Bleeding The Orchid

By Aidan Lord

Tense, violent and atmospheric, this collection of macabre short stories presents a surreal world where cities are plagued by evil forces, murder becomes the only solution to extreme loneliness and visions of horror stalk their unsuspecting victims.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Aidan Lord
• Release date: Jan 17, 2012
• ISBN: 9781466191976

Aidan Lord

Based in the United Kingdom, Aidan Lord is the author of horror stories that will disturb, amuse and offend in equal measure. His first collection, entitled 'Bleeding The Orchid', is described thus: Tense, violent and atmospheric, this collection of macabre short stories presents a surreal world where cities are plagued by evil forces, murder becomes the only solution to extreme loneliness and visions of horror stalk their unsuspecting victims. A second collection of short stories entitled 'Red Day White Day' is scheduled for release by the end of 2012.

Book preview

BLEEDING THE ORCHID

by

Aidan Lord

SMASHWORDS EDITION

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PUBLISHED BY:

Aidan Lord on Smashwords

Copyright 2010 Aidan Lord

This book is available in print at most online retailers

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CONTENTS

Me, My Friend & I

Coma Deep

Bleeding The Orchid

Crip

The Boy Who Does The Walk

Dismembering Abigail

Isolationists

The Nightwatchman

ME, MY FRIEND & I

I was barely a few days old when Rex first entered my life.

Our lifelong bond was forged at the very instant Mother placed him in the crib alongside my serene, angelic face. From those very first seconds, we had been inseparable. Years later, I often watched the shaky camcorder footage of this historic event, this epochal moment when unstoppable force had met immovable object. When our lives had become inextricably intertwined.

He was my earliest memory. When my eyes finally opened, I could survey the world and all its colour with beautiful naïve innocence. Sights and sounds, Mother and Father, family members and friends all strained for a look at the newborn. Yet so much wonder was rendered insignificant when I beheld him, towering over me in all his boundless glory.

Through my formative years he became a permanent fixture, constantly standing guard, twelve inches of straggly brown fur at my side both day and night. From dawn until dusk, from twilight to starlight. My keeper.

He was all things. Friend, parent, ruler, deity, sage. A source of wisdom that stimulated my inquisitive and impressionable mind and body. He showed me constellations and cloud formations, our heads cocked back against the twinkling sky. We enjoyed long walks in the park on blustery autumnal afternoons. During the sweltering summer months, we visited the seaside, holding ice-cream hands as we strolled along the promenade. In the winter, our creative and defensive instincts came to the fore; we built armies of invincible snowmen and positioned them across the hillside overlooking our home. When other children attacked we took refuge within our fortified snow castles, defending ourselves against the siege outside. Battles would be waged on the belligerents, and we would always be successful in deterring them.

There was never a dull moment; constant activity, an endless flow of dynamic conversation. We triumphed against all adversity. No-one else and nothing else mattered.

When it was playtime, we unleashed our unique brand of havoc on the unsuspecting neighbourhood. Nothing was safe. Cars were stripped of hubcaps and wing mirrors, windows were smashed, letterboxes were stuffed with litter and dog shit. Uncertainty often gripped us as we skulked outside the household of another victim; the unpredictability, the fear of confrontation, the risk of being caught. But nothing could surpass the feeling of elation as we fled from the scene of another crime with an irate resident in pursuit, cursing us as we escaped unpunished.

Hunting became our favourite pastime. Elaborate traps were hidden at strategic locations around the house and in the garden. Traps fit to snap a rat’s neck or break a bird’s back. A rusty cage became our municipal animal prison; scraps of meat were used as tantalizing bait. We watched with anticipation, sometimes lying in wait for hours, until some unfortunate creature ventured from the bushes and sealed its own fate.

Magpies were the most prized catch. With their distinctive black and white plumage, we viewed them as potential rivals to our eminence as the neighbourhood’s chief menace. We declared war, snaring as many of the beasts as possible. Once captured, Rex would wring their necks and string the corpses up from trees and washing lines as a warning to other magpies. Sometimes, we took turns throwing the corpses at nearby houses. One for trouble, two for joy. Our battle against the magpie ensemble was swiftly won.

It was such fun, hurting little things that were defenceless or weaker than us. Things that couldn’t fight back, or were quickly subdued if they dared to try. The nature of our prey didn’t matter. The bigger the better. When living things evaded us, we relied on the dead to fuel our entertainment. There was a main road just five minutes walk from our house. Rotting corpses were in abundance; foxes, badgers, the occasional dog, any animal that had carelessly wandered onto the main road and suffered an untimely demise. And we had plans for roadkill.

We tempted local children with promises of free candy, pacified them with a few cordial words and won their trust. As they reached out their hands expectantly, we suddenly produced a severed animal head mounted on a stick. The children would scream, their eager expressions dissolving into masks of pure blind terror. Sometimes, we daubed the head with garish paint or sliced open the mouth so that the dead creature’s teeth were bared, maximizing the grotesquery of the animal’s face, maximizing the extent of the children’s fear.

He accompanied me on my first day at school. We simply couldn’t be apart. Mother suggested that I leave him at home so I could concentrate in class, but I protested so loudly and violently that she could only agree. Rex and I walked proudly up the school drive together, an allied front, a deadly duo. Two would succeed where one would fail.

We spent lunchtimes making mischief together, hiding the teacher’s notes and sticking pins on the children’s chairs. We loosened the lids on bottles of glue, so that when upturned, the entire contents of the bottle would flood onto some hapless child’s lap. Obscenities were scrawled messily across the white board and action figures were horribly maimed, their plastic limbs ripped from their bodies and strewn across the classroom. When class resumed, pandemonium would inevitably follow. Some children would scream in pain as their butts were pricked, others complained loudly at the sticky substance that unexpectedly caked their trousers. Teacher would demand to know who was responsible, but no admission of guilt was forthcoming. As the lesson degenerated into bedlam, we giggled with surreptitious pleasure at the mayhem we had caused.

On one occasion, the teacher attempted to engage us with some class participation, asking each child a question in turn. As she energetically conducted her lesson, Rex remained resolutely oblivious. I tried to follow his sterling example, but the teacher addressed me directly. I only noticed when she tapped my shoulder and waved. Her lips moved, but I couldn’t fathom the words. I wasn’t interested. She must have repeated herself multiple times, but finally became exasperated with my apathy and returned to her desk.

Eventually, she discovered that I could be prompted to co-operate through Rex. She would place him in front of me and whisper, Rex says it’s time for Maths now.

I would obey unhesitatingly. Rex’s wishes must be fulfilled.

Later, when it was time for reading comprehension, teacher would again communicate her lesson plan through Rex; only then would I conform.

I was one of the few children who actually bothered to wash their hands after using the toilet; Rex had taught me the merits of decent personal hygiene. Alas, such a novel concept was lost on my peers. Every other boy stank to high heaven. Rex would always laugh at little Tommy, this idiot who sat next to me, so stupid he was beyond remedial. Poor Tommy was possessed by a pungent stink so overpowering that you could smell him from a hundred metres away. I used to help him with his equations occasionally, and I still have vivid memories of leaning over to point at one of the answers on his textbook, only to be contaminated by his rank aroma. Rex roared with laughter; I indignantly silenced him with an elbow to the ribs. The other children, including Tommy, just blindly continued. Such carefree childish innocence; these idiots knew nothing of germs and bacteria. They just wanted to escape to the playground, escape to the swings and seesaws and sandpits. They were of little interest to me, and I made few friends. Toys and games and playgrounds and similarly banal activities were secondary to the pleasure of Rex’s worldly company. They thought I was strange, they thought I was abnormal. But none of them had a life as rich as mine.

We wrote filthy verse about them, trying to cross the boundaries of taste and decency. It was friendly competition, a playful bid to surpass each other, to plumb the most obscene depths of our minds. Rex usually won these little contests. His dirty limerick about Tommy sent the poor child running from the classroom in floods of tears. It was a strange but significant victory.

Not everybody shared our amusement. My parents seemed to dislike Rex, for reasons I couldn’t unravel. Seeing us together, Mother always fixed me with that accusing grimace that Rex called her ‘vinegar face’. Father would open the front door and brusquely shoved us both outside, regardless of season or temperature. We were no longer welcome. I didn’t understand why.

For hours we were left unsupervised to roam the streets. Even at that age, my feelings of bitterness were regressing into something truly unpleasant. A burning resentment. Evil thoughts became my defence mechanism against the ongoing friction and frustration.

I couldn’t identify with them; they were cold beings, morose and humourless. There was always a contrast between the effervescence of my partnership with Rex, and the frowning sterility of the family home. How could I explain to them what Rex meant to me? My fondness for him was greater than my fondness for anything or anyone else.

Whenever we returned from our exile, Mother would woefully try to make amends; on one such occasion, she bought me a present - a magic talking doll. When you pulled its chain, it would emit phrases of love and union. I’m your best friend, it claimed. I’ll love you forever.

For months, I endured insufferable terror at the hands of this doll. It seemed amiable enough during daylight hours, but at night it assumed a life of its own. Frequently, I would be awoken by its nocturnal bloodlust. Its eyes would glow red, its cheerful grin would mutate into a demonic scowl and fangs as sharp as needles would grind together in its monstrous mouth. Steam poured from its snapping maw as it clawed rapaciously at the bedclothes. If anybody dared pull its chain after midnight, it would utter words and curses of unspeakable horror, its head turning through revolutions as it quoted from the book of Revelations. Alerted by my terror, Rex would jump from the bed, beating the doll senseless and stuffing it into a cupboard. Then he would return to bed, embracing me with a kiss, quietly assuring my security. Only then could I sleep again.

In the morning, Mother would remove the doll from the cupboard and return it to its chair, from where it would stare at me with voiceless venom, desperate to strike but kept in check by Rex’s formidable presence.

But the doll would have other opportunities. One evening, Mother hurriedly arrived at school. She was late for an appointment, and we had to leave immediately. In our haste, there was no time to fetch Rex from the classroom. I screamed and protested but she insisted that I was being silly, and that one night without him was not the end of the world.

I will never forget the tearful journey down the school drive as I imagined Rex all alone in that dark, empty classroom. Would he be afraid? Would he feel abandoned?

Lying alone in bed that night, I was at the mercy of the darkness. Rain and wind battered the house as the trees seemed to sigh and moan with despair, scratching the windows with their scrawny branches. From the corner of the room, the talking doll was watching me with a rabid grin. I panicked. Hiding beneath the duvet, I could hear its footsteps moving across the carpet. Tonight, it was coming to claim its prize.

With jagged claws, it attempted to snatch the duvet from my grasp as it clambered hungrily onto the bed. Fighting back, I could hear its chattering teeth tearing at the thin fabric that separated us. The battle continued until dawn, when it seemed to sense that the opportunity was lost and quietly retreated to the corner. I had won. Rex would be proud of me.

The trauma of a night without Rex was distressing enough; arriving at school the following morning did nothing to allay my fears nor to soothe my ire.

It was October 31st. All Hallow’s Eve. The classroom had been decorated accordingly.

A pumpkin grinned menacingly from the teacher’s desk. Plastic bats and spiders dangled from the ceiling. Some children had designed cardboard gravestones bearing their own names and epitaphs, others had dressed in fancy costumes and stalked the school corridors as mummies and vampires.

And there amidst the morbid festivities was Rex.

The other children had dressed him up as a witch. A feeble black hat emblazoned with stars had been placed upon his head. Strands of shredded newspaper formed an absurd wig. A long black gown covered him from shoulder to ankle in some pitiful attempt to produce an aura of mystery.

I was livid. Apoplectic with rage. My beloved friend now resembled little more than some occultist transvestite. Furiously, I tore the clothes from his body and held him in my arms. The teacher and the other children watched with puzzlement as I burst into floods of tears, incensed that he had been demeaned in such a manner, yet relieved to be united with him again. Such peace and joy as we lay side by side that night, joined together under tangled bedsheets. He held me close, his strong arms around me; I felt the warmth of his breath as he buried his face in my hair, kissing me, cradling me.

To celebrate our reunion, we embarked on a hunting extravaganza. Rex decided to increase the stakes; another child trapped within the cage, as opposed to a mere animal, would be our huntsman’s holy grail. School provided us with the perfect victim - Tommy.

It was easy to persuade him to follow us home. He was as trusting and excitable as a puppy. We vowed to lend him our collection of comic books, if he would only squeeze inside the cage. He willingly obliged - and the door was shut. Tommy, our eternal bugbear, locked up as we teased him through the bars.

The magpies fly high in the sky, we chanted. They’ll peck out your eyes and cook you in pies.

We rotated the cage on its axis, our chorus of taunts mixing musically with his petrified caterwauling. It was only when he started hurling himself against the bars that we released him. Tumbling from the cage, he lashed out in an apocalyptic temper tantrum, his arms flailing like rotor blades. A blue bruise was growing across his forehead. He had wet himself; that fishy stink enveloped us again. His ordeal over, he limped home, gifting Rex and I with a story that would tickle us until our dying day.

One cold weekend, we went for a stroll on the recreation ground