Down in a Hole

It's the dead of night, miles from anywhere, in the middle of a lonely forest, and a man is hard at work. He stabs at the ground with a shovel, tossing dirt, excavating a hole roughly the size and shape of a human body. The man has bad intentions, that much is obvious. Who digs a body-shaped hole in a secluded area under cover of darkness otherwise?

What the man doesn't realize is that he is not alone. Behind him, screened from view by trees and undergrowth, stealthy and silent, a lone figure watches him work. The hole will not go empty. The only question is who will fill it, and why?

This is the premise of my short story titled, "Under an October Moon," featured now in the outstanding dark fiction magazine, Twisted Dreams. It's available in print form for $7.55, and as a file download for just $2.55, and let me tell you, this is a pretty damned good deal if you like original, disturbing dark fiction.

The magazine also features original artwork, reviews, and an interview with actor Brad Greenquist, veteran of movies and appearances in TV series such as Stargate SG1, Alias, The Practice, and Walker, Texas Ranger as well as many others.

Here's a small taste of my story, "Under an October Moon":

He leaned on his shovel and examined his project with a critical eye. The original plan called for a grave roughly four feet deep, six feet long and a couple of feet wide. That was before Ray had realized just how much goddamned work was involved in digging a grave out here.

Now he pictured Linda dropping into a four foot long hole - its current size - and concluded these new dimensions would work just as well and would save him a lot of effort. He would simply break her legs with the shovel once she had fallen into her permanent residence, then fold them back over her torso before filling in the hole.

What difference would a couple of broken legs make, really? Linda would be dead, or nearly so, so it's not like she would complain. And what if she did? Who the hell was going to hear her?

I think it goes without saying Ray's project doesn't go exactly as planned. Check out Twisted Dreams and "Under an October Moon" if you love dark fiction, especially with Halloween right around the corner. Just be careful walking through the woods.