Melody Chambers stood before the floor length mirror
that had been installed in her master bathroom a few days ago. She was
carefully inspecting her body for bites. She knew the house had been treated
for pests but she wasn’t taking any chances. She and her husband had bought
what realtors like to call a ‘fixer upper’ a few months ago and they were
finally done with the renovations. The mirror was the last thing to be added
before they had moved in. The light flickered above her head and she sighed.
That darn
light is always flickering, she thought.
During the renovations, Daniel had called in an electrician but he hadn’t been
able to find anything wrong with the wiring. Yet whenever the bulb was
replaced, the new one would burn out the instant it was put in. Eventually, they
just gave in and settled for the original bulb that had come with the house.
“At least the lighting isn’t that bad,” she muttered.
Melody took one last look in the mirror before getting
into the tub. Hopefully the hot bath would ease her anxiety and soak away a
dreadful day of work.
She ran her hands down her thighs, massaging her
aching muscles. As her palm moved down her right leg, she felt a small bump
halfway between her upper thigh and knee. Curious, she raised her leg above the
water and peered at the small red blemish. She flicked a fingernail lightly
back and forth over it, trying to gauge its true size. Hmm, she thought, could be a
mosquito bite. Submerging both the leg and her instinctive fear, she
finished her bath and got dressed. Her husband was already in bed and appeared
to be half asleep but she had to wake him.
“Daniel?”
“Hmm,” he answered groggily.
“Can you get some mosquito repellent tomorrow?”
“Uh huh.”
“Seriously D,” Melody insisted, “you know how much I
hate having little critters around me.”
Daniel sighed, battling exhaustion in order to calm
his wife.
“I’ll get it hun. Don’t worry about it.”
Melody bit her lip and nodded. She resisted the urge
to make him promise. In her head, she could hear her mother’s snide voice
telling her: “Forcing men to make promises make them feel pressured. It’s a
childish thing to do. Find another way to do it or don’t do it all”. She
sighed. She would just have to trust that he’d get it.
A few days later, reeking of mosquito repellent,
Melody was inspecting the same spot on her leg under the bathroom’s constantly flickering
light. The bump had continued to itch as she assumed it would. She had also
assumed that it would get better but to her dismay it didn’t. What had been a
small red spot was now an angry red blister. She could even see the beginning
of a pale yellow centre. Melody called to her husband from her position on the
side of the tub.
“D? I think the bite is infected. Do we have any
antibiotic cream?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Daniel answered from the living
room.
While listening to her husband open and shut drawers,
Melody rubbed the pad of her thumb repeatedly over the blister as if the action
could erase it from her body. Daniel had to touch her shoulder in order to get
her attention.
“Found it. A little worse for wear but better than
nothing I guess.”
Melody took the half empty, battered tube and asked,
“What do you think? Does it look infected?”
Daniel squinted his eyes at his wife’s leg. Given her
history, he tried to strike a balance between compassion and rationality.
“Well…I don’t really see much there,” he said with a
shrug, “Just where you’ve been scratching at it.”
Melody rolled her eyes and massaged the cream into her
leg. She wanted to really get it in there.
“Whatever. It’s my leg. I should know.”
“Sure,” Daniel murmured.
He knew better than to disagree with Melody when she
was getting agitated about her bug issues. When she had gone to the Caribbean
on a family vacation as a child, she had come back with quite a few itchy bites
that her parents had attributed to mosquitoes. A week later, the bites had
become swollen and showed signs of infection. When Melody’s parents had carried
her to the paediatrician, the doctor had poked tentatively at one of the
swollen bites. To her surprise and Melody’s horror, a worm popped out.
She hadn’t been bitten by mosquitoes; she had actually
been infested with botfly larvae. Melody endured having 5 of the maggots
removed from her body and her mind had never completely gotten over the trauma.
Therapy had helped somewhat but Daniel had accepted that it would be an ongoing
struggle. He saw no harm in humouring her now.
A week went by during which Daniel watched Melody
scratch the general area without saying a word about it. He thought about
bringing it up but decided against it. She would either get over it like she
had before or tell him if it had gotten worse. He didn’t want to push her in
either direction.
As if on cue, Melody called for him from the bathroom.
He was starting to hate that room. Why
did it have to have the brightest bulb? Melody seemed to always be in
there. When he got to her, she was in her usual spot on the edge of the tub.
His breath caught in his throat when he saw how pale she was. Her gaze was
transfixed on her thigh.
“Is everything alright?” he asked.
Slowly she turned to him, her mouth moving up and down
without a sound.
“Are you okay?” he tried again while slowly venturing
closer towards her.
“There’s something in my leg,” she whispered.
“What?”
Daniel closed the gap between himself and his wife
quickly. Her hands were on either side of her leg as if she were afraid to
touch the actual area. He peered closely at the spot Melody was always
complaining about and frowned. All he could see were the ragged scratches made
by her fingernails in various stages of healing. He supposed it was possible
that those could be infected but…
“Sweetie…I’m not sure we’re seeing the same thing but
we can go to the doctor in the morning alright?”
“In the morning? What about now?”
“Uhm…how about we put some more of the cream on it?
That should keep things from getting worse during the night, right?”
She frowned uncertainly but nodded slowly after a few
moments.
“Alright,” she replied, “but first thing in the
morning we’re going to the doctor.”
“Sure hun,” Daniel said, a relieved sigh escaping his
lips.
He watched her rub the cream on her thigh with so much
pressure he worried she might be bruising herself without being aware of it.
Still, he waited patiently for her to finish and led her to bed when she was
done. He lay awake in bed until he was sure Melody had fallen asleep. Only then
did he allow himself to drift off.
The sensation of insects crawling beneath her skin
jolted Melody awake. Alarmed, she slunk out of the bed carefully so as to avoid
waking Daniel. She entered the dark bathroom and pushed the door closed slowly.
She ran her fingers tentatively along the wall in search of the light switch,
silently praying there were no ants out and about. She found the switch and
flicked it on.
She sat in her favourite spot and rolled up the right
pant leg of her pajamas. The blister had become a sore the size of the base of
a cup and she could see two distinct though jagged circles. The outer circle
was light pink and shiny. The inner circle was red, warm to the touch and
slightly raised towards a centre. At this centre was a bright yellow pus-filled
hole.
The very same hole Melody was sure she had seen a
maggot-like head pop out of earlier in the evening. The hole had scabbed over
and that bothered Melody even more. There was something inside her. It could be
burrowing through her body even as she sat there.
“I have to get it out,” she muttered quietly.
She opened the medicine cabinet and took out a pair of
tweezers and small trimming scissors her husband used on his beard. Slowly,
carefully she used the tweezers to lift the scab off. A viscous pink mixture of
pus and blood oozed from the sore. Melody gritted her teeth and pressed the
raised sides of the sore with the blades of the scissors causing even more pink
liquid to slide unto her thigh.
Finally she had flattened the sore leaving no more
room for the creature to hide. She used the tweezers to clear the flesh that
might block its path, oblivious to the uneven tears she was rending in her leg.
Melody bit her lip and while she waited, a small beige head peeked out of the
widened hole, its pitch black antennae waving back and forth testing the air.
Melody yelped and lost her grip on her little
scavenging tools. She slapped her hand over her mouth to stop herself from
calling out to Daniel. He would only tell her she was giving in to her fear
like she had several times before. He would tell her she needed to get some
rest. But how could she rest? This…thing was living inside her. As if taking
advantage of Melody’s indecision the creature ducked back into her thigh.
“No, no, no…” Melody whimpered.
She quickly retrieved the tweezers and scissors from
the floor. She picked frantically at the hole with the tweezers but couldn’t
find where the filthy creature had gone. Frustrated, she used the blade of the
scissors to cut a line from the hole to her upper thigh. She dug some more with
the tweezers. Nothing. Melody’s heart was thudding in her chest. Her breath was
coming out in short, raspy gasps. She knew she needed to find the thing before
she had a full blown panic attack. If that happened she would lose control of
the situation and Daniel would have to get involved. Worse yet, she would still
be infested.
Melody pulled her shirt up and stuffed her mouth with
the thick cotton material. She closed her eyes and tried to slow her breathing.
Still, her harsh exhalations seemed to echo in the pristine bathroom.
Determined, she opened her eyes and plunged the scissors into her thigh. Her
screams were muffled by the plug of cotton as she continued to quickly cut
crude lines into her flesh. The bright red blood blossoming from the gashes
only registered on a subconscious level as she concentrated on her search.
Bits of skins and flesh were discarded as she tunneled
into her thigh. She wiped tears from her eyes when her vision became blurry,
smearing blood across her cheeks. Melody caught sight of a part of the beige
body writhing in her thigh and pulled at it with the tweezers. As the tips of
the tweezers closed around its wriggling head, the creature latched all its
numerous legs into the muscles surrounding it.
Melody cried out from the pain of having needle thin
spindles digging into her flesh. Despite the agony, she held on and pulled the
creature out. She could now see that it was about the length of an unsharpened
pencil with black legs and black antennae at both ends. It was beige with
splotches of green all along its body. Melody brought the wriggling creature
closer for inspection. She peered at the rhythmically clacking spincers and
imagined that it was cursing her tenacity. A broad grin of triumph spread
across her face.
“I got it,” she whispered.
“Daniel! I got it!” she yelled.
Daniel was dreaming. Angry swarms of mosquitoes were
chasing him along the sea shore. He was trying to outrun them but the sand kept
sucking his feet down. Melody was calling out to him from the cement walkway.
She was being devoured by cockroaches. Bit by bit, pieces of her fell away as
Daniel struggled to reach her. All the while, he wondered why she didn’t just
move. She wasn’t being sucked into the sand like he was so why didn’t she
just…move?
Melody’s shout dragged him back to reality. He sprung
up in the bed, at first disoriented by the sudden change in scenery. He could
see a thin line of light glowing under the closed bathroom door. Christ, he thought, not again.
“Melody?” he called through the door.
“I got it! Come look!” she replied.
Daniel rubbed his eyes and opened the door.
“Hun, it’s the middle of the…”
His mouth hung open, the words he planned to say
accumulated at the back of his throat threatening to choke him. His wife had a
delirious look on her face, her short dark hair plastered on a face slick with
sweat. Her blood drenched hand was extended towards him, waving a pair of
tweezers back and forth to get his attention. Daniel could only see the damage
she had done to herself. Melody’s right pant leg was rolled up to mid-thigh and
its lilac hue was drowning in maroon. Everything between that bloody line of
clothing and her knee had been ravaged.
Bloody strips of flesh hung from Melody’s leg. Blood
was running down the sides of her thigh unto the tiles. The floor and shower
curtain both had sprinklings of darkening flesh and blood. Daniel stared at his
maniacally laughing wife in horror.
“Hun, what did you…”
“Look!” she interrupted, “I’ve got it! Now do you
believe me?”
Daniel tore his gaze away from his wife’s massacred
leg and looked at what she was holding. She held the tweezers as if she had
unearthed a valuable prize. Daniel wondered what she thought it was. All he
could see was a lumpy strip of flesh with red and beige colouring stippled
through it. He took a breath and forced himself to calm down. This was more
serious than what had happened before but it wasn’t impossible to handle. At
least he hoped it wasn’t. He tore a wad of tissue from the toilet paper roll
and held it out to her.
“Good job hun. Put it in here and we can show it to
the doctor when we get to the hospital. Let me just get something to cover your
leg up and we can go.”
Melody’s face lit up. “We’re going now?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Daniel collected the strip of flesh, wrapping it up
carefully under his wife’s watchful gaze. He kept the urge to cry, scream and
run away under control with the breathing techniques Melody’s psychiatrist had
taught him. He grabbed a clean sheet from the bedroom and returned to find Melody
trying to get up from the side of the tub.
“No!” Daniel cried, concerned about the spastic twitch
of muscles he could see through the exposed flesh. How far had she cut? he wondered. He wrapped the sheet quickly
around her leg, barely avoiding the growing pool of blood under her foot then
called an ambulance. He watched in trepidation as blood started to appear on
the outside of the sheet in splotches. As he wrapped another sheet around the
wound, the sounds of the ambulance pierced the quiet neighbourhood.
He helped Melody into the ambulance and held her hand
as they connected her to a number of machines to monitor her vitals. The
paramedic wrapped a thick material firmly around the mangles leg and kept an
eye on the blipping lines on the monitors. Daniel watched the paramedic’s every
move until Melody’s hand brushed his arm gently.
“Where’s the worm?” she asked.
Daniel showed her the wad of toilet paper in his hand.
Melody smiled and slipped into unconsciousness. Above her head, the paramedic
met his eyes but said nothing.
#
Melody’s eyes fluttered open. The glare of the
overhead lights burnt into her irises and she lifted her hand to rub her eyes.
The hand didn’t move. She tried the other one. Nothing happened. Confused, she
tried to get up so she could see what was holding her hands. A thick band
tightened against her chest and she could only move about an inch off the bed.
“Hello?” she called.
A nurse pushed her head through the doorway. She
smiled at Melody and held up a finger. A few moments later she walked into the
room holding a small tray.
“Good morning Mrs. Chambers. Time for some breakfast.”
“But my hands…”
“Oh, don’t you worry about that,” the nurse replied,
patting Melody’s hand.
The nurse sat in the lone chair beside Melody’s bed
and speared a piece of scrambled egg with the fork. She held it before Melody’s
lips and waited.
“I don’t understand…” Melody said.
The nurse rested the fork in the plate with a sigh.
“Mrs. Chambers…you came in with a very serious
self-inflicted injury. The doctors patched it up as best as they could. Your
leg will be different but it will be fine. What’s important now is helping you
get better so it doesn’t happen again.”
“Where’s Daniel?”
“Once you were alright, he went home to…clean things
up a bit. He’ll be back soon.”
“And the worm…what was it?”
The nurse shook her head sympathetically.
“Honey, that was no worm. You tore out your own leg.”
“What? That’s not true! I saw it. I’m sure of it. I…”
The energy in Melody’s outburst waned as she struggled
to remember what had happened. The memory seemed to change with each flicker of
the light.
“I was so sure…” she whispered.
“It’s okay dear,” the nurse replied, looking at Melody
sympathetically, “You weren’t yourself. The doctors here will help with that.
In fact, you should be meeting with them in a few minutes.”
Melody looked around the sterile room and at her
restraints.
“Where am I?” she asked.
“You’re in the psych ward of the hospital dear. Now
let’s get your strength up shall we?”
The nurse smiled again and placed the fork before
Melody. This time Melody opened her mouth.
SIX MONTHS LATER
Daniel massaged his temples while standing in front of
the medicine cabinet in the new bathroom of his brand new house. After Melody’s
breakdown, he didn’t think twice about selling the house. Thankfully, they had
done such a good job fixing it up he was able to actually make a profit from
the sale. This time around he didn’t bother to look for a house they could
‘make their own’. They didn’t need unique. They didn’t need character. They
needed a house that didn’t inspire Melody to mutilate herself. He took a bottle
of painkillers from the cabinet and twisted the cap off.
He closed the cabinet door and gave a start when a
pale face with greasy ringlets of hair cascading around it appeared in the
mirror. The bottle fell from his hand and pills clattered into the sink. Melody
was doing much better now but she had gotten gaunt since the ordeal. Fixing her
mind had done her body no favours and it pained him to remember what she really
looked like now. Sometimes, the sight of
her still shocked him. If she took pleasure in anything anymore, he would think
she was scaring him on purpose.
“Everything okay Melody?”
She held her hand out for inspection.
“Do you see that?”
He looked at the outstretched arm.
“You mean the bite? Yeah.”
She nodded and whispered, “Good,” more to herself than
him. Melody limped out of the bathroom while absent mindedly rubbing her arm.
Daniel sighed and tried to recover the pills from the sink. It will get better, he thought, it has to.
Melody lowered her body carefully into the soft patio
chair. The doctors had done their best work on her leg but the damage had been
done. Her leg was now plagued with a weakness that made her limp and chronic
pain that kept her awake at night. She ran her finger along the groves and
ridges of the mangled flesh. It was a mess that still paled in comparison to
what had happened to her brain. Even in her dreams, she played the game of
‘Real/Not Real’ without knowing if she was moving closer to sanity or further
away.
A mosquito buzzed around her head and she willed
herself to remain still. Encouraged, the insect flitted along Melody’s exposed
thigh. It settled unto the edge of the indented thigh and got comfortable. As
it bent forward to drink, Melody slapped it with an open palm. She lifted the
palm, picked the tiny corpse from it and flicked it away. She ran her finger
through the small blood spot and brought the finger to her nose. Inhaling the
tangy odour, Melody smiled and whispered, “Real”.
#
Miles away in her new home, Jessie Munch was frowning
at the puffy red nail bed of her index finger illuminated by flickering
bathroom lights. She poked it and bit her lip.
“Brian! I think I have another nail infection.”
Brian Jenkins chuckled from the bedroom. Ever since a
traumatic toenail infection a few years ago, where she had to have a section of
the big toe on her left foor removed, Jessie compulsively checked her nails
every night. At least once per month, she thought she saw an infection. She had
yet to be right even once.
“You always think that hun. Come to bed. Remember you
have that big meeting in the morning.”
Jessie ignored her boyfriend and continued to rub her
thumb over the swelling. She popped an Augmentin tablet into her mouth and
washed it down with tap water. With one last look at her nail, Jessie muttered,
“Whatever. It’s my body. I should know.”
END
Karen Heslop writes from Kingston, Jamaica. Her stories can be found in Apparition Lit Mag, 4StarStories and The Wierd and Whatnot among others.
An Elven portal in the woods, emerging from stone and forest floor.
I had heard tale that The Elves dwell in these woods. Many underestimate The Elves; they have a fondness of heart for Tolkienesque Middle Earth fantasy stories and tales where Elves are the most highly civilized, virtuous and intelligent. They forget that those are just myths, save for The Elves being cunning. Remember that the Pied Piper was an Elf, and the children he took were not destined for such a glorious fate.
My sister lost her firstborn to The Elves. She hadn’t noticed the Changeling until it was too late. Her baby had already long since been stolen away. She was so distraught she refused to eat or speak. She locked herself in her room. Or my family locked her into it as she succumbed to the madness. Such are the ways of the family, for all of our protection. We never question but follow as expected, as a means of self-preservation. It has kept us all alive.
But I couldn’t get the sinking feeling out of my stomach; the grief became too overwhelming. That is why I came here. I know I will not be able to rescue the child, nor my sister. But I seek to avenge their meaningless deaths. To ensure that it doesn’t happen again. My family will never act. I am tired of the Village Elders just shrugging these things off in hushed whispers and badly shrouded secrets. It happens time and again. We are all expendable. They never do anything.
So here I am, in the Elven wood. Alone. As soon as my family figures out that I’m here, they will disown me. They probably already have. Again, it is for our own protection. I’ll be just another casualty of The Elves. Everything is so structured, so regimented. Anyone who dares act in opposition to the rules vanishes. We are all so afraid.
I lay in wait. It’s just a matter of time before the portal appears. The Elves use the portals to travel across time and space. They appear where and when they wish. But this time, I will go through first. I know not what is on the other side, just that the portals allow only one to traverse in each direction. We will trade places, if only for a moment until another portal forms. Hopefully that will be enough time.
The trees shift and morph. Falling leaves drift slower and slower towards the ground. There is a stillness that I cannot fully express. My breath hangs heavy in the silent air. There is no sound, no smell, no taste. It is time. The hairs on the back of my neck and arms rise. I can sense the opening forming. There is an uncanny familiarity in this moment, as if I have been here before.
As soon as the portal opens, I dash through. But something isn’t right. No one came through from the other side. Or did they? I cannot tell. I am alone, in limbo between states of existence. The world spins around me. I can feel the drift. Is this what death feels like? Cold unbroken silence? I feel distant eyes upon me everywhere, all around me, in the trees, the clouds, pinpoints of light that shimmer through.
I can feel The Elves eyes upon me everywhere. In the leaves, in the trees themselves.
I wasn’t sure what to expect. Maybe this is all according to plan. But who was orchestrating the exchange? My idea was only half formed in those passing pensive moments I am able to think for myself, few and far between. My family, the Village Elders… no one allows time for freeform thought. I hadn’t considered what would happen after the portal exchange. I never really got past step one.
A voice greets me from the trees. It is hauntingly familiar but seems only a distant memory.
“I’ve been expecting you.”
The world slowly comes into focus. Clarity restored, the leaves circle me in an embrace. My sister emerges, her dark eyes smiling. She cradles the baby in her arms.
“You made it. You escaped,” she sings.
“I didn’t see anyone,” I retort, skeptical. I hadn’t recalled having seen any Elves, dark nightmarish fiends that they are, wild, unkempt, uncouth. Savage beasts like Pan or Krampus. Is this an illusion? My sister seems so lifelike, so much herself. She is the joyful young mother I had known her to be. Filled with love and laughter. Light dances about her, and she shimmers.
“Not in passing,” my sister clarifies. “You have been living among them your whole life. I had done so as well until the baby was stolen. My heart broke; I had to follow after. That was when I learned the Truth.”
“Why do you think we are so sheltered? Why are we forbidden to do anything? They do so to protect us from the Truth about who and what we are,” she continued. “We’ve spent our lives evading that which we truly know ourselves to be. We were the stolen ones, not the other way around…”
I notice that the portal I came through is still open, reinforcing my idea that no one had passed through the other way. It is as if the portal was opened specifically to call me through. My sister extends her hand, beckoning me to join her. There is a gleam in her eye I cannot pinpoint. She seems happy, but something still isn’t quite right. I’m still uncertain why I am here, in this time and place, as if destined to be present in this moment, in this decision.
The Village has fallen away to the woods. There are no breadcrumb trails to follow home. The idea of home itself seems distant like yet another illusion. Nothing makes sense anymore. I am unsure whether I am coming or going. Two paths lay open before me. Which shall I take?
I have been getting ready for a jewelry show in February and thought I’d share some of the fun eye candy necklaces I’ve been working on. Do they thwart or attract the Evil Eye? I think that depends largely on the wearer’s intentions… Each is hand-beaded and features a spooky printed eyeball pendant as its focus.
And the piece de resistance… A RAINBOW Evil Eye necklace with magnesite stone skulls! I love these happy little deadheads – they are just too spoopy… I have seen these beads ranging in size from very small to huge and I love all of them.
Eye Candy Necklace by Jennifer Weigel with rainbow Evil Eye and magnesite stone skulls
I love using eyes in art in weird and unusual contexts in my art. They have so much presence and symbolism. They also bring a sort of surreal atmosphere to any artwork, which bears just a hint of spookiness regardless of context.
Revisiting my costume modeling work, like my previous witch and skeleton sitting, I participated in a Living Wax Museum as part of No Craft Left Behind at Monika House over Halloween this past year. The premise is that participating performers each choose a historical figure, living or dead, and portray them. Anyone attending the event then asks questions to deduce who the living wax figures are. It’s a lot of fun, and also educational.
My identity for the Living Wax Museum
Here are some images of my outfit and props. Since I was a silent film actress, I decided to create intertitle signs to flash at audience members rather than talking, kind of like reading the snippets of conversation between scenes in actual silent films. See if you can guess who I am.
Intertitles for my costumed identity as part of the Living Wax Museum
The intertitle signs from the Living Wax Museum read:
I was a silent film & stage actress.
I was 30 years old when I became famous.
I appeared in more than 40 films between 1917 & 1926.
I was known as the 1st “Vamp” for my femme fatale roles & am cited as the 1st sex symbol of the film era.
Magazines called me “The Arch-Torpedo of Domesticity”, “The Queen of Vampires”, “The Wickedest Woman in the World” & more.
My best known roles included Salome, The Vampire in A Fool There Was & Cleopatra.
I was born in Cincinnati, Ohio to Jewish parents Bernard Goodman, a Polish tailor, and his wife, Pauline Louise Francoise of Switzerland.
I moved to New York City in 1908 & debuted in The Devil on Broadway.
I was falsely hyped as born in the Sahara in Egypt “under the shadow of the Sphinx & the Pyramids” & I dabbled in the occult.
I was known for my kohl-outlined eyes & revealing costumes before the 1930s Hays Code for decency.
I was rumored to have trained with Sarah Bernhardt, received over 1,000 marriage proposals & had a sandwich in my honor.
Most of the films in which I appear were destroyed in the 1937 Fox vault fire.
I married director Charles Brabin in 1921 & retired from acting in 1926.
I died in April 1955 and am buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, Ca.
I was named for the daughter of US Vice-President Aaron Burr, Theodosia.
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