The Critical Soul

She called him at midnight again, screaming that he had killed her soul, again he hung up. How dare he trash her novel, it was her soul she put into it, and he killed it with the stroke of a pen. Twice she had seriously thought of shooting him from the church bell tower where she sat everynight with her sniper rifle. She thought to use a red lazer scope to give him a moment of panic, to know how she felt when she saw his words, but the more she came to hate him the more she just wanted his life to be over. Tonight she didn’t take the shot, she leaned back, took her finger off of the trigger, and lit up her cigarello. Maybe her nightly 3am call to him would give her some relief, maybe he would agree that he killed her soul, if he would just say he did, she would end the phone calls. Those four words would change her life forever, it would mean that at some point in her fucked up life she did have a soul once, before the hatred and the pain and the disappointment crept in.
She looks at her watch even though the church added a clock to the tower, she could hear every movement of the minute hand, tick tick tick, more moments of life lost to her forever. It is almost a quarter to 3, she leans forward, rifle in hand, a cell phone in the other, and waits for the next call.
.
.
He answers the 3a phone call as he always does, this time she isn’t screaming. “Don’t you see that you killed my soul, does it bother you at all?’ she pleads to him.
“Lady, you killed your own soul along time ago, I can see it in every word you write” he says in hushed tones.
“Thankyou” she says and hangs up the phone. She puts the sniper rifle down, and pulls the handgun from her pocket. He was right, about everything, every word he crucified her with was right. She puts the gun to her head and pulls the trigger.
(2010)

A Breath of Fresh Hell

She had thrown the damn letter in the trash twice, yet she would still find it on her porch the next morning. The third time she actually stuffed it into the can and watched the garbage collector dump the contents into his massive truck, with a smile she pulled her can back to the side of her house, the wind blew the lid back and there it was, stuck to the bottom.

She took the hateful thing inside and reread the contents. It was just the obituary in the Nebraska newspaper that her cousins had sent her. Were they really so oblivious to the fact that after all of these years she still hated her mother? Did they really believe that she would attend the funeral? While she had been dreaming of this day for years, she respected her cousins enough not to attend, as her only reason for doing so would be to dance on that bitch’s grave and sing the song “Ding Dong the Witch is Dead” from The Wizard of Oz.

She had the song memorized for over twenty years now, yet today she realized that she no longer even cared. As she set the obituary and the envelope to burn she said “See you in Hell Mother. You’d better find a good hiding place because when I get there the fun starts. For me, anyway.”

The smoke from the paper drifted out the window and disappeared into the twilight, it fluttered through the air of open wounds and debts unsettled, finding it’s way to the place where Vengence is God.

Somewhere in Hell a woman began to scream, a scream that would stretch to eternity.

.

.

(trash, twice) Weds..

Paul You’re a Dead Man

• Posted by alisa rynay haller on April 30, 2010 at 11:30am
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AUTHOR’S NOTE: this is not a serious piece, just a joke between 2 friends. Don’t bother reading it.

 

 

Thanks to Paul, our Friday’s challenge on our new favorite literary sight was to add a word or a phrase in a foreign language. I bought the plane tickets to Australia that night. When I arrived on his doorstep he was more than surprised, and welcomed me inside. He was grilling shrimp shishkabobs on the barbeque, and when I took a wooden skewer and skewerd his black heart with it all he could shout as his life blood dripped onto the tiles was “Krykee, A’ve gott shramp on the’ barbee”. I stepped over his flailing body and I have to admit, the shrimp was pretty good, I’ll bring some back for CJT.

Member’s Pick, Friday:
The Visitor

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Big Ben

• Posted by alisa rynay haller on April 13, 2010 at 3:30pm
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There’s a rumour going around that the term “it was a pallbearer-dropping-the-casket start to the day” is an indication

of it’s going to be a bad day. Still in half sleep half dream mode I remember when the Haller clan actually did drop

Uncle Ben on the way out of the church. Irish Catholics can turn anything into a party, so there were many jokes about

“did anybody ever check for a pulse” and “we knew he’d go down fighting” and finally I stuck the missing bottle of

whiskey in Uncle Ben’s casket and that made him happy enough to let us put him in the ground. Gads, how many

years ago was that? Anyway, considering I have nothing but hilarious recollections of that term I can’t seem to

relate to this new phrase. In the distance there is an ever growing annoying beeping sound that finally reaches

crescendo levels and I jerk awake and slap the snooze button on my alarm clock. Big Ben says it’s 5:30a and I have

to go to work soon. Oh, now I get it.

.

.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Take it Away Tues

it was a pallbearer-dropping-the-casket start to the day

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Serial Killer Still At Large..(tin cat series #1)

• Posted by alisa rynay haller on April 12, 2010 at 6:30pm
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The daily headlines read the same for weeks on end; Serial Killer Still At Large; no leads.

Living in a less than affluent section of New Orleans the headlines disturbed me along with my neighbors. People

began pairing up for everyday activities. Husbands jogged with their wives in the morning instead of reading the

Sports Section, brothers walked sisters and mothers to schools and grocery stores, my best male friend even took to

escorting me to and fro from my job as a cocktail waitress at the Tin Cat Pub. The Pub was somewhat high end for

sort of club that it was, but my friend Alphonse faithfully waited for me every morning when I got off at 3am.

 

I made very good money at the Cat, and the boss was great for allowing unscheduled smoke breaks. It was during one

of these breaks that I would sprint the four blocks down to the Diamond Dog Saloon where the married men that had just

paid me small fortunes for lap dances went to mellow out before going home to their unsuspecting wives. It was a

simple act of timing that lead them to me as I hid in the shadows of the dark alley where I purred “ready for a freebee

Big Boy?” I don’t believe I’ve ever had a refusal, looking back on the old newspapers it appears I did not. I did give

them a heads up so to speak, I always whispered in their ears at the Tin Cat “here the kitties purr, but beware of dogs

in packs, they’ll rip your throat out” and it just aroused them more.

 

After ripping out “Neil from Spokane”s throat I looked to Alphonse, “You got the disposal covered?”

“I sure do sweet thing,”

“Don’t forget to leave the ring finger and head for the newspapers”

“Do I evah? See ya at the Cat at 3” as he sauntered off to his riverfront alligator farm.

 

 

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Finally, Mercy comments

For all the 16 years of her devotion and love, all I can say is that in the end, I finally showed her Mercy.

 

 

 

 

 

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Going Home

• Posted by alisa rynay haller on April 8, 2010 at 12:30pm
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1. Someone from the past had been sending me messages for days, weeks, eons on end. My dead twin brother, I buried him on Halloween four years ago. I finally decided to buy the one way ticket to home, the suicide note I left read simply; Gone Home.

When I arrived in Hell I was greeted by the Lord and Master himself, Lucifer.

“My child, you’ve finally come home” he said to me as he kissed me on the cheek.

“Daddy, you knew I would eventually” I said as I hugged and kissed him back. “Now where is that worthless brother of mine?” and we chuckled as we walked arm in arm through the gates of my Father’s Kingdom.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Time and Time Again (bridge series #24/loophole 2)

• Posted by alisa rynay haller on May 26, 2011 at 2:00am
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*** 

Coral continued her casual stroll through the Desert of Secrets, she tapped her sacred cane a few times on the sandy hiway, lost in thought, the silver alligator head of the walking stick remained cool in her hand. 

 

When her last customer left Here, she raged at man’s infallible gods and closed the place up, not permanently of course, that was not allowed, but she left none the less. 

 

 Her thoughts never wandered far from her beloved Timekeeper, that beautiful Bull Alligator that braved the bridge to show her the blackness that would consume all that was or ever would be. 

 

 When her thoughts did wander they went to that woman Coraline, or to her other self, Aleese, both stuck in a hell that would eventually pale in comparison to what was to come.

 

Time and Time Again she thought of them all, and time and time again she shed tears for those that would be lost, and wished for the tenth or the millionth time that Something would change.

 

Lightening struck the asphalt everytime the cane tapped a beat, when she lifted the walking stick over her shoulder the storm intensified, and for an instant she knew fear. Something was Wrong.

 

Coral immediately turned back and ran as rain as black as raven’s tears and as thick as coal pelted the ground, leaving craters in their wake.  Seeking shelter from the storm she huddled in the doorframe of the little tavern just off the hiway, the sign above the roof said “Here”, but Something had Changed.

 

Try as she might the door would not open, she began to kick the door with her foot, then rammed it with her shoulder, but it barely budged.  She knelt down to catch her breath, the ancient wooden cane her only support, when a sound so loud cracked behind her. She dropped the cane and covered her ears.

 

The (thunder?) assaulted her six more times before it ceased, she likened the sound to an axe cleaving a tree,  ad infinitum, and then the door to Here opened with a slight creak.  She reached for the cane and found it had been sundered, the silver head had melted, obscuring the..

the..figure that was shaped as..as.. Coral gave up that train of thought and entered the tavern, she barely registered that an object was shimmering across the road. 

 

 For a moment, just a moment, it looked like a bridge, but when she looked closer it was gone. She chalked it up to the fog and the wind and the sand playing tricks on her mind, but she looked once more, just in case. 

 

For a moment, just a moment, she swore that there was an alligator looking back at her, but the next blast of wind dissipated the image and it was gone.  Gone just like her mind she thought, an alligator in a desert of all the silly things!

 

Coral  turned the sign over to “open”, put her apron back on, and began wiping down the bar, safe from the ravages of the desert storm.

                                                                               ***

 

In the year 1803 a female alligator laid thirteen eggs somewhere along the banks of the Mississippi River near a place Man called “New Orleans” in a state they called “Louisiana”.

 

The incubation period was typical and therefore unnoteworthy, even by Timekeeper’s standards.  Of the thirteen, twelve were female, they hatched without incident and swam away in the murky waters, following their mother.

 

The thirteenth was a male-child.

 

The last to break free of his egg he was immediately eaten by a larger reptile lurking in the water, thereby nullifying his future as the Greatest and Oldest alligator of Time immeasurable even to the Old Ones.

  

 His deleted existance was not only noteworthy, but also horrifying, especially by Timekeeper’s standards.

 

*** 

 

 

(if ya’ll are trying to connect these, it kinda picks up after “Walking Away” #20, then skips to #23?) 

 

Plot Thickens, Thursday:

Seeking shelter from the storm

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When September comes

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• Posted by alisa rynay haller on August 16, 2011 at 11:30pm
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We drove out of the backwoods of Louisiana planning next year’s visit, where we would stay, what streets we would conquer, the tours we may take. The cemeteries, famous and forgotten alike,  the white and the black, we would lay hands on those stones that called to us, say hello to our old ghosts,  hello to some new. 

The plans we make when we know we are lying to our children, it is a fine line. 

The truth cannot be explained in any way that will be understood until the future comes as predicted, not by a seer or a tarot reader, but that future that only adults can feel in their souls,

                    (there won’t be a “next” year sweetheart, don’t ask me why I know this)

The lie cannot be excused until it has become a thing of the past,

                    (Yes sweetheart, I knew, like I always do)

And so new promises are made in the present,

                   (Sweetheart, we can go in September this time! No work, no school!)

Promise? I promise.

And so August is roaring like a lion on the winds of a date come too soon, and we both know, and make little eye contact.

Before we left I took as much spanish moss as I could carry in the suitcase, the trinkets and baubles left on the couch, we told each other “just in CASE we don’t make it back”, so we both knew.

The moss left behind waved goodbye to us as the plane took flight, it knew too.

We decorated the tree out front with our stolen spanish moss, at night when the moon is full it looks just like Her, Louisiana that is. 

We added blue and green and purple globes to the barren landscape to remind us of Royal Street, or the color of the mist when it meets the night air in the backwoods.

And so we were blessed this year with rain in this barren land, so much that our dirt is now overgrown with weeds and grasses as tall as a man and our tree drips green lace. The tips mingle with the riot of life below so that it is difficult to tell which is growing up and which is growing down.

And so we cut secret paths in the brush when the moon is new, so that when it is full we can play hide and seek with each other, giggle at the new paths the wildlife has tamped, we get lost, and we get found.

Tonight I swear I saw an alligator by the duck pond.

 I’m sure it’s just a lizard but they do grow them big here.

The ducks don’t seem to mind him much so we will call him Elvis and tell the neighborhood children that we have a Real Lyve Loozi Anna  Gater in our yard.

Of course you can only see him if the Moon is just So in the sky,

and if he wants to be seen.

(Yes Sweetheart, looks like we made it to September afterall!)

 

 

 

 

 

Words, Inc., Wednesday:

(1) line, (2) where, (3) wave

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Paint It Black

• Posted by alisa rynay haller on August 19, 2011 at 12:30am
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Why did Dante’ neglect to mention the deeper circle of Hell in his famous Inferno?

I have read the tome, and it still did not prepare me to survive in this barren badland I call Desolation.

All seasons here are the same horrid color, or lack thereof.

Searing heat so white it blinds the eyes to anything beyond the front door, if the door hasn’t swelled from the flames.

Freezing cold snow so white that it obliterates any landscape beyond the front door, if the door isn’t barracaded by ice.

Is it any wonder that I have black walls in this prison I call “home”?

It is only against black that white has any beauty at all. 

 

(1) Start your story with a question

(2) Include, in your story, the name of a city that starts with the letter ‘D’

(3) End your story with the word ‘white’ somewhere in the last sentence

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