Del and Mladen review ‘Pumpkinhead’

Image courtesy of MGM/UA.

“Pumpkinhead” Starring Lance Henriksen, Jeff East, John D’Aquino and Florence Shauffler. Directed by Stan Winston. 86 minutes. Rated R. Amazon Prime.

Del’s take

They had me at the cicadas.

If I remember the South for anything it will be sluggish July afternoons, when the chore of taking a breath is like sucking a wad of steamed broccoli into your lungs, as cicadas hidden within the needles of longleaf pines screech and screech and screech screech screech. According to folklore the infernal bugs “hibernate” underground for 17 years until one night they awaken to scale a nearby slash pine – yes, it’s always at night – squeeze from their shell, pump up their wings and fly away to enjoy a brief yet incandescent third act of noisy fornication.

That rhythmic screeching, like chalk chalk chalk on a blackboard, is stamped onto my brain. So, when I heard it used as an audio effect in “Pumpkinhead” I knew the story was taking place somewhere below the Mason-Dixon, where the ever-increasing heat has baked the brains out of everybody who lives there, transforming them into Trump supporters.

The horror.

I didn’t let that stop me from enjoying “Pumpkinhead’s” other charms. The movie, which was released way back in 1989, has become a cult favorite despite early panned reviews. The directorial debut of special effects wizard Stan Winston, “Pumpkinhead” inspired a straight-to-video sequel, two made-for-TV sequels, a comic book from Dark Horse and even a video game.

Plus, it stars one of my favorite underrated actors, Lance Henriksen, who appeared in several James Cameron movies along with Bill Paxton and Jeanette Goldstein. He brings just the right touch of doom to his role as grieving father Ed, who sets off the horrific chain of events in “Pumpkinhead.”

The story goes like this: As a young boy, Ed witnessed a man being killed by a monster and knows that with the help of the right people, he can summon a demon to avenge the death of his young son Billy, who was accidentally run over by a dirt bike rider who had come to the back woods with his friends to party.

With the guidance of Haggis (Florence Shauffler), a crone who lives in the deep woods, Ed summons the Pumpkinhead demon and sets it loose on the teens, choosing to disregard her warning that Pumpkinhead is as dangerous to those who evoke its presence as those intended to receive its wrath.

The result is well-choreographed and photographed slaughter that follows a predictable path with only a slight deviation there at the end. Lessons will be taught and for some, learned, while for others there may be no moral to this story.

“Pumpkinhead” is one of those fun B movies that works if you can get past the threadbare writing and horror movie clichés. It calls forth an eerily gothic atmosphere you have never seen from Henry James or even V.C. Andrews. Henriksen delivers his patented emotionally wounded performance – you can’t help but sympathize with the guy, even if events leading up to his actions follow a corny, well trodden horror movie trail.

The real star here is the Pumpkinhead demon, which I thought worked very, very well. It’s a movie monster you haven’t seen before and in ways reminded me of the atavistic horror of “Alien.” It produces a similar quality of dread, even if the cornpone story doesn’t.

“Pumpkinhead” has lots of gross and gore, which should forestall whiny lectures from Mladen about R ratings and blood spatter. It’s a necessity for any serious horror movie collector or fan. Watch it in 2021 about mid-October, after the real horror of 2020 has mostly faded from memory.

I give it a B.

Mladen’s take

Del and I have been friends for a long time. And, still, he’s simply unable to judge the depth and breadth of my intolerance for inadequate moviedom mayhem, violence, and cussing.

“Pumpkinhead” is a good movie. I throw it an A- for the superb creature effects, which offset the movie’s quasi-“Deliverance” vibe. However, there are no dismemberments or intestines spilling from sliced abdomens. Shoot, plenty of blood is spilled, but no depictions of arterial pulse squirting. Sure as hell there is very little swearing, if any, that I recall and there is definitely no damned nudity. So, forgive me Del, but I’m whining, anyway, though, really, it’s closer to satisfied grumbling because the “Pumpkinhead” plot is solid.

In fact, I had little trouble overlooking the plot’s trigger, a grieving father mischaracterizing the city slickers’ accidental mistreatment of his geeky son. What unfolds is horror movie commentary on the ruin that engulfs those seeking revenge. For, you see, Ed the father becomes entwined with the monster he unleashes. When Pumpkinhead kills, Ed feels it.

—

Quick, what excellent recent movie uses the same type of symbiotic relationship between man and beast as an integral part of the story? Answer: “Sputnik.”

—

It’s Pumpkinhead who has me enamored by this late 1980s film. This is a lovingly, carefully, patiently, and nicely crafted terror animal. The only non-practical, i.e. without makeup, and non-mechanical visual effect in the movie is blurred and swaying filmography showing Ed sensing that Pumpkinhead is about to strike.

Pumpkinhead, by the way, is a tall guy in a costume. The creature is a decaying pink and skeletal. It has no hair, a tail, claws for hands, pseudo-hooves for feet, and long bony protrusions from the shoulders. Its legs at the knees bend like a heron’s, forward, if I recall accurately. Its teeth are long, crooked, and cracked and eyes white, opaque, and all-seeing. Pumpkinhead is a conjured beast, maybe risen from the fires of hell, making a living in the material world. Pay attention to the shrunken monster’s face when it’s re-buried.

Pumpkinhead’s interaction with reality as we understand it is very nicely executed in its namesake film.

There’s our nightmare walking past a window as though taking a leisurely stroll while the kid killers inside the cottage talk about what to do. When Pumpkinhead prowls through the house, it ducks beneath doorways. It swivels and tilts its head to listen. And, Pumpkinhead has no trouble looking straight at you while contemplating, I imagine, what to do next. It kills your ass and then hangs around for a moment to watch the reaction of your friends. There are no rampages. Just a methodical hunt to pick off the offending, big-hair youths. Wait till you see how the monster decides to handle a rifle. Pumpkinhead is scary as hell because it’s very human.

To me, Pumpkinhead has a subtler charisma than the Xenomorph in “Alien,” more natural finesse than the Predator in “Predator,” and a finer malevolence than Freddy in “A Nightmare on Elm Street.”

It’s my hope that no dumbass 21st century producer decides to re-make “Pumpkinhead.” This is a story and a monster that stand on their own. The beast borne of revenge shouldn’t be risked by a crappy re-do.    

Mladen Rudman is a former journalist and technical editor. Del Stone Jr. is a former journalist and author.

Image courtesy of De Paolis In.Co.R. Studio.

“The House by the Cemetery” Starring Catriona MacColl, Paola Malco and Ania Pieroni. Directed by Lucio Fulci. 86 minutes. Not rated.

Del’s take

“The House by the Cemetery” is a film only a horror purist could love, and love it they do, in gushing online paeans that celebrate its blood-drenched genius. Written by legendary screenwriter Dardano Sacchetti and directed by the Godfather of Gore, Lucio Fulci, “House” is itself a paean to violence, splashing its audience with viscera, maggots, and other gory tropes of Italian horror cinema.

It is part of Fulci’s Gates of Hell trilogy, which also includes “City of the Living Dead” and “The Beyond” – entries in a catalog of horror movies, spaghetti westerns and comedies that make up the erstwhile communist agitator’s body of work. Fulci passed away in 1996 due to complications from diabetes after suffering a life nearly as tragic as his horror films, but he has developed a cult following over the years and many of his fans rate “The House by the Cemetery” one of his best works.

The story is about a young academic, Dr. Norman Boyle, who brings his wife and son to a small, rural town so that he may resume the work of a colleague, identified only as Dr. Petersen. Petersen was researching the notorious Dr. Freudstein, a 19^th century medical practitioner who allegedly conducted forbidden experiments resulting in disfigurement, death and, shall we say, supernatural complications. During his investigation, Petersen inexplicably loses his mind, kills his girlfriend and hangs himself from the rafters of the town library. Now Dr. Boyle has arrived to finish Petersen’s work. He has even moved his family into the house that was previously occupied by Dr. Freudstein.

The Boyles are joined by Ann, ostensibly a babysitter for young Bob, the Boyles’ blindingly blonde-haired son. But she may be in league with the supernatural forces that rule the Freudstein house. Bob’s mother, Lucy, seems to sense something is off about Ann. In fact, she knows something is off about the entire house but she soldiers on, the loving if weary spouse of an obsessed academic.

The Boyles’ presence rekindles the ghostly inhabitant of Freudstein House and all manner of jump scares, sudden spooks and not-so-ethereal attacks commence, culminating in an inevitable showdown between man and boogeyman.

The film was released in 1980, which dates it. More substantially – and jarringly –  its Italian roots, and its Italian horror sensibility, establish a distance between movie and audience that “House by the Cemetery” may not be able to overcome in the United States. Its case is not helped by the oceans of blood and horrifically graphic violence that, even by today’s standards, will present a challenge to weak-stomached audience members. It could have been worse. According to lore, Fulci was mandated to slay at least some of his darlings to keep the movie at an R rating in the U.S.

More puzzling are the weird lapses in cognition experienced by the characters. For instance, in one scene a woman is brutally (and bloodily) murdered. Her body is dragged across the kitchen and down into the cellar, leaving a blood trail wide as an interstate highway. The next morning Ann, the suspicious au pair, sets about cleaning up the mess (without inquiring as to its cause, which to my mind casts her in league with the devil). Lucy walks into the kitchen, sees Ann down on the floor with her bucket and scrub brush, and asks her what she is doing. Ann says, “I made coffee,” and that answer seems satisfactory to Lucy, who turns and heads toward the stove. Blood trail? What blood trail? The movie is rife with such oversights.

Replete with overly dramatic acting, a musical score that will strike Americans as intrusively silly, and inexplicable gaps in storytelling, “House by the Cemetery” falls more into grindhouse mockery than art house storytelling.

For those reasons I won’t recommend it. I watched out of a sense of duty to Fulci and Sacchetti, but in retrospect, “House by the Cemetery” wasn’t very good.

If you are a horror purist or a collector of oddball cinema, you might enjoy the movie. Otherwise, try something a bit more modern, and a lot more consistent with reality.

“House by the Cemetery” is available on Shudder.

I rate it a D+.

Del Stone Jr. is a former journalist and author.

Image courtesy of Flickr user Electroholunder https://www.flickr.com/photos/67342500@N00/

INTRODUCTION

This story went through several iterations before it became the tale you see here.

I started it in the early 1980s – exact date unknown; my memory is hazy but I vaguely remember seeing U2’s “New Year’s Day” on MTV while taking smoke breaks from writing. That would put it in the vicinity of 1983.

I based the viewpoint character on a woman I knew from work. She was small and looked frail but was anything but – tough as nails! You didn’t screw with her. Oh, and her name was Rocky, just like the character in this book.

I wanted to write a story about the ultimate horror, at least for a parent: that of losing a child. I was warned to stay away from stories that put children in peril, but I thought “Sitters” might avoid that prohibition by its resolution.

One other feature that’s notable about “Sitters” – if in fact anything is notable about “Sitters” – is that it represents what horror used to be, not what horror is now. I grew up in a time when horror was external – a monster, a supernatural agency, just something out there that presented a threat to you and I.

These days it seems horror is more internal – modern horror stories seem to focus on a vague sense of unease, the suggestion that something may not be quite right, or a feeling of out-of-place or disaffection within the viewpoint character.

Maybe an easier way to say it is that in the past, horror was a monster. Today, horror is a mental illness.

I got feedback from various editors and, through their suggestions, I created the story you’re about to read.

“Sitters” eventually found a home at Northern Horror, a Canadian magazine. They did a good job presenting it.

—

SITTERS

Rocky was sitting on the corner of the mattress, trying to get an earring fastened to her ear, when the kid began bouncing on the bed.

She had it – no, she didn’t, damn it – she almost had it, but a jolt sent the earring spinning out of her fingers. It bounced and rolled across the efficiency’s narrow floor. It disappeared beneath the fold-out card table.

Judi, who was babysitting the kid again tonight, offered a tired smile and settled into the worn-out La-Z-Boy. Judi was youngish, but something about her seemed old, Rocky thought. Maybe it was her clothes. Her jeans were frayed at the pockets and mere threads held the knees together; her sweater was unravelling at the shoulder seam. Maybe it was the rattiness of her clothes that rubbed off on her, so that she resembled a much older imposter, masquerading as a young, down-on-her-luck divorcee.

Misery loves company, Rocky told herself, and got up to look for the earring. God, if she ruined this last pair of pantyhose crawling under there … well, that would be a bitch. Because there was no money to buy a new pair and she needed to look good – to be honest, she needed to look perfect. Because Mr. Deaton liked all his clerks to look perfect. He said a nice-looking clerk might encourage customers to linger, and when customers linger they buy things. And because Mr. Deaton was the manager, what he wanted was important.

“I wanna GO!” the kid shouted. Rocky stretched and groped beneath the table, felt something hard, and came up with the plastic head to a toy robot. She pitched it aside and the kid yelled, “Hey! That’s mine!” His voice was quavering between tears and anger, but he wasn’t whining yet, whining in that tone which always meant he was about to throw a tantrum, and for that Rocky was thankful. She didn’t want to deal with a tantrum. Not half an hour before her shift started at K mart.

She found the earring. She stood and fastened it. She smoothed her skirt.

“I wanna go too,” the kid repeated. She composed a smile and sat down beside him. She mussed his hair. He made a face and rolled away, but when he looked at her again he was smiling too. God, if there was anything that could shine through the despair she’d been feeling these past few months, it was the kid.

Rocky said, “I’m going to work, honey. You remember what I told you about work?”

He nodded.

“I can’t take you to work with me because Mr. Deaton wouldn’t like it, and then he might fire me and we wouldn’t have any money. What would happen to us if we didn’t have any money?”

The kid recited, “We wouldn’t have a roof over our heads.”

Judi sighed.

Rocky nodded. She felt a small ache of guilt that the kid had to learn this kind of lesson so early in life, but circumstances had forced her hand, and she was alone, and sometimes she had to share her burdens, even if it mean sharing them with a 6-year-old.

            “Mommy,” the kid said. “Does Judi have any money?”

Judi almost laughed. Rocky snorted, “With what I’m paying her? You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Well … if you don’t pay her much money, why’s she here?”

“Because,” Rocky cuffed his chin. “She likes you. Now you and Judi are going to have a good time. Isn’t that right, Judi?” She cast an inquiring glance across the room, and Judi nodded yes. Rocky noticed she had her touchstone in hand and was rubbing it absently, as if it were a cat she was scratching behind the ears. Rocky’s gaze lingered on the stone. It was black as anything she could imagine, and polished to a smooth luster by Judi’s persistent rubbing. Judi was never without it. She would not let anybody touch it. She said once that if it ever left her grasp it might lose the magic or charm or whatever it was the thing held over her. She said it was the one thing in life she could rely on.

The one thing in life she can rely on. Rocky turned away. I guess if anybody has a right to feel that way, it’s Judi. Rocky wondered what she would do if her ex-husband snatched the kid on one of his infrequent visitations. Would she be haunting police stations and badgering detectives to find the bastard? Would she be babysitting at night to pad her meager income and take her mind off things? Or rubbing magic rocks to prop up her sanity?

Rocky realized she was shivering.

Judi smiled uncertainly. “I’ll take care of everything.” She said nothing more, and then an uncomfortable silence descended over the room, interrupted only by the sound of their breathing.

“Well!” Rocky announced a little too cheerfully. “I want your fanny in bed early, kiddo. You and Judi can watch TV and then you shag it for the sack.”

“I can stay up late!” he shouted.

“No. You stay up late and I might have to hock your fanny.”

“To the boogeyman,” Judi added.

And I could use the bucks, Rocky thought morosely, but she only said, “That’s right.”

Judi smiled. “I’ve seen the boogeyman.”

The kid’s eyes widened. He said wondrously, “You have?” and Rocky frowned.

“Yes,” Judi continued. “Once. But I can call him back. With this.” She held up the touchstone. “You’ve seen fortune tellers on TV who use crystal balls to contact the spirit world? Well, this is my crystal ball, and with this I can call the boogeyman. Would you like to see the boogeyman?”

The kid looked fearfully at Rocky. He whined, “No.”

Judi was silent a moment. “Then you’ll have to do what your mother says and get to bed early.”

Rocky stared at the woman, unsure for a moment if she should go along with this deception. Something like this could scare the hell out of the kid, give him a complex or something. It could stay with him the rest of his life. So Rocky finally said, “Honey, Judi’s just teasing. There’s no such thing as the boogeyman – but if I come home from work and find you still up, you’ll wish there was.” She glanced furtively at Judi, who was rocking in the La-Z-Boy, then back at the kid. “Now don’t be a little pain and maybe we’ll get ice cream tomorrow.” She almost hated herself when she saw his snaggle-toothed grin. There wouldn’t be any ice cream tomorrow, of course – not when she could barely keep a roof over their heads, as even the kid had learned to say. There was never enough money and she was tired of worrying about it and it seemed she never knew what to do, what was right and best and proper, and if somebody would just tell her what to do, for God’s sake –

No. She told herself to stop. That was no way to think. She struggled to concoct a smile. So. She’d get money, somehow. Maybe the old man would come through with a child-support payment; maybe she’d find a better job and take her kid and move to a new town. Start a new life.

Yeah, she thought desultorily. Maybe I’ll win the lottery and marry Donald Trump.

Rocky got her purse. She stood before the mirror, fiddling with a strand of hair, gave herself a good looking over and headed for the door. The kid had planted himself stomach-down on the floor in front of the old black-and-white TV. The tuner was shot, so the picture faded in and out. Judi was rocking herself gently in the recliner, staring at the TV and rocking, her slender legs barely moving as she stared and rocked. It isn’t her clothes that make her look older, Judi decided, but she said only, “Any word from the cops? About your little girl?”

Judi shook her head. She said, “But one of the detectives told me something I still can’t believe. He said they arrested a woman for selling her daughter so she could buy crack. Cocaine. Can you believe that?” She looked up at Rocky, her eyes red and glistening around the edges. “How could anybody do such a thing?” She looked away.

Rocky stared at her a long moment. She’d heard of women like that, women who beat their children senseless for crying too much, women who gave away their children or starved them to teach them God’s love or stayed married to wife beaters and kid beaters because they didn’t know what to do. Fearful women. Selfish. Women who were crazy.

“I don’t know how anybody could do that,” Rocky finally answered. “I guess they don’t know any better. Or they just don’t care.”

Then she opened the door and stepped out into the night.

—

Later, much later, Rocky was back at the door, trying to fit the key into the lock. It wouldn’t work right, and she hoped she remembered to tell the landlord to fix the damn porch light so she could see what she was doing.

She got the door open. The end-table lamp was on. The TV was watching over the room like a dead, gray eye, nothing but interference crossing the screen. Judi was not in the La-Z-Boy.

The kid wasn’t in bed.

A little sigh of exasperation whistled through Rocky’s lips. She dropped her keys, her purse, just dropped them there at the door, and stalked across the room to the bathroom.

She called to him.

But he wasn’t in the bathroom. He wasn’t under the card table. The closet. Under the bed; he wasn’t there either.

He wasn’t in the apartment.

Suddenly, Rocky had no feeling in her body. Thoughts jumped into her head, each more terrifying than the one before. Her gaze flitted, bat-like, around the room. A note was lying on the end table. It was held in place by Judi’s touchstone – no, it looked like the touchstone. But it was smaller somehow, and dull, its luster used up. Rocky snatched the piece of paper; the stone clattered against the base of the lamp with an awful ringing sound.

The note read: Please I’m sorry Touch the stone youll know what to do.

The note slipped from her fingers. It see-sawed through the air and ticked against the cracked linoleum. Rocky’s gaze wandered aimlessly and unfocused, until it fell upon the stone.

She took it in her hand.

A current snapped from the stone, shocking her, but she could not let it go. The room began to sway – no, she was swaying, careening, toppling drunkenly onto the bed. Weird images fizzled and popped behind her eyelids. She was seeing through somebody else’s eyes. She heard echoes of thoughts and emotions, fading, then gaining in volume, like the sounds of a party drifting across the night. She felt pinches of physical sensation. Judi. Judi’s eyes. Judi’s thoughts. Judi’s body. It was as if some residue of Judi were in the stone, and by touching it Rocky had allowed whatever was there to enter her mind.

It is a night months in the past, and Rocky can see and feel Judi going into the run-down basement apartment she rents, and the place is deserted, the woman who was babysitting her daughter gone, her daughter gone, and only the woman’s touchstone remains, a taunt, a watchdog, something more than a stone. A spike of emotions – confusion, panic, dread – scrambles the image. It returns. Judi is holding the stone. Somehow, it is communicating to her; the past – vague images of an endless succession of women who have held the stone before; the future – what Judi must do. And Judi is thinking, Yes, yes, anything for my child. So she takes the stone and, following its mysterious imperatives, unbuttons her jeans and slides it up into her. Rocky can feel its smooth warmth inside Judi, as if it were made to fit that orifice. The warmth spreads along her nerve endings and the sensation is both repulsive and erotic. She feels it burrowing deeper, the warmth intensifying, her unwilling receptiveness to it sending it deeper still. There are other sensations: friction and sliding and a thick fluid filling her, so that she looks down and sees a black, slimy substance flowing out of her. Ropes of the stuff slither up her arms, down her legs, across her stomach, building upon itself until a shape begins to form, almost human but almost something else. She feels pressure on her shoulders, rough and unyielding, as huge hands pin her to the floor. And then … and then the pressure builds in her, the warmth replaced by scalding heat. Her legs twitch apart as a reflex to the pain and it is too much and she tries to scream, but her muscles spasm uselessly. She thinks her spine is splitting. She knows it is splitting, right down the middle, and boiling water is sluicing up the raw nerves of the spinal cord to explode inside her brain in exquisite agony.

The vision mercifully fades. Others appear and retreat like ghosts on the old black-and-white TV. One quick picture: Judi, lying on the floor, legs apart, body throbbing, simultaneously amazed and sickened to be alive. The touchstone is lying between her legs, and when she touches it she is stung, only this time the transfer is not from stone to flesh. She feels something flow out of her and into it, a reservoir in the odious thing beginning to fill, a spark of energy.

The scene blurs. Others from the months to follow whip past, the threat of the stone continuing to grow, until the near-present swims into focus. Rocky sees herself leaving for work earlier that day. Judi is fingering the touchstone, and it is huge now and alive and crawling with a strange power. The image dissolves and is replaced by another. The kid is lying on his stomach watching TV, a “Blue’s Clues” rerun. Judi’s stare moves from door to closet to window, as if in anticipation of something. “Well?” she asks. “Where are you?” The touchstone lies in her palm like a fat tick, gorged on … what? Blood? No, but some part of her, something more elemental than blood. The kid looks up, puzzled, and mumbles, “Huh?” She hushes him. Then, “Where are you? I’ve done what I was supposed to do. The stone is ready. And I’ve got a fair trade.” Rocky can taste her fear, intermingling with hope and desperation.

Rocky can feel her tired soul.

Flicker. Another scene. The kid is clutching her arm. He whimpers, “I’m scared, Judi. I want Mom,” and she can see the fear crawling in his eyes. The front door bangs open. The kid lets out a piping little shriek. A plague of shadows slithers into the apartment, sliding up the walls and around the furniture in sinuous tendrils of black. The kid sinks his fingers into Judi’s arms. The lights are on but the room is suddenly mausoleum dark. The kid is screaming, screaming, and incredibly, Judi is pushing him away from her, giving him to the shadows, and then Rocky hears herself screaming, summoning all her rage and terror, until the shadows envelope everything and the image fades.

Lights, again. The TV is babbling. A little girl is standing in the doorway. Judi’s little girl. A line of spit is about to drip from her chin. Judi sucks in a breath and chokes. Her joy, her anguish are like a punch in the stomach. She exclaims, “Oh! Oh God!” The image becomes grainy. Whatever of Judi is left in the stone is waning. Judi rushes across the room. The connection unravels. Now only fragments of images come to Rocky. Judi scribbling the note. Judi leaving the stone. Judi hurrying down a poorly lit sidewalk, the girl dangling from her arms. A bus, somewhere, wheezing to a halt. Judi climbing aboard. Gone.

Rocky opened her eyes. She felt a tear slide down her cheek and catch at the corner of her mouth. The TV hissed in the background. Her heart thumped irregularly, like a piece of machinery about to break down.

The touchstone was lying next to her, on the bedspread. She raised a limp finger to touch it, but hesitated, her instincts battling with reason.

Eventually, she did what she thought she had to do.

—

“Rocky? You sure you’re up to this?” the woman asked, spooning another egg into the saucepan of boiling water. “You look like hell, if you don’t mind me saying.”

The woman’s name was Lisa. She was a cocktail waitress at a downtown strip joint. She had a son, Bobby.

“I’m all right. I was up all night,” Rocky lied.

“It’s OK if you don’t want to bother,” Lisa said. The kitchen table was littered with squeeze bulbs of food coloring, a bottle of vinegar, and bowls. “I can get him some of those candy Easter eggs and a chocolate rabbit – God knows he’d rather have that stuff anyway instead of this,” she said, indicating the pan on the stove. “But the money. …”

“No. Really,” Rocky said. “I don’t mind. I’m just a little tired. The cops, they – they – “

Lisa’s frown was full of sympathy. “No luck, huh?”

Rocky shook her head. She hated herself. All these lies.

Lisa snorted. “God! I hope they find the creep. I hope you get your kid back. Your ex – he must’ve been a real shithead.”

“Yes,” Rocky agreed.

“If my ex-husband ever tries that shit, I’ll – I’ll – “ She feigned a right hook. And then she was collecting her car keys and purse and jacket.

“Now don’t give Aunt Rocky a hard time,” she shouted into the next room, where Bobby was watching TV.

Rocky slid her hand into her jacket and grasped the touchstone. Thankfully, it took nothing from her. Lately, she hadn’t been sure she could give any more. But it was fully alive now, throbbing with power. It was ready to be … it was ready. It occurred to Rocky that a few hours from now, Lisa would probably be hearing these thoughts. She wondered if she should apologize. Maybe not. Any woman who truly loved her child would do what Rocky was about to do. Lisa would understand, wouldn’t she?

“You give Aunt Rocky a hard time, mister, and I’ll – I’ll – “

Hock his fanny to the boogeyman, Rocky thought dejectedly.

Lisa snorted again. “I don’t know what I’ll do,” she yelled. “But you won’t like it, mister.”

The kid grunted in reply.

Lisa rolled her eyes in apparent disgust and left. Rocky locked the door behind her and went back to the kitchen. Water gurgled sluggishly in the saucepan and a column of steam gathered into a fog bank beneath the range hood. Bobby shuffled in and took a seat at the table. He said, “Can we start doing the eggs now?”

“Not yet,” Rocky answered. “They’re not cooked.” She checked the burner and turned up the heat. The water seemed to boil a little more vigorously.

“I don’t like being alone all the time. Why won’t Mommy take me to her job with her?” Bobby asked, and Rocky’s heart sank when she started to give him the same answer she’d given her own kid a few months before. God, it had been a thousand years since he’d … been gone, but in a little while, just a little while longer, she’d have him back and the problem would be in somebody else’s lap.

Lisa’s, she reminded herself grimly. How can I do this to Lisa?

“I like Mommy,” Bobby said, absently tapping the vinegar bottle with a spoon. “Don’t you?”

Rocky started to say yes but the word caught on something in her throat. She pretended to stir eggs. She wondered when it would end, this passing along of misery and fear to women who already dealt with more than their share of those things on a day-to-day basis, and she wondered if anybody would ever have the courage to say no, to sacrifice their sanity and possibly the only thing they loved in the world to break the lineage of pain. She wondered if she could do such a thing, and her soul flinched at the thought of it. She wondered if she could stand to live with herself for having done such a thing. Probably not. But she wondered how she would cope with the alternative.

“I like you too,” Bobby said, with the earnestness of a little kid. “But I think I like my mommy a little bit more.” He pinched a paper-thin slice of air with his thumb and forefinger. “This much more,” he explained.

Rocky stared at without seeing the boiling water. It was raging now, and a caul of foam had collected at the top. She didn’t know what to do, and it seemed she had never known what to do, even when the choices were clearly laid out for her, and maybe that was why she had fallen into this predicament. She fingered the touchstone and it felt soft and diseased and overripe, so much unlike the hard little pellet Judi had left for her.

“Aunt Rocky? Do you hear something?” Bobby said uncertainly.

The water was boiling and the foam was spilling over the side of the pan and flashing into steam as it cascaded over the burner. The eggs bounced in the turbulence, their shells clicking together like little teeth snapping.

“Aunt Rocky?”

Foam and scalding water flowed down onto the burner. Rocky fingered the touchstone and thought of women who sell their babies to buy cocaine. She didn’t know what to do.

“Aunt Rocky,” Bobby said, his voice a squeaky whisper. “I think I hear something. Outside.”

Her fingers formed a cage around the touchstone. She thought of women who beat their children senseless –

“Somebody’s outside, trying to get in!” Bobby insisted breathlessly.

 – women who give away their children because they no longer love them –

“Somebody’s trying to get in, Aunt Rocky!”

– women who starve their children –

“Aunt Rocky! Aunt Rocky! Somebody’s – “

– women who stay married to their wife beaters and their child beaters because they don’t know what to do –

“I want Mommy!”

– and all the women who aren’t like that –

The saucepan was a volcano of steam and foam. Rocky snatched the touchstone from her pocket and held it above the hissing cauldron – Here you go, bastard – and started to let it drop.

            She heard, rather, she felt the word NO whistle past her ear, seeming to grind through her body, and then every window in the place exploded inward, every light bulb detonated like a rifle shot, and something darker than the sudden night brushed by her, a shadowy, sinister touch that chilled her to the bone, and snatched the touchstone from her fingers.

Then Bobby was wailing for his mommy, and from the living room another small voice, achingly familiar, began calling for his mother too.

About the author:

Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”

Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.

As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.

Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .

THE CLOSET

A short horror story

By Del Stone Jr.

—

Introduction

This story violates one of the big rules of horror – never place a child in peril.

Which is odd. I see movies do it all the time. “Pet Sematary” anyone?

Be that as it may, in 1982, which is when I am guessing I wrote the first version of this story, I didn’t know about a prohibition against placing children in peril. I wrote what I thought was a scary story. (Actually it’s not so much a story as a vignette, but again I’m splitting hairs.)

Even in 1991, when I obviously revised the story after Operation Desert Storm, I didn’t know about such a prohibition. I didn’t start selling professionally until 1992 and it was then I learned about the no-kids-in-peril rule.

These days, with demon-possessed children, zombified children, vampiric children and God alone knows what else horror moviemakers do to kids, I think this story, about a boogeyman that may or may not be in the protagonist’s imagination, will be OK.

Who knows? Maybe it’ll influence some irresponsible parent into being a better Mom or Dad.

One can hope.

—

THE CLOSET

There. She heard it again, recognition sinking in with an ache, the voice touching her like a stone cast into a deep, dark pool. That small voice calling against the torrents of dark that had come spilling over the apartment as afternoon slumbered into twilight. He called that way every night, lately. Something had changed in the boy. He was afraid.

Aereal wrapped herself against the cold crouching at the edge of her thoughts. The apartment seemed big. Too big. And empty. Max filled the place, made it a home – when he was here. He took away the cathedral silence, the echo that lurked at the edge of every sound she and Kelly made, and filled the place so that it seemed too small for the three of them. Until the next six months when he’d be gone.

“Momee.”

Blink.

His voice dug at her. She moved without thought across the living room, her feet tracing a quiet, susurrating path through the deep, blonde carpet.

Where the hell is Qatar anyway?

Mother had warned her. Ever wise, mother, with that patronizing, self-satisfied I-told-you-so smile, her eyes glittering with an almost predator smugness. “Mark my words,” she’d said. “You’ll regret setting up house with that young man. His line of work? You’ll be lucky if you see him three months out of the year. He may be a good man, but that isn’t everything, Aereal. You know? I’m talking about companionship. How will you ever get to know a man who’ll be gone as often as he will? How will you ever know what he’s up to?”

Mark my words. …

The memory of her mother faded. Aereal was standing in the hallway, a huge tunnel of dark. Somewhere at the end of that pit was her son. Her hand automatically went to the light switch.

Oh, it hasn’t been that bad, she tried to tell herself. The longest he’d been gone was what? Six months? Eight months? Not like some of those husbands who go remote for a year or more. And after this Qatar thing he was supposed to get an assignment stateside.

“Momee!”

Blink.

She said in a hushed voice, “Yes, kiddo. I’m coming.”

It hadn’t been that bad. She had the Military Wives meeting on Thursday night, and the batik classes.

Kelly had come along somewhere between Panama and Dakar, she thought. Wasn’t it odd she couldn’t remember … only five years ago. And thank God Max had gotten extended leave to stay with her that first six months. Otherwise, she couldn’t have done it. Not alone.

I don’t want to depend on him so much.

She closed her eyes.

But I need him.

And Kelly. Lying here in the dark. Didn’t he need his father too? Because they were both afraid; she had tried to convince herself otherwise, had tried to deny the fact with distractions and phony bravado, but even through the most elaborate curtains of self-duplicity she could still see a light of fear burning, a fear of being left alone.

“Momee!”

Her fingers curled around the door jamb, finding the light switch and flicking it on. She raised her hand against the sudden brilliance and hurried into the room, shielding her eyes. The boy began to emerge from under the covers.

“Momee?”

At first she only saw a blonde thatch of hair, flattened on the sides and tousled into a chaos of curls on the top. Eight fingers, then all ten gripped the top of the bedspread as it were a trapdoor into which he would flee.

All at once, Aereal was filled with awe, and a helpless, crazy love. Had she and Max really made this perfect creation?

“Momee, Momee – ”

The tightness in his expression was working out, shifting and smoothing to relief, then love. She felt herself going soft and helpless. She sat on the edge of the mattress. Kelly reached out, took her hand and gazed at her.

“Momee, I saw a monster. In the closet. A real monster.”

Aereal smiled and let out a pent-up breath.

Blink.

A monster. She knew the feeling.

“It was a big one,” he added, his head bobbing in an exaggerated nod. “In the closet.”

She began running her fingers through his hair, straightening the curls.

He’s too young to look like Max. Yet … she stared hard. Those eyes … she blinked and smiled.

“And why would there be a monster in the closet?” she said softly.

“I saw it.”

“And what did this monster look like?”

The boy began to think; his forehead drew lines of concentration. When he spoke, it was in a slow, careful voice, as if he were describing an image that might change if the words didn’t come out just right.

“It was big … very big … like a gorilla. And it was hairy, and it had all these sharp teeth with gooky stuff dripping off. And its face was all yucky and ugly.”

He paused.

“And it had big yellow eyes that glowed in the dark.”

Areal chuckled to herself. Sounds like your father when he gets up in the morning.

“ – as big as a monster. And he’s in there right now, Momee.”

Aereal stood up, walked over to the closet. Kelly squealed, “No, Momee! It’s in there! An’ it’ll eat you all up!”

She held up a hand, shushed him and smiled. When she spoke, her voice was like fingers running through his soft hair.

“I want to show you something.”

She pulled the closet door open. The boy gasped.

Blink.

Izod shirts; neat, unmoving rows of Hagar slacks for boys; Levis; Ocean Pacific; Roos shoes; a plastic ‘65 Mustang which, if the battery hadn’t gone dead, could shine its headlights – ”right into your eyes and probably blind you,” or so Max had said, quoting Aereal’s mother when she had given it to Kelly.

“See? No monsters.” Aereal smiled.

Blink.

No monsters. Not in the closet.

She saw the terror going out of him, saw him fill with bafflement, as if she had pulled off some arcane magic trick.

“There never was a monster,” she explained. “There’s no such thing as monsters.”

The boy looked confused. “But I saw – ”

“You had a bad dream.”

And his eyes seemed to say: a dream?

She went to his side and took his hand. “A dream. You dreamed it. There’s no such thing as monsters. Besides, how could a monster the size of a big, hair gorilla fit inside your closet?” She giggled and cuffed his chin. He smiled uneasily. “That teeny-weeny closet? Why, a monster would squash himself to death trying to fit in there.”

The boy smiled broadly, a spontaneous grin that said all was understood. Aereal bent, kissed his forehead, her lips barely brushing his cooling flesh as he dodged shyly.

He’s so small. She stood, a thread of unease pulling at the corners of her smile. God, I wish Max were here.

“Now you go to sleep, young man. And I don’t want to hear any more nonsense about monsters – or this’ll be the last time you eat Showbiz pizza before bedtime.”

“Does pizza make you have bad dreams?”

“Sometimes spicy food makes you have bad dreams, yes. So if you see another monster, it’ll just be the singing gorilla you saw at Showbiz.”

Blink.

“`Night, Momee.”

He was pulling the covers up around his neck, wriggling beneath the sheets in a boneless squirm. She slid the closet door shut, paused at the bedroom door, and whispered, “Good night! Sleep tight! Don’t let the bed bugs bite!” The boy giggled. Then she turned out the light.

The darkness lunged at her, grabbing her and threatening to swallow her. She frowned. Had she turned off the living room lamp? It seemed darker. She felt another tickle of disquiet stir inside her, something she couldn’t quite scratch. She touched a finger to the wall and traced her way along the hall. Then she was walking on carpet, in light, and she let out a tiny, keening sigh of relief.

Where the hell is Qatar? When is he coming – no, don’t think about it anymore. There’s no point making yourself miserable … more miserable.

She curled into the La-Z-Boy. A Time magazine hung over the armrest. She curled her feet beneath her and began to rock … gently. The magazine plopped to the floor, the pages flipping open to a photograph of Saddam Hussein, still in power, shaking a defiant fist at the rest of the world.

Blink.

“I am not built for solitude,” she whispered to herself. She crossed her arms and tried to squeeze warmth into her. I thought I could deal with it … all those other wives who hold down the fort while the troops are off in some God-forsaken little stinkhole country. How in God’s name do they stand it? Aren’t they in love?

Darkness seeped in around the window panes and beneath the door. Across the room it took the form of a mist, coming no closer than the light.

Can they turn it off, like I could turn off this lamp? She did not move her head; her eyes rotated in their sockets until she was staring at the shade. She reached for the lamp switch –

Where the hell is Qatar? Where the hell is Max?

“Momee!”

 – and snatched her hand away as if it had been bitten.

Did I make a mistake, or am I just being selfish? Oh God, why couldn’t Mother have just kept her mouth shut … putting those thoughts in my head. Christ! Why can’t I be sure of myself? So he’s gone six months out of the year … eight months … that’s OK. Not great but OK. I should be able to cope. If it weren’t for these … fears? Qatar. Tank traps and mustard gas and Scuds. Maybe something will happen. Maybe I won’t be able to handle it.

She squinted against a sob. There were tears here, somewhere. She felt them oozing into focus, as everything else began to slip out of focus.

“MOMEE!”

I love Max. She flipped on the TV. CNN was airing a feature story. But damn it, I need him here … with me … God, I’m too small for this loneliness. I can’t beat it –

“MOMEE!”

Blink.

CNN broke into its broadcast with a telephone report from correspondent Peter Arnett. Explosions were occurring over Baghdad. Aereal’s blood turned to slush. Something whipped out of her, a shout of fear, blind and unintentional. She blinked uncomprehendingly, shook her head, and yelled, “Kelly! What is it?”

“MOMEETHE MONSTER IS BACK! THESHOWBIZMONSTERHE’SGONNAGETME – ”

Something serrated and feral, a growl, took the darkness at the end of the hall and ripped it to shreds, mixing the pieces into something darker and more terrifying.

Blink.

What in the name of God was that?

“MAW – ”

The wall thudded, the sound of something soft and ripe splattering against hard sheetrock.

Bombs were falling over Baghdad.

Horror drove through Aereal like a knife. It penetrated every nerve, every muscle, until it engulfed her body, finding all the soft parts, snaking around her throat in reptile bands of tightness, squeezing, squeezing –

Blink.

I can’t breath –

She moved with surreal slowness. The living room seemed to flicker out of focus. A wall came at her and she grabbed it.

And then she screamed.

She ran into the hall, felt the scream come back at her from crazy angles, rebounding from the pits of shadow in terror-filled pulses. The hallway seemed to unwind into a tunnel, a throat, ringed with cartlidge, swallowing her. She ran; she tripped and stumbled.

Blink.

She crashed into the door. The knob hit her between the ribcage and pelvis. It drove the wind from her, sent spangles of raw pain thumping up through the middle of her brain, the burning trails momentarily erasing thought.

Blink.

She winced and lunged at the door knob, attacking it, twisting and battering at the door until it gave way and she stumbled into the room.

Blink.

An ingot of pallid light fell through the thick, greasy air. Aereal raised herself on one elbow, grabbed a corner of the bedspread and tried to haul herself up. The bed started to pull itself away from the wall but she was up, overbalancing, toppling toward the sheets. Momentum drove her face-first into the mattress.

It squished.

Blink.

“Kelly?”

The bed was empty. From the living room she could hear the tinny CNN announcer saying: bombs, air strikes, bombs, air strikes. … Terror settled over her like rigor mortis, clotting her thoughts. She forgot to breath. Her hands scuttled automatically, pulling at the sheets, which were heavy, reluctant, slicked down in. …

Blink.

What?

Oily and black, like tar, in the half-light. She held up her hand and stared at the palm, stared into it as if something were crawling beneath the flesh, stared glassy-eyed as a reddish-black drop oozed across the palm, gathered at the lip of her hand and then dripped, splashing against the Ninja Turtles on Kelly’s pillowcase.

Blink.

“KELLY!”

Blink.

Blink.

Blink.

Her terror multiplied three-fold, four-fold, became something primal and uncontrollable, something she could not understand. It was beyond Kelly now. Beyond Max. Beyond any fear she had known. And it was growing.

Blink.

 – Max –

Blink.

 – Kelly –

Blink.

 – me –

She began to scream. It seemed to peel her, diminish her, make her smaller and more vulnerable. So the cold could creep in. The terror.

Behind her, the closet door began to slide open.

About the author:

Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”

Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.

As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.

Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .

Image courtesy of PickPik by way of a Creative Commons license.

TELEPHONE CALL

A short horror story

By Del Stone Jr.

—

Introduction

“Telephone Call” is one of my earlier horror stories, written in 1982 or thereabouts.

I was in love with the genre. Stephen King had brought new luster to horror with books like “’Salem’s Lot” and “The Shining,” but there were others, too – Whitley Streiber, Dennis Etchison and Anne Rice, to name a few. It seemed horror was the fashionable thing to read.

I remember wanting this story to be well-written. I labored over every sentence, struggling to imbue the prose with vivid imagery and realistic dialogue. What I accomplished was something far different.

When I read this story now I cringe, because I see I violated John Carley’s rule.

Who, you’re asking, is John Carley?

He was a columnist who wrote for the newspaper I worked for, a retired Army general and a super nice guy. We had lunch one day after I had begun writing a weekly column of my own, and he told me something about writing I’ve never forgotten:

He said that one day I’d know all the big words and would see the beauty of the small words.

You can see that lack of understanding in “Telephone Call” because it is shot through with big words and even bigger writing when something less would have done a better job. They call this “overwriting” and it’s a problem I’ve struggled with my entire writing career. Whenever I write anything I have to go back and slay slay slay my little darlings.

Finally, now, at age 68, I understand what John Carley was trying to tell me. I don’t feel bad about that; some people never learn.

So I now present to you this cautionary tale about overwriting – “Telephone Call.” Not a bad little horror story and certainly in the old gotcha style of horror storytelling, but yes, overwritten.

That’s the way things were for me in 1982.

—

TELEPHONE CALL

Light, swimming out of the nether-darkness like fluorescent goldfish, rattling their gill plates and incandescent scales and luminous, translucent fins, then corkscrewing back into that black plasma. Motes of incandescence, gathering just beyond reach, receding into the black hole of the subconscious. Inertia-less acceleration. He is drawn into that eddy of self. …

Brrring.

The cyclone is fractured – scattered under the weight of its own spin. Light dispersed into hazy shoals of anemic brilliance that spread across his subconscious field of vision like a rainbow sheen of oil on brackish water.

Brrring.

A pinprick of dawning awareness gnaws at his wounded reality. And there is perception of another impression, black and unwelcome. The sensation is discomforting. He attempts to subdue it.

Brrring.

The light fades.

Brrring.

His world collapses.

—

When Larry awakened, he didn’t know where he was.

Brrring.

A sound he thought he recognized … something he had heard on countless occasions – so often, in fact, that now, here in the dark, he was confounded by its familiarity and could not attach meaning to it.

Brrring.

God, the phone, asshole. With a focal point to which he could anchor himself and gather in memory, understanding returned to him – in disconnected snatches. His room – the unfamiliar shapes of a chest of drawers, book shelves, nightstand, filling in the gloom, giving the shadows substance – he remembered. The new apartment (in that exclusive building) Mom and Dad said he’d never be able to afford (He’d tell them about the promotion tomorrow, maybe …).

Brrring.

The telephone rang again, a rakish, shrill intrusion of obscene noise that violated the pre-dawn calm. He groaned, struggled to shift his weight from a numb shoulder. The radium leer of the clock said 2:47.

“Ohhh … oh Gawd …” he moaned. “Who in Christ’s name cou’ be callin’ this time o’ night – uh – mornin’ – ahhh — whatever. …”

Brrring.

A memory flared, a speck of light against a slate-gray wall, then shrank to a dull ember.

“Do – do I have to answer it?” And he tried to suppress a shudder. Once before, on a night that would forever remain stamped upon his brain, he had heard those same words spoken in equally harmless context – his mother had said it – when they were calling her from the plant down on Chillicuth to tell her that Dad had lost his right hand in a contour stamper while working the graveyard shift and could she please be at the emergency ward waiting room at Jonquil Medical in half an hour, that yes, he was quite all right, and what? No, he wasn’t in shock, although he’s looked better at times, that the doctor said he could go home in a few days and would eventually he’d be good as new. Well, almost.

Brrring.

Good as new. As much as a one-handed man could feel.

The memory was sour; it filled Larry with a disquieting sense of unease. He told himself: Yes. I got to. …

While asleep, he had wound the bedcovers about him into a linen sarcophagus. Now, as he peeled away the layers his warmth evaporated, was replaced by a chill that seemed to work its way beneath the flesh, down, down, into the marrow itself. He shivered.

Brrring.

He swung his feet off the bed. The shock of standing jarred him; blood coursed to his numb legs in a stinging tide that made him think: My God, am I getting old? He grabbed the door jamb to support himself, sighed, started to reach for the light switch and then thought better of it.

“No, no … don’t turn that damn thing on – ”

Brrring.

“Awright, awright,” he muttered. “I’m coming – I think.”

The bedroom opened onto an abbreviated hallway that fed into the kitchen and, ultimately, the living room. Larry knew the floorplan of the apartment well enough – had had every virtue pointed out to him by the agent who had shown him the unit. It wasn’t as if he were committing himself to unfamiliar territory.

Still … something was different. Something to which he could not attach a name. The air was oppressively heavy – humid, perhaps; it seemed charged with a … mood, or a presence that he couldn’t identify. The hall looked forbidding, festooned with mottled patches of wan, pale light reflected through the bedroom window and variegated strips of nebulous shadow. The doorways to the kitchen and living room were bottomlessly and uncomprisingly black. They concealed from him their interiors, their secrets.

Larry couldn’t name the faint stirring that was working inside him, but he did know that now, here, in the dark, turning on the lights hadn’t been such a bad idea, that he wanted them on –

Oh, for Christ’s sake! You’re acting like a goddamn kid! The thought again sent him remembering his boyhood, and lying awake late at night in the changed-over attic bedroom he and his older brother had shared, listening to Roy, who was all the time telling him, “And if you’re not asleep by eleven, you know, Loogey (that was his nickname), the boogerman comes with his boogerdogs, and he pries open the window downstairs,” (Here, he would furnish appropriate sound effects) “CREAK, CREAK, CREAK – and he comes down the hall until he gets to your bedroom door (‘Please Roy … it’s dark’) and he peeks through the door (‘Roy!’) and … HE GETS YOU!” He remembered how he had lain in heart-thudding terror, watching the very same alarm clock he had glanced at only moments before, praying he would be asleep before eleven.

Jeez … whatever happened to. …

(He wished fear could again be reduced to the simple common denominator of a boogerman, as it had been for him as a child.)

Brrring.

The sound jolted him out of his reverie, brought a new chill. A part of him still wanted the lights on, but stubbornness and adult pride and just a hint of shame forced him to wade into the soupy, nocturnal gloom (his arms outstretched, his hands crawling along the walls that should have by now become familiar to him but for some reason defied intimacy, for some reason felt alien and unnatural – as if they were …).

Brrring.

“Yeah, I’m coming!” And he thought: What’s that? The fifteenth ring? The twentieth? Shit! Why don’t the guy hang up and call back tomorrow?

Still, the phone had rung that way the night they called about –

Larry quickened his pace, and jammed his toe against the hall sideboard. He felt it strike wood, heard the lip-curling thud of flesh and bone suddenly compacted, and waited for the aftershock of pain.

Brrring.

“Ohhh, Goddammit! All right, all right!” Muttering imprecations, he turned into the dark kitchen, blindly flogged empty space. It seemed larger than he had noticed. Stupid damn idiot. Too late, he saw something loom out of the murk (a phantom shape that made his breath catch in his throat), and banged his head against a Club aluminum pan dangling from the wrought-iron rack. This set off a cacophony of clankings and rattlings among the other pots and pans hanging there that pierced the darkness, made him somehow feel vulnerable. Angrily, he snapped on the light switch and waited impatiently for the muttering fluorescents to sputter into life. (They did so with a delicate, chime-like sound, and filled the kitchen with ghostly, blue-white light.) The phone was snugged up against the wall, flush with the cabinets. He grabbed the receiver before it could ring again.

“Yeah. H’lo?”

“Lawrence J. Crockett?” The voice was dry, harsh, the sound of winter branches scraping against roofing shingles on a cold, windy evening. It rang of some terrible authority.

“Yeah, uhhh, yes, this is Larry Crockett,” he answered warily. “Whaddya want?”

“Lawrence J. Cockett of Gabled Arms Condominiums, Unit 3-C?”

Larry winced, held the receiver away from his ear. The caller had a peculiar way of enunciating each syllable so that it seemed to “click.” Words that might have been shaped by a fleshless mouth, Larry mused. They elicted various distasteful images that he refused to speculate about any further – at least not here, in the quasi-dark.

“Telephone number 234-2444?”

“Yes. Yes it is.” He frowned. Dumbass. Isn’t that the number used to get me?

“Mr. Cockett, I need to meet with you.”

Larry stared at the wall. Meet with me? A maelstrom of conflicting emotions whirled through his head. The first, and most distinct, was dread. Dread, followed by indignant anger (The gall of this bastard. What does he mean, calling me at three o’clock in the morning –). Lastly, there was curiosity. …

“What? Who – who is this, anyway?”

The line was silent a moment. Then, with dire calm: “This is Death calling, Mr. Crockett. I need to meet with you.”

Fear – the squirmy, nameless kind of fear a pseron might feel if he ever reached out into the darkness from the warmth and safety of his bed and encountered something cool and pliant that twitched beneath his touch – settled in Larry’s spine. He listened in fascinated horror, then slammed the receiver back onto its hook.

“A prank,” he whispered breathlessly to his fluttering heart. He grinned at his reflection in the glass-fronted china cabinet, took a breath. “That’s all it was. A prank.”

Brrring.

His heart missed a beat, then hitched into a loud yammering of sledgehammer blows.

He couldn’t have redialed that quickly.

“Hello?”

“I need to meet with you –”

“Leave me alone,” Larry cut in, a ragged edge of panic in his voice. “Leave me alone. Get off my telephone or I’ll call the police.” A person in the adjoining apartment thumped on the dining room wall and shouted for silence; Larry jumped. “Leave me alone!”

“I need to meet –”

He hung up, half-walked half-staggered into the kitchen where the light was better, and snatched a Dixie cup from the dispenser.

God! What’s the matter with you, Lar? You’re shaking like a goddamn schoolgirl on prom night. The Dixie cup quivered in his hand. Calm down, my man. Hell! You were spooked before you even picked up the damn telephone. He went to the refrigerator, jerked it open. The profile of his face was framed against a black background with spectral light. Where’s the orange juice? There isn’t any goddamned orange juice. He crushed the cup; shingles of wax flaked off into his palm. Then he dropped it into the trashcan and brushed his hands.

Get a grip on yourself. …

He stared at the phone as if it were a living thing, as if at any moment it might disengage itself from the wall and come stalking him.

I don’t think he’s gonna call ba –

Brrring.

Leave me alone.

Brrring.

Leave me alone!

Brrring.

Brrring.

Brrring.

The telephone was ringing. He let it go five minutes, ten, then fifteen; between each bell he held his breath, prayed the next would not come.

And when it became too much for him – when the ringing had pried its way into his brain and he began hearing bells even when the telephone was not ringing and he knew he must answer it or tear it off the wall – he worked up the courage, the anger, to storm across the kitchen –

– Wait –

He stopped, hand on receiver.

Brrring.

The phone quivered within his grasp.

Maybe – maybe you’ve been going about this all wrong. … He leaned against the counter, wrapped his arms about himself as if he would squeeze out a thought. His features were creased with a concerned frown. Humor the kook and maybe he’ll leave you alone. Maybe. Give it a try. You let ’im know you’re scared and he’ll be calling back all night, the shit.

Brrring.

He turned to the telephone, lifted the receiver from its hook (thinking: Be cool, now) and said, “Hello?”

“Mr. Crockett? I need to meet with you, Mr. Crockett. I need to meet with you, Mr. Crockett. I need to meet with you, Mr. Crockett.”

Larry’s skin crawled, as if an invisible hand had pressed frigid fingers against the base of his spine. He swallowed hard. That – that voice. There was no dealing with it. It evoked … images. Flesh stripped away, revealing the intricate ridges of vales – the convoluted topography of a skull. Cavernous eye sockets. Blank, yet somehow seeing. Not so much as a hint of cartilage about the nose. And those awful teeth, clicking and snapping as words chattered through them with the sound of a tree branch being raked across the rotten slats of some weather-blistered picket fence, clinging to the mandible and maxilla long after the gums had peeled away.

A voice from the grave.

Larry felt his gorge rising. His strategies were seared to fly ash and blown from memory, leaving him defenseless again.

“Look,” he spoke into the mouthpiece. The words came out coated with chalk. “This has been loads of fun – I’m sure you’ve enjoyed yourself – but I think we oughta call it a night, you know?” Oh God, what are doing? Don’t encourage him to say anything! Very quickly, he continued. “I mean, uh, I’ve had a rough tday and all that and I’m really worn out, you know, and I gotta get up early in the morning and to work, so could you please … please … just. …”

A brief silence. Then, “Mr. Crockett, I need to meet – ”

“GODDAMMIT NO! NO! If I have to tear this – this fucking – ” (He had to force the word out.) “– phone off the wall to keep you from calling here, then – then – ” He couldn’t trust himself to speak any further. His anger was evaporating, leaving in its place a residue of fear he would have hated seeing in himself.

“I need to meet with you, Mr. Cockett,” the voice responded with a creaking cadence that set Larry’s teeth on edge. “I need to meet with you.”

“Please. …” He was moaning now.

“I need to meet with you, Mr.Crockett.”

“Please … just leave me alone. Please?”

“Mr. Crockett, I need to meet with you.”

Quietly, almost solemnly, he set the receiver on its hook. If the telephone rang again he would not answer it – not for any reason. He would taking no more calls this evening.

Brrring.

He had expected it, but still his muscles locked. He tried to ignore the sound. He’d let it ring all night. Maybe the guy next door would come over and handle it. Let’s see how good he could do. He wheeled on stick legs and turned off the lights in the dining room and kitchen; darkness crashed down around him like a series of collapsing walls, smothering him in a cyclone of vague, shadowy forms and shapes. His eyes smarted with the afterimage of light.

Brrring.

He set his jaw and waded into the black hell that was the hallway, felt his way along still unfamiliar walls and door moldings.

Brrring.

Ignore it. Just don’t pay any attention to it.

Brrring.

His room: a sinkhole of shadows, funneling in monolithic darkness, implacable and less compromising than he had ever remembered it. This, complemented by flawless silence, stifling and oppressive, not unlike the calm found within a sealed mausoleum. Even the clock was hushed. …

Strange –

He felt his flesh begin to crawl again, felt his skin scrunch up into goosebumps. A cool breath of dread blew against the spot on his back between his shoulder blades; the hairs on his neck came alive like tiny scintilla. He held his breath.

Something was wrong. The telephone had stopped ringing and something was wrong. He knew it just as surely as he knew he was standing there now, terrified beyond articulation, not sure why and wanting only to run and hide, to pull the covers over his eyes and listen to his thumping heart (praying to God it was his heart and not someone – or something – else’s) beating so loudly, wanting desperately to hear Roy chuckle and say, “Come on, kid, stop bawlin’ for Chrissakes – I was just kiddin’. I was just having a little fun. That’s all – all – all. …”

Get into bed.

So close, the sanctuary of the bed. He could just cross the threshold and make his way around the corner of the headboard (Under the sheets and Roy youcansayanythingyouwantonceI’munderthesheetsbecausenoonecanseemeorhurtme – ) –

Something touched him on the shoulder.

He recoiled in italicized horror. The room was already occupied, but not by any childhood boogerman who, after leaving his trusted hounds at the window, had come creeping-crawling up the staircase to spirit him away at the stroke of eleven. No, this was a thing so remorselessly cold that it could hardly be considered alive.

“Hello, Mr. Crockett.”

Larry screamed.

—

UNFINISHED ALTERNATE ENDING

Author’s note: At some point I wrote, or least began, an alternate ending to “Telephone Call.” I don’t remember what I was thinking at the time, but I can guess where I was going with this:

Larry tells the entity on the phone to come on over, then alerts the doorman to approaching undesirable. But what Larry doesn’t know is, the telephone caller has already arrived at his home.

—

Larry blurted, “Come now!” and tried to stifle a malicious giggle. He had had an idea, a foolproof plan, something he knew could not fail, if things worked out the way he expected them to.

The voice said uncertainly, “Are you sure, Mr. Crockett?”

“Yes! Yes!” he answered breathlessly. “Come right now! You know the address?”

“Of course.”

Larry dropped the receiver onto the hook, sprinted across the dining room, the living room (slipping from brilliant light into smoky tendrils of shadow). He found the call box on the wall to the left of the door, jammed his thumb against the button, and shouted, “Fulton! Fulton!” During one of his many conversations with Fulton, he had discovered that the doorman had once worked as a bouncer in a nightclub. If Fulton could delay the man until the police arrived. …

It took a moment. Then came the tinny, metallic response. “Yes sir. Mr.Crockett, is it?”

“Yeah. Lis – ”

“What you doin’ up so late, Mr. Crockett?” the man asked in a paternal tone.

“That’s what I’m trying to explain. Listen: This freak, this pscyho’s been calling my place for the past thirty minutes – really bothering me, you know? At first, I thought it was one of those prank calls. But this guy’s certified nuts. Well anyway, he knows where I live, and he said he was gonna come over – ”

“When’s he s’posed to get here?”

“That’s just it,” Larry said, pressing his mouth as closely to the speaker as he could get it. “He said he was coming over now!”

“Don’t you worry yourself none, Mr. Crockett,” Fulton told him, lapsing into heavily accented black dialect. “I’ll be ready for him.”

“Good. Good. Look, I’m gonna call the police – ”

“Shiiit! Don’t need no cops!” the man growled. “I’ll just get ol’ Fred and that McKinney kid from buildin’ security. We can handle it.”

“Yeah but – but I don’t want this weirdo bothering me anymore. Tonight may be the only chance we’ll have of catching him – ”

“Like I said, Mr. Crockett. Don’t you worry ’bout a thing. We’ll fix it so he don’t bother no one for a long-ass time. You jus’ get yourself back to bed.”

Larry chuckled. “All right, Fulton. Have it your way. And thanks. You’re a lifesaver.”

“I know.” That, with mock indignation.

“I really appreciate this – hey! I’ll buy you and your buddies a drink sometime. OK?”

“I just might take you on the that, Mr. Crockett.”

“Yeah. Well, thanks again.”

“Uh huh. Goodnight, sir.” And the box was silent.

Larry turned away, smiling, and strode across the living room, through the dining room, and into the kitchen.

I wonder what they’re gonna do to him?

He punched on the light over the sink, extracted another Dixie cup from the dispenser. A roach skittered across scuffed linoleum, vanished the stove.

Funny. I thought these apartments were supposed to be clean. The refrigerator door opened with a begrudging sigh. He remembered

—

That’s where the manuscript ended. My expectation is Larry returned to his bedroom, where he encountered Death waiting for him.

About the author:

Del Stone Jr. is a professional fiction writer. He is known primarily for his work in the contemporary dark fiction field, but has also published science fiction and contemporary fantasy. Stone’s stories, poetry and scripts have appeared in publications such as Amazing Stories, Eldritch Tales, and Bantam-Spectra’s Full Spectrum. His short fiction has been published in The Year’s Best Horror Stories XXII; Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine; the Pocket Books anthology More Phobias; the Barnes & Noble anthologies 100 Wicked Little Witch Stories, Horrors! 365 Scary Stories, and 100 Astounding Little Alien Stories; the HWA anthology Psychos; and other short fiction venues, like Blood Muse, Live Without a Net, Zombiesque and Sex Macabre. Stone’s comic book debut was in the Clive Barker series of books, Hellraiser, published by Marvel/Epic and reprinted in The Best of Hellraiser anthology. He has also published stories in Penthouse Comix, and worked with artist Dave Dorman on many projects, including the illustrated novella “Roadkill,” a short story for the Andrew Vachss anthology Underground from Dark Horse, an ashcan titled “December” for Hero Illustrated, and several of Dorman’s Wasted Lands novellas and comics, such as Rail from Image and “The Uninvited.” Stone’s novel, Dead Heat, won the 1996 International Horror Guild’s award for best first novel and was a runner-up for the Bram Stoker Award. Stone has also been a finalist for the IHG award for short fiction, the British Fantasy Award for best novella, and a semifinalist for the Nebula and Writers of the Future awards. His stories have appeared in anthologies that have won the Bram Stoker Award and the World Fantasy Award. Two of his works were optioned for film, the novella “Black Tide” and short story “Crisis Line.”

Stone recently retired after a 41-year career in journalism. He won numerous awards for his work, and in 1986 was named Florida’s best columnist in his circulation division by the Florida Society of Newspaper Editors. In 2001 he received an honorable mention from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his essay “When Freedom of Speech Ends” and in 2003 he was voted Best of the Best in the category of columnists by Emerald Coast Magazine. He participated in book signings and awareness campaigns, and was a guest on local television and radio programs.

As an addendum, Stone is single, kills tomatoes and morning glories with ruthless efficiency, once tied the stem of a cocktail cherry in a knot with his tongue, and carries a permanent scar on his chest after having been shot with a paintball gun. He’s in his 60s as of this writing but doesn’t look a day over 94.

Contact Del at [email protected]. He is also on Facebook, twitter, Pinterest, tumblr, TikTok, and Instagram. Visit his website at delstonejr.com .

Image courtesy of MGM.

“The Haunting” Starring Julie Harris, Claire Bloom, Richard Johnson, Russ Tamblyn, and Lois Maxwell. Directed by Robert Wise. 1 hour, 52 minutes. Rated G. Shudder.

Del’s take

The opening paragraph of Shirley Jackson’s “The Haunting of Hill House,” upon which “The Haunting” is based, may be the finest paragraph of fiction ever written:

“No live organism can continue for long to exist sanely under conditions of absolute reality; even larks and katydids are supposed, by some, to dream. Hill House, not sane, stood by itself against its hills, holding darkness within; it had stood for eighty years and might stand for eighty more. Within, walls continued upright, bricks met neatly, floors were firm, and doors were sensibly shut; silence lay steadily against the wood and stone of Hill House, and whatever walked there, walked alone.”

That paragraph sets the bar for excellence in writing. To match that standard of excellence in another medium, a movie, represents a challenge almost as frightening as the story itself. Robert Wise almost succeeded with “The Haunting,” a scary, atmospheric adaptation of Jackson’s novel released in 1963.

To critique a movie 58 years after the fact seems unfair. Times, people and technology change. By today’s standards “The Haunting” looks silly and shrill. But strip away years of desensitization, computer-generated movie effects and a few evolved cultural standards and “The Haunting” becomes a terrifying excursion into the unknown.

The story is about Eleanor (Julie Harris), in every sense an “old maid” to borrow an expression from that time, who yearns to escape her past. She spent the better part of her adult life caring for her disabled mother and carries a great deal of guilt for not answering her mother’s call for help the night she passed away. When she is invited to participate in a paranormal experiment at Hill House by an anthropologist, Dr. John Markway (Richard Johnson), she takes the family car against her sister’s wishes and drives off into the New England countryside. At Hill House she is joined by a purported psychic, Theodora (Claire Bloom) and young Luke Sanderson (Russ Tamblyn) who is due to inherit the house. The four are besieged by spooky goings-on, including things that go bam bam bam in the night, and ultimately must decide if these are actual events or if they have been primed by the house’s menacing ambiance to imagine them.

Both the book and movie present a question about ambiguity – are there really ghosts at Hill House, as events would suggest, or is poor Eleanor, driven near to madness by a life of caring for her demanding mother while her sister and family go about their lives with purposeful ignorance, simply imagining the voices, loud noises, and sinister airs of that rambling Victorian mansion? One thing is certain: Eleanor is desperate for attention and Hill House gives it to her, and while she seems to recognize the poisonous consequences of that attraction she doesn’t seem to care. She wants to be wanted and she never wants to leave. Hill House has become her lover.

“The Haunting” shows its age with voiceovers to communicate the neurotic internal monologues of Jackson’s protagonist, and quick zooms to suggest a ghostly presence pounding at the bedroom door. A more subtle approach would have more effectively conveyed Nell’s escalating emotional tension (see Jack Clayton’s 1961 production of “The Innocents”). We can also assume a modern audience would not sit still for the slow pacing. Other efforts – Jan de Bont’s 1999 iteration, or the recent Netflix mini-series loosely based on Jackson’s novel – reflect a more modern approach, although one could argue they were not nearly as scary as the Wise production as the novel’s menace is communicated by nuance and implication, not monsters jumping out of closets.

It might not be possible for any filmmaker to successfully capture all the dark corners of “The Haunting of Hill House,” but of the efforts so far, the Wise version most faithfully represents Jackson’s acclaimed book. It is not supremely excellent, like Wise’s 1951 effort “The Day the Earth Stood Still,” but it’s spooky as hell and well worth the nearly two hours of viewing time.

It deserves an A-.

Mladen’s take

A-, Del?

Have you already eaten too much corn candy in anticipation of Halloween?

Has the lingering sugar high distorted your ability to review a movie accurately?

C, Del. “The Haunting” is a C. The film is somewhat entertaining shlock. It’s shlockiness can’t be excused because it was made in 1963.

“Nosferatu” was released in 1922. Still bone chilling. Still eerie.

“Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” 1956. Still ghastly. Still gruesome.

“Psycho” psyched audiences in 1960. Still oedipally demented. Still remembered.

“The Haunting” hovers on just this side of watchable.

“The Haunting” is pinned to an emotionally traumatized person as is “Psycho.” Eleanor, like Norman, can’t help herself. That’s where the similarity between the two films ends.

“Psycho” pulls a stunner at the end. Norman turned victimhood into rage, disorientation, and remorselessness potent enough to rationalize murder. All that “The Haunting” does is keep Eleanor a victim to the disappointing end. First, she is mistreated as a child by her family. Then she’s mistreated as an adult by the diabolical house that also stars in “The Haunting.” Pathetic.

Norman is malevolent. Eleanor mews.

“The Haunting” has some merit. The movie mocks fire-and-brimstone Christianity. It allows for the possibility of the paranormal.

The movie has a couple of solid horror moments, too. Who’s holding Eleanor’s hand during a nightmare? Couldn’t have been Theodora. She was sleeping on the other side of the bedroom. There’s the doorknob and restless door. Both scenes are decent creepiness left to the imagination.

The film’s story is coherent. The first-person exposition pushing “The Haunting” along not too annoying.

The soundtrack would have been better suited for a sci-fi movie of that era rather than a horror flick. Once you’ve heard the simple high key tapping of the piano in “Halloween,” it’s tough to withhold comparison to other horror films no matter the year they were made.

The men in “The Haunting” were dressed as stereotype required. Tweed for anthropology Professor John and a fine jacket with some sort of emblem on the breast pocket for playboy capitalist Luke. Costume design for the ladies was appropriate, as well. Eleanor wore poofy 1950s dresses with flared skirts and sufficiently tight bodices to silhouette perky breasts. Theodora, and I believe this was done to show defiance of social norm and fit her character, wore black, including slacks. She, like Eleanor, was nicely sculpted. 

C, Del.

And, this is the finest opening paragraph in fiction:

“Call me Ishmael. Some years ago – never mind how long precisely – having little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part of the world.”

The finest opening sentence in any paragraph of any fiction book written is:

“Listen: Billy Pilgrim has come unstuck in time.”

Mladen Rudman is a former journalist and technical writer. Del Stone Jr. is a former journalist and author.