Stuck With Me – While reading about the famous conjoined twins, Chang and Eng Bunker (of Chinese heritage, they were born in Thailand, inspiring the term “Siamese twins”) I discovered that they died hours apart. Horrified at what it would be like for the longer living twin, I decided to explore it with this story. I originally submitted this for a magazine, but the editor contacted me back and asked me to re-submit it to an anthology he would soon be opening. I did, and he accepted it! The theme of that anthology was “doubles.” How timely was that initial submission?
Miss Etta’s B&B – I actually wrote this one to a specific anthology call, which required it to heavily involve food. I’m sure they got a billion stories dealing with cannibalism. I got a very nice personal rejection on the call. It was inspired by a woman who really had a handyman (or so she called him), who buried the bodies of her pensioner tenants. Her motive was collecting the pension checks. As far as we know, the real woman didn’t eat any of them… (Look up Dorothea Puente, if you’re curious.) My critique group was split half and half on how many got the whole tongue thing at the end. Did you?
Unwelcome Guests – This came from a late night jaunt across the internet. I happened across a story about Black Eyed Kids (BEKs). Upon further research, I found all kinds of claims by people that they had experienced real-life interactions with BEKs. Usually, it was simple sightings, but sometimes it went further. But what would happen if they were able to get into your house?
Tent City Horror – After Hurricane Katrina, the city of Colorado Springs became overrun with people fleeing the storm-ravaged areas in the south. Tent cities popped up, and the newspapers were constantly trying to find ways to deal with the vagrancy issues. One particular park was heavily populated by the homeless, with tents and other makeshift shelters along Fountain Creek visible from the Interstate. I wanted to look at how far a city government might go to rid themselves of what they considered an eyesore and embarrassment. The migraines suffered by the main character were inspired by a migraine condition I have, and the research I did in the first couple years of the problem, where I discovered how many people with chronic migraines lose their jobs, marriages, homes, and lives due to their constant suffering and the associated depression.
Let’s Play a Game – This was inspired by the very real practice during the London bombings of parents who couldn’t afford to leave their jobs in the city sending their children off to live with people out in the country who were willing to take those children in. Knowing full well how situations like this can go, with there always being adults wanting to take advantage where children are concerned, I wondered what would happen if one of those children was pure evil. The caretaker in this story was inspired by the foster parent of one of my employees, when I managed a theater back in my 20s. I repeatedly tried to report the abuses this foster teen dealt with, but nothing was ever done. All I could do was be as kind as possible, and do what I could for her when she was at work. I hope she’s doing well now.
Dearest – This one doesn’t have any major inspiration. I just thought it would be fun to write a love letter from a stalker, but bury that particular lead. The rest developed as I wrote.
Beneath – I have a thing about murky water. If something can swim up on me and not be seen, I want no part of it. I was fascinated as a child to learn that a town my grandpa lived in during his youth had been flooded, buildings intact, to create a reservoir. The thought of swimming in a lake, unaware of a ghost town below your feet stuck in my head. This was another one where the editor I submitted it to for one thing (an anthology with a specific theme) rejected it with a note to resubmit when another anthology opened up. The anthology it ended up getting accepted into had a water theme. Again, lucky timing. The best kind of rejection is the one that comes with a request to submit to something else by the same editor.
Night Shift – It’s been pointed out to me that my stories tend to be circular. This one is more obvious than others, in that it starts and ends with some of the same sentences, which I believe Shirley Jackson did in The Haunting of Hill House. I enjoyed the matter-of-factness of the repeated statements. Something about the coldness of it makes what has occurred, sandwiched between those lines, all the more horrifying. This was actually born of an anthology call for horror in an asylum I didn’t have time to write to, but upon seeing the call, I got the idea. Revisiting it later, I wrote the story, even though the call no longer existed.
Where I Woke Up – I have a long-term, mental love affair with the book The Girl in the Box, by Ouida Sebestyen. I even got to exchange letters with Sebestyen while putting together an author day for my middle school (I had the coolest English teacher ever!). Sadly, she couldn’t make it to the event, but she was so sweet and supportive. The story involved a girl, plucked up by a stranger while walking angrily from her friend’s house, typewriter in hand. He stuck her in some sort of cellar, with some water and bread, and never came back. In the darkness, she types journals on her typewriter as she runs out of food and water. Given, I haven’t read it since middle school, so I may be remembering it wrong, but I found the situation and lack of a real ending or motive completely unsettling, especially as I had multiple times escaped kidnapping attempts in real life. I thought it would be unsettling in a different way to wake up in a strange, unescapable house, with no idea who you were, no memory of the “normal” world you must have come from.
A Doomed Affair – This story was written for an anthology call dealing with hotel horror. It was accepted, but never saw publication. The editors of the publication, frustrated with the publisher’s inaction, withdrew the stories for the authors, returning the rights to us. I was excited to be in the anthology, because I’d met the publisher before, and because a friend was also in the book, but publishers have real-life issues, too. One of the things that will instantly turn me against a character is adultery. I wanted to see if I could write a sympathetic character, despite her intention to commit adultery.
Your Mother’s Eyes – I wanted to try my hand at a quieter type of horror. I was also doing a bit of a role reversal concerning an ill parent, with the other parent acting as a caretaker, as my mom was caring for my dad, who had ALS, full time. My parents were soul mates. So are the parents in this story. The thing is, the person who’s dying often comes to terms with it before the rest of their family. But even of the family, caretakers have it the hardest. Their lives revolve around the care of their loved one. When that is taken away, they’ve not only lost a loved one, they’ve lost their purpose, the thing their entire life has revolved around for however long the illness lasted.
The Importance of Self-Defense – I imagine this one is pretty obvious. I wrote it during the beginning of the #METOO movement, while watching women try to explain to men what it’s like to be female in the world at large. The things we have to check for when going out in public that men probably don’t give a second thought to. The fact that were taught how to use our keys to defend ourselves, as if that’s all it would take. What would happen if a virus flipped it all? This is also the closest I’ve come to writing a vampire story.
Message of the Night-Gaunts – I was invited to contribute to an anthology of Colorado authors, many of whom were friends and acquaintances. It had to be Lovecraft themed. The only problem? I’d never read Lovecraft. When I researched him, I discovered he had the same sort of night terrors I do, where a figure would stand over his bed. He called these Night-Gaunts. How could I resist? I’ve since found that many people have this very same night terror, often accompanied by sleep paralysis (like me!). I read a couple of his short stories to try to get a feel for his writing, then wrote this story.
Treading Water – Oh, hey, look, another water one! What if it wasn’t that the water was murky, but that the victim was somewhere without light, unable to see what else might be in the water with her? I should mention that sinkholes freak me out. They can open anywhere, at any time. How are you supposed to prepare for that? They’re especially common in Colorado, for several reasons. Because we have an underground spring that meanders along beside our house, I used to have nightmares of it eating away the porous rock beneath us, causing a sinkhole to swallow us up in the middle of the night. While that particular story may happen at some point in the future, I wanted this one to involve water. I also wanted it to be a quieter type of horror. Sad instead of terrifying.
Good Girls Don’t Swallow – I was invited to submit for a horror comedy anthology. The plot had to revolve around something your mama might have told you not to do, a wives tale. There were so many good ones, but they weren’t funny to me. Then I thought about the threat of swallowing your bubble gum (don’t swallow your gum, or it will stick in your intestines!). What if it didn’t stick in your intestines? What if, instead, a chemical reaction occurred that caused it to grow and grow and grow inside you?
The Dating Game – This one was also written for the Lovecraft anthology. I’d already done serious, but there were so many interesting characters Lovecraft had created. Dating games aren’t a stranger to horror; a famous serial killer was once selected on the real Dating Game (Rodney Alcala). The woman who’d chosen him from behind the partition was so freaked out, she refused to go out with him. Lucky for her. But I wanted this to be funny, to be a bit of fun while I explored the weird creatures, and I wanted the anonymous “man” behind the partition to be the one putting himself at risk. I put this and Good Girls Don’t Swallow at the end of the collection to hopefully let readers ultimately leave on a higher note. Just this once.