Love Is in the Air: a Valentine’s Day Series by Jennifer Weigel
This is the first installment in a Valentine’s Day series of shorts by Jennifer Weigel in which unsuspecting lovers succumb to deadly gases.
Episode 1:
Shelby sat curled up in Braydon’s arms. Moments before they had been studying for their Psych 101 midterm together and he was lightly stroking her hair. They’d become closer over the course of the class, never officially dating but just growing more and more comfortable together than apart like a long-married couple.
They stared longingly into one another’s eyes and bent towards one another to kiss for the first time. It was a gentle kiss, coaxing and full of hope, dreaming of future possibilities and of building a life. They continued to gaze into one another’s eyes as they pressed their lips together once more in a longer display.
The textbook they had been reading fell from Shelby’s lap as they began to catch wind of something… untoward…
“What’s that smell?” Shelby asked, her nose curling.
Braydon took a long sniff, inhaling deeply, before letting out a huge sigh. “I dunno,” he answered. “It’s kind of like stale corn chips and cheap lilac perfume.”
The aroma grew stronger. The air seemed thick with it, becoming heavier with every breath. It began to resemble unkempt feet, like bad body odor mixed with sweat, wet shoes, rapidly propagating bacteria, and perfume. Surely this was beginning to cross over into Zappa stinkfoot territory.
“It’s horrible,” Shelby exclaimed. “I can barely breathe.”
“I know,” Braydon replied. He wriggled free of their embrace and raised an arm to press his nose into his armpit. Nope. He discreetly sniffed at Shelby’s hair. Not that either.
“What do you suppose it is?” Braydon asked.
“No idea,” Shelby replied, stretching forward quivering. “Whatever it is it’s awful.”
The couple arose. Shelby sat on the sofa massaging the bridge of her nose and burying her face in her sleeve trying to catch a whiff of what remained of her tropical sunset body spray. Braydon stood on shaky knees and slowly traversed the room, sniffing the air as he wove to and fro across the floor of his flat.
The noxious odor permeated everything. There was no escaping it. It was making both of them woozy. Braydon shuffled back to the sofa and flopped beside Shelby. He held her tight to him. Teary-eyed, she eagerly pressed her face into his shirt.
As the foul odor became even stronger, the rest of the apartment seemed to dim around them. The world grew hazier and hazier, as if they were trapped in some sort of all-encompassing invisible insect fogger. Shelby sobbed, trembling as Braydon drew her closer to protect her from the unseen terror.
The police found them exactly as they had lain on the sofa, wrapped tight in one another’s arms. They appeared to have suffocated together. There was no sign of foul play, nothing amiss, no lingering fumes to offer any indication of what had happened, just two college co-eds tangled together.
You can find more of Jennifer Weigel’s writing by visiting her website here at Jennifer Weigel Words.
Wow, you’re still with us… So, taking it from Part 1 and Part 2 of this saga, we’re still knuckle deep in finger spiders here at Haunted MTL! Because I made A LOT of unfulfilled requests for a spider out of fingers, I will continue this snarky little AI art series with NightCafe and Canva through the month of September…
Images: Overall design aesthetic of fashion / design advertising spread in muted tones with four AI art rendered images of spiders, built spiders, and spiders on hands, with any given number of legs on spiders and fingers on hands as you’d expect from AI interfacing at this time. Prompts used from top left to lower right include: fingers spider; fingers as spider; fingers as spider legs no hand; spider out of fingers.
Text reads: Creepy Crawlies Finger Spiders What You Get! This is all on you… You let the terrifying AI art generated finger spiders in the house and then let them crawl on you. When you turn into a spider, that’s all your own doing. Leave me out of it.
Images: Overall design aesthetic of fashion / design advertising spread in muted tones with four AI art rendered images of spiders, built spiders, and spiders on hands, with any given number of legs on spiders and fingers on hands as you’d expect from AI interfacing at this time. Prompts used from top left to lower right include: spider hand; fingers as spider legs; spider hand fingers; spider as fingers.
Text reads: Creepy Crawlies Finger Spiders Look I’m Sorry! I wish I could help. I really really do. Keep scrubbing at it even if your flesh falls off. It’s really your only hope now. You’ve been bitten and there’s not much to do for it now.
All of the AI art images used in this series were generated on Thursday, June 13, 2024. If you want to see more freaky spiderness in art here on Haunted MTL, check out Bitten and Soul Catcher. More AI art graphic narratives from Jennifer Weigel have explored Little Red Riding Hood and Into the Deep Woods. Oh, and the Tiny Brain Computers exploration. To see more such devolutions into AI generated art, check out the Will the Real Jennifer Weigel Please Stand Up? blog.
They’re back… So, continuing where we left off, we’re still knuckle deep in finger spiders here at Haunted MTL! Because I made A LOT of unfulfilled requests for a spider out of fingers, I will continue this snarky little AI art series with NightCafe and Canva through the month of September…
Images: Overall design aesthetic of fashion / design advertising spread in muted tones with four AI art rendered images of spiders, built spiders, and spiders on hands, with any given number of legs on spiders and fingers on hands as you’d expect from AI interfacing at this time. Prompts used from top left to lower right include: finger spider; spider out of nothing but fingers; spider made out of only fingers; fingers as spider.
Text reads: Creepy Crawlies Finger Spiders Too Late! Well now that they’re in the house and you’re hunting them down, don’t let them crawl on you. Not only are they seriously creepy, but the AI art generation can warp time and space around itself and allow them to evolve to your biology.
Images: Overall design aesthetic of fashion / design advertising spread in muted tones with four AI art rendered images of spiders, built spiders, and spiders on hands, with any given number of legs on spiders and fingers on hands as you’d expect from AI interfacing at this time. Prompts used from top left to lower right include: spider out of only fingers; fingers into spider; finger spider; fingers as spider legs only.
Text reads: Creepy Crawlies Finger Spiders No You Didn’t! I can’t believe you let the AI art generated finger spiders crawl on you! What were you thinking?! Just try to wash it off as best you can… Like seriously, I can’t help you any more, you’re on your own.
All of the AI art images used in this series were generated on Thursday, June 13, 2024. If you want to see more freaky spiderness in art here on Haunted MTL, check out Bitten and Soul Catcher. More AI art graphic narratives from Jennifer Weigel have explored Little Red Riding Hood and Into the Deep Woods. Oh, and the Tiny Brain Computers exploration. To see more such devolutions into AI generated art, check out the Will the Real Jennifer Weigel Please Stand Up? blog.
So I tried to convince the AI to give me a spider made out of fingers, because there’s no way it could possibly mess that up right? Wink. After multiple unfulfilled requests for finger spiders, I bring you this snarky little AI art series with NightCafe and Canva for the month of September…
Images: Overall design aesthetic of fashion / design advertising spread in muted tones with four AI art rendered images of spiders, built spiders, and spiders on hands, with any given number of legs on spiders and fingers on hands as you’d expect from AI interfacing at this time. Prompts used from top left to lower right include: fingers as spider; spider made of fingers; a spider out of nothing but fingers; finger spider hand.
Text reads: Creepy Crawlies Finger Spiders Coming Soon! It’s just a matter of time before these horrifying AI art generated creations come crawling into your home to feast on your blood. For they are hungry and they are evolving…
Images: Overall design aesthetic of fashion / design advertising spread in muted tones with four AI art rendered images of spiders, built spiders, and spiders on hands, with any given number of legs on spiders and fingers on hands as you’d expect from AI interfacing at this time. Prompts used from top left to lower right include: fingers as spider; spider hand shadow puppetry; fingers in shape of spider; spider that is a hand.
Text reads: Creepy Crawlies Finger Spiders They’re Here! Too late, you let them into the house. You’d better be sure to find and squish them all before they breed and come after you. They are still hungry, and they are still evolving…
All of the AI art images used in this series were generated on Thursday, June 13, 2024. If you want to see more freaky spiderness in art here on Haunted MTL, check out Bitten and Soul Catcher. More AI art graphic narratives from Jennifer Weigel have explored Little Red Riding Hood and Into the Deep Woods. Oh, and the Tiny Brain Computers exploration. To see more such devolutions into AI generated art, check out the Will the Real Jennifer Weigel Please Stand Up? blog.
