Necro Files: Two Decades of Extreme Horror

I dreamt about hot neon the colour of clotted blood, of deformed faces that looked as if they had been squeezed between unrelenting elevator doors. Sometimes I would realize that I had been awake and staring into a mirror.

Occasionally, I would come across copies of The Chicago Tribune at the library. Usually they only carried West Coast papers like the Seattle Intelligencer or the Vallejo Vestry.

One day six months ago, I read of a scandal involving a prominent Chicago network newswoman. Rumours circulated of a lesbian affair with a woman with an acardiac twin. This particular shit was slung because the woman was up for a national news desk spot. But, still. I flew back on United to see if the Tomeis were back in town.

Josephine and Celandine had been back in Chicago since the summer of 1991. Someone besides me had seen her in Vegas and knew an even better way to use her. A local writer exploited her for shock value in one of his novels, saying that she had become one of the highest paid call girls in the city, and that the head under the ribcage was dead and often mutilated.

The guy in Vegas was right. The head feels no pain.

But that doesn’t mean you don’t have to fix it.

* * *

She is asleep.

I stare out the window, the one facing east. Josephine Tomei died this past Christmas. It is just me and Celandine. I called Norm and told him I had family matters to take care of here.

I left things open.

She is asleep because she still is taking the drugs that she started on in Vegas. The only reason she hasn’t lost all of her self-esteem. I swear I will get her straight. It is 5:30 and the sun is coming up.

I play the Elvis soundtrack to Jailhouse Rock. “I Wanna Be Free”; the title song. Finally, “Lover Doll.”

I listen to the younger, pre-bloat King of Rock ’n Roll, singing about how he loves his lover doll madly.

I pull the sheets gently away from Celandine’s drugged form. The head is still watching me. Dawn’s light slashes a diagonal across Celly’s black pubic hair. I pull off my shorts.

I reach forward, kissing Celly’s closed mouth. It doesn’t open. I lick her breast, the left one, then the right.

I reach into her cunt with my hand, one finger at a time. I can put three fingers in comfortably. She does not respond. My dick is still limp.

“… let me be your lover boy …”

I take my fingers out of Celandine and stroke the head’s hair. Its mouth opens. The eyes have a certain curiosity.

I swear I will get Celly off the drugs, get our lives together. Take her back to Denver with me.

I move towards the head, my dick growing to half-mast. There is early morning traffic outside. In the real world. Our real world.

Straddling Celly’s sleeping body in a half-assed way, one foot on the ground, the other leg’s knee near her armpit. Positioning myself over the head. Guiding my dick into its mouth.

It is not hard to believe that it begins sucking.

(For Denise Szostak)

The Spirit Wolves

Charlee Jacob

“The Spirit Wolves” was first published in Into the Darkness #4, 1995.

‡

Charlee Jacob has published in the horror field for twenty years. Once a prolific writer, her disabilities and multitude of meds have forced her to stop writing. For a bibliography of her work, see her website at charleejacob.com