Menu Settings

MaryBeth set her coffee cup on the metal coaster on the antique end table and grabbed the remote.  Depressing the large red power button, the screen flickered twice and exploded to life.  The volume felt as if it were booming through a large fog horn.  The burst seemed to rattle the coaster and the metal lamp in the table nearly toppling the coffee mug.

"Steven!  Did you play with this thing last night when I told you just to leave it alone and go to bed?"

Steven stumbled out of the bedroom in his boxers and white t-shirt. His hair in the left side of his head appeared to have been tortured into submission by the pillow sometime in the night.

"I did leave it alone," Steven pleaded while rubbing his eyes.

"The damn thing was turned up to top volume.  I hope the kids didn't wake up.  I was hoping to catch up on the DVR."

MaryBeth began fiddling with the menu settings fighting her way through the sometimes German, sometimes French settings.  "What's with the languages?  I thought you said this TV was Swedish."

"The family is Swedish.  I think the TVER is from some place in Central Europe.  I would tell you where, but I don't want to expose you to my poor knowledge of geography."

"Try me."

"Umm.  Ok. Maybe, Sierra Leone?"

"That's Western Africa."

"Senegal?"

"Nope."

"Yugoslavia?"

"Right area, but no longer a country.  Describe it."

"I think it's a tiny one.  Has that science place and they don't take sides."

"Switzerland."

"Nooooo.  I don't know if that's right"

"It's ok.  I no longer care and just found the English setting."

"Is there more coffee?"  Steven didn't wait for a response and shuffled off to the kitchen.  MaryBeth picked a show and selected to play.  She flicked the jump ahead button and watched the screen flip past a vacuum cleaner commercial.  In the background she saw a ghost shape like her husband silently speed into the dining room hunching over as he stubs his toe in the cabinet in the hall.  The image flickered out an instant later.

MaryBeth blinked her eyes and stared at the empty space.  A moment later, Steven walked out of the kitchen with a cup of coffee before jamming his toe and unleashing a stream of vulgarity not often heard in such a combination.  Coffe splattered onto the floor and on Steven sending him crawling into the kitchen on his hands and knees.

MaryBeth shrugged the scene off and chuckled to herself as she sipped her coffee and enjoyed her show with a background of swearing husband.

CarolAnn's TV

The ad in the paper was cryptic, but not to the point that the cheap price of free could be ignored.  Steven was in need of a TV for his new place and this guy was just giving away a 42" LCD 1080p.  The ad said to call some local number and ask for a Sven or Jorn or something Swedish that Steven could not accurately pronounce. The seller took no offense.

Two days later, Steven lugged the 50 pound thing from his car and carried it into his new home.  He waited with excited anticipation of what his wife and children would say.  They had begged him to do some research and get them a repacement for the 100 pound behemoth currently in their living room that made the entertainment center creak and failed to pick up even local network channels.

Steven worked in sales for a local hardware wholesaler and had no interest in utilizing his experience to haggle on prices in his personal time.  This trait was one that frustrated MaryBeth to no end when he refused to even argue for a discount on the most commonly discounted items.  Robbie's orthodontist likely bought himself a new car with the amount he failed to discount on countless braces tightening and retainer fittings.

He was warned about the TV from the seller.  It had been brought from their home in Sweden and the menus were in Swedish, but it was a great deal for a working TV.  He was assured the reception and playback of high definition video was superb despite the unreal price.

It was priced to move and Steven was willing to be the mover.  He couldn't wait for the afternoon to arrive. What would MaryBeth think of this steal of a deal?  How excited would Robbie be?  What about CarolAnn?

Down in the Valley

The silver Camaro rounded the curb squealing tires ever so slightly.  At 45 MPH on the 25 MPH turn, the front end shuddered enough to blur the KNZE 2 on the vanity plates.  With the top down, Kinzie's long flowing hair screamed out the side window from the centripetal force as if trying to escape her skull.  The brake lights lit as the car skidded sideways along the end of the turn leading to the entrance to the Death Valley mall sending the rear quarter panel through the roaming dead standing in the middle of the street in front of the parking lot.  The train engine style front bumper sliced through the layers of the dead strewn in the parking lot on her way to the parking garage.  She lined the center point of the bumper with the carved out notch in the ramp and sped to the recommended 50 MPH on the handmade sign.  The front tires leaped from the pavement at the top of the ramp landing across the two foot wide gap at the edge of the next level.  The gap below lay stained in red from the bodies unable to understand the lack of floor and stumble to the grinders below.

Kinzie slammed down her foot on the brakes and directed the car into an open spot.  The engine idled as she checked and adjusted her hair from the drive. The engine cut out as she grabbed the keys and leaned to pull the machete from under the passenger seat next to her purse.  Her light weight knit jacket covered the slim leather holster she slid the large knife into before stepping away from her car and to the sliding doors outside of Macy's.  Just another quick trip to the mall and off for her mani-pedi appointment.

Up on the Mountain

Lilly turns twenty six today. There will be no birthday cake with twenty six candles and no silly cards in the mail.  The time for clubbing and drinks with close friends has passed.  In fact, it never was a time of bars and fruity cocktails with names that no one really feels secure ordering.  Lilly lived up on the mountain since she was twenty one and then some.  At twenty five, she laughed to herself about being able to rent a car without a another adult.  That was about all that twenty five was good for in the old world.  Not worth much more in this one either.

The year before, Lilly rang in twenty four by tossing her cousin's freshly deceased body off of the Caulky ridge.  The Caulky ridge was named after Tom and Claire Caulky who took a leap off of the rocky drop-off to their deaths not two hours after watching the hillside elders toss the body of their only son, Tim, off the same cliff to the rocky outcroppings two hundred feet below.  The Caulkys plead for leniency.  They plead for the chance to take care of their son another way.  The elders refused.  The group had lived on the mountainside for eight years at the time of Tim's death.  They had dealt with death on the mountain in this way for the previous six years after the first family member passed quietly in the night and rose again because the family did not let on that their elderly mother had taken ill.  The Caulkys were denied and off the ridge they went.

At sixteen, Lilly was shoved into the back of the family's SUV with the barest of essentials before her parents plowed out of the garage barely clearing the still opening garage door.  Her father didn't stop for a moment.  Not after running down the cloying remains of Mr Farson from next door and her former best friend, Michelle Farson.  Lilly to this day is still not sure that Michelle was as dead as her father when they struck her with the car.  It didn't matter.  Her normal teenage life ended that day despite having hidden in their house for two weeks prior ever since the news of the infection spread to the suburbs.  It was startling how many people died on a daily basis before factoring in the new threat of infection from the newly raised.  The CB radio conversations she overheard while huddled in her room hating her parents for refusing to let her go out and check on her friend seemed like a hoax.  However, her family was greeted by thirteen other families on top of that mountain ten years ago.  Lucky thirteen they joked.  Lucky, indeed.  Saved from the constant threat of formerly beloved bodies dragging their decaying asses up and down the block attacking every man, woman, child, and family pet not secured behind reinforced doors and windows.

Ten years of learning to trap and share the meat of small animals with those she did not feel earned their keep.  A decade of scouring the trees and bushes for edible fruits, berries, and nuts to find out somebody didn't tell anyone about deathly allergies to be combined with the lacking of any anti-histamines or epinephrine to save them from the cliffs.  Over a third of her life spent cowering under ragged blankets in the cold and burying her own feces in the woods like an animal.  She was done with it.  Tomorrow, she would head down the mountainside to the main gate to judge the destruction of the old world.  She planned to break away during her morning trapping and scavenging to scout the dangers and, pending any insurmountable obstacles, return to the world she once knew.  God damn, zombies!

I am Benedict XVII!

He plants his hands squarely on the brick outlining the Riverside Mall sign.  His feet kick to the sky as his hat taps the bricks between his hands completing his handspring over the row of hedges beyond the sign.  Feet firmly on the ground for a mere second, he sprints to the nearby flagpole placing his hands around the pole linking his fingers.  He flings himself outward and spins around the pole twice before placing his feet against the concrete base and launching himself airborne into the grass.  His white robe twirls within his somersaulting form sweeping out in all directions in a crouch on the sidewalk when it ends.  The sidewalk lays out before him in a straight line towards the cul-de-sac housing the local electronics giant and the national retail chain, but he leaps from side to side like a football player taking on the tire drill.

At the curb, he pauses briefly looking in both directions as if cars are waiting to catch him off guard in a closed off shopping center at 3am.  He sprints for the bushes next to the bike rack and slides between them like he is heading for second base.  His tall white hat peaks out from the hole he entered through for only a moment before slicing upwards through the stiff branches to the standing form of a man in full papal vestments with the exception of the bishop mitre meant to look like an un-bejewled papal pretiosa.  The rope at the waist of the robe is let out tuck the length of robe up so as not to tangle in his footsteps.  The rope pulls tight and the form flows less with fabric but just as easily with fluid motion.  At the corner between the electronics store and retail chain, the bricks form a textured ladder he uses easily to skip back and forth vertically until he is hanging by his fingertips by the edge of the roof.

He dangles freely sliding one hand after the other until he is on the small metal ledge behind the Megatronics sign.  His tall cap peaks out from the central downward V in the M of the sign.  He peeks cautiously out for signs of security.  No flashlights are visible and no sirens pierce the stillness.  From the pants pocket found below the white robe, the form pulls a small camera and sets it on the ledge aimed out across the distance towards the outline of downtown Indianapolis.  The distance is far enough to allow the city scape to be taken in with the camera lens without being hidden by the faux papal cap.  A smirk crosses his lips as he imagines the expected image about to be produced.  The timer feature is engaged to begin the 10 seconds of beeping.  He leans back to keep from blocking the city outline from the picture leaving his head leaning against the M.

One beep counts each second.

Two beeps... the wind picks up and rustles the leaves on the ground twenty feet away.

Three beeps... he peers down in the low glow of the sign to make sure his robe is laying flat.

Four beeps.
Five beeps.
Six beeps... the robe straight, he looks back to the camera lens.

Seven beeps... the wind dies down, but the leaves rustle still.
Eight beeps... the sound gets louder and the thought that someone else is there starts to sink in.  With two beeps left, he prepares to grab the camera and run after the flash goes off.

Nine beeps... he never hears the tenth beep or sees the flash from the camera.  He does not see the muzzle flash from the tree line either.

Ten beeps... the mitre tips askew from the new hole beneath the brim on his forehead.  He is slumping down the sign, but the slope of the M is slowing his decent.  The distant outline of the city is mostly blocked from the picture taken giving the resulting image a more gruesome outcome.  Death caught on digital.  The memory card adds one final file for the police to review along with birthday parties and a camping trip with his friends.  Jonathan Campbell ceases to be, but his camera remains precariously on the ledge.

It is two days before someone is walking below the sign and realizes the dried puddle is coming from the sign above.  The discovery closes a recently opened missing persons report, but opens another one for the federal file.  The string of murders rises to four.  All public locations and all with young men in religious costumes.  The bullet casing is found in a nearby storm drain, but the shooter is long gone.  He is off to rendezvous with his team to determine if they closed their assignment or if the search for the real man continues.  Jonathan Campbell is not the first wrong target, but he will not be the last.

Love of your Life?

"Three men sitting at home on a Saturday night. What could be more exciting?" Adam sat back loudly groaning as a spring from the back of the couch jammed into his rib. He hated Jake's apartment and , to a lesser extent, Jake for refusing to buy new furniture like he was still living in his old college house. Jake had graduated from undergrad eight years back and been through three years of law school including an internship with the largest consulting firm in DC.

"Maybe watching a major boxing event?  Oh, wait.  That's what we are doing tonight."  Tyler gave Adam a snide look before landing on a different wayward spring in the same couch.  "Ouch  You need to toss this piece of crap soon, Jake.  If I get tetanus from one of these springs, you will be buying me a new TV with the punitive damages to my shattered soul."

Many of Tyler's faux legal speeches came across like he had failed out of a drama school instead of law school. More fake legal speak from Tyler meant another bout of fighting the urge to remind him he had failed out of law school within the first year. Luckily, crowd noise filled the room as the announcer entered the ring to announce the two large men planning to beat each other senseless for the enjoyment of everyone paying sixty dollars to watch from home.

"Any interest in making this interesting?  Side bets?  Drinking games between rounds?"  Jake maintained his drunken college kid mindset now partnering it with the flaunting of money now that he also had a job.  Not that he had a large salary, but it was apparent by his home that he wasn't spending much of whatever he made.

"I have this going 8 rounds."  Adam states confidently.

"Nah, 7 at best.  I'm guessing maybe 4 or 5.  Probably over before Denise can even get here and take Adam away."  Tyler jumps in undercutting Adam Price Is Right style.

"That's not going to happen anymore.  We split up."   Adam folded his arms resolutely.  Tyler looked chagrined at his comment.  Adam did not show any sense of remorse.

"Sorry." Tyler and Jake share the same emotionless response.

"Whatever." Adam waves a hand in the air to move on from the topic of his bachelorhood.

"Well, at any rate, I'm guessing it will be a decision after 10 rounds."  Jake prepares to explain why, but is cut short by commotion on screen and the ring side announcers attempting to dictate what just happened.

The champ is lying on his back with trainers surrounding him.  The challenger is standing with the ring announcers microphone somehow wedged into his glove like a weapon.  Blood can be seen dripping from the microphone as camera's shake and stutter attempting to get a view of the action.  Before the bell has even been rung to begin, the challenger is disqualified. 

"What the..."  Adam echoes the sentiment of the room.

"What the, indeed."  Tyler concurred.

As if on cue, the oven beeped reminding Jake the temperature was right for making the frozen pizzas he had pulled out for the event.  Tyler chuckled to himself at the beeping and then quieted at something else on the screen.

"Gentlemen.  The saying goes, 'When your night ends prematurely, extend it unusually.'"  Tyler, now sounding like a bad male enhancement drug commercial, speaks.

"That's not a saying."  Adam, still in a state of disbelief, states absentmindedly yet correctly.

"Well, it will be now.  Jake, toss me the remote."   Jake chucks the remote to Tyler before heading to the kitchen to turn off the oven.  'No reason to waste a pizza here with nothing to watch,' he thinks.

When Jake returns to the living room, Adam is shaking his head profusely.  "That's one of the most idiotic ideas I have ever heard."

"What did I miss?"  Jake plops into his run down recliner and groans as he lands on the wood beam running across the back behind the lack of padding.

"Watch for yourself"  Tyler clicks the quick rewind button twice and a 30 second ad typically seen later at night comes on the screen. 

Looking for love?  Found someone but want to know if this is your soul mate?  You can find out for sure by texting your first name, month and day of your birthday, and favorite pizza topping to 7685.  Text your information to SOUL and receive the first name of your soul mate now.

Tyler pauses on the last screen with the details and number to text.

"And what exactly are you suggesting, Tyler."

"I am suggesting we take advantage of fate.  This fight was never going to happen.  I think it was meant to put us here together and suggest we get on with our lives.  A cheap, late night style commercial during prime pay per view time?  How does that make sense.  These channels have other major cable channel events to market when the fight is over, yet this got put out instead.  I say we run with the ball when it is handed to us whether we were expecting to play or not."

"Stop mixing metaphors and say what you mean."

"I am saying, text for your soul mate.  Adam is even single right now."

"Barely single.  Don't you think I could use some time off from dating after Denise?"

"Oh, please.  We never liked her and that's only because we could both tell you never really liked her either.  That puts you right her with us.  Stop wasting your time with fill ins and find the real thing now.  We each text and get our soul mate names.  Then, we go find them.  Don't we owe it to ourselves to be happy?"

Tyler held for a moment as Adam and Jake looked at each other and back to Tyler with the same look of confusion at their friend.  "Well, that and I think it might be a fun way to spend a Saturday night.  We roll through bars looking for girls with these names.  If none are at the first place, we move onto the next.  Think of it as a love pub crawl."

Jake and Adam continued to look uncertain. 

"Fine.  I will reimburse you for the text charges and buy the first 3 rounds."

Like sleeper agents hearing a code word, Adam and Jake each flipped out their phones on cue.  Jake shrugged indifferently at Tyler as he began entering his information.  Of the three, Jake made the least effort to define what his time off from work would include.  Seconds after hitting send, a response returned.

"Awesome. Mine is a stripper name for sure." Jake flipped his phone closed and smiled with the confidence only a man with no clear weekend plans could manage. "Cinnamon. Fantastic. I know where I'll be going tonight."

Tyler's phone buzzed loudly.  "Savannah.  Could be joining you or I could find myself at a coffee bar.  Crap shoot.  I love it!"  Tyler smiled broadly looking at Jake before shifting his focus to the buzz from Adam's phone.

Adam stared at the screen on his phone speechless. Jake and Tyler jumped up and began putting their coats on.  They were a few steps from Adam to check what name he was staring so intently at when Adam flicked his thumb to the side of his phone and hit the lock key before anyone could see the message received. "Rain. It looks like I'll be joining you two tonight."

Jake tossed Adam his coat and grabbed his car keys.  A few blocks down the road, Jake and Tyler were planning their first stop as Adam sat quietly in the back. Reaching into his pocket for his phone, Adam looked down at the screen on his phone with some trepidation. The screen burned into his iris with the response from his text response.  One word lay before him.

Roger.

Mad Man in the Morning

Savagely beaten.  These words conjure gruesome images the moment they are spoken.  A victim of a horrendous crime barely recognizable as themselves afterwards.  Brad Pitt in Fight Club taking a beating from the owner of basement he had usurped. Deep dark beings come out to play when savagely doing anything.  Somehow, I am filled with those both deep and dark this morning.  I find a whisk to be excessive when making eggs in the morning, but my use of a fork for scrambling the yolks can be a bit savage.  Bits of egg are scattered over the counter as my arm motion whirls out of control for the bowl size I use.  I will brutally tear at the stain later with an antibacterial wipe.  It will suffer.

Starch is an enemy to speedy cooking in the morning and my patience is thin early.  I gash the skin of the potatoes and I slice through the flesh.  Slice.  Slice.  Slice.  No dice.  The torture is brief before reprieve.  Brief.  Reprieve. Held under the ice cold water ripping the essence of the potato from itself before mercifully tossing the slice onto a towel to dry.  A medieval scalding awaits them in boiling oil once all of the slices have been prepared.  They will at least suffer together.

Long strands of sinewy pink lay on the searing hot metal bubbling and popping the muscle and fat from a recently completed filleting.  Strips of meat ripped from the whole in thin layers only to be reunited in packing before being torn apart again and tossed into the fire.  Bubble, bubble, pop.  Bubble, bubble, pop.  Flip.

This sinister kitchen swells with the aromas of death and bacon as I dance in circles laughing maniacally at my creation.  A bit of egg up top.  A long dead slice of flesh here and here.  Sinewy strands now crinkles and twisted at the bottom and top.  My artistry of the damned lays in front of me for the taking.  My victorious cries break forth without warning, "Sweetheart!  Breakfast!"

My five year old bounds into the room like a wild animal ready to dismantle an unwitting gazelle.  She strides to her feeding site and mounts her chair.  I place the offering in front of her and she giggles.  Scrambled egg eyebrows, potato slice eyes, bacon mouth and a pointed bacon hat.  "I like the breakfast clown, daddy."

"I know you do, little love."  I kiss her head and return to my lair to cleanse the chamber of my crimes.  Tomorrow, the eggs will pay again and they will join the criminal flour in a hideous depiction of Disney vermin.  My darkness knows no end.