Scribal Terror

Family fun

Don't you think it's great when the whole family gets together and picks dilberries off the maltese?

Vampyre Robin: A Collaborative Horror . . . Story

 

by Dorkafork, Mojo, Rob B, Jake, JWebb, Gail, Prairie Biker, Scott P, Chrees, Michael, and MC: Thanks to all for a wonderful Halloween treat!

It was an overcast and clammy night, with a low chance of precipitation, as the darkness moved in like a cold front from the north that may result in temperatures in the low 50s. My restiveness continued, the ghastly glow of the Weather Channel flickering in my poorly-lit abode increased my disquiet. The grim countenance of the weather girl stared back at me. I pondered how I had arrived at my despicable state. The memories were patchy, like the clouds that are likely moving in on Thursday

A sudden deep chill precipitated my dread. Turning instinctively, I saw, out the front window, a pair of beady red eyes staring hatefully at me. A bird was perched on the branch of the Hollyhock...

It took me a minute to focus through my chemically induced haze and I realized those sick red eyes were my own. I couldn't decide if they were blistered from too much rubbing, too much whiskey or too much of her. I suppose it didn't really matter. She wasn't coming back for round two of bitter matrimony unless it was as a zombie. Although I don't know how I'd tell the difference.

I struggled to get up from the couch of my hastily rented furnished apartment. I swear, the couch was bowed like it had been custom made for a camel who like to lay on his back.

The robin was still there, staring at me. Watching intently. A creepy metaphor for my bird, who had recently flown the coop, I guess.

I needed a cigarette, so I stumbled into what the landlord described as a 'kitchenette'.

I was startled out of my funk when the phone began to ring.

"Her name was Lola, she was a showgirl
With yellow feathers in her hair and a dress cut down to there
She would merengue and do the cha-cha...."
Why did I ever pick that ring tone?

As I reached for the infernal device I saw a movement out of the corner of my eye.

It was the robin, which had made its way to the mailbox sized kitchen window above the sink, and it had what picked up what appeared through my bleary eyes to be a hair ribbon.

There was something odd about the ribbon.

While the recorded voice on the line encouraged me to vote for Prop 7...or was it against?...I realized that wasn't a ribbon but my lottery ticket. The robin put the ticket on the window sill and seemed to look at me and the numbers at the same time, all the time making a guttural noise. The combination of the whiskey, droning phone voice, and the robin's growling sounded like "Never win, never win"
"Great," I muttered,"Like I need a bird to tell me that." As I reached up to take the paper from the robin, the bird lurched, almost drunkenly, away from my outstreached hand. It hopped and fluttered towards the open kitchenette window. While closing the distance between myself and the bird, I noticed a lumber shape outside.

... and when I say "lumber" I mean the hulking form of a huge stack of two by fours and a couple pallets of drywall that The Home Depot had apparently delivered to the my house in error, now sitting in my driveway enticing me to yet another unfinished home improvement project.. "..but how? when?.." I thought to myself.. then suddenly it all became clear.. The boards.. The bird.. The Cha-Cha... "Freakin Bob Villa..." was all I could think to say..

Just then....

there was a loud knocking on my door that
made me hop and flutter myself; i looked at
the robin, the ribbony ticket; RAP! RAP! RAP! my eyes grew wide as i moved toward
the door.

"Harker?" "Harker?" "Can you hear me in there?" "Where the hell's the rent?"

"I pre-paid the room," I yelled through the rice paper thin door. Which was true. "Harker lives in '31' not '13', you dyslexic hotelier. Besides, She isn't here anymore and she was just being nice when she said she liked your zydeco band."

It was a sore point between the hotelier and me, our continuing zydeco feud. She truly did prefer his zydeco to mine, and that knowledge consumed my very soul! Between the lumber and the bird, I had trouble working on my latest zydeco composition. The infernal racket.

That's the name of the piece, "La racquette infernale"

I was humming it when the pounding began.

I opened the door to investigate. Standing there, with my bitterest zydeco rival, I was shocked by the shear volume of the noise.

Perched at the top of the hill, radiant in it's halogen illuminated glory was the bane of all that is peaceful and quiet. Ever enemies, we shared a sideways glance at what would be a force we'd both tentatively align to thwart.

It was the band called The Grateful Undead, and the robin was its advance man.

The "ribbon" in its beak -- a complimentary ticket to hell on earth.

And that ticket was a strip of baby blue silk. It used to be stitched to the inside of her wedding gown and how that damn bird got it out of her grave, I just don't know.

The hotelier, a portly fellow named Marion, turned to me and said through a thick creole gumbo of an accent "We're gonna have to go up there." "The hell I am," I replied.
"No," he said and he stared at lights up hill, " We are. My wife and your mama are up there for the Ladies Auxiliary bingo and tobacco spitting regionals. I doubt they're prepared for the undead."

They're probably better prepared than we are, I thought. I turned to Marion, who used to be a librarian, and said, "All right, let's go, but don't we need something first; a drink .. some holy water .. a yoyo?"

"How about one of my special Bloody Marions?", he asked.

"No thanks", I said, but I noticed the feral gleam in Marion's eyes as he stared at my throat.

Then he said "I must tell you that I'm really a woman."

Was that the reason he/she/it was staring at my Adam's Apple" I wondered. "Or, was there something more... nefarious?"

I was stunned to see Marion turn and run down the hall as fast as his stubby legs would let him, tearing off his clothes as he turned the corner towards the stairs that would take 'it' to the street.

I was shocked by the revelation, because Harker's love for Marion now became totally hot. But even the bow-chikka-wow running through my head was unable to get me back into the funk I had previously been startled out of. In my dazed state of being horn- uh horrified, I lost track of what Marion was doing...

"So you're really a woman are you? Then you must be a Marionette - which means someone is pulling your strings," I replied. "Wouldn't be a red-eyed fowl from hell, looking to rip the larynx right out of my Christian neck, would it?"

And with that, the robin perched behind me jumped into the air with a fork in it's beak. It darted across the open space and drove it into the transvestite, zydeco hotelier neck. Marion stumbled backward grasping at the plastic cutlery and the robin circle back to my kitchen and picked up a spoon.

Suddenly, there was Harker, standing in the doorway smiling, and holding a large black cat with wild, unruly eyes. "Am I in time for the party?" she asked.

(Alternative ending)
"Whaa..? Huuh? Noooo!! " Maryanne near screamed, bolting upright in her bed... For a moment she sat petrified in fear and confusion.. her heart beating a million miles a second.. as the robotic voice from the box next to her repeated again and again, "Time to get up. Time to get up."

As the first few frantic moments passed her eyes finally focused on the familiar setting of her bedroom.. "Oh crimminy" she thought."what a freakin messed up dream..That's it, I'm done with Prozac.." As if to assure herself the dream was actually over she felt her throat and found that mercifully the over-sized Adam's apple was no longer there then held her hands in front of her face relieved that they were once again the delicate hands of a woman and not the hideously large meathooks of a preoperative tranny..

Finally, gathering her will, Maryanne tumbled out of bed and wrapping herself in her terrycloth robe stumbled groggily toward the kitchen and the days first cup of Folger's fog lifter.. As the steaming drops slowly filled the waiting carafe Maryanne filled her time by switching on the tv, more to break the silence than anything else and opening the levolors to let in the light.. She barely even heard the FOX weather girl's voice drone ".. overcast and clammy tonight, with a low chance of precipitation.." as she stood transfixed by what she saw outside her kitchen window.. On her lawn a single Robin boldly stood staring back, it's eyes like tiny burning embers..its beak opened in what could only be described as a sneer.. and at its feet lay a single strip of cloth.. a hair ribbon..