ruined insulation, bundles that look like gray clouds dragged down by hard rains.
Moths dance. Crickets chirp.
A man emerges out of shadow. He's singing a song.
"Young people, hark while I relate
The story of poor old Polly's fate
She was a lady, young and fair
And died a-groaning in despair."
The song is folksy, old, measured. His voice is gravelly, yet behind it the voice warbles and wavers from lowpitch to high-pitch, as pleasant as the tines of a fork dragged across a piece of slate. Sometimes the voice is a man's. Other times, a woman's.
"She'd to go frolic, dance and play
In spite of all her friends would say
'I'll turn to God when I get old
And then I'm sure he'll take my soul.'"
Lauren whimpers against the gag. Scabs at the corners of her mouth crack, and fresh blood flows over dry. Her palms are marked with Xs. Shallow cuts, but cuts just the same. Her feet bear the same marks.
"One Friday morn, Polly took ill
Her stubborn heart began to fail
She cried 'Oh no, my days are spent,
And now it's too late to repent'."
A new odor, a pungent odor, fills the air. Smoke. Strong of dry flowers, funeral flowers, rose and lavender and carnations, an oily tincture of bitter orange.
"She called her mother to her bed
Her eyes were rolling in her head
A ghastly look, she did assume
And then she cried, 'This is my doom'."
The man's face is that of a bird, a featherless beast with flesh of leather and a beak as long as a child's arm. Wisps of greasy wet smoke drift up from holes in the beak. Human eyes blink from behind filmy goggle lenses bolted to the flesh. This is not his head but rather a hood, a hood that covers down to his shoulders and leads to a bare and sallow chest. Across that chest is a tattoo, blue as a vein, dark as a bruise: the boomerang wing of a barn swallow, twin tails sharp as a barbecue fork.
He reaches into the dark corner of the room, past a scorched mattress. From the shadows he draws a fire axe.
"She called her father to her bed
Her eyes were rolling in her head
'Oh early father, fare you well,
Your wicked daughter screams in Hell.'"
Lauren struggles upon seeing the axe. She rubs her head back and forth, trying to escape, trying to free some part of herself – her scream a hollow and harrowing call as the barbed wire saws into her cheeks.
Blood in her throat. Almost choking her.
The man in the beaked hood leans in, caresses the girl's face. His fingers return wet with red. He steps back, axe held against the tattoo's ink.
"'Your counsels I have slighted all
My carnal appetite shall fall
When I am dead, remember well
Your wicked Polly groans in Hell.'"
The man's eyes close. Rapturous. Ecstatic. The axe raises aloft. A pair of insects suddenly move to circumnavigate the blade: moths in orbit like tiny satellites.
As the man sings, the girl writhes and screams and cries.
"She wrung her hands and groaned and cried
And gnawed her tongue before she died.
Her nails turned black, her voice did fail
She died and left this lower vale."
The axe-blade falls heavy against the table. It falls into a groove that's not new. Lauren's head, silenced, tumbles behind the table. The man kicks it into a ratty wicker basket lined with a black plastic garbage bag.
The killer drops the axe to the ground with a clatter.
He picks up the head, still singing as he holds it aloft. Blood pitter-patters against the ruined floor. His voice changes now: gritty, growly, throaty. His own voice? The words now are barely sung. They're not even spoken so much as they're coughed out of his throat and spat to the earth. A crass expectoration.
"May this a warning be to those
That love the ways that Polly chose
Turn from your sins, lest you
Moths dance. Crickets chirp.
A man emerges out of shadow. He's singing a song.
"Young people, hark while I relate
The story of poor old Polly's fate
She was a lady, young and fair
And died a-groaning in despair."
The song is folksy, old, measured. His voice is gravelly, yet behind it the voice warbles and wavers from lowpitch to high-pitch, as pleasant as the tines of a fork dragged across a piece of slate. Sometimes the voice is a man's. Other times, a woman's.
"She'd to go frolic, dance and play
In spite of all her friends would say
'I'll turn to God when I get old
And then I'm sure he'll take my soul.'"
Lauren whimpers against the gag. Scabs at the corners of her mouth crack, and fresh blood flows over dry. Her palms are marked with Xs. Shallow cuts, but cuts just the same. Her feet bear the same marks.
"One Friday morn, Polly took ill
Her stubborn heart began to fail
She cried 'Oh no, my days are spent,
And now it's too late to repent'."
A new odor, a pungent odor, fills the air. Smoke. Strong of dry flowers, funeral flowers, rose and lavender and carnations, an oily tincture of bitter orange.
"She called her mother to her bed
Her eyes were rolling in her head
A ghastly look, she did assume
And then she cried, 'This is my doom'."
The man's face is that of a bird, a featherless beast with flesh of leather and a beak as long as a child's arm. Wisps of greasy wet smoke drift up from holes in the beak. Human eyes blink from behind filmy goggle lenses bolted to the flesh. This is not his head but rather a hood, a hood that covers down to his shoulders and leads to a bare and sallow chest. Across that chest is a tattoo, blue as a vein, dark as a bruise: the boomerang wing of a barn swallow, twin tails sharp as a barbecue fork.
He reaches into the dark corner of the room, past a scorched mattress. From the shadows he draws a fire axe.
"She called her father to her bed
Her eyes were rolling in her head
'Oh early father, fare you well,
Your wicked daughter screams in Hell.'"
Lauren struggles upon seeing the axe. She rubs her head back and forth, trying to escape, trying to free some part of herself – her scream a hollow and harrowing call as the barbed wire saws into her cheeks.
Blood in her throat. Almost choking her.
The man in the beaked hood leans in, caresses the girl's face. His fingers return wet with red. He steps back, axe held against the tattoo's ink.
"'Your counsels I have slighted all
My carnal appetite shall fall
When I am dead, remember well
Your wicked Polly groans in Hell.'"
The man's eyes close. Rapturous. Ecstatic. The axe raises aloft. A pair of insects suddenly move to circumnavigate the blade: moths in orbit like tiny satellites.
As the man sings, the girl writhes and screams and cries.
"She wrung her hands and groaned and cried
And gnawed her tongue before she died.
Her nails turned black, her voice did fail
She died and left this lower vale."
The axe-blade falls heavy against the table. It falls into a groove that's not new. Lauren's head, silenced, tumbles behind the table. The man kicks it into a ratty wicker basket lined with a black plastic garbage bag.
The killer drops the axe to the ground with a clatter.
He picks up the head, still singing as he holds it aloft. Blood pitter-patters against the ruined floor. His voice changes now: gritty, growly, throaty. His own voice? The words now are barely sung. They're not even spoken so much as they're coughed out of his throat and spat to the earth. A crass expectoration.
"May this a warning be to those
That love the ways that Polly chose
Turn from your sins, lest you
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