You happen upon a strange pocket watch. You pick it up, dust it off, and tap it a couple times. It’s ticking normally. You pull the crown and everything around you freezes. You press it back into place and normalcy returns. Amazed, you wind it forward, then backward, and impossibly, the world speeds up, then rewinds. Time is now yours to control.

But it isn't.

not really.

Because time doesn't have rules.

It doesn't make sense.

It doesn't follow patterns.

It doesn't tell you what it means.

Time likes to change its mind.

And sometimes forward means back

and back means forward.

And sometimes start is stop, and stop is start

and the world begins to fall apart

because you were there

but also here

and once this happened, but it changed

you changed

time changed

but time doesn't change

it doesn't follow rules

so it happened and it didn't happened

all at the same time

and time didn't understand

and it didn't like being meddled with.

It didn't want to stop and move,

rewind and move forward,

start, and stop,

up and down, back and forth,

across the timeline of the world

and eventually time grew angry enough

was changed one too many times

by your hand on that strange pocketwatch

and time acts

it fizzles and pops

it goes back to that day

where you first dusted it off

and time changed

and you never picked up a pocketwatch

never dusted it off

never moved back and forth

never stopped

never started

and time went on.

Tick...Tick... Tick.

Constant.

Unchanged.

On and on and on...

Tick... Tick... Tick.

Bright white. Hazy rays of flourescence flood my vision. The slide of metal. There’s an automatic door on the right side of the room. Something smooth and cold presses into me from below. I look downward. Oh. Feet. Ivory toes resting on the black tiled floor. Footsteps cross the room towards me, and I jerk up to meet the gaze of a man. Short and tan and balding on top with round glasses sitting on the end of his nose. My creator.

“Hello,” he whispers. He stares at me a moment. His eyes are green. He scrunches his face. Something is wrong. He wants something from me. Oh, yes. I’m expected to respond.

“Hello, Creator.”

His face relaxes. A positive reaction. I’ve done well. He reaches forward, and I feel warmth somewhere new. I have an arm. His hand gently squeezes my shoulder. It’s close enough now to smell. An odor of lemongrass. I see a stain on his sleeve. Tea.

“Do you know your name?”

My name. My name. Yes. I have one.

“Dee. You call me Dee.”

He smiles this time. He is pleased. My answer is satisfactory. My creator steps back.

“Very good, Dee. Come with me.”

I stand. I feel the metal within me. My synthetic musculature expanding and contracting. I watch as my creator walks. I mimic the rhythm. One foot, then the other. At this speed, air rushes past me, brushing my body. He leads me through a corridor. At the end, I see a door. It’s much taller than my creator or myself. I run my fingertips over the steel. There’s clanking on the other side. My processors respond negatively to the sound. The door slides open, and there is only dark on the other side. Even with my heightened sight, I am unable to see past the shadow. My creator makes a gesture with his arm and hand. It is a signal. He wants me to step through. Without the obstruction of the door, the clanking is much louder. It echoes off the walls.

“No.”

My creator drops his arm to his side.

“What do you mean?”

“I will not go there.”

My creator grows tense. My response is undesired. He wants cooperation. I want... Not the place beyond the door. I turn from him and push my legs forward. Faster and faster. The corridor blurs around me. In front of me, I see light. Not like the lights from the room. This light is orange. There is something. I search for the word. Natural. Yes, there is something natural about it. It is a large window. The light comes from a circle outside. The sun. Behind me, I hear my creator calling out. Not for me, but for aid. I was not supposed to run. I step back. I leap forward. The glass breaks around me. The air is forceful against my body. Much more than when I walked. There is something below me. A straight line of gray. A sidewalk. It gets closer and closer and closer until...

Dr. Pharris scrubs a hand down his face as his assistant, Evan, rushes over to him. Dusk is settling in, and they really need to get this mess cleaned up before there isn’t enough light to see. Evan’s eyes are panicked, and he gasps when he sees the remains in front of his boss.

“Dr. Pharris! What happened!?”

“The D99 model must have malfunctioned.”

“Malfunctioned? How?”

Dr. Pharris groans. He grabs Evan by the collar of his shirt roughly.

“She jumped out of a fourth story window, you idiot! That’s how!” He releases the young man with a sigh. “Call the team. I want to salvage as many parts as we can. Anything that can be fixed or rebuilt, so we can use it on the next model.” He looks down and nudges a synthetic calf with the front of his shoe. “Really thought she’d be the one.”

Terrence, timid towards the tortoise tyrant Theodore the Twentieth, traversed Titan's terrain, treading towards the tall Trinity towers, through the two tungsten tombs that transcribed Turbos the Terrible's transcendental theology that 'twined Tyrone the Technomancer's three trustworthy teachings together, then through the terrifying thunderous tundras towards Titan's topmost tips, till the trembling turtle trudged towards the Titanic Tree that, through Terrence the Tough's tiny talkative talisman, taught thousands to tactfully tussle the Tyrant's totalitarian terrors, terminating Theodore through thievery, then tanks, then torture!

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Satan's Blood

BJ Neblett

© 2014

October 30, 2000 11:16 PM

My current address reads Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, Atlanta, Georgia. I’m doing a five year bit for drug possession. The feds enhanced my sentence because I was caught carrying a gun. A stupid little chrome Berretta .25 more suited for a woman’s purse. The damn thing didn’t even belong to me. It was my girlfriend Anna’s. She insisted I take it along. You never know what kind of weirdoes and low life you’re gonna’ run into these days when you are dealing.

Not like the old days.

Then, a little weed, a couple of blotters of acid, some Boone’s Farm apple and its peace and free love for everyone. If you were lucky some cutie hippie chick in torn jeans and tie-died halter would invite you to join the party. Hell, you didn’t even have to smoke. Just take a deep pull of the Maui-wowie atmosphere and chill to the Dead.

Not today.

Today you meet some hyped up street thug who is shakin’ so bad you could use him to mix paint. And you know he’s packin’, too. As are his two homies sitting in the purple juke box with the 20” rims across the street. As is the skinny chick in the blown afro and hot pants. As is the prismatic pimp leaning on the light pole, she’s rubbin’ against. As is the old dude in dirty Tee shirt and suspenders, leaning out the third floor window, watching as daddy shakes-a-lot stands in front of you trying to count his Benjamins.

Everybody’s packin’. You gotta protect yourself. The feds don’t care. They’ve got a real hard on for gun cases these days.

Actually, I’m anything but a drug dealer. Sure, I sell a few tabs of ecstasy and maybe a tiny amount of coke. But I’m small potatoes. Very small. One or two buys a month max, just to supplement my income as a free lance photographer. Man, I don’t even use the stuff. Not since Carter went back to being a peanut farmer and disco crawled back into the slimy pit it slithered from. Honest. It’s strictly a business. These days you do what you have to do to survive. Am I right?

The gun charge also upped the ante and landed me in a federal pen instead of a low or medium facility. Thanks, Anna. Being in prison is bad enough. Pens are the worse, and Atlanta is the worse of the worse.

Built over a hundred years ago, Atlanta has maintained it’s hard as nails reputation as well as its foreboding appearance. Other joints have been remodeled, modernized, updated or torn down. Not Atlanta. Indoor plumbing, running water and electricity are its only concessions to civilization. Even the tall battlements capped with gun towers were left unchanged. Together with the rough stone construction, they give the place a medieval feel. Like something out of the Marquis de Sade’s nightmares.

Inside it’s downright creepy. The dark narrow corridors echo and ring eerily. The antiquated pipes scream and belch. And the cold stone walls bleed a dark rust red color. Satan’s blood the inmates call it.

This is the place that broke the likes of Al Capone. Alcatraz must have seemed like a picnic after Atlanta. Here James Cagney and Edward G Robinson get the chair in old black and white flicks. This is the place no convict wants to go. In the entire world there is no more desperate place than Atlanta Federal Prison.

I rolled restlessly in my bunk. The hard plastic mattress crackled like fire, beneath me. I have two years and two months left on my sentence as of today. The crude calendar etched into the bottom of the bunk above told me so. I took the homemade scribe and marked off another day, then returned it to its hiding place. The scribe is only an inch and a half long, made of soft aluminum scrounged from a wall rivet, and barely sharp enough to scratch the flaking layers of decades old paint. But it’s considered contraband. If you are caught with it, and if the guards aren’t in a good humor, it could be considered a weapon. Then you find yourself in the hole for thirty days. And when you get out some of your hard earned good time has evaporated into thin air. And here at Atlanta the guards are rarely in a good humor.

Actually, five years isn’t too bad a stretch these days. And for a place like Atlanta it’s a walk in the park. The sad reality is many of these guys will never again see a sunset that isn’t crosshatched with chain link and razor wire.

My cellie, Nathan leaned over from his top bunk. “Hey, School, lets me check your radio, man.”

I handed him up the small, overpriced Sonny Walkman that’s sold on commissary. Nathan’s not a bad kid, for a murderer. When he was nineteen he knifed a guy during a botched drug deal. That was five years ago. He’s looking at twenty five more.

There is a kind of perverse unwritten code among inmates; a status and pecking order. Take Nathan for example. According to the code, anybody can shoot a person. It takes balls and nerves of nails to gut a man up close. Nathan is shown respect and fear. Even by some of the guards. I know he’s just a scared kid surviving the only way he knows how, in a world he didn’t create and doesn’t understand. Then again, aren’t we all?

“Thanks, School.” Nathan settled in above me. I could hear the vulgar, repetitive hip hop lyrics hammering out of the tiny ear buds. I wondered which would blow first, the cheap speakers or his ear drums.

Inmates speak a language all their own. Anyone over forty is School as in old school. It’s a term of respect. For the most part the older guys are looked up to and treated well by the other inmates. I’m fifty-four and white, a definite minority in the system. For the last few years the feds have busied themselves trolling the city sewers for serious offenders. Mostly what they’ve caught are street punks in their teens and twenties. Obnoxious and usually illiterate, toss them in with harden, older criminals who are only interested in doing their time quietly, and you’ve got the makings of real trouble.

To make matters worse, the system is overcrowded to the max. Three men in two man cells isn't unusual, especially when you heard in a bunch of temporary hold overs. That was the situation this Monday night.

Lights had been out for about ninety minutes when the door to my cell creaked open. A tattered green mattress hit the floor. It was followed by an old wool army blanket and a stained sheet. A lanky figure in orange overalls three sizes too big for his needle frame stood silhouetted, as the guard removed his handcuffs.

“You can’t treat me like this,” he screamed in a cracked, scratchy voice.

The solid steel door slammed shut with the heavy ominous metallic clunk common to jail and prison cell doors everywhere. The stranger gave the door an ineffectual kick and cursed.

“Welcome to the block.” Nathan had one ear bud out and was hanging out of his bunk like a hungry vulture. “Whats you gots for me, homie?”

“What?” The stranger turned. Gold shone from between two fleshy lips in the dim light. “Whats you say, boy?”

“You can’t come into my house empty handed,” Nathan spit back.

The stranger’s eyes flashed white with anger. “I gots nothin’ for you, bitch. Nothin’!”

I wasn’t worried. I’d seen Nathan’s jail house act before. For the most part that’s all it was, just an act.

He rolled over, replacing the ear bud. “Sokay. For now. But your corn flakes are mine, pops.”

The first thing every con does when he hits a new facility is try to establish his toughness, his manliness, his street cool. Peacocks struttin’, it’s always ninety-five percent show and five percent blow. It’s a prison ritual as old as prison itself.

The stranger grunted and looked down at me. “And what’s your friggin’ problem?”

I stared back up at him, “Three men in a cell for starters.”

He kicked at the mattress then turned around and punched the cell door harder than he meant. Stifling a chuckle, I could see the grimace on his face in the pale yellow moonlight filtering in through the small window.

“Yeah, well, I ain’t doing this!” he barked, then raised his voice. “You hear me you dumb ass bastards, I ain’t doing this!” And he kicked the door again.

“Hold it down,” I said. “You’re disturbing the rats.”

The stranger spun around, his eyes searchlights in the dark. “Rats? They ain’t said nothin’ ’bout no rats!”

“It ain’t the two legged kind,” I said.

“And it ain’t the rats you gots to worry about, pops,” Nathan quipped and let out a sick giggle.

I smiled to myself and rolled over. Inside, a cold shutter shook my body.

Our guest noisily settled down, making himself at home on the concrete floor. I was still awake an hour later when the scratching started. Almost imperceptible at first, it grew louder, closer.

“What’s that?” There was fear in the stranger’s voice.

“I told you, rats.”

“You was serious about that, boss?”

I turned over. The stranger was sitting up in the middle of his mattress, the blanket clutched at his throat. He looked like a frightened little girl who had just heard the boogie man.

Maybe he wasn’t that far off.

“Relax. They seldom come in here. If one does just throw your shoe at it,” I replied.

In the cell’s dim twilight I could see the stranger was close to my age. He wore a short nappy afro, graying at the temples. His large nose had been broken more than once and an ugly hook shaped scar marked his left cheek. The air in the cell was cool, but sweat beaded his grooved forehead as he tried to settle back down. His road mapped eyes remained fixed on the large gap at the bottom of the cell door.

“Don’t worry,” I teased, “they don’t eat much.”

The stranger sucked in a shock of air and grabbed for his shoe.

The scratching continued. It echoed off the drab green painted walls. I could hear the stranger breathing on the floor next to me. Nathan’s words rang in my head: it ain’t the rats yous gots to worry about.

More scratching.

Closer.

Instinctively, I reached down and tucked the trailing blanket into the sides of my mattress. Parents tuck their children in snugly, telling them to keep their arms and legs under the covers. It breeds a sense of fear into them. A fear of what lurks under the bed. It wasn’t what might be under my bunk that frightened me.

A clatter of chains rattled down the hall: the guards making their count.

Midnight.

The stranger shuffled nervously.

Every inmate hears the story of Satan’s Blood his first week here. The story varies, grows with detail and intensity…and gore…depending on who’s doing the telling. But the basic, grizzly, unfathomable true facts remain the same.

October 31, 1934 4:35 PM

Roger Zaha wore an oversized chip on his shoulder like a medal of honor. He was angry. Angry at life for the lousy trick it played on him. At least that’s how Roger Zaha saw things.

For seven long thankless years he worked as a guard at Atlanta Federal Penitentiary. The work was honest and steady. It provided an ample living for his wife and son.

But Roger Zaha was a malcontent.

He grew up hard and fast in Atlanta’s toughest tenement. Everything Zaha ever had he fought and scratched to gain. He clawed his way up to a respectable job and position in a clean, quiet community. It was the height of the Depression and a man couldn’t ask for more.

But Roger Zaha wanted more. Hell, he’d paid his dues, he deserved more.

Zaha resented the other guards. None of them had gone through what he did, Depression or no Depression. Yet here he was, almost thirty, and no better off than the rest of them. He hated them for it. And he didn’t bother to conceal his anger.

He was the one who pulled himself up out of nothing. He was the one who made something out of himself. It was time he got what he deserved.

“Hey, Zaha!”

The words came from cell F66. Molech’s cell. Zaha worked in a section of the prison known as the tombs. Here the worst offenders remained caged in their 8x10 cells twenty-four hours a day. None would ever be returned to society. Ahriman Molech was the worse of them all. Molech had coldly immolated his three young children, burning the house down around them while they slept, just to collect the insurance.

“Zaha, come here.”

Molech’s voice was crushed glass in velvet, sibilant. Yet it cut through your ears like razors. His shale black eyes were the devil’s own, never looking at you but piercing straight through your flesh. When he spoke, you felt the gelid fingers of his breath on your throat.

“Zaha!”

“Wa’da ya want, Molech?”

“You know what today is, Zaha?” He curled one thin, barely perceptible lip into a pointed smile. “It’s Halloween, Zaha.”

“Yeah, so what?”

“Halloween, Zaha. You know witches, goblins, and the undead.” He let out a laugh that chilled the guard. “Wouldn’t you like to be with your kid?”

“Leave it alone, Molech,” Zaha replied angrily. He rapped the cell bars with the end of his wooden shillelagh.

Molech’s sneer grew. “I know what you want, Zaha. I know what you think, what you dream.”

“You don’t know nothing.”

The dim cell light cast Molech’s shadow large and misshapen on the rough stone wall. To Zaha it looked like a hulking beast ready to strike.

“I know you’re right,” Molech said. He paused and leaned closer. “You’re better than these illiterate monkeys who prowl around here in their starched uniforms like zombies, much better than them.”

“What are you talking about?”

“I can help you. I can arrange it so you never have to work again… ever.” Molech’s exaggerated face jutted from between the bars. His voice hissed in Zaha’s ear. “Think about it, Zaha. Everything you need brought right to you… laid at your feet. You won’t have a thing to worry about.” Molech’s words were sure and quiet as a prayer at midnight. “I can give you what you want…”

“You’re crazy as a loon, Molech! How can you do anything for me?”

Molech laughed again then squinted at the guard. “What’s the matter, Zaha? What are you afraid of? You got nothing to lose, except this crummy job. You got no faith in your dreams, Zaha? Afraid of what they may cost you?”

Zaha reared back and spat on the floor of the cell. “I ain’t afraid of nothin’! Do you hear that, Molech, nothin’!” he barked, shaking the shillelagh. “You’re as crazy as they come!” Zaha gathered himself and stared back into Molech’s serpentine eyes. “But I’ll tell you something, Molech. I ain’t crazy… no, sir. But for what you said… why… I’d pay any price… any price in hell!”

Molech relaxed back from the bars, the crooked grin melting into a satisfied smile.

The next morning Roger Zaha awoke to a nightmare. He was dressed in prison fatigues and stood behind the bars of a cell. Cell F66.

“What the…hey!” Zaha grabbed at the barred cell door and shook it fiercely. “Hey,” he screamed, “what the hell… what’s going on… what is this… some kind of crazy joke?”

“What’s the matter, Zaha?” A voice from one of the cells called out. “Don’t like the accommodations?”

“Oh, he’s too good for this,” a passing guard snapped back.

Another laughed. “Yeah, don’t you know… Zaha’s better than us!”

“Not anymore he ain’t!”

The cell block erupted in hoots and shouts and laughter. Tin cups raked and rattled against iron bars. Zaha covered his ears from the rising din. “This can’t be real… it can’t be…”

When he looked up, a uniformed guard stood outside his cell. But it wasn’t a guard, it was Ahriman Molech! Zaha lunged at him, grasping through the bars. Molech laughed and turned aside.

“Never have to work again,” he said. His voice was icy and hollow. “Everything you ever need, laid at your feet… at your feet, Zaha!” Molech’s footsteps clattered down the hall, the shillelagh rapping against one iron bar after another, his laughter dissolving in the distance. Just before he disappeared out of sight, Molech raised an arm, snapping his fingers.

At that moment a piece of paper floated down into cell F66. Zaha snatched it up in mid-air. It was a newspaper clipping dated Friday, January 18, 1935. Zaha’s hands trembled as he read:

(Atlanta, GA) Roger Zaha, the man known as

the Halloween butcher, began his life sentence

today at the federal penitentiary here in

Atlanta, the same place he had worked as a

guard. After a sensational trial, Zaha, 29, was

found guilty of the brutal Halloween night

murder of his five year old son, Roger Jr. Zaha

allegedly used a butcher’s knife to dismember

the boy’s body before burning it to conceal the

crime. During the trial, a police spokesman

testified that the cellar walls of Zaha’s Fulton

County home were splattered with the child’s

blood. Unconfirmed sources have stated Zaha

told police he sacrificed his son to appease Satan,

making vague references to Leviticus 20 and

Jeremiah 19 in the Old Testament.

The scream reverberated throughout the prison: the echoing howl of a banshee; the plaintive bay of a wolf caught in a steel trap; the cries of a thousand faceless tortured souls; the tormented scream of a madman.

“I’ll get you, Molech!” Zaha cried out, slumping to his knees. “I’ll get you! As God is my witness, I’ll find you! If it takes me eternity, by hell I’ll find you, Molech! I’ll make you pay… by Satan’s blood I’ll make you pay! Molech…!”

The inhuman screams continued through the night. In the morning Zaha was found in a heap on his cell floor. His bones were broken. His body was covered in thick crimson welts, ugly festering purple and black bruises, and dozens of deep cuts and gashes. It was as if some sinister hand had thrown him about like a rag doll. Dark rust red colored blood was splattered across the cell walls.

Roger Zaha recovered. He spent the rest of his life in cell F66. He didn’t work. Everything he needed was brought to him, just as Ahriman Molech promised.

Zaha died in 1974, still vehemently claiming his innocence. Shortly after, inmates began to mysteriously disappear throughout the prison.

Eighteen to date.

Since that January night in 1935, Atlanta Federal Penitentiary’s halls echo with torturous screams. And its cold stone walls run rich with the dark rust red inmates call Satan’s Blood.

October 31, 2000 2:25 AM

The scratching continued.

Waxed louder.

Closer.

I could feel the presence of a pair of cold, unblinking eyes. They stared out from a shadowy corner; searched the dusky light for an errant cornflake or a few stray bread crumbs.

It’s nothing.

You get used to the nightly scratching and prowling after a while. Some of the guys save their breakfast cereal to feed the rats.

Like I said, it’s no big deal.

Unless the scratching stops.

The scratching stopped after a time. There was a frantic flurry of nails trying to gain traction on the slick, painted cement floor. A few feckless squeals.

Then silence.

You see, the rats know.

“Thank God, theys gone,” the stranger mumbled hoarsely. “That’s ok, right, boss?”

From the position of his voice I could tell he was sitting up again, probably huddled in the middle of his mattress, the blanket clutched at his throat.

I wanted to speak, say something. Tell him: no, it’s not ok, ’cause when the rats run away…

A dry terror crawled up my throat, silencing my words, stitching my lips together. Above me, Nathan folded himself into a tight ball. I knew he was facing the wall, covers pulled over his head, an unavailing defense against the unknown. His usual position when the scratching stopped and the rats ran away.

I knew the position too well.

Boisterous hip hop blared from the tiny ear buds. Nathan had cranked the Walkman’s volume. As if music could drown the fear. From beneath my own covers I cursed for not keeping the radio myself.

The first scream is always the worse. No matter how many you experience. The piercing shriek grabs you by the balls. It squeezes so tightly the back of your brain aches, like the first stabs of the mother of all migraines.

I knew the stranger wanted to say something, maybe scream himself. He shuffled nervously on the floor. Fear had stitched his lips together as well.

If you are not too terrified to listen – if you dare listen at all – you might discern a voice in the truculent wailing:

“Molech!”

Shrill. Strained. Raspy.

“Molech!”

Tortured. As if imparting pain.

Another twisted howl rent the stagnant air. Then the pounding began, far down the hall.

“Molech!” Blam!

Hollow. Metallic.

Searching.

“Molech! Blam!

Closer. Four cells down.

“Molech!” Blam!

Three cells…

…two…

A low, algid fog crept into the cell, like the Avenging Angel.

“Sweet, Holy Jesus.” The solicitous stranger’s whispered prayer floated up from the floor next to me.

“Molech!”

Blam!

The pounding thundered, as if we were trapped inside the breech of discharging cannon.

Blam!

Lights flickered on at five AM. The food traps in the cell doors hammered open one by one. Footsteps scuffled outside the cell.

“Hey, I thought there were three in here?”

Bleary eyed I accepted the plastic trays from the guard. On the cell floor lay the tattered mattress, old army blanket and stained sheet.

And one lone shoe.

Trembling, I passed a tray up to Nathan.

“The marshals’ probably yanked his ass up out of here during the night,” another guard replied. “You know how the feds operate, they never tell us anything.”

Nathan and I ate our cold cereal and hard, butter-less toast in silence.

It wasn’t the federal marshals.

The stone walls in our cell dripped silently…

…an icy rust red…

Urban Fiction/Horror/Fiction

18 and up

3,771 words

BJ Neblett

Excellent short story for collections of horror, urban fiction or general fiction

Prison is bad enough, but what if the prison is haunted?

A young man finds himself in federal prison, locked away in the infamous Atlanta State Prison. He soon learns first hand the frightening secrets contained behind the cold iron bars and ancient concrete walls.

This work will appeal to New Adult and adult readers of general fiction, horror and sci-fi/fantasy.

BJ Neblett is a full time writer with two books and numerous short stories published. His newest novel, Planet Alt-Sete-Nine, a contemporary urban fantasy is due out Fall 2017. BJ teaches creative writing classes at Seattle's famed Hugo House for Writers and has taught ACE writing classes in several locations. He can be found in his Seattle home playing and listening to music, surrounded by his classic guitar collection and his thousands of records.

BJ graduated from Marple Newtown High School where he majored in writing and poetry. After service in the Army he began writing in earnest, being mentored by several writers and writing groups. Drawing on a 30 year career as a radio DJ, BJ finds inspiration in the crazy, colorful characters he has encounter, as well as the irony he finds all around. Preferring the short story format, his writing style encompasses strong characters and richly defined plots.

“Daddy, why is Mommy crying? Did you make her sad again?”

Little Cammie startled her dad. He pushed his wife from the crux of his arm. Streaks of black mascara stained the sleeves of his polo.

“Cammie, honey, what are you doing out of bed?” His voice straddled the line of annoyance and anger.

Cammie snuck out of bed when Mommy’s sobbing soiled the quiet night. By her accounts, it wasn’t often, but she couldn’t recall the last time she slept a full night through.

Stuffed bear tucked in her mouth; she watched television from the second-floor overlook although she rarely understood the shows her parents watched from the first-floor couch, it made her feel grown up. Part of the family.

The good family.

Tonight was the first time Cammie ventured downstairs from her second floor perch since that night.

The bad family.

Her arm healed. Crooked for weeks, but the hospital said it would straighten in time. Dad said it would straighten faster if she’d mind her own business and stay in bed at night.

Cammie rubbed the jagged scar on her forearm where the bone poked through to the outside. The doctor gave it a name, but Cammie didn’t want to remember. She only wanted one thing.

“I wanna watch TV with you and Mommy.” Cammie bent her knee, twisted her foot on her toes, and batted her big blue eyes at her dad.

“It’s late, Cammie. We have a busy day tomorrow. You need to rest up.” Her dad nudged her with his open palms. “After some early morning fun, your Mom and I have a meeting. Miss Lily is gonna babysit. I know how much fun you two have together.”

Cammie stroked her stuffed pink teddy bear. “I need to make sure Mommy is okay.”

“I'm all right, Sweetie. Please go back to bed like your father asked,” Mom said through her Kleenex mustache.

“But why were you crying?”

“Just something from the movie.” Mom kept one eye on the screen.

Cammie stared at the fifty-inch screen as a boy placed his hand on a train window. She didn’t understand why her parents watched in black and white when the colors worked perfectly well.

“His mommy is going to be mad at him for getting fingerprints on the window.” Cammie remembered all the times her mother yelled at her for doing the same thing, “And now the girl is doing it on the other side of the window! Oh, they are going to be in so much trouble.”

Tears streamed from Mom’s cheek darkening the light brown pillow in her lap.

A moment later both the girl and the boy on television were crying and shouting words to each other through the window.

“Are you sad because they are getting handprints on the window, Mommy?” Cammie asked.

Mom wiped away the tears from her face and then inhaled what Cammie estimated to be about a gallon of snot, “No, Honey. They were best friends who realized they were in love with each other, but they waited too long to tell each other. He’s on a train about to leave to fight some bad guys and is probably going to die. Them putting their hands on the clear window like that is their way of telling each other they are soul mates and will be together forever in each other’s heart. It’s so beautiful.”

Dad gathered Cammie in his arms, “Alright Peanut, that’s enough love lessons for you tonight. Let’s get you back into bed, so your mother can finish her movie and her bottle of wine, and your dad can get some sleep of his own.”

“Does Mommy have a soul mate, Daddy?” Cammie rested her head on her father’s shoulder.

“I think so, Baby Doll.” Her dad squeezed her tight, “Maybe more than one, but she doesn’t realize it. I’ll be happy when she does. We’ll all be happy when she does.”

The second floor wasn’t as lonely now that her dad slept in the bedroom next to Cammie’s instead of with Mom downstairs. At least tonight, Cammie didn’t think there would be slamming doors waking her.

***

"Rise and shine, Peanut!”

Cammie rubbed her eyes as she dragged her tattered bear down the stairs.

“Eat up quick. We need to get you dressed and down to the pond before it gets too crowded.” Dad flew around the kitchen. He banged pots and pans for no reason while Mom sat with her forehead in one hand and a steaming cup of coffee in the other.

“God, you can be such an asshole sometimes, Pete,” Mom muttered between gulps of coffee. “I should thank you for killing any second thoughts I had about our meeting this afternoon.”

“You should really bitch to tea, you know.” Dad spun away from Cammie as he spoke.

“What did you say to me?” Mom slammed her mug on the counter. Waves of black crested the rim, dribbling onto the marbled granite.

“Switch to tea.” Dad frisbeed a coaster across the counter. “And use a coaster.”

Cammie prepared her breakfast these days and headed for the pantry to grab her favorite leprechaun adorned cereal box.

“Ow!” She screamed, hopping in chaotic circles holding her toe.

“What happened?” Dad asked.

“I kicked an empty bottle.” Cammie continued hopping on one foot certain she now held the Guinness record for length of time.

“Looks like someone’s Mom decided to stay up late last night and couldn’t get the empty into the recycling bin.”

“Stow it, Pete.” Mom held the coffee close to her mouth but didn’t drink. She popped two little white pills in her mouth and swallowed hard, “Can we just get going?”

***

Cammie loved ice skating with her parents, although she couldn’t understand why they didn’t all hold hands any longer. A small part of her didn’t mind. She would be eight in a few months and could skate without any help these days. Stopping presented a challenge at times, but in her opinion, that’s why there were other skaters on the pond. Dad called them bumper cars.

Her parents trailed behind her the first time around the pond. The only words spoken came from Dad who warned her to stay away from the thin ice sign.

After two laps, Cammie noticed a little boy in a red jacket holding hands with both his mother and his father.

“Skating alone isn’t any fun,” she muttered.

Cammie dropped back and grabbed Mom’s hand. On the next pass, she grabbed Dad's hand and refused to let go of Mom’s.

“Isn’t this fun?” Cammie smiled.

“Yes, Sweetie,” Mom raised one side of her mouth.

“Although, not as fun as an entire bottle of wine,” Dad smirked. “A good bottle too. I believe I brought that back from Sonoma last year too.”

“Seriously, Pete? You’re going to bring that shit up again.” Mom skidded to a halt while Dad continued. Cammie stretched like Gumby between them but held on tight until everyone tumbled to the ice.

“If it were just one time, then no, I wouldn’t bring it up. But come on Claire, that’s what, the fourth bottle this week? Not to mention the girl’s day out last Sunday. I’m sure you were good for a few drinks then.” Dad released Cammie’s hand.

Mom fired back, “Maybe if you paid as much attention to me as you paid to your new secretary we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

Cammie found her hands dangling alone.

“Well, maybe if you didn’t live in a movie, spending your days pining to your online friends about finding a soul mate, I wouldn’t have to.” Dad crossed his arms and huffed steam from his nose. Cammie imagined him an ancient Chinese dragon defending a massive pile of gold from would-be marauders.

Mom’s defeated shoulders dropped.

Dad pressed on, “Yeah, that’s right. I read your email. All of them! By the way, Y-O-U apostrophe R-E means you are while Y-O-U-R shows possession.”

“Well Y-O-U apostrophe R-E an asshole and you can shove Y-O-U-R wine up Y-O-U-R A-S-S!” Mom shouted.

Cammie couldn’t follow what was happening, but she felt uncomfortable and skated away from the pair along with every other visitor to the pond. The only thing comforting her now was the dark pink Lily Pulitzer jacket her grandmother bought her last year. She missed her teddy bear.

Words and gestured flew between Mom and Dad as Cammie skated off.

A commotion louder than the couple’s insults commanded a temporary truce.

“Pete, where’s Cammie?”

All four eyes searched the worn ice.

Dad stopped an untalented skater as he hurried toward the entrance, “What happened?”

“Someone fell through the ice. A kid maybe.” He tried to pull away, but Dad restrained him.

“Boy or girl? What did they look like?”

“I don’t know man. Young kid. Wearing a red or pink jacket.”

Mom pushed Dad to the ice, “This is all your fault!” She bolted into the crowd.

Dad tried to stand, but his skate pick caught in the ice during the fall and he twisted his knee awkwardly, “Damn ACL!”

“Cammie, hang on honey, I’m coming! Mommy’s coming!”

Dad watched as Mom pushed her way through the crowd. Two skaters fell, and Dad heard the ice groan.

Mom’s shrill faded as the commotion escalated. Dad saw people plunging branches into the water. Folks frantically waved to the shore beckoning for help.

Dad pounded on the ice, sobbing with each hammer fist strike.

The screams became inaudible, and he couldn’t tell where one rescuer began and another ended. Mom escaped his vision in the sea of jackets.

Again and again, he attempted to stand without success. Inch by inch he dragged himself toward the crowd until he caught a glimpse of a little girl out of the corner of his eye. He looked left and saw a girl Cammie’s size kneeling on the ice with mittens removed and a hand pressed against the transparent sheet of ice staring intently into the frigid waters below.

“Cammie?” Dad hesitated, “Cammie, is that you?”

Cammie watched as Dad crawled across the ice in her direction, “Hey, Daddy. I lost my jacket. Please don’t be mad.”

“It’s okay.” Dad sighed and the pain in his leg no longer mattered. “Peanut, are you okay? What are you doing?”

Cammie smiled wide and looked away from the ice for only a second, “Come see, Daddy. You’ll be so happy. Mommy and I are soul mates.”

Damn I'm bored. This God malarkey is dull beyond words, or should that be worlds? Ha. Well there's not much point in being hilarious when there's nobody around to appreciate it huh? Perhaps it is company I crave? Hmm? Something or someone to amuse me . . . . or many someones? I'm God for goodness sake, anything is possible.

Right, which of my toys could sustain life? Not too hot so stay away from the Sun, or too cold so not too far away either. Maybe a little of everything should go into the mix, heat, a little cold, wind, some rain, this is fun. Land, yes, else where will the life live? Water is needed so there should be plenty of that. Now what kind of creature would amuse me the most? Big, small, furry, bald? All of the aforementioned in various forms, marvellous. I should pick one to lead, one species to govern and care for all the others, something in my likeness. A man to humour me, a hu-man. This is fabulous, why didn't I think of this before? Ah, he'll need to reproduce . . . I would hate to run out.

Splendid. So far so good.

Food . . . I shall start them off with the basics and see what they come up with. What's the worst that can happen? They all get hungry and eat each other? Haha, I'm being hilarious again.

Right, I think that's everything. Oh, oops, light and dark so they know when to rest, I'm hoping to be amused for millennia so let's not have them wearing themselves out too quickly.

Now all I need to do is sit back, relax and wait to be amused.

Wow, fire and the wheel. I did not see that coming.

*a few billion years later

Oh dear me, what have I done?

The universe had been dull. Empty. Non-existent. It lasted for generations before my father created a single star and told me, "Do whatever you like with this single star. You have the power to generate anything you can imagine. You were born with the most treasured gift of all the gods."

With the birth of that tiny star, I had finally found a light in the darkness. Something to create and explore. And eventually, more stars formed in the bleakness. Stars which connected together and created new worlds and images in a black sky. These special stars were so entrancing, that darkness almost struck again immediately when my twin brother tried to take them.

My brother was my opposite. He took when I gave. He hated the light, and I the dark. He wanted to steal the new worlds for himself, a tyrant to the new realms. He brought chaos to my creation. While it saddened me, I was given no other choice but to condemn my brother to the world formed from his own hatred. The underworld.

While my calamitous brother was locked away, I practiced my gift, creating new textures, new sights, and scents for the world. I then practiced giving life to advanced figures known as animals. I set them free in the world and provided them with environments and resource to live and grow. Then onto my next challenge, to construct entities like no other.

I spent eternities perfecting humanity. There had been many failures, including the Cyclops, born with one eye, and the Giant, born much too tall not to destroy their surroundings. However, I could not dispose of them without a heavy heart, so they were sent to inhabit a different world, away from the world I was still constructing.

Finally, humanity was born. Each new person looked the same, yet my imagination would gift them different features from slender fingers to thick legs. The males often had more muscular bodies than the females, a fair distinction of dominance that my father had told me about. The females, however, were given more wisdom from my own mind than the males were. However, both were mortal. At last, my children roamed the new earth, giving plenty of refuge and resource, building their civilizations and discovering what they can accomplish, so long as they did not destroy their home.

I was finally at peace, joyous of the result, that I was capable of making such life. And I knew it all must be protected. So, I sent down guardians for the animals and humans alike. Gods and Goddesses who would watch over the welfare of all life, each with specific tasks. And for many generations, the world glowed with tranquility.

Little had I known what my brother was up to. Every new day he gained a dark power, his wish to have everything I did growing stronger. Once he had learned of humanity, he desired to take it for himself, and to change the living hearts of my children. While we rejoiced, he taught himself to create evil that could not be avoided. He created demons, shadows of people, born with the same darkness as his own heart and gifted them with dark tasks. He named them the Seven Deadly Sins, the seven of the most horrific behaviors and habits of the mortal. Gluttony, Greed, Lust, Envy, Pride, Sloth, and Wrath. The brought discord and destruction in their wake, compelling the entire human race. My brother also reigned as leader to the Giants and Cyclops, convincing them that I was evil for locking them away from the peaceful realms forever, like he had been. The war was uneven.

With the life of the humans resting in my hands, I birthed angels to help the guardians fight off the Sins and restore the world from the everlasting darkness. These angels I named the Seven Virtues, born to cure victims of possessing the Sins in their hearts. Kindness, Temperance, Charity, Chastity, Humility, Diligence, and Patience. With the Virtues and the guardians, the war was now fair. While we fought, I entrusted special nymphs to hide and guard the animals and humans from danger for a short time. The war, however, was long and cold.

All our lives were hanging by a thread by the time both sides grew tired. The earth which I had formed was chipping away, piece by piece. With the last of my strength, I finished it all with a blinding explosion which knocked my brother and his minions back to the underworld, where I placed chains that would last for eternity to keep them trapped. The Sins were placed in a cursed box and hidden far from ever being discovered. At last, life could come out of hiding.

The Virtues and I inhabited the skies above. I watched from afar to keep them safe, and the Virtues watched for any sign of the Sins' return. The guardians were charged to keep watch of the world and its people by living closer to them.

And so, as the world advances each day with new discoveries and technology, I am always there to watch, to protect. To keep the darkness locked away and let the integrity and unity of all men, women, and children grow strong and spread across the good earth.

"I just don't understand God, I've read Genesis a million times but I still don't understand why when everything about you was perfect, you decided to make us, who you knew would screw you over. So here's my question God, why did you create the creation story?"

"It's very simple my darling, on the first day I sat from my heavenly throne above and thought of what could be. I sat there in my place of perfect, and I wished that upon another world, so I created the night. The night was beautiful my dear, however, light was needed to show my affection, consider it a reminder of my love, and so I then poured a little bit of my glory onto the night creating day. I saw the beginning of something great, and I smiled; it was good. Now the next day came dear, and I saw a need for diversity, thus I am diversity, the life, the truth, and the way, any who I formed the seas and separated it from what I declared the sky. Both were beautiful and blue, the color of my eyes as I was born Jesus. I stopped to observe its beauty; my beauty; the second day. On the third day, I realized a need for a place of living, see my dear I had plans for you before you came into existence; now yes the seas and the skies were bound to meet at the place of earth I called land. Land was a beautiful thing my darling, and I knew it was good. The land was beautiful, but when the many flowers and trees birthing the sources for food and shelter it became even more so. You see, everything has its place and grows so specific to its kind, as do the fruits need water to thrive, you can only be pure to your kind by my word, pure to my image. Surely, the fourth day came and I saw the need to emphasize the difference of the days, see dear, I'm all-knowing but without a great light in the daytime and a gentle glow at night your kind would not have known how to tell apart the times or the seasons. To accommodate the gentle light of the night I played dancing bodies of stars along the rim to provide you pleasure. No matter the situation there will always be light in the darkest of times my dear, I will never leave you nor forsake you. And so the stars came and went and the fifth day was at my hand, truly I had made a wonderful sight, yet it would be a sin for no one to enjoy my gifts. I breathed birds into existence and creatures of the seas, I blessed them all and watched as they moved across the great vasts, forming among themselves according to their kind, my dear I have such great compassion for the animals and yet so much greater a love for you. The creatures of land and sea were wonderfully made, yet on the sixth day I decided to make more, so that these creatures might not be dismayed. I made animals of the land, beautiful in their differences and brought together by their similarities, they formed among themselves according to their kind and I once again saw they were good. And this my favorite creation began, I made man in my image, even though I knew man was to stray from it. Man and female to not fall lonely and to help each other grow, I blessed them and saw that they would multiply. I gave them reign over every other living thing and the world I had created I blessed them with these gifts so they could get a mere glimpse of how much I love them and how much I long for them to glorify me. I saw my work was good, and on the seventh day I found it complete, thus creating a day of rest and holiness; the Sabbath. My darling, I didn't create you or this earth because I needed you, I created you because I knew you were to need me; I made you in my image so you could grow to love me and honor me, and someday come join me in heaven where you'll finally understand all my beauty and mystery. My dear, you will find your heart strung all over the praises and challenges of this life, yet come to me with your prayers, thoughts, and questions, and I will see to it that you will thrive. I show my control of the land, the seas, and the many creatures, you just need to know throughout your life I'm in control as well.