An Eyeful
For three days after the spider bite Johnny ’s right eye was blurry and pulsated and brimmed with pus. Johnny had been staying in the darkness of his bedroom, but on the fourth morning he went into the bathroom to look in the mirror at his swollen eye. Exposed to the light in the bathroom, the eye crawled farther back into its socket, retreating from the brightness.
Tryst
Her neck was long, stretching out from her kimono like a pale snake as her body lay sleeping on her tatami. From her room, and down the hall, her head went floating, searching the paper-walled rooms of the palace for the handsome young samurai. Blade drawn, and already wet with blood, the emperor awaited her within her lover ’s room.
Call And Answer
The cornfield trembled beneath the Harvest moon, and so, too, did Maggie, fearfully holding her doll to her chest. Somewhere in the corn rows the scarecrow walked, calling out with his dry, straw-tongued voice. After a time, Maggie ’s doll called out in answer, inviting him over.
Discovery
Warren had been tracking the Great Horned Owl for months, seeking the pellets left in its wake. Sometimes at night, while alone in the woods, Warren heard voices, and even screams, as if far away, and saw orbs of light in the treetops. After Warren was confined to the asylum he continued to talk of fairies and pellets while clutching tiny skulls in his hands.
The Gallows Judge
Harold Marsh was a hanging judge who claimed no greater satisfaction than a gallows jig. Often Marsh would order a hanged man taken down, just before he could die, and then strung up and hanged again, just so he could watch the dance such men did a second, or even third, time. After retirement Marsh was found dead in his house, hung up in front of a mirror, a grin on his purple face.
Marriage Vows
Before Josh ’s first wife, Kelly, had killed herself, she vowed, “Josh would remarry over my dead body! ” And so, when Josh married Britney, his second wife, the ceremony was held atop Kelly ’s grave. True to her word, Kelly made no objections
Tangleroot And Tressknot 