Excerpt
From "Viridian" by Amanda J. McGee
The fifth wife was named Mary. She was a mathematics teacher, before Ethan found her in a coffee shop on the border of New York. She kept tutoring after they married, up until the day that she died. Her books are in the library still, all theories of quadratic equations and how to calculate the circumference of a circle. Her students, of which there were two, were told she was sick. They would need to find a new tutor. Ethan sent the emails, and the students didn't question them. Maybe they were relieved. Mary had been a distant presence to them after all, someone they saw once a week to talk about something they didn't much like.
Mary's previous relationships had not been good ones. She was the kind of nice, mousey woman who attracts domineering men like flies to honey. It was easy for Ethan to be what she needed. For her, he did not dress in suits and ties. He wore nice sweaters, glasses with thick frames, and mussed his hair. Mary thought that his name was Frank, and that he fixed computers. Both of these things intrigued her. The large house in the woods, the fortune—these were just a pleasant surprise.
They were married in spring. The flowers that Mary chose were carnations. She ordered pinks and whites, but all of the flowers came red as blood. Not being superstitious, Mary ignored the blood red flowers and the way her skin pimpled when she walked down the staircase of the foyer to meet Ethan. Her elderly father was the only one in attendance from her family. His eyes were rheumy with age, and he did not see the way Mary shivered, or the secret, cruel smile Ethan hid before he shook his hand. He was only happy for his daughter, who had found happiness.
Ethan did not love Mary. There was no requirement for him to love her, though it was very necessary for her to love him. By the time that Ethan met her, he was already adept at feigning affection, and Mary fell in love quietly, the way that a leaf slips beneath the water.
There is a scar on Ethan's thumb that Mary gave him, a white crescent in the meat of his palm. The last taste in her mouth was the copper of his blood. Mary was peaceful, nurturing and gentle, but she did not die peacefully. She does not rest peacefully, at Evergreen.
From "The Comforter" by Mike Allen
Maddy unfolds the note.
She usually finds them stuck to the underside of her desk. She hasn't given much thought to how they adhere there, though when they come free she's never noticed glue or anything else that would make the odd-textured paper sticky. The precise little squares feel like suede, and the words at first glance look like they're stitched on in black thread, though on closer inspection the effect is more that of a tattoo. Maddy hasn't figured out how the optical illusion works.
This new one reads, in crude block letters:
how you and me are kin
my mom stole your mom's skin
She glances at the teacher, whose eyes are locked on his laptop screen. He is scowling, his goatee and shaggy dark hair giving him the look of a deeply offended beatnik, but that's just Mr. Newman's normal expression. He's a man with resting bitch face.
Her desk is strategically positioned, back corner nearest to the door. She quick-scans the rest of the class. Most are pondering the algebra questions displayed on their tablets with varying degrees of absorption or frustration. None are focused on her. She quick-grabs her bright pink backpack, stuffs this newest note into the outer pouch where she's stowed all the others.
She started getting them the day they came back from Christmas break. One came loose from the underside of the desk as she doodled in her algebra textbook, fluttered down to alight like a leaf on her bare leg. It read
found you
on one side and
i know where your parents are
on the other.
Others followed, not every day but sometimes several days in a row, always and only in this classroom, under this desk.
you should be me and i should be you
my mother will stitch us together
i like how you draw skulls draw one on the desk
With a fingertip Maddy traces the still-smudged outlines of the skull she sketched in pencil, someone else's attempt to erase it not quite finishing the job.
She hasn't figured out who is leaving the notes. Her class with Mr. Newman is second period, a group of supposedly-smart eighth graders. First period is Mr. Newman's free period. The third period class is a smaller group of advanced-placement seventh graders. She's tried hanging out late to spy, but so far as she can tell, no one sits in her desk. The little teacher's pets all cluster in the front. Later periods, she can't make it across the building in time to have a peek without being late for classes.
Whoever is making these, they know she shouldn't exist. She wants to meet them, and ask why she's alive.
