Funny Horror (Unidentified Funny Objects Annual Anthology Series of Humorous SF/F) Read online

  I am a werewolf. I hate silver. Silver hates me.

  I started to cry and Amanda came in and took the silver tray away from Louise and said "Louise, what what what have you done to your little playmate, and with the silver tray that my dear grandmamma gave me? It is of great sentimental value to me and completely irreplaceable. Look, you have bent it. It will cost a lot of money to have it fixed."

  That was when Louise grabbed the silver tray back and ran to the window and just flung it open and threw that tray right out into the air like it was a paper airplane. Then she said, "Look! I just saved you a lot of money. I want some chocolate ice cream now. Call Room Service and charge it, Buzzard-face."

  Here is what Amanda said: "They don't pay me enough to put up with this sort of crap."

  Here is what Louise said: "What did you just say?"

  Here is what else Amanda said: Nothing.

  Louise smiled. "That's what I thought." And we had chocolate ice cream.

  While we were eating, the frog dog came over and bit me on the arm. He didn't do it hard enough to make me bleed, like when he turned me into a werewolf. He did it just enough so I would look at him. Then he rolled his googly eyes at me and at the door to the bathroom.

  I got up and said "I have to go to the bathroom."

  Louise said, "Who cares?" She grabbed my chocolate ice cream before I could take even one half of a step away from it and gobbled it down as I was walking away, but I didn't care because the frog dog was walking right beside me all the way into that bathroom.

  I shut the door behind us and sat down on the toilet lid. The frog dog sat down on a big pink fluffy bath mat and looked at me tilty. "It's a good thing you found me," he said. "You never should've run away after I bit you. Something could've happened to you, and you're the One!"

  "I am not one," I said. "I am six."

  He said, "Spare me the cute stuff. I have been around this town since before Peter Stuyvessant learned how to pee without getting any on his wooden leg and I know my stuff. I am the Vessel of Lycanthropy, which makes me like the Holy Grail for werewolves everywhere in the greater New York metropolitan area, except for Staten Island. I am the immortal blood descendant of the great she-wolf who suckled Romulus and Remus, and the Fenris wolf who will bring the doom of Ragnarok upon the gods themselves, savvy?"

  I said I savvied. I didn't know what that meant but Louise wasn't going to be eating my chocolate ice cream forever and I wanted to find out more before she came and banged on that bathroom door at us.

  The frog dog said I was the Chosen One because he did not just go around biting every Tom Dick and Harry unless the Spirit of Lycanthropy told him to. So far he had been around for twenty million hundred and two years and bitten an awful lot of people but nothing much came of it because someone always shot them with a silver bullet and he was losing hope. He said that when I got older I would be able to turn into a wolf without having to wait for the full moon because rank has its frilly edge. He made me promise not to get shot with a silver bullet and I did because right then I would have promised anything just to get him to stop yapping at me.

  That made him happy. He said I was going to bring about the Kingdom of the Werewolves through the spawn of my loins, and that we were all going to lay waste to New York City including Staten Island and roam the streets in wolf form by day as well as by night and every single day too, for Lord's sakes, and devour the human beings and crunch them and absolutely skrink their bones.

  Here's what he said: "Your coming is Foretold and Inevitable."

  Here's what I said: "Like the Revolution."

  Then he asked me if I had even been paying any attention whatsoever to everything he'd been telling me and I said maybe and he snorted so hard that big glops of wet spray came out his nose and spackled all over me and the shower curtains. That was when Louise started banging on the door.

  The frog dog said, "You will be the Chosen One and you will like it." Then he peed on the bath mat.

  Louise's governess got all mad about that, but Louise just got on that telephone and called Housekeeping and told them "Get one of your lazy maids from Refugeeland right up here pronto, cleaning up dog pee is all they are good for, I bet they are all Communists. My mother knows Senator Joseph McCarthy and he will get their fat bottoms shipped right back to Commieville before you can blink, same to you, and move it, Stupid." Then she told me to come back next day to play more.

  That night in the park I told Lily Packmother about what the frog dog told me including about how rank has its frilly edge. She said "Emmeline, I think you must mean rank has its privilege" and I said that was all right by me as long as I got to be a wolf whenever I wanted to. Then she said, "I am so proud of you for being the Chosen One. I always knew you were special. You will be the salvation of all werewolfkind some day through your progeny."

  I said, "Is that the same thing as the spawn of my loins?" and she said that yes it was, and that I would understand when I was older and went into heat. So I guess that means next summer unless we get to live somewhere that has air conditioning. Then she gave me a nice haunch of mounted policeman for my dinner and scolded me when I left the bone marrow because that chocolate ice cream at the Plaza Hotel had spoiled my appetite and werewolves were still starving all over the place in China. That is all they seem to do over there, for Lord's sake.

  The next day I wanted to go back to the Plaza Hotel and play with Louise some more. She has all kinds of toys, even if she is a pill. Lily Packmother said it would be all right if I went but that I would have to come right straight home to Central Park before it got dark or she would like to know the reason why. She said that now it was known that I was the Chosen One, it was very important for me to come to the big pack meeting that night and receive homage.

  I think homage is all very well and good but I like chocolate ice cream better, mostly because I know what that is.

  So that morning I went right in through those big doors and straight across that lobby and right into that elevator and all the way up to the top and down that hall and knocked on that door until Louise's governess opened it and said, "Oh, it's you. I thought you knew better than to come back for more of the same with that little bastard."

  I said, "Why are your eyes all red?" and she said she had really tied one on last night and I wanted to know one what but then there was Louise with scrambled eggs on her face so I never did find out.

  Louise ate up all her breakfast and didn't offer me any except the toast crusts. I told her I was hungry and there were werewolves starving in China. She said that was tough toenails and threw her juice glass at me. Then we went to her room and she said we were going to play Davy Crockett again.

  I said, "I want to play Robin Hood instead and you can be Richard Greene."

  She told me fat chance, and Robin Hood was a big pansy. She laughed at me when I said he was not a flower just because he wore green all the time, on account of living in Sherwood Forest where it was important for camelflog. Then she told me what she meant about Robin Hood being a big pansy and laughed at me some more when I said that sounded absolutely ugh.

  "That's nothing, you baby," she said. "You should hear what your Mommy and Daddy did together to get you born." And she told me that too and it was even more ugh.

  "My Mommy and Daddy never did that," I said. "My Daddy told my Mommy that the Revolution needed more soldiers to fight the boorjwah oppressors so they got me from the Workers' Collective because from each according to his ability to each according to his needs and they needed me for the Revolution, so there."

  Here is what Louise did then: Stare at me like her frog dog.

  Here is what she did next: Turn to me and say, "I bet you are the daughter of that stupid Commie who shot himself in the park last year. The police were looking for you. You're going to be put in an orphanage."

  I said, "No, I am in the System and my Daddy is in this hotel visiting the Rosenbergs. He told me to sit on that park bench and he went away and he i
s in here somewhere. I am going to find him before I am one single minute older. That will show you. Goodbye." But when I tried to walk past Louise, she shoved me back so hard I fell on some of her broken toys which are everywhere and it hurt.

  She said, "You're nuts. He's dead. It was in all the papers last summer. I read all about it. So did Amanda. I'll prove it to you." Then she hollered for her governess to get into the room fast or else and when she came rushing in Louise told her, "This is that dead Commie's kid. She's stupid and crazy and she thinks her Daddy's coming back. TELL her!"

  First Amanda stared at Louise. Then she stared at me. Her eyes were all soft and watery. She said, "Miss Louise, you cawn't cawn't cawn't expect me to tell a child such a thing until I am sure this is the child in question. I would like to speak with her alone, if you please."

  Louise said, "No. I wanna watch."

  Amanda said, "There is a large box of petty force in my room which I was saving for myself" and Louise scootled away to utterly lay waste to the whole thing. Then Amanda turned back to me and asked me all of these questions about my name and my Daddy and what happened in the park that night. I told her everything she wanted to know except about how the frog dog bit me and the rest of it. She gasped a lot.

  Then she said, "Oh you poor child, I am afraid that everything that wretched little beast told you is true. My heart breaks for you, but your Daddy is indeed No More By His Own Hand and you match the newspaper descriptions of that unfortunate man's lost little girl." She put her arms around me and hugged me tight again like when she thought I was a lamb. That was nice. She smells like lilac bath powder and lemon candies. She cried in my hair. I cried too because now I knew my Daddy was not coming back ever again at all and I was utterly heartbroken.

  Louise came back in with a whole bunch of petty force grundled up in her fists. Her fingers were leaking pink and green icing and yellow cake. When she saw Amanda and me crying on each other she threw those lumps of squooshed petty force at us and laughed. She said I was a crybaby and I should stick my head in gravy and wash it off with ice cream and send it to the Navy.

  Amanda said, "Miss Louise, you ought not not not mock this poor orphaned child. You are Privileged and you should use what you have to help those who do not have as much and be thankful your lot in life is not theirs."

  I wiped my tears on Amanda's blouse and said "Yes, like Marks said, from each according to his ability to each according to his needs or else."

  Louise showed us this absolutely rank grin all smoolied over with melted petty force icing and said, "She is a Commie just like her stupid dead daddy and you are a Commie sympathizer and I am going to turn you both in to the police and my mother now."

  I said, "Thank you for a lovely time, Amanda. You have been very nice to me and I will do my best to see that you are not devoured by the spawn of my loins, but I really must be going now." I shook Amanda's hand and headed right for that door but Louise grabbed me and twisted my arm hard and said "You're not going anywhere, except an orphanage and jail." Then she knocked me down and sat on me.

  Amanda said, "Miss Louise you cawn't cawn't cawn't be serious about any of this. Get off the poor child this instant!" But Louise said that if Amanda did not move her fat rump the Hell out of there, she was going to call the police herself and tell them Amanda was a big lady pansy and then she could keep me company in jail and see how she liked it.

  Amanda said that was a dreadful lie, but Louise asked her if she felt like seeing who the police believed, some old English bag or someone whose mother had more money and influenza that God Himself. That was when Amanda burst into tears all over again and ran out of the apartment and Louise and I were left alone.

  Here is what I said: "You better get off me now."

  Here is what she said: "Make me."

  Then I said, "Maybe I can't make you get off me now, but just you wait until the moon is full and I start to itch all over and I completely burst right out of my clothes if I do not get them off in time and I become a wolf and rip your throat out."

  That was when she laughed at me some more and called me a looney and said I would wind up in an orphanage and jail and the nut house, but that it came as no surprise to her because everyone knows all Commies are crazy. She asked me, "Do you know what would fix you right up, you big screwball? A lobotomy. Would you like a lobotomy?"

  I said, "What I would like is to be old enough to be Foretold and Inevitable so I could start itching right now this very minute and—Ow! Stop bouncing on me!—and not have to—Ow! I told you, stop that, you're making me mad!—and not have to wait full moon to grush y'r froab in my powfur zhaws ob def an'—Ow! Ow! Ow-owOOOOOO!"

  Oh my Lord, Lily Packmother simply would not approve of what happened. She says that just because we live like savages in Central Park and become ravening, murderous, bloodthirsty beasts every time the moon is full is no reason not to respect Tradition or we would be no better than Trade Unionists. But I could not help any of it. It was all enormously Foretold and Inevitable and fun. I did not have a warning itch even one little bit and it was still daylight outside let alone time for the full moon when my clothes simply burst right off before I knew it, and I think I was lots and lots bigger than I usually get when the Change is upon me and Louise screamed but not for long because I am very 'fishent.

  That was pretty much that. Louise tastes like old hardboiled eggs and does not have any trousers I could borrow to cover my shame afterwards, which is what Lily Packmother calls it, only more of those stupid dresses.

  Here's what I can do: Burp up patent leather shoe buckles.

  It took me utterly forever to find one drop of mustard in that whole apartment, for Lord's sake.

  I AM EMMELINE. I am six. I live at the Plaza Hotel.

  I have to. Louise's mother does not visit often, but when she does it would be a good idea if there were a little girl of approximully the right age to say hello and what did you bring me? I will have to get used to having a different name now. Lily Packmother says so. She says it is the least I can do so Amanda can keep her job and not have to face a lot of uncomfortable questions from the police. Besides, Amanda says it isn't as if that rich sow will ever catch wise, not for how little she has ever cared about having a child in the first place and some people are not fit to raise a begonia let alone a little girl.

  I am not a begonia and I am really not Louise. I am still me, EMMELINE.

  I am going to have lots of toys.

  I visit Lily Packmother in Central Park all the time. She and Amanda have become very good friends. They both say how proud they are of me for being a big girl and solving a big problem all by myself even if I did solve it with a very messy solution. But Lily Packmother says that is all water and other liquids under the bridge and Amanda says she is only sorry in theory about what I did to that little bitch, no offense meant to Lily Packmother and none taken.

  The Vessel of Lyncanthropy has a new name too. I gave it to him. He is Frankie because that is a lot easier to spell on my drawings of him and also because I still love hot dogs. He says the fact that my power to turn into a wolf in broad daylight manifestoed so soon means that I was the Chosen One and how! He says once I grow up and get the ball rolling, ordinary humans won't have a snowball's chance in Hell. Amanda says he should not not not use such language in front of a mere child.

  That makes Frankie sad because I am going to take whole entire ages to get that ball rolling, on account of the backwards dog years and me being as young as I am to start with. Then he cheers up because he is immortal and good things are worth waiting for and the twenty-first century is not that far away. He says the humans may be harder to catch then, on account of all the flying cars and jet packs strapped to their backs, but we werewolves will manage.

  I say "Hello, Housekeeping, send someone up to clean our room there are lots and lots of stains all over from the roast beef dinner I had that exploded please give yourselves a gigantic huge tip thank you and charge it please."


  Now all I have to do all day is play in the Plaza Hotel and not give Amanda too many headaches and see to it that the rest of the pack gets a fair share of any leftovers we have from dinner. Then I watch television. I get to watch Robin Hood all I want.

  Oh my Lord, there is absolutely too much for one small child to do while waiting around for my loins to spawn and bring about the Kingdom of the Werewolves or to infiltrate the power base of the moneyed classes and overthrow Capitalism, whichever comes first. It will be fun.

  Tomorrow I think I'll write Comes the Revolution! on all the tabletops in the Palm Court with Amanda's Hazel Bishop red lipstick.

  Ooooooh, I absolutely love waiting for the Revolution!

  I am Emmmm. . .Louise. I am six.

  For now.

  This story originally appeared in the Full Moon City anthology, Simon & Schuster, 2010.

  Nebula Award winner Esther Friesner is the author of over 40 novels and almost 200 short stories. She is also a poet, a playwright, and the editor of several anthologies. The best known of these is the Chicks in Chainmail series that she created and edits for Baen Books. The sixth book, Chicks and Balances, appeared in July 2015. Deception's Pawn, the latest title in her popular Princesses of Myth series of Young Adult novels from Random House, was published in April 2015.

  Esther is married, a mother of two, grandmother of one, harbors cats, and lives in Connecticut. She has a fondness for bittersweet chocolate, graphic novels, manga, travel, and jewelry. There is no truth to the rumor that her family motto is "Oooooh, SHINY!"