A Story Box Full Of Regret: The Collected Shortish Stories of Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys

By Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys

Dare to venture into the multilayered cosmos of acclaimed author Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys with his latest anthology, "A Story Box Full of Regret." This provocative collection of science fiction and speculative fiction stories offers you a passport to parallel dimensions, hidden galaxies, and uncharted epochs, all housed within the confines of a single book.

In a realm where nothing is as it seems, Scorpio-Rhys pilots you through a labyrinth of interstellar intrigue and post-apocalyptic prophesies. Each page spins a vibrant tapestry of distant worlds, unforgettable personas, and narratives that stretch the boundaries of your imagination, ultimately leading you to the crossroads of fiction and reality.

Embark on this wild odyssey through a literary universe humming with sentient androids, ominous alien lifeforms, and the echoes of civilizations long vanished. You will bear witness to the very fabric of humanity, stripped bare and dissected, as characters grapple with the profound depths of regret, the unquenched flames of desire, and the relentless river of time.

But, "A Story Box Full of Regret" extends beyond being a mere assortment of tales. It is a veritable trove of unparalleled escapades, a vortex pulling you into its depths, challenging the foundation of your existence and leaving an insatiable craving for more.

Prepare yourself to plunge into these electrifying narratives. Prepare to question everything you have ever known. But most importantly, prepare to keep turning the pages.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rhyan Scorpio-Rhys
• Release date: Dec 11, 2024
• ISBN: 9798227996459

Book preview

PROLOGUE

The key was nearly as old as he was and the lock he slotted it into definitely predated his birth.

There’s a knack for opening this door, Warren Burke said, as he jiggled the key a bit in order to get the lock to turn. Grabbing the doorknob in both hands, he gave it a sharp twist and lifted it at the same time while he put his shoulder to the old wooden door in order to force it open. Used to stick in the summer and I had the damnedest time as a kid trying to get inside.

He was greeted for his effort with a blast of air that had been still for too long and had grown quite stale.

We need to get these windows open and air this place out, his wife, Nessa, said as she moved past him and made a beeline to the living room.

You relax, Warren said. Let me do it.

I’m pregnant, not made of porcelain, she said over her shoulder, in a tone that said you relax, as she made her way to the first window.

Warren knew she hated when he became overprotective, but in his defense,  it was his first time at fatherhood and his wife was seven months pregnant with their twins. No names had been picked out because Nessa was a firm believer in the jinx, having lost a baby during pregnancy in her previous marriage.

And while Nessa pulled curtains apart and opened windows as far as they would go, Warren stood in the foyer and stared at his childhood home that seemed so much smaller than he remembered it.

This place was welcoming once, from the open door to the wide hallway. On the walls were the photographs of a family who so obviously loved each other. The floor was an old-fashioned parquet with a blend of deep homely browns and the walls were the greens of summer gardens meeting a bold white baseboard. The banister was a twirl of a branch, tamed by the carpenter’s hand, its grain flowing as water might, in waves of comforting woodland hues. Under proper lighting it was nature’s art, something that soothed right to the soul.

He hadn’t realized how long he’d been rooted to that spot until Nessa came to him after opening all of the downstairs windows.

Hey, you okay? she asked.

Yeah, fine.

You know, if you’re having a change of heart, we don’t have to put the house up for sale.

You know as well as I do that we can’t afford two houses. This place is too small for the four of us, the neighborhood’s gone to pot, and there are too many bad memories here.

Okay, your house, your rules.

My father’s house, he corrected.

"That he left to you in his will, so technically…your house."

Warren sighed. Let’s make three piles in the living room: things in decent shape that we can sell, things in fair shape that we can donate, and junk to throw away.

And one more pile, Nessa said. Things that we keep.

I don’t want anything in here.

I’m not thinking about you and your unresolved resentment toward your father, I’m thinking about our children who have no beef with their late grandfather, who deserve to know where they come from. Don’t fight me on this because you’re going to lose.

Then that fourth pile is your hassle.

Thank you, Nessa said and kissed her husband on the cheek. Now, I need to crack the upstairs windows.

She turned but Warren caught her gently by the arm and said, I know how you get when you’ve got a project. Take it easy, take it slow, we’ve got plenty of time. Please, for me.

It was Nessa’s turn to sigh, as she nodded her head in reluctant agreement.

The sorting process started in the attic. That was Nessa’s idea, start from the top and work their way down. And it became apparent quickly that no one had been up there in years.

Boxes that held Christmas decorations, handmade and store-bought Halloween costumes, pots and plates, photo albums (which Nessa snatched up immediately for her To Keep pile), old moth-eaten clothes, suitcases, and a locked steamer trunk. All resting under a thick layer of cobwebs and dust.

The thing that caught Warren’s attention was the locked steamer trunk. He had been up in this attic as a boy playing pirates with his imaginary friends and this trunk had always been the treasure chest he had to protect from thieving scallywags. He could have wasted time rummaging through the house in hopes of finding a key, but chose, instead, to look up on YouTube how to open the lock with a screwdriver.

Inside he found his father’s military uniform, duffle bag, maps, MREs, an M1911 pistol, a box of ammunition⁠—

The uniform and MREs are an interesting piece of history, but that gun and ammo are not finding their way into my house, Nessa said forcefully.

No complaints here, Warren agreed, carefully placing the firearm and ammunition to the side. I’ll call the police station and let them know we’re bringing the gun in on our way home today.

Good. So, what else is in there?

Under a layer of old clothes, Warren lifted a heavy case by its handle. He set it on the floor, flipped the latches and opened the lid to reveal an old Underwood manual typewriter.

I wonder what’s this doing in there, Warren said, more to himself than his wife.

I think that’s pretty obvious, said Nessa.

Uh-uh, you don’t know my dad. I’ve never known him to write a thing in my life.

Nessa peered into the trunk and spotted a parcel wrapped in brown Kraft paper and tied like a present with twine that the typewriter case had been hiding. Normally, she would have let Warren open it out of respect for his father’s personal belongings, but curiosity had gotten the better of her, and she was pulling one end of the twine to undo the bow and unwrapping the package.

Inside the Kraft paper wrapping was a pile of papers, some white, some yellowing, and some gone brown like autumn leaves.

What’s that? Warren asked, glancing over at the papers.

Typewritten, double spaced, looks like a manuscript to me, and it’s got your father’s name on it: Geoffery Burke. Nessa handed the top sheet over to her husband.

No, that’s impossible⁠—

I’ve got a stack of papers in front of me that says different, Nessa rifled through the stack. But I think I’m wrong about it being a manuscript. It looks more like a bunch of individual stories, and the bottom half are all rejection letters. You never know, sweetheart, this manuscript could tell you about your father and his past.

Warren glanced at the stack of paper in his wife’s hands, then looked away. He busied himself by packing up the typewriter.

Maybe it can’t tell me anything at all.

Why are you being like this?

Being like what? You want to sit here and create a fantasy life for my father, a man you never met⁠—

And whose fault is that? I begged you to reconcile with him because I wanted to meet him, I wanted to know where you came from, and you denied me that, just like you denied him a son. He died all alone because you were too pigheaded and proud to bury the hatchet! Why would I want to be married to someone so callous and coldhearted?

The temperature in the attic suddenly dropped twenty degrees and though they were mere inches apart, the distance seemed a thousand miles at minimum. Warren was at a loss for words, processing the enormity of Nessa’s outburst. Nothing but the sound of breathing passed between them for an eternity.

It was Nessa who broke the ice for she was always the bigger person whenever they argued, saying, I didn’t mean that.

Yes, you did.

Okay, but I could have phrased it better.

I know you mean well, Warren said. But you have to understand that when I think about my father, I have two opposing sets of memories. The earliest ones, the distant ones, he was a happy man and when my mother became sick, he was the positive one, trying to keep everyone’s spirits up. My mother lost her battle with cancer when I was 10 and my second set of memories, the ones that stick, were of him shutting down emotionally.

Honey, he just lost his wife.

Yeah, and I lost my mom and my dad, too! He wasn’t a writer, okay? He was a contractor that threw himself into his work and forgot he had a son. He never raised a hand to me but sometimes I wish he had.

You don’t mean that.

At least then I would have gotten something from him besides indifference. He’d go to work each day, working as many double shifts as he could to pay off the hospital and funeral bills and when he came home he was barely human. Eating, brooding in his room, drinking himself to sleep. And who had to pick up the slack? Who cooked and cleaned and made sure things around the house got done? Me! With never a word of acknowledgment or thanks.

Do we really have to have a conversation about men not being the world’s best communicators? Nessa said. Tell me, how often do you thank or even acknowledge me for everything I do around the house?

But that’s different.

Please don’t fix your mouth to tell me that I’m your wife and that’s my responsibility⁠—

Uh-uh, nope, Warren shook his head. Do not turn this into one of your rants on chauvinism. You know exactly what I meant.

Here’s what I know, when you want to be, you’re a sensible man who knows better. Is it a shame that your father shut down when your mother died? Of course, it is. And if he were still alive and shunning you, you’d have every right to be bitter about it. But he’s gone, Warren, and you shouting at his ghost isn’t going to settle the matter or change the past. Any grievances you had with your father should have been placed beside him in the coffin and left at the cemetery.

Life isn’t that simple!

That’s where you’re wrong, Nessa said, taking hold of her husband’s hand. Life is that simple. It’s us with all our expectation baggage that makes it difficult. Your father tried to handle his grief the best way he knew how, a lesson he probably picked up from his father. But what your father didn’t do was hang his depression over your head like a dark cloud for the entirety of your life. You did that all on your own. And you can stop doing that, as well. If you can’t manage it all on your own, guess what? You’ve got me to help you out. But I’ll tell you what I’m not going to help you do, and that’s dragging that dark cloud over into our family. Our baby deserves a fresh start with a cloud-free daddy, and I aim to see he gets just that, comprende?

In every argument there comes a point where continuing to quarrel is futile, realizing this, Warren said, Okay, since you’ve got all the answers, how do we go about dispersing the cloud?

Nessa held up the stack of papers in her other hand. This might give us a head start.

You want me to read his stories, stories he kept hidden from me all these years? Warren tone made his opinion of his wife’s suggestion crystal clear.

No, Nessa clarified. I want us to read the stories together and maybe we can talk about how they make you feel.

What, like I’m in therapy?

No, like you care for your wife and your unborn child and you’re willing to take this first step to make peace with your past for the sake of your family’s future.

It really means that much to you?

You can’t even imagine.

All right, Warren said. Here’s the compromise: we’ll read one story together, and if I’m not feeling it, we pack the rest away, never mention them again and find some other way to help me move on.

Nessa set the papers down, spat in her palm and extended her hand, saying, Deal!

Warren eyed his wife with bewilderment. You don’t expect me to⁠—

Spit, candyass, and let’s seal the deal.

Warren sighed, hocked a loogie into palm and grasped Nessa’s hand firmly. Choose wisely.

Nessa flipped through the pages, examining titles until she plucked a sheet from the pile. How about this one? she smiled.

OTTILIE WAS NOT AN ANGEL

Ottilie was not an angel, despite firsthand testimony to the contrary. The eyewitnesses weren’t liars, mind you, they accurately relayed what they saw; they simply hadn’t seen the event in its entirety. Blame it on the limitations of sight from three-dimensional eyes.

As a child, she was fun and full of life, enthusiastic and excited about everything. Blessed with a contagious personality, an infectious laugh, and vivid imagination, she was always in the middle of trying to sort out an illusory problem, usually some trouble she had unwittingly started, running two steps ahead, dragging me behind and explaining the faux pas while we ran from invisible monsters.

As we grew older, the monsters never stopped chasing her.

Ottilie was never satisfied. Born fortunate and afforded comforts most would have killed for, my sister always yearned for more. Not to have more, but to be other than what she was. Something less limited. In fact, that was a bone of contention between us. She never grasped how I was so contented with my lot and the finiteness of my existence. I tried to explain I had two lives, my own and the one I lived vicariously through the connection we shared; that bond that was more than just mere telepathy, shared consciousness, or psychic rapport.

To me, it was far better to be the only ugly entity in a world of beauty rather than the reverse. From my vantage point, whenever I looked out into the world, all I’d ever see would be splendor. And that was what it was like sharing her mind. I tried to present this as eloquently as possible, but somehow her thirteen-and-a-half-minute headstart in life granted her a gift of expression that I lacked and allowed her to brush my reasoning away with weary disinterest. I never held it against her, though. I knew I had the better view.

Sadly, what made her beautiful to me, made her dangerous to herself. She realized early on what her life could possibly be and her mind would not, could not, allow this world to be enough, so she contemplated and calculated for days on the best way to escape. And those days blossomed into months and those months matured into years. A lifetime of limitation, combined with therapy and drugs—both prescription and street—wore down the tread of her spirit.

To everyone else, she was a woman of secrets and it bothered her that she couldn’t keep those secrets from me. I told her I would never discuss it with anyone and I never did, but she didn’t believe me.

In drugs, she finally found a way to shut me out. Her mind became a shattered prism refracting pieces of wailing mayhem in the blindness. My first and only choice for a sister and best friend became little more than a stranger to me. A clouded reflection trapped beneath a layer of ice too thick for my thoughts to penetrate. For the first time in my life, I truly understood the meaning of the word loneliness, and I thought what did I do that could have led to this?

Among the things she dabbled in, philosophy, inventing, and mathematical architecture, Ottilie was not a busker. Yes, she performed in the park, but not for money, merely for her own sanity. I visited her most days when time allowed. I wasn’t quite sure she knew I was there most times. Except for the last time I saw her perform.

On that particular afternoon, the old spark had returned to her eyes. I knew instantly she was off her meds because I felt her consciousness tickle the outer fringes of my mind. Not like it used to be, her thoughts were close yet somewhat far away but I didn’t care. I had been alone in my head for so long I’d gladly accept any crumb or morsel thrown my way, and this was the first time since we were children that I had seen her approach anything near the neighborhood of happiness. She could barely contain her excitement when she told me she finally figured it out.

Harmonics! she said, as she danced and twirled around me like a pavement ballerina. The answer was there all along, hidden in plain sight, staring me in the face, and now I’ve worked out the formula!

She sat me down on a park bench and sang for me, or rather she sang to me and for herself. Her voice was divine, unmatched; a summer breeze through crystal chimes. People were drawn from their workaday existences. They formed a circle around us, unable to turn away from Ottilie, who sang of theories, both superstring and Bosonic, of manifolds and fractals, octonions and triality, as she strummed vector chords of coordinate geometry on a second-hand acoustic six-string.

What the throng of spectators saw was Ottilie being lifted into the air; her toes brushing the top of the manicured grass as her skin turned a tone so soft and unearthly to the eye that the color defied description, yet radiating like so many suns. The light that enveloped her made all other light seem dark in comparison, for the briefest of moments, before she popped completely out of existence.

What they hadn’t seen was the enormousness her frail frame acquired—probability, enfolded symmetry, phase space—as she ascended dimensions. Her song had given her the freedom she desired all her life and carried her onward and onward until she encountered a barrier that prevented her progress. Thinking quickly, she changed the tone of her song. She no longer sang for herself, she sang for the barrier and what lie beyond. Flattering it with melody, requesting an audience.

That was when a pinhole opened in the outer barrier of everything, allowing the omniverse to kiss my sister. She knew in that instant it was not what she wanted. She tried to flee, but the feverish rush of knowledge feasted on her being without mercy. She suddenly understood everything that was meant to be understood, as well as all the bits that weren’t. This tremendous understanding allowed her to spy the surface of a giant puzzle that contained the ultimate ensemble of every conceivable information pattern, as it was about to be solved.

But she simply couldn’t endure her brief exposure to timelessness. Her bones popped, limbs twisted and organs reformed as she was purged from the omniverse; stripped of her personal dimensionality and the many unnecessary facets of humanity attached to them. Layer by layer. Until all that remained was her core self, a small and insignificant thing that lost all depth, width, and finally length, as they imploded within her.

Ottilie was not an angel, but I allowed people to think she was, as I combed the park grass daily, searching for my sister who called out in my mind telling me she wanted to be other than what she was—a zero-dimensional entity.

STARS GO BLUE

It was a secret place, a quarter acre of Eden abandoned and erased from the mind of mankind the instant the original sin was committed, and I had stumbled upon it quite by accident.

No, that was a lie and I promised myself I would not defile the sanctity of the garden if it could be helped.

I was not proud of the actual reason of how I came to be in this place, simply because I was a stalker. In my defense, it was only the once, I hadn’t made a habit of following women around without their knowledge. Just one woman. The one I was currently spying on, crouched here in the bushes amongst the flower blossoms, berries and leaves.

Mari.

Coworkers called her Marionette behind her back and sometimes to her face, passing it off as good-natured teasing. There was nothing good-natured about it. She acquired the nickname because she was a gangly woman who moved about in a jerky fashion, as if the unseen wires that made her move were constantly in a tangle that the puppeteer hadn’t been able to sort.

Mari did as people of her ilk often do, she kept herself to herself, stared at her shoes rather than make eye contact, and accepted all the negativity heaped upon her shoulders with nary a complaint. But she couldn’t hide the fact that she was miserable, just as I couldn’t hide that I was somehow drawn to that misery.

Although I wanted to know her for a while, I was too shy to make an approach. Today, I told myself, would be the day. As I went through my daily grind, I slowly mustered all my courage and screwed it to the sticking place. Ten minutes to quitting time, I marched to Mari’s cubicle, prepared to make my intentions known…

But she wasn’t there.

I searched by the fax machine, in the kitchen near the coffee maker, I even bore the brunt of strange stares when I loitered outside the women’s restroom, but she wasn’t anywhere to be found. Completely and utterly defeated, I grabbed my coat and left for home.

Half a block before the entrance to the subway, something grabbed my attention out the corner of my eye. Across the street, Mari sat on a bench at a bus stop as the 5:17 pulled up. I wanted to run across the street, braving the crosstown traffic and hop on the bus to make my stand. Instead, I froze. All my former courage had long abandoned me.

For the second time today, my heart sank. And for the second time today it did so without merit. The bus pulled away to find Mari still seated. And she sat as bus after bus pulled up and away. She did not read a book. She did not listen to music. She simply sat patiently.

Then when sufficient time had passed, Mari stood and walked away. I couldn’t tell you what possessed me to follow her on the crooked path that weaved through narrow alleyways, towering overpasses, black as pitch underground tunnels. Eventually her journey came to a halt in front of a lot that appeared to have been vacant for centuries.

Mari stood at the perimeter of the lot and at the precise moment the evening woke and forced the daylight into hiding, a door appeared with seven locks. She stood absolutely still and waited. In the newborn evening sky, stars bloomed and seven of them twinkled blue in a sequence that repeated seven times. The locks tumbled one after the other and the door opened slowly.

Mari stepped through the door frame but hadn’t appeared in the lot on the other side. From my vantage point, she simply vanished.

I ran to the door and managed to squeeze through before it shut, but instead of finding myself in the overgrown and refuse-filled lot, I stepped into paradise. My clothes melted from my body and ashamed of my nakedness, I hid in a nearby bush.

In the very center of the garden stood a mammoth tree that bore unrecognizable fruit of various shapes and sizes, the roots of which branched out along the grass and touched two streams on either side, one that appeared to have been made of milk and the other honey.

Standing beside the tree was Mari, naked but no longer that gangly woman who was awkward in her skin and awkward in the world. Here, her jerky movements flowed gracefully, her normally dull and lifeless eyes were polished to a fine shine, and her crooked mouth straightened and nearly split her face in half when she unleashed that radiant smile.

Mari blew a kiss up to the tree and somehow that kiss became a breeze that rustled the leaves which made a sort of melody unlike any I had ever heard. A pure music played by nature itself.

She danced around the tree all night without tiring, in time with the tune, and sang in a voice that was different from her normal mousy tone, stronger now, more confident. And I watched all the sorrow and strife, all the hurt and anger, all that was wrong with her life evaporate from her body.

When she sensed it was time to leave, Mari reached up and plucked the smallest of the fruit from a low hanging branch and dipped it in the stream of honey before washing the meal down with a cupped hand from the stream of milk.

The door reappeared and her clothing was folded neatly in a pile beside it. With each layer she put on, the transformation to her old self, the Mari that people mocked, began.

I thought about following her, but how could I ever leave this place, this patch of perfection? I knew she would be back and the next time I would talk to her, for certain. Until then I was contented to wait until she returned to dance again. I would wait until the stars went blue.

THE SPACE BETWEEN

When I was asked to deliver this eulogy, I was terrified. I am not the best orator in the family, that honor goes to Arthur, my brother, who couldn’t be in attendance because he and his family lived too far away, as opposed to my youngest sister, Ethel, who simply couldn’t be bothered to pack up their families again for a repeat memorial service. You see, we buried my great grandfather Walter two short weeks ago and while I understand the inconvenience, family is family and they should have made it their business to be here, if not to offer support to those of us this passing strikes hardest, then at least out of familial obligation. If it sounds like I’m bitter, I am, and I apologize for burdening you with it but not sorry for voicing the way I feel. That was one of the lessons I learned from the person we’re memorializing today.

This woman gave life to the woman who gave life to the woman who gave life to me and I owe her so much because I have a good life. If it’s true that grandparents give us a sense of who we are and where we come from, then great-grandparents let us know how far we’ve come and the sacrifices that had to be made for us to exist.

Today, as we bid farewell to GiGiMaw Eleanor, I realize the size of the hole left in my heart and in my family. I am truly blessed to have so many strong women in my life and it is extremely rare for a relationship three generations removed to be so crucial and so enduring but then Eleanor was that phenomenal sort of person every single day of her life. And you don’t have to take my word for it, others will come up and tell stories that will make you laugh and fill your hearts with joy and hope. I, on the other hand, wish to tell a different story, one that few of you know but I think it’s time to clear the air of ghosts and secrets from the past.

Eleanor and Walter had two children, a daughter, my wonderful GiMaw Ruth, who is with us today, and her older brother, Ned, who is no longer with us. From the stories Eleanor told me, Ned, the granduncle I never had the honor of meeting, was an active little boy, rambunctious and always full of playful mischief, but he was kindhearted, especially to his baby sister. Always the defender of the weak and a paladin of justice, he had the makings for growing into someone important, someone the world needed.

When he was just six years old he was the victim of a hit and run which cut his life short. Alerted by the neighbors, Eleanor and Walter rushed to the scene of the accident and gathered up their son’s body and immediately carried him home as not to cause a spectacle. They carefully and lovingly cleaned Ned head to toe, dressed him in his Sunday best and placed him on their bed in the space between them and mourned their loss in private all through the night.

This was in a time before the dead were taken to morgues, back when it was the family’s responsibility to take care of funeral arrangements themselves. My great grandparents were poor, like nearly everyone else in town, so these two people, these two parents, dug their son’s grave with their bare hands, wrapped him in his bedsheet and placed his body into the ground, burying his corpse handful by trembling handful.

Eleanor and Walter divorced each other two months later. They were still in their twenties and chose to remain living under the same roof for their daughter’s sake, together but separated. Eighty plus years of sleeping in their marriage bed with a space forever between them where their phantom son lay, sharing an experience that was so painful that they couldn’t risk casting an eye upon the other for fear of reopening a wound that never fully closed.

But as I mentioned, they were private people who managed to keep that pain to themselves and had I not known the story I would have been hardpressed to spot their unhappiness whenever we stopped round for a visit. Up until the end, GiGiMaw Eleanor had more energy and showed more interest in my life and the lives of my children than anyone I’ve ever known. No offense, Mom.

What made my great-grandmother special? So wonderful? As the relative who lived the closest, she was always present, part of our everyday lives in such a tangible way, baking and cooking and babysitting and taking our daughters for surprise days of shopping at the mall.

You impacted my life in so many ways, GiGiMaw Eleanor, helped shape who I am, who my children are. You influenced all of us so greatly and I will always love you and save a special corner of my heart to keep you with me because you held the family together.

And in keeping with your tradition, I wanted you to know that we