Things Were Not Right

Part I: The Evening

   Along the way I admire the barbed-wire fence with its foot-high piles of human refuse strewn at the base, like pieces of pop-art crawling and shifting, only crawling with rats keeping a promise of a decaying future... the security lights sputter and ineffectively gleam through the darkening mist. The ravens perched on the power poles wait patiently above for new carcasses in the street...

  The leaves rustled, an unmistakable 'crunch' when there should have been silence. “This is it” I tell myself, as my heart jumps out of my throat, oh, how could I allow myself to end up in this situation. What a fool I’ve been...

   A special day. Normally I don’t do makeup, but tonight I feel different. I like to be unpredictable... there is nothing more annoying than being predictable, and I know what my friends expect tonight... so... and these fishnet stockings are perfect, with this black miniskirt and crimson vest... yup... that’s all I need tonight... and my favorite pet snake, what the heck... it should liven things up a bit...

The Graveyard. 

   I must walk through the industrial zone and the adjoining woods, dark and decaying in this section of the city. No one in their right mine would walk through their alone, especially a female, and especially at dusk... but whoever said I was in my right mind? Female, no doubt about that, I have my mother's genes...

   Yes, I am crazy, but that does not mean I am not wary. Instinctively I avoid dangerous surprises, such as strolling around a corner into an idol enemy gang. I pick my way through the crumbling, soot-encrusted buildings and see the small stand of woods ahead. Evidence of gang warfare abounds, but only for the knowing eye- broken glass, pieces of knife blades, blood-soaked rags... the names of those who’ve come away with bragging rights, stories for their grandchildren if they live that long, the scars... and the graffiti. I know the vandals. Sarahana, Amandania, Kimberlana, Laurinia... such nice girls to their parents. I felt a blow by what I saw next... the gangland grave marker of someone who went down in a fight... just below the Margetta graffiti scrawled in tribute on the cinderblock wall, and a lone, wilted daisy in a small pile of broken concrete... then another, and another... Marialana, Bettina, Nancanonia... all prep students by day. Those nights will be forever burned into my dull and aching senses. As I made for the woods those nights lingered in my mind... and I questioned my ill-conceived existence once again...

   In the woods I feel a bit safer than in the industrial zone... maybe it was my affinity for spiders, as being surrounded by mother nature just felt right. That is when my first suspicions arose that this night was wrong. Two pieces of girl’s clothing were strewn along side the trail Then I glimpsed an intimate piece wrapped around the trunk of a tree... I could only imagine the jeering, leering minds that did this, the terror of the victim, and the sheer raw animal power of the hands behind those warped minds... sure, my fear was growing, my senses tingling, but that did not stop me tonight... I could run, I could scream for help... and I felt myself pulled forward by concern for my gang members- how foolish they always were- sometimes I don't know why I recruited them. If they were in trouble, I might be able to do something with my wiles, in spite of my weakened physical condition...

   The signs were not getting better... trees marred, and by what I could not tell. I slowed as much as I felt I safely could to get a better look in the darkening light, and I almost vomited when I saw what they were- names carved into the trunks, and filled with what I knew was dried blood... Dorothia, Helenoiese, Elizabethera, Patriciana... this was not gangwork, this was sheer homicidal madness. I made my way forward with even more purpose than before, and with more fear needing to be suppressed with every new step along the filthy trail. The trees bend forward to tell me to turn around -now, and go home, before it is too late...

to be continued... but not tonight... it's late now, and there is something tapping at my window...