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  TOYBOX

  By Al Sarrantonio

  First Digital Edition published by Crossroad Press

  Copyright 2011 by Al Sarrantonio

  Copy-edited by Patricia Lee Macomber

  Cover image by: Vincent Hie http://www.vhproductions.com

  Cover Design by David Dodd

  LICENSE NOTES:

  This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return the vendor of your choice and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  ALSO FROM AL SARRANTONIO & CROSSROAD PRESS

  Novels:

  Moonbane

  Collections:

  Halloween & Other Seasons

  Unabridged Audiobooks:

  Moonbane: In production

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  "Gems of weirdness."

  —Publishers Weekly

  "Will linger long after you've closed the book."

  —SF Chronicle

  "Each and every one a gem."

  —Joe R. Lansdale

  "These stories sneak up on you, then slam down on your head when it's too late ... a dark treasure chest full of incomparable horror fiction."

  —Edward Lee, author of Monstrosity

  "A very talented writer."

  —Washington Post Book World

  "A writer of great stories."

  —Raymond E. Feist

  "A true creative wonder, an artist."

  —Thomas F. Monteleone, author of The Reckoning

  Introduction copyright © 1999 by Joe R. Lansdale

  “Pumpkin Head” copyright © 1982 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Terrors.

  “The Man With Legs” copyright © 1983 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Shadows 6.

  “The Spook Man” copyright © 1982 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Twilight Zone Magazine.

  “Wish” copyright © 1985 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Shadows 8.

  “Under My Bed" copyright © 1981 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Shadows 4. “The Big House” copyright © 1999 by Al Sarrantonio.

  “Bogy” copyright © 1987 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Whispers VI.

  “The Corn Dolly” copyright © 1984 by Stuart David Schiff. First appeared in Whispers 21-22.

  “The Electric Fat Boy” originally appeared, in a substantially different form, as "The Meek" in Cemetery Dance Magazine. Copyright © 1990 by Al Sarrantonio.

  “Snow” copyright © 1996 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Realms of Fantasy Magazine.

  “Garden of Eden” originally appeared, in a slightly different form, in Cemetery Dance Magazine. Copyright © 1995 by Al Sarrantonio.

  “The Dust" copyright © 1982 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Death.

  “Father Dear” copyright © 1983 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Fears.

  “Children of Cain” copyright © 1989 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Stalkers.

  “Red Eve" copyright © 1991 by Al Sanantonio. First appeared in Under the Fang.

  “Pigs” copyright © 1987 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Shadows 10.

  “Richard's Head” copyright © 1991 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Obsessions.

  “Boxes” copyright © 1983 by Al Sarrantonio. First appeared in Shadows 5.

  For my Aunt Josephine and Uncle August

  who many, many Christmases ago gave

  me those Alfred Hitchcock anthologies

  and put ideas in my head.

  CONTENTS

  Introduction by Joe R. Lansdale

  Pumpkin Head

  The Man With Legs

  The Spook Man

  Wish

  Under My Bed

  The Big House

  Bogy

  The Corn Dolly

  The Electric Fat Boy

  Snow

  Garden of Eden

  The Dust

  Father Dear

  Children of Cain

  Red Eve

  Pigs

  Richard's Head

  Boxes

  AL SARRANTONIO, SHORT STORY BARON

  An introduction by Joe R. Lansdale

  When I first started trying to write seriously, I encountered stories by Al Sarrantonio, and as I began to sell, I encountered even more of his work, and always in better places than where I was appearing.

  Perhaps I should have been jealous. But I wasn't. It was obvious that he belonged in better places.

  He knocked me out. I wanted to be able to do the tricks he did with words. I looked everywhere for his stories, and though I can't say (sadly), that I found a lot of them, because I don't believe there are that many, each and every one I found was a gem.

  Later, when Al turned to novels, his short story production waned. There's a reason for this. Novels give you more bang for your buck. Meaning, a short story seldom made a writer more than a few dollars back then, and a novel paid better. Not a lot better, but better. And it had greater potential. Sadly, more people read novels than short stories, and are more willing to lay their money down for a novel length tale than a book of short ones.

  Books, at least theoretically, mean you have the chance of royalties. (Hah!) A following. A publisher that wants you to do more novels. A solid product that's more likely to be kept and held onto than a magazine containing one of your stories. Library space. And books help keep the Family happy because they get to eat, have a roof over their heads, and don't have to use a bucket to tote water from the stream. Or another bucket into which to deliver their morning constitutional and tote out of the house. Preferably not to the stream where the other bucket goes.

  If this sounds like I'm running the novel down, I'm not. I love them. But I'm saying this: the novel is not ignored. The short story is.

  That's the sad truth, brothers and sisters. But it's the truth.

  So, if you're gonna survive, you got to write novels.

  But, Al, though a solid novelist, is to my mind, at heart, a short story writer. Sure, his books are entertaining, but there's a unique magic, a special attitude, a personal stylistic attack, that belongs to his shorter fiction; he's one of those handful of writers who actually owns a big patch of the short story real estate. It might be said, as a novelist, Al rents out space. He certainly improves the property, but as a short story writer, well, we all have to back off and consider.

  For there, in short story land, he is a powerful land baron.

  I wanted desperately to wrest away a little of that real estate from him for myself.

  So I studied and probed his stories. Poked them with mental pokers, sliced them with imaginary scalpels, and finally came to the conclusion that there was no way I could understand his method. It was not mechanical. It was not something that could be dissected, examined, understood. It was, literally, just what it appeared to be.

  Magic, baby.

  Voodoo.

  Dat ole hoodoo from beyond that's got no explainin’.

  Yet, in spite of his tremendous magic, Sarrantonio is one of our most ignored short story writers. One of our most ignored writers.

  Shame on everygoddamnbody. He da man, dear hearts, and you got to know that.

  Maybe it's because his magic has appeared in so many places, and has never—I really find this hard to believe—never been collec
ted. This book, I hope, I beg, I plead, will remedy that lack of awareness.

  All you got to do folks is open the cover, get past this introduction, and get to the words.

  And then, the magic takes over.

  Sometimes, it's dark magic. Nasty magic. Sometimes it's white magic. But it's always magic.

  Let me point out my special loves.

  Pumpkin Head. Boxes. Richard's Head. The Man With Legs. The Dust. Father Dear. The Spook Man.

  Good grief. I'm going to name every story in the book. Who cares about my special loves. They are all tremendous.

  What Sarrantonio does in nearly all the aforementioned stories, is either make you feel like a child again, or he looks at his story with child-like eyes. And so do you. Everything is rich and bright. It's as if all the sensations you feel while reading his tales are being felt for the very first time. Sweet and sour. Hot and cold. Dark and light. Sad and happy.

  His prose is often poetic. A touch of Bradbury's poetry perhaps. The Bradbury of THE OCTOBER COUNTRY. A bit of Charles Beaumont's sly meanness. A lot of Robert Bloch's cleverness. Fred Brown's too. But, finally, and without question, these stories are Al Sarrantonio's.

  As, I said, in the real estate of the short story, he does not rent out space. He owns it.

  But let me tell you, dear hearts. To enter into these stories, to stand on their terrain, even if you are trespassing, is more than worth it. You may not own the land beneath your feet, but by being here in this magical place, you will be transformed, and you will never be able to leave.

  You can close the book, of course, but it's too late. Al's done done his thing.

  The man with legs will tap about in your head, pumpkin head's noggin will loom forever, and you'll never quite think of boxes in the same way. Or even little wads of dust.

  That's a writer, dear hearts. That's what it's really about. He or she doesn't merely entertain you. They own a part of you.

  Forever.

  Look, I know. I just said it, but it bears repeating, and I'll say it again. A good writer, and Al Sarrantonio is that, owns you.

  Because you become part of their real estate. No matter where you go, after reading these stories, Sarrantonio's got a piece of you. It's worth the slavery.

  It has its benefits.

  So don't be afraid.

  And to make the rest of us writers feel even more frustrated, Al's a pretty nice guy.

  But take this book and turn the page and trespass on Al's property. Go ahead. Take the step.

  It was In-Between time.

  In-Between time: a brown and gray morning somewhere in the middle of January slush and March's chill-rain. December was dead; the Christmas tree was firewood and the ornaments—the delicate glass bulbs, the shining tin angel the flickering tinkerbell lights—were packed away The presents were scattered to the four corners of the shimmer-glass house, some broken, others broken, mended and broken again. Thanksgiving was dead Easter unborn. New Year's had been put to bed growing old. Summer was decades away; the 4th of July, a hazy distant dream.

  It was In-Between time: and Selene brooded all morning, pacing from top to bottom of the shimmer-glass house, shaking her raven curls, stamping her slippered feet. "Bored, bored," is what she said, moving with a sigh from the stuffy attic to the cold-smelling cellar. The playroom was boring, the kitchen boring, the teleview room boring. Outside, dull-barked, unleafed trees, drooping, waiting for the gray rain, were boring. The other shimmer-glass houses, lined up like crystal dominoes along the block, were boring.

  Selene settled on the living room floor, brushed the fibers of the cranberry rug first this way, then that. She would wait for the boring morning to turn to boring afternoon and then boring night. Then she would climb into her boring bed and sleep dull sleep. Thus would pass In-Between time: sleeping at night, by day brushing the dull rug until either spring came or she brushed her way right down to China—which was probably boring too.

  But then—

  The doorbell rang.

  Ding-Dong!

  Bing-Bong!

  A thrill went up little Selene's spine. That was not the way doorbells in shimmer-glass houses usually rang—usually they buzzed with the vapid sound of a weak mosquito.

  It rang again: Ding-Dong!

  And again: Bing-Bong!

  This was not boring.

  Selene almost reached the door before her legs did. "One, two, three," she counted.

  She threw open the door.

  Christmas assaulted her eyes—and Thanksgiving, Halloween and the 4th of July. There was a whirlwind of holiday colors, green, red and orange and black, a tornado of sparkler lights and circus bulbs. The cyclone moved by, off into the living room, and when Selene ran in puffing with excitement it settled right on the cranberry rug where she had started her boring trip to China.

  The whirlwind of light subsided.

  And there stood...a man.

  He wasn't a man, exactly. His face and hands were painted too brightly white, his boots were too black, his pants and vest and tall cap too red. His buttons were large brass sunsets. His eyes were flat black circles, and his lips red brushstrokes that looked still wet.

  In his hands he held...a BOX

  There was surely black enamel somewhere in the world that looked as bright and liquid and deeply painted as this, but Selene hadn't seen it till now. This black enamel looked like deep midnight itself, splashed on and somehow sticking. The box had blinding silver hinges and a lid attached and on the lid in bright yellow letters, was the word:

  T*O*Y*S

  “Who—“ Selene began.

  But her mouth fell open silent as the figure suddenly bent, stiffly at the waist, like a soldier, and set the box before her.

  “Not boring,” he said, in a voice like Father's when something good happened. He turned his head sideways to regard her with his flat black ryes. “Would you like to see?”

  And before Selene could answer he had pulled the lid up on the toybox so that Selene could look down into it.

  It went on forever. There was a toyshop down there—a toyshop so wide and especially long that Selene could not see the end of it. On shelves and in glass cases toys sat, some crowded so close together they touched like kisses. Everything was amber lit, the color of dust motes.

  TOYS.

  There were drums and planes and wagons and blocks. And where there wasn't one toy there were three.

  “Would you like to play?” the Toyman whispered, bending his voice close to Selene's ear. “Would you like to see what these toys can do?”

  And again, before she could answer “Yes!” the Toyman read her mind.

  “See,” he said

  Selene gasped happily

  And there, down at the far reaches of the toyshop, in the dim recesses, something floated off a dusty wood shelf. Something orange, bright and round, with a cutout mountain-peak grin and two triangle eyes, something burning bright and strong within that flew at her down the corridor like a live and screaming thing....

  PUMPKIN HEAD

  An orange and black afternoon.

  Outside, under baring, but still-robust trees, leaves tapped across sidewalks, a thousand fingernails drawn down a thousand dry blackboards.

  Inside, a party was beginning.

  Ghouls loped up and down aisles between desks, shouting “Boo!” at one another. Crepe paper, crinkly and the colors of Halloween, crisscrossed over blackboards covered with mad and frightful doodlings in red and green chalk: snakes, rats, witches on broomsticks. Windowpanes were filled with cut-out black cats and ghosts with no eyes and giant O's for mouths.

  A fat jack-o'-lantern, flickering orange behind its mouth and eyes and giving off spicy fumes, glared down from Ms. Grinby's desk.

  Ms. Grinby, young, bright, and filled with enthusiasm, left the room to chase an errant goblin-child, and one blackboard witch was hastily labeled “Teacher.” Ms. Grinby, bearing her captive, returned, saw her caricature, and smiled. “All right, who did this?”
she asked, not expecting an answer and not getting one. She tried to look rueful. “Never mind; but I think you know I don't really look like that. Except maybe today.” She produced a witch's peaked hat from her drawer and put it on with a flourish.

  Laughter.

  “Ah!” said Ms. Grinby, happy.

  The party began.

  Little bags were handed out, orange and white with freshly twisted tops and filled with orange and white candy corn.

  Candy corn disappeared into pink little mouths.

  There was much yelling, and the singing of Halloween songs with Ms. Grinby at the piano, and a game of pin the tail on the black cat. And then a ghost story, passed from child to child, one sentence each:

  “It was a dark and rainy night—”

  “—and...Peter had to come out of the storm—”

  “—and he stopped at the only house on the road—”

  “—and no one seemed to be home—”

  “—because the house was empty and haunted—”

  The story stopped dead at the last seat of the first row.

  All eyes focused back on that comer.

  The new child.

  “Raylee,” asked Ms. Grinby gently, “aren't you going to continue the story with us?”

  Raylee, new in class that day; the quiet one, the shy one with black bangs and big eyes always looking down, sat with her small, grayish hands folded, her dark brown eyes straight ahead like a rabbit caught in a headlight beam.

  “Raylee?”

  Raylee's thin pale hands shook.

  Ms. Grinby got up quickly and went down the aisle, setting her hand lightly on the girl's shoulder.

  “Raylee is just shy,” she said, smiling down at the unmoving top of the girl's head. She knelt down to face level, noticing two round fat beads of water at the corner of the girl's eyes. Her hands were clenched hard.

  “Don't you want to join in with the rest of us?” Ms. Grinby whispered, a kindly look washing over her face. Empathy welled up in her. “Wouldn't you like to make friends with everyone here?”