The Jar and Other Stories, page 1
THE JAR AND OTHER STORIES
By Edward Lee
A Macabre Ink Production
Macabre Ink is an imprint of Crossroad Press
Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press
Smashwords edition published at Smashwords by Crossroad Press
Crossroad Press digital edition 2024
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Meet the Author
Edward Lee is the author of over 50 horror, fantasy, and sci-fi novels, and dozens of short stories. He has also had comic scripts published by DC Comics, Verotik Inc., and Cemetery Dance. Many of his novels have been reprinted in Germany, Poland, Japan, Italy, Russia, Spain and other countries. He is a Bram Stoker Award Nominee; his Lovecraftian novel INNSWICH HORROR won the 2010 Vincent Price Award for Best Foreign Book (Austria), his novel WHITE TRASH GOTHIC won the 2018 Splatterpunk Award for Best Extreme Horror Novel, and his collaborative novella HEADER 3 (with Ryan Harding) won for Best Extreme Novella. In 2020 Lee won the J.F. Gonzales Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2009, the movie version of his novella HEADER was released by Synapse Films and is available now on Tubi; several of his novels are currently under option. Lee has also sold a collaborative film script (with David Hayes) to Sub Rosa Studios; the film is tentatively entitled OUIJA SLUMBER PARTY, and has a release date in mid-2025. Lee is a U.S. Army veteran and lives in Seminole, Florida.
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“GPS” copyright © 2024 by Edward Lee. Appears here for the first time.
“The Baby Shower” copyright © 2023 by Edward Lee. Originally appeared in Obituaries 4, limited-edition, summer 2023.
“A Very Bad Day in Hell” copyright © 2022 by Edward Lee. Originally appeared as a bonus story in the Crossroad Press edition of City Infernal, June 2023.
“6-Thirteen” copyright © 2022 by Edward Lee. Originally appeared as a bonus story in the Crossroad Press edition of Infernal Angel, June 2023.
“The Bounce House” copyright © 2022 by Edward Lee. Originally appeared as a chapbook by Madness Heart Press, March 2023.
“The Jar” copyright © 2024 by Edward Lee. Appears here for the first time.
Table of Contents
* * *
GPS
The Baby Shower
A Very Bad Day in Hell
6-Thirteen
The Bounce House
The Jar
GPS
“You have arrived at your destination, Number Three, Mirror Lake Road,” informed the GPS navigator in a drab female voice.
Deb was relieved to hear the sound of gravel crunching under the red Fiesta’s tires. Finally, she thought. The four-hour drive seemed like eight, what with Kipper in the passenger seat the whole way, jabbering about himself, fiddling with the Sirius, and constantly bitching about being hungry and horny.
She parked just as Uncle Nort’s cabin loomed into view within the copse of trees. It was bigger than she’d remembered it, a genuine log cabin with a metal roof.
“Ooo.” Kipper made the hackneyed remark. “A cabin in the woods. Creepy.”
It kind of…was. It had just the right amount of wear and tear and surrounding overgrowth to actually look sinister. In truth, Deb had always been a bit skittish about such stuff: the idea of ghosts or knife-wielding madmen or the things that went bump in the night. But she simply couldn’t pass up the money.
“So this is your Uncle Don’s place?” Kipper said. He had a bad habit of squeezing his crotch anytime he wanted, which he did at this precise moment.
Deb frowned. “My Uncle Nort. He rented it for two weeks each summer since I was a little kid—I used to love coming here. Then he flat out bought the place when he retired, kissed the city goodbye, and never looked back. Wish I could do that.”
“What, leave the city? Leave me?” Kipper joked.
Damn right, leave you, you walking sperm-machine. She’d gotten sick of Kipper’s sexual prowess long ago, a prowess which included a nine-inch dong as fat as one of those big dill pickles floating in the barrels at the deli. So what? she thought. A lot of good that got me…
Just before Deb got out of the car, she caught an inadvertent glance at her thirty-year-old face in the rearview. Fuck, she thought. I look forty. Vague dark circles under the eyes, crow’s feet, and some preliminary wrinkles. Where’s my life gone? Partying with pretty-boy ex-cons like Kipper. Too old to strip, too beat to do porn anymore. Fuck…
Now, this was likely too severe a condemnation; her face still retained some vestiges of its former cheerleader prettiness, and her body, though starting to sag in places, could still walk the walk in the right light. But Deb was at that grim moment of revelation all women encountered just when they least expected it. She wasn’t a young hottie anymore.
So I better make the best of it…
She popped the trunk, grabbed her suitcase with one hand and her equipment box with the other. Kipper slung his own duffle over his right shoulder but ignored the remaining grocery bags. “Come on, Kip!” she barked. She trudged toward the cabin’s front door. “You can carry more than that!”
“Naw, babe. See, I need my left hand free so’s I can feel up your beautiful ass,” and then his left hand slipped around and…felt up her ass. Next he slid down her tacky sweatpants to expose her bare rump. “Yessir, that’s angel food cake, the cutest, tightest ass I ever seen.” He rubbed around and squeezed. “Like a eighteen-year old’s.”
Deb half-smiled. She knew he was bullshitting, but at least it made her feel better.
“Nice digs,” Kipper said as they entered, immediately greeted by a nice piney, woody scent. As large as the house seemed on the outside, it felt much closer inside, much more cozy. The long half-log walls lent a perfect in-the-wilds ambiance, peppered with framed photos and paintings of such stuff as one would expect: wildlife, endless stretches of landscapes and forest tops, one even with a single ranger-tower poking up out of the infinite sea of pines.
Kipper dropped his duffle bag on an oak-framed couch, then rubbed his crotch. “So how long do we have the place?”
“Ten whole days. Uncle Nort’s vacationing in Switzerland.”
“And how much is he paying us to house-sit?”
“Kiss my ass, buster. He’s paying me a grand. It’s my gig, and so are my webcam and OnlyFans gigs. A setting like this is unique.”
“Yeah. Unique.”
Just as Deb was essentially unemployed (since she’d been shown the door of the last strip joint in town), Kipper was unemployed as well, unless one considered selling his grandmother’s painkillers employment, exploiting his power-of-attorney over her bank accounts (just a nip here and a nip there. No big deal, right?) and “slinging” whatever petty drugs he could downtown. Together, the two of them were on a slow boat going down, but at least they hadn’t sunk yet. And the grand she’d be getting for this house-sitting venture would help out a lot.
Several throw rugs topped the main room’s shiny hard-planked floor, mostly rife with rustic scenes embroidered on them, and even one faux bearskin rug complete with a dummy head. The rusticness fell a notch when it came to the entertainment center facing the couch: surround-sound stereo, multiple video-game platforms, and an 86-inch 4k flat panel.
Kip was astonished. “Wow! Can’t wait to see some porn clips on that screen!”
Deb groaned to herself.
In the west wall was a huge, screened fieldstone fireplace, not that they’d be needing it in the summer. Even if it were winter, Deb knew that cutting firewood was not something Kipper might avail himself to. Cutting farts? Yes. Cutting lines of coke? Yes. But not cutting firewood, nope, no way. All those muscles for nothing…
More rustic decor was found in the kitchen, the only items being out of place were an extra-wide double-doored refrigerator, a separate freezer, and a wine fridge. Kipper didn’t even ask; he was popping open a pricey-looking bottle of wine before Deb had finished looking around.
“Give Uncle Nort a break, huh? A least drink the cheap stuff,” she said.
No glasses were necessary, evidently; Kipper just started chugging from the bottle neck. A moment later, he’d found a big jar of peanut butter and was gouging out divots with his fingers.
“For fuck’s sake, Kip! You’re a Neanderthal.”
“A meander-what?” he asked, sucking blobs of Jif off his big fingers.
Next, the bedroom, she thought. There were actually several, but she couldn’t remember what the master bedroom was like.
Wow… A high four-poster bed took up half the room, and the posts were fashioned by varnished larch logs. This would make for some great shots for her OnlyFans page and her Patreon. It would give her typical stuff a brand-new look. This’ll work just fine! She brought in her case full of her sexy lingerie and all her “toys,” then she set up her laptop on the bed, because she knew she’d get no work done in the living room, where Kipper would no doubt have his eyes glued to every T&A flick on cable.
She went back outside to bring in the groceries, realizing then that she’d forgotten to buy a lot of what she’d intended. She half noticed the GPS navigator screen fizzing in and out, and a message that read CALIBRATING ALTERNATE LOCATIONS, whatever that meant. That fuckin’ thing cost a fortune; it better not be crapping out!
Outside was gorgeous, perfectly still and silent, save for a few chirping birds; the blaze of the day was slipping away. She grinned at the new, cool, tranquil environment, which seemed enchanting; it made her feel as though she were falling under a spell that she could never experience in the city. Between the distant trees, a westering sun dragged molten orange light down between the trunks, and wisps of mist seemed to exude from the plush carpet of detritus that reached beyond as far as she could see. At once her oblique mood dissipated, and she could actually say she felt happy for the first time in a while.
Kipper was asleep on the couch already, snoring. Was it possible he was actually rubbing his crotch in his sleep? Deb didn’t want to know. She returned to the bedroom and set up the camera and tripod right at the foot of the bed. Some of her clients paid extra for “private” shots and vid clips more explicit than most. All in day’s work, she realized. A girl’s gotta do anything she can to make money. In THIS day and age? You ain’t kidding…
She smiled when she got down to the bottom of the suitcase; she’d almost forgotten. What she pulled out was a Ouija board, the glow-in-the-dark kind. One client was paying righteous money for Deb to do a naked Ouija board session and attempt to call up any spirits that might be lingering. The prospect daunted her a little, but what harm could there be? Even if there were such things as ghosts, she’d read someplace that there was no record of a ghost ever hurting anyone.
She showered languidly, relishing the water carrying away the grime of the long ride. Next, she plopped herself belly-side down on the bed and began to half-doze at once. Her brain felt cluttered with all the goings-on of the day, but just as her mind approached the dusk of consciousness, all these cares were usurped by feelings of comfortable contentment. She smiled as the promise of sleep titillated her, and she seemed to be imagining herself roaming silently through the woods, through the fragrant scents of nature and beneath dappled starlight—just as she had when coming here as a child. Chasing fuzz-balls and whirlybirds, swimming in the lake, watching the squirrels frolic in the towering trees…
She fell into the most pleasant sleep she’d had in a long time, until—
A sudden phantom weight pressed the wind out of her; she gasped as her entire body tensed up. Something huge penetrated her with no warning—a cock, a hard cock, lubricated with God knew what. The throbbing thing seemed to barge right up her sphincter, like a rat plowing into its lair. Then it banged briskly in and out of the tight confine. Each stroke flattened her more on her belly, pressing more air out of her.
But at least it only lasted a minute.
“Damn you, Kip, you inconsiderate fuck!”
“What?” He was already finished, already getting up from the deed. “I thought you liked it up the heinie.”
“Well, I don’t!” she snapped back. She felt the warm spurtle of semen lolling around in her bowel like a hot tadpole. “You don’t just fuck a woman in the ass when she’s asleep!”
“Huh?” He refastened his belt. “Oh, sorry. I’m gonna cook some hot dogs. You want any?”
“NO!” she bellowed.
Kip moseyed off to the kitchen. Her senses couldn’t have been more disarranged: her rage at him, her rage at herself, and then the avalanche of despair that always stalked her when she realized what a mess she’d made of her life.
Feeling icky, she took another shower, and didn’t even want to think about the semen that was still loitering up her butt. I’ll get rid of it later… She had things to do tonight, and she was surprised when she looked at the clock: 10 p.m. It was time to get online and address some of her webcam fans. She put on a pink teddy with a split crotch and logged on.
Here was HARD4EVR, putting $35 into her Venmo to insert the vibrating egg in herself and have an orgasm (in reality, pretend to have an orgasm.) No problem. The next guy, FarKingHell, tagged her with fifty, to see her max out her nipples with the nipple pump. No big deal, and it actually felt sort of electrifying. Here was another fifty, from DickStanding, to strip nude and rub baby oil all over herself. SORRY, she typed to him, THAT’S MESSY. 75 OR NOTHING. A moment later, her Venmo dinged, and she was in business. It went like this for over an hour, but then a few regulars started slapping down a hundred at a time. Usually she’d get an oddball, and sure enough, here he was: BrownEyeSly.
His text read, I’LL PAY 500 FOR YOU TO LUBE UP A BAGUETTE AND STICK IT IN AS FAR AS IT’LL GO. Deb winced. YOU MEAN LIKE A FRENCH BREAD? she typed back, irked. YES, he replied. IT DOESN’T HAVE TO BE TOO FAT, JUST LONG.
What is with these guys?
Then she typed back I DON’T HAVE A FUCKIN FRENCH BREAD! and to this he responded quite reasonably, WELL, DO YOU THINK YOU COULD GET ONE FOR 500 BUCKS? TOMORROW NIGHT, SAME TIME?
An image locked in her mind’s eye: herself, spread-eagled on the bed…
With a French bread stuck in my cooch.
But it was five hundred dollars…
YEAH, SURE, she typed back. WHY NOT?
At the end of the session, she saw she’d made out pretty well. She could go to one of the other cam sites and do live-mic, but… Fuck it. I don’t feel like talking dirty tonight. That gig was more tiring than one might think.
Remaining online wouldn’t be necessary for what came next; she was merely to videograph herself, naked, using the Ouija board. No time like the present, she reasoned. She rearranged the camera, diverted the angle a bit, then placed the board on the bed. The client, whose screen name was MILES LONG, was paying a lot for this private job, and he’d amplified his credibility by transferring half of the money up front, always much appreciated.
MILES had communicated some modest instructions too: only candles burning, no electric lights, have a partner watch the board closely and write down any letters that the planchette might indicate. Was there anyone specifically Miles wanted to reach on the “other side”? A dead relative, etc.? No. Were there any specific questions she should ask, any special way he wanted her to conduct herself? “No,” Miles had texted her. “Just be naked and ask whatever you want. Just ask stuff like the ghost people on TV ask.”
“Piece of cake,” she muttered to herself.
She got rid of the teddy and walked out of the bedroom, but stopped as if hit in the face with a two-by-four. There was Kipper, lying nude on the couch with his legs spread like a wishbone, masturbating a mile a minute.
“Really?” she yelled. She could feel veins beating in her forehead. “You’re jerking off? You just butt-fucked me a few hours ago!”
Kip shrugged, looking over his shoulder. “Well, studly fellas like me, shit, we gotta cum, three, four times a day or we have a fit.”
Deb’s countenance of outrage doubled when she saw exactly what Kip was jerking off to on the huge TV.
“Really? You’re jerking off to Granny on the Beverly Hillbillies?”
“No, no, hon. Ellie May and…sometimes Miss Jane. That’s one pipe cleaner bitch I’d love to lay me some dick on.” And then he continued with his mission.
