Better Weird: A Tribute to David B. Silva Read online

  ****

  The razor, gleaming and pristine, is poised over a vein that looks like a small blue wire beneath white electrical tape, carrying the current to a heart that no longer wants to accept the pulse. In the mirror, my reflection, pale and defeated, looks back at me with cold eyes, nods almost imperceptibly, encouraging me to continue…

  ****

  Oblivion is Heaven, and in it, I see Stacey as she was before the doubt and the darkness rent us apart. She is sitting on my sofa, her legs curled beneath her, twirling a lock of her blonde hair in her finger. She wears my cream V-neck sweater and jeans with ripped knees. She has a half-smile on her lips, her green eyes focused on the copy of Fifty Shades of Grey she has propped up in her lap. We have discussed her acquisition of the book, specifically how uncharacteristic it is for her to buy (a) anything that isn’t nonfiction, and (b) anything so tied to popular culture.

  The sun streams in the window behind her, granting her a corona, limning her with gold as if she’s an actress in an old romance movie. I tell her as much and her smile widens, her eyes flicking almost reluctantly from the book to where I stand watching her.

  “That’s why I always sit in this specific part of the couch at this exact time of day,” she quips. “The dramatic effect.”

  “Is that so?”

  “Uh-huh. You’ll note I’m a lot less choosy about where I sit when it’s raining.”

  The clock chooses that moment to remind us of the hour. The chime fractures the moment, sullies the innocence of it. Poisons it.

  On the bathroom floor, I jolt awake, and listen.

  There is no sunlight here, only morgue-light.

  And it’s raining.

  ****

  It takes some time for me to crawl out into the living room. My strength is gone, fled with my will to live. Thunder rolls out there beyond the large windows, but there’s nothing to see through the sheets of rain but the occasional flare of lightning.

  The air feels taut, heavy with expectation. The flies have abandoned their buzzing.

  Have you been to see her?

  The front door is wide open

  (because I am the key)

  revealing the hall beyond. I half expect to see the woman standing there backlit by the sickly yellow lights, but the doorway is empty.

  It might help.

  My apartment, however, is not.

  The lightning illuminates the silhouette of a woman, sitting on the couch, her face turned in my direction, though I can’t make it out.

  “Stacey…”

  I never went to see her because I have grown to fear the world out there, and because I have always had an aversion to hospitals, and worse, graveyards. But now, as my breath begins to slow, my pulse to weaken as it pumps the blood out through the vents in my wrists, I realize despite all the pain and the suffering, I did all that needed to be done to get her to come back to me, did what she’d been waiting for me to do.

  Did all that was left to do.

  “I love you,” I whisper, and she answers in the voice of the storm because there is no need for words, not as we know them. Even toward the end she said little.

  In the end, the end of us was just the beginning, and there is nothing left to do as she rises from the couch and her shadow rushes ahead of her to embrace me, but weep with joy.

  For us, and whatever comes next.

  I love you.

  The clock stops.

  ****

  Remembrance by Kealan Patrick Burke

  Like many writers of my generation, I adored The Horror Show. Like its successor, Cemetery Dance, a magazine of which Silva greatly approved, it represented some of the best short fiction the genre had to offer, and gave many a young writer their start in the publishing business. I was too young and too inexperienced to submit to Dave’s magazine, but even growing up in the south of Ireland, I was attuned enough to the genre to be well aware of it–thanks in no small part to the efforts of Stephen Jones–and to go to great lengths to acquire copies of it. The stories I read within those pages only inflamed my desire to be a writer, and when I moved to the states many years later and made the decision to edit an anthology of my own, I didn’t have to think twice about whom to ask for advice.

  This was back in 2001. The book was titled Hour of Pain, and it featured stories by a host of up-and-comers. Appropriately nervous, I approached David and asked if he’d be willing to give me advice, fully expecting him to be too busy to deal with some fresh-off-the-boat nobody. His enthusiasm completely knocked me for a loop. Despite the fact that he undoubtedly had his own projects to worry about, he was on hand via instant message to answer any questions I had, day or night. And if there was a running theme to his advice, it was one of integrity, i.e. that if I was going to do this book, or any other, I had to be doing it for the right reasons. Not for fame, and certainly not to make money (among the many invaluable lessons he taught me back in those days was to be aware of the economic realities of this profession.) My heart had to be in whatever book I was doing; I had to be willing to make the tough decisions to achieve the goal I had initially envisioned. I couldn’t be afraid to reject stories I didn’t like out of fear of offending the writers, because, David said, critics would not share such polite considerations once the book was unleashed upon the world. He even offered to write the introduction to the book, which I considered way above and beyond what I had asked or ever expected of him. But that was David through and through, generous to a fault, perhaps genuinely unaware that it is perfectly acceptable for a writer of his caliber to turn down the clumsy appeals of a newcomer if the time is just not there. It just wasn’t in his DNA to be anything but helpful, and people like that are few and far between.

  A few years later, I put together the Charles L. Grant tribute anthology Quietly Now, and David emailed me before I’d even finished sending out invitations. “I have a story for you,” he said, “and I’d like to send it, because Charlie is a hero of mine. Which is not to say that you shouldn’t reject it if it sucks, because I’d like to think you remember something of our old conversations and how I feel about such things.” He needn’t have worried. His contribution “Wrinkles” is easily one of the best in the book. But that humble attitude was typical of him. He had no ego, no arrogance, and always seemed genuinely surprised to hear from folks how good they thought his work was. Any praise I levied on him during our exchanges was invariably waved away in favor of redirecting the focus of the conversation back on me. To him, he was just a writer, just as capable of a bad story as a good one (though if he wrote bad ones, I’ve never read them) and as accepting of rejection as any professional writer should be, as indeed he advised me to be, an attitude I maintain to this day.

  We kept in touch over the years, and when, a few weeks ago, I saw him online, I thought it the perfect opportunity to touch base. We spoke for about an hour, and I found myself constantly trying to eke information out of him about his current projects, because he seemed more interested in what I was doing. What I did learn was that he was eager to increase his output now that “his health issues seemed to be under control.” I invited him to take part in my blog interview series THE SEVEN, if only to learn more about what he had lined up than he seemed willing to share during our exchange, and he agreed. I sent him the questions, and when weeks passed without a response, something that was not typical of him, I assumed he was busy with his own writing and considered it a good thing.

  Then, when I logged in to Facebook one afternoon and saw “RIP David Silva”, my first thought was that it was the name of his new book, i.e. “RIP” by David B. Silva, because there was no way it could be anything else. He was too young, and what he’d said during our last conversation about his health issues being under control surely meant that it could only be a reference to some new and exciting literary pursuit. I hoped and prayed that it was, but of course, I wouldn’t be writing this if it had.

  I posted the news to my feed for the benefit of those who didn’t know
, and then I logged off the Internet for the night and just moved around in a daze, leafing through my copy of The Definitive Best of the Horror Show, which Dave had sent me years before. I couldn’t focus on the words. Until then I don’t think I realized how big a part David played in my development as a writer, or how much I had assumed that, like so many of the greats, he’d just always be there. My heart broke for the loss of a mentor, a good soul, and a good friend. It’s broken still.

  David was quiet, shy despite his accomplishments, and absurdly generous with his time, even if those requesting it were complete strangers. People always seem to say these things when someone passes on, regardless of whether or not it’s true. In David’s case, it most certainly was. That I’m here today, writing at all, constantly striving to better my craft and give back to others, is proof of that. For all the lessons I have learned from all my heroes, the need to be a good writer and an even better person is one I most assuredly learned from him.

  Thanks Dave, for everything.

  Kealan Patrick Burke

  DOWN BY THE SEA NEAR THE GREAT BIG ROCK

  Joe R. Lansdale

  Down by the sea near the great big rock, they made their camp and toasted marshmallows over a small, fine fire. The night was pleasantly chill and the sea spray cold. Laughing, talking, eating the gooey marshmallows, they had one swell time; just them, the sand, the sea and the sky, and the great big rock.

  The night before they had driven down to the beach, to the camping area; and on their way, perhaps a mile from their destination, they had seen a meteor shower, or something of that nature. Bright lights in the heavens, glowing momentarily, seeming to burn red blisters across the ebony sky.

  Then it was dark again, no meteoric light, just the natural glow of the heavens–the stars, the dime-size moon.

  They drove on and found an area of beach on which to camp, a stretch dominated by pale sands and big waves, and the great big rock.

  Toni and Murray watched the children eat their marshmallows and play their games, jumping and falling over the great big rock, rolling in the cool sand. About midnight, when the kids were crashed out, they walked along the beach like fresh-found lovers, arm in arm, shoulder to shoulder, listening to the sea, watching the sky, speaking words of tenderness.

  “I love you so much,” Murray told Toni, and she repeated the words and added, “and our family too.”

  They walked in silence now, the feelings between them words enough. Sometimes Murray worried that they did not talk as all the marriage manuals suggested, that so much of what he had to say on the world and his work fell on the ears of others, and that she had so little to truly say to him. Then he would think: What the hell? I know how I feel. Different messages, unseen, unheard, pass between us all the time, and they communicate in a fashion words cannot.

  He said some catch phrase, some pet thing between them, and Toni laughed and pulled him down on the sand. Out there beneath that shiny-dime moon, they stripped and loved on the beach like young sweethearts, experiencing their first night together after long expectation.

  It was nearly two a.m. when they returned to the camper, checked the children and found them sleeping comfortably as kittens full of milk.

  They went back outside for a while, sat on the rock and smoked and said hardly a word. Perhaps a coo or a purr passed between them, but little more.

  Finally they climbed inside the camper, zipped themselves into their sleeping bags and nuzzled together on the camper floor.

  Outside the wind picked up, the sea waved in and out, and a slight rain began to fall.

  ****

  Not long after, Murray awoke and looked at his wife in the crook of his arm. She lay there with her face a grimace, her mouth opening and closing like a guppy, making an “uhhh, uhh,” sound.

  A nightmare perhaps. He stroked the hair from her face, ran his fingers lightly down her cheek and touched the hollow of her throat and thought: What a nice place to carve out some fine, white meat.

  What in the hell is wrong with me? Murray thought, and he rolled away from her, out of the bag. He dressed, went outside and sat on the rock. With shaking hands on his knees, buttocks resting on the warmth of the stone, he brooded. Finally he dismissed the possibility that such a thought had actually crossed his mind, smoked a cigarette and went back to bed.

  He did not know that an hour later Toni awoke and bent over him and looked at his face as if it were something to squash. But finally she shook it off and slept.

  The children tossed and turned. Little Roy squeezed his hands open, closed, open, closed. His eyelids fluttered rapidly.

  Robyn dreamed of striking matches.

  ****

  Morning came and Murray found that all he could say was, “I had the oddest dream.”

  Toni looked at him, said, “Me, too,” and that was all. Placing lawn chairs on the beach, they put their feet on the rock and watched the kids splash and play in the waves; watched as Roy mocked the sound of the Jaws music and made fins with his hands and chased Robyn through the water as she scuttled backwards and screamed with false fear.

  Finally they called the children from the water, ate a light lunch, and, leaving the kids to their own devices, went in for a swim.

  The ocean stroked them like a mink-gloved hand, tossed them, caught them, massaged them gently. They washed together, laughing, kissing–then tore their lips from one another as up on the beach they heard a scream.

  Roy had his fingers gripped about Robyn’s throat, held her bent back over the rock and was putting a knee in her chest. There seemed no play about it. Robyn was turning blue.

  Toni and Murray waded for shore, and the ocean no longer felt kind. It grappled with them, held them, tripped them with wet, foamy fingers. It seemed an eternity before they reached the shore, yelling at Roy.

  Roy didn’t stop. Robyn flopped like a dying fish. Murray grabbed the boy by the hair and pulled him back, and for a moment, as the child turned, he looked at his father with odd eyes that did not seem his, but looked instead as cold and firm as the great big rock.

  Murray slapped him, slapped him so hard Roy spun and went down, stayed there on hands and knees, panting.

  Murray went to Robyn, who was already in Toni’s arms, and on the child’s throat were blue-black bands like thin, ugly snakes.

  “Baby, baby, are you okay?” Toni asked over and over. Murray wheeled, strode back to the boy, and Toni was now yelling at him, crying, “Murray, Murray, easy now. They were just playing and it got out of hand.”

  Roy was on his feet, and Murray, gritting his teeth, so angry he could not believe it, slapped the child down.

  “MURRAY,” Toni yelled, and she let go of the sobbing Robyn and went to stay his arm, for he was already raising it for another strike. “That’s no way to teach him not to hit, not to fight.”

  Murray turned to her, almost snarling, but then his face relaxed and he lowered his hand. Turning to the boy, feeling very criminal, Murray reached down to lift Roy by the shoulder. But Roy pulled away, darted for the camper.

  “Roy,” he yelled, and started after him. Toni grabbed his arm.

  “Let him be,” she said. “He got carried away and he knows it. Let him mope it over. He’ll be all right.” Then softly: “I’ve never known you to get that mad.”

  “I’ve never been so mad before,” he said honestly.

  They walked back to Robyn, who was smiling now. They all sat on the rock, and about fifteen minutes later Robyn got up to see about Roy. “I’m going to tell him it’s okay,” she said. “He didn’t mean it.” She went inside the camper.

  “She’s sweet,” Toni said.

  “Yeah,” Murray said, looking at the back of Toni’s neck as she watched Robyn move away. He was thinking that he was supposed to cook lunch today, make hamburgers, slice onions; big onions cut thin with a freshly sharpened knife. He decided to go get it.

  “I’ll start lunch,” he said flatly, and stalked away.

  As he went, T
oni noticed how soft the back of his skull looked, so much like an over-ripe melon.

  She followed him inside the camper.

  ****

  Next morning, after the authorities had carried off the bodies, taken the four of them out of the blood-stained, fire-gutted camper, one detective said to another:

  “Why does it happen? Why would someone kill a nice family like this? And in such horrible ways… set fire to it afterwards?”

  The other detective sat on the huge rock and looked at his partner, said tonelessly, “Kicks maybe.”

  ****

  That night, when the moon was high and bright, gleaming down like a big spotlight, the big rock, satiated, slowly spread its flippers out, scuttled across the sand, into the waves, and began to swim toward the open sea. The fish that swam near it began to fight.

  ****

  Remembrance by Joe R. Lansdale

  Dave was the alternate horror magazine. Twilight Zone was a horror/fantasy/whimsy magazine, and there were a number of small ones out there, but for me, in the small press, his was the one. I really liked Dave and liked working for him. I wrote a column for him and he published a number of my stories and excerpts from novels, and some other odds and ends. He contributed heavily to horror during its boom era, and was one of the most important editors in giving so many new and beginning writers a home. He helped change horror into a real genre. And he was a good guy. He will be missed.

  Joe R. Lansdale

  PAINTING BY NUMBERS

  Bentley Little