One Dark and Stormy Night

  One Dark And Stormy Night

It was a writer’s night. Every surface was slick and it didn’t look like the rain was done dancing. The thunder rolled through like a war machine. The fog was creepy delicious and the interspersing flashes of lightning only intensified mother nature’s power.

A chill ran through Betsy Monroe. She carefully removed the relic typewriter from the back of the closet and blew the dust off it. The woman, mousy, petite with an additional couple of pounds smiled and remembered purchasing the machine for twenty dollars and a box full of blank paper almost forty years before.

She was a student then, studying to be a nurse and out of the blue had decided one day after the pressure and anxiety of mid-terms were over to write a story. Of course, the young woman had composed essays for some courses especially English, but had never attempted any creative writing. The heavy course load curtailed most outside adventures.

That faithful day, she took the typewriter back to her dorm room with the box of paper and set it down on the desk. She fixed a cup of tea and then started to type. It was raining outside and just a really dreadful night. Her roommate and most of the other girls had gone to some ball and wouldn’t be home for hours. The dorm was empty, quiet, perfect for a night of writing.

The lightning was a real bully that night flashing its power all over the campus and the city. Just as an explosion of quick light punched the darkness, Betsy looked out the window and saw a toad sitting on the grass. It wasn’t very appealing with warts spread across like a serious case of acne and its face bloated like a corpse. But the eyes were hypnotic, almost bewitching.

And she started to type.

“One day, it began to rain hard and the college students ran for cover. It was a driving downpour that was very cold. As soon as it started the toads emerged. Some were no bigger than a regular sized thumb, while others bulged like grapefruits.

But it wasn’t the size that was intimidating; it was the sheer number of the creepy amphibians. There were tens of thousands of them spread across campus like it was a plague. Nobody dared to go outside and didn’t know that they had already claimed their first victims.”

The fingers moved across the typewriter as if they were pushed by some unforeseen force. One page led into another and soon the first chapter was done. The pile of pages began to accumulate and only encouraged the budding writer to push on.

She finished the story at about the time her roommate Clarissa Schultz came home from the ball, soaked to the skin, the eye makeup running down making the girl look like a clown and the usual carefully coiffured hair a frizzy, disappointing mess.

“I can’t believe tonight. Stan’s hunk of junk stalled in the pouring rain and we were forced to walk for miles - me in my high heels through the mud. We didn’t even get to the ball. I am so mad at him right now that he’s lucky I’m still his girl.”

“Of course, he is,” smiled Betsy.

“What have you been doing all night?

Betsy smiled and shrugged her shoulders. Next to the typewriter was a stack of neatly arranged sheets of paper.

“I’ve been writing.”

“Writing? You aren’t an English major; you’re a nursing student.”

“I know that, but I was downtown running errands and saw a pawn shop. I had never been in one and saw this typewriter with a box of paper for ten dollars.  I just had this urge to write a story.”

“I don’t go to pawn shops. They are beneath me.”

“Anyway, it was a real white hot experience.”

“You think sitting there at a typewriter trying to write something is fun?”

“Better than walking in the rain and the mud all night.”

Clarissa turned her pointed nose at the ceiling.

“Well, let me read it so you can have my opinion.”

Betsy put a firm hand on the pile of pages and stopped the snob.

“No, it isn’t for your eyes.”

“Well, I have better things to do than read some boring story.”

Clarissa moved away to take a nice hot shower.

Betsy put the finished manuscript back in a box and in the closet. She put the typewriter aside and got ready for bed.

When Clarissa wasn’t around probably satisfying Stan the Man with the crappy car, the young woman read through the manuscript and made a few changes. Then with the shaky confidence of a new writer, packaged everything and mailed it off to a first novel contest.

The days and weeks passed. Betsy didn’t give much hope about winning the contest and threw all of her energy into the nursing program. She had another year and a half before graduation. Jobs were plentiful and her career path seemed properly paved.

One day, there was mail. Betsy took the letter quietly and went to the room. Luckily, Clarissa wasn’t there. Slowly, the girl nervously opened the envelope and started to read but her mind didn’t get past: ‘Congratulations, you have won the contest.’

The prize was the manuscript was shown to a New York publisher who liked it so much there was a publication offer. 

She accepted the offer and it went straight to the best-sellers list. The horror tale of how thousands of ugly, bloated toads terrorized a college campus made every student on the planet a little uneasy.

Everything happened quickly. There was only one year from graduation and she had worked so hard it was difficult to throw everything away. Besides, was the toad novel a flash in the pan?

Betsy’s publisher wondered if the young writer had another gem in her repertoire. As it turned out, she did.

The promising nurse quite school (much to everyone’s surprise and her parent’s chagrin) and moved to New York City to become a writer of horror tales. The move was facilitated when the first book was made into a movie and the money poured in.

The second novel about a man running a woman over while driving home from work after the late shift on a foggy night only to find out she was a witch was another number one best-seller.

For a dozen years, Betsy reeled off one horror novel after another that were all number one best-sellers and made into movies. She was the queen of the boogie tale. In fact, they called her the ‘Madame of the Macabre.’

Her name was internationally connected to the horror tale and she basked in the glory. The usually quiet, reserved, nerdy looking woman was incredibly popular and rubbed elbows with Presidents, celebrities, dignitaries and athletes.

The release of her new novels were events with people standing in line for hours to get their hands on a copy. One day, while at a book signing at a mall, she ran into her old roommate Clarissa.  

The once snotty girl looked unravelled. Two young children hung onto her like unwanted baggage.

“Hello?”

Clarissa pretended she didn’t recognize her old college roommate.

“Hey, remember me?”

Betsy grabbed her arm and couldn’t believe the poor condition of her clothes and shoes.

Clarissa turned around and faked a smile.

“Is that you Beverley?”

Betsy smiled.  

“It’s Betsy. Are those your children?”

The two children screamed louder.

Clarissa attempted to quiet them down.

“What are you doing at this fancy mall? I guess its a step up from a pawn shop.”

“I am a famous writer of horror tales. I’m sure you’ve heard of me. I’m here for a book signing.  What do you do?”

Clarissa frowned.  

“Well-

“Our mommy is divorced.”

“Yeah, she doesn’t have a job.”

“We live with our grandmother.”

“Oh, that’s really too bad, Melissa.”

“It’s Clarissa,” she said in a harsh tone.

“Right, well I have to go. I can’t let my adoring fans wait too long. Have a nice life, Vanessa.”

Betsy walked away with attitude.

Everything was great and she never once regretted not following through to be a nurse.

But, then Everett Hunter happened and her life was turned upside down.

Her latest horror book told the story of a young couple going camping for their three year anniversary. It was idyllic until a psycho turned their romantic getaway into a painful slaughter.

Everett Hunter turned her book of scary fiction into the real thing. He followed some young couple - they had children - and tortured, raped and murdered the entire family.

When caught, he smiled that creepy smile that would fuel millions of nightmares and simply said: “It was Betsy Monroe’s story that made me do it.”

Suddenly, speaking engagements were cancelled. Her books were pulled from library shelves. The new movie deal was cancelled. Everett Hunter’s dirty deed stuck to her like a rash that wouldn’t go away. 

Betsy attempted to defend herself from the onslaught of criticism; but just churned in the quagmire even more. The victim’s family launched a lawsuit that went to court. She took the stand and was quoted as saying: “He was evil and whether the book was written or not, the sick, twisted individual would have carried out the dastardly deed.”

She tried to escape the lunatic’s grip with another great novel that would shut up everyone forever. But the magic had evaporated. The words would not cooperate, organize and drop properly. Days and weeks and months went by, and the intensity of the struggle was forged deeper.  

Soon, the typewriter fell silent. 

The international celebrity couldn’t escape her demented presence. The whispers and accusations and pointed fingers became too much. She went into seclusion and became a recluse. The woman had devoted all of her life to her career and had never married. Betsy lived alone in the mansion with the wrought iron fence guarding a private world. There had been protests outside those gates but eventually everyone went away and left her alone.

But once in a while, someone would ask what ever happened to Betsy Monroe?But then, one day, she read in the news how Everett Hunter had been murdered in prison.  

Suddenly, she was free.  

The article briefly mentioned a link to that wretched novel and the author, but it didn’t matter. Those dark eyes, creepy smile and hot breath were gone forever from the long, sleepless nights. Like the disappearance of menacing toads from a college campus.

She was sixty-seven years old. The arthritis had robbed the woman of some independence and some ability. Typing was a torturous chore, but then she hadn’t touched a keyboard in more than thirty-five years.

One night, it was raining hard and the lightning provided a wonderful show. The thunder cracked and boomed loud enough for her cat Simon to be disturbed.

Although it was now the age of computers and with her money she could have bought the fanciest machine, Betsy pulled out the old typewriter. The pile of blank pages next to her was incredibly intimidating.

She inserted the first page and took a deep breath.

There was a moment of hesitation; the fingers hovered over the typewrite unsure of how to proceed.

And then the first word was typed followed by a second and a third. The initial sentence developed and took shape. The paragraph stood at attention neat and clean.

Her smile grew, because the magic had returned. It flowed through her like the gusting wind that huffed and puffed that night. The windows rattled from the thunder and her smile grew.

“Hang on, Simon, it is going to be a dark and stormy night.”