The Lamp Post

My name was June, but daddy always called me Junebug. I grew up in St James parish. I had a boyfriend, played volleyball, and was going to university. I loved to explore the swamps, and even though I was a petite pretty blond, the feel of muck between my toes was the best thing ever.

You would be surprised how easy it is to get lost in a place you thought you knew so well. I was boating alone, got lost, and that is how I met the monster that killed me.

My bludgeoned body slowly sank beneath the waters. First my feet and legs, then the rest just followed like a ship. The last thing my murder saw was my silky blond hair disappearing into the blackness.

I was shrouded in the quiet darkness. I could feel death, the decay of it almost immediately; then, the feast began. At first, it was just the occasional nudge as the minnows probed at me, then little nibbles. Next, the Crawdads pinched at my bruised legs and arms. Bloodsucking leeches embedded themselves onto my torso. Still bigger fish came taking bigger bites, punching golf ball-sized holes through my breasts. The worst, though, were the alligators. Fighting over my flesh, they tore out chunks of me until all that remained were tendon and bone. Before long, all the creatures of the Bayou had tasted me.

"The worms crawl in, the worms crawl out…the worms play pinochle on my snout." I tried to smile at the recollection of that childhood song, but water insects had chewed my lips away. I giggled, but all that came out was a gurgling bubble of silt and foam. "Don't forget why you're here," came the whispers.

A snapping turtle ate my eyes out a few days later, or was it weeks? Yet I could still see the light. It was not the warm tunnel of light that beckons you to heaven where the angels sing you praises, but the single lamp post that I stared at while Jake threw me off the dock. The light from it was akin to an angler fish's bauble. Its brightness appears warm and inviting until you get too close and notice the teeth. I was lost and saw that damn light. It led me to him, and just like an angler fish, Jake's teeth were razor-sharp... He didn't even have to lure me; I fell right into the mouth of the monster.

Imagine a hellish suspended animation. I could feel my emotions dissipating, thoughts jumbling. If you had cracked open my skull, you would have seen bits of matter floating in a swampy soup, but nothing substantial remained. There was no hypothalamus or cerebral cortex left, nothing that would allow me to function, yet I did. I twitched, saw, heard, and I had thoughts, angry, murderous thoughts of revenge. They were the only emotions I had left.

Jake had killed others before me, women who met the same watery fate. I did not know how many because I could no longer count, and if I'm being honest, I did not care. I did see that they were not just tendon and bone as I was; somehow, the same waters that claimed their bodies then reanimated them. Algae reformed their muscles, barnacles attached to broken bones, hardening, and repairing. Tiny creatures of the swamp pieced me back together like a macabre patchwork quilt. I still don't know why we could see or think. It must have been the magic of the Bayou.

Time continued until one day, I could wiggle my fingers and toes, a big step for the dead. I watched him sitting on the dock, dangling his bare feet into my watery grave. My fingers began to twitch. I strained to reach upward, and then, with a sudden pop, my right arm broke free. I ached to grab his ankles and yank him down into the same dark depths of which he condemned myself and these other poor women. The rest of my body was stuck in the silt, but I knew that someday we would be free. I cracked a smile with my newly formed lips made of Spider Lily and Spanish moss. We were getting closer.

I do not know how long I was down there, how many times the brightness of the sun above me had dimmed to that single awful lamp post, the one I would never forget. But with each light cycle, we became more robust; our outrage fueled this transition.

Jumbled thoughts, I remember that it was bright above, so I knew it was daytime; I heard a boat engine drawing near. The wake from the motor made what little of my hair that was left sway back and forth in watery slow motion. Why had they come to this cabin? Did they have any idea of the danger that lurked both above and below?

A milestone in my reanimation occurred. I managed to dislodge my skull from the cement-like slit. My sisters, who up to that point I could only see when they floated above me, slipped spindly fingers under my neck and pulled until my head came free. "I'm coming for you, Jakey." I thought.

Two more women joined our ranks. Both were weighed down with heavy chains. A pretty girl with coco skin and long dark hair, wearing a flowery dress and a nameplate necklace that said "Elizabeth." Her throat was slit, and her body mutilated, although, in life, I knew she had to have been beautiful. I watched with solidarity as the Bayou consumed her flesh.

I heard the sound of a sister's cries. Slowly I turned my head, vacant eyes searching. I saw her, one foot weighted down with a chain. I wondered why Jake did not weigh me down with a chain. Was he careless? Or perhaps because it was so abnormally fridged, he did not think anyone would be out on the Bayou. Maybe he reasoned that the gators would finish the job for him before the cold snap ended. Or maybe he just ran out of chains. It didn't t matter. I watched her struggle and wail as the tiny creatures of the Bayou tirelessly chewed off her ankle bone. Oddly, I don't think it caused her pain; I don't think any of us were capable of feeling pain; only the rage. She wailed in frustration that she couldn't leave the grave in search of the man who put her there. I felt that same frustration, and if I still had a heart, it would have ached for her.

The brightness above me dimed again, replaced by that single lamppost. I remember gurgling with fury at the reminder of the lighted lure to which I fell prey. That light that beckoned me so many months ago, or was it years ago? Time is such a funny thing when you die.

That curled lamp post with the sickening yellow light haunted my already haunted existence. Vast clouds of mosquitoes and moths buzzing around it in suicidal fury. After all, that light was the last thing we saw as we gasped our last breaths.

Finally, I was able to will myself to sit up. It was odd to feel freedom in what was once a simple task. As I looked down at myself for the first time, I no longer saw my ivory white skin, no more polish on my nails. I realized that I was missing an arm from the shoulder down, one the gators must have taken the whole thing, bone and all. I did, however, have both legs intact. Lurching forward, I stood up, assured that the clams attached to the remaining scraps of clothing were holding me together. I moved my feet, and they complied.

A scream rang out as another pitiful creature was caught in the anglers trap. We gurgled and wailed, floating toward the sound, toward the light, always the light. There was no urgency to save her, no desperation to stop him from consuming her. Those emotions were beyond us now. The mist formed thick atop the Bayou. My head broke the surface, and all the other women he sacrificed to the swamp followed. I emerged from the water and saw Elizabeth next to me, her newly formed jaw chomped up and down, looking for living flesh to sink her remaining teeth into. My body felt foreign and heavy with the weight of gravity. It was not the sweet release I thought it would be. With each step, my body felt heavier, but we saw him, and the fire of hatred pushed us onward.

Jake sat on top of the girl's chest, his fingers wrapped around her delicate throat as he is squeezed the last drop of life away. Her body convulsed in her death throes, and then she was gone.

The lamppost above him drew us closer. Next to me, another girl missing both legs dragged herself forward. The mist and the darkness camouflaged us as we stumbled up the muddy bank. Swamp shrimp falling from our hair, and algae sprinkled over our bones like cancerous freckles.

At first, Jake was too aroused by his newest kill to pay much attention to the changes around him. It was the noise that finally alerted him. The sloshing sounds as we rose from our watery tomb, the occasional thud when one of us fell. He looked around, but it was far too late. Half of us had already begun to clamber onto the pier.

A look of horror and disgust crossed his handsome face. At first, he just stared at us, mouth agape in shock. I took my first awkward step onto the long wooden dock before he moved. A shrill scream escaped his lips as he walked backward. His shrieks were abruptly cut off when he tripped over his latest victim and fell hard on his backside. It was her ultimate "fuck you" to the man that murdered her just moments before. I was so close, I reached a bony hand toward him as he tried to crab-walk backward in a desperate maneuver. We were gaining on him as we reached the end of the dock. Forced to sacrifice precious seconds, Jake clambered to his feet and prepared to jump into the water. He stopped short, body visibly quivering at the sight of half a dozen skeletal heads bobbing on the surface like grotesque lily pads. The time had come...we were upon him.

I expected him to plead, beg, blubber, but he did not. Black glittering eyes glared at us as he struggled to gain his composure. Reaching down to his bootstrap, Jake pulled out a large knife, probably the same knife he used to slit Elizabeth's throat. She gurgled at the sight of it.

"Fucking Whores!" He screeched. "I'll kill all you bitches again." Unhinged, he cackled maniacally and swiped the blade at us; unphased, we continued our advance.

We fell upon him like a pack of lionesses. Barnacle-encrusted fingers dug out his eyes, ripped his lips back from his teeth, and snatched out his tongue. he hollowed and thrashed, but death came just like it had come for us. Jake could not escape. We shredded his body until he stopped moving. We bit at his face until he stopped screaming. There was nothing left but bits of gore. Pleasure came to all of us as we destroyed the monster. Slow and painful death was ours to give, and now it is done.

The sun rose that following day, and we slithered back into the swamp from which we came. Floating weightless until our bones again reached the bottom. The rage was contained. Now we will wait to be found and reunited with those who loved us. To be buried in cemeteries and left to rest in peace. My name was June, and I met a violent end.