All Things Truly Wicked: Tales of Sinners, Saints, Science, and the Supernatural

By Anthony V. Pugliese

Bad things happen to good people as much as anyone else. Sometimes good things happen to the bad, too. There's no middle ground. The universe doesn't discriminate between those we believe are saints and those we view as sinners. Think about all those so-called evangelists who had fallen due to scandals. Don't forget the criminals who reformed and became successful by writing books, doing interviews and starring in movies. We are all half saint/half sinner. No one is completely bad or good.

We live in a society often devoid of compassion, harmony, and fairness and a chock full of distractions and temptations. No one is immune. The urge to succumb to the tiny devil which speaks to us from within our psyche can be so powerful, even so-called saints can break bad.

The characters in this book are neither saints nor sinners. All will face unearthly terrors in the form of bioluminescent cats, spiteful witches, killer insects and other horrors. All will teeter within an otherworldly realm, traipse a thin tightrope between daylight and shadow and be changed forever. All things truly wicked start from innocence, and within these pages, all become . . . the truly wicked.

"All Things Truly Wicked: Tales of Sinners, Saints, Science, and the Supernatural" is a compilation of short stories by Anthony V. Pugliese that explores the complex workings of the human mind and the darker aspects of human nature. The book features a range of genres, including horror, science fiction, and the metaphysical—and they all contain unexpected twists and turns that will keep readers guessing until the end. For instance, a chapter in the book might initially give the impression of being a crime thriller but then suddenly shift into the realm of the paranormal. Throughout the book, Pugliese isn't afraid to explore disconcerting themes and topics, resulting in chilling tales that provoke reflection. It is also important to note that some of the scenes in the book are quite graphic in their depiction. For example, "Her eyes were wide with fear and anguish. She beckoned for help as the behemoth rat violated her with vigorous force." The author uses different techniques to build a haunting and powerful story. He draws on elements of religion, such as Jesus Christ, specific vocabulary, such as "la amada de Dios", folklore, such as gremlins and Krampus, and scientific concepts, such as tardigrades, to create a particular atmosphere. Adding believability to the fictional world they are creating. Pugliese's writing style is atmospheric—his characters are well-rounded, each with motivations and desires. This makes it easy for the reader to become invested in their stories and root for them, even when they're not necessarily "good." They feel like real people with real-life problems, such as this excerpt: "I found someone else." "Another woman?" "No." Her eyes kept staring forward, no blinking, no emotion. Her next words seemed rehearsed. "I'm...involved...with a man." "All Things Truly Wicked: Tales of Sinners, Saints, Science, and the Supernatural" is a collection of short stories that intertwine psychological exploration with unsettling imagery. It will appeal to horror, science fiction, and supernatural fans. This work of fiction offers something for every type of reader. Stories that will leave a lasting impression on the reader, staying with them even after finishing the book.

The Moving Words Review, themovingwords.com

• Language: English
• Publisher: Newman Springs Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 30, 2020
• ISBN: 9781645315780

Book preview

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All Things Truly Wicked

Tales of Sinners, Saints, Science, and the Supernatural

Anthony V. Pugliese

Copyright © 2019 Anthony V. Pugliese

All rights reserved

First Edition

NEWMAN SPRINGS PUBLISHING

320 Broad Street

Red Bank, NJ 07701

First originally published by Newman Springs Publishing 2019

ISBN 978-1-64531-577-3 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64531-578-0 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

The Grimalkin

Curio

Creature of Habit

The Blooms

Noonday Devil

Metastasis

Christmas Presence

The Night Clingers

Who’s the Feralist of Them All?

Night Songs

Carnage

For my mother,

Rose Marie Queenie Pugliese

June 23, 1931—April 2, 2013

All things truly wicked start from innocence.

—Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast

Introduction

Being wicked and treating others with discord and disregard has been a privilege in many civilizations for centuries. In ancient times, emperors and kings were expected and even encouraged to assassinate their predecessors to gain everything, which included their treasure and thrones.

In Victorian and Elizabethan times, the royalty underpaid their employees and overtaxed the peasants on purpose in order to stay wealthy. In today’s media and pop culture, it almost seems kinda cool to be cruel. Sometimes, we cheer for the sinning bad guys and see the victimized saint as pathetic and overly passive.

In the midst of the worldwide pandemic in 2020, we’d seen the hidden darkness come to the surface in many. Senseless killings, riots, and political upheavals were rampant for months and still go on today. We watched in horror while average people transformed into vicious animals storming the nation’s capital: rioting, looting and committing mass shootings. Sinners and saints they are, and like the players in this publication, they too became truly wicked.

1

The Grimalkin

Evil events from evil causes spring.

—Aristophanes

In ancient times cats were worshiped as gods; they have not forgotten this.

—Terry Pratchett

Dolores Lorie Candelaria hated cats. They were sneaky and connected with witches and black magic. They carry worms, spread disease, and steal babies’ breath. Lorie couldn’t think of a single creature more worthy of a torturous death than a cat.

She came out to check her mail and found more than thirty feral cats on her property. They left dead birds, rabbits, and mice all around her Block Island home. The large long-haired grimalkin with the golden eyes had to be the leader. The others seemed to mirror her. They walked when she did, all prancing in a straight line behind her. They sat when she did, jumped when she did, and even vocalized when she mewled. The old gray feline definitely had complete dominance.

The grimalkin sat, whipping her tail. Her myriad companions surrounded her as if to pay homage. She glared at Lorie with half-shut eyes. The others hissed, howled, and snarled, some with ears flat to their heads with backs and tails bristling.

As Lorie raked up the bloody beasts on the walkway and grass, she recalled the black-and-white cat which used to sit on her mother’s shoulder. Her tail flailed back and forth, contempt in its neon-green eyes. Once, she awoke at three in the morning with the wily feline on her chest looking down at her and swiping at her face with its paws.

Lorie kept her view on her new visitors while shoving tattered, eviscerated animals into a trash bag. She walked toward the dumpster at the end of her walkway but not before checking her mail. Nothing but bills and junk; and when she tried to walk farther, the screeching, hissing cabal corralled her in while their commander sat on the porch and evaluated from afar.

Lorie thought she saw a red-haired woman with a hooded robe and piercing eyes standing where the grimalkin rested. What the hell? She looked again. Just the cat. Lorie shook it off while the clowder below her bared their teeth. A tortoise-shell-colored cat reached out with one paw and nipped her bare ankle. Shoo! Go away!

A strong gust of wind joggled her licorice colored hair when the cats scattered off in all directions. She embraced herself, her heart palpitating and her body shaking like the night her ex-husband Carrick Cutter McBast returned home from prison.

Cutter, a former merchant marine with connections tied to the Irish mafia and the Irish Republican Army, had been released from his incarceration due to a legal loophole. Twelve months ago, he waited for Lorie while hunkered in her doorway with a whiskey bottle. Hours later, she wept at the bathroom mirror while tending to her abrasions and swelling eye.

She had always endeavored to avoid unharmonious relationships like the one she had with her abusive, drunken father, but two years ago when Cutter showed up at Boston General Hospital where she worked, he had peaked her interest and held her in a hypnotic grip. He conveyed an innocence behind the deep-set hazel eyes and he held an inescapable charm. Lorie joined him in matrimony after three months only to discover he also had an unbridled, barbaric sexuality, a volatile temper and a cocky swagger masquerading an internal self-loathing.

Lorie spent nights staring out the kitchen window with black eyes and contusions, twisting her Irish Claddagh wedding ring around her finger and trying not to focus on the past bone fractures, psychological abuse, and the ingratiating Cranberries tune Cutter frequently hummed with passive-aggressive fervor, With their tanks, and their bombs, and their bombs, and their guns…

She packed her bags one night while her tormentor lay catatonic on the living room floor. It was late September now, and the summer tourist trap had fallen silent like the Catholic school she once attended in Massachusetts. The trails, the bluffs, and the beaches were all depressing and somber since the guests left for the season. No more boat races or clambakes and no more children building driftwood forts on the sand dunes. By six in the evening, spumy waves bathed the rocky shoreline as the South East Lighthouse and its keeper’s dwelling in New Shoreham twelve miles south across the island sound became immersed within a gloomy mist. Lorie watched the sunset’s golden brilliance render a red-orange halo coloring on the horizon.

She stepped on three mutilated mice sprawled on the kitchen floor when she went back inside. A resounding thump from the basement startled her. She unhooked the hasp, pushed the creaking door slowly open, and stood at the entrance, trying to formulate a reason not to go downstairs. Her heart fluttered. She clicked on the switch and took tedious steps down the squeaky, wobbling staircase. She sighed when she reached bottom, her body going limp with relief. She picked up the fallen water-stained cardboard box. Scattered snapshots overlapped on the cracked concrete, most with Cutter’s face cut or torn out. Thudding and scraping noises started within the walls and spread to the floors. The bulb hanging on a cloth cord from the rafters dimmed, crackled, and popped.

She screamed and ran up the stairs, her phone falling from her hand. She fumbled with the gadget before it vanished in the coffee-thick darkness. The house’s interior became ebony. Damn! The electric’s out, she said. She stumbled around the kitchen drawers to locate her flashlight before parting the drapes on the window above the sink. Cottony fog swallowed the cottages and structures dotting the shore on the island’s opposing side, but the harbor and beyond had power. Everything was normal. Ferry whistles blew across the Atlantic. Buoys bobbed and chimed like death knells. Gulls and other birds circled and soared about the cliffs. Shiny, translucent gray clouds advanced.

The drawers all opened up at once and the cabinet doors slammed open and shut. Windows oscillated, pipes clanged, walls groaned, and plaster cracked. She grabbed the light and took refuge under the kitchen table. She thought about her young brother who died in Afghanistan after taking cover under a store canopy during a terrorist attack. The ceiling fizzed and split. Pictures flapped. Dishes, cups, bowls, and glasses flew out and shattered on the floor. Sparks discharged from outlets and sockets. She crawled across the white tile on her knees with arms over her head. The incoming ruckus ended within minutes then silence filled the house.

The grimalkin appeared with one abrupt motion on the outside window ledge. She glowed like a beacon, her skeleton gleaming from within. She alternated into a blackish gray with the exterior pulsating bright yellow. She shrieked, hissed, and pawed the glass with her feline mafia in the background. She hissed and screeched. Lorie rapped her knuckles against the window. The grimalkin clawed against the glass. The others joined her single file over the fence and beyond.

Lorie ran upstairs, changed into a green sweater and black spandex, slammed her tote bag on the bed, and started emptying her dresser and highboy. Lightning flashed through the sky and thunder cracked in the distance. The birds darted about to escape the forthcoming deluge. With nowhere to go, she grabbed her battery-operated radio, ran downstairs into her tiny studio, slammed the paneled door, and locked the deadbolt. She lit a cigarette with shaky hands.

She reached for a fistful of sunflower seeds in the bowl on the paint-stained table beside her. The local weather station sputtered on about mudslides, flooding, dangerous lightning, and horizontal hail. Thunder fractured the sky repeatedly as the tempestuous squall propelled branches and leaves against her windows and siding. Something compelled her to set up a canvas on her easel. Without thought, she pulled up her sleeves then grabbed brushes and paint tubes. Like a crazed virtuoso, eyes broad, mind focused and teeth gritted, she slammed, and stroked the burlap in a feverish pitch, paint flying about like ejaculate. She grabbed one brush, then one tube, and so on, her mind like the roiling sea miles away. Compelled to finish, like a puppet, she had no control over her movements as torrential rain and pea-sized hail clattered on the skylights, roof, and windows. The two hours that had passed only felt like minutes. Saturated in sweat, she breathed heavily. She viewed the completed macabre black, brown, and eggshell-colored creation while the storm raged. She had only ever painted still life, murals, and portraits. The cat—or whatever it really was—bedeviled her. The cat’s form rested amid a hill of skulls, her lambent skeleton radiating from inside her crystalline exterior.

Lorie stared into those golden eyes. The cat moved, blinking and moving its tail. Its skeleton glowed a bright blinding white. Something or someone spoke to her—a feminine voice. Call me Cailleach. Executed. Hanged, buried but alive. Long ago. Brought back dead, made anew. Peasants, men defiled by ignorance. Killed me. Troubled. Need you…need…

Lorie’s connection ended, and the painting returned to normal. Once her mind cleared, she giggled to herself. What was in those sunflower seeds?

Her mother often regaled her with Celtic tales when she was a child. This, combined with her paternal grandmother’s disturbing mythos immersed in Italian folklore, caused Lorie many sleepless nights. A child born with a chicken’s head, two-headed farm animals, gas stoves burning red fire instead of blue—a bad omen. Lorie thought about the woman. Everything Lorie wished to be: strong, independent, and mysterious.

She looked into the cat’s eyes again.

An explosion rocked the house. Lorie fell from her chair. Something was beating against the roof and walls outside. Something huge. She unbolted the door while something large and horrendous roared outside. The widows rattled.

Lorie went into her kitchen closet and grabbed the baseball bat her brother once gave her for protection when she lived in Mystic. Something the size of a school bus with gray-and-black fur trotted by the living room bay window. A walloping screech filled the air as a mottled leg armed with white claws as long as scythe blades came smashing through the window. The gargantuan cat scratched up the floor and tore up walls while its earsplitting wail echoed. Lorie reared back and struck the monstrous appendage. A pained shriek combined with irascible howls caused her to cover her ears. A snarling infuriated face peered through the window. The mammoth aberration caterwauled in frightening timbre, its nose wrinkling into a savage snarl. Lorie lifted the bat high into the air, her eyes locked on the leonine beast’s menacing gape. She brandished her weapon higher. I don’t understand what you really are, she said, "but I’ll give