Reprise: The Punishment

“Hey, Tommy, look at this!” With fiendish fervor, Butch Abernathy hurled a rock against the front of the old Pomeroy house. “That oughta wake the dead!”

“No!” Tommy cried.

But it was too late. The sound of shattering glass splintered the night. The old Victorian house shuddered, sighed, and groaned a low, mournful cry.

Butch bolted down the street. “Sucker!” he yelled over his shoulder.

Tommy turned to run, but invisible fingers grabbed his ankles. He kicked and stomped, struggling to break free but the Hands gripped tighter. They dragged him, screaming, along the weed-infested sidewalk and up the crumbling stairs into darkness as black as molasses. Then down, down, down into the cavernous depths below. A flickering lantern revealed the awful punishment that awaited him.

The Hands shoved him onto his knees, rammed his head into a wooden cradle, and yanked his wrists behind his back.

“But I didn’t do anything!” Tommy screamed.

The blade of the guillotine came slashing down.

The End

Story by Dawn Pisturino.

Graphics by Rebekah Joy Plett. Click photo to enlarge.

Published October 18, 2011 on Underneath the Juniper Tree.
Copyright 2011-2021 Dawn Pisturino and Rebekah Joy Plett. All Rights Reserved.

Published on The Brooklyn Voice, June 25, 2012.

Artwork by Asheka Troberg, The Brooklyn Voice. Click photo to enlarge.

Copyright 2012-2021 Dawn Pisturino and Asheka Troberg. All Rights Reserved.

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