Overheard at Table 1: Notes for April is the Cruelest Month

 
April is the Cruelest Month

"Man's yesterday may never be like his morrow; Nought may endure but Mutability. "
— Percy Bysshe Shelley


What does that mean?
 

It means that I’m going to mute you now.
 

The sharpened rebar pierced Marc through his navel, and erupted from his spine.  Marc was lifted high into the air, impaled and screaming, and brought down savagely onto the ground.
 

1/2
 

Oh my GOD! Mags! what he’s doing to that poor man.
 

I know!  Glorious, isn’t it!
 

No, it’s horrible
 

The beautiful brutality! Finally, a man worthy of our lust!
 

What do you mean OUR lust?
 

 2/2
#Mags




I brought this to you because I thought you could help.
 

How can I help?  
 

You both share the same … determination.
 

Thank you for the compliment, detective.
 

It wasn’t a compliment.
 

Yes it was.  You just don’t want to admit it.   But anyhoo, all I can tell you is what you already know:  he’s killing member of this “dark poets community” – how many is that?
 

Hundreds – even thousands.
 

Well, you got a lot to choose from, but mainly it seems like he’s going for the ones he thinks are not “real writers” – those who don’t actually write or who just fool around in other people’s DMs.
 

But why?
 

He’s an editor.  In his mind, the whole community is a book, and he’s whittling it down until it’s fit for publication.
 

That’s insane.
 

Writers are a strange bunch, but editors, well, they’re even stranger.  Their logic is well, let’s just say, it’s esoteric.
 

That’s not very helpful.
 

Just look for the ones in the group what haven’t actually written a lot in the past few years.  Start with them.  HE certainly has.
 

Thanks … don’t know if you’ve been much help, but thanks.
 

Oh, and detective, if you do catch him, tell him 2 Peter 3:17
 

Do I have to look that up or are you gonna tell me.
 

“Be careful that you are not carried away with the error of lawless people and lose your own stability.”   

You would do well to hold on that verse yourself.
 

See ya ‘round, Billy.
 

You know where I am, Detective. I ain’t goin’ nowhere but the chair.

Overheard at Booth 4: Notes for "Mags"

[end of book one]

two shots.  one, then two.

a dog barks in the distance.

Mags slumps against the blue metal dumpster.

man stuffs the gun back into his belt and says, "fucking stupid slutwhore cunt" and turns to walk away.

"Hey, fucker!" Mags says, hand to her side, blood spilling from between her fingers, "I'm not stupid!"

MAGS! MAGS!  are you OK? 

"What an asshole," Mags says.

MAGS! Stay with me!

"ass ... hole" and suddenly it is very cold.

[that's where book one ends]

[book two]

1.

I awake in a hospital room and the first thing I notice is that my right wrist is handcuffed to the bed, because I want to scratch my eye because it itches and suddenly I'm jerking this clanging metal against metal, so I scratch with my left hand because that one is still free.

Light is coming through the window and it's hella bright.  Can somebody shut the curtains or something? and I don't know for a second or two if I'm speaking that or just thinking that, but it seems like someone heard me because there is someone at my side now, can't really focus on the form but it has that feeling of a female body, the fleshly belly pressing close against me, there is a warmth to the female body, especially those who've had children recently, it's very, very comforting.

But this person isn't saying anything, aren't they supposed to ask me how I'm feeling or hold up fingers or something like that, but the voice I hear now is someone behind them, "Do you know your name?" it says, and yeah, it's a woman, but it's obvious that she hasn't had any kids ... or else she drowned them in some fucking river or something.

"What?" I say.  Gee. That's a brilliant comeback.

"Do you know your name?" it asks again, and then it, steps to the side of the comforting belly (which I will now say is the nurse) and holy shit, yeah, it's a cop.  Definitely a cop.

"Yes I know my name," I say.

"What is it?"

"Don't you already know?"

A man behind her says, "She might still be under."

"I'm not a hundred about that."  Then, to me again, "Please tell us your name."

"Charlotte," I say.  "Charlotte the harlot.  Like the Iron Maiden song."

Then, finally, someone draws a curtain ...

2.