If you can't take the heat, leave the kitchen. Aspiring chef Candace couldn't, so she had decided to quit and slit her wrists. While her big brother Peter fought to keep her in the game, her little sister Millie whispered a wish to D's snake. And, boy, did she get it. Will she and her siblings survive the experience?
Pet Shop of Horrors
Derelict: Part II
"Happiness is not a state to arrive at, but a manner of traveling." Margaret Lee Runbeck
Candace was hiding inside a cave. She new the mean snake was waiting for her outside. It was cold and damp and she felt terribly unhappy. But she couldn't go out. She just couldn't face that horrible python again.
"Some things you can't run from, sweet pea. That only makes them want to sink their teeth in you even more, they like the chase."
The girl was a light blond and she was beautiful. She had a golden tunic falling down to the floor. She was sited on this big mushroom with her legs crossed.
"Who are you? Where am I? What's happening here? Have I gone mad? Is this Hell?"
"I've always wondered if hell is really necessary, as far as punishment goes we seem to be doing a pretty good job on our own right here."
Candace rolled into a tight ball and started crying.
"Oh, don't do that please. If I have to kneel, I'll ruin the dress."
"Oh sure, figures, the effing dress is more important than me."
"And why should you be more important to me than my dress? I've had this one for over 25 years, you know?"
"You don't look that old and the dress seems brand new."
"Well thank you, I take good care of myself. I wish I could say the same about you."
Candace looked down; she was naked and covered in mud. Plus she had bandages on her wrist and then she remembered. She had tried to kill herself.
"I couldn't even succeed at that. I'm such a loser."
"Have you ever tried to win, sweet pea?
"Have I? You can bet your fucking ass I have! I have tried so hard, always a little bit harder, always uphill, always against those who are better than me and I always get the short stick. No matter how hard I try! Perseverance always gets you shit!"
"And how does that make you feel, Candace?"
"How do you know my name?"
"Is it important?"
She decided that it wasn't, after all, this was just some sort of mad dream so the girl was a product of her sick mind: "It makes me feel sad."
"You don't sound sad, sweet pea."
No she wasn't sad, not really: "Angry…so angry I could just blow them all into pieces."
"But you didn't get them, did you? No, you took their lead and bit your own tail."
"I…I…What else could I do?"
The blond smiled at her and her fangs showed. Oddly enough Candace wasn't scared.
"You could have done what you really wanted. You could have got your revenge not on them, whoever they might be, but on him. On the one that gave you the last shove. You could still do it. I could help you, sweet pea."
"Why would you want to help me?"
The blond walked to her, made her stand up and kissed her. Well their lips were barely touching but for the looks of it the blond was sucking some pearly mist out of her. Candace was definitely going mad, she should have been terrified but she wasn't. Worse, she was kissing a girl, sort of, and she kind of liked it. She felt lightheaded.
"Because, sweet pea, you and me, we are the same."
Candace knew that at some level it was true so she returned the smile: "Ok, you're on. I'll let you help me get my revenge. So what's in it for you?"
The blond took out a triangular dagger with snakes curling around the hilt: "Nothing you haven't already thrown away, sweet pea."
An Asian girl with midnight blue black hair and a dark blue dress came from the entrance of the cave: "Yes. And you know what to do. Don't you, Candy?"
The python, Candace didn't know how she knew it but this girl was the python. And she also knew what she needed to do. She did it over the scars she already had, no point in getting a new set.
She could feel them getting inside her twisting and reshaping her. Her bones cracked under the pressure. Her body grew taller and slimmer. Her hair grew longer and lighter, almost white with the faintest yellow tint. Her eyes took on an almond shape and a dark blue shade.
The three of them left the cave and Candace looked at her new reflection in the water. She was pretty in a dangerous sort of way that made her smile. She knew the clock was ticking so she got herself going. She had a rat to catch.
"Look, cub, a meteor shower."
Claire and Millie had returned to the apartment. Candace was still out, too soon to worry about that but the doctors said the electrosomething or the other was wrong. Peter had stayed perched on one of the plastic chairs. Claire had fixed up dinner and had pretended to work until she had fallen sleep over her opened books.
Millie didn't feel sleepy so she had taken Padma out of the terrarium and was watching the night sky with her.
"Shooting stars. Mom said you could make a wish, those are a lot of wishes."
"Would you grab them all if you could, cub?"
Millie denied: "I can't think of that many wishes."
Padma laughed softly: "There are some who could and even then they wouldn't be satisfied."
"Sometimes I don't understand what you are saying."
"Oh you do, cub, is just the words that throw you off. So not even a little wish?"
"I've already told you, all I want is for us to be happy again."
"There's something you aren't saying, cub."
Millie looked down at her slippers and gave the left kitten's head a tap with her right foot.
"There's something…"
Padma sighed, there's always something. She had hoped it wasn't, but she should have known better.
"What is it, cub? You can tell me, I'll keep your secret."
Millie held Mr. Buttons closer, burying her nose in his head; sometimes she could smell her Mom when she did that. Lavender and Rosemary, she always had those in her garden.
She was about to say it but she shook her head forcefully: "No, I shouldn't. Peter says they can't come back even if they want to and that they are happy in Heaven. He wouldn't lie to me."
Padma looked at her and knew she firmly believed that. Too close, that had been too close. She realized she had started liking this cub.
"That's okay, cub. Why don't you try counting the shooting stars and see how many there are?"
The cub fell asleep before reaching a hundred.
"By the Buddha, I swear, how the mighty have fallen. The great Padma watching a human cub sleep with sheepish eyes." Takshata had walked in wearing her red shiny armor.
Padma hissed at her: "What are you doing here? You were supposed to be with the boy."
"He's heading down here. The girl is out of danger though she hasn't awoken, so they sent him home. And I think you should be more worried about the other girl, look at what Jaya is doing to her."
Claire had fallen asleep and had landed in the middle of a ragging storm. Waves rose and fell around her, she could deal with a calm ocean, but this was too much. Worse was coming. The green monster, she couldn't be called snake, was back. The thing was speeding towards her. She tried to remain calmed and swim away. She couldn't figure out where the beach was but she just had to get away from that thing.
Too late, she was swallowed. She could feel something liquid coating her. God, she was going to be digested alive. Claire started trashing and she realized they weren't digestive fluids, it was water. She was going to drown inside of a snake. Talk about your über nightmare. It wasn't a smart move but she opened her mouth to scream and the water began filling her lungs.
Peter walked in and tried to make his way in the darkened apartment. The place was a mess. Claire claimed there was an inherent order in the way she piled up her stuff. If there was one, he couldn't see it. Millie was sleeping in front of the window her head lying inches away of a fish tank with a white and a red snake. Shit, they were probably harmless but Claire was too careless. Where was she?
She was lying on her desk and under the moonlight her skin had a bluish tint. Peter noticed she wasn't breathing. His heart missed a beat: 'Not her, please, not her too.' He should have stayed away from her, as his instincts had told him to. He knew this would happen, everything he got close to was destroyed. And that's why he had stopped trying.
"Then let her go."
The voice came from his back. He had heard her before: "No, I won't."
Hoping that his sister wouldn't wake up he laid Claire down and put his finger in her throat trying to find out if something was obstructing it.
"Stop, it's useless. You always fail."
"I won't fail. This time, I won't."
He kneeled beside her and pressed his lips against hers. He blew in her mouth and tried to get some air in her. Then he started pressing his hands against her chest.
"It's not working."
"It has to work."
"Why? Because you want it to work? You are not the center of the universe, boy. Time won't stop for you."
Peter wanted to cry: "Because it's my fault."
"How do you figure that one out?"
"I should have done something. There must be something I could have done."
"What if there wasn't? What if there isn't?"
"Then maybe Candace is right, this world is fucked up and we should all just quit."
"Sometimes the world is fucked up, but sometimes it isn't."
"Then what are we supposed to do?"
"Pick up our fights wisely, cut our loses promptly and, sometimes, when there's nothing left to do, take comfort in tears and the company of good friends."
"I'm not cutting her loose."
"Good, then stop dragging her around halfheartedly. It's unfair to her and to you."
"Great, first I have to make her breathe."
"Carry on, boy. I'm all done here." The red curled up and set down to rest.
Claire had run out of air. That was scary enough, but what was driving her mad was that she couldn't move.
"Yesss that's what really ssscaress you… to be impotent."
"Well, thank you for the insight, you fucking bitch."
Claire tried to fight but she was growing weaker by the second.
"Let go."
"Hah! You wish. Hag!"
"Sometimes you really should let go."
Claire was standing inside a circular room. A lovely brunette in a white gown was looking at her. Was that how angels are supposed to look like?
"Where am I? Am I dead?"
"No, you aren't. But you know, dear, sometimes clutching at the steering wheel will only make you crash."
"So what are you supposed to do? No hands and see where you end?"
"Yes, sometimes you get someplace good."
"And most of the times you end with your butt in the air."
"That's a risk you can't avoid taking when you play."
"I'm not a gambler."
The girl laughed and it was like a thousand bells chiming: "We all are, whether we are having fun at the table or we are watching from the trenches."
"Sometimes the table isn't fun."
"The trenches are never fun."
"I don't know what you are talking about."
"Oh you do, but it's time for you to leave."
The girl shoved her out of the white room and Claire came through coughing. Peter was there and, good Lord, he was crying. He almost got the air out of her once more. But Claire didn't mind, she returned the embrace as tightly as his.
The moment the girl had walked in the bar he had spotted her. Leroy Chaney was a gourmet, and not only for food. The girl was a little bit too ethnic for his taste. But it'd do as an aperitif. 'The night is young' he thought
Candace looked around trying to find her target. He was sited on a stool drinking from a tall glass. Had he always been that old? And what was wrong with his hair? A year with him and she never knew the man dyed his hair. Something inside her giggled, something else hissed. She shrugged and thought: 'Ok, ok, gee how grouchy are we? I'll hurry up.'
There wasn't much of fight really. The rat had fallen right into the trap with a big phony smile. Candace could hear him thinking, literally. He was a sleazebag and all his allure and class were superficial. Why hadn't she noticed before?
'The bitch has fallen right into my lap, women are really stupid and they only serve for one thing.'
The blast of the thought had almost sent her to the floor. She tripped on her high heels.
"Are you okay?" His mouth said but his filthy mind told a different story: 'As if I care, I just don't want to deal with a clumsy cow and a broken ankle.'
"I'm fine. I just stepped on something. I need to go to the bathroom."
Before Candace was out of his reach his mind yelled: 'Five minutes bitch. I'll give you five minutes and then I'll go find me some other piece of ass.'
Candace was looking at the mirror: "Christ! He is disgusting. I don't want to do this anymore. He's not worth it."
"Sure you aren't just chickening out, Candy?" asked the blue one inside her.
"Of course not, he's just not worth my time. To think I was willing to…Yuck! I need to puke."
"So you are going to let him leave," said the golden one raising an eyebrow.
"Hell no! He's a pest that needs to be taken care of. But there are better ways of doing it: denouncing his sorry ass to the school board for starters. And then letting his wife know what a creep he is for seconds. Though, if she has stayed with him for this long without finding out that… Who knows? She might even deserve him."
"Oh sweet pea, that's priceless! Ok, if you're sure then now it's the time to go," said the golden one with laugher in her voice.
"We'll take it from here," ended ominously the blue one while Candace left.
The phone rang and Claire and Peter stopped kissing. Candace was awake. Thank goodness Millie wasn't, she had slept through the ruckus.
Claire let him go with certain reluctance. In all probability all his defenses would be back up when he came back. Still she managed a weak encouraging smile while she said: "You go. I'll stay with Millie."
Peter nodded absentmindedly looking at his youngest sister and asked: "What did you gave her? She slept through it all."
"A tisane, anis and chamomile, works like a charm."
"It sure does."
There was something different with the girl. Something in her eyes and in the way she swung her hips to the music. But, who cares? For what he wanted her, that was irrelevant.
Shankapala laughed and Ananta laughed too, humans can be so stupid. The guy hadn't noticed he was dancing with death under the moonlight tonight. But humans are fun to toy with. Padma wouldn't like it though, the white one always told them they shouldn't play with their food.
Leroy had taken the girl to an apartment he kept downtown. And he had gone right down to business. The bitch had shoved him away. He had to bit his lip to stop himself from slapping her.
"Slow down, tiger. At least give us a hug first."
Then the bitch had taken hold of him and started squeezing, harder and harder still. Leroy watched wide-eyed while she crushed his bones. He started trashing when the thing opened her mouth and began swallowing him, by then all the fighting was mostly for show.
"Where have you two been? The girl is fine and they all went to her."
Ananta and Shankapala looked away. Padma's eyes could become daggers. Takshata moved away from the line of fire. Jaya didn't care for her sisters' blunder. She was still sulking from the scolding she'd gotten from hers.
Padma narrowed her eyes and cried out in exasperation: "Ohhh! I can't trust any of you. You weren't supposed to do that, you blood thirsty dumbasses!"
"There wasn't actually any blood spilling." Shankapala tried to pry a smile from her. Nope, old sis, was not in the mood for smiling.
"He deserved it," pointed out Ananta who wasn't one to be sorry, especially for a good meal.
"Sure he did. But not on the little one's tab. That wasn't what she asked for and she doesn't deserve the consequences for it."
Ananta looked down and then she saw a way out: "He's still somehow here."
"Then hold hands, my sisters. Tonight, we dance."
Claire was getting ready for dinner at her neighbors'. Candace was celebrating her come back. It hadn't been easy at first but after she gave the first step others had done the same, pity the rat had smelled the storm and abandoned the ship. Candace just shrugged, all she wanted was to have her dream back and the rat could go to Hell on its own.
He wasn't the only one gone. Padma had fled. They had looked for her all over Claire's messy apartment. Then they had waited for Millie to come back from school holding their breath. She took it surprisingly well. She said Padma had told her that was going to happen, because she didn't need her anymore.
Sheila was gone too. Claire couldn't keep her. Sure it had only been a dream due to the lack of oxygen, sleep apnea the doctors had called it, but still... She had taken Sheila to the Count's Pet Shop and asked him to find her a nice home. The man had agreed and as she was leaving he had insisted on paying her. She said she would take some crickets, but he insisted on giving her money. And the man even had the nerve to tell her she should go buy a dress with it. She told him she didn't wear dresses. She'd always thought that she looked like a bear in drag in them. He suggested a print: apricot flowers. And had directed her to the place where he had his kimonos made, saying the seamstress there was a miracle worker. Claire didn't know how to feel about that last comment.
A couple of days later, Claire was looking at her reflection on the mirror and what she saw was not a bear. The seamstress had done a miracle alright, managing to make her seem feminine. But after a lifetime of wearing loose pants, she felt odd in the airy creation. The print was gorgeous, though. The bell rang. It was Peter. He looked at her and stood speechless.
"Oh, come on! It can't be that bad."
"You're wearing a dress."
"Well, no shit, Sherlock. Aren't you the little detective?"
"You never wear dresses."
The guy looked befuddle and Claire was beginning to get angry: "What, do you want me to change?"
"No, you look nice."
She blushed.
He stared intensely at her and was making her nervous.
She blabbered: "They are apricot flowers."
"What?"
"The print… they are apricot flowers."
His eyes grew dark and he literally jumped her. They landed on a bunch of articles about komodo dragons. They rolled a bit while kissing and a big dictionary fell on Peter's head.
"Ouch! That's it! We're leaving this pigsty."
"Hey, it's my home you're talking about."
"No it isn't. I'm taking you home."
He carried her through his threshold… Their threshold, she corrected herself, though they still had to discuss the finer points, and she could bet her ass there was going to be plenty of discussion, but that deal was closed. Besides, the poor dear deserved some points for the effort of upholding tradition. She was big enough to make that not an easy feat; especially with the bump he had in his forehead. She kissed him lightly and whispered a promise. She said she'd make it up for him as soon as they could. Candace, who after her hospital stay had developed keener senses, took the hint and walked Millie to the door.
"But dinner…" protested the little one.
"Later Hon, we're having dessert first. How about some ice-cream?"
"What about Peter and Claire?" asked the little girl frowning.
"Oh, they are having dessert first too," Candace laughed as she forced a still protesting Millie to go through the door.
"Who would have said it? Your sister is all assertive now, isn't she?"
"Live and learn."
And that's life for you people, with a little luck and a little perseverance we live to tell the tale and learn something in the process. Still we all have to pay our dues.
Padma tried not to enjoy too much watching Jaya hunting mice in the pantry. That was the easy part. But then again, despite what her sisters' thought, anger was not her thing. There are so many veils we have to lift to see the light. But hers had always been attachment. She missed the cub, so much.
She shrugged: 'Oh well, another spin in the carrousel. But as a snake, please, Buddha. Humans are sooo…Take this blond for instance.'
"The spirits don't rest in this town. That's another case of kamikawhatever you're always ranting about," said Detective Orcot while grabbing a bunch of sugar glazed cookies and swallowing them without breathing.
"He probably flee, detective. Given what he was facing that's not a surprise." said D scowling at him, thinking not so much about the latest kamikakushi case in town but about the amount of cookies that had just disappear from his silver platter. Attachment comes in all shapes and sizes. But what incensed his ire the most was that heathen of a detective was gobbling his almond glazed sugar cookies as if they weren't precious delicacies, each one as unique as a snowflake.
"Yes, the chief also thinks he's fled. But I have a hunch he didn't have the chance to. We've managed to find this apartment he had. Man, you wouldn't believe the stench. If they'd let me, I'd have lifted the floorboards. He's probably down there."
"Have another cookie, detective." It really pained D, but if that was the price to keep the detective's mouth shut… He was willing to pay it.
'We all have to pay our dues, eventually,' thought Padma letting her attention drift from the pair having tea and nagging happily at each other back to her sisters. Take for example Ananta and Shankapala, who were having guard duty, and had hissed the detective away from the cage on the counter.
"That's disgusting! What are a sewer rat and two snakes doing right beside the food?"
"They are keeping an eye on him. And he is food too, detective," said D with a sinister smile.
"Food?"
"Yes, a delicacy on its own right. In this case, he's waiting for a meeting with a client's cobra. No one seems to want him as a pet."
"That's a no brainer," said Leo grabbing another bunch of cookies but before he threw them down his gullet he frowned and asked: "Hey! Why don't the snakes eat it?"
"Oh they know better than that… now," D could barely hold back a smile.
"He is not a looker but I think it's cruel to keep him just to be eaten. I would've thought that out of anyone in this world you'd agree. What with being a vegan and all that."
"This world is all about eating or being eaten, detective. And, even if you happen to find yourself on top of the food chain, you still have the risk of ending up being eaten by your own demons. Though some pull through and come back wiser from that battle."
"Uh?"
"Then again some don't get a clue of what's happening. Do have some more cookies, dear detective."
Padma and D chuckled. Leon frowned; he just didn't get the joke.
AN: The title is sort of an uncommon word so I'm sparing you the bother of picking up a dictionary, it's a nautical term for abandoned ships, also it means to quit voluntarily.
To me suicide is the ultimate expression of anger since you hurt others by hurting yourself. In a sense it's like saying to life: 'So you don't like me? Good, I don't like you either.'
I'm not one to cast stones I've been known to direct anger towards others and myself. But to quit the game for such a rat…that makes me want to kick someone. Ups, guess I'm a few steps away from enlightenment too.
Now, snakes, oh how I love them. In Tibetan Buddhist iconography the serpent appears most often as a symbol of anger, one of the 3 defilements or veils. (The others are attachment and ignorance.)
No wonder then that snakes are considered the appropriate ornament of the wrathful deities. In this case I was thinking of Vajrakila, or Vajrakilaya, the god of purification. He has his hair tied up in a white snake. In his ears are a couple of yellow ones and around his neck is a red one. Green snakes form his anklets and bracelets; while a midnight blue serpent serves as a sautoir (a long necklace, longer than opera-length -30-35 inches- often with an ornamental tassel or pendant at the end) he holds a p'hurba a "spirit nail" or spirit dagger with entwined snakes on its triangular blade.
The identities of some of these snakes are: dark blue Ananta, red Takshata, white Padma, yellow Shankapala, and green Jaya. Feel free to use any if it strikes your fancy, remember anything older than 100 years is public domain.
In China there are quite a lot of legends of snakes turning into girls. They usually fall for a mortal and end up badly. For some reason in the cheap kung-fu movies I favor, white snakes play the good gals and the strumpets are always green snakes. Anyway, I wanted to write a story in which they were not the ones taking the crap.
The little girl's pet is actually an albino Corn Snake of a shade called blizzard. They have the anerythristic recessive trait gene. That means they are pure white and are more common than may be implied by the story. They are wonderful pets because they are smaller and less aggressive than other rat catchers. Inoffensive really, that is if you aren't a rat, a snake called by any other name is still a snake.
Mercurial Weather
Curses or Comments? They are all appreciated.
