Apex Book Company

Rosie patiently dusted the bookshelves; removing each book and wiping it down with an electrostatic rag and then replacing it precisely where it had been. She removed each knickknack one at a time from the mantle and wiped it free of dust. Then she ran the feather duster over the smooth surface of the oak mantle before spraying it with furniture wax and buffing it to a high gloss.

“Filthy!” she hissed in disgust.

She wiped down the television and stereo system with the rag, spraying window cleaner on the screen and wiping it until her reflection shone through. She then threw the rag into the trashcan and grabbed another, repeating her frantic wiping on every piece of furniture, every knickknack, and every trinket in the room. Everywhere she looked there was grime and scum–tops of the baseboards, beneath the stove and refrigerator, underneath the couch and between its cushions. She ran the vacuum slowly over the carpet until she was sure all the dust and dander was gone. Then she poured water and cleaning fluid into the steam cleaner and retraced her path over the carpet until it looked as if it had just come from the showroom floor. She poured three capfuls of ammonia into a bucket of water and lowered her mop down into it. Then she began furiously mopping the floors, walls, and ceiling. When she was done the house shone like a show model.

Rosie appraised her work with admiration. Satisfied over her accomplishment she went upstairs and stripped off all of her clothing, dumping them into the washing machine along with a capful of laundry detergent. She looked her body over, sniffed her hands and armpits and wrinkled up her nose.

“Filthy!” she declared with undisguised revulsion.

She sprinted to the shower and began furiously scrubbing at her flesh, using various soaps and bath gels before grabbing the bottle of bleach and dumping it over her head, wincing in anticipation of the burn. Various cuts and abrasions sang out in agony as the bleach seared her flesh and she scrubbed herself raw. When she finally stepped from the shower, she smelled as fresh as new linen.

She dressed in fresh clothes and went out onto the porch to watch as the garbage man struggled to heft her two trashcans into the trash truck. She winced when he dropped one of the cans and piece after piece of her drunken adulterous husband tumbled out onto the sidewalk. Blood flooded from the upturned receptacle and stained the sidewalk crimson as first his head–eyes still wide in surprise, mouth open as if still trying to lie his way out of it–then his legs, arms and finally his bloated torso splattered onto the street behind the garbage truck. Body fluids rolled up onto the driveway in a wave as blood, organs, and intestines came boiling out of the tremendous gash bisecting the corpse’s stomach and chest. Last, the gore-streaked weed whacker, the pruning shears, and the meat cleaver slid out of the garbage can on a slick trail of blood and viscera.

The two garbage men were shocked but managed to avoid throwing up and further soiling the blood-soaked street. They cautiously approached the second trashcan. The braver of the two stretched out his foot and kicked the can over, leaping back as the woman came sliding out, leaving her skin and much of her flesh crumpled up at the bottom of the can. They both lost all pretense of bravery when the woman–whose breasts, ass, and vagina had been removed, carved out so that the white of ribs and pelvic bone gleamed through where her sexual organs had been–turned eyes wide with terror towards them and began to scream. They hopped back into their truck and peeled out of the cul-de-sac, leaving the bloody mess behind.

“Filthy!” Rosie shrieked, her voice trembling with the force of judgment, tears beginning to well up in her eyes. She turned and went back into the house to collect her cleaning supplies.

END

Wrath James White is a writer, a fighter, and an all-around bad ass. He has fought professionally for nine years and has been training fighters for four years now. If you have a taste for the violent, the erotic, the blasphemous, the political, the philosophical, and the extreme, then check out Teratologist co-written with Edward Lee, Poisoning Eros co-written with Monica O-Rourke, Succulent Prey from Bloodletting Books (and forthcoming as a MMPB from Leisure Books), The Book of A Thousand Sins, his collection from Two-Backed Books, and the novella His Pain from Delirium Books. If you have a weak stomach, a closed mind, rigid morals, and Victorian sexual ethics, then avoid Wrath’s writing like the plague.

Wrath co-wrote the horror novella Orgy of Souls with Maurice Broaddus, published by Apex Publication. Orgy of Souls is available in the Apex Store as a limited-run, signed hardback editor or a more cost-conscious trade paperback.