The Tasteless Death of Lance Green (excerpt)
From Blood in the Yolk
Wuz up, rats! I hope you’re all doing fantastic. I should be coming down from my high after getting runner-up in season 10 of the Lunar Awards for my psychological horror story, Sticks, but the party isn’t over yet! I’m excited to share an excerpt from an upcoming anthology that I have the pleasure of being included in. Long-time readers won’t be surprised that the collection centers around birds! My jam!
Alongside my story, The Tasteless Death of Lance Green, are six other uncanny tales to delight and disturb you, from six killer authors that I’m lucky enough to call friends:
, , , , , and . What a lineup, right? 🧨I hope you enjoy! Preorder now: Blood in the Yolk.
Huge thanks to
(Tiny Worlds) and (Spare Press / Spareorgan) for getting this out into the world! Blame them!In the excerpt below, our boy Lance Green takes a stroll with Natalie Blake, a horror author who tends to do her best work while visiting the Fox & Hound Inn. Unfortunately for Lancie Boy, it’s nearly time for a new book.
Excerpt from The Tasteless Death of Lance Green:
The golden glow of late afternoon gave hints of warmth, but the teasing breeze, never committing to stopping or to being a gale, sent goose pimples down Natalie’s arms. Lance wanted to hold her close, to keep her warm.
He inhaled; his head felt better out here in the fresh air.
“Don’t you just love it here?” she said.
Lance looked around; he wasn’t big on nature. The only reason he’d been here in the first place was to appease Sherry, to make up for the incident in San Francisco with the waitress named…well, he couldn’t recall her name, either, but he remembered other things about her: those hips, and that soft, swirling tongue in his mouth.
“I don’t think I appreciated it until this very moment,” he replied.
“Is this your first time staying at the Fox & Hound?”
“First and last, I’m afraid. It’s nice enough, I suppose, but it’s not my scene. I prefer fine dining and dancing—and why is there so much dust in that inn?” He laughed.
“The Fox & Hound is old, as are these lands. My daddy used to take us here when we were children. I remember the hunts they’d have. I loved the horses, but the hounds and men scared me. And the poor fox! I begged my father not to harm the fox—to leave it be! All with tears in my eyes, of course. And now look at me, wearing a stoat—does that make me terribly cruel?”
“Yes, it does.”
Natalie stopped walking and looked at Lance in shock. “I didn’t realize I was taking a stroll with Saint Francis of Assisi.”
“I just mean that you’re human. Cruelty is part of living. If not for the ermine, that beautiful neck would get cold. And if not for the fox, the men would waste away in their armchairs.”
“Would you mind if I used that in my next novel?”
“Just make sure you give me a signed copy,” he said with a wink.
They came upon a duck-filled pond surrounded by white lilies, their yellow pistils pointed toward the blanket of bright gray clouds like children trying to catch raindrops on their tongue.
“It’s called dabbling,” said Natalie, pointing to a drake.
“What is?”
“What the ducks are doing. See how it looks like they’re riding tiny upside-down unicycles? Well, they’re eating bugs off the bottom of the pond.”
Lance picked up a small stone and felt it between his thumb and forefinger. He wondered where Sherry was at this moment. Maybe Heathrow, or already on a flight back to the States. He didn’t want it to be over because, despite everything, he did love her. She made him feel centered in a way that nothing else could, but only when they were together; when they were apart, he just couldn’t help himself. “You know a lot about ducks?”
“More than some,” she said. “Less than others. Writers need to know trivial things in order to make the big fibs believable. You have your dabblers, or as my father used to call them, ‘puddle ducks’—those are the ones who eat off the bottom of the pond, like these here. And then you have your divers, the ones that go deep.”
A duck quacked, swimming up to greet them. Lance looked at the stone in his hand, then threw it at the duck, just missing it. The stone landed in the water with a plop.
“Why would you do that?” asked Natalie.
“Oh, come now. It’s just a bird. Now tell me, if I were a duck, what would I be, a diver or a dabbler?”
For a moment, Natalie’s face was stern. Lance thought he’d lost his opportunity to charm this English beauty, but her face softened, and her stormy eyes calmed. “I suppose I’d mark you as a dabbler. You strike me as a man who acts on whims.”
Lance laughed and dusted off his hands.
“Let’s say you’re right. That I’m impulsive, I mean. How does that make me a dabbler?”
Natalie put her finger to her lips in thought. “Well, a diver is willing to put in the hard work—oh, they could just as easily eat bugs off the top of the water or dabble in a little pond, but they choose to go after the good stuff—the deep stuff.”
Lance was unsure how to respond to this accusation of indolence. He was a successful lawyer at a big firm and, up until a day ago, he was married to a beautiful woman. Sure, she was no Grace Kelly, but she was still pretty. And she was intelligent, more than most of the woman he’d met over the years. And, at the end of the day, Sherry was smarter and prettier than Natalie. So, who was she to call him a dabbler? He pinched his nose; his headache was back.
“It’s not a criticism,” she added. “I’m a dabbler, too. In a way. I travel to the Fox & Hound because the stories are easy to come by here. All I need to do is write a few lines, and the story just sort of unfolds. I’ve tried writing elsewhere, and it’s useless.”
“What do you mean you only write a few lines?”
“Just that. I’ll write something like, ‘The fox hid in the pond, thinking it was safe, but then realized it didn’t know how to swim.’ And then an entire story will unfold for me. It’s been like this since I was a child.”
“Is that what you did for your last novel?”
“Yes, in a way. Normally, I let the details unfold without thinking too much about things, but this last time…I didn’t like where the story was heading. If you’re lucky, you might meet the inspiration for that story tonight. I’ve invited Harriet to dine with us at the inn. She’s a sweet little bird, but I don’t think she likes me much—oh, but I adore her and I want her to like me, too.”
Ah, Harriet. Lance knew it started with an H. “Harriet, you say?”
“Yes, have you met her? She lives with her father just down the road.”
“I may have met her last night. She’s got a thing for me. Stick close to me tonight, won’t you? She seems nice, but she’s not my type. I like women, not girls.”
“I see,” said Natalie, staring into his eyes.
Lance turned to face the pond. He didn’t need to be judged; he was perfectly equipped to judge himself. Still, Sherry knew he was weak. She shouldn’t have let him go down to the pub while she stayed in the room, nursing her headache. She should have demanded he stay in the room with her. Lance picked up another stone and held it in his palm.
“I’d like to freshen up before dinner,” said Natalie. “A lady needs to look her best, even in the country.”
Lance cupped her hand and said, “I can’t imagine you looking anything other than gorgeous. I think I’m going to have a smoke out here in the fresh air. My head can’t stand that dusty room.”
She left. Lance watched her hips as she walked down the road. She was sexy. There was no denying it.
“And don’t you go hurting any of those ducks!” she said, over her shoulder.
He raised a hand and smiled. “I would never.”
Although Natalie had gone, the scent of gardenias remained. Lance watched the ducks lazily swim across the water. All that business about the inn helping to write stories was ludicrous.
“Inn, if you can hear me,” he said aloud. “Grant me one wish…send Sherry back to me.” He laughed, picked up a rock, and sailed it at a gaggle of ducks. As they scattered from the pond, the water off their beating wings looked like tiny shards of gold in the late afternoon sun. He stood alone, staring up at the birds as they flew away.
“Bye-bye, puddle ducks,” he said. He turned to go, but paused upon hearing a gurgling sound coming from the water.
He walked up to the pond and peered in. Beneath the surface, among the sediment, he saw what looked like cornsilk swaying with the green algae. He leaned in closer. The yellow strands parted, revealing something light blue.
At first, he thought it might be a dead fish, but then he saw the nose, and those familiar but lifeless eyes staring back at him.
He screamed, stumbling backward and over a large stone.
It can’t be, he told himself. Sherry was gone; he’d seen her speed off in the middle of the night in their rental car. He shook his head; no, it was impossible.
As he rushed to his feet, his heart wanted to burst from his chest. He forced himself to walk to the edge of the pond to prove to himself his eyes had betrayed him. If you look at anything long enough, he thought, the mind will play tricks on you. It was just a fuzzy mind being silly. Too much of the drink, too little of the sleep, is all.
He leaned over, peering into the water, commanding himself to be calm.
The cornsilk hair was now an auburn fur. It wasn’t Sherry. It was never Sherry. It was a decomposing fox, with sunken eyes and a long white tongue floating in the murky water.
Lance wiped his brow with the back of his jacket sleeve and sat down beside the pond in the dirt. He was relieved, but unsettled. In the distance, the faint sound of a horn blew.
End of excerpt.
Preorder now: Blood in the Yolk. 🦆💀
Ouija Bird by EJ Trask
Palimpsest at Hook Wood by Jon T
The Tasteless Death of Lance Green by Sean Thomas McDonnell
A Feathering by A.P. Murphy
Outnumbed by William Pauley III
Corvus and Crater by
Ravens by Author Michele Bardsley
Very fine work, Sean. Wouldn't have expected any different. I'm so glad to see it worked out! Powerhouse collection by powerhouses!
So well written, Sean. I'm really hoping the ducks drown Lance.