A 30-second Horror Tale

I gradually awoke to hear, “I ... I had a bad dream.” Her tiny voice trembled with fear. “C ... can I sleep with you?”

“Okay,” I said groggily and scooted over to make room. She got under the covers, her little body snuggling close, seeking warmth. Slowly, my awakening mind reminded me that I have lived alone for 20 years.

Apologia: This is loosely based on a real event in my life. And needless to say, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Writing Exercises From A Rather Odd Mind

The first Thursday evening of every month, I meet with an eclectic group of Christian writers in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. We have been meeting for at least 29 years, and my publishing success, as sparse as it may be, comes from the encouragement and wisdom of this group.

Each month’s event follows a specific outline; one part is known as the Writer’s Prompt. A phrase or situation is given, and those attending have 10 minutes to craft a quick story or poem to share with the group.

I came across a collection of my older prompts when going through some old files, and I am offering them to you with tongue firmly planted in cheek.

Needless to say, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

The first tale comes from the prompt, “Write about an allegory”:

It was a beautiful autumn evening, and the Halloween party at John Walker’s home was going full tilt. The full moon, the chain of pumpkin porch lights, and the scent of cheap Pumpkin Spice candles from the local Dollar Store brought an almost magical effect to the atmosphere.

John left his kitchen door with a massive pitcher of green bubbling brew. “Are there any takers?” he asked.

Sam Smithers raised his hand, and John poured him a tall glass of the heady, smoking brew. Sam raised the glass in a toast and took a tentative sip.

Immediately, he turned several rainbow hues and, gasping for breath, fell to the floor, reminding me for all the world of an October leaf, struck by an early frost, ripped from its secure perch to plummet to the moldy forest floor below.

“Heavens, John,” I said. “What did you give that poor soul?”

“I call it my Autumn Drink,” he said. “One sip, you turn colors and fall.”

I meditated on that for a moment. “John,” I said, “I hate to change the subject, but what is an allegory?”

John shrugged. “I don’t have a clue.”

I don’t remember what the given prompt was for this short, but I do remember it was fun:

“I didn’t think you were serious,” she said. “There are several reasons why time travel is not a good idea, and I’m surprised that I have to reiterate them to you. Paradoxes are the dilemma of not knowing whether time is malleable or rigid, the possible annihilation of self, and the possibility of breaking the linear nature of time and turning it into a loop. One does not dabble in affairs best left to God.”

I gritted my teeth and tried to remain calm. “That is all well and good,” I retorted, “but as always, my dear, your warnings always come in hindsight. Too little, too late, you might say.”

Outside the narrow cave entrance where we had taken refuge, we watched the tyrannosaurus as it continued to turn our time machine into rubble.

Again, I am trying to remember the prompt and the time ran out before I could finish the story. However, I include it here for your amusement.

It is said that there are realities that humanity was never meant to know, and for those who knew him, Terry Magee knew half a dozen. Once every Saturday evening, members of the Fox and Hare would gather around one of the oaken tables and over large mugs of everyone’s chosen beverage—nonalcoholic as everybody there was a teetotaler—Terry would regale us with one of his adventures.

“I remember back in my ill-spent youth, I served as first mate onboard a three-masted schooner dubbed the Ruptured Duck, a name that is a story in itself. We were bound for the Hebrides and had to take the treacherous waters around Cape Fear. It is said the waves there can surmount Big Ben, and the tides are faster than the intestinal agony of those who have eaten my great-aunt’s meat pasties, but the greatest danger”... here he paused for dramatic effect “... are the mermaids. Now, what any red-blooded man can see in a woman who is half fish is beyond me, but many a hardened sailor has thrown himself overboard from hearing the dulcet tones of a choir of mermaids singing He Ain’t Nothin’ but a Hound Dog.

“As we made our way through the treacherous waters ...”

As you may have perceived in the stories above, I enjoy picking on fellow group members, and I trust they’ll consider the source and respond with pity. Again, I have no idea what the prompt could have been.

Stephen Hensel is a Jack of all Trades, a fascinating individual who is a treat to talk to about any subject. John Walker is an ordained pastor writing a genuinely chilling horror tale.

“It is said, Reverend Walker, that there are things that a man was never meant to know,” Stephen Hensel said. “And I know at least three of them.”

“Ah,” John Walker replied, “but as a man of the cloth, I know at least four.”

“But what does your knowledge gain you?” Stephen snorted. “Can you craft the full moon’s light into beasts of legend? Can you cast the illusion of life on a figure made from sticks? Can you convince a person the reality of a dream?”

John smiled. “All that and more. I do not mean to brag ..”

“Too late,” Stephen interrupted.

“...But,” John continued, ignoring the insult, “I can mesmerize a crowd by merely speaking, a feat I perform on the first day of the week without fail. Not only that, but I can make food from a potluck dinner look, smell, and taste palatable by merely the power of suggestion in the form of a prayer of grace.”

“Ah,” Stephen said with a smile, “” but I have yet to reveal my most extraordinary feat of legerdemain ...”

Suddenly, the two men were interrupted by the sudden appearance of a third. “Lights out, gentleman, but first, your medications. Then sleepy time for all patients.”

“But,” Stephen pouted, “we were first promised ice cream.”

I have always been fascinated with cryptids, especially the canine version, whether they be called werewolves, dogmen, lycans, or spectral canines. Needless to say, they sneak into my writing quite often, and my writer’s group is very patient with my obsession. 

My wife was furious when I walked through the front door.

“It followed me home, hon. Can I keep it?”

“No!” she sputtered. “A dogman? What are you going to do with a dogman?”

“Well, it seems to have latched onto my pants leg, and I think it likes me.” I shook my foot, and it growled, never releasing its fangs from Levi’s.

“No!” She said adamantly. “I refuse. What if it bites one of the kids? Is it even housebroken?”

“Look,” I said, “it seems to be well-behaved. Let’s try it for a few days and see.”

That was eleven months ago, and I regret I didn’t acquire a dogman but a dog woman. Now we have five of the little ankle-biters running amuck. If anybody wants one, they’re adorable, have had all their shots, and are free.

If you have enjoyed my foray into writing, you can read more of my insanity in the links below. Not all of it is humor, and I have dabbled in dark fantasy romance (with a body count), science fiction, and horror. Enjoy.

• Amazon U.S.
• Amazon Canada
• Amazon UK

I Have Found My Treasure!

After years of searching, I found my genuine desire: an all-metal, manual pencil sharpener. I have destroyed numerous cheap plastic imitations that adhered to a flat surface with a suction cup and burned out countless electric pencil sharpeners.

Mock me if you will, but I sneer at mechanical versions that gouge the paper and snap off the lead with the slightest pressure. Alone, I am the last person on this planet who uses #2 pencils. 

I have found my Precious. Leave me content in my cave while I scribble out riddles on cheap pads of yellow paper. 

The Movie That Changed My Life

In December 1959, my parents took me to see my first movie on the big screen. In Easthampton, New York, the only cinema in town opened its doors to Journey to the Center of the Earth, released by Twentieth Century Fox and based on the 1867 tale by French author Jules Verne.

The theater had an actual chandelier and organ, and murals were painted on the walls and ceilings. At age six, it was the largest building I had ever seen.

The lights dimmed, the movie began, and I experienced magic.

If you have yet to see the film, Sir Oliver Lindenbrook of Edenborough discovers an ancient artifact from Icelandic explorer Arne Saknussemm relating his travels to the center of the Earth. Determined to repeat the feat, Lindenbrook, accompanied by his admiring student, Alec McEwan, makes their way to Iceland. Continuing with the Wikipedia entry:

Professor Göteborg, upon receiving correspondence from Lindenbrook attempts to reach the Earth’s center first. Lindenbrook and McEwan chase him to Iceland. There, Göteborg and his assistant kidnap and imprison them in a cellar. They are freed by local Hans Bjelke and his pet duck, Gertrud. They later find Göteborg dead in his hotel room. Lindenbrook finds potassium cyanide crystals in Göteborg’s goatee and concludes that he was murdered.

Göteborg’s widow, Carla, who initially believed Lindenbrook was trying to capitalize on her deceased husband’s work, learns the truth. She provides the equipment and supplies that her husband had accumulated, but only on the condition that she accompanies them to protect her husband’s reputation. Lindenbrook grudgingly agrees. Hans and Gertrud also join the new expedition.

On a specific date, they mark the sunrise’s exact location on Snæfellsjökull and descend into the Earth following markings left by Saknussemm. However, they are not alone. Göteborg’s murderer, Count Saknussemm, believes that, as Saknussemm’s descendant, only he has the right to be there.

My memory of that film is reduced to three specific memories: the discovery of the crystal cavern, the massive whirlpool in the inner sea that traps the explorers’ raft, and the dinosaur they encounter in Atlantis as they try to escape to the surface.

Around the age of twelve, I discovered the book the movie was based on in my school’s library. In the book, Sir Oliver S. Lindenbrook is Verne’s Professor Otto Lidenbrock, a garrulous, temperamental professor in Hamburg, Germany. Alec McEwan is actually Lindenbrook’s nephew, Alex. The story starts with a  small scrap of paper dropping out of a newly purchased book of ancient antiquity, which reads:

Go down into the crater of Snaefells Jökull, which Scartaris’s shadow caresses just before the calends of July, O daring traveler, and you’ll make it to the center of the Earth. I’ve done so. Arne Saknussemm

On this flimsy evidence, the duo travels to Iceland and hires a guide, Icelander Hans Bjelke, a Danish-speaking eider duck hunter. After discovering the entrance to the center of the Earth, they begin their journey. All the film’s other characters are gone, including the eider duck, Gertrude. In the novel, the three endure great danger until they encounter a vast internal sea. Gone is Atlantis, but like the movie, our brave adventurers eventually are blown out of an active volcano in Italy and return home to great accolades.

I read the book times beyond counting, joining H.G. Wells’s War of the Worlds and Lewis Caroll’s Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass as beloved rereads in my well-read childhood.

The movie and the book awakened a sense of wonder, which caused a lifelong fascination with science, pulp fiction, dinosaurs, and spelunking. But “when I became a man, I put away childish things,” and I never reread Jules Verne’s masterpiece after I surrendered to the complex realities of adulthood.

That is until a month ago. When wandering in a bookstore, I found a small tome that bore the book title I had put aside decades ago. On a sudden impulse, I paid for my purchase and once again explored the inner Earth’s lava tubes and limestone caverns. With my three guides, I again experienced the terrors of being lost and endured hunger and thirst in the quest for adventure, as well as the wonder of the inner sea, dangerous dinosaurs, and the horror of being blown out of the lava-choked throat of a volcano.

I assume that in my seventh decade of life, I will once again give way to the temptation to repeat my obsession with Verne’s brave trio as they plunge into the depths of the Earth. As I own the film’s DVD, I will also have the opportunity to relive a significant childhood event.

However, the film and novel made one other impact on my life. Wanting to experience my own adventures, I eventually became a writer so I could live through my literary creations. Some of you have read my work, to which I can only say: