II PRETTY LITTLE THINGS There’s a devil waiting outside your door.— Nick Cave, Loverman FOURTEEN MONTHS LATER “LUCY CRIED AS THE REVOLVER PRESSED against the side of her head, just behind her left eye,” the author reads aloud from an unfolded book on a lectern. “The metal felt cold against her skin and every time she paused to breathe, the rancid smell of gun oil burned her throat. It was a sweet scent, like rotten bananas soaked in gasoline.” A poster-sized copy of the book cover rests on a tripod just left of the lectern. In the center is an… Continue reading TWO
I A DOWNWARD SPIRAL Perhaps you had better start from the beginning.— Christopher Lee, To the Devil a Daughter HELL IS EMPTY AND ALL THE DEVILS ARE HERE is sprayed across the sidewalk in runny red paint when I exit the taxi in front of the Ritz-Carlton in downtown Budapest. The other pedestrians walk over the letters without acknowledgement, just as they do the homeless woman praying over an open sewer hole churning out steam. She looks up at me and smiles with a very Gorgo-like smile. Her lips part and I see maggots. I walk through the revolving door,… Continue reading ONE