#fiiction

Audiobook Free on Google Play Books for a Limited Time Use Redemption Code:  LRLHJLVRR55PD https://play.google.com/redeem?code=LRLHJLVRR55PD The last time Charlotte James saw Van Gogh’s famous sketch “Regret,” it was hanging on the wall of a museum in Cardiff. That means the version now lying on her desk is a fake. Or does it? Join Charlotte James, fine art consultant with a dodgy past, and a…

Who is Going to Dinner?

“Hey guys, dinners on me.” Ted thrust an arm in the direction of a local bar and grill on the corner. The three, dressed to the nines for the big meeting, entered the establishment where a gray-haired, waitress, her attitude sagging just like her skin, led them to a booth.

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Jack stood back and motioned for Jill to slide in ahead of him. “I’ll have a daiquiri.”

“The…

(via The Inheritance)

The Shadow of The Shaking Tree By Perry Mark Stratychuk

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The pub in which the devil tends bar is not at ground level. To enter it one must descend a set of squat, uneven stairs and step through a stone archway with the words "abandon all hope," carved into it. Located in a dangerous and unfashionable part of town, the bar services a loyal clientele of alcoholics, drug addicts, thugs, and miscreants. It is a place where you could get a tot of hard liquor before noon, meet a lover for a discreet tryst, or search out dangerously rough trade. At night drugs are sold over neat whiskeys served in smudged water glasses and unspeakable things go on in the bathrooms. 

"Ah! What'll it be Love?" This is my greeting upon entering the filth and foul air tonight, much as it has been every morning, afternoon, and night since James decided to hold court here some 20 years ago. 

The Devil speaks in an Irish brogue, goes by the name James, and is addicted to cocaine. He is tall, with a neat, ruddy beard and curly auburn hair he keeps tucked under a derby cap. He dreams of one day undoing all of existence. 

"James-" I get this far before I am interrupted by James holding up his left hand to me in the universal sign of "stop." With a flourish and a wink he pours out two generous droughts of his drink of choice: Wild Turkey, 101 proof. 

We clink, then touch our glasses to the bar, down our drinks, and pause for a moment to savor the sensation that follows a shot of something strong to the head: the body reels and the mind's focus softens. 

James replaces my empty tumbler with a bottle of cold beer. I put away half of it with one long pull. 

"JAMES," I say, a bit too loudly. 

"Yes, Love?" he replies, leaning on one elbow, his face inches from mine. His breath is  malodorous and hot and his eyes smolder in the dim light.

"We have a problem," I begin, but no sooner have I spoken then we are interrupted by the entry of an ugly little man dressed in ostentatiously tacky finery whom I recognize as James' coke dealer, Lethe.

"AH!" James exclaims, slapping his burly palms together and leaving me with a fresh beer for company while he sets about making genial small talk with Lethe.

Swiveling 180 degrees I survey the early evening bar crowd. To my right, seated at the bar, is a hard-living-looking blond woman drinking a glass of room temperature white wine. In front of us, the cramped, dark bar moves and mutters-its population a fraction of the critical max it will reach around the night's dark meridian. 

So far there are some leather dykes-an anti-effete cadre of surly women with snarls for smiles and black laquer on their nails. Their ranks include a dental hygienist (by day), a tattoo and piercing artist, and a fussy, plump brunette the others refer to as "Jiggles," much to her jiggly chagrin. The dykes are regulars here and they dislike me. There has been animosity ever since a friendly game of pool got out of hand and I came at them brandishing my pool cue like a spear. "Don't mess with me, dipshits, or I'll run you through and make bitch skewers out of ya!" I believe is what I said. 

Turning back around I stare glumly down at the bar, which is a decoupage affair of old-timey newspaper clippings arranged under a yellowing shellack. At a cursory glance the clippings are just a jumble of headlines but in fact, they chronicle soe of the greatest and most wrenching of mankind's tragedies. 

Under the headline Spanish Flu Pandemic Claims 30 Million! there is a grainy shot of grim doctors and nurses standing amid beds full of bodies in a makeshift ward at the Bronx Zoo, Front and center, grinning directly into the camera is James. 

Calamity without equal, Miles Long Conflagration Claims San Francisco "We Shall Rise Again!" Vows Mayor. In the picture for this a group of men haul away debris and bodies on stretchers. Amidst the fuzzy frowning faces one man is visibly grinning, his mane of curly hair peeking out from underneath a derby cap.

"Dammit all to hell." I mutter. I am unhappy that things seem to have come derailed. The Thief has gotten the drop on us, and just when we were so close. Or maybe we weren't close at all. It's been eons, a millennia of efforts, big advances and then decades of waiting. A poet I like used to ponder "what does it mean to say 'forever?'" tonight the phrase sends an uncomfortable shudder through me. 

The blonde senses my mood and, turning at my muttering, gives me a glance that says "I too find life to be terribly unfair and would sure love to commiserate with someone who understands." The look could also just be a harbinger of her asking if I have any smokes to bum or drugs. I have no intention of letting her engage me in friendly banter. 

I grunt at James, who is now preparing to leave his station at the bar and accompany Lethe to the back room of the bar. Rolling my eyes I wave my empty beet bottle.

"You think I'd forgotten about you, Love?" He asks with mock surprise. Sashaying over he places two fresh bottles in front of me and with a dismissive wave of his hand announces "I am now going to go be indisposed." 

"Watch the bar Love, and don't fret about this latest development. Everything is under control."

So that was that then. Our train had derailed, the track was now on fire, and the conductor was about the go for a little tour of the clouds for anywhere between an hour and a week. But not to fret, everything was under control. 

I say this last part out loud, so all the blonde hears is "under control."

Sensing that I am primed for some heart to heart, she turns to me with an ingratiating smile and says, "Something got your underbits in a bind, girl?"

I turn and fix her with an incredulous stare.

"Talk to me again and I'll have James turn you into a giant herpes sore." 

"What are you going to get from the store?" She responds, cupping her ear and leaning dangerously close to the tipping point off her stool. 

I shake my head and return to staring at the bar.

"HEY," she waves her hand at me. She won't be denied her barroom banter. She smells lonely, her energy hops around like a fish out of water. She is barely alive and the most alive parts of her are her fears and desperation. 

"Look, I feel ya honey, I've had one of those days myself."

"What, was your next customer yelling at you to hurry up from the end of the bed?"

Now it's the blonde's turn t ostare at me incredulously. 

Sighing, I pick up my beer and head over to a table in the back of the bar. 

I drop into my chair a little heavily. After I finish these two beers I will be properly buzzed. I ponder the night's events and the greater scheme of things into which they fall. I try to comfort myself with rational platitudes. There was an incalculable calculus to existence: when dealing with imperfection (life) perfect calculation was impossible. Things go wrong. Nothing is ever easy.