QSFer Michael Schutz has a new queer horror book out:
Intenze is the newest designer drug. Take it, and nightmares come alive. “Edging” is a better rush than the Tower of Terror.
It’s a fraction of the price of a Six Flags admission. And it’s the most addictive high the tiny suburb of New London has ever known.
Excerpt
“Take these,” Scott said. He held out his hand, where two Intenze lay in his palm.
Josh snuggled deeper into the crook of Trevor’s arm. He’d been half-asleep in his boyfriend’s bed. How had Scott found him?
And why does he look so terrible?
Scott’s normally half-flush complexion had turned so pale that Josh could see the blue veins under the skin. His hair clung to his sweaty forehead. A sour smell of hot sickness emanated from Josh’s jock crush, turning the basement room rank and humid.
Then Scott jerked toward him like a Godard jump-cut.
Trying to scramble away, Josh tumbled out of bed. Trevor moaned and rolled over to face the wall.
“Quiet,” Scott said. “Don’t wake him up.”
“No?”
Scott shook his head, smiled, and flickered for a moment like bad CGI. He stepped closer and proffered the pills once more.
Josh didn’t have the power to fight. He opened his mouth, and Scott popped in the Intenze as if giving medicine to a cat. Josh grabbed his bottle of Coke off the upturned produce crate that served as bedstand. Dry swallowing was for the movies.
“There. Don’t you feel better?” For a moment, Scott looked taller, skinnier.
That’s not Scott.
And his face looked tore up.
It’s that monster who chased me here Tuesday night.
But in another second, it was just old number 29 standing there in Trevor’s basement.
“How did you get in here?”
“I can get in anywhere.” Scott’s Chicklet teeth were no longer so white. They’d been stained a nasty yellow-brown as if he’d been eating filth.
The Intenze must have kicked in.
Why did I take it? I swore I wouldn’t. I promised Trevor.
“Why didn’t you help me in the locker room?”
Scott sneered. His lips pulled back over those scummy teeth, and now they didn’t look like squares pieces of gum but more like uprooted gravestones toppling over themselves in his blackened gum line.
“You’re not Scott. You’re my hallucination.”
Author Bio
Michael Schutz was born and raised in the frozen tundra of Wisconsin, where the macabre tales of Ray Bradbury and Stephen King kept him warm at night. He’s seen way too many horror movies to be healthy and wants to pull you into his warped world of blogging and podcasting with Darkness Dwells (http://www.wheredarknessdwells.com).
He is the author of the novels EDGING and Blood Vengeance and the novella Uninoch. His short fiction has been featured most recently in Crossroads in the Dark II: Urban Legends, Dark Moon Digest, Sanitarium, and the anthologies Beasts: Revelations, Beyond the Nightlight, and Cranial Leakage: Tales from the Grinning Skull. He lives with his three naughty cat-children in northern California. You can keep tabs on him at:
http://www.michaelschutzfiction.com
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