u/JackSmrkingRevnge

Hello all,

Here's a short story about the Bella Maggiore Inn when it was still open. I'm putting together a collection of transgressive/folk horror stories based in Ventura County. This is based on a real ghost named Sylvia who haunted an old hotel that was frequented by men and paid "companions".

My style is minimalist, btw. If you hate that, I get it. But I'd love to hear thoughts on whether this is something that would seem intriguing enough to want more of.

Hey writers/readers

Last week I posted an intro to my short story "Seedless", a normal tale about a man who has sex with a watermelon to cope with the death of his wife. I'm sending bites here and there for feedback, and if you like it, I'll post the whole thing to my substack :)

And please feel free to say if this is amusing or the worst thing you've ever read. 🍉

Thanks friends.

_____

You wake to the scent of damp earth and the distant hum of a tractor grinding through rows of green. The fog hasn't burned off yet. A gray haze drapes the fields— floating ghosts tangled in the bottlebrush.

You used to love mornings like this. Back when your wife pressed cold hands to your chest, flicked her eyelashes against your collarbone. It tickled. You'd smile. Make waffles. Then hike deep into the hills to fuck among the waist-high lupine. She'd spread, gush, cling to locust branches, spitting and yelling that she loved you.

Now that's gone. Now, you drink too much. Cheering with your left hand, tossing it back. Giving in to absence. Passing out and pretending you're tired. The land doesn't feel the same. Its neat ranches mock your mess— orderly lemon groves, vibrant rows of strawberries with their heart-shaped leaves. Pumpkin patches swelling fat and orange by October. Everything still alive. You're not.

Your garden is a wreck. You did your best. To your credit, you survived better than the rest. But it wasn't enough. The watermelon vines tangled, crept through the fence. You should trim them, but you don't. You let them choke everything. Let them take over. The fruits swell in the heat— bellies pressed to the dirt, splitting open with ants and neglect.

You used to cut them out back, split them clean. When one was ripe, you'd bite and feed it to each other, laughing, sticky, sunburned.

Now, they rot. Neighbors send their wishes, and bottles. Baskets of what they grow. Those rot too, under your roof. Outside, the horsetail trees wave. You sit on the porch with a beer in your hand and watch the farmers. Biting hard. Fuck their routine. They don't know what it's like to lose this much.

Grief rooted your gut like bindweed. You're constipated with it. Migraines like car alarms.

Your wife used to bend over the tomato plants, her neck shiny with effort.

The irrigation ditches gurgle. The scent of wet soil and fertilizer carries on the breeze. Life keeps pushing forward. It doesn't care about your calluses, the dead pets from tick infestations. You hate a world that demands growth. You feel stuck. Weighed down. For all those tears, a drought still came.

You are saddest when the daffodils die. They were her favorite. Now you spend mornings brewing harsh drinks—just to clear your head. But no matter what you mix, it's never enough. You still feel her trying.

Fresh-squeezed juice. A daisy in a crusty vase. You remember creeping upstairs, hands full, proud to serve her the same.

It hurts. It always does. You've run out of ideas to honor her. A part of you hopes it's her that stands in the bedroom corner at 4:15 a.m.— the hour her water broke. The morning she died.

Her watering can still leans against the fence. Her gardening journal sits open on the kitchen table. Dirt Therapy scrawled at the top of the page.

____

You always wanted to visit Mexico. For years that was a dream. But it was always the money. And the desire for kids. Then her parents. Your parents. The pressure for grandkids. "Think of the backyard barbecues," they said. "The camping trips. The recitals." She wanted it too. So did you. It was on the list from the start. First date—you both agreed: no more than three, but at least one beautiful one.

And then she got sick. Mentioned the blood. The after-morning. She cried at work. Couldn't focus in the yard. Stopped planting. Lost her way. You felt sick watching her unravel. The guilt got you drunker. Didn't matter how often you kissed her to sleep, or played with her hair. You told her: "There are other ways. It's not over." You meant it. You think. Maybe more for you than for her. It didn't stop her from doing the thing you begged her not to do.

You were sound asleep. She already knew. Knew she lost it. In the toilet. She dragged herself out in her nightgown, before the sun even rose. While you drooled away upstairs. Didn't realize you'd lost both. The cat scratched at the bathroom door. That's what woke you. You raced downstairs—five steps at a time. Kicked the back door off its hinge. And there— under a black-blue sky, buckeye branches rattling in the wind—you saw the chef's knife. The vines. And her. Your wife, both arms carved open. Nightgown blotched in red. Face paler than the moon. It broke you how thorough she was. It tore you up—how she wasn't one for attention. And it shattered you, how selfish she looked, even in death.

—

The day of her service, when you came home, her gardening journal was still there, open on the table, turned to another page stained with her pain and scribble, titled,

I'm a failure of nature.