Friday Flash: Graham's Coffin

Day after Thanksgiving, I figured I had to have a holiday-themed piece. So I checked, and...I do, but then again, I don’t. Here’s a thousand or so words from a piece I daren’t submit—it’s borderline horror, and I have strange luck when it comes to horror fic. While it sells, it never, never, NEVER appears in digital or print. Editors leave before contracts can be signed, venues fold, sites go dark...

It’s enough to make a sea lily superstitious!

Still, submitting isn’t the whole of writing, and I thought the 10,000 calorie dinner deserved to have some horror written about it. You’re probably full, so here’s just a taste of “Graham’s Coffin”

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Pierre’s mind wandered, though his hands were busy freeing pomegranate jewels from their botanical wrapping. He thought as he worked of his love: of her slow soft smile, the curves she hid so often beneath fabric like a shroud, tender flesh in hues only Nature herself could paint. Ruby gleamed beneath his gaze, revealed only after his long effort. One perfect jewel he slipped between his teeth, firm careful bite releasing a sharp burst of pleasure so different from the everyday.

Fitting, for this was not just any day.

He’d plotted this so carefully. A myriad of foods lay waiting, soft blushing apricots approved and readied; walnuts all shelled, nutmeats holding their promises deep within their wrinkles; gold-skinned shallots, their shape oddly evocative of his love’s breasts, ready to be denuded by quick flicks of his blade.

Washing crimson from his hands, he checked the time.

A cup of tea, then; give the body time to lose its chill. He made tea properly; loose leaves, scalded-out pot, the works. Memories of her: “Wait! You just boiled that water, and you’re throwing it out?” But she’d changed her tune when she tasted the brew. Her first time, that. And theirs.

Pierre’s hands were steady as he sipped his tea, but he felt that they should shake. No man should be so happy and still calm. Shaking should be the least of it! Better, though, that his hands not quiver; his knives were sharp, and there was much yet to do.

The goose had been blanched and buttered two days before, resting since. He’d thought of her as he’d bathed the bird and trimmed it, slipped his hands beneath its skin. Would he ever be so close to her as this? And now it was time, time to see if he could free its promise—if it would become all it could be, in his hands.

He rinsed the cup, turned to the bird. To his tools and ingredients, his accomplices in this.

Ribs firm and distinct to his fingers? Yes: the celery was fresh and crisp. He chopped it, machine-gun sound an echo of his speeding heart. Brilliant green apples wept easily as he cut out their hearts with a twist, then made artistic shapes of what was left. Blood oranges lived up to their sanguine name when he quartered them, sweet-tart scented blood staining the air. The shallots yielded last, their flimsy wrappers falling away to reveal creamy flesh.

He bathed them all in Madiera, tossed them gently, let them slip through his fingers once—twice, again—all languorous, lingering. Tenderly, then, he spooned the filling into its destined home; no pie-coffin this, but a richer bed by far. A bouquet of lemon verbena and thyme and flat-leafed parsley became a brush with which he painted shallot-butter over the body.

(Brief flash of him using such a bouquet to stroke the skin in the fold of her elbow, the crook of her knee, the nape of her neck. “Am I to be cooked, then?” she’d asked him. “No, just eaten,” he’d replied.)

The goose lay cushioned on a bed of herbs, a sacrifice waiting for the fire. Gently, he slid the pan home, glorying in the untender embrace of the oven’s heat. So his love’s body could sometimes be, hot as a furnace beneath the satin skin. Hot enough to cook on, and he’d gladly lie atop her until he was well done.

A nice line—he’d need to share it. Over their meal.

Recalled to the moment, he surveyed the wreck his kitchen had become. There were sides yet to prepare, but he needed room to work. He swept the counter clear of vegetable detritus, thinking all the while of the last time she’d been seated there. “Why aren’t you a chef? You’re good enough to be.”

“I don’t like to cook for strangers. My passion is in my dishes, you see.”

She’d looked him up and down and laughed, low, satisfied. “I do indeed. A man of taste.” It was the first time she’d opened herself to him. Tart and sweet and salty, a perfect taste. He’d nibbled as much as he’d licked, as had she. On the foods he offered, and on him. Late that night, on the two at once.

He scrubbed his hands clean of every speck of dirt, then gently washed tiny potatoes with their baby-pink skins—and, laughing, indulged himself in whimsy, and cut them into stars and crosses, imagining her giggles as he worked. Would she shed her layers for him, let him see her as she was?

Would she, could she, see him beneath his? Back to the cleaning. Counters. Vegetables. Himself. (Don’t forget behind the ears! She liked to nuzzle there. And other places, too...)

Tender baby spinach, washed and patted dry. He wondered if it was, perhaps, too much. But his love was a woman with no fear of calories, and he wanted to give her the full experience. And she had, once, said something about iron. So a few handfuls of spinach went toward the salad, a few more to sauté.

He made biscuits, to while away the time while the goose cooked, dividing his dough in two and setting one half aside. The other he mixed with fine-chopped herbs, the same ones he’d used in the goose, lemon verbena and thyme and flat-leafed parsley. Some of the remaining shallot butter, too, he stirred in. The goose was far enough along to have begun to shed its fat; he drew some off and rendered it, using that to grease his biscuit tin, and smiling at her prophesied reaction.

They do say that the smell of fresh-baked bread is an aphrodisiac. And never more so than to her!

Minutes before she was due to arrive, he put the finishing touches on his dishes, draining those things set to crisp, mixing his gravy, dressing the salad with which they’d begin. Opening a bottle of wine. His breath was shallow, nerves, excitement. His ears pricked for the sound of the door.

She came in, all smiles, eyes bright and eager. Moved into his arms with flattering haste. “You smell delicious,” she whispered, and kissed him.

Her mouth tasted of wheat and wine. At first.

...