Fly On The Wall: Fairy Tales From A Misanthropic Universe, Vol. I (3 page)

She looks at her baby and
hopes that this will last forever. She can not picture him growing.
Yet deep down she knows he will.

Her slender form paces
back and forth through the water, the second train flies past with
her babe on it, she listens to its blue and green cars roll by with
frightening thunder, and she remembers,
“Hush little baby, it's just the choo
choo"
. But her baby is not there, her baby
has grown up. Now he drives the very lion whose roar had frightened
him so long ago. Her green dress is now loose and wrinkled, no
longer does it caress her curves, now instead it hangs formlessly.
What little skin peeks through shows many agèd spots. Tanned though
it is, it no longer glistens, it no longer glows as it once had.
She had known her babe would have to leave, but at least he came by
each day.

Her legs make their way
through the shallow water once more. They moved slower than they
had before. Like a wild herd's elder members she seems to trail a
little behind, a queer protective prey. Finally, the third horn
heralds its parent train. She is tired. She looks at the metal
monster as it passes and knows it is all over. She can not imagine
his voice. It's been years since last they'd spoken, an eternity
will pass until they could again. Deep down she knows that he will
call eventually, she hopes, she wishes, she yearns once more. Her
emerald green dress is ratty now, it hangs off her gaunt form
revealing her age. Her once beautiful skin resembles a well-tanned
piece of leather, it no longer glows. As the third horn ends, her
babe races past in a blur, she too then ends.

As the aneurysm bursts,
the train conductor wonders why he never calls.

He scored. He was sure of
it. Seeing her in that hotel lobby had set his loins alight. She'd
sat there in full view of all, twiddling away. Twas true she faced
towards the wall but he still knew, and if he had so would the
others. He walked up to her and saw even more clearly how her
waistband pulsed up and down on top of her wrist. He could make out
her knuckles oscillating beneath her skirt. She tried not to squirm
in that too comfortable lobby chair, but it felt a little too good,
so she did. He said “Hi” to her, she just kept going, she kept
grinding. Warmth spread throughout her body as more tension built
within with each passing second. He could tell she was a sex
fiend.

“
How'd you like to waste some time?” She asked, he just
couldn't resist. Off they went to her great stone abode. “Won’t you
come up?” she'd queried on the step, in front of her carved
mahogany gate. As if that question warranted an answer.

“
Of course”.

Hand in hand, they went up
to the door to her habitat. They walked through her castle, to her
room. He couldn't believe his eyes. Devices dotted the walls, she
had so many, everything that money could buy. They went to her bed,
about to embrace each other in purely carnal passion. Pleasure
would soon abound just as it had before. Just as they were about to
jump onto each other she reached under her bed and brought out a
great tome. She fluttered through tissue thin pages making quite
the commotion. Finally, she stopped, right on a page whose only
feature was a thinly dotted line. She signed first with tall &
slender cursive letters. “Nikki”. Then it was John's turn to put
his Hancock on her paper. Once he had Nikki clapped her hands, and
it disappeared in a puff of mauve smoke. The lights went out,
engulfing poor John in pitch black. She didn't matter, and he
didn't care. He would be out of there by morning, she was just
another notch, another hoe, another bitch which he'd not call. She
would not even see him leave, even if she would most surely watch
him come.

The sun rose. He looked
around, first calmly, then frantically. He was all alone in her
immense room with her countless devices. Each fiber of his being
ached. Her machines and machinations had drained him, he lay limply
upon her bed, willing himself up. He gathered up his pile of
clothes from the floor and sheepishly slipped into them. He stepped
over to the room's door and made his way out. Was he alone? How
could this be? How long had he slept? Why did he feel so hazy? All
he found was a small note on the stairs, it said 'Thank you for a
funky time, call me up whenever you want to grind, xxx' and a
number – Nikki's. What exactly had she done to him? “COME BACK
NIKKI” he cried and whined.

It was on small child's
'train' that she had discovered her passion for conducting. It had
not even been a real train but rather a golf cart plastered with
thick grained false panels. Its wooden facade concealed the rubber
wheels beneath quite well. Each car was open and no bigger than a
cow. It wasn’t very fast, but it determined the direction of her
life journey. Nearby a cargo train rushed its load onwards to new
horizons. She looked at it as it zoomed by, its size and power were
magnificent. She had never seen such a raucous, monstrous, thing.
Sure, a T-Rex could eat you, but put a T-Rex in front of a
train,(and give the train a big enough cow catcher) and you would
soon be having a T-Rex t-bone. Unlike most kids she kept her dream
alive, unlike most kids she became a train conductor.

A week ago there happened
to be a particularly fateful day. Bird strikes were not altogether
unusual, neither was the occasional deer. She had trouble dealing
with those but she managed somehow. If there had existed a diet
which did not harm plants she would have been on it, so it saddened
her to the core when her metal dinosaur snuffed out the lives of
gentle woodland creatures. It saddened her more still when she hit
other people. Every languishing body which no longer found value in
a life. Every splattered fool who jumped but a moment too late in a
too fatal game of chicken. Every wrecked unmoving lemon. All
demolished by her mighty beast. Perhaps it was her pondering,
perhaps it was her crying or her nearby empty bottle; whatever it
was that day she did not see. She did not have time, not by when
she'd realized. She couldn't stop quickly enough to avoid the
stationary station wagon. Perhaps its owners assumed the track to
be abandoned, or perhaps they'd simply not given it any thought,
whatever the case they sat in the car waiting to be towed, with
their young kids in tow. With a crash, a great cloud of red mist,
and a heavy metal rain, her dinosaur was through.

Once her beast had come to
a halt she called “Mayday!” thrice. She stepped out of the
locomotive whose face was now dyed red and black with tar, and
blood, and engine oil, to survey the damage. The main compartment
of the car was to the left, the other parts of the were
miscellaneously strewn about on the ground, deposited violently in
non-final resting places. She peered in through the window of the
sole intact piece, against her better judgment. She had never done
so before, she knew better than that. Maybe it was her wondering,
maybe her horror widened eyes or maybe even the whiskey which did
her vision mottle. She knew it could not be good, but she was
compelled to see by some mysterious endogenous force.

Therein she saw what had
once been a little girl – her body bent by the impact into an
impossible right angle, pieces of a man – a pulverized red and
white mass of bone and flesh, a bloody bra next to a shattered
window through which his bride had flown, and what could only be
described as mincemeat in a baby seat. A fly was already busy
depositing her eggs therein. She knew then what she had to
do.

Today all she hears are
the birds chirping and singing, communicating their cheerful well
wishes to all. All she can see is the wind tugging gently at tree
branches like enamored children tug at one others' hair. And yet
the horn fills the air around her, though it doth sound from afar.
And yet, and yet that raucous monstrous beast approaches. As she
waits for her true love to chug along just one last time, she whips
out a silver flask so she herself can chug, chug, chug,
along.

Stormy days were his
favorite, they were perfect. Just him, the rain, and the wind;
nobody bothered him, nobody molested or got in his way. She lay
unmoving on his table. It was cold and she was unable to speak;
paralyzed by drugs and fear. She could not feel, but she was quite
aware. He smiled at her then reached for his blade. On a day like
this, even the police would be staying in. It was a perfect day and
he was happy, a matter which in itself was no mean feat. As his
blade began to slice through her perfect goosebumped skin his mind
wandered elsewhere, it went to his favorite killer;
Zodiac.

How had he managed to
elude capture? What did his code say? What could it possibly mean?
How did he have the balls to taunt the police like he had? He
supposed it didn't really matter. He tried to sneer his mask up his
nose, the slippery devil had dropped, and he didn't want any blood
getting into his mouth or nostrils. Slowly but surely it migrated
back up his creased face. Grasping his fine handled blade, he
cupped her naked breast and made his first incision, it was the cut
which always excited him the most. Between the scratchy-tearing
sound of skin and the nascent trickle of red, nothing was quite as
pleasurable, nothing was as exquisite. He stared down upon her
nudity with contempt. Such vanity. Such wasted resource, such
stupidity! At least it would all be over soon. He cut deeper, past
the fat which clung to his fingers like disgusting yellow jelly. He
cut, and cut, and cut again, becoming more excited the closer he
got to completing his masterpiece. He was almost panting as he
painted with her blood. His adrenaline surged, helping him power
through the last few stages. With scratchy paper towels, he wiped
away the thin red film which covered her body like glaze covers
pork chops. He could almost smell success, or maybe that was her
blood? She wasn't his first and by this point, it was clear to all,
she wouldn't be his last. It was all the same though, was it not?
When they were on his table he was their God, he held their lives
in his hands, and did with them that which he pleased. He loved
nothing more. He lusted for the sound of human skin being sliced
open by his fine blade, he loved the smell and color of her life
force, he loved his helpless sleeping subjects. But sadly he was
nearly done. And then he was, and so was she.

“
Hello Mrs. Marlborough, how are you feeling?” asked the
doctor.

“
Oh. My. God. I have never felt better!” she responded. She
noticed a button on the doctor's coat emblazoned with a design of
sorts. A circle with a cross through it. She supposed it
represented some charitable organization or other. “I love them,”
she continued, looking down at her new DDs, “Thank you”.

On the windowsill, a
solitary fly watched all.

They met on a cold,
miserable, winter's eve. Obscuring snow marred all beauty, all but
hers. She was a curious creature, almost unfathomably attractive.
She was more beautiful than the Kraken was mighty. Most would not
be have been complemented by such a statement, but she would have
been, for that was her nature. With feverish ambition he pursued
her, stopping at nothing, so that he might catch a glimpse of her
once more, on a more intimate, more personal level, of course.
Perhaps his intent had not been entirely benign.

That evening had been
unlike any other, he liked winter but that night made the rest of
the frigid season pale into a warm springtime insignificance by
comparison. It wasn't as though they'd done anything particularly
special, just the standard fare: pub grub, and a Guinness. Perhaps
his dating skills were not those of noted lothario Adam Mohiruto,
but he had some game still. It would help him, but it wouldn't be
sufficient. Sadly he didn't know this, not then anyway.

They walked and they
talked. Through the night, they held each other, not in body but in
mind. He could little look away from her. Her long hair bounced
with every step, imprisoning his attention. He watched the solitary
strands play with each other, they intertwined and jumped gently to
and fro. Her beauty was truly great, but it was the least
attractive thing about her. Her smile made a novel warmth spread
through his body. Like a severe and unwelcome episode of heartburn,
it made his insides churn. He needed her.

He could tell just by
looking at her that she wanted him, her glancing touches, her shy
smiles, and purposefully pointed feet, it all sent shivers down his
spine. Their chemistry was something he'd neither felt nor seen
before, with as much intensity as the stars his passion burned
brightly. He was determined to have her. He was determined to be
hers, he was determined that it was right.

“
Ugh, another one of these idiots,” she thought to herself on
a cold winter's eve. She feigned interest, at least that way he
wouldn't go crazy and scream-y. She would not kiss him though, and
she certainly would not sleep with him. Maybe she'd hug him, but
more likely just shake hands. Perhaps she would turn this into a
short story about unrequited love. Yes, that would be quite ironic,
but under her pen name, A. Mohiruto, only then would jackasses like
the one in front of her part with precious dollars in hopes of
finding their very own predestined love scuppered somewhere between
prolix lines. Meanwhile, she would feign interest in his tales,
which seemed to vacillate uncertainly between Kakure Kirishitans or
some fool called Larry's latest televised mishaps.