Wow so I haven’t updated this place in awhile.  This was supposed to be the place to get my creative juices going again.  The Drunken Zombie Film Festival took a lot out of me I guess.  But anyway look for some new stuff coming soon.  Reviews, stories, and what not.

Since it’s close to Halloween I figured I should post a scary story for everyone.   This is an older one that was published I think back in like 2003 or 2004.  It was in some underground magazine in the UK.  But basically the story came about because I had something in my eye and went into the bathroom to see if I could see it in the mirror.  I got really close to the mirror and just had a creepy moment where I was wondering how I would react if my reflection just grabbed me.  so thus I set out to writing a story where that happened.  I think everyone at one point or another just had an unsettling feeling about their relfection.

Look at these walls, padded. Like I would intentionally hurt myself by banging my head against it. That would just be stupid. They call me insane, but I’m the most sane person in the world. It’s he that’s insane. The other me. Well I suppose I should explain. Let’s start at the beginning, or as some stories begin, “Once upon a time…” But this isn’t a fairytale, and it doesn’t have a happy ending. It started off when I found the other me.

It started out as a normal day. The alarm went off, and I got up and neglected my workout routine as usual. I had a girlfriend. What did I need to work out for? So I hopped in the shower and the usual. Lather, rinse, and repeat. I got out and dried off. Got dressed, and then went back into the bathroom to begin messing with my hair. Yeah, I’m vain about my hair. At the time it seemed pretty normal. Nothing out of the ordinary. Now that I look back I can remember thinking that my reflection in the mirror wasn’t really synced up with what I was doing, but I thought I was only humoring myself. How wrong I was.

I went to work and did the usual–reports and meetings. I’m in such a routine with these that I pretty much slept through all of them. Sleepwalking was more like it. I went through the motions, but my mind was shut down. Lunch consisted of a nice lemon pepper chicken and rice at this nice outdoor café right around the corner from work. It was a nice day out so I figured why not enjoy it since I was locked in the office all day.

Well I was enjoying my chicken as I read the newspaper. Same stuff in the paper every day really. Wars were being fought, interns were being slept with in Washington D.C., and another school shooting. Doctors were saying it was due to a recent movie. I was disgusted as the school shooting was on page five, the interns on page three, and the war on page two. What was on the front page? Another celebrity break up. I read part of it and saw that it was hard to keep a relationship together when you are famous. Yeah, it must suck having millions of dollars and to be able to work all over the world. If you could call it work. Trying one day at my job and they’d be crying for their mothers. I seem to be getting off the subject at hand. Who wants to hear me complain about my job?

So I put my paper down and ate the last bite of chicken on my plate. I threw the tip on the table and began to get up. My reflection danced across one of the windows. I looked over and saw myself getting out of my chair, but something seemed out of place. I looked down to see if maybe I had spilled something on my shirt. Everything seemed to be in order. No stains. I looked into the window again and saw right away what it was. My reflection was smiling. I wasn’t smiling, but my reflection had a huge grin on its face. Not an , “I just got a new puppy,” smile but more of a ,”your liver is going to taste great when I eat it,” smile. It was scary. I leaned closer to see if I could figure it out. As I did, it began to speak.

“Dead, dead, dead.” It just said this over and over again. I looked around to see if anyone else was noticing this, but everyone sat calmly eating their lunches. I looked back at the windows and everything was back to normal. No chanting reflections., just plain old me. The sun was getting to me, I decided, so I headed back to the office and finished out my day’s work. By the time I walked out the front door of my office building, the incident at lunch had been pushed to the back of my mind.

When I got home I changed into jeans and a t-shirt. I was going out with my girlfriend that night, but it was only dinner and a movie so it wasn’t worth dressing up for. Anna was the type of girl that most guys would have died to be with. She had a smile that would drive you up the wall, long blonde hair that framed her face perfectly, and a body that most super models would be jealous of. How was I so lucky?

When I entered the bathroom, the events earlier in the day entered my mind. I peered into the mirror and looked closely. It seemed normal. As I turned to exit I thought I saw my reflection wink at me but when I looked again it was still normal. No evil smile. No chanting. I breathed a sigh of relief.

I picked Anna up at her apartment, and we had a quick dinner before heading to the theater. We decided on the new Jim Carrey movie. I had hoped it was more like his comedies. Anna hoped it was more like the dramatic movies he had begun doing lately. It turned out she won. It’s not like I don’t like those movies, I just like his movies better when I can laugh. So we sat and watched. To my delight there were some funny parts. Halfway through, my bladder told me I had drank too many sodas, so I went to the bathroom to take care of business. I washed my hands, and when I glanced up at the mirror I saw my reflection was smiling again. That evil smile. I looked around and saw that I was alone in the bathroom. When I looked back it was still smiling.

“What do you want?” I asked it. It just sat there smiling at me. Anger had begun to build up in my mind. Why wasn’t it responding? “What the fuck do you want?” This time I was screaming. Still it sat there only smiling. “Answer me, God damn you!” I almost gave in to the urge to punch the mirror and shatter it into a million pieces when it spoke.

“I’m going to kill her. I’m going to cut off her head and put it on the coffee table.” All I can say is that pure terror ran through my body. I was pretty sure it was talking about Anna.

“Why are you going to kill her?” I asked. This time it only sat and smiled again. “Why damn you?” It didn’t break that evil smile. “Answer me mother fucker!” I was screaming at the top of my lungs when the door opened and a couple of high school boys walked in. I looked over at them, and they looked at me like I was crazy. When I looked back at the mirror my reflection was back to normal. They walked around me trying to keep as far away from me as possible. When the doors on the stalls shut I looked back into the mirror but the evil reflection was still gone. I threw some water on my face and went back to my seat. I don’t remember much of the movie after I sat back down. The rest of my time was spent worrying about what was happening to me, and what could happen to Anna if my reflection had been talking about her.

Finally the end credits began to roll. As we walked out into the cool night air, Anna began to talk about things that had happened to her at work that day. The only image filling my head was that evil smile. It’s one of those images that gets burned into your brain. By the time we got to Anna’s apartment she had been talking for twenty minutes and I didn’t hear a single word she had said. I said my goodbyes and gave her a kiss. She was surprised I didn’t want to come in for some extracurricular activities. I had way too much on my mind to even start something like that.

The evil smile was stuck in my head as I walked home. How had this come about? My reflection has somehow become a sentient being. It could move, think, and talk on its own. Worst of all was the fact that its intentions seemed to be murderous. Was it jealous? Was it just inherently evil? These were questions I didn’t have the answers to.

I got home and began to pace around my living room. What could I do about this? If I told anyone they would laugh their ass off at me. And if something happens and I kill it? Does it hurt me? Do I live without a reflection for the rest of my life? More questions and fewer answers.

Quietly I moved to the bathroom. Slowly I reached my arm into the darkness and flipped on the light switch. The panels on each side of the mirror flared to life. Everything seemed normal just as it had that morning. I walked into the bathroom never taking my eyes off the mirror. As I approached my reflection grew bigger but still seemed normal. It moved right along with me as I stepped in front of the mirror.

“I know you’re there,” I said to my likeness. Nothing happened. It just mimicked me, as a reflection should. “Show yourself damn it!” I yelled. Nothing. I started to get really angry again. Why was he not showing himself? I put my hands on the mirror to see if my reflection would move with me. All I could feel was the coldness of the mirror beneath my palms. I slid my hand across the surface. The hand on the other side moved in unison with mine. I stopped and spread my fingers apart. My head began to hurt. I had to be going crazy. Here I was standing in my bathroom testing to see if my reflection would move along with me.

Giving up I began to lower my hand from the mirror when something grabbed it. I looked up to see that evil face grinning at me. It my arm grasped around the wrist. Forcefully it began to pull me towards the mirror. As it did, it began to come out of the mirror. Its head materialized right in front of my eyes.

“Dead, dead, dead,” it began to say over and over again. I started to struggle against its grip but it held fast. As it got closer and closer, I was sure it would begin to tear my face off with its teeth. I squeezed my eyes shut. It was still pulling me forward when it suddenly let go. I fell to the floor. When I opened my eyes I could see the toilet in front of me. It felt odd, as it seemed that with the way I fell, I would have gone through the mirror. As I began to get to my knees, I realized that the toilet was on the wrong side of the room. The whole room seemed to be backwards. I turned to look into the mirror behind me. There was my reflection staring back at me with that smile. That stupid, evil smile. Somehow I was now in the reflection and he was out in the real world.

“I told you I was going to kill her,” it said to me. “I am going to stick a knife in her belly and slice her open.” It closed its eyes in ecstasy, as if it were really enjoying describing what it planned to do. “Her insides will fall out onto the floor. It will be so much fun to run my fingers through them.”

“You leave her alone!” I yelled. This only seemed to make it enjoy it more.

“Warm blood spilling out of her. It’s the best feeling.”

“Why are you doing this?” I asked. It only smiled and then walked out of the bathroom. I pressed myself against the mirror to see if I could see where he was going. Suddenly in front of me the view changed and I was staring into the small mirror that hung by the front door of my apartment. It glanced up at me again.

“See you soon,” it said as it walked out the door. I waited in a panic, as the view did not change for quite some time. From what I could gather my view would change every time it stood in front of a mirror. I didn’t expect my view to be changing for a while, as it was a twenty-minute walk to Anna’s apartment. So I waited. It seemed I could only walk in any direction about two feet before I hit an invisible wall. Rules of the reflection world were obviously different.

As I waited, I pondered about what I could do. If I broke the mirror on this side could I get out? I pulled off my shirt and wrapped it around my arm. With a quick jab the mirror broke. Tiny shards fell to the floor. All that I accomplished was taking away my view of my living room.

Dejected, I put my shirt back on. Just as I pulled the shirt over my head the view changed again. To my disappointment it was the view of Anna’s bedroom from her full-length mirror by her closet. I saw Anna embracing “it” through the door in the hallway. Instantly I began to pound on the mirror.

“Anna! It’s not me. Get away from it.” It looked up at me and smiled that evil fucking smile that I have grown to hate. “Get the hell away from her!” But that only made it smile more. I saw it reach behind its back and produce a large knife.

“No!” I screamed. It quickly grabbed Anna by the throat and pushed her down on the bed. A look of surprise was on her face as the knife plunged down and entered her chest. Liquid crimson began to flow down her into puddles on the bed. She struggled for a few seconds but the knife had entered her heart. It turned to look at me again.

“I told you it would be fun.” It pulled the knife out of her chest and began to do some of the most horrific things I have ever witnessed. I’m not going to go into detail, but my evil reflection made good on its promises. Her head would be found on the coffee table and her insides were all over the floor. He had his way with them. It made me sick. My stomach churned as I saw my girlfriend’s intestines played with.

When it was finally finished it left the room. Anna was now spread out all over the room. Her body lay on the bed but her head had been taken into the living room. Tears were flowing down my face. Why did this happen? I still didn’t have the answers. It walked back into the room with the telephone at his ear.

“Yes. I just killed my girlfriend and chopped her into pieces. You might want to send the police.” It hung up and walked over to the mirror. “The police will be here soon to arrest me. Or rather arrest you.” It smiled again. I wanted to rip that smile off its face. The phone rang in its hand , and it threw it against the wall.

“Why did you do this?” My voice was shaky.

“Because I could,” it responded. “If you’re looking for more of an answer there is none other than because I could.” It left the room again leaving me sitting there trying to make sense of it. Before long I heard a banging on the front door. It came walking in again.

“Time to go home.” It reached into the mirror and grabbed my arm. I tried to back away but my lack of room to move inhibited me. It pulled me back into the room just as the police kicked in the bedroom door.

You can pretty much guess the rest of the story. They say I am crazy. I am not crazy. Every time I see a mirror and see that fucking smile I begin to scream. But I am not crazy, I tell you, I am not crazy. Why does it keep torturing me? I hate it. If I could, I would kill it. I am not crazy. You have to believe me.

Usually I would dismiss this movie as another one of those movies that tries REALLY hard to look all indie and make it look like the recognizable people in it are trying to make themselves out to be someone who enjoys the craft of acting and not the millions of dollars they get for it.  I’m glad that I didn’t pass on this for that reason.

The movie is basically about a couple (John Krasinski and Maya Rudolph) find themselves suddenly and unexpectantly pregnant.  When they soon discover that they are going to be without family or friends while raising the baby they set out on a trip to mutliple places to see if they can find the right place to start their new life.  First they find out that Burt’s parents (played brilliantly by Cathrine O’Hara and Jeff Daniels) are moving to Belgium for 2 years.  So off Burt and Verona go to find out where they should move.  The story takes them to mutiple places and they meet all sorts of characters.  Mainly I don’t want to ruin what happens at each stop as the characters themselves are great and should be discovered on their own.  But some of the great faces playing them are Jim Gaffigan, Maggie Gyllenhaal, and Allison Janney.  All of them pull off a terrific performances.

Of course behind this is one of my favorite directors Sam Mendes.  He of American Beauty, Road To Perdition, and Revolutionary Road fame from a script written by Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida.  While the movie is about finding ones place in the world and what not Sam took a brave approach by wanting to go back to a smaller budget for this film which he hasn’t worked with in awhile and brought in a whole new production crew that he had never worked with to help challenge himself and see what the collaboration between this new group would bring to the table.  What he ended up with is a great dramedy.  We get to see John Krasinski break out of his usualy straight man role on the Office (to Steve Carrell’s funny man) and really explore more than just a sarcastic note here or there.  He owned the character of Burt and really seem to grow into him quite easily.  Maya Rudolph was the surprise for me as I usually know her for her comedic roles and her she pulls the comedy back and delivers a great performance as an expecting mother that has no idea where her life is headed.  The most important thing this movie has is heart.  While we’re traveling from location to location we know for a fact that these two characters love each other more than anything in the world and it doesn’t have to focus on that and let’s you see what’s happening with all the new characters we meet.  I definately recommend it and if you are looking for a in between comedy/drama this is the movie to watch.

This is a short story done mainly as a writing exercise to help out my friend Mike (whose story is found HERE) get his head wrapped around his world in his upcoming book FREAK.  But it was fun to write a story about people with super powers where nothing super heroic happens.  Plus I wanted to show that getting super powers wasn’t always a good thing.

“Another one Shakes,” Alex said as he held up his glass.

“Come on. You’re going to drink my last bottle.”  Shakes poured him another one.  “You know how hard it is to get good whiskey nowadays?”  Avery Creek had been shut down for awhile now.  Quarantined by the government to contain a virus that killed off half the populace and gave the other half new abilities.  Shakes could now burn anything with his gaze.  The guy in the back looked like he was now made of steel.  Alex himself had become an empath.  Meaning he could feel other people’s emotions.  Alex considered this a meaningless ability.

“I can tell you’re pissed, but trust me I need it.”  He knocked back the glass and let out a breath as it burned down his throat.  Alex put his hands to his temples for a few seconds and then threw a wad of bills on the bar.

“That doesn’t do me much good anymore,” Shakes commented.

“Yeah but they might be coming back in style now that the Army is in town.”  Shakes grabbed up the bills and put them in the empty register drawer.  “Have you seen Tina?”

“Not that I’m entirely comfortable with the way she’s earning money nowadays but I think she left here about an hour and a half ago.  I’m sure you could find someone else of that expertise down by the park.” Alex smiled at him.

“Nah has to be Tina.”  He scooted his stool back and went to stand but his legs were wobbly.  The whiskey was doing its trick.  As he stumbled to the door he bumped into a table.  The guy made of steel immediately stood up.

“You spilled my drink.”  Alex could feel the rage rolling off of him.  He was looking for a fight.

“Sorry pal.  Haven’t gotten my sea legs yet.”  The steel guy grabbed Alex by the collar.  “Whoa! It was an accident!”  The table next to them started to smoke.

“None of that in here,” Shakes yelled.  His eyes were glowing red.  “Alex get out of here.  Steve, I’ll get you another one.”  Steve let go of Alex’s collar.  Alex smoothed his shirt out and walked backwards out the door.  He turned and began to walk down the street towards his apartment.  Just as he was about to cross the intersection he saw Tina walk out the door of a house.

“Tina!”  She turned and smiled when she saw it was Alex.  She had blonde hair and some of the bluest eyes he had ever seen.

“Alex.  What are you doing out?”
“Just left Shakes.  Looking to see if you were available.”  She looked back at the house she just came out of.

“I’m not taking anymore clients tonight.  The curfew is coming.”

“Ah, come on.  Come to my place.  You can spend the night.”  She smiled at him and looked at the ground.

“Probably not a good idea.  That’s how hearts get broken.”

“Look, I’ve got a ton of rations left over.  Spend the night and you can have your pick.”  Tina looked down the street.

“I don’t know.”

“It’s not like this is the first time we’ve done this.”  After thinking about it she nodded her head.

“Okay.”  They began the four block walk to Alex’s apartment.  Tina had started using her new ability to her advantage over the last few weeks.  She could heighten one’s emotions to their maximum giving the person the most intense experience ever.  Of course trading sex for good made great use of her ability and made her highly sought after among her clients.

When they got back to Alex’s place Tina immediately jumped into the shower.  Alex sat on the bed and grabbed an almost empty bottle of whiskey and downed the rest of it.  He put his hands to his temples and pressed firmly.  The shower shut off and Tina came out wearing a towel.

“Thought you had enough at Shake’s earlier?” she asked.

“No such thing as enough anymore.”

“Well it’s just with my power I don’t know how it will affect you if you’re drunk.”

“Yeah, how does that work anyway?  Pheromones or something?”

“I don’t know.  I just sort of mentally push towards someone and it happens.”

“Well you don’t have to push to hard with me.”  He leaned up and kissed her.  She let her towel drop.

When Tina awoke Alex was already up.  He was digging around in his freezer.  She saw him pull a bottle of vodka out.

“Already?” she asked.  He turned back to look at her.

“Yeah.  Going to be a hell of a day.  I can tell.”

“Well I know it’s none of my business but are you planning on drinking yourself to death? I’d rather not stick around for that.”

“Maybe.” Tina grabbed her clothes off the floor.  Alex opened the door to his small balcony.  He took a swig off the bottle as Tina poked her head out the door.

“I’m going I think.  So . . .”

“Do you know why I call on you?” She seemed confused.

“Yeah.  The same reason everyone else does.”

“You know I’m an empath right?”  Tina walked out onto the balcony and stood next to him.

“Figured that’s why you liked me so much.  My power got you off extra or something.”

“Afraid it doesn’t work that way.”  He took another drink.

“Why?”

“Being an empath I’m sure has its uses.  But you know what it’s like being in a city that is scared?  This whole city is terrified of what’s happening.  Scared of not having enough food.  Scared of going outside and being assaulted by someone with super strength.  Scared of themselves.”  Tina put her hand on his arm.  “Every day I get flooded with all of it.  The whole city.  Right now a guy across the street there is afraid to touch his baby boy.  He can shoot fire from his hands but he can’t control it.  He can’t even touch his child.  Downstairs a lady is afraid her husband is cheating on her with her twin sister.  They combine to form a giant woman.  They form a single being and she can’t even trust her sister.  She doesn’t trust herself.  All of this.  All day.  It’s so overpowering that I can’t even tell what I feel anymore.  Do I feel sad or am I sad because someone else is?  Do I feel anything?”  He turns his attention to Tina and looks into her blue eyes.  “When I’m with you and it happens my emotions get so heightened that I can tell they’re mine.  I can know what I’m feeling for that short period of time.  And no matter how short the time it’s worth it.  Just to know I still actually feel something.”
“I didn’t know.”

“I know.  No one does.”  Tina puts her hand on his chest and pushes.  For a few seconds his mind is clear and he knows he feels happy.  But slowly the waves start coming again.  Love, happiness, sadness, greed, fear, loneliness.  Tina turns and goes back into the apartment.

“You know where to find me,” she says as she closes the door.  Alex takes another drink and presses his palm to his temple.

So I watch way to much TV so why not blog about it?  So here is how premiere week kicked off.

The Ultimate Fighter:

What’s the one draw of The Ultimate Fighter this year?  Kimbo Slice!  The coaches are interesting as Quinten “Rampage” Jackson and Rashad Evans are the coaches and they can not stand each other.  The show opens with them sitting in the Ultimate Fighter gym trash talking each other.  And then of course the prospective fighters come in.  At which point Dana White drops the bomb of all bombs on them.  This year Kimbo Slice is trying out.  Why is that news?  Kimbo fought in the Affliction organization which folded.  The whole time Dana White talked trash about him saying he was an overrated street fighter who couldn’t step foot in a UFC ring.  Well the last big fight Kimbo was in he got knocked out pretty quickly and Affliction folded not to long after.  Well Dana White is the smartest business man ever as he knew that if they put the offer out for Kimbo Slice to join the Ultimate Fighter that it would be ratings gold.  Luckily Kimbo accepted and Dana has gone on record saying “Yeah I talked tons of shit about him but at the end of the day he showed up.”  Well Jackson immediately called dibs on Kimbo.  Evans let him have him seeing no potential in him.  After all the teams were decided most of the big guys ended up on Jackson’s team and Jackson got to pick the first two match ups.  His first match up wasn’t his smartest as he picked Evan’s best wrestler to fight his guy that had the worst ground game causing him to spend the whole match on his back.  And he got busted open pretty quickly.  In the end Evan’s team won.  Not off to a good start for Rampage.

Fringe:

Well we basically start not to long after last season’s season finale.  We saw Olivia standing in an alternate reality with William Bell (Lenard Nimoy) in the twin towers in NYC.  Here we open with a guy who had just been in a car accident waking up and running off.  We follow him and he forces his way into a man’s apartment.  Knocking him out he takes out a machine that he places into the man’s mouth and then into his own.  When he hits a button his face changes into the face of the man lying on the floor knocked out.  We have a shape shifter.  Back at the accident the police are asking who was in the OTHER car.  Turns out it’s Olivia’s.  They call in Peter and Walter to find out that no one had seen her leave the scene.  As Walter is in the SUV all it’s electronics start going crazy.  he gets out just in time for Olivia to appear out of no where and fly through the windshield.  She’s taken to the hospital where they say they don’t expect her to regain conciousness.  As Peter is saying good bye she begins speaking Russian and then bolts up awake.  She doesn’t remember what happened or where she was.  From here the story goes into some great stuff as FRINGE division is shut down, the shapshifter turns out to be from another reality and is charged with hunting Olivia down and finding out what Bell told her.  Lots of action and lasting effects for the rest of the season.

The Office:

Well it’s really hard to review this show.  I mean it’s The Office.  The main thing is Michael decides to spread a lot of rumors to cover up a real rumor of Stanely having an affair.  In doing so he spread one that Pam was pregnant which from the season finale we know to be true.  Jim and Pam haven’t told anyone yet for obvious reasons.  But they then decide to let everyone know to protect Stanely since everyone knew one rumor was true but Michael tells everyone the truth anyway.  Funny stuff but a little slow for a season opener.  And the stuff with Andy was not very funny at all.  Him wondering if he was gay because he hears a rumor he was is kinda stupid.

Community:

Well this new show starring Joel McHale and Chevy Chase started off pretty good.  I’m curious to see where this show is going to go.  It starts with Joel Mchale setting up a fake study group to get to know a girl.  Joel Mchale is actually a lawyer who’s college diploma is found out to be fake.  So he’s trying to get a college degree and knows one of the teachers there.  The first episode is pretty good but I am curious as to where the show will go from here.

So things are starting to come to a boil in the Blackest Night story.  The heros are finally starting to band together as they realize this is happening all over Earth and into the deepest reaches of space.  We see the reanimated Firestorm take on the current version of Firestorm and things don’t go exactly well.  How this is going to affect the future of the character that has already undergone a ton of changes in the past few years has yet to be seen.

Barry Allen also finds out that simply removing the Black Lantern rings isn’t an option.  The rings have pretty much grown roots into each of its victims.  Then soon after the Indigo Lanterns finally make their presence known as they jump in to help Hal Jordan fight off some of his former pals.  They explain to him that the power of green (willpower) mixed with their color Indigo (compassion) can shut the rings down.  Thus getting rid of a few of the revived Black Lanterns.  They also explain that the only thing that can pierce the blackness is the white light and that of course Hal is going to be the one that will need to quest for it.  There has been rumors leading up to Blackest Night that we might see Hal ascend to a White Lantern.  And of course something I believe BL Firestorm said something to the affect of “No matter what he will rise!” with no one really questioning who HE was.  I stupidly looked on the DC website and they have already spoiled it by having the cover of #5 up.  But I won’t do that here.  So some great stuff in there as well as we discover the fate of The Atom.  This story just continually gets better and better.

For some reason I think this is the funniest joke from Arrested Development ever.

So here is a story I wrote awhile ago that has yet to find a home.  I think it came about during the few weeks of the Writing Challenges For Dummies that a few of us were doing over at Writerscafe.org.  I really just wanted to write a story about two brothers going on an adventure together.  It very much has a midwest feel to it.  And maybe that is why it has yet to be picked up for publication.  But if you grew up in the Midwest (especially rural midwest) then you can easily understand this story.  Many times there are no other children for miles if you live on a farm so far away from the city your siblings can easily become your only playmates.  Of course here I do give my characters an avenue of getting off the farm but they of course decide not to.  So read on and enjoy:

I should have just gone to play baseball like I wanted.  It was the summer of 1975 and I was eleven.  All I really wanted to do that day was ride my bike the mile or so into town and see if anyone was playing ball up at the park.  I felt lucky that day.  Maybe I would have hit a home run that day.  But in all fairness the outfield fence was only one hundred and fifty feet from home plate.  It’s not like no one had done it before.  I hadn’t, but once I hit one that hit the bar that ran along the top of the chain link fence that was the outfield wall.  Everyone on the other team called it a home run and let me take all my bases but in my heart I knew I hadn’t hit an actual home run.
That is all I had planned on this lazy Sunday afternoon.  If I had gone then maybe things would have been different.  Instead that summer turned into a whole mess.  A mess that I will never forget but it seems like everyone else has.  It started when my older brother Sam decided he wanted to go fishing.
Sam was two years older than I was.  So of course I thought he was greatest person in the world.  I would follow him around most days.  He was pretty good about letting me tag along.  There were only a few times he seemed to not want me around.  That was when ever he was around Sara Fletcher.  I think he was sweet on her and didn’t want his little brother hanging around while he was trying to figure out a way to kiss her.  But at the time I thought that was gross and would have much rather been as far away from that as possible.
This particular day Sam wanted some company down at the fishing hole.  I really just wanted to get into town before a game got to far in play that I couldn’t jump in.  In the end though Sam won.  I mean when it came down to it just the fact that he really wanted me to come with him made me push all the baseball nonsense out of my head.
“Come on,” Sam said.  “We’ll catch us some fish and then take a swim over at bowling ball tree.”  Bowling ball tree was a large tree that hung over the creek that flowed through our woods.  The creek was pretty small most of the way through the woods but by bowling ball tree it formed a huge pool.  Past bowling ball tree it shrank back down to the small trickle.  The name came from a story that someone’s older brother heard from someone else’s older brother had told them.  Apparently back in the Fifties someone had thrown a bowling ball into the water from one of the highest branches of the tree just to see how much of a splash it would make.  When they went to retrieve the ball (probably their dad’s if the story was true) it was no where to be found.  Either it had been sucked into the mud at the bottom of the water or had been swept away by the current.  So every time someone swam down by the tree they were always keeping an eye out just in case they happened to stumble upon the aforementioned bowling ball.  While no one could tell if the story was true just about everyone in town had heard it.  Thus the tree now had the nickname of Bowling Ball Tree.
“It’ll be great.  I bet we even find that old bowling ball.  Come on Tommy Gun.”  My name was Tom but Sam always called me Tommy Gun.  To this day I have no idea why.  He must have heard the phrase tommy gun somewhere and it stuck in his mind.  And of course I immediately put baseball out of my mind and headed inside to put on some old shorts and an old t-shirt.  If we wore anything somewhat new and got dirty down in the woods our mother would have skinned us alive.
So off we went with our fishing poles resting on our shoulders.  Sam carried a small tackle box.  I carried a small net.  Sometimes I would use the net to catch frogs while we were down there.  Most times I wanted to keep them as pets but none of them seemed to last very long.  Of course at that age I didn’t seem to realize that they needed a lot of bugs to eat to survive.
The fishing hole we were going to was through a dense patch of trees at the end of our family’s property.  We first had to walk across a cornfield, through the dense patch of trees, down one side of a large ditch, up the other side, over a small fence that marked the end of our property, and finally down a small slope to the bank of the large pond.  Nothing more than blue gill and catfish swam here.  Most of the time we ended up throwing the fish back as they were too small to account for the trouble of gutting them.  It was fun just the same.
When we finally got there and approached our usual spot a large bull frog jumped in making a large splash.  I gripped my net.  Maybe I would be going home with a new pet today.  We baited our hooks and threw them in.  For most of the time at the fishing hole we talked about the usual stuff.  Music, TV, whom at school had seen so and so’s boobs.  The whole concept of feeling a girl’s chest seemed completely foreign to me but Sam was just entering the era that all boys enter.  The boob era.  One minute girls were gross and then the next moment boobs seemed to be the only thing you could think of.  How did they feel?  Were they soft?  Were they heavy?  Usually by thirteen all of this was running through a boy’s head about twenty times a second.  I just let him tell me and I sat amazed listening to life as a thirteen year old.
Sam had also taken up smoking.  When we were out like this he smoked openly.  If our parents knew that he was smoking he would have been lashed numerous times by our father’s belt.  Which was ironic since our father smoked at least two packs a day.  I was sworn to secrecy.  Of course if confronted with a lashing of my own I would have given Sam up in a minute to save my own behind.  But he didn’t know that.
The fish didn’t seem to be biting that day.  I caught one fish but it was almost the same size as the hook that had caught it.  So I threw it back in the hopes that I would catch it another day in the future.  The frogs were being pretty sneaky that day too so by the time we had decided to head over to Bowling Ball Tree for a swim I hadn’t caught one.
We made our through the woods until we ran into the creek.  Then we followed it along until it widened into the large pool.  Bowling Ball Tree sat at the edge of the bank.  It was tilted slightly and leaned out over the pool.  A lot of kids from around the area came here to swim.  It was surprising there was no one here this day.  If you climbed up the tree and went out on one of its branches you could swing yourself off and into the water.  There used to be a rope tied to one of the branches but time had taken its toll on it and a few summers before it finally broke while one of the Easley twins swung out over the water.  No one had seen to replace the rope for some reason.
I took my shirt off and threw it on a nearby bush to keep it off the ground.  Sam threw his up on the bank by the tree.  He seemed to be less worried about something crawling into than I was.  We both jumped right in with our old pair of sneakers.  It was wise to wear your shoes while walking around in the creek.  Sometimes high school kids came down here to drink and threw the bottles into the creek.  Timothy Lamansky had been down here two summers ago and was walking without his shoes on.  He stepped on a broken bottle and it went straight through his foot.  Luckily I wasn’t there that day but a few people at school who were told me about it.  They said you could see a large jagged piece coming out the top of his foot.  I made sure to never venture in the water without shoes again.
This day me and Sam made the most of having Bowling Ball Tree to ourselves.  We would do cannon balls off the high embankment.  Sam would go out over the water on a branch and swing so he would do a back flip into the water. All the while we both felt around in the mud with our feet and hands to see if we stumbled upon the old bowling ball.  Neither of us did. If we had just left ten minutes earlier the day would have ended perfectly.
We were pretty much bored with swimming and I had gotten out and put my shirt back on.  Sam wanted to go up for one more jump from the branch.  I sat down on the embankment next to the tree to watch him.  He climbed up the leaning tree and made his way, hand over hand, out onto the branch.  Sam began to swing back and forth until he got enough momentum going and then swung himself forward so we did a back flip in the air and landed in the water feet first.  I clapped after he landed.
Sam burst out of the water smiling.  I got up ready to start the trek home.  When I pushed off the ground to get myself up the edge of the embankment began to crumble away.  I grabbed at the edge to keep myself from falling but it was too late.  I tumbled down the muddy wall of dirt and hit the water.  Sam started laughing and pointing.  It wasn’t a huge deal since I had just been swimming in this same water.  When I looked up at Sam I saw that he had stopped laughing and was looking at the wall of the embankment that I had just had the pleasure of sliding down.
I turned to look and saw something that was a dull gray color.  Sam swam over and walked up to the wall of dirt.  He gently began to brush away some of the dirt.  More and more gray began to show.  Eventually a large stone appeared.  It had some strange carvings on it.  One looked like a sun.  It was a round circle with lines coming off it as if rays of sunshine.  The next one looked like a wolf.  The third one was hard to make out.  Time had worn most of it off.  Sam pulled at the rock and it seemed to move.
“Help me Tommy Gun.”  I went walked over and grabbed one side of it.  Sam counted to three and we both pulled.  At first it didn’t seem like it was going to come loose but at last it began to give.  With one last tug it came off and Sam almost fell over backwards.  The large stone fell into the water and sank to the bottom.  I went to reach for it when Sam let out a whoop.  “What the hell!?”  I looked back at where the stone was and saw a hole in the dirt wall.  Inside was a skull.  My first instinct was to run away but Sam was standing steady so I didn’t want him thinking I was chicken.
Sam looked into the hole.  The skull lay on its side.  Upon getting closer I saw that a full skeleton.  It had seemed to me now that we had opened an end of an old burial coffin.  The area was known to have been home to multiple tribes of Indians.  Sam began to reach inside but I grabbed his arm.
“Don’t,” I pleaded.  Sam just shook me off and reached in.  Out he brought what looked like a stone pendant.  It looked similar to the wolf that had been carved on the stone.  A leather strap went through a hole at the top of it.  As Sam pulled on it the leather strap broke easily.  What happened next has been burned into my brain ever since.  As soon as that leather strap broke howls went up into the air all over the woods.  Both Sam and I jumped.  None of them sounded close but they seemed to come from all over the place.  It scared us enough to grab our things and take off towards home.  We ran most of the way.  Once we got out of the woods and into the cornfield behind our house we slowed to a walk.  Howls still went up occasionally in the woods behind us but we were far enough out of there now that we didn’t much care.  Sam studied the stone pendant most of the way home.
“Probably best not to say anything to Ma or Dad about what we found.  They might not let us go down there no more.”  I nodded but in truth I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to go back.  Knowing there was a skeleton in the wall of dirt by Bowling Ball Tree made that seem like a less attractive place to hang out.
The rest of the night went on as usual.  We had dinner and then me and Sam took turns getting our baths in.  I spent some time reading in me and Sam’s room.  His bed was on one side of the room and mine was on the other.  I was in the middle of a paragraph when he came in wearing the stone pendant.  He had found a string and put it through the hole at the top.  I looked over the top of my book at him.  Sam just flopped down on his bed and seemed to not notice me looking at him.  Outside a howl went up in the night.  I turned to look out the window when mom came poked her head in.
“Time for bed you two.”  I closed my book and said my good nights.  Mom flicked the lights off and before long I had fallen asleep.
Sometime in the night I heard a howl and jumped up in my bed.  I looked over at Sam and saw his form lying on his side asleep.  I went to lay back down when another howl went up.  This one sounded like it was close.  I turned and looked out the window.  Sitting there in the back yard was a wolf.  It was looking up at the second story window of our bedroom.  Again it raised its head in a howl.  I watched as it stared at our window.  Eventually it stood up and walked back into the darkness.

The next morning I had almost forgotten about the wolf until I saw Sam come to breakfast.  He was wearing the pendant under his shirt.  I could see the string around his neck.  It led down into his shirt.  We did our usual chores and then I headed in town to see if there were any baseball games going on.
After playing in three different games the sun began to dim. I jumped on my bike and headed back home.  Just as I pulled up in front of the house I saw my dad making his way into the house.  He had worked overtime today.  I tried not to get in his way.  He was a nice man and I loved him dearly.  On days he had to work overtime he was less than happy by the time he got home.
I made my way in and found mom just putting dinner on the table.  I walked into my room to put my glove by my bed.  Sam was in his bed.  He was asleep.  I asked mom why he was asleep and she had told me that he hadn’t been feeling well all day.  That night I stayed out of our room most of the night so Sam could get some sleep.  I read in the living room while dad watched a baseball game on TV.  When it was time for me to go to sleep I made my way in quietly without turning on the light.
That night I awoke to howls again.  I looked out and saw this time that there were now three wolves sitting in our backyard looking up at me.  They sat staring.  The moon made their eyes shine.  After howling again they turned and walked back into the darkness.  I didn’t sleep much for the rest of that night.
The next week Sam was in bed sick.  Mom had taken him to a doctor but all they had said is that it must be a strain of summer flu and he just needed to rest.  I tried to stay out of the room as much as I could.  The only good thing seemed that no wolves had visited our house that week.  Or their howls hadn’t woken me.  I prefer to think that they didn’t come.
Finally the night came where howls awoke me and I looked out the window.  There had to be more than twenty wolves now in the backyard.  I sat transfixed on them.  They just sat and stared.  Almost daring me to come outside to meet them.  I sat and waited for what had almost become a game.  Soon they would turn and walk back into the darkness.  I kept waiting for it but it never seemed to come.  Eventually some of the wolves got up and moved leaving a large space in the middle of the group.  I saw something moving in the moonlight but had no idea what it was.  As it stepped closer I saw that it was a person.  The figure dragged one of its legs behind it.  When it finally stopped below the window I had to cover my mouth to keep from screaming.  Below me was a skeleton.  Parts of it had mud and leaves falling off of it as if that were its skin.
I jumped back from the window and covered myself in my bed. I squeezed my eyes shut.  When I finally got my courage back I looked back outside and the backyard was empty.  I looked over at Sam and he was snoring away.  I tried to make myself go back to sleep but every time I closed my eyes all I saw was the deadly crowd that had gathered in the backyard.

The next night when I was told it was time for me to go to bed I tried to protest but I knew that would only save me for a few hours.  I didn’t sleep for a few hours after getting into bed but eventually it overtook me.
I heard the howls and opened my eyes.  I didn’t want to look.  I knew it would be out there staring up at me.  The howls kept coming and I knew that they weren’t going to leave until they knew that I had seen them.  I slowly looked out and again the yard was full of wolves.  This time they covered just about the whole backyard.  I wouldn’t have been surprised if a giant light came on and I saw that they covered the entire field behind our house.
Standing in the middle was again the skeleton.  He looked up at me.  Slowly he raised his hand and pointed at me.  Again I jumped back into my bed and covered myself up.  I didn’t look out the window again that night.
When I woke up the next morning I went over to Sam and sat next to his bed.  He looked horrible.  His skin was pale and his forehead was wet with sweat.
“I think it wants it back Sam,” I told him.  He didn’t really respond.  “I have to take it back for you.”  I took the pendant off Sam and put it in my pocket.  As much as I didn’t want to I knew where I needed to go that day.  I made my way out into the backyard.
I turned and looked up at the window.  This is where it stood.  Looking at me.  I made my way out into the field and into the woods.  I found the creek and followed it until it opened up into a large pool.  As I approached I was glad that no one was there.  Somehow most of the kids around here must have had a subconscious urge to stay away from Bowling Ball Tree.  If only me and Sam had picked up on it.  I saw the small hole in the dirt wall.
I looked around to make sure there were no ghouls about.  Nothing in the woods seemed to even move.  No birds chirped.  No bugs seemed to call out to each other.  It was silent.  I took my first step into the water.  The water was nice and cool in the warmth of the day.  I swam over to embankment.  Some dirt had fallen and closed off part of the hole.  I inched forward with the pendant held out in front of me.  I really just wanted to throw it into the hole and then run for home.  As I got close to the hole I heard a howl go up in the air.  It sounded as if it could have been from only ten feet away.  I jumped and then began to look around to make sure I wasn’t about to get mauled.  When I turned my attention back to the hole I saw that the skull was facing out looking at me.  I let out the loudest scream I had ever heard.  It began to move as if coming out after me.
I threw the pendant at it and jumped back into the water.  I swam back to the other side.  When I glanced back I saw it pick up the pendant.  That was I needed to see.  I began to run.  Suddenly all around me howls went up into the air.  When I finally broke out of the woods into the field I sat down and began breathing hard.  Finally the howls stopped and I got up and jogged back to the house.
When I came in I saw Sam walking out of the bedroom.  He had regained a little of the color in his face.  For the first time in a week he was able to eat and keep it down.  That night I slept all through the night.  When Sam finally regained his health I tried to tell him about the whole experience but for the most part he seemed to shrug most of it off.
Three years later my brother was out hunting with my father.  They had separated to see if they could rustle some rabbits out of hiding.  My dad said he heard Sam scream and ran over only to see a wolf running away.  Sam had his throat ripped out and large chunks of his arm that he had tried to defend himself with were gone.  Most people attributed it to a rabid wolf.  ‘What a sad occurrence.’ most people said.  Personally I think it wasn’t a random act.  Of course if I tried to tell anyone why they would think I was nuts.  So I let it go.  But part of me always looks over my shoulder to see if a wolf might be lurking.
Not surprisingly I left the country for the big city of Chicago.  Less chance of random wolf attack I think was part of it.
I only went back to Bowling Ball Tree once after all that.  Dad had died back in 95.  Mom held on for a long time but it came time that she had to be put into a home.  That only lasted about two weeks before she finally let go.  When I came back home to take care of the sale of the land I made my way back through the field and into the forest.  Now that I’m a grown up it’s a forest.  When you’re a kid it’s the woods.  I found the creek and followed it.  I finally got back to the part where it opened into a large pool and I was both sad and relieved to see that the tree had fallen over.  Somehow it had fallen sideways.  Maybe in a storm or something.  And it now blocked the embankment.  Hopefully that would keep any curious children away from climbing up the dirt wall and discovering the small opening that was in there.
When I turned to leave, off in the distance a howl went up.  Even then I began to hurry out of the forest and back into the field.  When I signed the papers off on the sale of the old house part of me was happy to be done with all of that.
The other part of me still gets awakened at night in my nice apartment in Chicago by a strange howling.  Hopefully if I ever get the courage to look out the window I won’t see them all staring up at me.  And part of me knows that if I do look that instead of a skeleton leading them it will be Sam.

Besides being the pop icon pin up girl that she is I knew nothing about the life of Bettie Page.  This film gives us a pretty decent insight into who Bettie Page was during her run as the pin up queen.  We start out with her as a child in Nashville Tennessee going to church and being with her religious family.  The interesting thing about the film is that it mostly plays in black and white.  It seems fitting for this film.  At certain points it does transition to color.  All of her time in Miami changes to color.  I think it mostly has to do with whatever type of pictures she is currently taking.  In New York they were mostly black and white while in Miami most were color.

We follow Bettie during her early modeling career and into the stuff she is more known for the bondage and S&M pictures.  From reading interviews after watching the movie I think they handled her thoughts on it pretty well in the film.  She didn’t take most of it seriously at all and just thought it was a lot of fun.  This of course led into some of her more serious work in Playboy and lingerie modeling.  The film deals with the senate hearings on Juvenile Delinquency and how that affected her modeling at that time.  It’s sort of the climax of the film that segways into her becoming religious and from there we’re left to wonder where Bettie Page went.

I thought Gretchen Mol did a great job capturing the spirit of Bettie Page and the set design was fantastic.  If you don’t know much about Bettie Page and want to know more then definitely check the film out.  From what I have read there is supposed to be an authorized documentary about her coming out soon.

So it looks like another anthology will be listed on the side bar under Read My Published Short Stories.  This one is a little more special though as I helped edit and pick some of the authors that will be included in the book.  So that’s pretty awesome.  Me and DC Comics Letterer Steve Wands are putting this puppy out and Steve did an amazing job on the cover art that can be see to the exact right of this paragraph.  Reminds me of an short story called SNIPE HUNT I read when I was younger.

In this story a couple of high school kids take these younger kids out on a snipe hunt.  Well one of the kids actually captures some small creature thinking it must be a snipe.  the big description is the orange glow of it’s eyes.  So he takes it back to the group and the high school kids are mystified.  And the story ends with the creature crying out and in the woods all around them orange eyes start to glow.

But my story THE KNIFE is going to finally be in print.  It’s been written and rewritten and rewritten back to the original story many times.  It’s been sitting on the shelf long enough.  Now to get the other stories off that shelf and into something.  Bleh.  But if you are reading this and want to know more about the book then head over to DARK: A Horror Anthology Blog!