RESURRECTION Contestant

He couldn’t bear to be in the same room with her for more than 10 minutes. Peggy studied the dinner plate as if it were the most interesting thing in the room, even though she pushed the food around it aimlessly. The only control the woman had in her entire life was her oral intake and she exercised that obsession without any intervention from Jason.
  
He got up and stretched and yawned. He was beat and would probably tinker in the home office, hopefully get a couple messages off to Candy and get his titillation for the evening. It was the only thing that kept him going any more. And, the woman was willing to wait which was a lot to ask since they had be playing this side game for four years now.

Peggy’s father had a stroke and it had slowed him down. Jason lurked on the sidelines waiting for the man to finally retire and let him own the business as he promised him upon marrying Milton’s daughter. Jason would be certain the man signed the business papers before he happily announced his divorce plans.

Like every evening, Peggy went to the TV, sat down and stared. He wasn’t even certain she knew what she was watching. That vacant look had become her usual expression. She pretended as if he wasn’t in the room and later he would go to bed, her body already firmly hugging the opposite side of the bed and not even a murmur of “good night.” It helped his conscience to know they’d grown this far apart. It would make filing for divorce seem like the obvious conclusion.
 
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She looked like hell. He recalled her mentioning feeling poorly yesterday. Jason gave Peggy lots of room, steering clear of her, afraid that the dark circles under her eyes and red crusting on their rims was contagious. Her skin was pale, her hair dragging down without the usual manicured styling.

Her movements were mechanical as she walked to the back of the house. Jason looked around the kitchen. No dinner. Oh, he was in the dog house, all right. It was her subtle way of saying he hadn’t been paying her attention. He’d have to do his duty tonight. He couldn’t afford her divorcing him before he had the company in his legal rights. However, there was no way he was kissing those crusty lips. He shivered inwardly at that notion.

He wasn’t even certain why she would just lie there and let him use her body. The woman had deprived herself of all pleasures from laughter and wine to food and sex. She was only mimicking the living. He couldn’t imagine her ever becoming angry enough to throw something or yell at him, but damn he would have respected her for once!

There was no avoiding her any longer. He heard Peggy shuffle into the bedroom and plop down on the bed. He followed her in and dimmed the light. She liked it dark and whined about her imagined body fat, but he needed a visual for sex. He always got his own way. She had no will at all. It was attractive at first and now he just wished she’d show some spunk. It was impossible to respect a woman who was essentially dead inside.

Feeling his way under the sheet, he touched the edge of her tank top. He pulled on the strap, gliding it down the sharp angle of her shoulder. If he seduced her as if he wanted her, divorce would seem quite unbelievable. No, he should approach it clinically. It would be enough to show he was still a husband to her, but not enough to make her romanticize that he desired her.

Jason slid himself beside Peggy as she let out a low husky growl from her throat. He stopped for a second, thinking she was about to sneeze.

He pulled her onto her back. The hair covered her face and she made no motion to remove it. He lifted his hand; flicking back the over bleached hair. Her eyes looked strangely opaque and pale, the pupils enormous against them. God, he hoped it wasn’t contagious. 

Jason held his breath and studied her pale skin and cracked bleeding lips. She seemed to be looking at him but not seeing him. He looked to the bedside table; secretly hoping this time she took too much medicine. He wasn’t the killing type, but if she was stupid enough to take too much of her sleeping pills or anxiety drugs, he wouldn’t feel bad about it.

Everything remained in place. He leaned over her, his hand reaching for her bottoms to ease them off her jutting hipbones when she jerked forward, wrapping her lean arms around him. Her mouth made contact with his shoulder, an aggressive move she had never done before.

With a loud chomp and a searing pain, Jason jerked and thrashed to get her loose as her teeth tore into his flesh. Desperately he shook at her frail body but her strength was unrelenting as she took another bite and another, blood oozing down in a hot trail to soak into the sheets around them. He screamed and pried wildly, his hands digging into her hair and working to yank her head back, but she was fixed on his shoulder.

The sound of tearing muscle followed numbness down the left side of his body and complete inability to use his arm to pry her loose. Helplessly, he fell to the side and she planted herself atop of him, mouth still affixed to him as the joint loosened from its socket and his shoulder fell limp and useless.

Barely conscious, Jason’s head lolled to the side and he moaned weakly as she tore into his biceps with a growl.

Before the numbness overtook him and the weakness from the lack of blood, Jason’s eyes focused on her tearing apart his arm into rubbery grisly bits like a ravenous freak.

In that fleeting moment, he oddly wondered as blackness engulfed him, if perhaps this was what she was starving for all along. A glimmer of respect shined in his glossy eyes as they became fixed and dilated.

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©2010 Sharon Clauss

“Coyotes?” The hitman pressed his face to the cabin window to glance out at the murky moonlight outside.

He stepped away and finished off the glass of Jack Daniels as he studied the gym bag. He had to think clearly about where to hide the cash just in case he was followed.

Collapsing back in an overstuffed chair, the criminal turned on the TV. The local resort’s channel touted the Olympic-sized swimming pool at the main lodge and went on to brag about how it was a giant preserve where hunting was not allowed and wildlife abounded. They encouraged the visitors to enjoy the woodland paths in total privacy.

Privacy.He chuckled at that. The resort was a nowhere place, a dead end mountain no one knew about. The criminals knew that cabin #5 was a special location. It was not only completely isolated by the woods, but the resort had a policy. If you were willing to shell out the cash, they’d protect your privacy completely. They had no records of a #5 cabin and no housekeeping. They liked to say, “this is the place to get lost.” In fact, the key was sent to him in the mail so he didn’t have to go further up the mountain to the lodge and be seen in public.

The hitman’s associates knew the in’s and out’s. He was learning them, but admittedly he wasn’t the brightest of the batch. He was no alpha dog, but he could provide a service when requested. Making hits was easy. Cash was plentiful. He never made this kind of dough in construction.

He ran a meaty hand over his grizzled face and sighed. The howling outside the cabin reached a crescendo. It unsettled his already taut nerves. He had no guilt about the kill, but he sure had fears about the cops finding him.

He got up and flicked on the front porch light. It shone on the pine trees nearby. Something shuffled by the side of the cabin and thumped the wall. He flicked the light off and held his breath.

“Just a raccoon.” He told himself, but his mind was seeing that strange black car that was following his car the last 10 miles to the mountaintop resort. Sure, they kept going on to the lodge, but they did see him turn down this road.

“I should check.” He grumbled as the howling stopped outside and he cautiously opened the door. Thinking about the coyote pack and their calls, Aaron felt a bit of nostalgia. He missed his gang in Philly. It had been a long time since he could go home and run with them, intimidating everyone on the streets. No, his work in Jersey took him away from there and it was too dangerous to go back.

“Yeah, I’m a coyote without my pack now.” He commented sadly.

The area near the cabin looked clear in the half moonlight. His car was tucked in behind the building out of sight. The cabin itself was completely engulfed by huge rows of wild bushes and brambles. No one would ever guess it was there. Even the ground was gravel strewn and showed few tracks. Just in case, he walked over into the circle of moonlight and kicked at the gravel to be certain no car treads could be seen.

The hairs on Aaron’s neck tickled. He knew he was being watched! He spun around, squinting into the woods nearby, a bead of perspiration rolling into his eye and stinging him blind. He backed up towards the cabin, surveying the area cautiously.

“Who’s there?” He called out, his voice cracking.

Something thrashed the bushes nearby and the hitman backed up a step, squinting into the darkness of the shrubs.

“You’re not gonna catch me.” He vowed under his breath.

Without warning, something yanked his shirt, pulling him to the ground with a thud. Shaking off the stars in his head, the hitman studied the dark figures above him. The half moon settled between their heads, casting them in silhouettes. There stood five man-like figures, hunched over, long snouts sniffing, smelling of wet dog and snarling lowly in threat.

“What in the hell are you?” He cried out.

The leader stepped forward and lifted him up easily with one gnarled furry paw as if he weren’t a 6’2″, 250-pound man. Claws dug into the hitman’s shoulder and he winced. When he braved opening his eyes again, he looked straight into the fiery red eyes of the beast, fangs exposed and glistening in the light. For a panicky minute, the hitman remembered the cries of his last hit. The man had been on his knees, begging to pay him cash, do anything to just live.

He whimpered hysterically just as his victim had.

Behind him a beast snarled loudly, another howled. Then the leader bent, teeth sinking readily into the hitman’s shoulder with a crunch. As his knees went weak beneath him, the beast leader grabbed the hitman by the hem of his shirt and dragged him deep into the blackened woods as the criminal lost consciousness.

The resort manager came the next morning, grabbed up the bag of cash, the traces of the occupant, and used the car key to move the vehicle to his cousin’s car shop where it would be parted out.

It never failed; crooks were looking for an easy out. He provided it for them. The pack of other thieves-turned- werewolves brought the criminal into their fold. They had all the fresh deer and wild turkeys they could want and the resort manager continued to give them new members. It was an amicable situation that helped both sides, as well as cut down on the uncontrolled population of wildlife in the preserve. In fact, he was feeling pretty pious about his life mission as he drove off in the criminal’s Mercedes Benz at sunset.

A stealthy creature followed not far from the bumper, eyes of fire, fangs exposed. He wasn’t the brightest of the batch and he was no alpha dog, but he served his pack well as he stalked their next member.

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©2010 Sharon Clauss