Category: Mulligan Smith

FP219 – Mulligan Smith in The Pinch, Part 1 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and nineteen.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Mulligan Smith in The Pinch, Part 1 of 3.
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3)
[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp219.mp3]Download MP3
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This week’s episodes are brought to you by Dunesteef.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Mulligan Smith, PI, takes on an unpleasant case on behalf of a concerned mother.

 

Mulligan Smith in The Pinch, Part 1 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan SmithThe house sat slightly to the right of the center of its block, and was flanked on either side by nearly identical replicas of its brick facade and wooden porch. The neighbourhood, on the west-side of Capital City, had been claimed by the somberly dressed office dwellers of the downtown core, and many of the small front yards had been smothered in pavement, to make space for extra parking.

Stepping from his baby-blue Tercel, Mulligan engaged the recording application on his phone, and dropped it into his hoodie’s breast pocket.

The house had no visible bell, so he opted to use the red door’s ringed knocker. Given the resistance he encountered in moving it, however, he concluded the thing was likely only intended as ornamentation – nonetheless, he gave it three heavy swings.

Selina Givens, his client, answered the summons.

She wore her dyed hair well, and, if the alteration hadn’t been made obvious by her highlights, he would be hard pressed to guess she needed it coloured.

Mrs. Givens reached out a hand, and her shake was firm, and dry.

Mulligan asked about the boy.

“He’s upstairs, and expecting you, but he’s having another talk with Stuart,” she said. “I wish that man would take this situation more seriously, I’m concerned that harpy might have permanently scarred Jarrod – might have made him some sort of pervert or something – but his father can’t stop winking and nudging.”

Smith nodded. He knew Ms. Lacy’s garbage cans were his likely next visit, and he held little excitement for the appointment: Digging through a sex offender’s trash was rarely a pleasant experience.

“I understand,” he replied, “I’ll do my best to be gentle while we’re chatting.”

The woman’s eyes filled with flame.

“I didn’t hire you to be gentle. You find that harlot’s secrets, and you air them. You find out how many more there are, you find their names, and you make her confess. I want her fired, I want her shamed, I want her burned at the goddamned stake – whatever it takes.”

The private investigator could only continue to nod. He was relieved to hear a door click shut on the floor above.

“I’ll, uh, just head on up,” he said.

As he topped the flight of stairs, Smith caught his first view of Mr. Givens, a stocky man in a tie-less dress shirt and gray slacks. The man stood, legs set in a wide stance upon the beige carpet which ran along the hall.

“Listen,” said Stuart, “Jarrod’s a good kid, but he’s fifteen, and needed to learn some life lessons at some point anyway. I’m not saying I condone what she did, but who better to learn from than a social studies teacher?”

Smith had no response for the father’s half-smirk, and, instead, simply moved past the man and into his son’s room.

The teen seemed surprised at his entrance.

“Sorry to bust in, your mom said I was expected.”

The boy’s shaggy haircut made it difficult to identify his reaction. Without waiting for a proper welcome, Mulligan took a seat in the wheeled chair beside a desk cluttered with homework, and surveyed the area. Band posters, largely unrecognizable to Smith, covered the three of the walls, and the fourth was adorned with a thick layer of photos, which appeared to be the product of a cheap printer, on even cheaper paper.

Although the furthest corner was dominated by a large flat panel television resting atop a dresser, the device had been muted, leaving the overhead ceiling-fan as the chamber’s only source of background noise.

“Yeah, come on in,” Jarrod said, after the PI had made himself at home, “I was just going to run down the street and grab a bag of chips anyhow.”

Biting at his upper lip, Smith gave a sticker-covered binder a staccato drumroll with his fingers, and stared at the TV, but he found no help in the silent insurance commercial that was currently playing out across the screen.

He sighed. “How many people have you told?”

“Mom and Stu had me tell the police, and I’m about to tell you, so that’ll be four. What you really want to ask, though, is what happened? Last Friday there was a dance at the school. I was there with a few people I know. I’m not graceful, but when it gets late enough, and everyone is sweating in the dark, no one notices how bad I am. I was there with Ashely – we’re just friends – but she had to go home early, as her dad’s a real prick. She actually came back though. She’s the one who found us.

“I was coming out of the bathroom when I saw Ms. Lacy. She was wearing a black skirt and a blue blouse, and she was giving me a funny look. She stopped me in the hall, and I remember thinking that I’d never seen her with her hair not in a ponytail. It was just a little messy – she looked pretty fierce.

“”Come here,” she said.

“So I did. She put her hand on my shoulder, and it smelled like she’d had a bit to drink or something – sort of a sweet, wine smell.

“We went past the caf, which’s usually closed during after-school events, and she brought me outside, but behind the school, where the running track is.

“It was dark.”

Jarrod’s voice broke.

“It – I mean, no one’s ever done that to me. It felt good, while it was happening. Her mouth was so warm.”

For a time the only sound in the room was the electric whine that moved the fan’s faux-wood blades.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Freesound.org credits:

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

215 – Mulligan Smith in Homegrown, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and fifteen.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Homegrown, Part 1 of 1.

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp215.mp3]Download MP3
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This week’s episodes are brought to you by Asunder.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Mulligan Smith, private investigator, finds himself trapped in a labyrinth of horrors.

 

Mulligan Smith in Homegrown, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Smith was tempted to pull his hands from his hoodie pockets, so that he might feel his way along the poorly lit corridor, but he refused to deepen his friend’s anxiety by appearing to be stumbling about the place. Instead, he depended on quick elbow work, and a slow shuffle, to navigate the plywood halls.

Ahead of him, a woman screamed.

It brought him up short, but Mulligan knew that if he lost his forward momentum there would be problems.

“C’mon,” he said, “it’s just hooligans.”

“Stay out of my face,” Billy Winnipeg told the darkness, “or I’ll lay you out like an abandoned highway.”

Taking a sharp left, they stumbled into a slat-walled room. The space was lit by a single flickering bulb, and the sound of rats scurrying appeared to come from just out of sight.

Before Smith could better inspect the room, Winnipeg’s rough shoulder encouraged him into the connecting tunnel.

As a chainsaw roared at the far opening, Mulligan wondered if the big man regretted his rush. He could hear Billy cursing and turning to retreat, but the Canadian was brought to a halt by a silent woman, in a crimson gown and domino mask, standing directly behind him.

“Just lemme be,” Winnipeg muttered, but Smith prodded him firmly in the spine, and drew him on towards the clatter of the motor.

They stepped into the chamber, only to be pinned by a spotlight, and, as they shielded their eyes, the engine suddenly ceased.

The room was decorated in scrawled red writing, but the radiance had crippled Mulligan’s night-vision, and he could barely discern the text.

Billy, eager to recover his honour, motioned the detective onwards, and proceeded to the gloomy mouth of the next passage.

It was as they moved blindly through the apparent void that Smith heard a whisper at his ear.

“Herb?” said the invisible man.

“Yeah,” replied Mulligan.

A rough hand grabbed at his sweater sleeve, and he felt himself redirected into an access way alongside the hall. Although completely lost, the heavy tread of Winnipeg’s boots, still close at hand, was reassuring.

Smith had been deliberately vague with Billy when he’d told him the facts of the case – he’d only emphasized its importance, which was essential to convincing the spookable Canuck to join him in venturing through Capital Gardens’ annual haunted houses.

Although the decaying tourist trap was amongst the city’s least visited attractions, its Halloween exhibition transformed the hothouses and office spaces into a maze of blankets, plywood, and underpaid temporary workers.

In truth, Mulligan found that the the mix of filmy glass, and jury-rigged plastic sheeting, appeared somewhat sinister enough at the best of times, which was why he’d brought along his companion.

Now, however, with his friend’s breathing obviously approaching the edge of panic, Smith began to feel some regret at his lack of clarity about the situation’s seriousness, and he wished he’d been more honest regarding the single mom of four, a waitress who’d haggled his price down to something she could manage on her thin income.

He’d met Mrs. Henry three weeks earlier.

“She’s a real shit-digger. She’s coming home with extra cash, and she doesn’t explain it. Hell, sometimes I think she’s bringing in more than I am,” were her openings words.

As he stood in the murk, Smith had to remind himself that it was only a teenage girl of which she had spoke. He’d been following Cecilia Henry, seventeen, since then, but, despite her mother’s concerns that she was busy turning tricks, his time was largely spent watching her work at the gardens, or observing her at home, where she occupied herself with homework and bossing siblings.

Still, her demand for efficiency made Cecilia a natural leader, and in the low-pay environment of the nearly bankrupt gardens, it had seemed to the detective that she’d worked her way into a controlling position over the small workforce of high school students.

Smith admired her drive, if not her means.

Another light came on, hung directly from overhead, and illuminating a short plaster pillar.

The stand’s flat surface was empty.

“Money,” demanded a female voice, from somewhere beyond the tight ring of brilliance

There was a three second window in which he was tempted to lay down a twenty and see what kind of stagecraft would happen next; he suspected a second spot would come on, revealing his purchase. He even wondered, briefly, if the plants were grown in one of the nearby flowerbeds.

Then a startled fun-seeker gave a far-off shriek, and Winnipeg exploded. “YOU DOG TICKLING BASTARDS, WHERE’S HERB!?”

Without waiting for a reply, he charged the murk.

Smith hadn’t realized his friend wouldn’t recognize the street-corner marketeer’s ganja selling call, and he could only assume Billy’s mind had constructed a kidnapping plot around an imaginary Herbert.

There was no opportunity to correct the mistake before the impact.

It would have been worse for the two delinquents that Winnipeg had managed to clotheslines, if it weren’t for the fact that the illegal detour had brought them into a room constructed of plywood on three sides, and a heavy tarp for the fourth. While the flimsy construction was impossible to identify from the interior, as Billy’s force carried him into the makeshift back-wall his bulk tore away the massive patch-job, flooding the false room with parking-lot lights.

There were a chorus of expletives thrown out, but Mulligan couldn’t miss the “shit-digger!” amongst the bunch.

Turning towards the sound, he grabbed the shoulder of the lithest of the black-sweater wearing teenagers who were attempting to scatter at the sudden exposure, and tugged off her cloth skeleton mask.

A distant siren split the air.

* * *

The next morning, as Smith paid up the tab for Billy’s Moons Over My Hammy, his gaze drifted over an abandoned newspaper left splayed at the counter. He was pleased to read that a drunken brawl amongst miscreants had broken up an apparent drug ring at the likely-to-now-close Gardens.

He also had to admit some satisfaction in noting that the police currently held no suspects. It had been a near thing, but, when he’d delivered her daughter home, the fire in his client’s eyes had convinced him that Cecilia already had more than enough to fear in her future.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

213 – Mulligan Smith in Resolution, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and thirteen.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Mulligan Smith in Resolution, Part 1 of 1.

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp213.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Asunder.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Mulligan Smith, PI, discusses the nature of blood relations.

 

213 – Mulligan Smith in Resolution, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan Smith“Remember that taxi I was waiting around for last week – the one with the corpse in the trunk?” asked Mulligan.

Walmart Mike reflected on the question while chewing stoically on his hash brown, careful to appear as if he hadn’t been anticipating the full tale since the incident.

“Yeah, I seem to recall,” he replied, after a sip of orange juice.

“Well, it was actually two bodies.”

Mike took another drink. “Yeah, read it in the papers, boy and his girl.”

Smith nodded, and eyed the busy Burger King. He wasn’t a fan of their work, but an increasing dislike of McDonald’s seemed to be an occupational hazard for his friend, the Walmart Greeter, due to overexposure. Usually he’d have sprung for some Denny’s, but both men were, for the moment at least, on a tight budget.

“I was hired to find Daren Lennox, by his parents. He’d been calling semi-regularly, from a blocked number, but didn’t talk much and often sounded pretty messed up.

“His Mom spent our opening interview weeping, and informing me that she was sure he was dead this time. Had some choice names for his off-and-on girlfriend, Delilah, and plenty to say about Daren’s crack habit.

“We had the conversation at their kitchen table. Not their crisply laid out dining room, just their simple, chrome-legged, mail-collector and sandwich holder. I got the impression talking over their son’s crimes was a common occurrence for the spot. Then there was the kid – Daren’s. It was cold, but they’d sent her outside to entertain herself on the backyard’s huge play structure. I could see her through the window glass, swinging listlessly and staring back at me.

“Papa Lennox said Lennox Jr. was a rotten apple. Spoke a lot about his responsibilities, and kept telling me he was only trying to find him for the betterment of the family.”

Mulligan took a bite of cold Croissan’Wich.

“Family is a funny thing,” said Mike. ”Before I straightened up, in – I dunno, early ‘73 maybe – I knew these two tribes, the Lemons and the Haywards.

“I used to hang out with Nicky Lemon, who was a bit of an idiot but way more reasonable than the rest of his kin. I mean, we made a few bucks by dipping unrepentantly into the tills of local convenience stores, so I guess he wasn’t that reasonable, but the rest of his people were frothy and full-o’-pissed-off.

“One Saturday night, Clyde Lemon – Nicky’s older brother, and a mean drunk – picks a fight with Stubbles Hayward, and accidentally beats the guy to death with a tire iron in the parking lot of the Pretty Kitty strip club.

“It sobers up Clyde, and he disappears the same evening, heading to parts unspecified. This leaves Nicky panicked, as he figures he’s the only male of his generation left to take the bullet that he knows is now owed.

“Doesn’t happen that way. Sunday morning, while Mr Goodyear’s wife is out buying him a bunch of stuff for a care package, a pair of Haywards kick in his apartment door and put five bullets through his nanny, and seven through his toddler.

“Too far, too far, and I couldn’t blame the head Lemon when he went ape shit in return. It was a little much to ambush the school bus though. By the time those bastards were done picking through the seats, they’d killed three Haywards, and left the other thirty or so kids traumatized for life.

“Things really hit the fan after that.

“I was keen on maintaining my friendship from afar, but I heard about it when Clyde and his sisters were all stabbed to death in a public washroom at a neighbourhood picnic. Everybody said security was tight at the event, but I guess the Haywards brought in a pro. They found nearly a whole generation of Lemons dead in stalls, the bloody mess draining away into the toilet.

“Nicky was out of town when it happened, and he stayed that way for a long while.

“The oldest generation of Lemons and Haywards died within two days of each other. Gran and Grampy Lemon’s car exploded on the highway between their house and their church. Rumour was that someone had actually bought a landmine especially for the occasion, but I could never figure how that would work. The eldest Haywards were accounted for ten years later, when a plea bargaining hog farmer included them in his checklist of bodies he’d been asked to feed to the pigs.

“The only people who walked away happy were the professionals who’d been paid.”

Walmart Mike rubbed the fried potato crumbs of his from his fingers before concluding.

“I guess my point is, soon as family is involved, business sense goes out the window and people will do anything for the stupidest of reasons.”

The PI, who’d also finished his breakfast, lifted his soda and found nothing but ice.

“Yeah,” he said. “family is exactly what tripped me. When I went to visit his girlfriend’s relations, they all told me he was scum, and wanted nothing to do with him. It was the mom, mostly, riling them. Given how much they seemed to hate him, I figured they couldn’t be close enough to him to know the details I wanted. My second visit, though, I backed it way up. Talked to her sister, alone, instead.

“She was calmer. Apparently, not long previous to his disappearance, he’d said he was going clean. I’d listened to the same from his parents, but they’d been quick to add that they’d heard it a thousand times already, usually when he was attempting to borrow money for another rock.

“The next day, while wandering around, I’d met this kid who’d known Lennox, and he’d said that Daren was dealing on corners previously, but had stopped.

“Well, I’m thinking he’s maybe got some old debts, and is laying low. I’ve met guys who think going clean is some kind of get out of jail free card as far as their outstanding tabs go, but improved morals don’t often impress crack dealers who’re down a half-grand.

“The schoolboy tells me he’d seen Daren and his lady not long before, and that they were stuffed into a taxi by an aggressive third party. The cabbie surfaced, but his car didn’t. He said he’d been given the boot by a trio of hijackers, but I suspected it was really just one who happened to know the other two.

Forgetting the status of his empty cup, Mulligan attempted to sip at his beverage, and received nothing but gurgling in response.

He continued.

“At that point I’m figuring I’m dealing with a simple drug-related murder. That seemed to pan out when I came across the vehicle in question sitting in your store’s parking lot. Cops took one look at Daren’s record, and I guess they assumed the same as well.

“It nagged at me though.

“I only fully realized how much time the girl had spent at Grandpa Lennox’s house when I went back after the discovery. It’s tough to see the reasoning behind a chronic failure, but I think Daren and Delilah knew they were poisoned, and didn’t want to mess up the child.

“They also must have known that if they were going to get clean, they had to do it on their own. I think they had, actually. I pulled some strings for a favour, and found a nice little nest egg in their bank account. Nothing huge, but exactly one nice little nest egg bigger than I’ve ever seen addicts be able to maintain.

“I’d met again with my clients to let them know, as I’d already waived my fees over the phone, but I figured I could give them some comfort if they knew that their son had been working hard to make things right.

“We’re talking, and I’m staring out the window again, at the girl – she’s climbing, totally oblivious to me, and she’s at the apex of this plastic tree-house thing. While waiting till Father Lennox is done telling me how it might all be for the best, I’m thinking that the equipment probably provides better shelter than my apartment.

“It hits me.

“If I had to guess – and I do, at least until the trial – Daren and his sweetheart were leaving the city. They were taking the girl. They were clean, yeah, but I’ve known a few junkies in the past, as I’m sure you have too, and it’s easier to stay sober if you don’t have close friends making bad suggestions. Their families probably didn’t seem like great support systems, and they likely thought they’d be further ahead just starting new.

“I don’t mention my epiphany, of course, but I do let them know about the nest egg, then I leave. The description the cabbie provided matched any thug I’ve ever heard of: Unshaven and angry. What I’d realized, though, was that it was also a pretty good match for what Lennox Senior might look like if he’d been losing sleep over no longer regularly seeing the little girl he’d had so much part in raising up until that point. Hell, he’d probably expected to see her off to college.

“Perhaps he saw her as a chance to fix the errors he’d made the first go-round.

“The uniforms sounded pretty grumpy that they hadn’t thought of it themselves, but the taxi-man found the photo of that particular passenger all too familiar.”

It was Walmart Mike’s turn to nod, and, for a time, the pair sat silently on their formed-plastic benches, their gazes turned towards the tray upon which they had piled their discarded food containers.

Finally, Mulligan stood to carry the crumpled papers and cardboard boxes to the trash. With a shrug of his shoulders, he watched the remnants slide into the murky depths of the bin.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

209 – Mulligan Smith and The Wait, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and nine.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Mulligan Smith and The Wait, Part 1 of 1.

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp209.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

This week’s episodes are brought to you by the In Broad Daylight.

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, our PI finds himself anxiously loitering with a man once well known for his hoodlum tendencies.

Flash Pulp 209 – Mulligan Smith and The Wait, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

Mulligan SmithMulligan Smith, private investigator, had spent the evening watching a blue Crown Victoria sit empty. The Ford was parked in the lot of the shoddiest Walmart in the east end of Capital City, and none of the employees bothered to note yet another unshaven vagrant hanging about the storefront.

The chill November morning had left a frost on the windshield, which remained even as the sun snuck away behind gray cloud cover, but the detective had been hopeful, until recently, that he could intercept anyone interested in the vehicle’s condition. He’d spotted the sedan’s taxicab markings when he’d first approached, and it had seemed odd that a working car would go unnoticed so long, but, the company door-decals were hemmed in by the constant flow of poorly parking shoppers, and the only other indicator was a small white roof-cap which might be easily missed on a brisk winter’s day.

Smith hadn’t stood alone the entire watch, however, and the wrinkled man with the comb-over halo, who’d helped occupy him for the last hour, was still talking.

“Ah, hell, I know you heard it a thousand times from your old man – well, hah, read it I guess, considerin’ his lack of snitch-meat, but things were different then. Listen: I shot a guy once while he was usin’ the john. It was in back of Mel’s – a pool place that used to sell smokes at twice the price, cause they also sold beer and they knew drunks are lazy.

“I cranked the door open while his hands were full, put one in his kneecap, and let nature do the rest. Hell of a mess, and he had to crawl out of it on his own. He was dragging a lot of liquids behind him when he finally made it back to the tables. I tipped Mel an extra hundred to shut him up. Can you imagine a c-note keeping a man’s silence?

“Times were different.”

Though Mulligan was well familiar with Walmart Mike’s shady past, he’d only known the man in the years since he’d taken on his latest identity. Even as they spoke, Mike’s greeter vest waggled with his wide-armed punctuations.

“For a fella who seems to rarely bother brushing his hair,” continued the former gunman, “you sure look agitated. Not that it’s my business – and patience is a virtue, sure – but if you got something you need to get done, then get it done. I ever told you how I got popped?”

The worldly welcomer set his hand to his cheek, rubbed at it with a sigh, then began his telling.

“I didn’t understand back then. I wasn’t out to hurt folks, I was just trying to make some scratch, and – well, it might sound like a cop out, but it felt like a war – felt like my time in Vietnam, actually. I kicked around a few cities, but the folks I fell in with had the same notion across the board. It was an enterprise, but it was also something that came out of neighbourhoods, and the kids they ran with, and the people they’d grown up around. The world was smaller. It was before the Internet had everyone poking everyone else, and you could think that even the guy three blocks over was your enemy, coming to cut you in your sleep and sell heroin to your sister. Jesus, selling horse to my sister was my job, and it kept me busy for a long time. Fortunately she was smarter than me, and went clean after lending me a black eye. What an idiot I was. My moronic acts may have been varied, but the worst of it was the death of Salty O’Malley. I barely knew Salty, and he never did much to deserve the knife I gave him.”

The recital stalled at the approach of a customer familiar with Mike’s on-the-clock barrage of polite hellos, and Smith began tapping his index finger against his pocketed phone. It was rare for Mulligan to grow impatient at the narrator’s stories, but he’d recently placed a fairly urgent call, and had yet to receive a response.

As he scanned the flow of battered minivans and high-revving hatchbacks, the interrupting round-faced man passed with a wheezed greeting. The automatic doors slid shut, and the storyteller continued.

“Doesn’t matter much why I did it – it changed me. Had a girl, and the same day she told me she was preggers. We’d been together a while, longest I’d known a gal, really, and we had a little basement place we rented from her step-dad. Anyhow, I broke down. I couldn’t handle the idea when my jacket was tumbling around in our tiny washing machine, stained with dead O’Malley’s blood.

“I told her I was so happy. Told her I had to call my Ma. I left. Tried to drink away the tail end of the ‘70s, but liquor has always given me the s##ts. Even then I was too much of a pansy to try anything stronger. The ‘80s were balls, I told myself at first I’d just stick to minor stuff, but my stomach wasn’t in it anymore. Got so hungry in ‘83 that I tried to mug an idiot tourist, in broad daylight, off Time’s Square. Started weeping as she handed me the money. Ended up giving her my last ten and apologizing. By the ‘90s I’d almost stopped having nightmares – dreams about meeting my boy and the cops suddenly bursting in, or worse, dreams of Salty O’Malley sitting in the darkness at the end of my bed, and asking me why I did it. It wasn’t the talking corpse that scared me in those, it was my lack of an answer.

“Anyhow, I’d heard from folks who knew folks that my kid had been born all right, and that he and his Mom had moved in with her parents. Lost track of them after that, but it was always my intention, once I could look at myself in the mirror, to go back. In ‘97, while I’m stocking the shelves at a Connecticut K-Mart, in walks a push-broom moustache in a brown jacket. He tells me about cold case files, and DNA testing, and it all ends in a long stretch at a tall-walled federal correctional shanty.”

The account broke briefly, as did Mike’s voice. With a soggy cough he cleared his throat, then finished his tale.

“I deserved it, even with my changes, and it wouldn’t have mattered anyhow. Sally had tears in her eyes when she told me he’d died at fifteen. Cancer. She forgave me though, and that was something.”

Both men needed a moment of silence, and, as they took it, a police cruiser pulled into the parking lot and began trawling the cement sea’s yellow-lined aisles.

He wasn’t sure if it was due to the story, or the delay, but Smith was feeling uncooperative. Originally he’d intended to direct their search, but he reasoned that he’d been clear about the license plate in question, and that the sweet smell of decay emanating from the trunk had been easy enough to spot when he’d encountered it an hour earlier.

He said, “You’re coming off a long shift – must be hungry. Let’s go grab a burger. Dad mentioned once you knew a guy in Boston who blew his own leg off and had to lay low at his mother’s house for three months?”

Smiling, Walmart Mike shrugged off his smock. “Yeah. Mean old bag, let’s see, that’d be ‘74?”

The pair stepped down from the curb.

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

205 – Mulligan Smith and The Drunk, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and five.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Mulligan Smith and The Drunk, Part 1 of 1.

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by the After Movie Diner Podcast & Blog.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Private Investigator Mulligan Smith finds himself left in the cold with an unusual drinking buddy.

 

Flash Pulp 205 – Mulligan Smith and The Drunk, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan SmithIt was the third Tuesday in November, and Mulligan’s Tercel was frosted with a night left in an open air pay-lot. He’d wasted his evening anticipating a man who hadn’t arrived. In truth, Smith had never been sure Daren Lennox would come to O’Doyle’s, but he knew it to be a preferred late night hangout of Lennox’s, and the detective was in need of a short conversation with the man.

Unfortunately, a previous altercation had banned Mulligan from the all night eatery, so he’d had no option but to walk the road, or perch in the alley that made up the block’s only storefront gap, and wait in the chill dark.

Now, Mulligan’s rasping pupils winced at the morning sun, and the cold wicked along his fingers and into his forearm as he struggled with his keys. The numbness that had stiffened his limbs during the vigil won out, and he dropped the set with a jingle.

As he stooped to collect the ring, a single braying laugh came from the distant sidewalk.

“Haw!”

The PI spun. “Don’t you think it’s rude to verbally mock strangers in public?”

“Don’t you think it’s rude to – uh – look like a moron in public?” slurred the bottle waving drunk.

“I would take a poll of the surrounding area, but it seems that I’m solely in the company of my moronic-peers, which certainly wouldn’t provide a solid sample base.”

“You think you can talk over my head? I may be drunk, but for all you know these are exceptional circumstances.”

“I usually wouldn’t taze a ten-year-old,” said Smith, his hands now warming in his hoodie’s pockets, “but perhaps you’re right, perhaps these are exceptional circumstances.”

The boy in the crisp school uniform raised a paper-bagged bottle to his lips, and smiled.

After he finished his gulp, he said, “You’ve got a Taser? I’ve been here since seven, when Dad went to work. Noticed you stomping along the road. You a detective or something?”

Tamping down his aggravation, Mulligan stretched. He considered his conversation partner.

“Well, that’s an interesting question, isn’t it,” said Smith. He cleared his throat, taking the child’s stance in. “You need help at home?”

“#### no,” the boy replied.

Mulligan nodded.

“Guessing my occupation is a lot of logic to leap,”said Smith, “but maybe not for someone who’s heard about a snoop in a black sweater poking around with a picture of Daren Lennox in his hand. You have something you want to tell me?”

The boy tipped his container, without result, then staggered to a trashcan.

“First find me some London dry,” he said.

“Hell no. Look, I’ll give you twenty bucks.”

“I’d just use it to get someone else to buy it anyhow, but, whatever. Dad gave me a fifty for lunch, and I stole another fifty from Mum, so I don’t need cash – what I need is gin.”

Mulligan lowered his head, and shuffled between feet, while he mulled his options.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Lucas.”

“Well, Lucas, you make a fair point, let us stroll to yonder boozery.” With that, Smith began walking, pacing himself at a speed a little fast for the boy’s short legs. Before his companion could complain, he pointed at the sharp-lined uniform. “You’re pretty far from Ashbury Academy.”

“My classes all start late,” replied the lush, as his feet dragged over the pavement.

“No one ever notices that you’re tanked?”

“I like to read a lot. I do okay. They never see me any way else, so they don’t know to believe differently. I’ve always got Scope.”

“Your parents?”

“Jesus, they both figure I’m a young rascal, or whatever, although maybe they don’t know how much I take in. They believe me over the occasional asshole who mentions something.”

“Sure,” said Smith. “So, uh – you into Power Rangers, or what?”

“Shut up,” Lucas replied, but they both grinned at the comment.

They traveled the rest of the distance in silence.

The automatic doors had just been engaged as Mulligan stepped onto the shop’s plastic mat, and the glass slid away as he entered.

Lucas was content to wait outside.

When Mulligan returned, the boy was quick to break the seal on both the bottle, and his silence.

After a long draw, he said, “I like to wander downtown when no one is home. I get to know some people. Daren’s been buying for me for months – he, er, used to sell weed over by the mall bus stop, and I told him I’d narc on him if he didn’t. I think he would have anyway, we sort of became friends. A few mornings ago I saw him coming by. It was super early for him, usually he’s only here in the evenings, and he was with his girlfriend. They were shouting at a cabby. They got in with him, but they were still arguing. Suddenly this other guy I’ve never seen before comes jogging out of the McDonalds and hops in the passenger seat. There was no more fighting, and they left in a hurry.”

“Friendsies?” asked Mulligan, smirking and motioning for the bottle.

The boy extended it happily.

Smith said, “If you remember the name of the cab company, I can probably learn where they went.”

Then he took a sip of his own.

“It was a Bluebird taxi.”

Mulligan nodded.

In returning the gin to its owner, he overextended his grasp, knocked the boy’s hand, and dumped a sizable portion of the liquor down the Ashbury emblem, and onto the carefully pressed shirt.

“####!” said Lucas, “I can’t go to ####ing school like this!”

“Probably shouldn’t head home either,” said Smith.

Realization dawned on the youth’s face as he noted Mulligan’s smile.

“You said you were my ####ing friend!” the boy shouted.

“I am.”

The PI reached for his cellphone as he mentally thumbed through his contact list – he had many friends, in fact, including some reliable ones who worked with Child Protective Services.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

201 – Mulligan Smith and The Golfer, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode two hundred and one.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Mulligan Smith and The Golfer, Part 1 of 1.

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by Scott Roche.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Mulligan Smith encounters a caddy-less man with a grievance.

 

Flash Pulp 201 – Mulligan Smith and The Golfer, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

“Don’t,” said Mulligan.

The golfer, a man of fifty, lowered his club. Running a gloved hand along his black-dyed comb-over, he considered the lanky intruder in the zipped hoodie.

“Why?” he asked.

The ball-flogger was wiggling his driver subtly, and Smith wondered if he was guessing at what the thick ebony head might do to a skull. Rather than become part of an impromptu experiment, the private investigator opted to speak quickly.

“I understand how you feel,” he said. “Folks I work for often have a tough time dealing with the emotional loss of a loved one.”

“‘Loss of a loved one’? She’s not dead, she’s ####ing the UPS guy.”

“True,” replied Mulligan.

“I know it’s ####ing true, I paid you a quarter of a year’s wages to find it out.”

Smith noted that, beneath his green polo’s collar, his ex-client’s neck had turned an alarming shade of red.

“OK, fine, but do you still love her?” asked Mulligan. He pulled deeply from his slurpee as he awaited the answer, his free hand idling in his sweater’s right pocket.

“Yes. No. I want to, but I can’t.”

The highly engineered graphite club shook under the cuckold’s mid-shaft grasp, and the detective turned slightly to give the sportsman an awkward sort of privacy.

“So leave her, and move on,” said Smith, “I’m not saying it’s any fun, but I’ve had plenty of customers do it before.”

“Give her half of the business? Sell the house we spent a decade designing and building? What kind of crap does she tell the kids? Would I ever even see them again?” The man wiped away the line of spittle which had drifted from his lip to his chin, and rolled his shoulders. He returned his grip to the handle, and took on a stance any professional would be proud of.

“My life is over,” he said, taking a few gentle practice swings.

As he formulated his response, Mulligan’s gaze wandered across the theoretical field of play. The overpass provided a clear view to the distant horizon, and he could only guess at the number of grid-locked civilians trapped in their gas guzzling four-wheeled capsules. The rush hour traffic was awash with the afternoon sun, and matters had been made more agonizing by the stalled hatchback the PI had seen to be blocking the left-most lane, five-miles further along the highway’s concrete ribbon.

For a moment, Smith considered the results of one of the dimpled balls taking flight. In his imagination it cruised, like a kamikaze pigeon, over the glassy sea of windshields, to finally explode into some unexpecting middle-manager’s cellphone conversation with his grocery list dispensing wife. Would the round missile still be moving quickly enough to kill the fellow on impact, or would it come to an oozy halt in an eye socket?

His fingers tightened around his hidden Tazer.

“Listen, I know a homeless paraplegic drunk who lives on rotting pizza scraps dumped from a Chuck E. Cheese. He’s a crack addict who spends the majority of his waking periods inspecting his useless legs for maggots, both real and imagined, but he’s also the most upbeat guy I’ve met. Why don’t we take a stroll and find him? Give you some perspective, and a chance to clear your brain a bit. This too shall pass, and all that.”

Smith’s former employer ignored the invitation.

“Thought about this for a while – always figured it would be almost like skee ball,” he said instead. “Me and Sharon used to head this way to escape the city. She’d pick me up after my shift at the Gas’N’Go, and we’d sneak down the back roads to this hillbilly driving field she’d found. There was never anyone else around, so we’d meander over in her mom’s chugging jalopy, smoking joints the whole way, then spend the night hitting balls. A quarter and this clanging beast of a machine would spit you out a bucket’s worth. It’s a bit of a ride, and it’d just as often be dusk by the time we got there. Didn’t matter that we couldn’t see where the hits were landing, we were just happy to share a bottle of wild turkey and each other’s company.”

Smith nodded, but, before he could answer, the wronged husband continued.

“It’s been years since we were on the green together. Now everything dribbling from her mouth seems so moronic. I don’t know why it hurts so much if I can’t stand her anymore.”

The married man considered the line of six spheres he’d set at the curb’s edge, and cocked his ear to better hear the drone of the cars below.

He raised the club to his shoulder.

Tazer drawn, Mulligan made a last attempt to reach the mourner.

“Fine, then consider this: If I don’t fire a few thousands volts into you, and you do kill someone, it’ll be prison. You aren’t going to manage cop-assisted suicide wielding only a rich-man’s toothpick.”

“I’m not afraid of jail.”

“You were so concerned that Sharon would get half of everything, how are you going to feel when she has it all? You won’t have to worry about dividing up your dream home, the whole thing will be hers. I wonder if the UPS guy likes leather couches and chrome kitchen fixtures?”

There was a roar of rage, then the golfer kicked his column of plastic eggs into the gutter and shattered the driver over his knee. With a gurgle, and upraised arms, he fell to the pavement, weeping.

Realizing that the danger had passed, Smith decided it would be prudent to wait another day before delivering the reminder regarding his outstanding bill.

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

199 – Sgt Smith and The Ham, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode one hundred and ninety-nine.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Sgt Smith and The Ham, Part 1 of 1.

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by Pendragon Variety.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Sgt Smith recounts a criminal tale of sight seeing, entertainment, and consumerism, from the mid-century streets of Capital City.

 

Flash Pulp 199 – Sgt Smith and The Ham, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

My Dearest Mulligan,

It was 1957, and I was working downtown, back when I got a lot of raised eyebrows at having earned a uniform amongst Capital City’s bluest. Since the guys were less than enthusiastic in welcoming a no-tongued new chump, I had been relegated to prodding tourists.

Now, my fifteen minutes of fame had come a few years earlier, but accidentally busting a serial killer had earned me little more than a stretch of concrete to wear down. I spent a lot of hours strolling between the junk shops and the museums, and directing folks who’d strayed from the sightseeing circuit.

There were three factions that I was quite familiar with though; the homeless, who hated the shopkeeps who tried to roust them, and loved the buskers who entertained them; the store owners, who loved the buskers that drew crowds, but hated the homeless who they saw as scarecrows for the out-of-town rubes; and, finally, the buskers, who were generally too stoned to bother with either, and mostly wasted their non-entertaining time waging passive aggressive mime-versus-poetry-beatnik wars for the best corner turf.

I became friends with some, and didn’t much care for others. There was a strongman, Jacky Patterson, who, it seemed to me, hauled his weights out in his old jalopy, then blew the day exercising in a ridiculous black spandex outfit. He was actually pretty successful, though, and loud enough that everyone knew him.

He’d tell stories while lifting children over his head, and folks would often get so wrapped up in the telling that his arms would be trembling before they’d remember to snap the photo they’d asked for.

All the brats wanted to ask him about, though, were his fights. They couldn’t figure a guy that strong who wasn’t constantly punching people, so he spun tales for them.

“You spot the moon last night? That big black spot it had?” He’d ask, striking a pose.

“Yeah,” the kids reply.

“Man in the Moon was getting too close to my girl, so I socked him one,” then he’d flex, and, for a second, they’d believe him. That’s the thing, It wasn’t just the charm – he had great patter, sure, but he was there most days, rain or shine, and it showed.

You didn’t see fellas that big back then.

Despite the closed-collar nature of those years, I recall him mentioning that the women in sensible hats were often his largest donors.

Another notable was Eugene Wagner, who would sit inside his sausage stand and mutter endlessly over the perceived insults cast upon him by anyone between the age of eight and eighteen who happened to pass by. His place always seemed on the verge of falling over. Although he made good money in the summer, he lived on it for the winter, and he was constantly broke. He complained eternally that hooligans were stealing various condiments, but I never saw anyone making a break for it with fists full of onions.

I tried his wares a few times, but I was better fed in the College pubs, which liked having me swing by to discourage the rowdies.

Anyhow, it’s around noon, late in the season, and you can feel the locals getting ready to fold up for the winter, or at least move their operations to warmer climes.

I’d wasted my morning keeping an eye out for a hooch-sponge who’d missed the shelter’s breakfast call. He was apparently a regular, and expected, so I’d peeked into alleys and prodded the locals.

Approaching Eugene, I handed him the rumpled note I’d been passing to everyone else.

His grill was smoking, and I’d had to push my way through a crowd of salivating lunch patrons.

“Someone missing?” he asked, raising a greasy eyebrow. He took the sheet with the details and looked it over as I nodded.

“Oh, I know this guy,” he said, “with the beard and the ridiculous red hat. Bought a sausage a couple weeks ago and used all my mustard. I swear he spoons the dill right into his mouth when I’m not looking. Ain’t seen him today though.”

He wasn’t interested in pressing charges on the pickle snatching, so I moved on.

None of the guitarists or poets had noted anything, and, unsurprisingly, the mimes were unwilling to discuss the matter.

As it happened, he was found on top of a shoe store. Whiskey-wings had given him the courage to climb, but they’d abandoned him before he’d managed to descend. Instead, he’d opted to sack out for the night. A better fate than he could have hoped for, considering, but it did bring me to notice that I hadn’t come across the well built Patterson, which was unusual.

The next day was the start of the last big weekend, and the Friday streets were packed. First, I had a poet snatch a country-crooner’s six-string, and chase around a particularly harsh critic.

“Beat me all you want,” shouted the guy in the tweed suit, “but it won’t change how your poor word choices create an unpleasant rhythm throughout the piece!”

Everyone then had sat through too many Bob Hope flicks, and they all thought they were smart arses.

After that, I squandered my hours directing the flow of people along the pavement. I remember not envying the street sweeps, given the clumps of Wagner’s red wax-paper wrappers wadding at the curbs.

Later that same day, a prim auntie slapped a mime. She said he was making lewd approaches, but he indicated she simply wasn’t a fan of the old rope gag. Did she want to have him arrested? No, but she insisted he drop the French act till she was out of sight. Given that I had her white handed, I asked if he wanted to press charges, but he shook his head no.

When I finally punched out, I did so thoroughly. I can’t say for sure what we got up to, Saturday and Sunday, but, given the date, it’s likely your Ma and I loaded the buggy to head to your Gramps’ cottage, so we could help get it buttoned for winter.

Monday was a different world. Instead of dominating the streets, the tourists looked like harried clusters of pigeons poking sidewalk scraps. The bars held only the regulars on their well-claimed bar-stools, the out-of-towners having drained away like the tide retreating from the pillars of a pier. I’d have business with a lot of them when the snow came, but, at that point, they were still friendly and willing to guffaw with Johnny Lawman over the mooks who’d finally migrated.

Now, while I was gone, we’d gotten word from Beefcake Patterson’s girlfriend, who reported him unaccounted for.

Thing is, I wasn’t able to shake Wagner’s question.

“Someone missing?”

He’d asked it before I’d handed him my sheet, and the assumption bothered me.

It was one of those moments: There was no one around when I approached the smell of the cooking meat, and I opened my notepad, wrote a single line, then set it on the counter and tapped it twice.

“Our strongman is missing.”

For a second time, he anticipated my thinking. He was out the little screen-door on the side of the booth before I could make it around the corner, but he’d been pretty generous in sampling his own product, and I had Wagner huffing and in cuffs by the end of the block.

I wasn’t there for it, but, back at his place, they found a monster meat grinder, and on a workbench in the basement, Patterson’s hand.

That’s it.

Oddly, the meat in the grinder was never tested, and the whole place was bagged, filed, and forgotten about. They hit Wagner with a murder charge, and he pulled a bum straw on his court appointed lawyer. Three years later he was found dead in a prison shower.

If you meet the right grade-schooler, you’ll find the story continues to float around as an urban legend, but the newspapers never got a whiff of it.

I know they did it to keep from appearing on a very special 60 Minutes, but it’s hard to know how many people moved through the district that summer, or how many disappeared into Wagner’s kitchen before we caught on. Maybe it’s best that all those tourists remained unaware of the local delicacy they were consuming.

Now I need to take a walk. Stop eating so much fast food crap.

Love,
Dad

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

186 – Mulligan Smith and The Bitter End, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode one hundred and eighty six.

Flash PulpTonight we present, Mulligan Smith and The Bitter End, Part 1 of 1.

[audio:http://traffic.libsyn.com/skinner/FlashPulp186.mp3]Download MP3
(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by the bistrips comic Treed.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Mulligan recounts a tale told to him by an estranged father.

 

Flash Pulp 186 – Mulligan Smith and The Bitter End, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan SmithMulligan and his friend, Billy Winnipeg, were making their way home from a long night of waiting. Smith had been hoping for more quiet over the course the evening, but his companion’s wagging tongue, and the drive still ahead of them, had left the PI’s mind churning at a tale of his own.

As they accelerated onto the highway that cut across the heart of Capital City, he began.

“The story goes like this. One day, Rodney is sitting in the front seat of a borrowed car. He’s got a letter written in pencil crayon tucked into the breast pocket of his coveralls, grease on his knees, and a .22 pistol in his lap. He’s crying.

“The letter is from his son, who’s eight, and it basically says, “Edwin is a bastard. Save me! Love, Jay””

Billy wiped mayo from the corner of his mouth.

“Edwin?” he asked.

“The boy’s step-dad.The whole thing is eating Rodney up, and he’s in front of the house Eddy shares with the kid and his mom, Maggie. Rodney is sick inside because he’s broke, Maggie ain’t interested in reconciliation, and he’s done begging to get her back. There’s no way he’s getting custody of Jay, but he’s thinking starting over in Mexico would be a great opportunity anyhow – figures if he fixes cars he can’t afford here, why not there?”

“Wiping away the tears, Rodney finally takes a deep breath, gets out of the car, and kicks in the door.

“Now, what he doesn’t know is that Edwin ain’t exactly a slouch. While his visitor is busy trying to avoid the door swinging back at him, Eddie has managed to clear the couch he was watching golf from, and, before Rodney can bring the gun around, he manages to grab it – he described it to me as a magic trick: one second he was holding the piece, the next he wasn’t.

“Well, suddenly unarmed, Rodney makes a break for it. He runs out, hops in the faux-wood-paneled station wagon, and putters away the highest speed his ride can manage. He got home OK, but, afraid the cops were going to come down on him, he skips town, and heads south for three years.

“He gets a job, life settles a bit for him, but he can’t stop thinking about Jay. He starts drinking, always, he told me, to toast his son. Five months into his exodus, he gets word that no one is looking for him, or has asked after him. So far as Rodney’s few friends could tell, they weren’t even certain that Edwin reported the incident.

“It’s not too surprising that he wasn’t a suspect, given that he and Maggie hadn’t spoken in half-a-decade at that point – hell, the letter was the first word he’d received from Jay in twelve months – but Rodney was reluctant to climb from the comfortable whisky rut he’d found himself in.

“Much later, on a July night, while drinking alone in a bar named Long Tom’s, Rodney stares through his beer goggles at the wreckage of his life, and suddenly sees a ridiculous plan.

“The next day he heads back to the shop and chops a length of piping. After work he packs it full of black powder, and starts driving. He’s got it in his head that if he just kills Edwin and Maggie, then Jay is his.

“His optimism might have been related to how much his friend, Jim Beam, was whispering to him.

“Anyhow, he gets a quarter of the way here, and stops at a McDonalds to make room for more bourbon. While getting back in the car, he figures he’ll check the trunk to ensure the gym-bag with the device is still holding together. Now, its a pretty basic device, and its hard to say how he managed to accidentally light the fuse – my guess, although he didn’t admit to it, was that he was smoking with the shaky hands of a drunk.

“Whatever the case, it pops right in bag, blows through the wall of the trunk, and removes his kneecap. Wasn’t long before someone ran over to check what happened, and found him lying there on the pavement, muttering to himself and missing a sizable portion of his leg. The uniforms patched him up, but they wanted an explanation for the situation, and he didn’t have a good one. Landed him two in the can.”

Smith rolled his window open, breathing in a lungful of damp night air before continuing.

“Sometime after that, back in Capital City, Maggie is wondering whatever happened to Jay’s deadbeat dad. She hires me to go looking for him, and, I manage to track him to a place named O’Neils. He’d been on parole for a few months, and had quickly fallen back in love with hard liqour.

“Cost me a six-pack to get all that information from him.

“He was too quick to tell it, though, and I knew something was on his mind. Instead of reporting my unfortunate findings and collecting my fees, I decided to keep an eye on Rodney for a short while longer. Edwin wasn’t hurting for cash to cover the bill.

“It happened the next afternoon. The booze-hound had slept in, but when he got up and hopped some public transportation, I followed along. I recognized the neighbourhood as we entered it – largely because it was my client’s.

“I have no bloody idea where he found the sword-cane, or how I didn’t figure what it was till he was off the bus.”

Mulligan nosed the Tercel into his apartment building’s parking structure.

“He was quick for a cripple. As soon as he saw Edwin getting out of his Cadillac, he had that steel flashing, and was bolting down the drive.

“I tried to stop him – yelled at him as I ran. I knew I wasn’t going to make it in time.”

Smith cleared his throat as he nudged the Tercel towards its resting spot.

“We were lucky though, Edwin and I.”

“From the rear-passenger seat steps a teen. Lamp-jawed and curly haired – he had his mom’s genetics.

“It’s Jay. He’s just back from stomping the Delmore Devils in nine innings, all under Edwin’s coaching, and he doesn’t seem happy to see some shambling maniac wielding cold steel against the man he now calls “Pa.” It had been many moons since he’d last encountered his biological father, and you could tell there was no recognition in his eyes.

“Boy had a way with a baseball bat. The first hit folded the wannabe samurai in half, the second bought Rodney’s right hand a few extended surgeries.”

Mulligan cut the engine and stepped from the car, stretching his legs.

“Took a few years of healing, but I hear that they write each other now. Rodney supposedly hangs them all up in his cell.”

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

INT CAR RAIN HIGHWAY R.WAV by mitchellsounds
acvent.wav by NoiseCollector

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

180 – Mulligan Smith in Nurture, Part 3 of 3

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode one hundred and eighty.

Flash Pulp

Tonight we present, Mulligan Smith in Nurture, Part 3 of 3.
(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3)
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(RSS / iTunes)

 

This week’s episodes are brought to you by Words with Walter.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Mulligan Smith and his short-tempered friend, Billy Winnipeg, find themselves caught up in a high-velocity chase.

 

Flash Pulp 180 – Mulligan Smith in Nurture, Part 3 of 3

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

Mulligan SmithMulligan Smith and Billy Winnipeg were on the highway, and traveling well over governmentally recommended speeds.

The Tercel was juddering under the strain, but, given the furious police sirens that were chasing him, the PI had little interest in slowing.

He’d never expected the job to be a simple one – no case was, when children were involved – but the real trouble had begun when he’d handed Winnipeg his cellphone.

The client was a fellow he’d worked with on a few other matters, although he was never entirely clear what the leather-jacketed customer’s interests were. He seemed to be some sort of life guru, although, in truth, Mulligan wasn’t quite sure – he was happy to take his cash, however, and, as Smith’s father had vouched for the swami’s integrity, he wasn’t losing any sleep over where it came from.

Unusual, though, was the amount of communication the man had required on this outing. He’d kept up a steady stream of prodding, via texts, and, as the private investigator was busy handling the wheel, he’d delegated the responsibility of replying to his occasional accomplice, Billy.

During their original rushed conversation, the client had demanded Mulligan approach the situation with extreme caution, so he’d opted to bring along his easily enraged Canadian friend. Beyond the warning, he’d also been provided a name, apparently straight from a business card the abductor had left in his possession. Poking around the alleged-snatcher’s credit information had initially brought few leads, but, just after lunch, a rental car appeared on the man’s Visa, and Smith was quick to hit the road after coaxing details out of a counter-jockey over at the Budget office.

Distance was the enemy then, so he’d made his next call while nosing his baby-blue car towards an on-ramp.

After the third try, the former client at the far end of the line had answered.

“Mulligan,” said the cracking male voice.

“Yep. Hey, listen, I need a favour.”

“I didn’t think you were calling to take me out for dinner.”

“Let’s not discuss your eating habits on the phone, you never know who might be listening.”

“Screw you, that Jenkem thing was years ago and I didn’t – ”

“Uh huh,” replied Smith, “listen, poo-huffer, I’m not all judgemental like your boss, so there’s no reason to explain to me. I’m just asking you to punch a rental license plate through your bleep-bloop-OnStar-bullpucky, and come up with a location for me – then I need you to do it again every half hour till I find the guy I’m looking for.”

“Is this really necessary?”

“Dorian, you know I don’t discuss details – unless its an emergency.” Mulligan had spun a little casual menace into his voice. “If you think about it, I’m pretty sure you prefer it that way – and, yeah, I assure you, this is an emergency.”

It was as he was jotting down the initial set of GPS coordinates that Smith had received the first request for information from the man paying him. That’s when he’d decided to promote Winnipeg to public relations.

For a time, things had proceeded smoothly. Accumulating only one speeding ticket, and catching a break when the hunted had apparently stopped for gas, a half-day’s worth of bent speed limits brought the pursuers directly behind the silver Buick in question.

Pulling alongside, Mulligan had confirmed the man in the driver seat as his suspect by his cheap suit and poor haircut, but he’d been surprised to also see a woman sitting in the rear. At first he’d thought she was terrified, as her eyes seemed unnaturally open, but a few seconds of observing her glazed look had left him wondering if she was aware of anything beyond the blanketed bundle she was absentmindedly holding to her chest.

The suit had broken off the conversation he appeared to be having with his companion – which she seemed in no condition to respond to – and gave the flanking Tercel a brief inspection.

Ignoring Winnipeg’s motions to pull over, the rented car had picked up speed.

“Give me the phone,” Mulligan had said.

“It’s out of juice,” was his friend’s sheepish reply.

“I just heard it ding like three seconds ago!”

“Yeah, but that was the last of it. Don’t you have a car charger?”

They’d been cresting a hill, and the long straightaway before them had given a perfect vantage point to the speed-trap ahead.

“No, but it doesn’t matter,” Mulligan had said, “we’ll have some company once he passes that cop, and we can straighten the whole thing out while the tot-toter is getting a ticket handed to him.”

The lead car had blown right by the black-and-white, which made no response.

“Stop napping and get back on the job!” Billy had shouted, as if he might rouse the slumberer.

Time and distance had grown short, and Smith had considered his client’s words regarding extra protection. Rummaging through the glove compartment, he’d retrieved a pistol.

“Uh,” Winnipeg had begun, while Mulligan cranked at his window. “I don’t think -”

Then the PI had fired five times, towards the clouds.

The inert siren had suddenly become quite active.

The cat-and-cat-and-mouse game continued for two more miles of open blacktop, then, without explanation, the rental jerked sideways, rolled onto its roof, and came to a stop not five feet from the line of trees that neighboured the road.

Leaving a thick black peel behind him, Mulligan made a U-turn, which was quickly imitated by the trailing patrol-car.

Grinding his already over-taxed vehicle to a halt, Smith lept from the car and down the gravel siding. Standing beside the nearest still-spinning rear-tire were Mulligan’s suspect, and a haggard woman who was taking turns attempting to wipe away her tears, and hold closed her ratty blue blouse.

To Mulligan’s practiced eye, she had the look of a working girl who’d aged badly while on her corner.

“Where’s the kid?” asked the PI.

“That son of a #####, magician” replied the hustler, wiping a smear of blood from his cheek. “I dont’ know how he did it, but he pulled me right off the highway. I don’t have the beast. He took it – carried it into the woods, by its neck.”

The responding officer approached the scene, weapon drawn, but the conversation he was overhearing was too interesting to break up immediately.

“You kidnap a baby,” said Winnipeg, “you hire a prostitute to tend it, then you try and tell me David Copperfield was waiting here to make it disappear? Have fun in prison pal, I’m sure your cellmates will find your spleen delicious.”

“It’s not like that, it’s – it’s not even a real child. The magician took it and, I’m sure, if you’ll just-”

Billy’s rebuttal to his solar-plexus ended the conversation.

“Hey now,” said the policeman, handcuffing the kidnapper while still keeping his weapon drawn. “This the same tyke I’ve been hearing about all morning? The bunch of you have a lot of explaining to do.”

Leading his captive to the rear-bench of his patrol car, the uniform began to rattle off a status update into his radio.

A black Chevy Lumina pulled to a stop just head of the parked Tercel, and a woman Mulligan didn’t recognize – wearing a Van Halen t-shirt, and a pair of jeans with a mustard stain on the left knee – stepped out of the passenger-side door, and stumbled down the embankment.

She was carrying a pamphlet of some sort, and, to Smith, it seemed as if she were attempting to avoid eye contact with anyone. When she walked passed him, he took a guess as to why – she stank of rum

The intruder beelined to the weeping hooker who was wiping a thick string of snot from her nose.

“C’mon,” the tipsy newcomer said, “don’t worry so much about that toddler, I’m sure he’s in a better place.”

Bunny was little interested in mentioning that she was on hand with Coffin, when, not sixty-seconds previous, he’d been holding the little brute’s mouth open with a rock, and wielding a pair of pliers in his free hand. Internally, she reminded herself not to look over at her ride’s trunk.

Meanwhile, Smith was chiding himself for not having considered that that might be why the woman had continued crying – he’d assumed she was complicit, and upset because of her capture.

“Can you tell me what happened?” asked Mulligan.

“He paid me fifty bucks…” started the mewling woman, ”I don’t really remember much. There was a baby, I know there was a baby – but, but it’s teeth…”

She broke down again.

“There’s a place for people who’ve, you know, uh, seen what you’ve seen,” said Bunny, reaching out to adjust the whimpering woman’s shirt, and tossing a sharp squint at the prying private detective. “It’s been around forever – it was started by some old dead bugger who saw a need to keep – I mean for, uh, special cases. Tough, long term, cases. I know its called the Sisters of Silence, but its not like a nunnery or anything – I asked and its OK if you still #### and drink and whatever. Work hard enough, and get clean, and, uh, maybe, you know, one day you might even meet that little ba – er, angel, again.”

Having concluded her proselytizing, and leaving behind her leaflet, the drunk hobbled back across the road and disappeared behind the tinted windows of the dark sedan.

After several hours of examination and explanation, and despite the lack of success in the official search for the infant, Smith found he had to smile: charging his phone revealed a missed, cryptic message from his client, indicating the child was somehow recovered and safe – and there was also the fact that Mulligan considered every moment of the incident to be billable.

 

(Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3)

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.

177 – Sgt Smith and The Discovery, Part 1 of 1

Welcome to Flash Pulp, episode one hundred and seventy-seven.

Flash Pulp

Tonight we present, Sgt Smith and The Discovery, Part 1 of 1.

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This week’s episodes are brought to you by The Shrinking Man Project.

 

Flash Pulp is an experiment in broadcasting fresh pulp stories in the modern age – three to ten minutes of fiction brought to you Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings.

Tonight, Sgt Smith recounts a tale from his time with the vice squad.

 

Flash Pulp 177 – Sgt Smith and The Discovery, Part 1 of 1

Written by J.R.D. Skinner
Art and Narration by Opopanax
and Audio produced by Jessica May

 

My Dearest Dundernoggin’,

Your mention of the Sweets last Sunday – and the hullabaloo surrounding that poor boy’s death – brought on an old memory from the depths of the leaky sieve that my gray matter has become.

Late in the ‘80s, I was working Capital City vice. There was this place at the far end of the industrial patch, a two-floor shanty that had been rezoned commercial and sold cheap. I knew the owners, Cooper and Collins, for a long time – they were nice, but their luck was poor and they were born into the wrong era. The bar was named, The Discovery, after Shackleton’s ship. They were massive history buffs, although I doubt any of the soused transvestites that frequented their place ever took much notice beyond the occasional opportunity to participate in themed costume nights.

Anyhow, they kept a relatively tidy place, and, even if it was in a rough end of town, any naughtiness happened off of the property. Despite its reputation, my memory is of a barroom full of folks just looking for a conversation with those of a like mind, which isn’t so different an idea than the place your Granddad frequented when I was a lad.

Doesn’t mean that the surrounding locals didn’t put up a lot of hassling at the station to have us do something about it. Different era I guess. I wasted many evenings drinking soda, trying to blend in, and keeping an eye out for anyone who might be attempting to pull a trick. I’m not saying it never happened, but I could have listed a half dozen street corners my hours would have been better spent watching.

Thing was, in some cases, the situation worked in favour of the regulars. That July and August, three guys had had their faces butchered, and one had found himself nearly castrated, all while walking home from a night’s worth of drinking. For a few weeks, my presence was actually pretty welcome.

There was a fellow, Daniel – he knew I was a cop, but he always seemed happy to have me at hand. Skittish when you first got to know him, but eager for a conversation once he realized you weren’t going to slug him.

This night, I’m sitting at the rail, underneath a picture of arctic explorers posing on an ice flow with a British flag, and I’m thinking it’s time to slip down the back way and through the alley that patrons looking to be a little more incognito usually took, when Danny starts heading to the washroom. I remember it distinctly, because I thought at first he was stumbling my way for a chat – he wasn’t, however, he was just listing from too many glasses of rosé, and his high heels were throwing him off course.

There was a pause, no longer than a minute’s worth, then he comes back. He’s a lot stiffer, and he’s got his hands in front of him. Frankly, at first I wondered if he’d been shot in the belly.

When he finally made it back to his table, he was coming around from his shock a bit, and every eye on the upper floor was on his slight face.

He held up a freshly severed thumb – not his own.

You could see a nub of bone protruding from the gory end, and it was still dripping.

Now, Aunt Clarice, the bartender, and the only natural woman in the building, was a stodgy broad. I’d seen her extract shattered glass from beneath a clumsy-handed reveller’s blood stained toga, and I’d seen her clench her fists against the occasional confused hick that would wander in to prove how not gay he was by starting a fight. In this case, she just stood there sputtering.

I can’t blame her, there’s something greatly unsettling in seeing a lone thumb. Although wordless, it asks: where is the person who ought to be attached to this digit, and how did they go about misplacing it?

At least a blood-drenched victim tends to babble an explanation.

The party was over immediately. No one had any interest in answering questions during the inevitable police response, and the place emptied in a glittering human explosion. Mid-deluge, I was guessing at the most likely destination for the newly-four-fingered man. The nearest exit to the bathroom was the route I’d considered earlier, so I dropped a few bills on the bar for Clarice, then threw myself into the flow, to be carried out to the cool night air.

Then we all came to a sudden halt.

I had to push my way up to the front, as the group had formed a sort of semi-circle with the open end facing a cinder block wall. Standing on a split trash bag was Timothy Buchanan. I knew the greasy little bugger because he’d spent quite a bit of time with Bobby Sweet, after they’d met in a halfway house.

Anyhow, Buchanan was holding this ridiculously over-sized folding knife – you know, brass with a faux-wood veneer, the kind of thing you buy for twenty bucks at a shady convenience store. It was stupidly huge – you’d expect the A-Team to mount it on the front of their van. He seemed to be getting tired just waving it, but that might have because of his missing ear. Not a Van Gogh half-job either: the whole bloody thing was hanging from where his lobe had once resided. It was held on by a stringy bit of flesh that looked like hot-dog skin.

As I moved to the opening, I saw Mint, another regular, being directed by friends back towards the bar. His cheeks were full of blood, and his thumb was missing.

I’ll be damned if I’ve ever seen forty fitter men in one place. If I hadn’t dragged Buchanan off to serve his sentence, he would have been missing a lot more than his quality of hearing – I think they’d have likely found him in a dumpster somewhere on the east side of town.

He was only tried for the single assault, and for a while I felt like maybe he should have gotten a longer sentence, as, when he went in, the attacks stopped. Later on, though, after nesting with a lifer, I heard he decided to settle down pretty permanently on the inside.

Everyone has a path to walk, I guess.

Love you,
Dad

 

Flash Pulp is presented by http://skinner.fm, and is released under the Canadian Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 License.

Text and audio commentaries can be sent to skinner@skinner.fm, or the voicemail line at (206) 338-2792 – but be aware that it may appear in the FlashCast.

We’d also like to thank the following members of the Freesound Project

– and thanks to you, for reading. If you enjoyed the story, tell your friends.