The driver scuttles out, black suit, black shades, white shirt, black tie—a caricature of driver. He looks at the house and shifts his shoulders as if a personal expectation has been fulfilled. He moves to the rear passenger door, opens it. A woman emerges, back straight, face blank. She’s older than Renie, younger than Victoria, but everyone is younger than Victoria.
Read MoreLuminaria
The Manila Times predicted March 30th would be a scorcher, the hottest day so far this year. The aswang called it a perfect opportunity to hunt and went to pack the cargo van.
Read MoreServant of the Aswang
Barely a sliver of skin was left exposed to the sun’s glare, but there was a whisper in the back of her mind that it didn’t really matter anymore. It didn’t matter if she had soft and beautiful skin, because the God in the Pit had made his decision and never unmade them.
Read MoreYou Too Shall Be PsycheThe printing nozzles skittered back and forth with eerie grace, laying strands of snow-white tendon over black carbon-fiber bone.
Read MoreSt. Theophilus the PenitentShe watched him basking in the dawn by the river, the butterfly man. She gave chase, with net and long legs, and he was eagerly captivated. She held her breath and him close, and he stayed still in her hands.
Read MoreButterfly ManTucked in the curtains of her balcony, the girl watches the parade march below, but she cannot feel the scorch of it. The crowds shout with gleaming teeth and poison tongues, the voices of madmen and soothsayers, creatures with glass hearts and dreamers selling their nightmares in bittersweet trades. Demand is high. Supply, too, is high.
Read MoreAs Long as You Can Stand ItBishop frowned and grabbed me around the waist, fingers tightening around my abdomen. He licked my cheek. I knew I should have felt the wetness, but there was only the pressure of his tongue against my skin, snaking over my ear and into my hair.
Read MoreThe BellsBrit lowered her wooden sword and sighed. She loved her students. But the girls kept hesitating, getting hung up on the moves, lagging behind. The three boys in the class of nine had stayed with her through the form, but when they thought she wasn’t looking they whaled at the ground with their weapons like taiko drummers. Could they be any more clichéd?
Read MoreQueen of DirtIt’s been a whole month since anyone’s seen Vera, and the circumstances of us finally seeing her this weekend are going to be ultra grody-odd, so I deliberate forever doing my Face. In the end I decide to go subtle: an airbrushed conglom of three of my most flattering private snaps, plus Holly Rexroat-Carrow’s lips and Sofia Lawless’s cheekbones from that Vogue shoot she did on the Moon. Nothing too recent, nothing that’ll make Vera feel like she is way, way unsynched and missing out on all kinds of hot shit. Which she has been, obviously.
Read MoreMasked