2020-11-08 - Cinderella's Slipper

It was a weekly game, between him and Cinderella. Finding the little grass mines she left behind in the backyard before mowing the lawn while the deaf Dalmatian puppy spent the week hiding the turf turds so he missed one, or several, to save and step into when mowing.
A fun game.
For her.

For Everett, it was also an excuse to reach into the knot of the tree in the backyard and sneak a smoke. Helping make that task and the weekly stress ebb away, even if he promised not to smoke anymore after finding out about the children.

And there he was, in the back yard, just under the juvenile oak tree's shade, looking into the window not but a few paces away, strategically taking a puff, tilting his chin up and exhaling into the sky, so he could look back into the living room through the window looking into the kitchen and watch the two women with two children. And procrastinate picking up lawn lumps. He was so distracted he didn't notice the second face, half-illuminated, step into clarity in the window's reflection behind and smaller than him. Her costume was a little late, more apt for Halloween than several days to Thanksgiving.

Her blonde hair up in poofy pigtails, when she spoke his spine stiffened instantly with recognition, "They should be ours." She sounded sad, and when he began to turn his head to look over his shoulder to spy her she snapped, causing him to pause, "No!" When she continued, he heard, saw her closer. Just behind him and his head turned forward. The partially remaining cigarette smoldering between his first two fingers was brought to his lips.

"She's cute, but he would have been first, not her. And a red-head? Really, Ev?" she asked before he felt slender fingers slip between his trunk and forearm and more grasp over his arm. Looking down he saw lily-white, lithe fingers interlace after cupping his arm. They were always porcelain, but never so cold. A knot rose in his throat, so instead, he shrugged that shoulder softly. She didn't relent, even though her tone changed: humorous. "It's kind of funny how it takes two girls to equal one of me."

This made him frown, and he gave himself time to reply while tilting his head and exhaling. "Whatcha mean?" he asked slowly with his usual guttural tone, while his eyes flickered from the living room to the corner of his eye. He saw only blonde puff and began to smell freshly tilled earth. And the hint of her perfume.
The pause from his right was deafening. So much so a yellow bird flew some distance over the backyard, the Goldfinch calling its usual sound almost twice before she replied. "Well, you've got that one. She's crazy, just like I am after he touched me," she indicated one of the women through the window with a nod of her head, hair swaying as something fell to the as yet uncut grass. "And then there's that one. Even more innocent than I am before you let him pollute me. She's even a medical professional like I am. Was, sorry, Tiny." His forearm was squeezed gently with the apology.

Closing his eyes for the length it took the disgruntled exhale to leave his throat, Everett opened them again and made another attempt to turn, to face her. The hooks on his arm lightly shook him before he turned far, "No." Thought the jostle was light, it felt she may still have been holding herself back. His brows frowned deeply but he behaved for now and let the shake pass. "That's not what's going on," he said, shifting his eyes to her corner for the duration of those short, impotent words. He up nodded to the laughing blubbery brunette baby being hoisted by the woman inside also in pigtails. "They're good people, and I love 'em."
"And you don't deserve them," she swiftly added. "But you know that. Or what you let happen to me will happen to them." This time, the punctuation was right, and she took a step forward further into his field of vision and turned towards him while letting go of his arm. Her tight-fitting harlequin outfit was just like he remembered; tight enough he could see her religion. But for a small change or two. The earthen smell became self-evident from the patches of dirt on her costume, the earth still wet in areas causing the loam smell to seek his nose.

But more than that, she was just like he remembered. Last remembered and it caused him to take a step backward in surprise. Underfoot, a Cinderella bone rolled his boot, and he slipped and fell on his rump, his cigarette bouncing thrice before quietly smoldering to itself in the green grass.
Half her face was missing.
Shot off when Dog found them in bed together, long after they stopped seeing each other. But that hadn't mattered to the mad biker. If he couldn't have her... The round from point-blank range took care of her former beauty. Her jaw dangled dangerously as though all the speaking she had been doing previously had loosened more than just her tongue. The hole through which the heavy caliber bullet entered her skull was devoid of gray matter. That too was a change. Everett found he wasn't wearing her. In its place, fresh writhing maggots continued to spill from the entry and exit wounds, dropping to the grass while a black beetle crawled into what remained of her nasal cavity, sat, and wiggling its antenna in glee to the surprised terror on the Sweet Retreat owner's face then crawled away.

Her normal eye rolled back to present itself as black-red and stared into him. A hot, stinking voice snarls, "I will devour them, and the children, while you watch." The specter that he once knew then lunges for him and Everett lifts his forearm to protect his face from skeletal talons.
And then.

Nothing.

Cautiously Everett lowers his forearm and peers over it, around. He sits up and looks around him quickly, like a dog spinning around to catch its own tail. She's ... it's gone. He's alone for a moment, to process what little thoughts penetrate such a thick skull when he begins to feel it. Growing dampness on his rump and he instantly knows what the cherry on top of this shit-sicle is.

Cinderella: 1.