The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Maddie’s Music Hall 
by Mercedes M. Yardley 

He told her to dance, so she did, she did, she did. She waltzed with ghosts. She cabbage-patched with revenants. She smiled big and white, her lipstick perfect, but her mascara constantly ran. She blinked lashes heavy with black powder and tears. Do you know what tears of the dead taste like? They taste like cocaine and sourdough and selling your soul to the handsome man in black who promised you could dance forever if you wanted, and wouldn’t that be a wonderful thing? Dancing every night for centuries. Forever and ever and ever.

And ever. No matter how tired you get, no matter how despairing. It doesn’t matter when you can just turn up the gramophone and dance.

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Fiction © Copyright Mercedes M. Yardley
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com 

More from Mercedes M. Yardley:

Little Dead Red

The Wolf is roaming the city in this Bram Stoker Award-winning Psychological Horror novella, and he must be stopped.

Grim Marie knows far too much about the wolves of the world, a world where little girls go missing.  After all, she had married one before she/he showed his claws, and what that wolf did to her little girl was unforgivable. Grim Marie isn’t certain if she can ever forgive herself for putting her Little Aleta in harm’s way.

When Grandmother becomes ill, Aleta offers to take the bus through the concrete forest to Grandmother’s house to bring her some goodies. She knows the way. What could possibly go wrong?

In this modern day retelling of Little Red Riding Hood, the wolf takes to the city streets to capture his prey, but the hunter is close behind him. With Grim Marie on the prowl, the hunter becomes the hunted.

Wolves pad through the darkest kind of fairytale: one that can come true.

Proudly brought to you by Crystal Lake Publishing – Tales from the Darkest Depths.

Available on Amazon!