Carolyn Coates sat alone in her apartment on the north side of Copper Hollow. Her latest manuscript, The Widow, was open on her laptop. She studied the last few lines:
If any of the grandchildren had cried at his funeral, Tulane would have found it difficult to contain her laughter.
Oh, you bastard. I refuse to bloom in your cage anymore. Rot quietly in your box forever.
She regretted only never knowing whether one strike of the knife would have sufficed instead of two.
Till death do us part, indeed.
“This ending has to be better,” Carolyn declared. And finished last week, she thought anxiously.
Snow whipped past the window as her fingers hovered over the keyboard. She typed for a few seconds before sighing and deleting everything.
“My god, I’m better than this,” she said before standing up.
She dropped four empty wine bottles into the recycling bin and returned to the window. The eviction notice sat on the countertop. Soon she wouldn’t have an apartment to clean up.
“Some hacks have all the luck, Spartacus.“
Spartacus flicked his orange tail in response.
That evening, Carolyn put a peacoat on over her sweater and drove to Whispering Spring Library, where she found Mrs. White’s car alone in the parking lot. She grabbed her things and got out.
The library was closed and empty. White tile floors turned gray in the dark hallway, and old shadows seemed to inhabit the place. Carolyn let her eyes adjust before stepping inside, just in case any of them had teeth. A habit she never grew out of.
The door to the basement opened hard, revealing a staircase made of rough-hewn lumber. A fieldstone wall served as the only way to balance herself down the steep staircase. Mrs. White sometimes had a difficult time making her way down. Mrs. White was odd that way, as if she could will herself in and out of being an old woman. Carolyn had seen her hearing go from non-existent to wolf-like in a snap, among other things. People around town told stories.
A familiar smell and feel of dampness rose to meet Carolyn as she descended the stairs. The North Branch Storytellers, her writing group, were the only ones who used the basement and locked up when they were done.
Hanging lights illuminated the room in a dim yellow fog, revealing the remains of old bookcases and the major source of the damp smell: a field-stone well, now forgotten and covered over with a sheet of plywood, though someone had curiously inscribed some type of Celtic symbol on the side recently.
Carolyn made a sharp left at the bottom of the stairs; she found Mrs. White all alone in the corner room.
“Can you believe what’s happening with Lenny’s book?” she said in a hushed tone as she sat down by Mrs. White.
“WHOSE JENNY?” Mrs. White answered loudly, looking confused, and every day as old as her sassy 88 years.“You’ve got to speak up, dear.”
Carolyn stopped to listen. She didn’t want anyone to overhear her, least of all Lenny. But for now, it was only her and the trusted Mrs. White in the library’s basement. The rest of the group would arrive soon.
“I’m talking about our Lenny. Lenny Kephenson. Our member, LE N N Y.”
“Oh,” Mrs. White said, pausing to search for a plausible response. “He seems to have found his muse, that’s for sure.”
“I’d say,” Carolyn said. “I’m just not getting it. I’ve read all of Lenny’s work for the last five years. These recent stories aren’t him. And this book. We never saw it before it hit the best-seller list. It’s like he pulled it out of thin air.”
Mrs. White looked towards the well and mouthed something before leaning towards Carolyn with a scandalous look in her eyes. “Do you think he’s using the A-I?” She said, attempting to whisper but failing miserably.
Carolyn couldn’t tell if Mrs. White was having tremors or if she was nodding as she pulled her head back, a suspicious look straightening some wrinkles on her face.
“He couldn’t have written it alone,” Carolyn said.
Before Mrs. White could respond, the door at the top of the stairs opened, followed by footsteps. They both went silent.
Lenny came through the door first, followed by Jude and then Ray. Lenny was wearing a dark wool sweater and what Carolyn thought of as intentionally disheveled hair. What a Neil Gaiman hack, she thought. Jude and Ray wore button-downs with slacks and neatly coiffed hair. They both sat down across from Carolyn and Mrs. White.
Lenny sat at the head of the table. She didn’t hate him; he just couldn’t write and had become a dick. He pulled a nice fountain pen out of his leather satchel.
He saw Carolyn eye the pen. “I had to come straight over from a book signing.”
Carolyn bit her lip.
Lenny smiled, then continued, “You can’t use a cheap pen to sign hardcovers.”
Carolyn forced a slight smile. She’d never gotten a hardcover printing, and currently, that level of success felt impossible.
“It was cool,” Jude chimed in, with no idea there was tension in the room. “Big crowd; lots of babes. Lenny signed so many books we thought his hand might fall off.”
“I’m embarrassed that I ran out of books,” Lenny added. “By the way, Carolyn, how’s The Widow coming?”
“Okay,” Carolyn lied.
“Well, if you ever need any help, you’ve got my number,” Lenny said.
“Thanks. I’ll keep that in my back pocket. Hey, speaking of books and help, I’d love to see your notes from The Deal. It’s such a departure from your normal writing.”
Lenny gave Carolyn a questioning look. “You think so?”
“I’d love to know how you did it. Your process, I mean,” Carolyn said.
Lenny laughed and looked at Jude and Ray. “Maybe one of these nights I’ll show you my process.” Jude and Ray started chuckling.
Mrs. White suggested we start our readings. The night proceeded as usual.
After the meeting, Carolyn walked Mrs. White to her car—something Lenny used to do. Lenny, Jude, and Ray stayed back talking in the main room of the basement.
“Oh, don’t let him frazzle you, dear,” Mrs. White said as she slowly sat herself down in the driver’s seat. “I think he’ll go back to being our Lenny before we know it.”
“Maybe,” Carolyn responded flatly.
Mrs. White turned her legs into the car and then looked around. “Oh, sugar-biscuits! I left my purse in the basement. Would you be a darling and get it for me?”
“Sure, I’ll grab it,” she said and walked back to the library.
As she approached the building, the light above the door began to buzz and grow brighter. She stood back for a second, watching as the sound grew louder and louder. Then the light went dark. She waited warily for a few seconds before opening the door.
The hallway felt warmer now as she stepped inside and headed toward the basement door. She could hear something else now, like a gurgling down below.
“Lenny…Jude…Ray…are you guys out here? Mrs. White forgot her purse.”
The light from the red exit sign reflected off the tiled floor in an elongated pattern. She smelled burning.
“Guys!” She yelled just before throwing open the basement door.
A giant plume of thick smoke billowed out, and she swallowed two lungfuls, forcing several deep coughs.
Oh my god! Fire! she thought and pulled the alarm next to the frame, but nothing happened.
“Lenny, Jude, Ray, are you guys down there?!” She screamed.
The room looked fuzzy and she couldn’t think.
Something rumbled down below, and the smoke thinned enough to make out the stairs.
“Guys! Are you okay?” she asked as she stumbled down. The familiar smell of burning bacon filled her nose.
Gray and black smoke columns curled through the upper part of the room as if they had conscious life, twisting slowly without fleeing, disorienting her. A susurrus of voices emanated from the well. Through some base instinct, she kept moving down the stairs. When she got to the bottom, she watched the clouds still spinning at the ceiling plane. There was no fire evident, the smoke seemed contained to the ceiling, the air was clear around her now. Then she vomited. When she looked up and traced back the source of the columns, she saw her: a woman sitting on the edge of the now un-boarded well. The guys were nowhere in sight. The smoke columns from the ceiling disappeared.
“Who are you?!” Carolyn asked before wiping her mouth. Her bloodshot eyes darted around the room.
“I’m Lenny’s agent. Benita DeVal, dear.”
A little wisp of smoke rose from the well behind her. Benita was a shapely woman, but the lights cast a shadow behind her that looked octopoid. The tentacles moved wildly. Carolyn tried blinking them away.
“Where are the guys?”
“Be more specific.”
She forgot who she was talking about, her focus gone. Then it came to her. “Lenny, Ray, and Jude.”
“Ah. They had someplace else to be, I’m afraid,” she made a pouty face and hopped off the lip of the well. The ghost-like tentacles waved in rhythm with the whispers that had grown louder from deep inside the well. The click of red stilettos sounded expensive on the cement floor. Carolyn half sat, half fell onto the floor.
She clutched at her head. “But they were just down here…”
The two ladies couldn’t have been on more different wavelengths.
“Literary business moves quickly, I’m afraid. It’s fairly cutthroat.”
“How did you get down here?” Carolyn said, crawling back towards the stairs. She felt drunk.
“Carolyn, are you down there?” Mrs. White yelled from above. “I saw smoke.”
Carolyn looked up. Was this real?
“Mrs. White. Won’t you come down?” Benita said.
Mrs. White moved well down the stairs, surprising Carolyn with her speed. She stopped a few steps from the bottom.
“What’s going on here?” Carolyn’s mind felt loose, as if it could come undone at any moment. She forced herself to focus, though she didn’t know exactly where she was.
“Well, dear,” Mrs. White said, sitting down to block Carolyn’s egress. “After I introduced Lenny and Benita, he tried cutting me out, bad move.”
“I—I’m just going to be leaving,” Carolyn said, and nearly fell over when she tried to stand up.
“You can’t leave, Carolyn,” Mrs. White responded, holding up a hand. “I’m afraid I’ve negotiated you into my deal.”
“What? I have an agent.”
Mrs. White shook her head. “And where has that got you, dear? Living in a cramped apartment, paying your landlord in favors. C’mon now, we’re talking about making a mark here. Like Lenny did. All we have to do is—”
Benita snapped her fingers, and Mrs. White’s mouth froze mid-sentence. The whispers from the well went silent.
“Uggh. There. Now we can talk,” she told Carolyn. “I can help you finish your story.”
Carolyn’s eyes widened, and she began laughing hysterically; uncontrollably. “What did you do to Mrs. White?”
“It’s not important. Do you want to finish it or not?”
“Who are you?”
“Darling, you’re quite dense,” Benita said. “But you’ve got talent. There’s a lot I can do with you. I’ve read your work.”
“You have?” She said with some effort, trying to sit up while the room spun. “Which ones?”
“All of them.”
“Which one was your favorite?” She said, now looking at Benita behind sparkly drunk eyes.
“I liked The Sons of Wild Jack. Something about conniving wives killing their husbands did it for me. But I think the one you’re working on will be even better.”
Carolyn blushed, sure she was losing her mind.
“Did Lenny show you what I’ve shared with the group?”
“Sure,” Benita whispered. Her emerald-green eyes sparkled in the low light of the basement.
“I’m stuck,” Carolyn whispered back.
“I know, dear. I’m here for you.”
“What can you do?”
“What do you want?”
A petty desire surfaced in Carolyn. “To be bigger than Lenny.”
Benita snapped her fingers again, and Mrs. White disappeared.
“Will she be okay?” Carolyn asked, feeling the urge of a deep sleep coming on.
“She was never okay.”
Carolyn nodded slowly. Benita continued.
“I need a story in return.”
“What kind of story?” Carolyn asked.
“A mountain-mover.”
“And you’ll help me finish my manuscript?”
Benita’s features seemed to darken. “Yes.”
Lenny had never been a better writer; only a luckier one, Carolyn thought. Her concerned look faded into a smile.
“I could do one book.”
Carolyn woke up the next morning with a severe headache and no recollection of driving home. Benita was just a helpful dream, she decided.
She believed that until a box showed up ten days later, marked: Contains Live Animal.
The apartment looked the same with its old wood floors, rounded doors and ceilings, and claw-foot tub. She’d finished her manuscript just-in-time thanks to Benita.
Spartacus meowed at her.
“Hang on. I’ll get him unstuck,” she said.
Carolyn walked over and pulled Spartacus’s orange hamster ball out of the corner.
“Oh, poor little thing. I suppose it is cruel to stick you in there so Spartacus can chase you around,” she said to a tiny version of Lenny who lay prone in the bottom. “Do you want a pinch of Dramamine?”
Vomit riddled the inside of the ball, and Lenny’s leg looked badly broken.
“You bitch,” he said in a tiny, exhausted voice.
“Oh Lenny. My little man,” she taunted, rolling the ball across the floor as Spartacus gave chase.
She had to admit this story Benita was having her write was a boring piece of work. All the information was in the box with Lenny. Apparently, she had plans for this rich guy and needed the masses to think he was something.
What harm could one book really do?