63
" Her tone changed from shocked to curious. “How was it? Was it… different?”
Sarah bit her lip, ashamed to be gossiping but feeling the strong urge to tell. “Yes,”
she confided. “He’s nothing like John. Nothing like him at all.”
“Really? What was different? Did he…?” Grace waved a hand as though erasing a
chalkboard. “Oh, forget it. I shouldn’t be asking this. But,” again her voice lowered, “is he tattooed everywhere?”
Sarah knew it was wrong to talk about him like this, but her inner schoolgirl took over and she nodded, eager to share details. “He’s beautiful … like a stained glass window. And he’s really good with his … mouth.” She raised an eyebrow, giving Grace a significant look.
Her friend gasped and giggled. “But isn’t it weird? Touching him?”
“Skin is skin, Grace,” Sarah chided. “The tattoos are only on the surface, you know.
He’s a man.” A sexy, vulnerable, intense, attractive, responsible, sweet, gentle and loving man. "
― Bonnie Dee , Bone Deep
65
" As he sat up, he heard soft dripping sounds from the bathroom, little plips like water slipping over the edges of the tub and into the floor. The hairs on the back of his neck rose as he realized where he‟d last heard that sound. His muscles tight with strain from his earlier exertions, he stood and walked warily toward the half open bathroom door and the tub beyond it. Slipping quietly past the door, he saw that the curtain was drawn, and again the shadowed figure lay behind it. One long, slim, leg dangled from the end of the tub, beads of water gliding down its length and off the polished toes. At the other end he saw a mass of auburn curls, matted deep red near the porcelain of the tub. It was the dream and the vision again, more real now, too strong to deny. Shaking, he moved toward the curtain, gagging on the sickly smell of rust and roses, feeling the thin nylon glide between thumb and palm as he pulled it back to reveal his darkest nightmare and deepest regret. He could see the crimson water now, blood bubbles gliding over its surface and clinging to the legs dangling over the tub‟s edge. When he‟d pulled the curtain completely away from the tub and around to its opposite side, he saw her face. Her eyes were closed and he saw that her lids were bruised and purple against the translucent paleness of her face, drained completely dead white under the makeup she‟d brushed on before she‟d died. Staggering by the sight of her, he knelt by the tub and extended one shaking hand to touch her cheek. It all seemed as if he‟d walked into a horror film and once again he needed to prove to his mind that this wasn‟t real. His hand shook as he lifted it nearer to her flesh, waiting for the corpse, the supposedly dead and buried to move. He touched his quivering fingers to her face, feeling its claylike reality. The sensation caused an immediate shudder of revulsion and he fought not to vomit. Even as the moment came, the sight of her moving in the water startled him and he jumped away from the tub. It wasn‟t an obvious movement at first, only soft breaths moving in and out of her nostrils, but then her chest rose and fell with it and he quaked, feeling unstable where he knelt on the floor.
Her eyes opened next and he felt the blood fall out of his face, wanting to scream but too afraid he would cause her to take some action, to reach out and touch him, proving well and forever that he was indeed insane. Scream and you might as well slit your own throat. He swallowed the scream like a rock and stared as her eyes moved slowly in their sockets, locking on him. Slowly, as if she‟d lost control of her muscles, she rose from the tub and looked down at him, smiling. Blood water slid down her bare body, over her neck, down her back and the smooth ridges of her breasts, to slip slowly down her thighs and down over her calves. A puddle spread on the floor, and as it extended toward him he struggled to his feet, skittering away from it. As he watched it spread, he shivered, weak as he started to cry frantic, horrified tears. Breaking down, he looked back up at her face and slipped to the floor once more, his knees incapable of sustaining his own weight. The smile grew wider as she strode to his shivering form, thrown on his side and struggling to rise. The blood water seeped into his clothes, making him sick, a drop of it trickling along the lobe of his ear and into it. And then she leaned down, holding those dim, stained curls of auburn out of her face and tucking them behind her ear. Her lips parted, blue beneath the strong crimson red of her lipstick, and she spoke into his ear with the chill breath of the dead. His eyes grew wide and horrified as she spoke, the hair on his neck rising, sending a maddening shiver of fear through him. “I‟ve returned, Raven.” She whispered “And I want what is mine.” The last thing he saw before his mind, finally, thankfully, shut down was her face in front of his. They were pursed for a kiss. "
― Amanda M. Lyons
68
" The Butcher’s Shop
The pigs are strung in rows, open-mouthed,
dignified in martyrs’ deaths. They hang
stiff as Sunday manners, their porky heads
voting Tory all their lives, their blue rosettes
discarded now. The butcher smiles a meaty smile,
white apron stained with who knows what,
fingers fat as sausages. Smug, woolly cattle
and snowy sheep prance on tiles, grazing
on eternity, cute illustrations in a children’s book.
What does the sheep say now?
Tacky sawdust clogs your shoes.
Little plastic hedges divide the trays of meat, playing farms.
playing farms. All the way home
your cold and soggy paper parcel bleeds. "
― Angela Topping
69
" But we who remain shall grow old
We shall know the cold
Of cheerless
Winter and the rain of Autumn and the sting
Of poverty, of love despised and of disgraces,
And mirrors showing stained and aging faces,
And the long ranges of comfortless years
And the long gamut of human fears...
But, for you, it shall forever be spring,
And only you shall be forever fearless,
And only you have white, straight, tireless limbs,
And only you, where the water-lily swims
Shall walk along the pathways thro' the willows
Of your west.
You who went West,
and only you on silvery twilight pillows
Shall take your rest
In the soft sweet glooms
Of twilight rooms... "
― Ford Madox Ford
77
" In the kitchen Anna was quietly plotting to get rid of him. A brief talk, then she would contact the publisher and ask for someone more suitable. When she bore her best china cautiously back into the room she found him on his feet, examining things. 'Here we are,' she said, speaking drily, trying to call him back to his place.'Who's this guy?' Dick asked, staring at a happy, rounded man having his photograph taken on a boat with a huge fish at his feet.'That is my Uncle Max,' Anna said impatiently. 'Here is your coffee.''Great. I need a cup. Strong and black.' Dick was feeling his reckless self coming out: so what is she thinks I'm a scruff? Push some buttons and see what the old cow's made of.Anna regretted that he must place his stained body upon her newly-cleaned velvet. She was grateful for having no sense of smell.'Tell me what you have written, Mr Michaels?' He noticed the challenge.'All sorts of rubbish,' he said unhelpfully, wishing to add the word 'rubbish', but showing admirable restraint. 'I write anything that's required.' As he spoke he noticed an unrealised pride in his humble craft. 'I turn things into readable English so people will be interested. You see, not everyone who has had an interesting life knows how to make it sound good; that's my job.' He could see her expression soften. Something simian amid the fine features? 'I make a great effort not to change the original intention, of course...''You call that a ghost, I think?''Yeah. The ghost brings people's lives to life. "
