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The Following season 3 review – sorta

Ok, this is not really a review. It’s more of a rant, but when do I write anything but half assed rants?

So I the Following, I watched the first two seasons and honestly it’s kind of an ‘eh’ show for me. It’s the kind of show I watch while I workout or I cook to, its not some cerebral show that eye fucks me on the regular it’s just kind of a chewing gum show I watch to fill time while I do other stuff.
It has fun themes and decent actors but is otherwise unremarkable. It’s sort of normie-tier Dexter. Well Dexter is sort of normie-tier Dexter if you read the books which are much better but I digress.
It was ok, it was a little sloppily written, the plot was sort of jumbled and all over the place and it struggled with characters. Because it has so many and Kevin Bacon and all his cohorts are sort of generic as fuck, like seriously they could swap them all out and it makes no difference and none of the main ones die so there tension is sort of lost but you don’t really care about them either.

But it was a great show for knives, lots of cool microtechs and cold steel knives on show. And in season 3 I actually saw my favourite killer using a knife I actually own which just touched my heart haha.

I dunno, I mean the main characters are sort of unlikeable and the bad guys are sort of between being too angsty and cunty to being too likeable. Like it gets to a point in season two where Joe Carroll the main killer cult leader played by James Purefoy who is awesome see Solomon Kane and Ironclad. He is so likeable to a point where it’s bad, it gets to a point where he’s almost a foil, he stops being scary, you forget he’s a serial killer. He’s just fun ol’ uncle Joe. So you have a real clusterfuck in terms of characterisation going on and the plot is sort of middling and predictable for the most part but its watchable.

Now here comes season 3 and it’s actually very different and its apparent from the start, it’s handled really well, written really well and it fools you, it takes a completely different path from the other two seasons. It sort of builds slowly to this midpoint where a new killer is revealed and at first I wasn’t that impressed because this show sort of throws out killers like hot dinners. In a way not dissimilar from Hannibal but in lots of ways I think this show is so much better than Hannibal because it has a lot more substance, Hannibal is all style, just freak of the week killerfest. It’s dull honestly and the following has a few throw away killers too but then this guy starts getting more and interesting.

It started to make feel like I was watching the first season of Mr Robot, the guy is like a serial killer version of Elliot from that show without all the shit show psychodrama of season two. But I won’t get into that emperors new clothes bullshit again. He even almost looks like him actually, although he’s a mulatto I think, not egyptian like I think Rami Malik is. But this dude could play a Kang if pressed haha.

I really liked his character, he had a lot of depth and was genuinely scary as well as likeable in a Dexter kind of way. The concept was great. But the show sort of fumbles him a little bit because it’s a bit one sided, the killers don’t really get away with much honestly, the fbi is a bit too good. Like they kill them all and not too many of the main characters are even scratched so it gets to be you’re rooting for the bad guys because they’re like the underdogs.

Because this guy is this awesome killer, like a total badass but he’s foiled constantly by these stumblefuck fbi agents and it can’t help but take the sting out a little.

But the season ended in a really nice open way because you have this awesome killer Theo, the hacker hacker haha. But it also leads into this rich kid serial killer social club a lot like Hostel and I think that could have been even better. Also Joe the serial killer from the first two seasons is executed but lives on in like a yoda ghost sort of way but creepy haha.

Sadly, just typing season 4 into google while I was looking for header images and it turns out they cancelled it which really sucks. Because although I wasn’t really invested, it was like Lucifer I just sort of watched it and took whatever I could from it. I had through the third seasons seen something really great blossoming and to see it cut short like this just when it was getting good is a little disappointing but eh there’s more fish on amazon prime haha.

Maybe I’ll do a black sails review just to talk about gay pirate kiss endings haha. Maybe not, might get kicked off the internet.

 

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DDD Chapter 3 ‘Come into my head’

Hey there dudes and dudettes, back again to let me shovel more interesting tripe into your noodle. well good. Got some doozies for you today.

Ok well not much to report on, got my first royalty report for GS and I’m too afraid to open it and admit I suck at marketing haha. Yeah, a fair few copies sold but probably not enough to warrant a release of a sequel which is depressing but you know if someone actually went right for me I’d have to eat my fucking hat, now wouldn’t I?
I sound saltier than I actually am, I know people like the book, what’s not to like, not tooting my own horn, its just a fun book. But I never really looked at it as my magnum opus or anything like that. It was never the book to save me from the poor house but nevertheless I want it to do well and hopefully with some time and elbow grease it can and then I can release the sequels.

I can’t really get down about it, because a) I have a lot better more traditional things to depress me a la life in general haha and b) I have two more serious book franchises in the works that have a lot more potential to do well and hopefully get me a fucking agent which is what I really need. I can’t be doing with this indie shit anymore.
I’m obviously talking about this and maybe the one who came back, after extensive work, actually now I think about it it might not even be long enough after the editing and DDD is a Dexter clone so I’m pretty fucked either way, but I have to dream because otherwise what do I have? What reason do I have to go on if I don’t keep the hope alive that this is all worth something? And what is that something? Money? Fame? Love? Immortality?

Who knows?

Come into my head

~

The steady metronome of waves gently beating the shore, the smell of the spray. I open my eyes but it’s just blackness and then a light comes on but it’s not a light, it’s a moon rising out of the sea. The sea, am I on a boat? I ask myself stupidly.

Then I can feel it, the cold cloying embrace of the ocean in answer.

I kick my legs but I don’t feel I need to, I’m bobbing, cold and wet, just with my head floating above the surface of the water.

I can’t see the shore, the ocean seems endless and the only noise I hear are the waves parting and my heart beating. A rising anxiety sets my teeth on edge and I can feel it all around me. Is this what it’s like inside? Is this it’s world? A cold endless black ocean. I can’t feel the bottom, why would it have a bottom?

I can feel something, something moving, circling, rising. Waves and bubbles rising to a crescendo peaked by an anticlimactic blub blub and something bobbing on the surface of the water.

It floats towards me and I know what it is before it the moon can cast it’s bright bitter smile down on it.

It’s a head.

A perfectly lopped head of a woman. It floats towards me and in the glare of the moon it rolls open and it’s wet hair parts like a flower and it’s my dear old aunt Mary Beth. I should feel things, I should feel earth shaking, bone clattering terror and cold sweat but I feel nothing, nothing but a joyful wonder. A question answered, a life revealed, a lie told and taken away just as swiftly and my heart races and in an instant. I’m surrounded by more perfectly lopped heads, floating and bobbing like rubber ducks floating in crude.

I wake up in the same cold sweat, no maybe even colder, as colder as that black ocean, or maybe I just left the fan on, yeah it’s the fan. I slop the sheets off my damp body and walk on over and turn it off.

I need a shower and maybe a ritualistic burning of my sheets.

The water washes over me and I’m expecting revelations, a brief aside into Jungian psychology. Did I even care what the dream meant, if it meant a thing?

The sea, the darkness, fear of the unknown, the oldest fear, pretty standard. If you’re not afraid of the unknown you don’t have a very good imagination. The moon, well that was easy. I felt my teeth clicking thinking about it, getting responses up my legs and back as I just let the water flow over me.

The heads were a gift from my new and anonymous friend, but why did I recognise them, why her? I often thought about my aunt, about how I would feel if she would die. To tell the truth, if I could love anyone it would be her. Her absence in my life would be the most notable. A sapping noticeable emptiness that could be called loneliness or sadness. Something close to that but sadness was a foreign concept to someone completely bereft of any feeling whatsoever. A blessing and a curse, a crisp clear almost chipper emptiness. Like a smile with no teeth.

Where did that come from? I turned off the water and towelled off, it was a Saturday so much less care was taken in regards to time and form. As I towelled my head I heard something like the door opening and whispering.

I opened the door and looked down the hall but all I could see was my aunt holding tight to the door and looking at whomever was there. I tried looking past her but all I could see were their feet, well one foot, the other seemed to be, well not there. The stump was pressed against the stirrup of a wheelchair. The other foot not looking much more useful next to it.

She whispered harshly and shut the door latching it with the chain and the deadbolt and scurrying into the kitchen.

It took me a few minutes to get ready. I ran a comb through my hair, when I found it and put on a loose t-shirt. Then a pair of jeans more hole than denim and walked down the hall of the minimalist bungalow we shared.

She was waiting for me in the kitchen nursing a mug of gourmet instant coffee and mumbling to herself as she was one to do when something was taxing her.

I’d ask her what was wrong but she’d usually outright tell me as I was the only one she could tell her in insular little world. She really needed to get out more, like me, at least in my dreams. She owned some kind of crystal hoodoo voodoo shop in town that was run by a couple of kids. She came in to visit occasionally but most of the time she didn’t have to. Especially not on weekends. The shop did well, that kind of crap always does in California.

I came in and leaned on the the sparkly faux marble breakfast bar, none of it was new. It had all come with the house and I didn’t need her to tell me that. It has a sort of flat pack feel, like everything could be folded up and carried away at a moments notice.

I put some bread in the toaster and pressed the plunger down imagining it was some sort of small flat animal.

“What did I say about carbs?”

“That they’re delicious?” I said.

She scoffed and went back to her coffee and nothing.

“Who was that at the door?”

“Oh just the mail man, you know how chatty I can get” She took a sip waiting for my reaction “Poor guy couldn’t wait to get away.”

Now I was no expert on the hiring process of the postal service. But I was reasonably sure someone wheelchair bound and missing vital appendages couldn’t make up the required walking speed. So that was either the result of liberal diversity policies running amok or a sweet little lie rolling off my aunts lips to my ears.

“What were you talking about?” I prodded catlike, fighting a smile at the corner of my mouth.

“Oh you know, the usual stuff” She said tossing her long hair around in my face. She had it tied back with one of those seventies bands things that gave it a little lift on the top and a floral loose fitting dress. “So what are you doing today?” She asked, skilfully changing the subject as she sipped her coffee, the smell of which was driving me nuts.

“I was planning to go to the library and catch up on some studying” Of what was a need to know basis of course.

We lived in a nice but relatively secluded part of orange county. Turtle rock was a picturesque little hamlet made up of cute little match stick houses. Street names that sounded like they came straight out of fairytales. Sweetwater and rainbow falls, morning dew, sandpebble, gumdrop lane, I made that last one up. It was a good area but in comparison to the homes around us we lived in a shack. It had privacy but was incredibly secluded. You couldn’t get anywhere without a car and that was something I was sorely lacking.

“Ok”

“So I was wondering if you could drive me there and I could maybe get a ride back?”

She seemed to not be listening to what I was saying and took another sip, her head bobbing and then caught like she skipped a beat. “Sure” She said giving me a laboured smile. “Wait the library? As in at your school?”

“Uh huh?”

“It’s fifteen minute walk versus a two minute car journey” She said pausing trying to register how much I cared about carbon emissions.

“Didn’t you hear? There’s a serial killer on the loose” I said trying my best not to glow as I said it.

“I heard” she said with a ringing tone in her voice like it jumped and fell down a well. “You sure you don’t want to go the mall or something, all that work on the prom and you haven’t bugged me for a dress or shoes.”

“I still have time” I shrugged.

“Ok” She said. She picked up her unwieldly keybang off the kitchen counter with a clattering noise. Various useless keyrings like peace symbols and weed leafs. Cool aunt persona mastered. “Shouldn’t you be out with your friends? It’s a weekend.” She said clapping the keys in her hands. She almost sounded hurt, like I wasn’t fitting into the fantasy she had for a kid my age. Frolicking through piles of maple leaves and having water fights with the local kids. Taking breaks in between licking giant circular lollipops and braiding my hair. Maybe her childhood was on rainbow falls but mine fell somewhere a lot darker on the map and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

“Who says my friends won’t all be in the library?” They weren’t, Paul was at basketball practice and Wendy was probably at a salon somewhere getting her nails ‘did’.

“Ok sure, I can get some stuff done in town and pick you up around six?”

“I was planning on staying late, I’ll just get a ride or catch a cab or something”

“How late?”

“As long as it takes, I don’t know, are you gonna take me or not?”

“Ok fine”

“Thanks” I said in my most chipper getting my way voice.

We left the house, it was still early afternoon, I slept til about twelve which was odd. I never usually needed much sleep but these dreams seemed to leave me feeling drained. The sun was hanging lazily in the sky and the birds saw fit to fill the silence of turtle rock with their incessant happy chirping.

Most people here didn’t stay on the weekends so the place was deserted apart from the sound of sprinklers hissing. They were probably all out on the beach with their jetskies making lots of noise.

We lived on the tip of a little culdesac called whitewater, probably the least fairytale sounding name in the area. It had a mini garden in the centre of what was supposed to be a roundabout but was a tad too small. But it left more than enough to allow whatever bike or hybrid car the neighbours were packing. The place was a little too metropolitan to have front lawns opting more for the shallay feel. Little neatly formed shrubberies and trees sticking out of perfectly shaped garden strips hemmed in by the bricked driveways. Their mail boxes all nicely shaded by god knows what trees, do I look like a tree surgeon?

The houses all looked the same or similar. The same matchstick wood with sandy coloured tiles matching the tone almost perfectly. They looked almost like unpainted monopoly houses in their uniformity.

Little balconies on top for relaxing two car garages that seemed to take up most of the space in the house.

She opened the garage and drove her little rollerskate car out of the needlessly huge garage. She saw fit to fill it with useless nicknacks, a fooseball table we never used and some piece of ethnic art she picked up in a flea market. Anything to fill the void left by the tiny car in the huge garage.

The car was so small it was basically a motorized rickshaw but complaining would be pointless and eat up too much air in the car. I was getting a free ride after all. A chance I sorely needed to get a leg up on whomever was in the shadows of the internet so interested in little old me.

I opened the car door careful not to break it. I eat all my green vegetables after all. And settled in the front passenger seat, sans legroom. No complaints uttered. She started the engine and the dull hum of the electric motor made my fillings ache.

It puttered along like a milk float down the end of the drive turning right on Sweetwater. A left onto Sycamore creek and then it was another left and a straight shot onto Turtle rock drive. Only coming out of the neighbourhood noticing how much it looked like a cult compound from the outside. Trees planted there like it was a model of some Swedish fishing village and the grass cut so fine it looked like it was just paper mache painted green.

We drove for what felt like miles of an endless stream of near identical houses. Neatly topiared bushes pointing up at the bright clear pale blue sky. Were there any clouds in Orange County?

I couldn’t bare to look at their near perfection anymore. Choosing to just follow the bumps of the dry dusty hills on the otherside, reminding us all that in fact we live in a giant desert.

I opened my window because of course AC was broken in the boxy car, I was lucky the window still worked. I poked my head out for some fresh air, taking in the smell of chlorine as we passed a walled off little compound. The tops of a slide poking over the high walls. Probably owned by some cartel money man that liked quiet swedish fishing villages and indoor pools.

After about a minute of watching shadows slide over the almost non-existant crumple zone of the car. We were pulling into the flat patch of concrete that was the campas parking lot. Which was nice and empty with it not actually being a school day.

Despite all the space my aunt parked at a jaunty angle trying to take up three spaces. I got out and rounded the car to peck her on her cheek narrowly missing her pair of fake DG sunglasess. Planting a bird like poke of hard dry lips on her freckled sunkissed cheek.

“Don’t work too hard” She called at my back as I walked into the shade of the foyer.

“I wont, thanks for the ride” I called back waving at the glare of the sun, covering my eyes with my forearm.

Now onto business.

~

0

DDD Chapter 2 ‘Do you see what I see?’

Hey,

Been kind of in a funk recently shouting at my tv, losing at Gwent haha. I wish after all the money I sunk into it I wasn’t so shitty at it haha. But I can’t stop playing it, what an abusive relation it is haha.

Talking about abusive relationships, nah, no more of that nonsense. All business now.

Pretty much been business as usual, keeping up my usual pace, can burn out about 8k a week as long as my day job doesn’t get in the way and we’re entering that busy season and the weather isn’t helping. I’ve got two fans on me as we speak and I already bought a third. And not pussy fans either, one is a big tower fan for about sixty quid the other is a powerful little clip on one attached to my desk.

This heat is insane man. I mean shit if people can use a snowball as proof that global warming isn’t real I can show the stains on my couch to prove the opposite, let’s not fight. It was joke. It’s just so freaking hot, this is England not fucking Zimbabwe, jesus.

Its going pretty well, pretty much the only thing in my life that is. I’m really enjoying how it’s turning out, it’s fun even for me and the response so far from beta readers is great.

So keep on keeping on.

See you…

~

Paul drove his dad’s car when he was out in the field doing what I could only dream about, literally. But in an all together less neat and ritualistic way. That’s a level of trust you can’t kill for. His dad was obviously very confident in the offspring he’d carefully chiselled out of clay. That or he was indelibly stupid.

It was an older model olive drab hummer with leather interiors that smelled like discipline and spearmint gum. The thing ran like it was brand new, the old man kept it in peak condition and his son took it just as seriously. I opened a bag of chips in her once on the way to an Ariana Grande concert and he made me get out and finish them on the side of the freeway.

Did I mention another thing I love about Paul Alan Jnr? He rarely talks, sure there’s strong silent types. And then there’s types who are conditioned to levels of ‘being seen and not heard’ that teeter on ‘culty’, is that a word?

They taught him well, sometimes I wondered if he wasn’t as damaged as I was. But instead of breaking the mould he’d been hammered perfectly into it. A living Ken Doll with no visible cracks or creases.

I am a big fan of comfortable silence but sadly in Orange County, near the coast, it’s in short supply. But inside the sealed air conditioned mobile command centre that was Paul’s dad’s car, it was preserved. Like some kind of orchid, hermetically sealed for freshness. I could almost taste it.

Just watching the anemic palm trees go by. Baking and cracking in the sun while I felt like a lizard on a cool shaded rock, bliss.

And with a full stomach it was even better. He took me to this little taco place we like near the beach because it’s quiet and he knows that’s why I like it. I had the vegan taco, I’m not vegan but I like their food and for some strange reason I like animals. Not really people or kids, although I don’t hate them. I just feel a callous indifference for everything that doesn’t walk on four legs. There’s something about them I like, their raw natures, their lack of pretense, lack of filter. Their natural instincts just accepted, not sanded away by school or television.

Although sadly the feeling is not mutual. Every cat or dog my aunt brought back would rather jump under a semi than let me pet them. I won a gold fish at a fair once, got it a bowl and a little castle, the whole bit. As soon as we put it in the bowl it climbed those castle steps and was never seen again. It chose a life of solitude like some hunchback. It starved to death rather than see me for all of the five seconds it would take for me to sprinkle food on the surface of the water.

He paid for the food, of course, perfect gentleman, did I mention that? Feminism what’s that?

“Are you mad at me?” He asked as he kept his eyes straight, hands at ten and two.

I looked at him and sighed, smiling with the corners of my mouth like a snake. “No.”

“Is that a real ‘no’ or a woman’s ‘no’” He asked still refusing to look at me.

“No as in no”. I just couldn’t get those dreams out of my head. Picturing the city under the blanket of night and me stalking it’s street like some carrion bird picking off the weak and the strong alike. It was a mix of horror and sheer splendour mixing in my chest. A feel so unexplainable, to try would be blasphemy.

“You just seem-“ A sound of leather shifting, from the seat. “-Different”.

Should I tell him about my dream, maybe just to shut him up. I don’t have to tell him about the good bits, I can keep those to myself, locked away in Dear Diana’s vault of diabolical deeds.

I make a bit of a show of it, lick my lips so he can hear, maybe not over the air-conditioning. “I had this weird dream is all” I shrug and smile.

“What kind of dream?”

Two questions in one day, my aren’t we the inquisitive type today?

“I was walking- walking at night”. I said tapping my front teeth together anxiously.

“Like a vampire?”

I scoffed.

“You really shouldn’t be walking alone at night” He said sounding like the father I never had.

“Oh really?”

“You haven’t heard?”

“Apparently not” I say losing a sliver of patience,

“You didn’t watch the news?”

“Not if I don’t have to, boring show.” There goes another one.

“They found bodies washed up on Huntington beach.”

“Bodies?” Happens every other day here. Some fat tourist from pittsburg pennsylvania goes belly up in a rubber dingy and we have to pretend to care.

“Headless bodies” He said making a chopping motion at his neck like I didn’t know what headless meant. “They think it’s a serial killer.”

A shock of something, a cold laughter in the dark, a tiny voice speaking a language only I could understand. Those words setting my teeth on edge, my skin to a cool burn.

“Really” I said trying to sound like I wasn’t chomping at the bit to google this on my phone right in front of him. I swallowed, trying to pretend like it didn’t phase me at all like it wasn’t the most rapturous news I’d heard in my life. Like there weren’t alarm bells ringing all through Diana’s dark deep depths. Like a light didn’t go off in my head telling me somewhere somehow this is what I’d been waiting for.

But what else? Of course I need to feign some sort of fear, some kind of concern, for the victims for their families maybe. I realised then that it had been a minute since I last spoke. I just threw out a stock “That’s horrible – those poor people” I added for effect. No tears, no screams? Too much.

“Don’t worry – I’ll protect you” He smiled into the rearview mirror.

“Did they find them?”

“Did they find what?”

“The heads” I asked quietly, trying to restrain myself, biting my lip.

“Now that you mention it, I don’t think they mentioned that.”

“Oh, terrible, I’m so scared” I said almost shaking with excitement. What could it mean, why take the heads? Was it just a gang thing? Maybe it was the cartel. They love murdering random people and scattering them all over the place. But what happened to the heads? Maybe they just washed away to become a house for a family of California Dungeness crabs. But not to find one, it could have just been Paul forgot but it seemed to strike a chord with Diana’s dark double. A shrill laughter, a tingle, a shiver up my spine, electricity on my finger tips. Every hair on the back of my neck standing up, I had to check my lip to make sure I wasn’t drooling. Something seemed so right about it, something I had no idea I was waiting for.

I had to find out.

The moment he stopped the car I bounded out the door like a dog seeing another passing car full of burning cats.

Tossing back a feeble kissing noise and something like “Bye babe, see you tomorrow”

He tossed something equally as vapid back and drove off down the street.

I quickstepped to the door of our ’reasonably’ priced Orange county that looked like a little beach hut. Complete with beach towels drying on a spinner in the tiny front yard.

I was trying not to break into a full scale sprint. Trying to keep my hand loose enough so I didn’t break the key off in the lock. All so as to avoid any unnecessary time wasting conversations with my aunt. So I’d be free to sit down at my computer as quick as humanly possible.

The keys on my chain rattled and it took me too long to find the right one and get it to keep still enough to go in the lock.

I turned the key closing the door behind me and striding through the halls passed the living room which I followed with my eyes. The tv was on, the news, something about the killings. What a coincidence but something in me told me this had to be a private moment, shared with no one. Not even my own flesh and blood and I also didn’t want any spoilers, no fluff, or padding. Just raw stark reality, no artists impression for Diana of the Dark.

I hurried past slurring my words “Hey, I’m home, had a great day, no hungry, kinda tired, going to my room kthxbai!”

Bustling past what felt like a crowd in a trainstation. Fighting a wooden hatrack I thought was cute on amazon but had yet to buy a hat for. I barged into my own room and shut the door.

I know what you’re thinking, possible psychopath girl. Her room must be silence of the lambs, American psycho levels of neat freakery, well you’d be wrong. My room is for lack of a better word, a hovel.

Clothes, clean and dirty in piles throughout the room and on my bed. Posters of bands I don’t listen to anymore if I ever did in the first place peeling off the walls. Containers of soft drinks and burgers, I never said I was vegetarian, I said I liked animals, big difference. They could be vegie burgers, I don’t remember.

The curtains were drawn and the room was dark and humid. I put on the fan and it started to cough and move warm air around my small room.

My laptop sat atop a throne of dirty clothes on my bed, half open like a clamshell.

I snatched it up and almost tossed it onto my dressing table slash desk slash landfill.

I turned it on and found a swizel chair with a sock wrapped tightly around one of the wheels. It’s swivelling days were over it seemed. I sat down and waited for my laptop to boot up which seemed to be taking much longer than usual.

Punching it wouldn’t make it go any faster. So I didn’t do that.

It finally booted up and I quickly logged in. My fingers almost tripping over themselves to type in my password ‘Dahmer7’.

~

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LCYE Chapter 13 ‘Confinement’

Just gonna be a quick update because I’m up to my neck in stage hand work right now for this grand show I put on for you kind people.

Again another shout out to my new subs on my mailing list, thank you very much for paying attention to this fucking train wreck haha.
I’m really busy, I got the edit back for LCYE and I’m just proofreading it again and making the changes as well still spamming for more subs haha. But it’s coming together. I just wanted to go over it with a fine tooth comb to make sure it’s at it’s best when I convert it into a pdf/epub and send it to you lovely people.

As far as my writing is going, it’s going haha. I’m writing something a little sillier as a break. I was trying this new diet which I had to rework because I felt like a zombie and it put a kink in my weight lifting but it’s all good now. I thought I had writers block but it turned out I was just dying haha.

I dunno, this novella I’m working on is a little wet, just wanted to keep myself busy til I’m psyched up enough for GS two, or something new. It’s just not jelling as well, it’s a blast from the past, it’s sort of silly and stilted and doesn’t really represent the growth and the scope of my newer work.

But enough of me rambling incoherently.

Here’s chapter 13 of LCYE that is being proofread and will be in the inbox of hopefully everyone reading this blog within the month.

Without further ado here is Confinement

~

He fell into consciousness wide eyed and drenched in sweat. His breathe burning in his chest. He strained against plastic ties which bound his arms to the black metal struts of what seemed to be a weightlifting bench.

Was it a room?

It smelled dank, rotting wood and coppery smells of rust. It was too dark to tell.

He was lying in what felt like a dentist’s chair, his arms held down at his sides. He was restrained not only at the wrists but it felt like all the way up his arms and his legs. He had zero mobility in any of his limbs. His head equally was held in place by what felt like plastic wrap, wound tightly around his forehead. It was sticky and forming a lot of sweat but none of which allowed him any more mobility.

He felt powerless, his heart beat out of his chest for what felt like an hour of blackness and panic. Finally, when he’d given up hope of his limbs proving useful for escape he faded into despair. Taking deep breathes getting gradually shallower and more quiet until he heard someone else breathing.

A generator sprang into life, humming and coughing behind his head. A bright unshaded bulb was born cutting through the thick dark dank of what he now knew was a boxcar probably deep in the railyard. In a place no one could hear them.

An unseen scratching, and then music started to play.

“How much is that doggie in the window (arf, arf)

The one with the waggley tail”

As the record was started, James felt a sharp tugging and a shifting in his seat. A feeling of falling as the hydraulics in the chair dropped him lower and then bolted him almost upright. Instantly he was made aware of what he was supposed to see.

In front of him were two rows of something obscured by a tan hide tarp. They were spaced out as if they were seats on a train and behind them there was something hanging on the wall. Something that looked like an animal.

He heard breathing getting closer to his ear and then a voice he thought he knew.

“James, it’s good to see you. Are you resting comfortably?”

~

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LCYE Chapter 12 ‘Silent Circus’

Bonjour, you know the drill now ladies and gentlefolk. I rambled on for a bit and then dish out another chapter of one of my many and diverse brainfarts.

Honestly not much has happened between the last time I did this except oh yeah I have a child now. Surprise. I have a child with a woman that doesn’t like me, on the otherside of the globe that I’ll most likely never see and she’ll grow up resenting me and calling someone else daddy.

Enough of that drama.

The wheels are still turning, I kicked the people who need kicks in the asses and it should be working it’s way up now. The cover sketches are on the way and I’ve sent the lcye manuscript off for editing, we’re just working out payment now.

So here it is as promised, soon to be edited and available for free when you join my mailing list. As usual this is just a snippet, the full chapter and the rest of the book can be found on inkitt with the hyperlink below.

LCYE Chapter 12

Silent Circus
~
Con drove this time.

“Right over there” Harri said.

“I see it”.

Con pulled the Lincoln into the Riverside County Sheriff’s department parking lot.

The department had its own street sectioned off with the court house on one side and the Robert Presley detention centre on the other.

They parked in the small east side parking lot in between a couple of shiny pickup trucks.

The building itself was located in downtown riverside. A built up area that made a change from the open spaces they’d become accustomed to out here.

The courthouse, the detention centre and the sheriff’s department building were all concrete buildings. Elegant but with a hint of noble authoritarianism.

The building they’d parked in the shadow of was a tall rectangular concrete edifice. The windows of which were narrow strips high across the top, well above the average person’s height. Around eight or nine feet off the ground hooded by concrete awnings. Evidently it was some sort of holding facility not connected to the actual detention centre.

Despite the serious tone the buildings evoked, this was still California and of course there were palm trees everywhere. But even they were regulated in a strict spacing along the sidewalks. More serious plants stood guard in grey concrete planters along the edge of the rectangular holding facility. Some sort of fern or bush that had been trimmed into a phallic point.

On the other side of the parking lot was what looked like a multi-storey car park. They’d come the opposite way so hadn’t passed it. In between that and the temporary holding cells was a small red building with a comms tower poking out of the top. That must have been some kind of small office building for admin personnel.

Con hopped out of the car and quick stepped around the front not quite sure what to expect. Harri bundled herself out of her side almost visibly shaking. The thought of standing seemed to throw her. She sat for a moment turned out in her seat leaning on the open door taking in as much air as she could before could stand without feeling sick.

Con stood like a child watching his mother recover from a car crash. He was a good foot away standing with his hands out of his pocket not sure whether he should try and help her.

His mind was made up when she steadied herself against central column of the Lincoln and her Glock fell out of hip holster. He quickly stepped in and stooped to pick up the small plastic gun, which now looked like a cap gun on the parking lot floor.

He lifted it up like a glass slipper and presented it to her on one knee. She scowled at him and made a chupse sound. “Thanks” She put the Glock back in the holster and steadied herself.

His eyes searched her for a moment and she chupsed again “It’s nothing sordid ok?”

“I didn’t say anything”

“I know but I can feel your smirk.” She closed her eyes and lowered the pitch of her voice “It’s not a big deal, I don’t want you to go building it up in your mind”

“I wouldn’t dream of it” A little smirk leaked out, his fears of her unknown past seemed to melt away just a little.

She sighed and chewed on her lip a little almost for show.

“You know I used to be a cop”

“No, I didn’t know that.”

“Really, I thought everybody knew. Well regardless, I used to be a cop back in St Louis and when I was such a thing I worked in narcotics.” She paused to watch his cogs spin a little. “I know what you’re thinking and it’s not that. I didn’t steal drugs from the taskforce, you think someone with a history like that could make it into the FBI?”

Con shrugged.

~

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LCYE Chapter 10 ‘Dance of the Dream man’ Raw AKA return of the dreamer.

Yoyoyo this obnoxious intro was brought to you by someone that smashed NaNoWriMo 2016!!!!!!!!

Yeah I’m not that psyched about it, all I got was a crappy like certificate I had to download and put my own name on and a computer generated pat on the back. Even my mother was dissapointed, I somehow convinced her it was important and the prize wasn’t just 50,000 words of complete gibberish. Nah I’m fucking with you, its pretty good, it’s not entirely finished, should be done and dusted by december and I’ll start leaking proofread chapters on here and probably inkitt too although I’ve been in talks with this publishing house called quivering quills or some gay shit, I don’t know, but they looked at GS and thought it was a piece of shit but who knows they might like this, it may not be a complete piece of shit.

So yeah I was gone, almost sort of lost my mind there, everyday spent inside my head trying to hold on to some semblance of sanity as well as keep up with a 2k a day word quota. It almost made my day job feel like a break from the bleak blank insane scratching inside the wet wailing walls of my skull. Which reminds me the holiday season is upon us and I must go back to work and listen to same christmas type music over and over again and try not fucking impale people with a christmas tree.

Updates updates updates, it’s back to business, shock horror, I lied to you Ladies Close Your Eyes has been completed for months maybe, not actually maybe just a few weeks and I was just releasing a chapter at a time to tease or whatever but I just thought fuck it and I wanted to mess with inkitts algorithyms so I published the whole thing. But I will still keep posting individual chapters because I’m back and I need a constant stream of content and with the day job and proofreading and sorting out all the shit I need to do to get GS ready for amazon or a garbage fire I really don’t have time to just do wordy nonsense blogs or reviews so yeah.

With no more to do here it is, Chapter ten ‘Dance of the Dream man’ if you haven’t watched Twin Peaks you should, very much inspired by that, I love the mixing of the dark and the absurd. Absurdity and comedy sort of act as lube for the big black cock of horror you slowly slide down allowing it to get deeper and deeper inside the anus of your fetid minds. Whereas without the lube you might just sit on it and jump off straight away. (Metaphor excellence achieved).

As for today I’m gonna be chilling and probably christmas knife shopping for myself.

As usual you can get a preview here and check out the full chapter over on inkitt. I’m probably gonna be giving this away soon as a free ebook to people who sign up to my blog so please as soon as I do this forget inkitt exists please haha.

Dance of the Dream Man

Cheers!

–

James was standing in front of the blue door; someone had left it open. He pushed it and it opened with a rehearsed creaking sound. Allowing a thin shaft of daylight to spread in an arc across the floor.

James swallowed hard and in his head it was very loud. He gingerly entered the small room following the beam of light.

The light ended before the opening of a tiny bathroom. Looking inside, it had no windows. Just a shower bath combo with a shower curtain pulled closed all the way around in the right corner running along the wall. The toilet was to the left in the other corner but the room was so small they were almost touching. The sink was in the small amount of space in the right corner closest to the door in front of the bath. The bathroom was tiled all around in a black and white pattern that went from the floor to the walls. The ceilings and places untouched by tiles were the same desert tan colour as the outside of the building. The toilet seat matched the patter, the porcelain was naturally white but the seat and lid were black.

There was just something off about black in a bathroom, it hid the dirt but it also felt dirty.

There was a loud dripping noise coming from the bath tub.

James approached the bath and gripped the edges of the shower curtain which met at the corner of the bath.

He parted them swiftly, like ripping off a band aid.

The bath was full of a brown dark liquid, a putrid rusty water that had a dank smell. The bath itself was filthy, the gaps between the black and white tiles were black with mould. The shower head and bath fixture were also covered in the same black mould. He examined the taps and the shower head but there was nothing leaking.

Remembering himself he set to looking about the bathroom for any clues. Shy of sticking his hand in that filthy water and draining the tub there was nothing of interest in the bathroom. He could have stuck his hand down the toilet, but why would he do that?

He left the bathroom and returned to the bed/living room area.

The bed was un-made and showed signs of a struggle, the satin sheets were half off the queen sized bed. The long red curtains were drawn, the chair in the corner of the room was empty and there was nothing on the coffee table. The room smelled like sex and cheap perfume.

The old TV was in the same place as his dream but the screen was dark.

“Dream?” As he said it he started to feel light headed, his heart started to race and he couldn’t get it to stop. “Was it a dream?”.

He stumbled and knocked the TV off its stand leaving a large crack down the centre of the bevelled screen.

James collapsed into the chair in the living area and tried to catch his breath, he closed his eyes and tried to centre himself, stop the spinning. It felt like something unnatural was happening. Like his brain was rebooting, trying to make sense of two memories overlapping.

Just like that he felt something poking him from the side of the seat cushion. He put his hand down the side to see what it was.

It was a business card.

‘Dr. Alphonso Moral’

It had the second love symbol on it with a phone number on the back.

Now he started to remember, he had gone there, but something had gone wrong.

He shambled out of the room, a sheen of sweat across his brow. The sun was still high but the fresh air made him straighten up a little as he walked back towards the office.

The office was still open; he must have been gone only twenty minutes.

Like before the old man wasn’t at his desk so James rang the bell. There was something off about the front desk though, there was something missing and he couldn’t quite place it. The fan was still going back and forth and although it offered some breeze it was slight and pointed in the wrong direction. He tried to turn it around but it was affixed to the desk somehow.

He rang the bell again, remembering it took at least three rings for the old man to know you were serious.

On the third ring he expected to hear some commotion in the back but there nothing, just the TV on like before. An infomercial about old people losing the remote was playing. Advertising some kind of device that would let you find it, necessarily he thought what would happen if you lost the device to find the remote too.

He rang the bell a fourth time but still he couldn’t hear anything.

James sighed anxiously. The old man must have gone out or he was sleeping in the back. All he really wanted was to use the phone. He couldn’t know for sure but he was pretty certain he was in a hurry.

James went around the counter and put on a loud but unthreatening voice.

“HEY- ERR, OLD MAN? I JUST WANNA USE THE PHONE, I’LL BE GONE IN A SECOND. I THINK I BROKE ONE OF YOUR TV’S I’LL PAY YOU BACK FOR IT, DON’T WORRY”.

James entered the back room through the little alcove beyond the beads. The beads making an unnerving cacophony of clacking noises.

The old man was asleep in his chair facing away from the alcove towards a large TV set on a stand not unlike the ones in the rooms, sitting in the corner. A long hanging mirror on the wall next to it.

The phone was on a small side table against the wall on the right as soon as you entered the alcove. It was a weird novelty phone in the shape of a football. Which was particularly odd since he hadn’t noted any football memorabilia of any sort in the lobby or anywhere as he looked around now. The room was ‘cosy’.

There were more of those plants wilted in the corners of the room. There was no furniture apart from the easy chair the old man was asleep in which looked like real leather, real old leather. There was a small table next to the chair but it was knocked over with an upturned bowl of chips next to it. He must have just knocked it over while he was sleeping. The floors were hard wood for lack of a carpet. There were just some beaten up looking rugs with floral patterns. There was another beaded alcove which must have led to a kitchenette and a bedroom if he really did live here.

James quietly picked up the phone’s receiver and started to dial with the card cupped in his other hand and the receiver cradled in his neck. There was another mirror on the wall above the side table and James looked at himself for a brief indulgent moment of vanity. He looked a little younger in that Jacket he couldn’t remember buying, not that it mattered. The cut above his eye looked ok and his neck wasn’t hurting as much.

As the phone started to ring he noticed something in the mirror he’d missed on his way in. There was something out of place next to the TV, in front of the long hanging mirror. The phone was still ringing while he looked closer at it in the mirror above the side table. It was some kind of heavy rectangular object, four wooden corners embossed with a brass trimming. The brass seemed to be rusting but only on one of the corners and along the sides of the object adjacent to that corner. Possibly it was supposed to be sitting in the corner of the room and those parts were never polished.

He couldn’t see much else from that angle so he took a step the right and craned his neck, he didn’t want to turn around and whip the phone off the table. He was on hold; the music was some French woman whining about something or other.

There was a plaque on the base but he was too far away to read what it said. But in his new angle he was able to see a small fuzzy shape and he remembered what was wrong with the desk scene. ‘Fido’.

The stuffed Chihuahua from the front desk had taken up legs and moved here and was lying on the floor. A cold sensation gripped his gut and he swallowed hard as his eyes craned up from the dog lying on the floor. His jaw tightened as he saw a pale set of eyes staring back at him reflected in the hanging mirror into the mirror above the side table.

The old man was slumped in his chair, his hairy white arms hanging off the sides. His lifeless cloudy eyes staring into the mirror. His head was a mess of blood and bone and brain matter, caved in with the corner of the little stuffed mutt.

James licked his lips frozen. A man’s voice came on the line.

“Hello, who is this?”

“I’ll call you back”. James said as he hung up the phone.

~

Dance of the Dream Man

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LYCE Chapter Chapter 8 ‘The Rabbit’

Running out of things to rant about, I guess I could rant about the nontroversy of the Trump tapes, as if that even matters, the news will report on anything these days it seems. I’m half expecting the next headline to be ‘TRUMP FARTS IN ELEVATOR’ ‘TRUMP LEAVES TOILET SEAT UP’ ‘TRUMP SEES MAN SNEEZE – DOESN’T SAY “BLESS YOU”‘. It’s kind of pathetic but there you go.

Almost finished this, it’s tough keeping it on the rails, my mind just wonders into the woods some times but I tried. I’m getting there, my work is becoming much more grounded as I put more time and effort into my research. Makes me hopeful for nano to see my progression but at the same time I’m thinking I should have done much more research for nano. But fuck it, I don’t really intend to win, I just think it’ll be good to switch off facebook for a month and do some solid work like I’m supposed to.
No fucking blogs, or twitter, or internet drama or trolling, any of that bullshit, just me and microsoft word and all the other shit I use.
It should be interesting, my first nano, I’ve got a blog share type thing coming up with a fairly famous zombie author, he’s more famous than me that makes him famous haha, John L Davis IV, so that should be interesting. I doubt he took the time to read my book but I picked up a copy of his and it’s pretty serviceable zombie fare.

Anyway back to the chapter at hand and yes, quite a few references to Lynch in here, a lot of twin peaks, a little wild at heart for some reason. I think it makes for a fun read, if anyone is reading it, my reviews seem to be getting more eyes on than any of my actual work for whatever reason that is. Ok well I’ll go kill myself then bye y’all haha.

Ok as usual you can find the full chapter for zero monies on inkitt by following this handy dandy linkamabob;

The Rabbit

Cheers!
~

The sign read ‘Twin Pines Lodge’ it was big and blue. The same colour blue adorned every door in the motel set into the cream colour walls. It was a common looking L shaped motel with the office closest to the street with a few adjoining rooms connected to it. Then you had the double packed rooms adjacent, facing out towards the street. There wasn’t a pine tree in sight. Just the large sycamores spaced out unevenly behind the back building.

The parking lot was nearly empty, there was a white minivan under a car port awning on the right of the entrance. And a white Toyota parked next to the office. He pulled into a space between the minivan and a big green dumpster that was facing out into street at an irregular angle. The dumpster was next to an oddly placed patch of grass that looked like someone’s front lawn. It was edged off by a black fence around the office of the neighbouring motel that had a nice little desert garden made up of cacti and orange rocks.

He got out of the car and looked around for a second with his hand cupped over his eyes. A curtain moved from one of the upstairs rooms. James felt exposed.

He walked slowly towards the small office building at the head of the fat snake. It was a tiny building partially hidden by some overgrown bushes. He entered and right of the bat got a trailer park feeling, the floor felt temporary, made of some sort of panelling covered in a carpet. There was no air-conditioning, just a big fan on the ceiling and one on the desk next to a nodding Chihuahua. He didn’t suspect the rooms had air conditioning either.

The room felt even smaller than it looked and even James not being of an advanced height felt it necessary to stoop. There wasn’t much to see, a beaten up couch that looked like it belonged in an airport waiting room. The carpet was blue, stained and pulled up at the edges, the owner probably had a dog. There was a small coffee table between the couch and a chair that didn’t match either the table nor the couch. A few tropical plants which also stooped.

There were a few framed pictures of what looked like stock photography of Caribbean islands, Barbados, maybe Jamaica. Some religious iconography above the desk, a picture of Jesus with the catholic heart and thorns. There was a crucifix next to it, just to make it doubly holy. The rest of the wall behind the desk was covered in framed plagues relating to some qualifications in motel owning and hospitality. Awards that looked like they’d been printed off the internet with the name; Howard Blum. An alcove behind the desk lead into the back where the owner probably lived. It didn’t have a door, just a set of those hanging beads that made a noise when you went through them.

James couldn’t put his finger on it but the room smelled stale, like the smell of rotting insect carcasses under a hundred-watt bulb. There was a bell on the desk, that on closer inspection actually looked like a doorbell that was taped to the counter, the wire running down the side. The desk itself was of some indistinguishable wood that was varnished to look like a hardwood. But it was patchy work and a lighter thinner wood showed underneath. Ringing the bell a second time he realised what the smell was. Taking a closer look at the nodding Chihuahua on the desk. He noticed it actually wasn’t nodding at all because in fact it was a real Chihuahua stuffed and mounted on the desk with a heavy looking ornate base. The plague read ‘Fido’.

He rang the bell again and listened, sounded like a TV was on in the back. He rang the bell again and heard a stirring, like someone waking up. He heard joints cracking, ankles creaked as they took on the weight of the body above them. A slow shuffling noise approached from the backroom.

A gaunt figure appeared mechanically and slow in the alcove. He parted the beads and entered as if he was coming out of an elaborate Swiss cuckoo clock. He was tall and thin but naturally stooped with age. He was wearing a string vest that really didn’t cover a lot up. His arms were sinewy and bare and there were visible tufts of white and grey chest hair sticking out of the places the old vest didn’t cover. His skin, wrinkled but looked as soft as a babies. His face was long and thin and looked like that of a sad horse with flecks of grey stubble and nose hair. He had full head of white hair sitting back on the top of his head. The style similar to that of Bob’s big boy, the mascot of the famous burger chain. A sort of fifties style swoop quiff. He was wearing a pair of Bermuda shorts and some fluffy pink slippers, hence the shuffling sound.

He shuffled behind the desk and cleared his throat.

“Err… this is going to sound strange- “James paused, suddenly flushed as he realised he hadn’t given any thought to what he was going to say. Or even what he hoped to find.

The old man’s eyelids fluttered as if he was dreaming and he lifted two weary grey eyes and pointed them at James with their bowed lids. “My dog barks some”.

James’ mind went completely blank as the old man stared at him “Err never mind, can you just give me a minute?”

“Mentally you picture my dog, but I have not told you the type dog which I have. Perhaps you might even picture Toto from the wizard of Oz” The man began to chuckle to himself. “But I can tell you my dog is always with me.” The old man said as he shuffled back to his room behind the alcove.

James went outside and paced some, he thought about lighting a cigarette but he remembered he didn’t have any. Come to think of it he’d given up years ago, so why that craving would come back now seemed odd. Maybe just something to do with his hand or a reason to be hanging around outside.

There was a small shooting pain behind his eyes. He put a palm against his eye and opened his mouth wide. Turning his head, he took a quick scan of the rooms to see if anything at all was familiar.

Every room looked identical moving across from the office, that same blue door. There was only one noticeable difference about the room on the end of the single story block. The door was ajar.

~

The Rabbit

 

 

 

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Ensanguined by Patrick Zac – A review

This first chapter is great. It’s punchy, it get’s right to the point, it delivers but doesn’t all together rush it either.
One thing I’m really critical of is long middling slow boil first chapters. Sometimes they work but most of the time they don’t. I think the story should start at the most interesting part of a person’s life, I don’t care if they’re great at cross stitch or they got a b minus in history, If that’s not the what the story is about and it’s not interesting I don’t care. I want meat and this story has meat, buckets of fresh bloody meat.
The story is great, not a lot happens at the start, by that I mean you don’t learn a hell of a lot about the main character but it was quite a short first chapter. That being said her voice is very strong, acerbic and a little self-depricating which is why I likened it to Dexter.
Although the Dexter analogy is a double edged sword, because although I loved those books and the show and I love the first person style. I like being inside a serial killer’s mind. It’s been done before and it’s been done incredibly well. Trying to compete with Jeff Lindsay is like trying to wrestle with a miami aligator, it’s not gonna go your way. And although I love the style it seems a little hackneyed a little by the standards of a Dexter Devotee like myself.
That’s my only real criticism. I loved the jump from the date to the murder, just no time wasted, cut straight through the bullshit like a hot knife through butter. It functions perfectly as a first chapter, just gets right into it and delivers a succint synopsis of what’s to come. A really great hook, which is what a first chapter should be. So you nailed in that respect I think.
The description of the murder is very nice too, gory but not over the top, it’s tasteful but still sates the blood lust of the reader.
Another criticism I have is I think readers when they write women they tend to mistake bitchiness for confidence or character. I see this slipping into that. So in some regards I think you should make her a little more self-depricating like Dexter. One great thing about Dexter is his ability to laugh at himself, which allows him to be the monster but still allows him to be likeable.

Final thoughts, I actually think this is something I could write, the style is a mirror of mine in some respects and I’ve dreamed of writing Dexter fanfiction this might be the inspiration or the push I need to do that. The last book just left a hole that needs to be filled by something.
I loved it, keep it up!

If you wanna check it out for yourself, head on over to inkitt to read Ensanguined and Patrick’s other stories for free.

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Ladies Close Your Eyes Chapter 4 ‘Women in Fridges’

I had a fucked up neck yesterday from doing manly shit so I couldn’t work out and I was doing some writing and I wasn’t really feeling it like I usually do. I couldn’t my whole yogi-yoda meditation shit. But it wasn’t too bad. I chose a house for this fbi scene I’m working on in a later chapter. Oh if you didn’t know already I literally go on google maps and look at houses and locations and stuff haha. I’m a fucking cheater ok.
Yesterday I literally went on a like a property website so I could look around a California house in Belvedere where I set this fbi scene. It was too good to be true, the house had a virtual tour, I could flip through pictures like I was walking through the place. It didn’t have any furniture but my mind ‘furnished’ it with … furniture. It really helped me visualise the scene. I felt more like a director than a writer. It was fun, still kinda pissed about my neck and it still hurts but I got a haircut today which has successfully eaten up all my writing time so I have turned to some self-indulgent whiney blogging instead.
And hark on the horizon, here comes my day job to fuck it all up again. So that’s happening.
I never really cared if this blog was doing well, it was more of a nice sounding board for me, just talking to myself then maybe when I’m long dead someone will look at it and say “Well he didn’t totally suck the sweat off a dead man’s balls”. But it’s perked up a little bit so that’s nice. Still can’t be fucked with that mailing list. GIMME YOUR FUCKING EMAILS! Why did that sound that Hillary Clinton in my head?

This was a pretty fun chapter to write, getting into some of the trippy dream stuff a little, strap in folks it’s only getting weirder from here.

As usual you can find the full chapter for no money down on inkitt;

Women in Fridges

Cya.

~

It’s cold, he awakes from his dream to the sound of running water. Cool night air brushes his cheek and he opens his eyes to see the bank of a stream leading into a larger river. He seemed to recognise it but couldn’t quite place it.

He was sitting on the bank of a stream under an overpass, but he couldn’t hear any cars going by. It was a cloudless night with a few stars tossed up into that mess of a sky. The moon was nowhere to be seen.

His back was against concrete. He was under one of the arches, his head felt heavy, it was hard to lift. He realised after some blank staring and heavy blinking that he was in a storm drain not on the bank of a river. He was lying on a raised embankment on the far side under the bridge. It was just cool dull yellow concrete lit by the ambient glow of the night as far as the eye could see. A trickle of a stream flowing under his feet. He saw a few whisks of grass in the distance beyond a chain link fence on the other side of the bridge.

His back felt wet as he leant against the wall. His legs splayed out in front of him in his work clothes, his black shoes covered in a film of light brown dust. His head felt dry and taught and it hurt to move his neck. He sat there for a minute trying to collect himself.

He leaned forward and pulled himself onto his knees. Crawling like a baby over to the small body of water running through the storm drain.

He splashed his face a couple of times and put a cold wet hand down the back of his neck. It felt dirty, the dry sweat made his clothes itch and hang heavy. He felt starched and sickly.

James looked down at his reflection. He looked tired he could taste blood. He bore his teeth, his gums were raw and dirty looking. He sucked his gums and spat a wad of blood into the trickle of water running through the storm drain.

It spread out fast. A brown and deep red viscous liquid hitting the water hard and dispersing as the stream started to pick up.

James stood up, stumbling. His flat shoes scraping away out from under his feet on the slick raised concrete under the overpass. He slipped back down to his knees with a bone jarring jolt. The fall sending questions all over his body, where is all this pain coming from?

The stream started to get faster and thicker and he didn’t know why, the sky hadn’t changed. Maybe a dam or sluice-gate opened. Were there any dams in California? Was he even still in California? He had to get out of there one way another. His heart started to pound, his mind rushing by trying to find answers to questions it hadn’t settled on.

Then a noise.

Plinking and then something larger, a splash and a hollow plonking sound. He walked out from under the overpass and looked up at the bridge. It was well lit with deco lamps lining either side only three or four feet apart. A waist high guard rail along the footpath. There were no cars pulled up along the side of the road, there were no cars going by. He waited thirty seconds but nothing came.

The stream was a black and dark brown like his blood now. Probably some filthy rain water from a storm drain higher up.

He squinted up and down the stream for what broke the water. Then he saw it, it was white which made it easy to pick out against the murk. It bobbed on the surface on the water like a fishing lure. It looked light but also hard and slick reflecting some dull twinge of moonlight from somewhere.

It crept closer to him bobbing in and out playfully. Before he could feel it. He was standing in the now knee high water. He stood unmoving watching it approach, taking shape in front of him. It was long and thin, delicate looking, it’s subtle curvature giving way to long thin fingers.

He bent down to pick it up.

It was the left forearm of a female mannequin. He starred at it quizzically, turning it around in his hands trying to discern its origin. He turned it over, there were scratches on the underside. Scratched on to its wrist were the words “SHE HAS DYED HER HAIR RED”.

He dropped the arm into the stream and it bobbed off down into the distance.

A torso, legs, hip, arms, hands, and a head, all the pieces, maybe more than one mannequin he couldn’t tell. He couldn’t know why just yet. They were blank, featureless, pale white parts. Perfect, only for the leaves and the debris that surrounded them in the vile manmade river.

He breathed in and out slow. The chill getting up his back, his shoes squelched full of water and silt, listening to the night music.

~

Women in Fridges

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