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The moonlight made the room flitter with shadows and white light. Green blinking lines indicated that it was four a.m.. He had to blink several times before he could convince himself it was true. Hadn't it just been one? He could feel her hand on him, loosely draped over his thigh. He cautiously picked it up and laid it lightly by her side.

Her shoulders showed sterling in the cool moonlight as her breast raised and fell to the quiet rhythm of her breath. He moved to get up but sat at the bed side for a while, listening to the slow rising morning yawning through the partially opened window. A hermit-thrush called it's final lullaby as a distant blackbird piped up with it'd song to the new coming day. But the world seemed held in place by icy shadows still waiting for the morning sun to melt it into dew.

"Leaving already?" she whispered behind him. She didn't move, but he could feel her eyes tracing his back. He turned and smiled at her in the darkness, his eyes lingering on the parts of her exposed in the fading sliver light.

"I don't want to leave, but I-"

Her tongue caught the rest of the sentence before it left his mouth, like a serpent to it's mouse. They held each other, interlocked in the shadows of one another.

"Then don't," she whispered in his mouth. Each letter lapped at his tongue making him shiver. He wanted to cover back up in the blankets, get lost again with her under the folds of wool and linen and never come back out. But he sat with her, knowing his next movement would break this moment. If he could just linger on it's tip for just a few seconds longer.

"I have to leave," he finally breathed into her, each word betraying his radiating warmth and quivering hands, which screamed for him to turn to her and pull her close. But he sat still.

"You want to leave," she said, pulling away from him, but still close enough for him to feel her on his back.

"I have to leave soon. We talked about this. You said you were fine. This was goodbye..."

He trailed off, squeezing her thigh behind him before letting his hand drop.

"I lied. I'm not. Stay. Please," her hands wrapped around him and fell to his inner thigh and caressed. He caught his moan and shivered it away. But she could feel it and pressed closer. She rested her chin on his shoulder as she continued to caress, kissing now, and humming an all too familiar tune.

His feet urged him to go, sliding back and forth nervously on the fringe of the bedside carpet. The tingling warmth tickling the soles of his feet. But the rest of him urged to stay, to lunge back into the darkness of the night for a few moments more in her cold embrace.

He was rigid now, and she stroked him as she hummed like a washerwoman at work. Her echoes reverberating in her breast on his back. She was slow, but each movement pulled him closer, her legs wrapping around his stomach, her warmth now resting just at the small of his back.

"Come back to bed. Stay. It's what you want, isn't it?" she hums in his ear, her legs constricting, her hands wringing him dry, pulling him back into the cold corners of the dark room. She doesn't wait for his answer.

"Do you think Jim was better off dying in his sleep?," Sharol asked, still unable to look him in the eyes. "I've heard people say it's better to avoid the pain and just slip off into a dream and never wake up again. But what if he was having a nightmare? Is that the last thing he'll remember? Or is Jim trapped forever in that nightmare unable to return to his body? Tori's girlfriend down in Vermont said she had a near death experience. Said the second she realized she was about to die, she was staring at a semi coming down the turnpike after her SUV hydroplaned out of control, and there was nothing she could do about it, that she was filled with a peace she never knew before. She said she never felt so alive. So okay with everything. Maybe that's the way we're supposed to go. Which do you suppose is better? Awake or asleep?"

She didn't wait for his response to keep on talking. He didn't have one anyways.

"I'd like to think going in your sleep would be best. I mean is being more alive before you die really a good thing anyway? We sleep to escape the hardships of life, would a sudden rush of it really change anything in the end?"

"I think you're right, dear."

Jimmy really had no opinion on the matter. He actually hadn't even been aware that people preferred one or the other. But he was taught that it was best to just agree with his wife when she got like this. She smiled at him then went back to crying. Jim's funeral had ended an hour ago and the other funeral goers were already at the church for the after dinner, but Jimmy and Sharol still sat in their minivan in the Fairbank's Cemetery parking lot. Sharol didn't seem to want to leave, and Jimmy had called off work for the next week for bereavement. He had no where to go.

Jimmy and Jim never really got close. Jimmy was never really clear on why. He'd tried on many occasions to connect with his son, but they seemed like water on leather as far as he could remember. Even as a toddler Jim wouldn't let him hold him for more than a minute before wriggling and writhing out of his arms. It was almost as if Jim prefered a fall to the floor than to be near Jimmy. And even when he grew up he never really understood Jim, or his weird hobbies. But Jimmy still phoned on birthdays.

Jimmy did find it odd that he hadn't cried at all about his son, though he liked to say that Sharol was doing enough crying for both of them. He remembered sobbing like a toddler at his own dads funeral and at his best friend Robbie's wake 3 years ago. Hell, he'd even teared up at the series finale of one of Sharol's soap opera's she always made him watch. But not here. Not now. Not at his only son's so sudden demise.

It's not that he didn't love Jim. He did, he told himself. He just never really got to know him. He was kind of like that estranged guy at work that you know you'd get along with if you got the chance to really talk but neither of you really feel the need to. And you never do. You may pass each other on the factory floor or at church, but you only ever faintly nod at one another and maybe exchange a slight smile. But you've both forgotten each other's name and the awkwardness of trying to find it again just doesn't seem worth it. And get on with your own lives. Their relationship was just like that except with yearly birthday calls and forced pleasant exchanges at Christmas.

When they finally made it to the after dinner Jimmy shared his concerns with the funeral director, who warned him that he may be in shock and the reality of the situation hadn't really sunk in yet, and it would eventually. But as Jimmy and Sharol drove home from the church in silence the only thing that shocked him was the tastiness of those little sandwiches they served after the service. It really stood out compared to the piles of dried out turkey and that bowl of half-assed potato salad that were served as well. He bet it was Margret Horner that made them. She'd been taking more risks with her cooking as of late and it seemed to finally be paying off.

That night he prayed about his lack of sadness for the passing of his son as Sharol snored relentlessly after a long day of feeling nothing but. He asked God if he had been a bad father. If maybe his inherited child raising methods had been misguided. If maybe he'd somehow pushed his son away. And God responded in silence. He often did that to Jimmy, though he didn't really mind. Instead Jimmy would just imagine his personal vision of the deity (which changed from day to day) nodding his head approvingly and maybe even giving him a reassuring thumbs up to let him know that everything was okay. But tonight he could only see a shaking head. Back and forth like a pendulum in an old clock. It had to have been his fault, he decided.

Jimmy shut off the bedside lamp, slid into bed, and kissed the back of his snoring wife's head and after a minute or two of restlessness, fell into a heavy sleep.

After dinner, Pike began to play a few songs on his harmonica. He heard the songs and howls from the beasts of the wood echoing among the trees, but they didn't seem so scary to him by fire light. He even tried to play along with them a few times, but their songs seemed too sad, too abrupt. Pike preferred the more lively pieces he'd picked up from other travelers in the settlements along the Merchant's Highway. They gave him a sense of excitement he'd only known among his dreams and even more so when he played them himself. They felt full of hope and life, he thought. But after a while he grew tired from the days travel and laid down to watch the fire die to a warm ember until he finally fell asleep and into the soft cloud of dream.

As he slept a fog began to roll into the wood like encroaching sea foam. The forest floor disappeared into swirling grays and whites, and the roots of the trees seemed lost. The cricket chirps and toad croaks muffled and suffocated under the blanket of fog and the entire wood fell into a delusive silence.

The world seemed asleep for a time until the lonely padding of bare feet and a wild heavy breathing filled the thick air. A cloth-sack cowled figure sifted through the fog, sometimes on two legs, sometimes on 4, barking out clouds of heaved breath as it moved. Tearing at branches and bark with dark heavy limbs, it seemed aimless, exhausted, wild. Then suddenly it's hooded head caught something in the air. The smokey warmth of charred wood tickled it's nose. It's yellow eyes fixed now on a lingering red glow in the distance. It began to move towards it as it's breath quickened with excitement and hunger.

At the camp Pike slept heavily as the dark red fire crackled on it's death bed and the fog and chill of the wood circled the camp, keeping it's distance and waiting. But the dark cowled figure had no time for such pleasantries and stumbled out of the trees into the vale.

Dawson McHenry was a simple man. He had three pairs of blue jeans, three shirts (one brown, one grey, and a red one for special occasions) and two pairs of shoes; one for work, one for leisure. He got his hair cut the same way for the last 13 years by Gus, his fathers barber, and he drove the same 1978 Ford F-250 his father had given him on his 18th birthday. And just like his father, he'd taken good care of it.

His days passed like the prairie wind, and before he'd known it, he was a man. The bounties of life no longer laid before him. Only a long gravely road with an old rotting wood fence on one side of him and never ending farm land on the other. He was nearing 40 and he only knew of one way to go. The way he'd always gone. Forward.

The old truck kicked up dry dirt and gravel as it bumbled down the old country road. The sun shined through the green tree line canopy, illuminating the dirt road in a goldish green glow. Dawson reached out the open window of the truck and sifted the warming spring air through his fingers while he though about spiders.

Todd Horn had been bitten by a brown recluse five nights ago and a lot of people in town were talking about it. And from what he heard, it had been a mess straight from the get go. Todd was a bull headed man. To him, with enough elbow grease and willpower, even the gravest of injuries could be endured, maybe even healed. Like a click in the motor that magically disappears when you stop listening for it. But, as it turns out, spider venom does not magically disappear when introduced to the blood of a man. It simply kills everything around it.

Todd's wife found out about the bite three nights ago when he fell face first into a freshly ladled bowl of goulash. Only after pulling him out and laying him out on the living room couch did she discover Todd's grease rag and duct tape patchwork on his right arm. When she pulled it away she found a puss packed mass of purpled flesh that still seeped a thick white liquid that she could only describe as 'sickly lookin' through sobs as she talked to Doctor Howard over the phone.

Even in a fevered haze he had fought off the doctor. Todd just needed to get back to work and everything else would sort itself out. Doc Howard disagreed and offered him an ultimatum: a quick trip to the emergency room now or amputation later. Even that took a few reiterations to get through Todd's skull, but most the people in town think it was his wife's threats to leave him as she couldn't stomach the thought of hanging off the stumped arm of her husband down main street. She wouldn't stomach it. He went to the hospital in Clear Springs the next day where they scooped out a handful of Todd's arm and wrapped it so well you could only just barely make out the indentation in his forearm. He went back to work the day after despite Doc Howard's orders of bed rest. No one expected any less.

But Dawson didn't think about Todd, at least not right now. He thought hard and deeply about spiders. To his surprise he'd never thought to think much of them before. He stomped and smashed them for his mother on occasion and when he was a boy he and the neighborhood kids would catch them in a paper cups and set fire to their legs with lighters and matches and watched them squirm till they didn't. But he'd never really thought about them. He wiggled his fingers in the wind and watched as his fingers dashed along the horizons hilltops like long, thin legs.

He thought about the fangs first, dripping with venom and death, but then he found himself thinking more about the mind of a spider. Why did they bite? Territorial reasons and self defense seemed like good enough reasons on the surface, but most of the bites Dawson had heard about happened when people were sleeping and unless you're sleeping on a bale of hay or in an old attic, the self defense argument seemed less and less likely.

He watched as farm houses passed by and faded in the rear view mirror. He reached into his jean jacket pocket and pulled out a cigarette, and as he pushed in the cigarette lighter by the truck stereo he chewed on the filter and thought while he waited for the click. Could spiders feel injustice? Could a spider feel wronged? Dawson thought on this with a mild chuckle, but as the funniness of the whole thing faded in the rear view mirror the question still stood in front of him.

When he heard the click he brought the heated coil to the cigarette and breathed in deep. And as he released the smoke out the window he felt himself lip the words: "Vengeance".

It makes sense, he though without thinking. Sitting in corners and crannies watching in still silence. Waiting for prey, sure, but even the simplest of men can pick up pieces of another mans life if he's left sitting long enough. And with that many eyes there's not much that one can hide from it's gaze. And the more you learn about a man's life, Dawson thought, the easier it is to find a reason to hate him.

He hadn't woken up that morning. Not that he was ever awake this early. He tended to slip in and out of his waking dreams till about 10 am, then he'd just nap until noon. Then, after several failed attempts, he'd drag himself out of his apartment sometime after 12 pm. But this morning was different. This morning Jim wouldn't be waking up past noon either. Nor would this be one of those evermore frequent twelve hour sleep days. No, this morning Jim was dead. But this wasn't new news either, as it had already been two weeks since Jim's heart had finally had enough of the years of abuse and decided to fight back. A murder/suicide some would call it. The papers would call it a heart attack. But Jim was already well into the later stages of decomposition on that early Sunday morning when Stacy Waterman got her first real smell of death up her big fat honker.

Stacy had been born with a fairly large nose. She'd been bullied and laughed throughout her childhood and despite what her parents and relatives repeatedly told her, she did not grow into it. After years of torment and even more of therapy she had finally come to accept her nose. Love her nose. But at this moment Stacy hated her nose. Years of tireless therapy sessions and self motivational speeches in the mirror went right out the window. Stacey Waterman would never trust her nose again.

Stacey was only able to decipher the smell from descriptions in whispered voices among her fellow Rental Manager friends at the annual Mason County Home and Apartment Rentals Convention.

"I hear it smells like a bunch of rotten portobello mushrooms left in the sun."

"That doesn't sound right, Camille."

"It's just what I heard. Scott says he heard it's more like rotten eggs, but I think he's just making that up."

Later Stacy would admit that Camille had been correct, but she would also like to add a dash of rotted meat, a spritz of dollar store perfume, and a whole mess of paper work to the description.

But just as Stacy took her first real whiff of two week old dead person two things happened at once: Firstly, Stacey pulled out her cell phone to call her boss as she'd been trained to do in case of emergencies. Secondly, in an almost evolutionary reaction, she began to scream. Her call went straight to voicemail.

"This is Timberwood Rental Agency. We are currently out of the office at the moment, if you would be so kind as to leave your name and number with us we will get back to you as soon as we can. Have a blessed day!"

As soon as the beep of the answer machine went off in the empty offices of Timberwood Rental Agencies, Stacy Waterman's screams shrieked from the speaker echoing off the walls. If any one had been in the office that day, they would have been fairly startled. But no one did. And Stacy's scream ended with a cut as she'd forgotten to change out the answering machine tape the day before. But back at the apartment complex Stacy continued to scream. So loud that everyone in the surrounding complex shot out of their comfy beds to see what all the commotion was about. Everyone except for Jim Harper, Apartment 213, who still laid on the old sagging couch he'd gotten from an ex-girlfriend 8 years ago and never had the heart to throw out, waiting for the final stages of decomposition to finally show him out.

Pike stumbled through the wood. It was thick grown with cypress and pine, the trunks so close to one another he nearly had to squeeze himself between them to continue on. The mid day birds filled the crisp Autumn air with their songs and mysterious rustlings shook the branches over head. Pike pressed deeper into the wood, stumbling over roots and steadying himself on the nearby trunks to keep his balance. He'd continued heading toward, what he believed to be, north for what seemed hours. If that traveler's directions were right, he should have hit the vale by now.

The canopy above him was thick, and what light did get through didn't show him much beyond a few feet in front of himself. As he walked and stumbled he quickly realized that he'd lost track of time. He wouldn't know if it was getting dark until it was too late and he could only imagine what kind of beasts lurked in these kinds of woods once true darkness settled in. He fought back the creeping fear and walked on, if only because he didn't know what else to do.

He nearly cried when he stumbled out into the clearing of the vale. The sun stood low in the blueing sky and gleamed an orange that filled him and the vale with a failing warmth. The clearing wasn't very large, but it would be suitable for camp. Pike even found a tiny fresh water brook nearby. He filled his water skins and bathed as best as he was able then set about making a fire.

The twilight soon fell and the purple in the sky drained to black, leaving shimmering specks of stars scattered in the upturned basin of the heavens. Below it, among the nights shadow, Pike's little fire showed brightly and crackled as he worked on cooking his dinner. He stirred the vegetables and meats in the rainbowing grease, recoiling slightly from the occasional popping and sniffing dangerously close to his concoction to see if it needed another dash of seasoning. It usually did.

Upon finally giving up on it, he left the pan to simmer a while and leaned back against a fallen, rotted log that rested nearby. He ran his hand back and forth across tickling dried moss that lined it's sides and watched the dancing shadows cast by the crackling fire play amoungst the tree line. The night was quiet and more serine than any night he cared to remember. He watched, listened, and smiled. He wondered if tomorrow would be kind enough to arrive a little late. He wouldn't mind. Not one bit.

The chatter of small birds filled the small square room. The cheeps, the clucks, the long schreees all bounced from wall to wall, batting their frightened wings against the peeling, sour yellow wallpaper. I hadn't needed the call of the song bird alarm clock though. I had already been awake and staring at the ceiling for hours that I hadn't bothered to count. The bird calls continued and I continued to stare. Because right above me, on my water damaged ceiling, a single droplet from the late night rain sat glaring right back. It had been there since I had woken up, jiggling with every stomp and door slam from the early birds of the apartment building.

It didn't bother me that the ceiling was leaking again. After calling to complain for the sixth time last week (or had it been the week before?) I'd already accepted that that the occasional drip was now a part of my morning routine. But what did bother me was that today it was still there, just looming above me. Refusing to fall until I least expected it. Once I took my mind off of it it would come crashing down. I could already hear the high-to-low whistle from those old cartoons mixed in with the bird songs of the alarm clock that still filled the room. Then *PLOP*, it'd land right on the bridge of my nose. A startled flinch followed by a flood of frustration that, while rapid, would soon settle to mild annoyance, then spin the drain to being forgotten entirely. But there it was; still, yet shimmering above me. And still, I waited for it.

Stellar's jays were starting their racket now. But at this point I refused to move. After so many hours, I'd finally come to the conclusion that my eyes were the only thing keeping that drip from dropping. Like staring down a territorial mountain lion. A single glance away and it would pounce. Ready for the kill. But as long as I kept eye contact I had dominance. A staring contest that would never end. One I didn't think I wanted to end.

I flinched when a hard knocking came at my door. I swallowed my gasp as the droplet drooped and shook. It settled just as the choir of cardinals fell silent. The whippoorwills would star next.

The knock came again, sharper now. I was ready this time and the droplet sat just as still.

“Excuse me,” said a polite yet deep voice through the door cracks, “Sir?”

I didn't move. I never really cared for visitors. And that wasn't going to change now, especially with all my focus being used right then.

I tried to imagine that I was nobody. And suddenly I was. I felt my feet vanish first, then my legs, hands, arms, then my torso, neck, mouth, teeth, ears, and finally my head. Engulfed in a slow tide of nothing. All that remained were a set of slimy, brown colored eyes resting on the stained, blue stripped pillow. They stared up at the clear little droplet in the center of the round rust colored water stain on the ceiling.

The knocks came again, getting louder now.

'I can't hear you!' I wanted to say, 'my ears have gone and most all of me too. So just get out of here and leave what's left of me alone.' But I couldn't. My mouth had gone the way my ears had left and I hadn't the hands or the will to search around for them. Not that I would. Not with that pupil of a droplet hanging over me.

“Hey,” said the door. All politeness had been beaten out of it with that last knock.

“You need to get up,” I thought I heard it say, though I wasn't sure how. “Turn that god damned racket off too. It's been going off all fucking morning.”

I wanted to look at the songbird alarm clock, which sat on a piles of unread books, scattered newspapers, and unopened mail, just to correct my door on exactly how long the alarm had been going off. But I had no neck to turn with and the backs of my eyes felt so cozy nestled into that dirty cotton cradle of a pillow; staring into that lone, rust colored eye up above, it's crystal clear pupil fixated on me.

So the songbirds continued, and so did I.

The door stayed silent for a while. It was just my eyes, the drop, and the forest full of birds in the darkness of that room. Time seemed to stand still like the head of a red-winged blackbird when it sings the “Leee” of it's “Oh-ka-leee”.

Another knock finally came, scaring away the blackbird, but the room was quickly filled with the tone deaf chatter of ducks.

“Come on, man,” the door whined, in a different voice this time. “Just get up and turn that shit off. Some people are getting pretty frustrated. I... someone'll call the landlord to complain soon.”

The door paused.

I remained silent and closed my eyes, hiding from the insistent quacking.

It felt quiet for a long time.

“Are you okay in there?” creaked the door.

I felt that drop roll down the side of my face.

I blinked, then I grabbed the alarm clock with the song bird chime and threw it at the wall. The plastic bars and digital numbers shattered to the floor and flocks of invisible birds silently flurried to and out the locked and blinded window.

I look up to see that the droplet remained above, untouched and unmoved. I touched my cheek and felt it there too, but this one was warm. I touched my lips. The saltiness of the tear reminded me of a summer day on the beach a long time ago. Then I wondered that if the alarm clock was broken on the floor, why could I still hear the wailing of drifting gulls?

It felt nice outside, Clem remembered thinking. He could remember watching the sun peak in and out of the clouds and he could almost feel that gentle breeze that felt like freshly cleaned white sheets fluttering on a clothes line. It was Sunday, so the roads were empty. Everyone in town was either at church or pretending to be and all he could remember thinking about was how much he wished he hadn't quit smoking. 'To just have one more on a day like this would be the the cherry on top', he could remember thinking over and over in his head as he watched the clouds drift by. But the fresh spring grass was soft on his back and for the first time in weeks he felt, or at least could remember feeling, that he could breath easy. He had to take what he could get. And this was just fine by him.

His Aunt Susan hadn't expected him home until at least 3 pm and he seemed to recall he had planned on meeting up with Jim Donald over in the Village Mart parking lot to buy some pot at 2. He'd had 3 hours to kill, but for some reason he couldn't remember what he did. Everything from then to now came up as a blur. Had he broken down and picked up a pack of smokes? Did he stop by Dennis Moore's house to get that $20 he'd owed him so he could pay Jim? Or did he just keep lying there in the grass, wondering what the fuck to do with himself?

He wasn't sure. And no matter how hard Clem racked his brain, he couldn't retrace his steps from the unfamiliar house he now found himself in and Watson's Park. The windows were dark, so it had to be pretty late out. Aunt Susan would have already called around town to see if anyone had seen him. She scared easy, especially when it concerned Clem.

The house reeked of cigarettes and the once white popcorn ceiling was stained yellowish black from nicotine. Extra butter. The old arm chair he found himself in was worn and the threads on the arms were scratched away from decades of lounging and nervous picking. There was also a coffee table that laid flattened and in pieces in front of him while someone laid motionless on top of it, face down in a pool of orange liquid.

'That couldn't be blood', he thought, though he wasn't quite sure. He'd never actually seen blood, at least not a lot of it. He'd only seen the stuff they showed on late night horror flicks on T.V. and the fake stuff they sold down at the Dollar Store on Halloween. It always looked red on those. But maybe it was actually orange.

Clem didn't recognize the body, at least, not by the way it was dressed. It was faced away from him and he knew he didn't want to try moving it just to see it's face.

'That would make all of this real', he told himself, 'as long as it just sits there and I sit here, there's still a chance I could wake up from this. This only keeps going if I do. If I don't participate, the illusion will just have to give up. Right?'

There came a hard banging at the door, the screen door rattling against the frame with every knock. He couldn't hear any voices from where he sat, so Clem kept still and quiet. Where had he gone after he dozed off at the park? He closed his eyes and pretended to hit an invisible rewind button. He focused hard on the backs of his eyelids, like he did through his windshield when driving through a thick morning fog looking for ghostly headlights. But each knock at the door made his heart jump one more rung towards his throat. And when the door handle began to jiggle, he found that his mind could focus on nothing else. It jiggled, it rattled, it clinked, and clicked. If it was the cops or this things family, they could tear the door down. If this is how he was going down he was going to do it enjoying his last few moments in a soft, ratty old armchair.

He closed his eyes, and listened.

Hi there. I'm sorry that you've stumbled upon this blog. There's nothing of interest here. No deep displays of artistry, no promises of grand projects, not even an interesting display of proper blogging. Nope, I'm just using this platform to post my daily writing exercises. Rough and terrible fictional short works that probably won't amount to anything, but I thought it might be a good idea to find someplace to put them. I'm usually a pen and paper kind of guy, but the corners of my room are filled nearly to the ceiling with crumpled, scrawled on pieces of paper and dead dreams. So like most artists, I've decided to go digital. Save paper, force myself through my own personal shame and share my "work" to the void, and maybe use this as a way to build up a more consistent writing routine. I don't know. I imagine if anyone has actually stumbled upon this post, they've more than likely stopped reading by now and I am, more or less, just talking to myself. But I guess that's kind of what this blog is about. Me talking to myself, day dreaming silly scenarios, and just getting lost in my own head for a little while. If you've read this far, again I apologize for your wasted time. But while you're here, take a seat, relax, and welcome to The Trash Bin.