Category Archives: Fiction

“Faerie Medicine” – Fiction by Julie C. Day

Excerpts, Fiction, Flappertising, Flappricana, ,

 

The Mountain Ash Fairy - Cicely Mary Barker, 1926
The Mountain Ash Fairy – Cicely Mary Barker, 1926

Like many of the pieces in our Summer 2014 issue, “Faerie Medicine” by Julie C. Day is about metamorphosis. But it’s also a moving tale of folklore, family, and rebirth in the beautiful, mystical forests of New Brunswick.

{ X }

THE TREE’S QUESTION STARTED WITH A CLEAR PLASTIC BOTTLE. One of those liter containers of “mountain spring water” people buy from a gas station cooler for $1.99.

The brown-haired girl poured two bottles of Aquafina into the hole she’d dug at the base of its trunk.

“But, Molly, Poppa Chris isn’t leaving. He’s not like—” the boy said, hesitating nearby.

“The water’s for the faeries,” Molly cut in. “Just like Poppa Chris, sometimes they need help keeping their promises … even if they swear and cross their hearts.” She lifted a pendant from around her neck, a cluster of blood-red berries hanging from a silver chain, and dropped it into the hole.

The tree could sense the children’s mother just a few yards distant, near the line that divided forest from bog. The woman had long wavery-gray hair and frowning lips.

“I mean it,” the mother called. “I’m not waiting.”

“For the faeries,” the boy repeated and knelt down beside his sister. Soon both children were pressing rough handfuls of peat between the tree’s roots, sealing both the necklace and the spring water inside.

“Molly? Matthew?” The mother’s voice was fainter now. “What’s gotten into you? Chris will be waiting for us.”

Molly glanced around as though just noticing the dim light and the mass of stunted evergreens. “Mom, wait!” Soon both children were hurrying away into the gloom of the forest.

The little tree held itself still. A low breeze, cool in the fading twilight, pushed its branches out across the bog and then back toward the stand of pines. Something felt different. The water in the peat bog was plentiful, but also full of acids that seeped up into its branches. Almost worse was the lack of soil. The tree had to survive on nutrients from the rotting remains that had settled near its trunk.

From the outside, one hundred and fifty-three years of bog life had hardly changed the little pine. But, inside, the two liters of spring water carried with it something new. The tree found itself suddenly concerned with one particular question: the matter of its name.

Concern was something it hadn’t felt in over a century and a half.

{ X }

Continue reading “Faerie Medicine” – Fiction by Julie C. Day →

“Lemon Lane” – Fiction by Foust

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Girl with Pigtails - Amedeo Modigliani, 1918
Girl with Pigtails – Amedeo Modigliani, 1918

From our summer issue, “Lemon Lane” by Foust is a witty, bitter, melancholy riff on fame, identity, and memory through the eyes of a former sitcom star.

{ X }

LET’S GET THIS PART OUT OF THE WAY: I know I look familiar to you. Believe me, we’ve never met before. I was Krissy on that TV show “Lemon Lane.” Back in the early seventies. Here, let me refresh your memory: If I put my hands on my hips and tilt my head to the side, you might see it. Now, I have to say “Hey! Don’t look at me.” Yes. I was that little girl with pigtails who was always in trouble.

I get that look all the time. That “Don’t I know you?” look. It’s because I was in your house. I was in everyone’s house. People think they know me. Well, they used to. I’ve almost aged out of it, but these two little moles on my cheek give me away. Remember the episode where I—errr, Krissy—tried to sand them off with sandpaper? And then she had to be in the Christmas play. And they made me be a shepherd because then I could wear a beard over where I’d sanded my face.

You know, I was a lot older than Krissy. Most people thought she was six. But I was actually nine when I got the part. When I started to get boobs, they fired me. Well, on the show I got written off to boarding school and my family adopted a little girl named Brandy who was supposed to be the daughter of a family friend who died. Her catch phrase was “Are you kidding?” She had to tilt her head to one side the same way I used to. But she didn’t have to put her hands on her hips.

Sometimes, I would get called in to make a guest appearance. Maybe for a holiday show or something. They would write up something so I could say “Hey! Don’t look at me.” The studio audience would laugh. And then the writers would find a reason for me to leave so they could get back to finding ways to make Brandy say “Are you kidding?”

After “Lemon Lane,” I didn’t get another TV show. I did do some commercials—remember Fudgy Squares? Or Kiddle Kids?

It’s strange, looking like someone who’s been in everybody’s house. I have two lives that run side-by-side like train tracks. Sometimes people forget which stories are real and which are from the show. It happens to me too. But when I remember something that happened and I realize that I was wearing pigtails, then I know it’s a show memory, rather than a real one. Those pigtails were fake. They just attached them to my real hair with some water soluble glue. At the end of every day, I had to tip my head over the sink in the dressing room and spend twenty minutes washing the glue out of my hair.

{ X }

pink portraitFOUST is a writer, printmaker, and curmudgeon. She lives in Richmond VA with her lovely husband Melvyn and several spoiled rescue dogs. She has an MFA from Spalding University. She goes by one name in order to save time.

“Other Side of the Fence” – Fiction by Anna Tizard

Excerpts, Fiction, Flappertising, Flappricana,
Chat au Clair de Lune - Theophile-Alexandre Steinlen, circa 1900
Chat au Clair de Lune – Theophile-Alexandre Steinlen, circa 1900

 Anna Tizard‘s “Other Side of the Fence,” from our Summer 2014 issue, shows us the world through the eyes of a feline figure with a curious past who traverses the boundaries between the mundane and the magically macabre.

{ X }

“I SWEAR IT WAS ONE OF ‘EM, I SWEAR.”

“Nick. It’s a misty night. Come on.”

“Nah, nah – it was her mist. I saw it rise. She’s a shape-shifter, I’m telling you.”

“Yeah. Just like that frog the other night from the pond at number six. Right idiot you made of us, getting caught in that hedge! I’m still picking thorns out of my sweater…”

The voices faded, muffled by the mist as I eased through a gap in the fence and shuddered the woody grit off my fur. Fences: most human folk just see barriers, separating devices. Opportunities, gaps, hidden places, perhaps a high viewing post; these are the fences held in the eyes of cats, immortals, and perhaps those two chasers back there, human by the look of it, their eyes widened by a preternatural curiosity.

If there was still a trace of my own mist clinging to my back legs, I wouldn’t have known it. I was too distracted by the sponginess of the grass beneath my paws, the newness of it all. The lowness of the twilight sky, a blanket of slate-grey with just a glimmer of blue and pink in it, swallowing everything into itself. To sniff the air was to have those colours wash through me, the scent of rain one and the same thing as my anticipation, and that first pinch of hunger.

At the tremor of those clumsy footsteps behind me I scattered up a tree, startled by my own agility, until those booming voices moved off, still bickering. For the first few hours of my life as a cat I didn’t test out my new dexterity but sat tensed as a watchman over those rows of rectangular gardens as the shadows unfolded themselves like some ancient leather-bound book falling open over everything.

This is the way I have learned to remember it, running a claw over the past. At the time I didn’t have enough experience of old books, blankets, or even humans to see it quite that way. But age and experience can help you piece together what was violent, fragmented, nothing more than imprints in the mud quickly filling up with rainwater.

What little I did know at that time spun back to me soon enough, though, shivering the very dew off my back as I dug my nerves deep into the branch beneath me.

Continue reading “Other Side of the Fence” – Fiction by Anna Tizard →

“The Virgin” – Fiction by Dylan Jackson

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Schädel (Skull) - Vincent van Gogh, 1887/1888
Schädel (Skull) – Vincent van Gogh, 1887/1888

In a dark, clammy alley near the intersection of loneliness, ignorance, violence, and lust, there’s Dylan Jackson‘s wry yet tragic tale, “The Virgin,” one of the many flappy lits included in our Summer 2014 Issue.

{ X }

SOMEONE GOT SHOT. Or, rather, many people were shot during a single incident. Some of them died, while others, despite varied injuries, managed to survive for the time being. He didn’t know where or when the incident took place, but from the little he could glean of the broken news report coming over radio in the front of the cab, Boneface knew that somewhere, people may have been as sad as him. It didn’t matter though. People die, just as more are created or brought into the world every day.

He hated getting out. Though, if it was a matter of necessity, it was reserved as a task carried out under the veil of night. On this particular evening, Boneface had found himself in want of a woman. This would be his first. After twenty-five years of unintentionally chaste living, the decision to procure intimacy had come almost as suddenly as he was sure to upon the initial encounter.

All evening he’d been sitting alone in his apartment—as he’d done nearly every evening of his adult life—pondering what it must feel like to be touched by another human to whom he bore no direct relation. The inspiration had come from nearly three hours of scanning through the titles of pay-per-view pornos that he couldn’t bring himself to purchase. It was less a matter of finance, and more an issue of pride, as his mother, and executor, would be the one to receive the bill. He’d made that mistake before and found himself wildly aroused, only to be met with deep embarrassment and shame the following month. Tonight though, he knew which mistake to avoid, and which new mistake he would forge. Continue reading “The Virgin” – Fiction by Dylan Jackson →

“Breakers” – Fiction by J.E. Reich

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Birthday - Marc Chagall, 1915
Birthday – Marc Chagall, 1915

“There are two things one is absolutely forbidden to write about: writers and bars.” We love how J.E. Reich’s  “Breakers” doesn’t give a flap about such silly rules– and that’s just one of many reasons why we chose to include this story in our Summer 2014 issue (FLAPPERHOUSE #2, currently procurable for only $3 US).

{ X }

I WENT ON A DATE WITH A WRITER WHO WAS LITTLE MORE THAN A RACKETEER. At the exhibit showcasing the works of the long-dead artist who had once been in exile from an old country, he read the descriptions of the paintings and wrote down one word from each on his uncalloused palm.  He was merely borrowing, would save these words for later. I tried to catch them while I drifted from painting to painting of women and bouquets, levitating upwards.  Exuberant, one might have said, or maybe exhume.  They fluttered and crumpled each time he closed his palm.  The rituals of creative types are only a few degrees away from felony.

Afterwards, we went to a bar, where the writer told me that there are two things one is absolutely forbidden to write about: writers and bars.

I told him that when I was a kid, I used to drink my mother’s aromatized vermouth straight from the bottle and never even blinked; how the burn would wear the silk recesses of my throat, to sever it from the inside-out.  I was a young drinker: twelve, thirteen.

Erode, he said.  It would erode your throat.

Yeah, okay, I mean, it would erode it, I guess.

A date between two men or a date between two women might as well take place on an analyst’s expensive chaise.  Here are the ways in which my life has been harder.  Let me count them, let me hold them up for you to see, let’s both feel bad together.

His username had been HexameterMe; his online dating profile had listed his occupation under Creative/Writing/Art.  So of course, I asked about it.

Well, yeah, I freelance. He paused.  The dark mahogany light of the bar dimmed for the exchange of ambience.  A stout, unlit candle stood on every table.  I also work for an agency.  I database for them.  I database during the day.  So he, too, wanted to be his better self. Continue reading “Breakers” – Fiction by J.E. Reich →

“Scars” – Fiction by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam

Excerpts, Fiction, Flappertising, Flappricana, ,
Untitled - Zdzisław Beksiński
Untitled, Zdzisław Beksiński

Digital copies of our Summer 2014 Issue will drop on June 20, but you can pre-order one right now for just $3 US. One of the very flappy lits featured in our 2nd issue is Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam‘s “Scars,” a surreal flash fiction seemingly spawned from the hazy hinterlands between dream and insanity…

{ X }

NATALIE DIDN’T KNOW WHERE THE MUSICIANS CAME FROM. When she woke from an ill-advised three-hour nap they were there in her spotless living room, their instruments strung out like her old college friends all over the brown plush carpet.

The empty carcasses of their instrument cases confused her. She stepped around them. She did not ask the musicians why they were there, but she did think it odd that they were not playing. Their instruments looked lonely leaning against her dusty elliptical, her empty bookcase – she had sold her books for cash at the local bookstore – her coffee table with the missing leg. As she stood in the kitchen door, which looked out at the living room, and shoveled peanut butter granola down her throat, she catalogued the instruments: one thick upright bass, one legless Casio keyboard, one worn acoustic guitar with a blue stripe down its middle, one tarnished brass trumpet, and one silver saxophone relaxing awkwardly on the couch beside a man whose dark fingers strangled its neck.

She looked, blurred by a nappy haze, from musician to musician, cataloguing them too, trying to place each man to his instrument. And they were all men, she realized with a start, five strange men in her home.

The one attached to the saxophone had dreadlocks to his hips, thick and black and beaded, a squarish face; beside him a thin man with two scars on his lips the shape of a trumpet mouthpiece sat with his legs crossed at the upper thigh; a rounder, cleaner man with the upright’s curved silhouette stood in the door to the study, his hands pressed against the frame as if blocking her escape, though the exit to the hallway was clear, thus that couldn’t have been his intent; a Hispanic man crouched behind her lazy boy, his hands poised across its back like a piano. The guitar player with shaggy brown hair covering one eye and black tape wrapped around each finger she didn’t have to guess at.

Continue reading “Scars” – Fiction by Bonnie Jo Stufflebeam →

“The Heartless Boy” – Fiction by Ed Ahern

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pandoras_box-400
Pandora’s Box, Omoi Tsuzura and Yokubari Obasan – Tsukioka Yoshitoshi, 1880

We’re giddy to open the box of our Summer 2014 Issue and unleash its first excerpt! Ed Ahern‘s “The Heartless Boy” is a mischievous modernization of one of the world’s most famous myths, swirling with twisted humor, demonic spirits, and wisps of what you might call romance.

{ X }

TOM WILLMAN WAS BORN EXPERIENCING NO STRONG FEELINGS–in fact, no feelings at all. No love or affection. No hate or dislike. Certainly no fear. The closest he came to emotions were pleasing or displeasing sensations.

Tom’s parents, desperate for a smile, had him tested for a litany of diseases, but he proved to be uncaringly above average. They quit trying to show Tom affection by the time he was six, and by the time he was ten were providing only what was legally required of them.

He ate because the tastes were good and food kept him alive. He avoided the harmful and the idiotic, so no drugs or gluttony, but also no designer water or wandering chickens. He exercised and bathed because his body felt better, and exhibited an attractive trimness about which he was oblivious.

Girls in high school viewed Tom’s indifference as cool and his trimness as attractive, feelings heightened once they discovered that his lack of emotion gave him extraordinary staying powers. Tom viewed his frequent sex acts as pleasant consensual exercise.

The person who tried hardest to know Tom best was Arthur Lausten, the high school psychologist. Lausten, with no significant life of his own, compulsively coached people on how to live better. His recurring daydream was perching in a confessional and prescribing atonements.

Tom was required to attend frequent sessions with Lausten, who toiled through hundreds of hours trying to etch Tom’s stainless steel persona with the bristles of a verbal toothbrush.

“Tom, you appear to be neither sociopathic nor psychotic, but except for satisfying basic biological requirements you’re completely indifferent to your humanity.”

“What’s your point, Mr. Lausten?”

Lausten was desperate He pulled out a large folding knife, flipped open the blade and waved it in front of Tom. “What would you do if I threatened to stab you?”

“Run.”

“And if you couldn’t get out of the room?”

“Ask somebody to reason with you.”

“And if that didn’t work?”

“Hit you with this book end.”

“How do you feel about me right now?”

“That question is inane.”

Early in his freshman year a bully had cornered Tom on the football field. Tom let the boy hit him twice before retaliating, knowing that in order to avoid discipline he had to have the boy’s aggression witnessed. Then he broke enough of the boy’s bones that the boy couldn’t be aggressive again for several months. The onlookers noticed that Tom’s expression had remained calm.

At the graduation ceremony, Tom was approached by several girls and avoided by most boys. Tom perceived both the attention and avoidance as irrelevant. An unknown young woman was among those who approached.

“Mr. Willman, I’m Raissa Pandorapolis. I have a job offer for you.” The young woman curved aesthetically and looked no older than he was, although her eyes had the worry lines of middle age.

“Ah.”

“Am I correct that you’ll be leaving home and are looking for work?”

“Yes.”

“Am I also correct that you’ve had difficulties with pre-employment screening?”

“The human resource departments tell me that I’m inhuman.”

“Not me. Please join me for lunch while I explain my offer.”

Continue reading “The Heartless Boy” – Fiction by Ed Ahern →

Summer Reading Recommendations by the Staff at The Library Of Babel

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The Librarian - Giuseppe Arcimboldo, circa 1570
The Librarian – Giuseppe Arcimboldo, circa 1570

Summer’s so close we can already feel and smell and taste the mixture of sweat and sunscreen dribbling down our foreheads and stinging our eyes. Which means that any day now, we’ll begin unleashing excerpts from our Summer Issue (which drops June 20). But for the time being, we’ve been thinking about other non-FLAPPERHOUSE writings we should read this season, so we consulted the good folks at The Library of Babel to offer their expert advice.

{ X }
IN THIS VAST, INDEFINITE UNIVERSE OF OURS, we often feel stymied by a certitude that the seemingly infinite bulk of prose crowding the shelves of our Library is, essentially, meaningless. Yet we should never lose our grasp on the elegant hope that, amid so much nonsense, we can always discover books which possess the power to transport us, to edify us, and perhaps even vindicate for all time the acts of human existence. With that in mind, some of our staff members would like to tell you which books they think you’d enjoy this summer as you relax on a hot beach with an ice cold lemonade! (Jorge B, Chief Archivist)
 
Pdger Mickkel Swigflapp (recommended by Melissa E, Circulation)

“A symphonic cascade of mysterious imagery and arcane lyricism. So thought-provoking, you’ll spend days reconsidering your preconceived notions about the true meaning of flybb jnki hozzmulph.”

Aggagagga Vru (recommended by Horace P, Marketing)
“Everyone likes to talk up Axaxaxas Mlo, but for my money, Aggagagga Vru is the far superior work. It explores themes like identity, loyalty, and kubbjarm with uncanny broofglang and a warmth that never feels saccharine.”

The Great Gatsbino (recommended by Fatima D, Administration)
“Pretty much The Great Gatsby, but instead of Jay Gatsby hosting lavish parties for high society in 1920’s Long Island, it features J.P. Gatsbino throwing bad-ass tailgate parties at high school football games in 1980’s West Orange. It’s no masterpiece or anything, and of course it’s highly derivative of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s American classic. Nevertheless, Gatsbino makes for a breezy, entertaining beach read. More importantly, it’s the closest thing to The Great Gatsby that I’ve seen in a long time– at least since some jerk-wad stole our only copy of that book several years ago. Seriously, whoever stole our Gatsby deserves to be tossed over the railing and into the abyss with a rabid mongoose strapped to their face.”

The Curdled Thumbscrew (recommended by Gary S, Cataloging)
“Most folks here will tell you it’s a fool’s errand to search for a book containing the Word Of God and all the secrets of the universe; they’ll tell you such books exist only in the fevered imaginations of highly suggestible Babel Librarians, and that even if such books did exist, any effort to procure one would prove an endless date with madness. Of course, those naysayers have probably never read The Curdled Thumbscrew. Now, this book itself is not the Word Of God, nor does it contain many secrets of the universe. It will, however, lead you to read The Crumbled Throw Pillow, which cannot be understood without having already read The Curdled Thumbscrew. The Crumbled Throw Pillow is also not the Word of God, but you must read that before it guides you to The Crooked Thimble, which will lead you to The Crusted Thingamajig, which… well, I’ll let you see the rest for yourself. Let’s just say that fifty-seven books later, I’m merely one or two steps away from Ultimate Enlightenment! The Almighty Knowledge that has been beckoning me for years is now so close I can sense it in my marrow. And to think, so many of my so-called ‘fellow’ librarians have been laughing at me this whole time, like that smart-mouthed know-it-all Katy G in Youth Services! Yes, we shall see who’s still laughing when I unlock the ancient truth of all past, present, and future life! WE SHALL SEE, KATY G…

Hearts Of Palm: The Jassy Madigan Chronicles, Part I (recommended by Katy G, Youth Services)

“I beg you, for the love of everything holy, don’t listen to a word Gary S tells you. Not only is he certifiably insane, but his taste in books is dreadful, and he always smells like cabbage. Instead, check out the latest novel by Young Adult master Katrin Vanderslyke! Readers young and old alike will love this coming-of-age story about Jassy Madigan, a kind but awkwardly shy teenage girl who moves to a new town and befriends the mummies in the local history museum. Will Jassy finally find acceptance among the 3,000-year old corpses of Egyptian pharaohs? Maybe even true love? I won’t spoil the answers to those questions, but I will tell you that you’ll enjoy every moment of this wonderful book, except perhaps for that section in the middle that just says ‘BWORP BWORP BWORP’ for 28 pages.

“CRYONICS” – Fiction by Mariev Finnegan

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All Human Forms Identified - William Blake, 1804 - 1820
All Human Forms Identified – William Blake, 1804 – 1820

Shortly after we first read Mariev Finnegan‘s “CRYONICS,” we knew this story had to be the grand finale of our premiere issue. It throbs with so much of what we want in FLAPPERHOUSE: surrealism, shadow, sensuality, satire– not to mention added bonuses like psychosis, psychedelia, silliness, sci-fi, and sexual metamorphosis– all blown up to glorious, apocalyptic proportions. (Apocalyptic not as in death & destruction, but from the Greek meaning “uncovering” or “revelation.”) We hope it opens a door or two in your mind, or at the very least, takes you for a spin on a delightfully bizarre trip.

{ X }

THE FIRST DEAD HEAD TO BE THAWED from Cryopreservation was a rich guy, big ego, big head. Bob Nowatchick (Ick, for short) was an autogynephilic transsexual, a narcissistic disorder in which a man is erotically obsessed with himself as a woman. Krystal did not exist, but Krystal was the only woman that could satisfy Bob. He/She were the ultimate evil: Complete unto themselves. Loved no one.  Screwed each other.

Krystal, a dark wisp of a girl, developed an ego, became judgmental about that slob, Bob. His diet of fast food, his drug-use, his constant anger– directed mostly at women– all disgusted her.  Also, his conservative fashion sense made her real edgy: Their wardrobe consisted of pressed tan slacks and casual sweaters. Because of him, that prick– he had no vagina, no womb– she would never have a child.

So one Labor Day, Krystal murdered Bob. She committed suicide by cop when he tried to have her arrested for raping him.  From up in the bell tower, Krystal shot badge number 911 dead. The return barrage of bullets destroyed their heart, but left the head intact.

Bob had paid a huge amount of money to preserve the head, which was removed from the grossly-overweight body, and frozen with the hope that resuscitation and healing would be possible using highly-advanced future technology.

Then, in all probability, Bob would get the death penalty for murdering a cop.

 { X }

Now, 16 years later, the large head, wrapped in foil, is removed from a holographic space chamber and placed on a laboratory table to thaw, because it can now be cured of brain death and brought back to life. A team of professionals attach an artificial heart and lungs, as well as electrodes and monitors. Never before has anyone been brought back after being cryogenically frozen. There had been discussion about Larry King being first, but they decided to begin with the last one frozen, because it’s the freshest. And if they mess up, who’s going to complain? It’s the head of a condemned man.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar goes public with many spiritual questions concerning the reanimation of life to a head: “Does the mind need the brain? Is our consciousness simply the result of brain function, the firing of neurons within a nonlocal consciousness? What happens when we die? Is the mind separate from the body, having its own eternal existence?”

The head scientist on the project, Dr. Franklyn, tells the public, “We are about to present scientific proof that life is a physical component of the brain, that identity can be restored by contemporary medicine, by restoring life to this head, this brain!”

 { X } Continue reading “CRYONICS” – Fiction by Mariev Finnegan →