“I’m not sorry, honey; you ought to know how much I love killing in the fun house.” Lou looked into her eyes and caressed her cheek. He kissed her. His mouth and his hands came away dripping with blood. “Alicia, my love, you’re bleeding…”
“Well, no shit, Bozo, you just sliced my face open.” Alicia was so sick of this. How could he not pay attention to who he is trying to kill? Maybe he was paying attention… He always had this way of seeing his spectators out of the corner of his eye. Maybe this was how it was going to end… eleven years of the most beautifully dysfunctional marriage the world may ever know- ruined in a few hundred stabs.
It had been more than a few hundred… The number of spectators they had killed… Each one stabbed at least twenty times… A few hundred thousand stabs then? A few million? Well every show had at least ten children. Then there were other family; mothers and cousins and grandparents… All those back alley kills they did by themselves… And it wasn’t eleven years;
They killed at least thirty people on their first date alone. Fifteen years ago then. Her first month of clown school.
“Let’s get you cleaned up, sweetheart” Lou put his arm around Alicia and guided her to the fun house exit. With his other hand he reached into his trench coat and pulled out his desert eagle 357 magnum and shot some five year old boy’s head off.
“Again with the fucking gun, Lou.” Knives were just more fun… Lou had started including them in his act after the first date. That was when Alicia knew it was love. Knives may be more fun, but that desert eagle turned Alicia on and Lou knew it.
“Aw, come on, baby, what do ya say we get busy on top of this kid’s brains? It could be just like our honeymoon all over again.”
“We did it again on our tenth anniversary and I cut myself on skull fragments remember? And I have already been cut once today,” Alicia threw him a dirty look.
“Well, how about you get on top this time, and I will handle the bits of skull?”
Alicia sighed. “Ok Lou… but after this let’s go cut people in the haunted house.” Alicia started hiking up her skirt and pulling down her panties. Lou was already on the ground covered in blood and gore, hard as a rock. Alicia knelt onto him and started rolling her hips back and forth.
Lou wraps his arms around her, and flips Alicia onto her back. Sure enough- skull fragments cut into her thigh. “Ow, Lou… You’re hurting me!”
“I know, baby… that’s what I want to do,” Lou reached for his gun. Alicia was faster. She grabbed her knife and in one fluid and practiced motion she sliced Lou’s throat wide open. Lou’s head fell back, hinged only by a small piece of spine. Blood poured onto Alicia. She pushed him off of her. She got up and began adjusting her skirt.
“You stupid mother fucker… you had to go and ruin a good thing…” She spat on his corpse. “Fifteen goddamn years down the drain… ” Alicia looked over and saw the fun house ticket taker. He had seen everything - the kid, the sex, the death of Lou. He stared; dumbfounded and horrified at the sights he had just witnessed.
“What the fuck are you looking at?” Alicia began walking towards him.
“N-N-No- Nothing… I swear I didn’t see anything. Please don’t hurt me!”
Alicia was standing right in front of him now. She kissed him passionately. She grabbed her knife and stabbed him in the chest. She twisted. She pulled the knife out and let the ticket taker fall. Blood pooled out of him and mingled with the blood of Lou, Alicia, and the little boy. Alicia put the knife back in the holster on her upper thigh and walked away from the pile of dead bodies. She would be performing her act on her own now…
Welcome to the freak-show, honey, check your soul at the door. For one night only, the amazing world-famous Circus of Murder is in town.
Once upon a time, well, once upon a time makes this sound like a fairytale, but then they’re often not as sugary sweet as the Disney version makes us think, so it’ll do. Once upon a time I wanted to be a ballerina – no, don’t laugh, I had more control over my limbs back then, it could’ve happened. A ballerina, full of grace and poise, or a circus dancer, bareback rider, daredevil horse-fairy defying gravity night after night. Not quite how it turned out, but not far off.
Teenage rebellion leads us down strange paths; the old idea of running off to join the circus had crossed my mind not long before the big top appeared at the edge of town, and when it’s on your doorstep it’s hardly running at all. Decked out in my protective black, hoping I looked much cooler than I felt, I strolled along to the edge of the field, working up the courage to ask for a trial. It was quieter than I imagined, no animals braying or trumpeting, no bustle outside the tents and trailers, no activity that I could hear or see at all. Which should have warned me, but instead it made it easier to cross the empty field and walk right in.
A macabre circus, the teenage goth ballerina’s dream, like an Alice Cooper stage show without the man himself. Not an opportunity to miss, I could tell that the moment the door-curtains parted and I saw the rehearsals inside. A sea of silk, lace, velvet, net and brocade; a dozen elegant young women leaping gracefully through hoops and hanging upside down from tightrope or trapeze. Now I understood why there were no animals, every part in this circus was played by one of these women. Except the ringmaster, of course. Like a cross between harmless family fun and a burlesque show.
They noticed me eventually, coaxed me into joining in, persuaded me I could be one of them, with a bit of training. No contract, no promises, just try a small part in the performance before they move on; if nothing else I’d have enjoyed myself, I’d have a tale to tell my friends. Nothing ventured, nothing gained, as the ringmaster said, and when he fixed his green eyes on me I had to agree.
So here I stand, painted as the clown I am, lowest of the low, here to greet the paying guests. I never was as graceful as I thought I was, and I’m only getting worse. It took me a while to realise that trying to leave just made me rot; I misunderstood, I thought if I left I’d die. I can’t do that though, it’s in the contract, I signed one in the end. Take a tip from me – always read the small print.
That reminds me, can I see your ticket? I’ll show you to your seat; make sure you get nice and comfortable, grab a cushion if you like. Because now you’re here, you can’t leave. Where would we be without our audience?
Alex stared at the church. Rusted brass glinted in the twilight. The carnival’s fairway swam with bodies large and small, with laughter and sickness, the beep of rides, the calls of carnies, the half scared screams of children. Two crows cawed from a broken window high above the door. They met his eyes and their caws changed, became a rough impersonation of his voice. “He sees us.”
He took a step forward and a plume of dust, kicked loose by his sneakers, made him sneeze. Thoughts of his little brother, who he was supposed to keep an eye on, fell away like a liars promise. The two guardians’ weaved through the air and landed in front of the door.
Alex stepped forward, the sweat sliding down his back, an itch behind his eyes, his tongue dry and thick. The bird on the right said, “You got no business here, son. You want to stay away.”
“No,” Alex said. “I think I’m dreaming. Right?”
“Sure, son. You’re dreaming. But you should dream somewhere else.” The bird pecked the ground, drew a line in the sand between dying clumps of brown grass. “Go on, get out of here.” When Alex ignored him, the bird hopped back from the line, and said, “You have to stay on that side, understand? There are bad things on this side and you don’t want to wrestle them.”
Alex rubbed his leg. “No one else can see you.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“What does it matter?”
“Why do I see you?”
“Get out of here.”
“No.” His heartbeat a little harder as he crossed the line, something compels him to move forward. A blizzard-like coldness saturated his bones. His arms closed around his scrawny chest. The crow said, “It onl
y gets worse, son.”
Darkness splashed out from inside the church like spilled black paint and shadows stirred on the ground, taking the forms of two women. Then they retracted back past the splintered steps. A crow stood on either side of him. He wanted to ask them what was inside but he knew they’d only try to dissuade him again.
An owl hooted and the voices on the fairway faded to a soft whisper. Dust stung his eyes as a breeze kicked up. But it didn’t come from the trees behind the building. It came out from the open door of the dilapidated church. He shivered, his foot on the step. It creaked beneath his weight. The crows started crying and flew back to their perch at the broken window.
Alex stepped through the doorway.
# # #
The interior of the church looked new and sunlight fell in through the six windows on each sidewall, all of the light merging between the pews as if it lit a path. A stone slab, waist high, sat on the altar in place of a pulpit. A naked girl lay there, squirming against the brown canvas ropes binding her hands above her head, and her feet below. She spoke a language that sounded ancient as she moaned to the ceiling or God or at herself in insanity. Alex wondered how long she’d been bound there and why he knew her.
When he touched the slab he felt a current flow through him, and it made him so tired he had to struggle to keep his eyes open. The girl turned her head, looked down at his hand. He looked down at it too, and when he looked back at her face it bubbled and caved in on itself. The dust of her bones swirled, caught in the light basking the stone. He sneezed again and wiped his nose. Don’t do this to me.
Something moved behind him. He spun around. A man stood there with half his face missing, a crow on his shoulder, their eyes locked on the floor. He looked familiar, and Alex’s pulse kicked like an aggravated moth at his wrists and temples. Alex’s voice came out thick and shattered. “Eddie?”
Eddie groaned and when he looked up a tear fell and he pointed behind Alex, at the altar. The bird on his shoulder said, “You’re in for it now.”
“What the hell is going on, Eddie?”
The bird said, “She’s here.” Its eye shone a baby blue, like a translucent robin’s egg lit from within. “Turn around. You want to wrestle the past, its waiting.”
Alex rubbed his hand over his mouth and pulled it away. The hand was huge and calloused, a grown man’s. He didn’t want to turn around. He knew what waited for him there.
Her breath touched his neck. She said, “You’ve failed your whole family.” Alex turned, feeling the power of his grown body but unable to use it. The nun stood there.
“Mom.”
Her habit was torn; bloody finger-like lines ran down her face, two swipes on either side of her thick nose. The young version of her, which had lain on the slab, had become this monster.
She drove her hand into his chest and he saw the Long Ago as The Nun squeezed the guilt-ridden walls of his heart.
He fell to his knees, seeing the past Eddie, the Carnival when they were children, the fear of not finding his little brother when it was his duty, always his duty, to keep him safe. The beating The Nun had inflicted until he bled like the small body the police found, its face crushed in, only half of him recognizable, but all of him gone. Gone forever.
In the distance he heard voices crying out, saw the night claim the sky, a crow’s wings spreading, taking flight. He wanted to tell Eddie, “I’m sorry”, but he didn’t know what one more time would change.
His body felt numb and hollow and he laid there, someone pushing on his chest, saying, “Come on, breathe, buddy. Breathe.” As the door of the church closed he waited for The Nun to speak, to laugh, but her silence said it all.
Brigham went into the grocery store in a hurry. His Kenneth Cole shoes squeaked on the linoleum as he rushed past the cashier line into the safety of the bread and cereal aisle. He didn’t think anyone had seen him or the crazy look on his face. People tend to notice a crazy looking man in a black Burberry coat in the grocery store.
He slipped on his leather gloves and pulled the Ruger out of his breast pocket. He let his eyes dart around in each direction, taking in everything. He knew that there was a woman at twelve o’clock seven meters away on the opposite aisle. She wasn’t moving toward him, just fidgeting with spaghetti. There was an old man ten meters away, about to cross into his line of sight at the far end of the aisle. He didn’t have to see them to know how they were moving. It was just a sense you developed in his line of work.
He pulled out the silencer and screwed it on to the end of the pistol. He placed it in his side pocket, tailored especially deep for just such an item. He took out a handkerchief and wiped his brow. He took a deep breath. The old man passed the end of the aisle and Brigham made an attempt to smile at him, the way an ordinary man might smile.
He looked at his watch. Seven minutes till seven. He ran his fingers in his other deep pocket, counting the extra bullets in it. There was to be absolutely no killing. He knew the rules, but he wanted to make sure he didn’t die in the process.
The words of his predecessor came to him as if from a long-forgotten dream…
# # #
It’s not enough to be a good shooter. You have to learn to be invisible. Get in clean, and out even cleaner. Oh, and don’t ever schedule anything for the first week of November. Not ever.”
“Yah, why is that, Danny-Boy?”
“You will have to be ready for November third.”
“What happens on November third?”
# # #
Brigham was starting to sweat. The fear was kicking in. He thought about taking a valium, but he didn’t like what it did to his steadiness. He spent the last seven minutes walking the aisles, recording the number of people and their relative positions. It was force of habit. Then he made his way to the centre aisle, canned goods.
# # #
“They will come for you, and they will find you. The ancients discovered that all the dead come up from a crack in the earth on the first of November. Samhain, they called it. These spirits drift around for a week or so, and then are banished back to the land of the dead. They set aside a special day for guys like us called Anturock. It’s like Halloween for hit men and that day, my lad, is November third. On the eve of that day all the ones that you have put down will come back for you and I will warn you that the word tenacious does not begin to describe their demeanour.”
# # #
The fluorescents crackled and dimmed to an odious half-light. A dark impenetrable vapour lifted lazily from under the shelving, and blanketed the floor like a low fog. Brigham took the valium and chewed it nervously, wiping his brow a second time.
# # #
“On the eve of that day, just before seven p.m. you should lock yourself in a crowded well-lit area. It’s good to have other people around. It confuses the spirits. Leave your gun at home. There’s no killing what’s already dead, and if you should accidentally down an unmarked target… well, you know what happens then. Your only goal is to outlast them. Just make it to the next morning.”
# # #
Brigham slid his hand to the pistol in his coat pocket, and found its comforting grip. An intruder grappled him from behind, slipping a cold hand into his pocket, clutching its fingers over his. A familiar voice whispered from behind him, choked with grave-mud.
“They always kill the one who trained them, don’t they? I see you brought your pistol. I knew you wouldn’t be able to resist.”
The flap of his coat rose up and the dead man squeezed his trigger finger into action, blasting silent rounds through canned soup and tomatoes onto unknown trajectories.
“You’re a better shot than I thought,” whispered Danny-Boy. Brigham felt the dead man’s hands loosen from his own, its spectral voice fading into the distance.
“So many unmarked targets… I’d say you got them all. You have a long night ahead of you.”
“It’s Momma’s turn.”
Gabby sighed. Uncle Fred’s babbli
ng usually didn’t phase her too much, but this current topic grated her last nerve. She rolled his wheelchair to the table and positioned his dinner in front of him.
“I know, Uncle Fred. It was your Momma’s turn to die. Her turn to go to Jesus, right?” This conversation was entering its third hour. Gabby struggled to keep her voice calm. It’s not his fault, she reminded herself. His brain can’t process what happened.
She sat down next to Uncle Fred and dove into her dinner. Her uncle hadn’t touched his food. He simply sat there, shaking his head, a thin line of drool seasoning his supper.
“It’s Momma’s turn.” His eyes shone with tears.
Gabby put down her fork and took her uncle’s hand. “Listen, buddy. Your momma, my grandma, were sick for a long time. That’s why I moved in here, remember? To help take care of her? And you, too? So now that she’s gone, I’m not gonna leave y--”
A wrecking ball smashed into her skull from the inside. She moaned, cranked it to a scream, and buried her head in her hands.
Not again, not again. The pain came more often now, these sudden jabs of incapacitating fire. Just count it out, Gabby. One, two, three. . .
At twelve, the torment eased up. She was able to open her eyes and lift her head by twenty.
That’s it. I’ll call the doctor tomorrow. Get to a neurologist. Without a dying grandmother to care for anymore, Gabby figured her excuses had run out.
She looked at Uncle Fred, but his usual mask of concern after one of her episodes was absent. His eyes bore holes through her own, burning with a clarity rarely seen in those normally dull and simple orbs.
“It’s Momma’s turn, Gabby,” he said. “She say sorry, but it’s her turn now.”
# # #
Gabby had never given much thought to that old saying before, the one about the eyes being the windows to the soul. But the closer she got to Uncle Fred, the more she grew to know him, to understand the elementary way his childlike mind forced him to live his life, the more she believed in the truth of those words.