Richard Laymon: Island

I give my women whatever they ask for: combs, brushes, mirrors, sanitary napkins, books, magazines—even a Gameboy and a portable radio, both of which run off rechargeable batteries. I have become a fairly good cook. The mansion has provisions enough to last us for a few months, so there is no need to worry about starving. I don’t even ration the food.

My women want for very little, except their freedom.

It became obvious, after many tries during the first few days, that their cages were impregnable. I couldn’t pick the locks. I couldn’t force the doors or hinges. I had no saw or file capable of cutting through the bars. With a pickax, Billie tried to break out through her floor—only to find iron bars imbedded in the concrete.

Nobody treats me like a leper, anymore. Connie and the twins quickly got over their shock at what I’d done to Wesley. I couldn’t be all that terrible, they must’ve supposed, since I was being so good to them. Besides, they knew that Wesley deserved everything he got.

The twins are great. They quarrel a lot between themselves, but they have become my great friends. Erin seems to be madly in love with me, which Alice thinks is ridiculous. They have been healing nicely (as have Connie and Billie). They are both incredibly beautiful, and continue to go around in their cages most of the time wearing few or no clothes.

Which certainly catches my attention. We don’t fool around in any sexual ways, though. They are too young for such things. Also, I love Billie so much that I never seem to work up very much excitement over Alice or Erin.

As for Connie, she remained sullen and surly for about a week. She knew that she was to blame, at least partly, for Kimberly’s death. She also found out, soon enough, that her mother and I were lovers. She gave us quite a hard time with that mouth of hers.

She seems to be over it, though. I think she has accepted the fact that it’s stupid to be jealous over someone you never really liked that much in the first place. I was her boyfriend of convenience who’d stumbled into her life by an accident of the alphabet. I was not, and never had been, any great catch. So let her mother have me.

That’s how I think she looks at it. We haven’t actually discussed the matter.

It’s hard to know what she feels. Lately, though, she has been a lot less snotty than usual. Eventually, we might even become friends. Who knows?

I could go on and on about Connie, Alice and Erin. And especially about Billie and me. I could write in lavish detail about all we’ve done, what we’ve said and how they’ve looked. The real story, though, pretty much ended with the death of Wesley.

Also, I’ve been spending too much time away from my women, writing in the privacy of Erin’s room for hours each day.

Now that I’m caught up to the present, I’ll be able to spend more time with them.

Eventually, I’ll set them free.

The keys to their cages are bound to turn up, somewhere.

Maybe under the mattress where Wesley said they’d be.

So long for now.

Richard Laymon is the author of over 30 novels and 65 short stories. Though a native of Illinois and a longtime Californian, his name is more familiar to readers in Great Britain. Australia, New Zealand and the rest of the world (where he is published in 15 foreign languages) than it is to most Americans. He has written such novels as The Woods Are Dark , Out Are the Lights , Tread Softly , Resurrection Dreams , Midnight’s Lair , The Stake , Quake , and Savage . He also wrote The Beast House Chronicles comprised of The Cellar , Beast House , and The Midnight Tour . The Traveling Vampire Show won a Bram Stoker Award for Novel of the Year in 2001. Two of his earlier novels ( Flesh and Funland ) and his short story collection ( A Good, Secret Place ) had previously been nominated for Bram Stoker Awards as well.

Check out the Richard Laymon Kills! website at: www.rlk.cjb.net.

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