Luna Station Quarterly: To Bethany, With Teeth.

To Bethany, with Teeth: A tale of abuse and retribution set in a world where witchcraft is a science, where hexes and spells are available to anyone willing to expend a little patience and effort.

I am really struggling with a synopsis for this one. I’ll just post an excerpt and tell you that you can read the rest in the latest edition of Luna Station Quarterly. Honestly can’t believe they took a chance on me. I am beyond thankful.

Here’s the gory part:

Mile markers tick by far too slowly. His jaw is clenched like a vise and it hurts. A warm wet stain spreads over his crotch. He screams like a barbarian in battle. Or like a mother, cradling her fallen son, demanding the Gods tell her why. An impotent howl. He’d push the pedal through the floor if he could. 

Whatever was bothering his ear is now squirming into his canal…flossing itself through his brain. It crackles like a bonfire, cozy like Christmas, but then someone fans the flames. His scream could break glass. He is burning from the inside out.

He loses all control of the vehicle. Its entire left side swerves hard into the guardrail. The shriek of metal on metal. The wail of the friction as the car soldiers on. The passenger side tires fly over a forsaken steel bumper. Detritus from another unlucky traveler. Michael’s seat belt breaks his chest. The back tire blows out and the car fishtails. Hands back on the wheel, he overcorrects and the car spins into the median before coming to a stop in four-foot high, matchstick-dry pink Fakahatchee grass. 

All is quiet. The heat leaves his head, and the buzzing fades into song. However dim and distant, it is sharp against the silence. The vocalist, undeniable. Bethany.

I’m dead, he thinks, struggling to laugh through broken ribs. She’s dead. 

We’re together. 

Incredible. He’s had his cake and eaten it. He calls out to her, a painful whisper. During the accident, he’d bitten his tongue. Blood pours from his mouth as he beckons her near. Bethany, come here. Get the hell out of my head and come here and sit next to me. Sit next to me, just let me feel you. All is forgiven. Everything, everything. Because you took me with you, didn’t you? Because you need me. You’ve been as miserable as I’ve been, you just needed me to show you. You’ve always needed me to show you. Oh God, Bethany, I knew. I knew you’d understand, if I could just make you see how much I love you. 

The fire that first torched his brain reignites in the air and falls into the arms of the grasses. It blooms wildly. Through the warped distortion of the mixing air, he sees her figure in the distance. But something is wrong. She’s not coming towards him. She’s moving away. Suddenly, there is pain. 

His screams rip his windpipe to shreds. His buttocks and thighs are melting into the vinyl – the earthy stench of searing flesh. The burnt bacon crackling of fat. At last, the flames find the fuel. A supernova. Every last bit of Michael’s soul drifts into nothingness like a wind-bothered dandelion blowball.

If you want to know what Michael did to deserve this, pick up your copy of Luna Station Quarterly today!