Bum Magic: A Tale of Sludge and Slime

“We should probably cut her arm off.”

It was weird to hear those words come out of my mom’s mouth, but it wasn’t much weirder than seeing her help drag a tied up, savagely-beaten old woman into a van.

We moved all of our stuff from the Escalade into Anita’s old Suburban — except for the shitmobile. I had to leave it behind, there just wasn’t any extra room or justification to take it, but I almost shed a tear leaving that old hunk of garbage behind.

My arms were still mangled to shit, so I wasn’t much help moving anything, but Mickey was nice enough to put them to sleep, so I didn’t feel much of anything; I was just a walking torso when I hopped into the passenger seat next to Anita and we took off, the old lady groaning quietly in the back between Caleb and Mickey.

“Do you think her power will go away if we cut off her tattoo?” I said. It made logical sense, but I still doubted it was true.

“It’s worth a shot,” Anita said. “If she regains some of her strength, we could all be screwed.”

“Then I guess we just have to keep beating the shit out of her any time she starts to look too lively,” Mickey said. He kicked her in the head and the back of her skull knocked against the bottom of Caleb’s seat. Caleb screamed. It was the first time I had heard his voice since we met earlier that evening.

“Don’t fuckin’ kill her Mickey, Jesus,” I said. “I don’t think she qualifies as ‘lively’ yet, so just leave her alone for now. We need her alert enough to answer questions.”

“I… ain’t answerin’ shit,” the old lady said in a moaning whisper.

I got out of my seat and crouched over her. When I want to, I can look pretty fucking wild, and I know I looked wild in that moment, with my eyes wide, my mutilated arms swinging freely, and blood covering my face and my shoes. Still, the old woman didn’t look scared — even barely conscious, she looked indignant.

“Yes the fuck you are,” I hissed at her. I was feeling real rowdy after that fight, I have to admit. I gave her a face full of slime, purely to piss her off. She shook her head frantically, disgusted, but without the use of her arms she had no chance of getting it off. She muttered some obscenities, but her voice became too weak to hear, and I went back to my seat before I gave the old hag a heart attack.

Anita drove until there were no longer any signs of civilization aside from stalks of corn as far as the eye could see. She parked, and everyone with functioning arms picked up the old lady and carried her into the cornfield. Once we reckoned we were far enough in to not be seen, they threw her onto the ground.

“Ok,” Anita took a deep breath, “before we start this, Gus, let me set your bones.”

My arms made horrific popping sounds as she moved my bones around, but because of Mickey, I didn’t feel a thing. After a minute, they were looking much better. Still broken to pieces, but better.

“Where’d you learn to do that?” I asked.

“Does it matter? We have a magical granny to torture,” she said.

“Right.”

Caleb shined a flashlight on the old woman’s face. She looked grim with her empty eye socket and a mean scowl on her face. Caleb looked mortified, but he held the flashlight steady. Mickey was the first to approach the granny.