Anyone Got A Delorian?

‘… believe it or not, I’m walkin’ on air…’

Crap! Who the fuck is texting me at this ungodly fucking hour of the night!  I look at my watch and see the glowing arms telling me that’s it’s 2am.  Groaning, I roll over, find my phone and slide my thumb across the screen to read the message:

‘Shit sorry dude, can’t make it… cya at the rink tomorrow. K?  Marcus.’ The date reads: 21, March, 2030.

It’s 2014… who frig is sending me this shit?

I choose to ignore it, but keep it as a laugh to show my friends.  None of us know anyone named Marcus, and it’s a long way until 2030.

Next thing you know, I’m almost asleep, and my phone goes off again!  Another voice mail is left:

‘I wanted to tell you I love you today, but you make me so nervous.  You’re so pretty. Marcus.’

I’m really beginning to wonder who this is.  I didn’t talk to anyone today… in fact I didn’t leave the house or chat online with anyone called Marcus.  I save both of these to my SIM card and put my phone into the drawer so I can hear the alarm.

Years pass.

I’ve moved across the globe to another country – San Fransisco in fact – to work as an artist.  Life is sweet!  I have my own studio apartment in the city, not far from the bay. 

The fog rolls in over the bay and I have a perfect view of that famous, gorgeous landmark – which is no longer in use due to that massive quake in 2020 – The Golden Gate Bridge.  It’s still red, and it’s still a monument to the great city of San Fran, but the US Government can’t do anything about saving it seeing the Ring of Fire land mass keeps on moving every few years.

My place is quake proof, so I’m good.  I’m safe.  For now at least.

Well, I’m working with another lot of artists at an art college I started up for low-income workers.  You know the type:  kids from families who can’t afford to send their kids to the hot shot schools now everything’s too friggin’ expensive.  Seeing I went to the right schools, I thought it would be best to teach the kids who need it the most how to get their butts out into the world where we really need it – no matter who they are or where they come from.

There’s only five kids in my group from my area:  Lisa, Annie, Marcus and George and Lou.  All have their own way of expressing themselves and all are in their late teens and have failed high school because they’re not good at anything else according to the education system… damned pigeon holing!  They show up at the studios under my apartment and work on their own exhibitions in a space where they wouldn’t normally be able to… I supply the stuff they need (you know, paint, brushes, mixed media… that kinda crap – I even made up a dark room for Lisa as she loves photography).

Anyway, Marcus and I are around the same age – in our early 20’s – and we’ve been hanging out a lot.  He lives in shelters a lot and gets kicked out of them often; so sometimes sleeps in the studio – which he’s not supposed to do, but where can he really go?  Besides, I love him, he’s so caring and sweet and gentle, I really wonder where everything went wrong for him to end up where he is now.

“Hey, how’s life, Suzie?” he asked one day as we all froze in the studio and he helped me install a pot belly stove in the corner I had scrounged from a garage sale on the weekend.

“Well, besides not being able to install this shitty thing, good.” I smile.

“You know,” he knelt beside me looking over the instruction, “Where you up to on here?... your accent is just lovely.”

“Step 6. What?  You kidding?” I screw up my nose, “You love the Australian accent?  It’s nasal, it’s flat… and when we shout we sound like rednecks.”

He laughed dropping the instructions and letting his hair fall over his face, “Oh you’re funny.”

“Nah… if you really want to hear me…” I cleared my throat and spoke good and properly, and sounded as though I had just finished a deportment course, “I would really sound like an English person, wouldn’t you think?” then reverted back to my usual accent, “And I hate it that I’d sound like that.”

This made him laugh even harder as he took the spanner off me, “Here, I know where you went wrong.” His eyes sparkled as he fixed up my stuff up on the instructions, “But it’s not your fault, the instructions were for the wrong pot belly stove… the next model up, not this one.”

“Shit… it figures.” I grunted.

“Say, what are you doing tomorrow night?”

I glanced around the large room and watched the rest of them getting into their work, “Nothing.  What do you have in mind?”

He finished up the work on the stove, “Well, I was wondering if you’d like to go skating.  There’s a rink nearby that’s still operational.”

“Sure… what time?” I smiled.

“Around seven?  I’ll meet you here.”

I waited inside the doors of the studio the next night.  It wasn’t until I searched my bag that I realised I had forgotten my phone, so I raced upstairs and found it sitting on the kitchen counter blinking at me. 

There was a voice message waiting for me:

‘Shit sorry, can’t make it… cya at the rink tomorrow. K?  Marcus.’ 21, March, 2030.

‘What happened?’

‘Have to find another place to stay.’

‘Come here and hang out with me.’

‘You Sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘I have something to tell you anyway.’

‘Tell me here.’

‘Okay.’

I put the phone down and unpack, head off to my bedroom and the toilet and just miss another call from Marcus.  He left another voice mail: ‘I wanted to tell you I love you today, but you make me so nervous.  You’re so pretty. Marcus.’

I frown, “Hang on… I’ve heard this before.  Years ago…”

Adam & Eve

I’m a creator.

You could call me a bar tender, but really, I’m a creator.

After you and your buddies piss off home after closing, I sit around with Smithie there and we dream up new cocktails and drinks to try out on you unsuspecting idiots.

Sometimes they work and you have a great time, while other times they don’t and you’re sick as a dog that night.

Or you cause a huge fight.

Or worse still, your friends cart you off home because you’ve passed out in the toilets.

But tonight, we cooked a great brew. 

It was pure.

Unadulterated, and sexy.

Rude in every single way possible.

Knocked us both off our feet after two martini glass-fulls, and yet we still had a full shaker of the shit left.

We called it Adam & Eve.

Adam & Eve was made from Bourbon, a shot of Southern Dragon’s Tear’s (these are rare an expensive), a sage leaf, ground up apple seeds, nutmeg and – to make it look naughty – a cherry on a toothpick.  Yep, Smithie and I had a great time trying to finish off Adam & Eve; but something strange happened after our first drink.

Something weird.

The place changed – and not in a good way.

The huge speakers by the stage turned into Hell Hounds.  They were huge, black, salivating and clawing at the ground to get to our souls.  Smithie stood up too quickly and knocked over his bar stool and he kept his eyes glued to the speaker. 

“Hey, mate, it’s not real.” I reminded him.

“Like fuck it’s not!” he slurred.

Leaning across the bar, I slapped his face hard and he stared at me, then back at the stage where the large speaker was itself again, “There see, Smithie, it’s a speaker, not a Hell Hound.”

“I think it’s time to go home.” He frowned, “That drink was too fuckin’ weird for me.”

I nodded, “Yeah, don’t we both know it?”

We tossed out the rest of the first lot of Adam & Eve we made, locked up the club and walked out to the car park as the sunrise was just starting to break over the sky.  I loved this time of the day normally… but today, I saw demons filling every shadow.

Exactly what did I put in that drink that had put me on edge?  Turning, I was about to ask Smithie, but he was in the nearest garden being attacked by a Hell Hound – the same one that was eying him off in the club!

“Je-zuz!  You guys were real?”

“Of course they were.” A voice said behind me, “Allow me to introduce myself, I’m Adam… and this…” he turned to his right as a woman stepped out of the darkness, “…is Eve.”

“But I created a drink.” I said, “I didn’t summon you guys.”

“You created the first drink of its kind… something biblical.” He smiled, “You put biblical ingredients into it, so you summoned us into existence.”

“And you called it by our names.” Eve stepped toward me, “How sweet.”

I stepped back, “What do you want.”

Adam looked around, “Well, you called us… the Hell Hounds have taken the first sacrifice.  To keep your end of the deal up, and everyone happy, we need more.”

“Sacrifice… deal?” I had no idea what they were on about.

“Of course.  You struck a deal with us; keep your end of the deal and your little place will prosper.” Adam smiled.

“Fail us, and it will rot.” Eve’s smug face stepped closer.

“No business is worth that.”

He put his arm around my shoulders, “Not even if it means losing your soul over?”

Three months have passed.

Nobody visits my place anymore and I’m still trying to create the perfect drink... it’s the drink to send those two bastards back to where they came from.

I pray to God.

I have tried to talk to the Angels to help me.

Nobody answers my calls.

Smithie is a servant of theirs now, and he doesn’t seem to be anything but a brainless zombie who I can’t kill no matter how much I try.  And now, it’s time to pull out the last resort I’ve got:  the Glock.  It’s loaded.  I lodge it under my jaw as tears course down my cheeks…

My eyes snap open and I’m on the floor behind the bar.

Damn!

Adam’s kneeling over me with the gun in his hand grinning ridiculously, “You didn’t think you’d be let go that easily – did you?” he helped me to my feet as he placed the weapon on the bar, “After all we have your soul, so you can’t do away with yourself… we will just keep on bringing you back.”

“You suck.” I spat.

“Aaw, don’t be mad at us.  Just bring us a sacrifice.” Eve smiled sitting at a table.

Then, it dawned on me.  I walked around the bar, to her table where she was sitting.

Faster than she could react, I pulled the silver knife I had hidden inside my jacket and drove it into her heart, “You want a sacrifice, you’ve got one!”

“No!” I sat up and looked around.

“Hey dude… that drink gave me hallucinations like you wouldn’t believe!” Smithie said to me from across the bar, “How about you?”

“Let’s not make it again… can we forget we ever made it?”

He leaned over and tipped his share of the cocktail into the sink next to me, “No problems.”

“And can I stay at your place tonight?”

“I was going to ask that of you… I got really spooked tonight.” He smiled, “but sure, come back to my place and we’ll drink lots of coffee and watch porn.”

“Dude, sounds like a plan.”

As we walked out into the breaking day, I turn at the sound of what I could only swear was the growling of a dog.  As we get to Smithie’s car, a guy and a girl approach us, “Hi… we’re Adam and Eve.  We’re new in town.”

Little Red Riding Hood - Grimm's Fairytale Retold

Well, it's time for a fairy tale - but not the way you think!  Chuck has asked us to write a Grimm's Fairytale the way we think it should be told; in on of 20 ways... I think I matched mine with Urban Fantasy.

Red hung her mozetta up on the hook by the door, “I’m back!”

“Oh, good.” Her Grandma’s voice was so musical, “Did you happen to buy the fresh parsley, Red?”

“Yes, it was on sale.” She picked up the elephant grass basket from beside the door filled with fresh fruit and veggies and pocketed her car keys as she walked through the small house.  Her Grandmother was the only person in her life now her folks were gone; killed in a freak plane crash over Greece some years back now.

“Wonderful.” The old woman turned from her stove with her famous apron on, “Just put that basket on the chair there, and… oh, doesn’t it all look lovely!”

Grandma always had her hair set in tight curls and her plump body made her appear clumsy, but she was anything but!  Red loved her Grandmother dearly and they both enjoyed being around each other; so the young woman spent a lot of time with her grandparent, now she was widowed.

“I only get the best for you.”

She gave her grand-daughter a tight, wicked grin, winking, “You don’t have to, you know.”

“I know, but I want to.” Red sat down at the counter as she poured herself a mug of tea from the large kettle and settled in and watched her Grandma cook them both dinner for the night.

A few days passed by and Red hadn’t heard from her Grandma.  So, she thought to pop by her house on the way home from work.  She pulled up in the little driveway in her red Fiat that lunch time and found the house locked up tight.

This wasn’t like her Grandmother at all.

So, she found the key in her glove compartment she always kept with her for the place and approached the house, opened the door and called out, “Hello?  Grandma?”

“I’m here dear…” a shaky voice called from upstairs.

“Oh, shit.” She mumbled rushing up the steps to her Grandmother’s bedroom, thinking the worse… she had pictures of her dear Grandma in a crumpled heap in the bathtub, next to her bed, unable to get out of her bed! 

Red didn’t know which was worse!

As she turned the corner and into the bedroom, she found a gun in her face of an intruder, “Crap!”

“Well, hello there.” His voice was deep, like a wolf’s growl, “I didn’t know Grammie had relatives.”

“Please don’t hurt her, she’s all I’ve got.” Red begged, “She’s my only relative alive.” Tears welled in her eyes, blurring her vision as she crumbled in front of the man, “And I’m all she’s got.”

Doubt clouded his face for a moment – and a moment is all she needed – as Red race forward and shoved the muzzle of the gun up to the ceiling!  The intruder pulled the trigger, making it fire! 

From the street, Hunter heard a shot from Mrs. Gardner’s house.  He spotted Red’s Fiat parked in the driveway and the front door wide open.  Something was wrong.  He race across the road as he pulled out his phone and called the police for help, then sneaked inside hoping to surprise whoever it was holding a gun to both the ladies.

“Now, sit down and shut up!” the man shouted levelling his gun at both women.  He glared at Red, “That wasn’t a smart move.  You made me waste a round.” As he turned, he was confronted by Hunter standing directly behind him, “Who the hell are you?”

“Actually, I think it was a very smart move.” He smiled, “That shot caught my attention.  And who am I?” he pulled out his badge, “I’m a cop.”

The intruder tried to push him out of the way, but Hunter was faster by none as he quickly disarmed the man, punching him hard, catching his gun and letting him fall to the floor as the sounds of the sirens began to fill the air from outside.

“Hunter, how good is it to see you.” Grandma sighed, “Have you met my grand-daughter?”

“I’ve seen you around, Red, but we haven’t officially met.” He smiled as he stayed with the two ladies while the other police personnel carted the intruder away, “We’ll need a statement down at the station.”

“I can give one to you right now.” Grandma sniffed, “That rotten little rodent kicked my door in, thinking I wasn’t home, then when he found I was, he accosted me!” she sighed, “Thank goodness Red happened by when she did, but she nearly became a casualty too.”

Red held her Grandmother’s hand, “Then, I did a dumb thing and jumped at an armed person…” she shook her head as she looked down, then smiled looking up at Hunter, “And then, Hunter, you came along.”

Red hadn’t realised just how hot this guy was!

“Say…” he smiled after all the police business had been over and done with, “What are you doing tomorrow night?”

Grandma Gardner smiled from her kitchen sink as she watched the day turn to night, listening to the two of them chat at the door, “What a lovely man he is.”

“Well, nothing… why?”

“Want to catch some dinner and a movie?” he asked.