Welcome! Name's Dom. Here's some stuff that I really, really like...such as writing, books, and more writing. I also love swing dancing, jazz, horror, history, and doing my small part to make sure that the world doesn't blow up.
Here we go again! Last year, I was lucky enough to win this contest (what the). Can I do it again? Guess you'll have to wait and see. #writingcontest #creativeloafing
Current reads! A blind buy from #dysfunctionalgraceartco and I'm SO excited to start. You just don't walk away from a cover like this. #bowlingballhead #doubleday #sciencefiction #sciencefictionart #sciencefictionnovel #booksofinstagram #literature (at Saint Petersburg, Florida)
The sheets stuck to Alex's skin and he shifted in bed, careful not to wake the girl beside him. He kicked off the blankets as he stared up at the fan, the blades agonizingly still. The atmosphere in the room was heavy, reaking of body odor and patchouli and forgotten last names.
The girl was turned away; they had fallen asleep spooning, but Alex thought it was too intimate, and he'd given her his back once he was sure she had fallen asleep.
He listened for a few moments while gazing up at the fan. It was still dark out. That was good. The people of the Earth were just beginning to stir and their racket was at a bare minimum.
He rolled to his side and sat up, his feet finding the floor. He held his breath as he found his clothes, scattered around the room like so much dirty refuse. A sock here, a shirt there. He spotted the girls underwear, hanging from the lamp like so many cliches. He grinned and he plucked at her panties, stuffing them in his pocket.
He looked at the girl one more time. The covers had slipped off of her when he was getting up. Her body lay exposed and her ass bore marks from the night before. A chill went through him when he thought about it. He glanced about, making sure there was no trace of him having ever been there.
He turned and he left, just as quickly as he'd came.
Alex put his jacket on as he walked, the summer rains beginning to sprinkle along his shoulders and dampening his scalp. He popped his collar as added protection.
The night before at the restaurant had made him stink: used canola oil, spilled lobster, dirty dishes, flaming grills, seasoned chicken breast - his mind was consumed with the kitchen and what he needed to do tonight when he went back, which was why he didn't seen her standing next to his car.
He jumped back when he noticed her, his nose now stinging with a new but familiar fragrance - patchouli. She stood stock still, acting as if the rain wasn't there at all. She was drenched. Her black eye shadow ran down her face, making her look like some sort of miserable clown. Her leather pants were almost baggy and her billowy dark blouse was hanging off of her. She had lost a lot of weight since they had seen each other last in that humid apartment - three weeks ago? Maybe four. Alex couldn't remember.
"Alex?" she said. She didn't move her feet, but it seemed like she was moving closer to him. He smiled, and his teeth shone in the rain.
"Hello, darlin'!" he said, dropping the 'g' so hard you could hear it hit the floor. "Where have you been?"
"Don't fucking act that way," she said, the words batting at him.
They didn't make a dent. He just said, "What do you mean?"
"You know what you fucking did to me!" she said, her tongue ring clicking against her teeth. Alex could remember how incredible that thing had felt while she was going down on him. The uglier ones always did oral better. They had to.
"I'm pretty sure it was consensual, darlin'," he said, leaning against his car nonchalantly.
"You gave me a goddamn STD!" she hissed through clenched teeth.
"Hey, you didn't ask-"
"Yes, I did! I was drunk but I still knew enough to ask..."
"Not sober enough to make me put a condom on, though," he said strategically, thinking he had one-upped her at last.
She was taken aback. She looked away for a moment, searching for the memory, trying to find evidence for her rebuttal. "You....you told me you were allergic to the ones I had," she said. "I DID ask you to wear a condom! Are you fucking gaslighting me right now?" She somehow looked bigger than she had before - taller, like a cobra rearing up during a snake charmer's song.
"No, no...look, I'm really sorry. Please, let me take you out tonight-"
"Sorry? Sorry?" She said, shaking her head in bewilderment, her mouth open wide. "You'll be sorry, you fucking snake!" The words vibrated as they left her mouth, humming and slamming and clicking like a great machine - Alex felt something squirm inside of him as they left her lips, and he didn't know why.
She brought her palm to her face and bit into it, hard. There was the snapping of her skin as it tore. She stared at him as she pulled her hand away and Alex stared at her blood smeared mouth, the crimson coating her lips and staining her tongue. She spat on the sidewalk, right at his feet. He grimaced, and he couldn't even say, "What the fuck?" before she had cupped her wounded hand and slammed him in the balls.
The shock flashed in his brain and he was stunned for a moment. He couldn't form words. He couldn't even shout. The pain filled him up, engulfing his groin and shooting down his legs. His knees buckled and he fell to the ground. He looked at his pants where a splotched, red hand print stained his crotch. A high pitched groan began leaking out of his mouth.
It was raining harder now, raining so hard it was almost comical. Everything was turning white; the girl was disappearing before his eyes, the water acting almost like static on a television set. He saw her mouth moving, contorting itself into grotesque shapes. He couldn't hear her anymore among the splatter of the rain and he wasn't sure if she was speaking English.
He blinked, and she was gone. She had ducked behind a row of cars and he couldn't see her anymore.
He pressed his hand against his crotch. He waited for the pain to ebb away, but relief would not find him - the longer he laid there, the worse it got. He struggled to stand up, first getting on his knees, and then shouting out as he got to his feet. His free hand grabbed at the car keys in his pocket. It was gusting now and the water sliced into him as he opened his car door.
He collapsed into his seat, crying out as his testicles rebounded from the force. He put the key in the ignition and turned the car over. He fumbled for the heat and hit the switch, listening to the drone of the system as it whirred to life. The warmth slid over him, and he took a second to just sit there. He wanted to be home and forget about the bitch, forget about her pale skin and her garish eye makeup and her stupid tongue ring and forget about the mumbling chaotic jibberish she had been speaking in the rain and forget about her final, intelligible words and how they had made him feel inside.
---------------------------------------------
He didn't turn any of his lights on when he got into the house. Sweat dripped off his nose. His skin was hot to the touch, the heat starting at his groin and radiating out to every part of his body. This wasn't like other times when he had been hit in the balls. This was a different, Biblical level of pain. He felt like his penis was on fire - a blaze with no embers.
He didn't want any of his clothes on. He was burning up. He yanked his jacket off, his shirt; he unbuckled his pants and kicked them away. The agony only intensified. He couldn't stand anymore and he made his way to the couch before falling down. It wasn't long before the couch cushions were soaked in sweat. He writhed there, grimacing, wishing it all away.
He knew he had to look at it. He reached for his underwear. He began peeling them back. His eyes were closed, his teeth set like a vice. His jaw felt like it would snap.
He rolled his underwear just past his crotch and looked down.
He didn't know where his penis started and where his body began. There was now just a bloated, aubergine appendage between his legs, coated in a sheen of something slimier than spit, stickier than mucus. The distended thing lay against his thigh, pulsing and writhing without Alex's consent. The thing wasn't a part of his body anymore.
He couldn't see his balls from behind the protuberance. Alex was sobbing, his chest heaving as he sucked in air. He actively searched for his testicles, his hand moving down, careful not to touch the viscous, thrumming, foreign object between his legs. He could feel the heat cascading off of it.
He found what was left of his balls. There were two empty sacks of flesh where his testicles had once been; just a mound of skin, hanging limply in a pool of unknown juices. "Oh fuck," he whimpered through his tears, and a stream of expletives followed.
He attempted to lift himself from the couch, but he fell back down. He needed to get his cell phone: he had left it on the bureau at the front of the house. It was maybe ten feet away, but it seemed like ten miles.
There was the sound of ripped fabric as his penis split down the middle. Blood splattered against his abdomen, against his chest, against his thighs. The dead flaps of skin fell off to each side like unwanted corn husks.
He was screaming now. He was screaming so loud he couldn't hear himself. He thought for a second he wasn't even breathing, that his body had adjusted so that all his mouth could do was scream, and scream, and scream.
The thing that remained between his legs was thin, more serpentine than the distorted shaft that was there before. It looked like it was somehow breathing along with him. It was black, so black Alex wasn't sure if there was even anything really there, thinking maybe his penis had just exploded into nothing.
But then, it lifted its head at him.
The skull was sharp and shaped like a diamond, its eyes wide and opalescent. The ridges above its pupils formed its face into a hateful scowl. Its scales caught the light, the shine marred only by Alex's blood.
A tongue flicked out of its mouth, tasting the air around it.
"What the fuck?" Alex said and kept saying, over and over again. The serpent began to move. It writhed up, coiling around itself, staring at him. It tilted its head, frantically jutting out its tongue.
Alex closed his eyes for a second, wishing this all away, knowing that this couldn't be something actually happening. That wasn't what happened in real-
His eyes bugged wide when the fangs sank into his thigh. He yelled, his throat raw. He looked down and saw it staring at him again, crimson now smearing its face. With frightening speed, it attacked him again and again and again, up and down his legs and arms and belly, striking without regard, stabbing skin and opening up veins. Alex jabbed at it but to no avail. It was too goddamned fast.
The bites were just flashes. With each one, Alex's vision would blur and brighten. From his chest down, there was just blood and gaping wounds. He grabbed at the monster, but it was able to dodge him with ease. He wondered for a horrifying second if it knew what he was gonna do before he did it.
Alex scanned the room, and saw the comforter that laid on the chair just across from where he was on the couch. He lifted himself up with what strength he had and threw himself onto the hardwood floor. The snake hissed as it hit its head and it seemed to be out of it for a second, flipping around itself for no obvious reason.Alex crawled along the floor, slipping in the sweat and in the blood and in the strange liquid that had oozed from the monster's birth.
His hands latched around the comforter. He turned onto his back, and as the snake aimed to strike once more , he wrapped the blanket around the black demon. He could feel it moving, slithering, trying to free itself. "No!" He yelled, folding and pressing. With a free arm, he held the blanket in place. The snake tugged away from him, and for a second it felt like it was going to rip free from his groin and Alex cried out.
He moved now, slowly, towards the desk. His elbow smacked against the hardwood as he crawled, kicking off the underwear that had fallen to his ankles as he inched his way forward. He grunted, a deep earthy sound, as he fought back against the darkness that he could see just on the fringes of his vision, the darkness that asked him to just give up and fall asleep and let it be over.
He reached up and pulled the drawer right out of the desk. Items scattered to the floor, things sliding off in all directions. He spotted the scissors and grabbed them, his hands trembling so damned much that he dropped them and had to pick them up again.
He propped himself up against the desk, legs splayed out in front of him. He eyed the lighter that had also fallen from the drawer, and with a quick elbow, had dragged it closer to him so that it was ready. He breathed deep. He let the comforter go and shot his hand down into the fabric. He felt the sting of the bite, and he pushed past it. He yelled, and yelled some more, spit tendrils flying from his lips. He tore his hand away from the teeth, feeling his skin rip with it, and he managed to get his fingers around the thing's neck. He kicked off the comforter to see what he was doing.
He pulled the snake tight. The thing was so strong, and so slimy from blood, it almost got away from him and he could feel his heart do somersaults. But he kept hold of it. He put the scissors as close to the base as he could, where his groin and the snake met.
SNIP
The snake shrieked and so did Alex.
He threw the serpent with what strength he had and it smashed into the wall, leaving a splatter. It fell lifelessly to the ground.
Blood was pooling on the wood floor below him at an alarming rate, soaking his butt cheeks and his legs. He could feel the life leaving him as he snatched the lighter, fighting with it once, twice, three times. "Fuck, fuck, FUCK!" He said, and finally the flame caught. He brought it to where his penis once had been and cauterized the wound, blackening the tender flesh. He was screaming again. He dropped the lighter.
The sound of it hitting the ground was the last thing he remembered.
He woke up, and it was impossible to tell exactly how long he had been out for. The blood on him was dry. He ached everywhere. His body felt like one, big, open gash. He glanced down at his groin, looking without wanting to look, seeing without wanting to see. It was empty; it was without. It was a singed landscape of nothing.
He cried. It was a wail that shook his body, made him vibrate with grief. Mucus drained from his nose. Through bleary eyes, he looked over at the snake's carcass- it was still there, eyes ever open, forked tongue out, its mouth agape.
He wiped his face with the back of his hand, accidentally reopening a few of the bites in the process. He thought about trying to walk, but even the simple idea of it made him want to pass out again. He got on his hands and knees and shuffled his way into the bathroom.
He braced himself on the kitchen sink, and slowly rose to his feet. He stood in front of the cold, uncaring bathroom mirror. His body was peppered with dozens of puncture wounds. His entire body stung as the cold air of the room kissed his flesh.
Alex retched when he finally looked at his groin. He had no time to go to the toilet. He spewed right in the sink, the vomit splashing back against the porcelain and hitting his face. He felt better for a moment, snot dripping down and pooling at his lip, until there was another wave of nausea. He stayed that way for a few minutes, the stench surrounding him as he collected himself. He turned the water on, washed his face, let it all go down the drain.
There was a wriggling sensation in his groin.
He turned the light on and carefully sat himself down on the toilet bowl. He craned his neck, looking at where his penis once had been.
A baby snake was there, slithering itself out from the burnt scab in his crotch. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The little bell rang as the door to the shop opened. There was the familiar smell of pet food, dog piss, and hay; the familiar sounds of chirping parakeets and squawking parrots. Alex walked up to the counter; the girl behind it knew what he needed. Alex came here every week for it. She tried flirting with him. She thought he was cute in that 'been through shit' sort of way. But every time she tried, he gave her the cold shoulder. There was always next time, she thought.
He left with the box in the bag. He put it in the back of the car with the rest of his groceries.
He turned the burner on once he got home. He put his sliced ham in the skillet, along with the egg, scallions, salt and pepper, and mushrooms. Monday was omelette day. Omelette day made him happy.
He sliced some avocado, laid it out on the delicious, still cooling creation. He put his dish on the table, took a seat.
He grabbed the box from the store, pulled it closer to him; he opened it.
He unbuttoned his pants and loosened them. He opened the flap in his underwear.
He delicately took one of the mice from the box, petted it for a moment, and then dropped it in his lap.
Alex grabbed his fork. They both enjoyed their meal.
On Halloween this year, I asked my friends on Facebook what scared them. I made a confession while answering the question myself - I’m scared that I’m lazy. I have a genuine fear of it; that I’m too lazy to give the time to my passions that they need in order to grow...most specifically, writing. So, with my friend’s answers, I decided to write a single short horror story every month inspired by the answers, releasing the stories in chronological order of their comments.
Tomorrow, I post my first one. And I’m still scared, but not of being lazy - I was able to fully write and edit a fun story that I’m proud of. But now I’m scared because the world gets to see this part of me, the weird non-dancing part that loves horror and weirdness.
Here we go anyway.
(But only if you like it!)
http://mashstories.com/shortlist/how-many-licks-does-it-take/
Hey! Just sending this out there again! My story, How Many Licks Does It Take?, was chosen to be in the running to win this competition! Please, read it, vote for it by clicking the ‘Kudos’ button, and if you can, comment on the bottom! I would so appreciate it!
You might’ve noticed Marvel character names all: A) start with the same letter and B) often sound fake as shit. Peter Parker, Matt Murdock, Bruce Banner, Stephen Strange, Reed Richards, Sue Storm, Scott Summers, Warren Worthington, Otto Octavius … and so on. We’re not even counting Rocket Raccoon and Drax The Destroyer. The reason is that Stan Lee has a shitty memory – so shitty that he couldn’t remember what his own characters were called. In his own words: “ … if I could give somebody a name, where the last name and the first name begin with the same letter […] then if I could remember one name, it gave me a clue what the other one was.”
6 WTF Origin Stories Behind Famous Pop-Culture Names
so, han, why did you change your last name to organa after you married leia and not the other way around? “because i’m—” [puts on sunglasses] “—no longer solo.” [chewbacca roars into the sunset]
I don’t write character-driven novels. Heck, I’m not even sure what the term means. I used to think it was when an author spent hundreds of pages muddling around inside a character’s head just to fill the gaps between a couple paragraphs of action.
I prefer to write plot-driven suspense thrillers. But how does the low-brow thriller writer create good characters? I’m still a novice on the subject so this is by no means a definitive exposition, just 9 ingredients I jotted down to make a clever acrostic: CHARACTER.
(Look here for a list of thriller agents.)
1. Communication style: How does your character talk? Does she favor certain words or phrases that make her distinct and interesting? What about the sound of her voice? Much of our personality comes through our speech, so think about the way your character is going to talk. Her style of communication should be distinctive and unique.
2. History: Where does your character come from? Think out his childhood and adolescence. What events shaped his personality? What did his father do for a living? How about his mother? How many siblings does he have? Was it a loving family or an abusive, dysfunctional one? What events led him to the career choices he made? You may not need to provide all this background to your reader, but it’s good to know as the writer. It helps give him substance in your mind as well.
germansingergirl
turnnoffyourmind
titsay
yousharknotpass
gummygunk
vaporwave
stormborns
