The Dark Issue 102: The Dark, #102

By Steve Rasnic Tem, Tobi Ogundiran, J.S. Breukelaar and Priya Chand

Each month The Dark brings you the best in dark fantasy and horror! Selected by award-winning editor Sean Wallace and published by Prime Books, this issue includes two all-new stories and two reprints:

 

"A is for Alphabet" by Steve Rasnic Tem
"In the Smile Place" by Tobi Ogundiran (reprint)
"Auscultation" by J.S. Breukelaar
"Never Lie to Me" by Priya Chand (reprint)

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sean Wallace
• Release date: Oct 30, 2023
• ISBN: 9798223047414

Book preview

THE DARK

Issue 102 • November 2023

A is for Alphabet by Steve Rasnic Tem

In the Smile Place by Tobi Ogundiran

Auscultation by J.S. Breukelaar

Never Lie to Me by Priya Chand

Cover Art: A Gathering by Vincenzo Lamolinara

ISSN 2332-4392.

Edited by Sean Wallace.

Cover design by Garry Nurrish.

Copyright © 2023 by Prime Books.

www.thedarkmagazine.com

A is for Alphabet

by Steve Rasnic Tem

There is beauty in fundamental things, and nothing is more fundamental than destruction. I could watch a forest burn, or a field, or a house, for hours.

I can still smell the smoke. It’s taken residence in my nasal passages, and I can’t get it out. I liked setting fires when I was little, and then I stopped. But I would have these gaps where I couldn’t remember what I did. I hope I didn’t hurt anybody.

Your ABC’s. It’s one of the first things you learn. I learned mine walking this street with my mother and looking at the large wooden letters mounted on the houses. The houses on Alphabet Row have letters instead of numbers, twenty-six houses, one for each letter, thanks to Raymond Queneau, the rich fellow who owned the land and built all these houses. At the end of the street, he constructed the library bearing his name, QUENEAU in huge stone letters beneath the spired roof. It’s a grand Gothic building full of surprises. The descender at the end of the Q hangs like a dragon’s tail over the front entrance.

My mom is the head librarian. Our house was on the corner across the street. Grandad willed this ruin to Mom, and she tried to fix it up, but she never had much money. Grandad was obsessed with all things Egyptian and remade his house using chicken wire, plaster, and paint to resemble an ancient tomb. The result was like a decaying movie set. Over the front door hung a painting of the sun with wings. Just under the roof were depictions of beetles. Hieroglyphs were crudely scratched into the exterior walls and much of the interior. Everything was crumbling. Mom worried somebody would report us and the house would be condemned. They would have done us a favor.

Every day when I was little my mom would walk me down the street and we would say the letters together and she’d ask me for words starting with those letters. A is for Apple, but also Arnold, which is my name, although everybody calls me Arnie. B is for Ball, or Bat, C is for Cat, or Can, or Crash, and on and on through Z (zebra, zoo, zoom). She said sometimes if you find the right word you can learn something important about yourself. A lot of those letters are gone now, due to vandalism or the owners taking them down, which is a real shame.

I got to know those houses, but Mom never let me get too close. I wasn’t allowed to trick or treat on our street, or to fundraise for scouts, or even step onto anyone’s lawn. When I asked her why, all she would say was Because I said so. I discovered she wasn’t the only parent with that rule.

I have, or had, three close friends. Carl, Doug, and Roger, each outcasts in our own way, so maybe our friendship was destined. But destiny is something I hate to think about.

We had our own dark versions of the alphabet, producing new variations as we tried to top each other. A is for Asshole, B is for Butchered, C is for Clown. Maybe clown doesn’t seem all that dark, but you never met the lady who lived at #C Alphabet Row. D is for Dracula. G is for Ghoul. E is for Eviscerate. Carl taught us that word.

We filled our time playing with Roger’s Atari, reading comic books and other cool stuff at Queneau’s Library, and riding our bikes around the neighborhood looking for clues. We considered ourselves sage detectives. But we were just being snoops. Terrible things happened in the neighborhood, most without our knowledge.

Hey you guys! Roger rolled into the library reading room like somebody shot him. At fourteen he was a stumbling disaster, always in a stained T-shirt, constantly screwing up. I wonder if he might have grown out of that if he’d had enough time. His hip caught a library cart and an avalanche of books spread across the floor. Roger had little impulse control. I could relate.

Oh my God! he shouted dramatically and fell to his knees on the books, crushing and tearing pages. An elderly librarian peeked in, sighed, and went away, probably to tell my mom. I pulled him off the damaged books, and Carl and Doug did what they could to fix things. I felt bad for Roger, who sat like a pile of dirty laundry, tears in his eyes.

Doug fiddled with one of the cart’s wheels, trying to straighten a bent piece. He was our mechanic. A little cranky, but there were reasons. He didn’t talk much about his home life, but everybody saw the bruises.

"Your