Frightmares: A Fistful of Flash Fiction Horror (7 page)

Gary R. Hoffman
has taught school, been self-employed, and traveled in a motor home. He has published or won prizes for over 300 short stories, poems, and essays. www.garyrhoffman.com.

THEY WON’T GET US

T. J. REED

Sweat dripped down his forehead, between his eyes, and off the tip of Brian’s nose. The pressure was getting to him. From the corner of the living room he could hear the whimpering of his two children, Amy, ten, and Sean, nine. They were hiding in the closet, just as he had told them to. Lying unconscious on the living room floor was his wife Tory, dried blood matting her hair against her head. Brian stood up from his recliner and shuffled to the window for the third time in as many minutes and parted the curtains. The dead were out there. Standing behind cars parked in front of his suburban home.

“Daddy, we’re scared,” Amy whispered.

“I know. So am I, baby. But I won’t let them get us.”

Brian picked up his shotgun that he had propped against the wall next to the window. He could start shooting in hopes of thinning the herd outside, but he was afraid the noise would only bring more of the ghouls to his home. He counted them again.
Fourteen
.

The masses were growing, and they were surrounded. At least that is what one of the walking dead had said. Brian had been surprised to learn that they could talk. The zombie’s booming voice had sounded like God himself, but God wasn’t in the business of killing and eating his family, as were the maggot sacks outside his once-quiet home.

Tory began to stir from her slumber on the floor.

“Brian . . . what happened?” Then she was out again.

Brian raised the shotgun, and aimed at his wife’s head. He knew there was only one way out for him and his family.

“No! Daddy, please! ” Amy cried to her father.

“I’m sorry, pumpkin, but this is the only way. I will see you on the other side. Now close your eyes and hold your brother. Hold him tight! When you get to heaven, Mama and I will be right behind you, baby. Go ahead now, close your eyes, and wipe away those tears.”

Brian shot his wife first, then both of his children. As he raised the shotgun to place it in his mouth, the living room window shattered in. The shots had excited the dead outside, and now they were flooding into his house in hopes of getting Brian and his family. But Brian knew he had cheated them out of that satisfaction. He pulled the trigger as they grabbed him and dragged him to the floor, but nothing happened. The gun had jammed.

The zombies rolled him onto his stomach and placed cuffs on him.

“We were too late, sir. They’re dead, the wife and the kids. The whacko shot them. Oh my God, he shot them.”

T. J. Reed
loves to tell stories and entertain his friends with his tales of zombie survival. He lives in Fredericktown, Missouri with his beautiful supportive wife and four wonderful children. He also is a Combat Engineer in the Missouri National Guard with two combat tours to Iraq. Visit him at http://theywontgetus.blogspot.com.

THE SHACKLES

JAMES S. DORR

He had her at last! He’d waited until day, when she would be asleep, and dragged her torpid body to the chair, sitting it upright, then locked on the shackles.

Slowly, the vampire woke.

“Sandor,” she said in her heavily accented voice. “What is the meaning of this?”

“Countess,” he answered, “you know what I want. You have promised many times—life eternal.”

“I do not make such promises to servants, nor would I let myself be forced to keep them. I am Countess Marya Zaleska, the daughter of Dracula himself! How dare you—”

“Remember, Countess, I helped you to steal back your father’s corpse, and then to burn it. You needed me then. And afterward you have not turned me away. I know your secrets.”

The Countess pulled against her chains. “Perhaps not all of them, Sandor,” she said, “but no matter. Even if I should promise this to gain my freedom, how would you hold me to it?”

Sandor smiled. “The shackles and chains are quite solid, I can guarantee. And do not try turning into a bat, your wings would be shattered before you could pull them out. You see, I’ve learned these things. As for your promise, you will pay me first. You will let me have a flagon of
your
blood that I might then drink before you have quite completely drained mine.”

She shook her head, straining to pull the chains from the wall, until she sank back again, exhausted.

“It will be night soon enough,” Sandor said. “I have watched you, Countess. I know you will need to have blood before dawn. You may feel strong now, but as the hours go by you will weaken. You will see, Countess.”

Sandor strode to the chamber’s window and peeked through its heavy drapes. “Indeed,” he continued, “the sun is just touching the western horizon. In not many more minutes it will be down. And that is when the lust comes on you, does it not? The desire—the
need
—to drink? I know you have tried to banish it from you, to deny your nature, but always it comes back. That prostitute, Lili. That doctor who you had thought might cure you. As I have said, Countess, I know your secrets.”

“And I have said, perhaps not all of them.” She fixed him with her dark, deep eyes. “You say it is sundown?”

He opened the curtain so she could see too. “Yes,” he answered. “Now comes the starvation. Unless, of course . . . ”

He held out the flagon, a knife in his other hand pointing toward the vein in her wrist when, suddenly, both wrist and arm dissolved into a white mist. A mist that expanded to include her whole body, swirling, flowing, now surrounding Sandor.

It echoed her words, “
Not all my secrets
,” as thousands and thousands of tiny droplets, each with its own tiny teeth, started the night’s feast.

James Dorr
has two collections,
Strange Mistresses: Tales Of Wonder And Romance
and
Darker Loves: Tales Of Mystery And Regret
, (Dark Regions Press) and his all-Poetry Vamps (A Retrospective) (Sam’s Dot Publishing). He is an active member of SFWA and HWA with several hundred individual publications to his credit. Dorr invites readers to visit his site at http://jamesdorrwriter.wordpress.com for the latest information and news.

SKIPPING STONES

A. J. BROWN

“Flat stones, Cadence. You have to use flat stones.”

Remy ran his hand through the sediment just beneath the water’s surface. Sand washed away with the slight current of the river as he pulled his hand out. Four black rocks, smooth and flat, lay in the palm of his hand.

He looked out over the narrow neck of the river. Tree branches stretched across the water from both sides. Thick moss hung down like heavy strands of hair on a hag’s head. Remy had tied the target to one of the thicker branches so it would dangle close enough to the water.

Remy turned to his daughter, took in the eyes that were odd: one wide and one like a slit across her face. He took in the way one side of her lip pulled down, the scars on her face and arms where flames had licked her skin. His heart cracked and he clinched his teeth to bite back the anger welling up in his chest. He released a long breath, relaxed.

“You do it like this,” he said, and held his arm out to his side and at an angle. With a flick of his wrist he let the rock go. It skipped across the water, went into the air, skipped again. “Damn it, I missed. But, you get the picture, right?”

Cadence nodded, her once-curly blonde locks clung tight to her skull. The one good blue eye shimmered with excitement as she took a stone from Remy, held her arm at an angle and tossed the rock. It plopped into the water and sank.

“Ah man,” she said, lowering her head.

“Try again.”

The second rock sank as well.

Remy held the last rock out for her. “One more, kiddo.”

Cadence took the final rock, one a little bigger than the others.

Remy stepped behind her, took her elbow and steadied her arm. “Close your eyes, child. See the target in your mind, feel it in your soul as if it were pain. We don’t like pain, now do we?”

“No sir.”

He stepped back. “Go on ahead now. Hit the target.”

Cadence shut her eyes, stepped out with one foot and flicked her wrist. The rock skimmed the water’s surface three times before striking the woman dangling upside down from the overhanging tree limb. The woman let out a yelp of pain as she swayed from side to side. Blood flowed from the wound above her eye, seeping into her brown hair.

“Nice!” Remy cheered.

The child’s eyes grew wide, a smile stretched across her young face.

“Do you want to try again?”

“Yes!” she said, clapped her scarred hands together.

He rummaged through the sediment, came back up with several smooth rocks.

“Aim for the middle of the face next time. She’s still much too pretty. Remember how she looked at you? Remember how it made you feel?”

Cadence nodded, took another rock and closed her eyes and remembered.

A.J. Brown
is a scribbler of words. Some of those words are decent enough to see the light of day. His scribbles have appeared in
Necrotic Tissue, Allegory, Bards and Sages Quarterly
and
The Gloaming.

MUSH

LOGAN BRANJORD

Gales of snow-speckled wind pelted the faces of Stockton and his dogs. Mint and Vanilla nearly tore through the harnesses in their strain to pull the sled up an endless incline. Each time Stockton heard more panting than pushing, he took the whip and cracked them on their haunches. Deep gashes decorated their rumps. Mint’s fur had stopped growing back in places where Stockton had “encouraged” her most.

The racer wiped frost from his eyelashes and snot from his cheeks. With the blinding yellow disc of the sun, he couldn’t see well enough to steer. Crags jutted up beside them.

The path began to slope downward. When the dogs couldn’t keep up, the sled skidded out of control. At treacherous speed, the sled slammed into a boulder. Wood splintered and Stockton flew through the air. He felt a jabbing pain into his side when he collided with the boulder. Everything went dark.

When he awoke, Stockton found his shinbone protruding from the skin and his knee cap had slid out of place. He saw splinters of wood sticking out from his side with a trail of red gel melting through the snow. It was his blood.

His dogs had deserted him. He saw shreds of chewed-up harnesses laying everywhere.
Mint’s fault,
he thought.
Mint was always a disobedient bitch.
She barked, nipped, peed on his things and ran away every time she got the chance. Worse yet, Mint distracted the other dogs. So she had to have been behind this little “canine revolution” of the dogs. Stockton wished he’d thrown her in the river after all.

Stockton must have fallen asleep. He awoke again under a full white moon and with a dreadful wind from the north. His legs felt numb and lifeless. His left side was tingling.

He called to his dogs. “Vanilla!” he said, “Mint!” His words echoed back to him.

A set of hungry eyes appeared against the tree line. Stockton’s chest fluttered. Then he saw their shape and he prickled with recognition.
That’s Mint!

“Mint!” he called, coughing violently, “Mint come!”

The eyes disappeared at the sound of his voice; very characteristic of Mint. Stockton fell asleep a half hour later.

Next time he awoke, his whole body was stiff. He could only move his neck and shoulders. His hips had frozen in place. Those eyes appeared again.

Stockton didn’t have the energy to call. He remembered his love for the dog now. He wanted her to come fall asleep on him. He craved to feel her warm breath against his cheek, despite her dog smell. As Stockton fell asleep he was vaguely aware of something warm massaging his legs.

Hours later, Stockton awoke, disappointed to find himself back in the bitter wind. His eyes were frozen shut. A crawling feeling went up and down his leg.

When he pried his eyelids apart he saw the bloody muzzle of Mint, standing over him, in the place where his leg should be.

Logan Theodore Branjord
is a 27 year-old writer living in the Twin Cities, MN.

IF THESE WALLS COULD TALK

JACK NEALY

When she left I decided to take out the wall that separated our bedroom from the guestroom. My brother came over to help and together we tore down a chunk of drywall. Later, the police explained to us that the bodies we found stashed inside the wall had been there for over thirty years. After the detectives left, after we were assured we would not be facing any further investigation, and after they promised to have the bodies removed within the week, my brother called me to say he was too busy to come back and finish the wall-removal job. He never was good at lying.