The Pink Room

John Michael Chase did not enjoy his time at his great-grandmother Nancy’s house. He was a little boy, and little boys should be spending their time riding bikes or throwing a football with other boys in the neighborhood. Instead, when he went to GG Nancy’s, he spent his time doing puzzles and watching old soap operas. GG, as John Michael called her, was a smelly lady in his opinion. She used a type of soap that was more akin to mothballs than fresh linen. He found out in his later years that it was because the cheap detergent could only do so much to counteract the harsh smell of Virginia Slims. GG’s cooking wasn’t terrible, but it was dramatically boring. She would tell John Michael that she grew up in the great depression and her cooking tendencies directly reflected her parents' unstable financial predicament. Last night they sat to eat soup, a common theme even on the 100-degree summer days. John Michael hated soup, and he hated vegetable soup even more. Tonight, though, the plan was to eat chilli, which he felt was just an enhanced vegetable soup. Tsk, tsk, he thought as he sat sifting through the puzzle at the old yellow table in her den. The puzzle was called “Summer on Brandon Lake”; the picture depicted a family having the time of their lives at their huge summer home on Brandon Lake. There was a boy in the picture flying high on a tire swing. Bastards, he thought of the people in the picture; he wasn’t allowed to say curse words, but he heard his old man say it while screaming at the St. Louis Cardinals pitcher. Nevertheless, He yearned for a day on the water, even if it was with his sister Rebecca and his parents. He had never had the opportunity for a lake day, though, with his family. His mom worked long night shifts at the hospital, and his dad was a car salesman working six days a week on the lot. He usually spent the afternoons at the boys and girls club, but there was a week after school ended when the B&C hadn’t quite opened yet. It never failed that his parents sent him to Pangburn, Arkansas, for a stay with GG. His sister, Rebecca, went to dance camp while he did puzzles in stinky GG Nancy’s house. In all honesty, though, the worst part was his sleeping arrangements. GG had a room dedicated to her dolls. They were all girl dolls dressed in lacy, old, tattered clothes except one doll, which was a boy. The outfit it wore looked like an elf costume; green and red were the colors of the creepy little weirdo. The room the dolls and he slept in was pink from top to bottom. In the room sat a creamy white bed with dolls sitting upright across the pillows. Every night, GG would pull the dolls off and put each one in the crib she had set in the corner of the room. John Michael would often think he saw the dolls crawling out of the crib at night. There was a device that hung over the top called a crib mobile. It rotated in circles and played music. John Michael called it a baby chandelier. Hanging from each arm were farm animals that dangled and made noises all night. He never spent time in the pink room unless he was going to sleep after a long day of old lady activities. 

He walked into the long kitchen that took up most of the middle of his GG's house; he smelled the chilli on the stove. He was just about to be disappointed when he saw the stove lit up, cornbread. 

“Are you making cornbread, GG?” He asked.

“Surely, thing Sugarfoot,” She said back to him. This had been her nickname for him his entire life. He felt like he had outgrown it, but he thought to his ancient great-grandmother that he hadn’t quite outgrown anything. A baby in her eyes, really. 

“Go on yonder and have you a bath. Then when you get cleant up, we'll eat some supper.” She shooed him towards the bright green bathroom where a massive cream-white tub sat in the middle. He always had to pay attention because the words she used never made much sense. No one said supper anymore except maybe other old people. 

He walked into the bathroom and pulled out a bright blue towel from under the vanity. John Michael turned the water on, and it immediately ran out piping hot. Steam flooded the small bathroom. He sat down in the hot water and put his arms over the side of the massive bathtub. Ahhhh, he thought as he sank into the porcelain water container. After a few minutes of relaxation, he saw a movement near the door. 

“GG?” He said, sitting up and looking toward the door. No response. He stood up and grabbed the towel on the counter. 

“Hello? Who’s there?” he said, hoping someone would respond. GG didn't have dogs, and she found cats repulsive outdoor creatures made for killing mice. He quickly dried off and walked towards the door. It was slightly cracked, and at the base was the small doll that was dressed like an elf. Ralphie was what his GG called him. John Michael picked the doll up by the arm, only holding it by his fingertips as if the little felt toy was a rotten banana left on the sidewalk for months. The pink room was right by the bathroom, and he threw the doll on the bed. The doll lay sprawled out like a dead body on the sidewalk in an R-rated movie he’d seen at Jackie Craig's house. He hung the blue towel on the coat hanger in the corner of the room, then he dressed himself and went into the kitchen for supper with GG. 

The chilli was bland and filled with beans, but the cornbread was incredible. GG served the warm bread with a side of sun-dried tomato butter that melted when it touched the tongue. He ate until his belly rolled over his Teenage Mutant Ninja Pajamas. As he leaned back in the chair, he stared at the kitchen TV. An oddity in today's world, but common for people of his GG’s age. 

MAN ESCAPED ARKANSAS PRISON, the headline read in all capital letters. Gee whiz, that is no beuno, he thought. “Walter P. Dicklen escaped today after his fifteen year vacation at the White County penitentiary. Dicklen was convicted of murdering eleven children. He is to be treated as armed and extremely dangerous.” The news reporter rattled it all off while standing in front of a bald, creepy-looking old man who looked to be in his mid-fifties. 

GG grabbed the clicker, switched to House on the Prairie, and leaned back in her hard wooden dining chair. John Michael never understood why she watched TV in the kitchen in a hard wooden chair instead of sitting in her massive recliner in front of her 55-inch flat-screen. He boiled it all down to old people being weird and set in their ways. 

“You want to play cards, Sugarfoot?” She asked him.

He thought about it, but he was almost done with his puzzle, and he just assumed go to bed because tomorrow his mom was picking him up after her shift in the morning.

“I think I’ll finish up my puzzle and go to bed, GG.” He said

“No worries, Sugarfoot. Don't forget to wash your teeth before night night time,” she said. Another one of her odd sayings.  

Once he finished up, he was back towards the pink room. GG sat like a statue watching her nightly program. When he walked into the room, he noticed the doll Ralphie was sitting up straight on the pillows. Odd, he thought; he threw him into the middle of the bed, but GG must’ve come in to straighten him up. He pulled all the dolls off and put them in the crib next to the bed. GG would’ve never known if he threw them on the ground; better yet stacked them up in the crib, but he was respectful of her stuff and set the crew of dolls in a circle as if they were having a meeting surrounding their only male counterpart, Ralphie the elf. He liked to think the ladies were giving him an ear full. 

When he crawled into bed, sleep eluded him. He was so excited to be going home, and summer would officially start. He tossed and turned until finally the darkness absorbed him. 

A shrill creaking sound woke him in the middle of the night. The window in the corner opened, and John Michael sat straight up in bed. He figured he was being ridiculous, but sure enough, the window was wide open. His eyes adjusted to the darkness, and he looked around the room, finding a large figure in the corner. The scream that broke from his throat was the loudest and most bone-chilling noise he knew he had ever made. The man in the corner leaped onto him. His hands covered his mouth. He knew GG hadn’t heard him; she turned off her hearing at night, and she was sure enough deaf without them. Even if she had heard him, though, what was the eighty-seven-year-old woman going to do? 

“Stop now, boy. Stop fighting.” The man said. He realized quickly it was Dicklen from the news. The escaped convict who was in prison for killing eleven children. 

He kept squirming to no avail. Even if he was big and strong, the comforter with Dicklen on top felt like he was moving in quicksand. Dicklen grabbed him by the throat and began to squeeze. He felt the most helpless he’d ever been in his entire life. His short and unprofound existence was coming to an end.

As his vision began to blur, the only thing he saw was Dicklen's teeth bared and the rippling muscles of his tattooed arms. Before darkness took him, though, he began to be able to breathe again, and the grip from his throat released. He fully opened his eyes and saw Dicklen laying on his side, the creamy white bed now a bright red. Standing over Dicklen was a small green and red figure. In the small felt hand was the six-inch chef's knife GG used to cut up the cornbread.