The Ladies of Horror
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Mistakes Happen 
by Marge Simon 

On October 31^st, you shut off your alarm, dress for work and make the rush to the crowded Blue Line. You settle for standing, clutching the silver pole, pretending to read the ads. Yes, it’s Halloween, so what? To you, it’s a lot like life, just a celebration of stupid. A bunch of idiot friends you couldn’t count on, parties you can’t or won’t remember. Women who came and went, leaving trails of smoky perfume. Only one of them loved you, but you wrecked her car, her credit, her life. So much for l’amour.

Tonight, you’re late getting home. You’re a little drunk and very tired, bellowing curses when you bump into a wall. Ouch! You cut your hand on the edge of a glass table. You feel around for the light switch but it’s not where it should be. Actually, nothing in your apartment seems where it should be. Then, ensconced in the blackness, you see two shining red orbs. Wings beat slowly back and forth, moving the stagnant air. A foul smell emanates from deep in that blackness, seeping into your very pores.

“Richard Whitmore Smith, your time has come,” it says, wrapping leathery wings around you. You can smell its fetid breath on your neck. You writhe in protest, “But I’m not Richard Whitmore Smith, I’m Richard Whitemore Smith! You’ve made a mistake!”

It laughs. “So? Mistakes happen,” it says as it unhinges its jaws.” Happy Halloween.”

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Fiction © Copyright Marge Simon
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com 

More from Marge Simon:

Victims
by Marge Simon and‎ Mary Turzillo

The title of this collection sets you up for the surprise of lyrical stories of victimizations with unexpected endings for the villains. Be ready to have your heart opened and cheer for perceived victims, human (made and unmade) and other life forms, victorious in the hands of these two award-winning poets. —Linda D. Addison, award-winning author, HWA Lifetime Achievement Award recipient and SFPA Grand Master.

Across histories and cultures and from Auschwitz to Babylon this book leaves you questioning who are the victims, and regardless of your conclusion you’re likely to get throat-punched. This is horror where everyone has a knife, and is ready to deliver this message: “Remember, you are always guilty. —Herb Kauderer, author of Fragments from the Book of the After-Dead.

Simon and Turzillo have only gone and startled me again. What a collection! Brutal. Beautiful. This quiver of poems strikes with the unflinching truth of persecution and oppression as seen through the lens of feminism. Prepare to come away bruised and yet strangely bolstered by Victims, a symphony of sadness orchestrated by two masters of dark poetry. —Lee Murray, Bram Stoker and Shirley Jackson Award-winner.

This is one of the braver dark poetry collections I’ve seen in a while. Horror poets generally employ victims in their work, but the focus is generally on the Evil. Turning the camera the other way is unusual, unsettling, emotionally risky, and surprisingly effective. From their stark opening take on Pygmalion, to the ending poem about the wasted life of Stateira of Persia, this powerful collection teases apart an impressive number of the threads of victimhood. Some are the usual cases, but quite a few are surprises, or reversals, or cases with unexpected layers. There is nothing repetitive about this collection. —Timons Esaias, winner of the Asimov’s Readers’ Award and the Winter Anthology Contest

Available on Amazon!