Beautiful Bones

Here’s part 3 of my new Damon the Demon story, Cemetery Blues…Read from the beginning here.

Damon ducked back inside his mausoleum and swapped the knitted blanket around his shoulders for a long waterproof coat. Before exiting, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror and was horrified to see that he looked like a monster axe-murderer from a cheesy horror film. Damon didn’t believe in encouraging the negative stereotypes that the living had of both the dead and undead, but he didn’t really have time to change.

Once back outside, he was pleased to see the rain, which was still falling, was doing so with less gusto. He pulled the hood of his coat over his head, while Jabez grabbed at the hem of his own coat and pulled it up over his head.

‘So now can you tell me where we are going?’

‘To see Shelly the Skelly, but you’re going to need to brace yourself.’

Damon understood the warning as soon as he saw her lying on the ground. ‘Oh my! Shelly! What’s happened?’

Damon, ignoring how wet the ground was, knelt down beside a gleaming white, slightly disarticulated skeleton. Her clothes, of which she took a great deal of pride, were in a right state.

Shelly the Skelly had once been a beautiful woman, admired by many for her looks and her sense of style. Now she was dead – and had been for a very long time – she liked to dress up in fancy clothes, like she used to. However, she had never quite realised that the beauty she had in life hadn’t translated that well in death. Her smile was more frightening than charming, and her come hither look with her empty eye sockets were not alluring but the stuff nightmares were made of. Still, she gave it a good bash.

‘Oh Damon! They were so beastly!’ Her bones were shaking as she spoke. Whether through fear, anger or upset, Damon had yet to determine.

‘Who were so beastly?’

‘Those people.’

‘What people?’

‘The people who took my bones.’ At this, Shelly wailed.

Damon took off his coat and wrapped Shelly in it. ‘Let’s get you out of this rain, shall we? Then you can tell me everything.’

Damon picked up the skeleton as best as he could. Early on in her death, she had arranged to have the bony remains of her body wired together like skeletons you found in medical teaching colleges. It was a painful procedure, but it gave her the freedom of movement she had been lacking. When Damon lifted her up, he understood the trauma she had gone through that night. Some of the wires holding her together had been cut. If he wasn’t careful, she would fall to pieces in his arms.

He got her to the closest bone house and laid her out on top of a flat-topped tomb. Jabez was sent back outside to keep an eye on the crime scene.

‘You’re such a good friend,’ Shelly whispered laying a hand on Damon’s forearm.

Damon straightened out her red wig. ‘Tell me everything you remember.’

‘Well, I was taking my nightly walk through the cemetery. It was quiet. No-one seemed to be about. Then, from out of nowhere, jumped these…these…people. I didn’t get a good look at them afraid. Couldn’t even tell if they were living or dead. One of them pushed me over and I fell.

‘“What did you do that for?” I asked.

‘And one of them said, “Quick, get her bones now, and make sure they’re a matching pair.”

‘I said, “Over my dead body. Nobody’s having my bones but me.”

‘And then they all laughed. One of them cut my strings and stole a pair of my rib bones. My rib bones!’ At this point, Shelly, understandably, became a little hysterical.

To be continued…

Read Part 4 Here

Written for: 13 Days of Samhain vol iii: Day 3: Over My Dead Body