, that’s a latte. On the way back to the cupboard you spill some cocoa on top, now it’s a cappuccino. These so-called coffee experts needed to get over themselves.

‘Would you like some assistance choosing your drink Sir’ said the barista. I can offer several excellent recommendations.

‘Just something simple will be fine’ Mike mumbled. He was already flustered by the thought of the myriad of questions about to come his way. He glanced around the café. There were several chairs and tables, none of which seemed to match. This was in stark contrast to the gleaming metal counters and floors. Must be a new hipster style thing, still odd though.

‘Of course, Sir, we have some amazing choices today that I can grind for you fresh. May I recommend the Tongan, smoky and sweet? Or perhaps our Javan lava blend, it’s infused through the volcanic rocks and topped with a bitter chocolate note. Very satisfying’ he grinned. The baristas teeth looked sharp and grey; the incisors, in particular appeared almost triangular.

‘Does it taste like coffee? Mike offered sarcastically. If it tastes like coffee, I will just have that. I don’t really care.

The barista looked confused and a little hurt. ‘They are all different sir, coffee, in the right hands is like a good wine or whisky, they all have different notes depending on the blend, a different feel on the tongue’

‘The first one will be fine’ Mike sighed. This guy was going to end up wearing this coffee if he carried on.

‘Sure, no problem. The barista turned and selected a mason jar of beans from a range behind him. He popped open the lid with long delicate fingers and swirled the jar round in front of him, inhaling deeply from the rattling contents as if reviewing a good merlot. His chest audibly crackled slightly as he breathed out. Probably the unethically sourced rollups Mike thought.

The barista smiled again at Mike. ‘I just love this one though, so smoky, leathery, salty’. He closed his eyes for a second.

Mike just stared at him. He found this approach was best in dealing with people when the words that were forming in his brain were so unpleasant.

‘And what about the milk sir?’

Here we go again.

Continue reading

Poetry by John Grey

February 15, 2023 /

YOU LEAVE IN WINTER

Those are your footprints
leading from my stoop
to the front gate.

The snow’s compacted,
preserved them,
even as it buries the path,
the garden.

Your departure
is trapped, slowed to a stillness.

Come spring,
the flowers will bloom.
Your leaving will thaw.

 

___

 

CHARACTER INSTRUCTIONS

Far from any highway,
or town for that matter,
follow the trail through thick woods,
narrow and sunless
but aided by occasional tree markings,
that leads to a cave,
a labyrinth really,
with tunnels branching off
in many directions,
but the one you want
drops down to the shore
of an underground river,
that you must wade across
to reach a passageway on the other side
where you should begin to see
strange markings on the walls,
silken threads dangling from the ceiling
that give the impression
of broken spider wings,
bones scattered here and there
on the muddy floor
and you’ll hear strange noises,
like a gorilla in great pain
though it’s coming from no great ape,
and much scurrying about,
lots of moving shapes,
shadows darting back and forth
across your flashlight ray,
before you finally enter this large chamber,
lit by glittering jewels,
with an altar on one end
and what appears to be a dark-robed man
conducting some kind of service
for twenty or so similarly-cloaked acolytes,
who bow their heads, hum softly,
with an occasional break
for an impassioned, “Yes master”,
before their leader suddenly
notices your presence, and all heads turn,
gleaming red eyes stare threateningly at you,
and then you’ll know you have arrived –
I can’t say whether you’ll live or die,
but you’re in chapter ten of my new novel.

_______________

John Grey is an Australian poet, and US resident, recently published in Sheepshead Review, Stand, Poetry Salzburg Review, and Hollins Critic. His latest books, “Leaves On Pages” “Memory Outside The Head” and “Guest Of Myself” are available through Amazon.

Poetry by Holly Day

February 6, 2023 /

Nowhere ‘Til April 

In my desk is a picture  of a jungle from somewhere

warm and green that a friend once sent me, said I could go there

live in his family’s abandoned farm any time I’d like

there’s no plumbing or electricity there and sometimes snakes

make getting to the front door difficult, but here is a picture

and I  can stay there. 

 

I can feel the edges of the green photograph in my pocket

when I walk the dog in the winter, when I wait for her to take a crap

hovering in apparent agony over the ankle-deep snow. I can go there

any time I’d like, and there would be snakes but it would be warm.

 

The Thing That Blocks the Sun

How huge the world must seem to a tiny bug. How huge my hands must seem

When they reach down to cover the tiny bug, blot out the sun entirely

Wrench it from the pavement and lift it to the sky. 

 

Or perhaps the size difference is so great that it doesn’t even register

As something happening, much as the way I can’t feel the world turning beneath my feet

Or hurtling through space, or the heaving of coastal plates as they slowly crash

Against one another. Perhaps this little insect doesn’t notice me at all

 

Thinks that every time I cover it with my palms, it’s just the sun setting out of place

Some cosmic aberration beyond its control

Not worth worrying about. 

 

________________

Holly Day’s poetry has appeared in Asimov’s Science Fiction, Grain, and Harvard Review. Her poetry collections include Where We Went Wrong (Clare Songbirds Publishing), Into the Cracks (Golden Antelope Press), Cross Referencing a Book of Summer (Silver Bow Publishing), and The Tooth is the Largest Organ in the Human Body (Anaphora Literary Press).

Flash Fiction by Sandra Florence

January 13, 2023 /

“Tang and Atomic Fireballs”

Once we had Tang and although I never liked it, my brother and I drank it because we were told it was made for astronauts and other flyers. I remember that my family went to Vandenburg Air Force base to visit my mother’s friend Francis and her husband Major Fick. The Ficks were air force people who had travelled all over the world and seemed so exotic to me. I thought of Vandenburg AFB in a hazy blue light, of a dreaming place for rocket scientists, engineers, and astronauts.  The Ficks lived in family housing at Cape Hart. The housing was all very modest, long winding streets of small, low to the ground houses.  Houses almost like ours with its flat roof and slump block walls. I thought their home would be much grander because my father was not a Major in the air force, and we hadn’t travelled anywhere except to Nevada and over to the coast at Pismo beach. I thought of the geniuses who worked on the 86,000 acres at the base and the labs, and manufacturing hangers, where impossible to understand formulas, and fantastic-looking equipment was stored and hung, where brain-power kept the booster rockets burning, and where strange perfumes seeped into the skies, sulfuric and foul. When the day was over I imagined how the doors to hangars were shut tight and wives put on pearl earrings for their Majors, Colonels, and Generals and went to the building for cocktails and dancing.  The cocktails were named things like the Payload, Coffin Launcher, and Polar Orbit. Major Fick and my father went somewhere that night, but our mothers stayed at the house visiting in the kitchen over coffee and tea. Francis was a tea drinker. The Ficks had four children, two boys and two girls. We stayed in the bedrooms and had contests to see who could suck on their atomic fireball the longest before the heat of it became too much and one of us spit it out onto the rug. The rooms of the house were dark, and everything was a mess, clothes everywhere, toys scattered, dishes not done, beds not made. I knew what my mother was probably thinking about her best friend’s housekeeping. I knew I would hear about it on the way home. And yet, at the same time, their home was full of what was once called oriental art, beautiful hand carved sculpture of historical figures, small jade lions, woven bamboo, dragon tapestries, and paintings from their life in Taiwan.

“The Bird–Shaped Cloud”

 A bird shaped cloud drifts by with a cherub inside. Drafts of grey heat lift the tiny angel into the rafters where its wings become trapped inside and there is no getting down. The bird shaped cloud drifts through my window and a tiny bit of rain pours onto the floor where my space crawler and sky patrol flying saucers sit abandoned in the late spring light. My pajamas have space men on them and track moon dust all over the room, at night. I sleep but not without fear, not without tender tears and rowdy voices from next door, where these kids are hopping up and down on their beds. I see them through my window in the fading light; I hear their laughter and when one gets a little too rough and the other cries out and the mother runs up and yells, what’s going on? When she leaves, they pretend sleep and continue with their roughhousing but quietly in the moonlight. Occasionally my space men get distracted and turn their cameras on the window next door and it throws everything into white shadows, playing against the walls; the kids stop what they are doing and stare caught in the screen; they seem captured, afraid to move, their hollow eyes stare back as the space men move toward them on a current of air between our houses, our windows. They peer into the boys’ room. I can hear whimpering and realize one boy is crying. The older boy puts his arm around the smaller boy. After a long while their camera light begins to fade and once it does, the boys fall back onto their beds. I can no longer see them and the space men return to my room silently through the open window and they too begin to drift. They seem fatigued by this encounter. The space men beckon the cherub to hurry as they gather their instruments. The cherub is anxious, begins fluttering its wings, bustling like a tiny bird, its wings stuck in the soft cotton of the cloud. At one point the cherub flutters so hard to free itself of the cloud and falls on my bed where an invisible star burns. I am becoming warm from the heat of the invisible star, from the fluttering of cherub wings, and then suddenly, it lifts off, darts toward the growing light. One of the space men grabs the fleeing angel and hides it in his shadow. It’s too late to sleep, the firelight is upon everything and the bird-shaped cloud breaks apart. I can hear the kids next door yelling and laughing as they run down the stairs for breakfast.

______________

Sandra Florence has been writing and teaching in Tucson, Arizona for the last forty years. She taught at the University of Arizona, at Pima Community College, and in community education settings working with refugees, the homeless, adolescent parents, women in recovery, and juveniles at risk. She is the recipient of two NEH grants, The National Conversation on American Pluralism and Identity, and the second in 2015 entitled Border Culture in the Classroom and in the Public Square. She has published scholarly articles on writing and healing and writing as a tool for public dialogue. She published a book of poems, entitled, The Radiant City, in 2015. In 2021, Midway Journal nominated Sandra for the Pushcart Prize for her short story “Café Metropole”.

Halloween Contest Finalist: Adventures in Babysitting By P.M. Raymond

October 31, 2022 /

October 25

A fiery red Pinto Roundabout maneuvers into the driveway across the street. The gleam from its rail bumper refracts the sunlight like the North Star. You watch this new arrival and mentally compare it to Sebastian Stewart’s invitation to show you his penis behind the Prentiss High basketball bleachers. Intriguing? Sure. But in the end, nothing to see here. 

As the car comes to a stop, the hatchback window reveals the silhouette of a full dome of hair haloing the driver’s seat headrest. A shadow of movement flits from the passenger side.  

Peeking through a sliver in the curtains, you observe a slender woman slink out of the driver’s seat. Her ebony frame is swathed in a paisley halter dress, her thick, jet-black hair styled with voluminous curls that only pink cushiony rollers could create. 

The passenger door swings open with flare and a little girl barrels out. Her hair is parted into two afro puffs, a staple of most little girls in this neighborhood. The patches on her bell bottoms are placed strategically to cover the telltale signs of roughhousing.  

This tiny but mighty storm in a teacup runs across the unkempt lawn, zigzagging under the late afternoon sun, then stops on a dime. Your grasp on the curtains tightens, your eyes squint in disbelief. Is that cheeky little kid staring at you? Her body squarely faces in your direction, eyes lock. She raises her right index finger towards you with a slow, come closer, wag. You swish the fabric panels shut. 

Your mother calls you to dinner and mentions that Mrs. Brownstone and her daughter Lyla just moved in across the street. She states you should go over and inquire about babysitting before that Carla Rayford down the street beats you to it. You’re intrigued by the pint-sized finger pointer, so you promise to stop by tomorrow.

October 26

You approach the Brownstone house. You better secure this babysitting gig, or your mother will trip a fit and you’ll never be able to get that new Jackson 5 album with your current piggybank savings. 

Lyla is jumping rope. The soft thump of her patent leather shoes as they hit the cement driveway is like a metronome. You say hello and introduce yourself. Her charcoal eyes grab you, (thump, THUMP), mesmerize you. Without warning, on such a clear breezy day, a sour tang bubbles from your stomach and fills the back of your throat. You didn’t feel nauseous until this very moment. “Is your mother home,” you squeak out. 

Lyla declares Penny is inside. 

You aren’t sure which is more disconcerting. The fading sensation you were on the cusp of vomiting or a child using their mother’s first name.

Lyla’s lanky legs bip and bop as she lingers on you. Her shadow elongates and you find it strange that Lyla’s jump rope handles cast a shadow that morphs her little hands into claws. You shake your head as the door opens and turn to greet Mrs. Brownstone.

Lyla scrapes past as you complete your due diligence on the babysitting front. Mrs. Brownstone desperately needs after-school care, and she was not at all impressed with the Rayford girl’s attitude. You negotiate $3 an hour. Just as you are counting your babysitting chickens before they hatch, you hear the commotion of movement in the background. With one hand, Lyla is moving a kitchen chair and with the other you see furry feet and a plump midsection dangling under the other arm. A greyish brown bunny squirms as she sets it down on the floor. Oh, great. Pets. 

As you turn to leave, Mrs. Brownstone stops you and asks you if you are free to take Lyla trick or treating later that week (“I know a pretty girl like you has all sorts of trouble to get up to, but it would be a big help”). You wonder if Sebastian will be out trolling with his skateboarder friends that night. Maybe you’ll run into him, the bleachers weren’t so bad, and Lyla would be a good cover story, so you say yes. 

As you turn to leave, you hear Mrs. Brownstone gasp. Lyla stands in the hallway, a mint green Tupperware bowl cradled by her small hands. Whatever is in the bowl sloshes around in a dark ruby liquid. As Lyla moves closer, a stench percolates to the front porch. You reel from the odor, a mix of spoiled chicken and cough syrup, burying your face in the armpit of your tie dye tee shirt. Mild cramps jumble in your stomach. Not this again.

Mrs. Brownstone shrugs her shoulders in embarrassment, the universal gesture of kids get up to the darndest things, then sternly rebukes her daughter (“Lyla Dorothea! Put that back in the kitchen!”). She apologizes for the outburst and offers you an extra $2 an hour for Halloween. You say absolutely. Embarrassment can be lucrative and who were you to turn it down.  

Lost in thoughts of money, money, mon-nay, you cross the peculiar neighbors’ lawn which has browned quite a bit since yesterday. As you step off the curb, you hear the squeal before you see the thick smoke from burning rubber. Mr. Cochrane’s wood paneled station wagon rocks to a standstill, his cursing continuing after the car stops. You nearly walk straight into his front bumper and an early grave. 

“You better take care of yourself so you can take care of me,” Lyla murmurs seemingly in your ear.

You heave in a gush of air, the shock widening your eyes. You whip around to see the little girl skip across the parched grass to Mrs. Brownstone, erect like a centurion at the front door. 

October 27

You try not to judge. What do you know about kids. Teenager or not, you’re still too young to cast aspersions but you sense Mrs. Brownstone must have her hands full, especially with a strange child, like Lyla. 

In fact, on your first day of childminding, Lyla begs you to watch a magic trick she’d been working on for years. Years? Hmm. Her soft cool hands take yours. In her cotton candy pink bedroom filled with porcelain dolls that sport an eternal scream in their eyes, she murmurs indistinct syllables and vowels, a secret language presumably shared by first graders and their clans. Lyla demands you close your eyes as she tugs your hand forward.

A sudden rush of wind swirls and encompasses your palm, prickling your skin. No other part of your body is subjected to the tactile gust. “What are you doing?” Your eyelids flutter but remain clamped shut like a superglued blindfold. Panic explodes in every nerve, nourishing your body with spiraling alarm.   

Your eyes finally open just as a saucer-sized black portal sucks Lyla’s Madame Alexander Little Red Riding Hood doll straight into it then closes like a shutter of an old camera. Your panic goes next level.  

“You’re stronger than I thought,” Lyla says with a satisfied yet blank stare. 

You run from the house but as you cross the weedy, tangling lawn, and reach the street, (no Mr. Cochrane in sight) your pace slows to a strut. By the time you walk through your front door, the afterbirth of recent events is expunged, and you can’t quite remember what it is you are supposed to forget. 

October 28

You’re afraid of Lyla but you’re not sure why.

You can feel her psychic thumbprints milling around in the card catalog of your brain – curating, rearranging, erasing – while you push her tiny rump higher and higher on the swings in the backyard. 

The two afternoons you’ve spent guarding (that’s what it is, right?) six-year-old Lyla, she confirmed her age using finger arithmetic, has bundled your nerves like a nightmare origami. 

An idea flashes through your head (Hang yourself before it’s too late) as you see the rabbit near the fence. Lyla jumps from the swing, arms waving in a wild and choppy motion. If her shoulders unhinge from her body, you will call it a day without one glimmer of shock because this is starting to seem normal (no it’s not). 

Lyla abruptly stops and stares at you, eyes vacant to the core but dancing around the edges. Her face is placid, except for the slight crescent smile.

The look dares you to comment. But what can you say? Lyla just made that rabbit disappear into a warping hole. Then she made it reappear but now the feet are where the ears should be, and the ears are coming out of its mouth like tonsils (OH MY GODDD!). The atrocity screeches with an otherworldly fervor. You join in. 

October 29

Your mother won’t entertain any “crazy talk” about that sweet, little girl. Her fear washes over you. She knows more than she’s telling you. 

You reflect on what love means and when love means absolutely nothing. Somehow you know love won’t be enough to save your mother not when Lyla needs you unincumbered and beholden only to her. Lyla housed that in your head yesterday. That and the blurred image of your mother (Mama!!!) in that dark portal. 

This is okay with you. The knowing part. Can’t stop a Lyla train that’s already left the station. It gives you time for extra hugs, a few I’m sorry’s that make your mother question your non-moody disposition (“Are you okay?”). Lyla terrifies you so much, but you know, somehow, that even though Lyla is going to banish your mother to that grim place, she has grace somewhere inside her because you will barely remember her or recollect what happens to her when she’s gone.

Love isn’t enough to save Mrs. Brownstone, not that Lyla ever really liked or loved the woman. Lyla’s mother isn’t her real mother but more like a caretaker. And things are not working out to Lyla’s satisfaction so… In today’s very special episode of “Svengoolie – Lyla’s edition” the little tike combusts her substitute mother in a horrific blaze in the barrel can in the backyard. Even made her climb right into the can and douse herself good and plenty with the gasoline.  

Lyla disappears the charred wriggling mass to the same plane your hand must have dipped in that first day you sat with her, the place where the rabbit most definitely went, the place where your mother will eventually…

For some reason, no one else in the neighborhood notices the piercing cries, the vines becoming one with the Brownstone house, and the utter darkness and despair starting to coat this street. You suspect Lyla has been working her magic from the day her patten leather shoes touched the ground. 

October 30

You consider killing Lyla while you both cross over Prentiss Avenue, a nice shove in front of the midtown express, but you’re not sure she can be killed. You try to veil this thought from Lyla but wonder if it matters. She’s probably wise to every machination you have. 

Your memory is not Mr. Cleaned as diligently as it had been days before. But why? Why would Lyla allow the breadcrumbs of terror to linger swimming around in your head? Lyla is planning something. But what? 

October 31

Choices. Such a funny word. It implies that you have agency in this world. Lyla’s world. You stand at the curb, your thoughts mired in the quicksand of what’s to come and wait for Lyla (and death and destruction) to appear at the front door. When it swings open, you see Mrs. Brownstone standing there, cloaked in woolen darkness. You could have sworn she had gone somewhere (burn, baby, burn). The inkiness shimmers in the background. 

Mrs. Brownstone, or whoever she was before Lyla crossed her path, stares at you, a hole where her right eye should be, her left eye milky and seeping. She gives you a faint sneer and tells you not to let Lyla eat any candy along the way (“Those fun-size packages of nougat will need a safety check, young lady!”). You think this is absurd since nothing can hurt a monster. (“Have her home by 9 pm, would ya?”) The interloper, Mrs. Brownstone, whom you realize you will never see again, practically shoves Lyla across the threshold and recedes into the darkness.

So, you head out amongst the ghouls and goblins, real and imagined, resigning yourself to walk hand in hand with Lyla and a jack-o-lantern bucket into the valley of darkness.

You don’t know what the neighbors see (yes, you do). They back away from you and Lyla. You see the O shape form, first in their wide eyes, then in their shrieks (What’s the matter? Isn’t it wonderful in hell?).

You catch a glimpse of Sebastian. His limp penis flopping where his ear should be. You did run into him after all!

When you see the shadow (Lyla, beautiful, Lyla) gliding down Prentiss Avenue, taking and inflicting, you want to dance with it, twirl with it, and cry with it because…

You are the new caretaker.

END

_______________

P.M. Raymond is a project consultant living in North Carolina with 27 cookbooks and an imaginary dog named Walter. As a native of New Orleans, mystical undertones are the roux in her crime and horror writing. Her main writing goal is to bring Black characters to life that preserve their humanity and dignity. Most days you can find P.M. enjoying a café au lait and indulging in the short story mastery of Shirley Jackson, M.R. James, and Joe Hill, the mesmerizing storytelling of Tananarive Due, and the manga mastery of Junji Ito. Her work has appeared in Dark Fire Fiction, Pyre Magazine, Kings River Life Magazine, and Flash Fiction Magazine. She also appears in Rock, Roll, and Ruin: A Triangle Sisters in Crime Anthology from Down & Out Books. Find her nightmares and noirs on pmraymond.com and follow her on Twitter.

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