Scarecrow

An old scarecrow shuffles into Danny's Coffee Shop.
He stinks of moldy rain-funk. 

Chloe and the Succubus exchange a look.
"Muffin, please," says Scarecrow.

God the Waitress picks a jukebox tune.
"Not that cows and corn cob shit!" wails the Succubus.

Step back.
Step over.
Spin.

Chloe reaches out a hand. "C'mon, sailor."
Scarecrow dancing.
______

A Flash 55 for my BFF Hedgewitch.

Image at top: scenes from "Dark Night of The Scarecrow", my favorite Halloween movie, in which Bubba the scarecrow comes back to get revenge on demented mailman Mr. Hazelrigg.

 

Three

Chloe the serial killer is having the devil's own time dragging the tv pitchman's body into the weeds.

How's that for an opening sentence? Eat my dust, rubes.

She had had her thumb out--
cute as a box cutter in an angel's hand,
chin up
hip cocked
standing in the harsh shine of the rising sun.

She hadn't given a damn about limescale.
She hadn't cared how many ShamWows he had in his trunk.
Now his shitheap Hyundai is parked crookedly on the shoulder,
and one lonesome long-legged caffeine junkie is trying to stash him behind the hollyhocks.

It must be the Bohemian in her.

She has almost got him to the center of the cloverleaf when she hears something.
Shit. She's not alone.
Chloe turns in a slow circle. 
Then she sees a dark form nearly obscured in the shade of a trash tree--
it is the Queen of the Vampires in black panther form,
and she is crying.
Have you ever seen a cat cry?
They do it silently, but with their whole soul.

"Here is the place," she says to Chloe,
"where Athena, Artemis, Hestia and I used to hang out.
In those days, we killed all the developers before they could draw their first breath.
Artemis used to turn guys into jackalopes; no construction crews.
Hestia would build a fire,
and the four of us would pass the Mad Dog around.
I liked us better then."

The tv pitchman forgotten, Chloe sits down in the tall grass,
as the Queen of the Vampires resumes human form.
She continues:
"Now Athena is some muckety muck with the power company.
She lives in a condo,
and her owl is just some detailing on the door of her fucking Audi.

"He used to hunt here, swooping down from the trees,
and Artemis loved him so much, just as if he were her own.
She would coo to him like he was Head Baby at the Adorable Factory.
With a mouse in his talons.
And those big eyes.

"Arty lives with some woman who wears an ankh and runs bullshit workshops.
She's gone vegan, and doesn't even remember Orion at all.
Chloe....?" She falters.

"Yeah, hun? Tell me." 

The Vampire Queen lets out a shaky sigh.
"She...she spells woman with a Y."

"Oh, hun." 

"I know, right?"

They are silent for a long time, the tv pitchman stiffening up beside them.
"What about Hestia?" Chloe asks, putting her arm around her friend.

"She runs a B&B,
making English muffins for couples from East Candyland,
chatting them up, then washing another god damn load of sheets in the afternoon.
What happened to us, Chloe?
We were cool. Why do we suck so hard now?"

Just then, there is a rustling in the grass.
Chloe looks up, the sun seeming to traverse the lenses of her shades.
"Look what the cat dragged in!"

It's the Succubus, fluttering her black wings lazily.
"What's this?" she asks. "GSA troop 17?"

Chloe explains, shrugging a shoulder at her friend sitting next to her.
"She's feeling old and uncool."

"Fuuuuuck," says the Succubus wisely,
as she and the charming serial killer lift the Vampire Queen to her feet.
"What you need is some coffee, lady.
And guess who's sitting in your favorite booth at Danny's as we speak?"

The QOTV sniffles and wipes her face with her sleeve.
"Uh...Emmylou Harris maybe?"

"Nah. Even better. The Dark-Haired Chick."

"She not in Toronto?"

"Nope."

"Not in Chicago?"

"Nuh uh."

Not in L.A.?"

"She's at Danny's, waiting for you, you silly shithead. C'mon. I saw a Hyundai we can steal. We can be there in fifteen minutes."

So the three of them step over the dead tv pitchman and in fourteen and a half minutes,
they are at Danny's Coffee Shop,
once again the cool queens of caffeine.
_____

black night hollyhocks

Although I only used one word ("queen") from the list, it was mood wings's word list that inspired me. This is also for the Real Toads mini-challenge. Kelly Letky's photograph "Dance With The Ghosts of Tomorrow" made me think of the spontaneous scrub that springs up in unused patches of land, like next to freeway interchanges. The top image is hers. 

Athena, Artemis and Hestia are the "maiden goddesses".

Diana the Huntress (Artemis)

Dedicated to cool girls everywhere.  

 

The Coffee Within The Cream. ( Or Something. )

The Succubus sits at her favorite booth in the corner,
smoking and reading her horoscope.

"Hey. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm." It's Chloe, the serial killer and resident sweetheart of Danny's Coffee Shop. "What's it say? 'Do your fucking roots already'?"

Behind Chloe, there are tally marks on the wall. 15 cheerleaders, 27 golfers, 11 assorted shitheads. 1 pop star. 1 criminal court judge. 2 morning people.

The Succubus reads her horoscope aloud. "Follow your dreams." Chloe snorts. Everyone knows that the Succubus follows other people's dreams and enters them. That she has incredible sex with them. That she steals their souls. Yadda yadda.

"I was in HER dream last night."

"HER?"

"You know. HER."

"Well Jesus H. Christ in a strapless gown," says Chloe. "Did you steal her soul???"

The Succubus looks over her dark glasses at Chloe as if the girl were simple-minded. "Uh, noOOOooo. Think about it."

Chloe has white dust from a sugar donut on her lips. She stops chewing. "Oh. Right. So, what was she dreaming about?"

"She dreamed she was on a bus, but it was more like a train. She had on boots and an expensive coat and a big hat, but no top, and the coat was open."

Chloe laughs. "That chick is coo coo. What else?"

"Well, she wanted to get off the bus at the National Shrine of the Little Flower, but the driver said the bus was a Limited and she couldn't."

God the waitress looks over. She's been eavesdropping. It isn't easy, staying omniscient. "Good for her. I hope she kicked him in the shins."

Two heads swivel over to stare at God. "Or somewhere!" chirps Chloe.

Just then, the Queen of the Vampires comes strutting in, in black panther form, with the Speaker of the House dangling from her jaws. 

"Ohmugaw, " says the Succubus. She looks at Chloe and adds, "Do you remember when our little kitty started out with birds and mice? All grown up now. " The Succubus sighs. "What's a demoness from the underworld to do?"

The Queen of the Vampires leaps up into a booth, dropping John Boehner so that she can rip the bejabbers out of the seat with her fearsome claws, to make herself comfy. "What are you two simps discussing? Oh, wait a minute. WHO are you discussing?"

(*cricket cricket*)

The QOTV is just about to sink her fangs into the Representative from Ohio, when she looks up. "Spill!"

"Um, we were discussing you, darling, but...not."

"Huh?"

The Succubus goes back to her Life section. "One day all of these mysteries will make sense to you. For now, child, eat your snack." 

Chloe snorts again. "She's so cute when she's confused." 

"Girls." It is the warning voice of God. 

"We're just fucking with her," complains Chloe. Instantly, she is surrounded by a hundred perky cheerleaders, waving pom poms. "Okay! I'll stop!" The cheerleaders vanish as quickly as they came. God smirks and goes back to working on her chalk menu board.

"One day you'll know your destiny, padewan," says the Succubus. "Your true identity." Then, lowering her voice as deep as she can, she adds, "Kitty...I am your faaaatherrrr." When she laughs it is surprisingly light and girlish. For a demoness. 

Just then, the little bell above the door jingles, and someone walks in. She's wearing jeans and boots and is complaining under her breath about having to drive a clown car. She is met with a loud chorus of whoops and wolf whistles from the Danny's girls. She pretends not to notice. Walking up to the to-go counter, she asks, "Who does a girl have to fuck around here to get some coffee?"

 * * *

Her eyes open, and she groans. Morning. For some reason, she wants coffee even more than usual. She has a weird urge to go to the National Shrine of the Little Flower today. She wonders what the bus schedule is like. Then, for no reason she can name, she puts her hand to her chest and feels the usual tee shirt. "Weird," she mumbles, getting out of bed. Let's see...coffee, chocolate chip oatmeal.....let Bosco out...then write something for the blog. Maybe a Danny's Coffee Shop thing. Or maybe some soppy love poem. "O Dark-Haired Chick," she begins, in her head. Um...what rhymes? schtick, trick, dick...no, that's not working out. Go with Dannys. Okay, um....

The Succubus sits at her favorite booth in the corner,
smoking and reading her horoscope....

______

for Real Toads "Find Your Creative Space".

I really did have the dream described above, about the bus, and Shrine, and my distinctive and stylish mode of costume, last night. I'm ready for my close-up now, Mr. DeMille.

Learn about the fascinating history of the Shrine of the Little Flower, HERE.

“First sign of madness, talking to your own head.”
― J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix 

   

Ohmuhgaw !

It is mid-afternoon on a Tuesday at Danny's Coffee Shop.
Denise the waitress is doing her nails.
Chloe the serial felon is meditating to "Relaxing Sounds Of Ocean & Surf".
The Succubus is crashed with her face on the table, drooling, but she still has on her cool shades. Savanna the teenage runaway puts a sticky that says "kick me" on the Succubus's huge black wings.
She thinks this is enormously hilarious.

The kitten Giuseppe Verdi wanders up to a table full of girls, wanting the standard fuss and adoration he is used to at Danny's,
but these are popular girls from the high school.
One of them screws up her face and says, "Ohmuhgaw. Why do these places always have cats??"
There is a book sticking out of her bag. Perhaps it is ornamental. She doesn't seem like a reader.

Denise looks up from her mani.
Chloe's chi goes off center and she ditches the Relaxing Surf.
The Succubus wakes up and flutters her wings,
which sends Savanna off the deep end, laughing.

One of the popular girls notices the charged silence and asks, challengingly,
"Wut???"

Just then, a blinding black blur comes hurtling at their table and lands on it, scattering all the bottled waters and ipads. 
"RAWWWWWWWRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!" says the blur, turning in circles on top of the table, like a maniac.
It is, of course, The Queen of the Vampires, in black panther form.

"OhmuhGAW!" screech the popular girls, as the QOTV demolishes their booth.
"Eww. Why do these places--"
but she is interrupted by the QOTV clawing out her nasty overdyed hair.
Luckily for her, the cat is distracted by the book that the kitten Giuseppe Verdi has pulled from the girl's bag.

Together, they go from one end of Danny's to the other, destroying the book with unrestrained glee.
"RAWWWWWWWWWRRRRRRR!!!"
"rawwwwwwwrrrrrrr!!!" 
they say.
It was probably not a history book, but now that book is history.

"Ohmuhgaw," squeaks one of the popular girls from underneath a table.
Chloe the serial killer sticks her head upside down beneath the table and inquires,
"Tell me, lame popular girl, what was that book?!?"
Popular Girl's glossed lip trembles as she says,

"The Oxford Book Of Haiku".
_______ 

Chloe Goes Wrong (Again!)

It is Sunday at Danny's Coffee Shop.
Chloe, the multiple felon with the killer shoes, is trying to drag a large inert something in from the sidewalk,
And not having a whole lot of success.

There is a woman standing outside the door of Danny's Coffee Shop,
Wearing a head scarf, a black dress, and a crucifix.
(The crucifix is not the ironic kind favored by the young and stoned.)

"Hola, chica," says Chloe, looking up at the woman,
"Help me get this inside!"
She blows her blonde hair out of her eyes and waits, tapping a foot.

The woman looks down at the something, and turns away, slowly, regally,
Without saying a word,
But her posture says very clearly, "No way, Toots."

Chloe's mouth drops open.
"Well fuck ya and feed ya fish heads then, I'll do it myself!"
She resumes her Sisyphean labors.

Oops.

Before she knows it, God the waitress has come outside and is dragging Chloe by the ear into the shop.

"Ow ow ow ow ow ow owwwwwwwwwwww!" yelps the serial murderess.
"Do you know who that is? Out there?"
Chloe looks both hard done by and cowed. "No...?"
"That is the blessed Saint Creola. Be nice. She's one of mine."
"Yes ma'am."
At 24, it is the first time Chloe, the fugitive from justice, has ever said this,
Even when she has been before judges.
But dude, it's God.

Her ear bright red, Chloe starts back toward the door, but on her way,
She smacks the Succubus's newspaper and gives Savanna the teenage runaway's chair a good kick.
"Off your butts, lazy sluts, come and help me."
They do. 
Savanna brings the knife that's inside her boot, just in case.

Together, they wrangle the something into a chair, where it sits slumped and still.
The Succubus lowers her dark glasses and gives Chloe a look that asks,
"Wtf?'
Chloe chirps, "It's Charles Bukowski!" the way a six year old might boast about finding a nickel.

"He sucks," say the Succubus, Savanna, God and Saint Creola in unison.
"And he's dead," adds Denise the waitress.
"And he stinks." So say them all, but he always did.

They prop him up in his chair and leave him.
He does not order anything, or speak, or (thank Goddess) write any poetry;
And yet, after a while, a drove of male customers of a certain age come and sit with him,
Starry eyed.

"They're like teenybop girls with Justin Bieber," remarks the Succubus,
Looking as if she had just swallowed a lemon.
One of the men at Bukowski's table asks for an autograph. He thinks "Buk" is Mickey Mantle. 
"Sign it Number 7!" he says hopefully, and guides his hero's hand to a pen, but sadly,
The hand falls off and tumbles onto the floor.

"Janitorial!" calls Savanna. She can be a smart ass.

Just then, the little bell over the door jangles,
And in walk the Queen Of The Vampires and the Dark-Haired Chick.
They are hanging all over each other. It's lovely.

"What's this?" asks the QOTV, staring at the something which is apparently holding a salon in the corner of Danny's.
"It's Charles Bukowski," says Chloe, already sounding bored with her toy.
"Eww," say all the regulars.

The Dark Haired Chick grabs their usual booth, and the QOTV slides in beside her.
She starts to tear at the booth out of habit, then realizes she is not in panther form this morning. 
Then she looks sheepish.

"Write me a poem, baby," she asks the Dark-Haired Chick.
Out comes a pen.
Out come some napkins from the holder.
She writes she writes she writes she writes, then stops;
The napkins burst into flame and black smoke rises from them.

"God, you're good," says the QOTV.
The Dark-Haired Chick smiles like a Cheshire cat.
There is a thud from across the room.
Charles Bukowski has fallen over!
"You did him in, babe," says the QOTV.

Never mess with a Scorpio. Especially not *the* Scorpio.

The girls drag the fallen something out back to the dumpster, 
And get rid of him along with yesterday's bagels.
"See ya, Chuckie!" says Chloe, and struts back across the parking lot.

She adjusts well to life's vagaries.

_____

bottom photo of Danny's Coffee Shop by Daryl Edelstein!
 

Word Garden's 1,000th Post!

The woman with the camera was getting exactly nowhere. She was standing inside Danny's Coffee Shop, trying to get a good shot of the Queen Of The Vampires, but every picture just showed wall, tables, coffee cups. No QOTV. She gave her camera a little shake, then smacked her forehead.

"Vampire," said Daryl with an eye roll. "No mirrors. No pictures. What was I thinking?"

The QOTV smirked as only a Vampire Queen in black panther form can, and went on shredding another booth. 

"Chica, hold still, I want to draw you!" Scarlet's always drawing someone.

Over by the counter, the waitresses God and Denise were chattering with Chloe--the resident serial killer and multiple felon--and The Succubus.

"I've got Mama Zen's," said Denise.

"Chick's hot!" sighed Chloe. "Hey," she said, turning to the Succubus, "you ever get into her dreams?"

"Nope," replied the Succubus, her eyes hidden behind big dark glasses. "I can't get past the buffalo blanket and the dog."

Chloe put on a mock pout. "Poooor Suk-oo-buss!"

"Oh shut the fuck up," muttered the Succubus mildly. It was morning, and she was feeling mellow after a long night of stealing souls.

Meanwhile, the kitten Giuseppe Verdi was rolling around on a tabletop with Stripey, a customer's cat, much to the amusement of Savanna, the teenage runaway.

The Succubus moved smoothly across the room, after perfunctorily flipping off Chloe, and sat down dramatically at a table next to a woman wearing nearly identical sunglasses. "Sara...you're so diviiiiiiiiiiiiine!" They looked like twins.

Behind them, a woman was leaning out of the doorway, screeching at some kids. "Get off my sidewalk!" She turned around and sat back down. "I'm never going to finish this poem!"

"What is it about?" Chloe asked Hedgewitch, for it was none other. 

"Well...it's about an incubus who shows up on a brush hog and seduces a girl who has three heads and twelve arms. Here, read it..."

Chloe read it as the denizens of Danny's swirled around her.

"Do you think it's too sweetsy cutesy? I could put some bats in it..."

Chloe shook her head. "It's perfect."

"Are you sure my mother in law will be turned into a toad?" asked Lolamouse anxiously, peering into the pouch she'd just been given by Denise. 

"She's as good as green."

Just then, a streaking black blur flew through the air and into a booth. It was the QOTV, who had just spotted the Dark Haired Chick. She landed with a happy thump and toppled them both over backwards where they disappeared into the seat. 

"Get offa me, you crazy spaz!" said the DHC, but she was laughing.

"Shhh! Everybody!" It was Chloe. She had moved over by the window, which had been designed by Ellen, and was intent upon something out in the street. "Silent treatment!"

The little bell over the door rang and the mail lady walked in. You could hear a pin drop. Nobody looked up.

"Wow, what's wrong with you guys?" she asked as she dumped a bunch of crap on the counter. "Here's your mail!"

The Succubus blew a smoke ring. Chloe examined a fingernail. God and Denise filled the napkin holders without looking up. 

"Okay then...er...bye!" But before she could get out the door, everybody yelled, 

"Happy one thousandth post, Shay!!!!"

"Aw shucks, you guys!"

Then a single voice rose above the others. 

"My Redbook! It finally came!"

Who knows what wonders may occur at Danny's Coffee Shop in the next one thousand posts???

Giuseppe Verdi At Large

Some dweeb holds open the door to Danny's Coffee Shop too long,
And the kitten Giuseppe Verdi is loosed upon the world.
Bounce
Bounce
Pounce
Pounce
Bounce
Pounce
Pounce.
"Come back here, you little shit!" shouts Chloe the cute blonde serial murderer,
And takes off after him as fast as her cross-trainers can carry her.

Meanwhile,
The Queen Of The Vampires, in panther form,
Has her great fearsome paws stuck up in the air
As if she were a Saturday morning cartoon character.
Her head is up against the Dark-Haired Chick
And they are both in a booth,
Joined at the hip as usual.

The Dark-Haired Chick says to the Succubus,
"Tell me what she's dreaming."
The Succubus squints,
Then tells her,
"She is dreaming that she is with you, in your kitchen.
She is dreaming that she is right side up, wearing red socks,
And that whenever she looks at you,
She feels as if she were riding in a gypsy wagon
Swaying in the wind."
Anything else?
"Yes. She wonders why the floor feels so light, like skating on chocolate."
With that, the QOTV's toes twitch;
The Dark-Haired Chick gives her dark-haired head a little shake
And her lips turn up at the corners.

Chloe comes breezing back in with the kitten Giuseppe Verdi in her arms.
"Bad boy. Baaaad boy!" she croons.
Danny's is just full of remarkable creatures
And the killer chicks who love them.

_________

Come Back, Little Sheba

A black panther sits concealed in the branches of a tree, watching for potential victims.

Game, in herds and small groups, passes below.

The panther is a killing machine, and to catch her eye can mean instant death,

But her feet dangle in empty air,

And her eyes are staring at nothing, unfocused and ditzy.


"Why is the QOTV up in the crab apple tree?" asks Chloe, setting down her Rolling Stone and craning her neck to see out the window of Danny's Coffee Shop.

"She looks stoned or something."


"She's moping," says Denise the waitress. "The Dark Haired Chick is out of town and she can't deal."

"Well, where'd she go? Peru?"

"Pawtucket, I think," says Denise.

The Succubus, sitting nearby wearing dark glasses indoors at ten in the morning, mumbles, "Wasn't it Punxatawney?"

"I heard Port-Au-Prince," says Savanna the resident juvenile delinquent.


Chloe bites her lip, still looking up. Then she strides out the door and the little bell jingles as she hits the sidewalk.

Stopping underneath the tree, she pitches a stale chocolate chip muffin at the Queen Of The Vampires.

Bullseye.

"Snap out of it!" she advises, stamping her foot and giving the QOTV the hairy eyeball.


The QOTV shifts a little on her branch, makes a few annoyed kitty noises, but remains a torpid cartoon of a jungle cat.

"She'll be back!" yells Chloe the serial killer, spreading her arms. Seeing it is hopeless, she goes back inside.

She gives God the waitress a sideways look.

"Seems like you could do something," she snipes.

"Like what?" asks God serenely, while filling the holders with sugar packets.

"Well," says Chloe, crossing her arms, "you could move Pawtucket closer to here!"


"Punxatawney," murmurs the Succubus.


"Port-Au-Prince," corrects Savanna, drawing on the table with her knife.


"Oh for chrissake," groans Chloe, but at a sharp look from God, she adds, "Sorry," then giggles.


Eventually, the Queen of The Vampires does leap down and dispatch a Jehovah's Witness, leaving only a few pamphlets strewn across the sidewalk.

On one of them, is a picture of a lamb in Jesus's arms.


A minute later, the shape-shifted QOTV walks inside of Danny's. "Baaaa," she says, tilting up her black and white lamb face at God.

It is a rare and fine thing when anyone can make God snort.

"Get out of here, you lunatic!" God swipes a foot at the QOTV, who shape-shifts again, back to a panther, and jumps up into one of the booths, which she promptly shreds with her fearsome claws before settling down.


She curls into a ball.


She sighs.


The Dark-Haired Chick cannot get back too soon.

________

A Rainy Day, And What Happened That Night

It has been raining all day in Norman.

Night comes,

And though the drops have stopped,

Everything is damp and smooth

Like fingers through shampoo.



Chloe is outside on the sidewalk in front of Danny's Coffee Shop.

She is thinking of absolutely nothing,

Just watching the cars go by,

When something lands on her head like a sudden mandatory hat from hell.

"What the...!?!"

She shakes her head as if her raised hands held tiny hurricanes.



A little tabby cat jumps to the pavement.

She looks up.

Chloe looks back,

And they are both as cool as a couple of card players.

Chloe says at last,

"You little sneak."

The Queen Of The Vampires (for that is, of course, who the cat really is) replies with unblinking green eyes that say,

My client is innocent.



It has been raining all day in Norman.

The Queen Of The Vampires felt small and so became an eeny cat

And hid on the supports underneath the awning where it was dry.

Chloe came out,

And her blonde head looked inviting, like a manger.

The Vampire Queen dropped,

Like a shrimpy space capsule from the sixties, coming home.



When she grabbed onto Chloe's dome,

She meant,

"I am lonely today.

Love me

Love me

Love me."

But it came out more like Kamikaze Cat From Outer Space.



Still, Chloe says,

"You rotten little sneak,"

And picks her up off the sidewalk, scratching behind her ears and under her chin.

"It'll be all right," says Danny's resident serial killer and multiple felon.

Then she carries her inside,

Where it is bright,

And familiar,

And filled with the mixed aromas of good coffee

And October on the drying jackets

In booths and hung on the backs of chairs.

___________

scribbled for One Shot Wednesday

Virginia Dare

Virginia Dare quits Dunkin' Donuts and walks across the street to Danny's Coffee Shop.

Only God, the waitress, knows who she really is.



Virginia Dare has survived ravenous winters on nearly nothing.

She has walked through tall stalks of fast-growing corn under a late-summer sun, easy and content with herself.

She has brought blue-eyed, bronze-skinned babies into the world, and raised them well.



She sits down and tries to collect herself.



Virginia Dare has had to adapt to a changing world.

She has worked toward and received her G.E.D.

She has filled out dozens of employment applications,

Writing "Virginia Dare" in the space for her name on each.



A few prospective employers make remarks.

"Virginia Dare!" said one fat one. "I love your donuts!"

She forced a smile.

"That's Dolly Madison."

Another said, "Yes, there really is a Christmas, Virginia," and laughed at his own tired joke.

She stood up and left without a word.



Virginia Dare remembers her mother, barely.

She told Virginia the story, how she had had to leave her husband and friends behind her, dead in the snow.

Carrying her daughter, wrapped like a mummy in everything she could find,

She had paused only to carve the word "CROATAN" into the trunk of a tree,

And then disappeared among the bare branches, into an unimaginably different life.



The bell above the door jingles and the manager from Dunkin' Donuts strides in wearing his little brown tie.

He has a silly-looking blond crew cut, and stops right in front of Virginia Dare.

He says, "What do you think you're doing, Dare? You can't just fucking walk out in the middle of morning rush! Come back with me right now and you can punch back in. Otherwise you're S.O.L. honey." 

He sees apprehension in her eyes.

Ha! It's working! he thinks smugly to himself.

What he doesn't see is the fully grown female black panther crouching silently on a table right behind him.

It is the Queen Of The Vampires, shape-shifted into her favorite form.



Twenty minutes later, the assistant manager from Dunkin' Donuts,

A mousy brown girl,

Comes in, looks around, and asks, "Where's Dave?"

The hot chick sitting over by the windows asks, "Who's Dave?"

It is Chloe,

Serial murderess, escapee from women's supermax, and the undisputed darling of Danny's Coffee Shop.

"No Dave here, honey."

It's true.

Dave has vanished, and his disappearance may remain a tantalizing mystery forever.



Meanwhile, Virginia Dare is smiling and sound asleep in a tattered booth,

Watched over by a Dark-Haired Chick drinking a pumpkin spice,

And a contented-looking

(and very full)

Black panther.

__________

Night Shift

The Dark Haired Chick walks into Danny's Coffee Shop.

She is wearing boots, jeans, and a white tee shirt with black cartoon figures on it. A girl is screaming into a microphone while other cartoons play instruments behind her.

There are lots of lightning bolts and musical notes.

The cartoon girl singer is wearing a hair band. The shirt says, "Hair Band."



"Ay! Muuuuuuuuy caliente, bay bay!" says the resident serial killer, Chloe, striking a flamenco dancer's pose and watching the Dark Haired Chick walk by. She wolf whistles.

The Dark Haired Chick mutters, "Oh shut up," but she is grinning.



There is a Vampire Hunter lying dead on the floor over by the free newspapers, and the Queen Of The Vampires, in the form of a black panther, is standing on his chest and tilting her head at him.

"Roowwwwwwwr," she says, which means "too late for Tums."

Then she sees the Dark Haired Chick come in and loses interest in the expired Hunter. She bounds gracefully into a booth and after joyfully ripping up the upholstery with her claws, shape shifts back into her natural form.

The Dark Haired Chick slings her bag into the opposite seat and slides in.

"Bitch," she says in greeting.

"Biaaaaachhhh," replies the QOTV, imitating her cat self with a big teeth baring hiss.



Chloe, born on a sunny Sunday in May, has gone back to reading Spin, but it doesn't hold her interest. She walks over to the window and looks out at the lights. When she burned down the neighbors' garage, it made the most pleasing light she had ever seen, but as usual, her parents failed to appreciate her achievement.

They were obtuse.

As a girl, sitting at the dinner table, she had decided a guest's filet mignon looked better than anything on her own plate, and so, after waiting for him to pick up his water glass, she pounced, popped it into her mouth and dashed up the stairs to her room with it.

Instead of admiring her grace and daring, her parents had bored and confused her with waves of disapproval. Apparently, the guest was her father's "boss", whatever that was.

It sounded like a type of fungus.

To her, he was weak, there to be fleeced, toyed with, dragged out to the curb and dispatched,

But her mother and father disagreed and punished her.

Was that any way to run a circus?



As a teenager, she had torched the neighbor's garage, subtracted a few cheerleaders (they irritated her) and been thrown out of the house.

She had stayed for a while with a friend, then took up residence in the rough at the local country club, where her parents were members.

What's one less golfer more or less? Like cheerleaders, they were annoying. But she had been shuttled through the legal system, where she was tried and convicted despite having bribed a judge with sexual favors. Did no one else in the world understand simple pragmatism?

She was sent to prison.

With the help of the Succubus, she escaped.

For the past seven months she has been hiding in plain sight at Danny's Coffee Shop.



"How come you don't have donuts?" It is the shorter of two cops who have walked in. 

Chloe stays facing the street and goes very still.

The Queen Of The Vampires lifts her head from the Dark Haired Chick's shoulder.

Savanna's hand falls down beside her boot, where she always keeps a knife.

The Succubus is thinking to herself, "if only they had stayed asleep in their cruiser, I could have stolen their souls!" Then she remembers that policemen have bitter tasting souls and abandons the wish.

Silence fills Danny's Coffee Shop.

Then God (the waitress) speaks. "Look y'all," she says brightly to the officers. "Your cop car is going on a call withoutcha."

It's true. Their cruiser is rolling away. They both bolt out of Danny's and run like big blue bats out of hell after their disappearing wheels.



When God laughs, it is like spray from a fountain.

Chloe looks perplexed, then her eyes get big. "YOU did that!"

"Uh huh," says God.



Chloe's parents never understood her, but God does. Every black sheep girl is still her little chica.

The Succubus is looking sleepy.

Savanna goes back to her underground comic book.

The Queen Of The Vampires has her eyes closed and her cheek on "Hair Band."

God is in Her coffee shop and all is well with the world.

Amen!

______

photograph by James Bengel. Used by permission.
______

Danny's, Home For Wayward Girls

More Savanna, because Sara asked for it. More Danny's because everybody asked for it. :-)

Savanna walks into Danny's Coffee Shop.

She is wearing a long skirt and boots.

She is thin.



"What is she, about twelve?" says Chloe to Denise the waitress. "Maybe you better card her."

"It's a coffee shop, you dipshit," chirps Denise.

God, the other waitress, hurries by.

"Behold! It is Yahweh, the great I Am!" Chloe announces, smirking. Denise chuckles.

"Oh cut it out you guys," says God, tilting her chin up and giving them both her best bite-me smile.

Denise goes over to Savanna.



"Hi hun. Been here before?"

"Sure, lots of times." She's never been within ten miles of the place.

She orders a small mocha. It's all she has the money for.



The Queen Of The Vampires, sitting at a nearby booth, shape-shifts into a black panther and gracefully hops down to go investigate the newbie,

But the Dark-Haired Chick catches her tail in her hand and brings her up short.

The QOTV whirls around, all gleaming white fangs and slashing claws,

But the Dark-Haired Chick just goes, "Pffft!" and goes back to her coffee.

Everybody knows,

The DHC can do anything she wants to the QOTV and the QOTV will let her.



For a second, Savanna's eyes are as big as gypsy moons before she recovers herself and remembers to act cool.

"That your cat?" she asks the Dark-Haired Chick.

The QOTV is sulkily shredding the booth and making a mess of it.

"Never saw her before," answers the DHC, dryly.



God comes over and talks to Savanna for a minute and then comes back with two sandwiches and a jumbo latte.

"I can pay," says Savanna.

"I know, sugar, but first time customers get this. It's a promotion." God is lying her head off. They never do this.



As God walks back by her, Chloe says, "Be careful, Mother Teresa. That one's got a knife in her boot."

"I know. I know everything."

"I roe ebryting," mocks Chloe, unhappily. "Nobody likes a know-it-all!"

"Nobody doesn't like me," counters God, brightly.



"That's Sara Lee," calls the Succubus from her corner table where she is reading the daily advice column through dark glasses.

"What?" they all ask.

The Succubus lowers her shades. "Sara Lee. It's 'nobody doesn't like Sara Lee.' Duh."



The QOTV is leaving deep grooves in the table with her claws. This seems to please her.

Savanna has one sandwich left, but not for long.

Danny walks in.

"Hi Danny!" they all sing.

"Hi girls," he growls contentedly.

Every day is a good day at Danny's Coffee Shop in Norman.

Today is no exception.

____________

Monkshood Tea

Chloe is sitting in Danny's Coffee Shop, watching CNN with the sound off and listening to Screamin' Jay Hawkins sing "I Put A Spell On You." It relaxes her.



"I want it played at my wedding," she says, squinting, when Denise makes a face and asks "What sort of twisted shit is that?"



CNN is reporting on an escaped female serial killer, at large for several months now. They show Chloe's picture.

"Gawd. I look like an Olsen twin."



Some kid comes in, with his thumbs in his belt loops and looking around as if he sees invisible hordes of paparazzi.

He once appeared on "American Idol."

"Lord above," says God the waitress, putting her fingers to her forehead and closing her eyes. "I hate when I get his table."



Chloe says, "Rest your dogs, baby. I've got this one."

God opens her eyes and looks over. "You've never waited a table in your life."

Chloe gives God one of those big-eyed, curl-lipped bite-me looks and and goes, "Well now I am."

God smiles and does a little head shake.

Chloe gets up.



Idol Boy gives her the once over. "Hi gorgeous. What you got that's any good?"

She gives him a smile that would turn a lemon diabetic, and purrs,

"Try the monkshood tea." She leans forward, lips parted, head tilted, eyes hooded. She even winks.

The little asshole orders it.



God's arms are folded and she is trying hard not to laugh when Chloe passes her and starts rooting around in her bag. She spreads some stuff out on the table.

"We don't carry anything called monkshood tea," chirps God.

"We do now," says Chloe, without looking up.

"What's in it?"

Larkspur seeds.

Holly berries.

Hogweed sap.

Dumbcane.

Nightshade.



Chloe brings Idol Boy his tea, then plasters a starstruck look across her face and watches.

He is in mid-boast when his expression changes and so does Chloe's.

His to confusion.

Hers to intense curiosity.



The Succubus puts down her book and calls over from her spot in the corner,

"A bag of Ghirardellis says he falls left when he goes."

Chloe murmurs, "You're on."

Her head tilts left as Idol Boy lists further and further to the right. Then he falls to the floor amid much flopping and flailing.

Chloe says smugly, "Pay up, woman."



Danny himself comes in the front door and sees the ex-celebrity dead as hell in his coffee shop.

"What are you girls doing?" He sounds as if he has been chain smoking for forty years. He has.

"Playinggggg," sing song Chloe and the Succubus like little girls.



No one else in the place has even noticed

They are all regulars.

None of them order the monkshood tea.

They know that when you come to Danny's

You order coffee.



CNN is reporting a rise in its popularity.

_________

Merde

Before she was turned, The Queen Of The Vampires was called Gladys Hotzelbacher.

Facts are facts. What can she do? But all that is over, now she is the magnificent Queen Of The Vampires, able to shape shift into anything, and mesmerize anyone she chooses with her regal and otherworldly manner.

Getting there was no walk in the fucking park, Bo Peep.



Penelope Hotzelbacher, the aged aunt of the aforementioned Gladys, the very same wretched and screeching old battle ax who told her she was damned and who tried to kill her with a silver dagger cleverly hidden underneath her ill-mannered and piebald Persian cat, who never moved except to crap in the potted plants,

That very same old mothball auntie has kicked the bucket and left the QOTV a small amount of money, delivered this very day by check. 

Well now.

The QOTV would love to tear it to little pieces and dance on it in exactly the way dear auntie would most have objected to, but she can't. She owes the fucking electric company a certain amount, and if she does not pay it by 5 p.m., out go the lights. 

Damn.

So, the Queen Of The Vampires grabs the number sixty-three bus to Evergreen road where the bank is, and walks in.

She is dressed entirely in black and crimson, with her hair down to her waist and her attitude filling the room like a brimstone plug-in. 

Just barely restraining the urge to shape shift, she walks up to the teller. 

"I want to cash this check," she announces, and presents it with a flourish. The security guard is transfixed, but the teller is all business.

"Sign the back, please," she drones, while doing something else.

The QOTV withdraws a genuine quill pen from her bosoms, and pricking her finger with its tip, she signs "Q.V." in blood, on the back of the check. 

"Ma'am?" The teller sounds spectacularly nasal and officious. "This check is payable to the order of Gladys Hotzelbacher. Is that you?"

There is a long pause. A very very very....long....pause.

The QOTV purses her lips, the same lips that have bewitched her victims to the point that they willingly bared their throats to her. People behind her are watching. The guard is watching. 

Very softly, she says,

"I was."

"What does that mean, Ma'am?" The teller sounds like a particularly dull  machine in a factory. "May I see your driver's license?"

The QOTV shifts from foot to foot and resists the urge to shape shift into a cobra. 

"I don't drive."

"Ma'am, I can't cash this check if you aren't Gladys Hotzelbacher. Are you Gladys Hotzelbacher or not?"

The QOTV remembers Gladys, the cowed, unloved whipping girl of the Hotzelbacher clan. Nothing like she is now. Nothing to do with who she is now. 

"It's my check," explains the Vampire Queen through clenched teeth, including the very long, very sharp ones. "Please cash it." Saying please to this automaton is costing her. 

"Ma'am," drones the teller, "I am not authorized to cash this unless you can show that you are--"

With that, the Queen Of The Vampires shape shifts into a black panther and leaps onto the counter, letting loose with an ear-splitting cat-scream and slashing an inch away from the teller's face with her murderous claws. 

She crouches, ears back, screaming, showing her fangs, and says, with her cat-mouth, "Cass da fucking check!!!!"

The teller says, blandly as a beige wall, "You'll have to sign it Gladys Hotzelbacher before I can cash it for you. It's regulations." She says this last bit the way some people say "It's in the bible" as if that settles everything.

So, not wanting her electricity cut off, the Queen Of The Vampires shape shifts back, bites her lip, stands tall and silently signs the hated name. 

Money in hand, she catches a bus downtown and pays the power company their money. Then she takes a third bus home. 

And so it is that Chloe finds the Queen Of The Vampires curled up in a ball in one of the outside chairs at Danny's, by herself, with her face down on her arms, crying.

"Oh sugar, what's wrong?" Chloe is not generally known for her Earth Mother warmth, but she knows a girl who needs a shoulder when she sees one.

The serial killer holds the red-eyed Vampire Queen for a while, and sings to her. True, the song is "99 Bottles Of Beer On The Wall", but hey. 

There are people working regular jobs who could learn a little humanity from golfer-killer, judge-seducer, prison-escapee Chloe. 
_______