Liars' League

When duppy does come, who are you? by Clarissa Angus

Read by Sophie Cartman (final story in podcast, here - find it at 1:30:10)

Under an obsidian sky with no stars, Kiyane crouches by the chicken coop in the yard behind mistress house. She doesn’t know what to do. Going back inside might mean she would dead. Hiding in the yard might see her get catch and could dead, too. She covers her ears, but that does no good. She can still hear every dying scream of her kin, the other folks trapped inside the house, before they fall away, leaving only the creeping silence of their killer.

When duppy come, you should run ‘way
When duppy come, them nah speak but them stay
Duppy is mean, but duppy is few
When duppy does come, who are you?

Skinning the Cat by Lanay Griessner

Read by Silas Hawkins (5th story in podcast, here)

I’m sorry I'm late, but skinning the cat took longer than I had expected. People always say that there is more than one way to skin a cat, but it's a lie. There is only one way to skin a cat: a progressive lifting and separating motion, like peeling a ripe avocado with a spoon. 

I honestly should have known better. It's not the first time I've done it. I spent my whole Anatomy course stooped over a formaldehyde-soaked cat carcass wrapped up in a garbage bag for safe keeping. I still remember my astonishment looking down into the body when I remembered that this moist bunch of deflated balloons was once coughing up hairballs. I also remember that if you pulled on a tendon with the surgical equivalent of a crochet hook you could make the paw twitch. Memories.

By the Flower, not the Axe by Leila Murton Poole

Read by Clareine Cronin (fifth story in podcast, here, at 55:15)

The King always has blood beneath his fingernails. It is all I think about as he touches me, clumsily, with bloated hands that struggle to obey his desires. Rusty flakes crumble onto my skin, the dried blood of hunted deer and boar though they may as well belong to one of my predecessors. Henry sees his wives as dispensable, to serve his purpose and nothing more. The ghosts of his beheaded wives surround the bed, chanting a word that drowns out his grunts of carnal desire.

Run.

Come Find Me, by Pat Black

Read by Lisa Rose (second story in podcast, here)

Put your hands over your eyes and count to ten.

No peeking; not even a tiny bit. Block out the light. Don’t let in enough to see red at the edges.

That’s your flesh, you know. That’s your blood. The dark bit in the middle? That’s your bones.

I’ll be around the trees somewhere. You need to know, not just where to look, but how to look. This deep in the forest, light plays tricks. I could be standing right in front of you. You wouldn’t know. I’m hard to see, and I’m even harder to catch. No-one’s caught me yet. Would you like to know how?

Be Lucky, Girls by Hannah Downes

Read by Lucy Mabbitt (first story in podcast: click here)

Esme’s heart beats so quickly that even super fast songs, 160 beats per minute, sound as though they’re in slow motion.

My pulse could outrun anything, she thinks to herself as she lies awake each night, her bedsheets palpitating in time with the blood pumping fast through her veins.

The thought that her pulse could outrun anything is something of a comfort to Esme when she reads news headlines, daily, about women being raped, murdered, deleted from her city. And yet she still cannot will herself to close both eyes.