Gone God Bundle

Chapter 1:
In The Beginning …

“ ‘Trap the bogeyman,’ she said. ‘Steal his bell,’ she said. And what do I do? I listen to her,” I muttered to myself as I laced beads onto a long piece of thread.

“I listen to my dead wife—who speaks to me in my dreams, by the way. That’s normal—when she tells me to hang out in a dark, scary park with a Mug Me Here sign on my back, because … what? … I’m still pussy-whipped?”

I chuckled at the thought as I laced the last of the ceramic trinkets, then walked the thread around three nearby trees to form my own Bermuda’s Triangle of yarn. A cat’s cradle—if the cat were the size of an elephant. “Pussy-whipped from beyond the grave.”

I carefully placed my Cabbage Patch Kid that I got from my ehem—collection in the middle of the triangle. Hey, don’t judge me … I love old toys and the Cabbage Patch Kid is a classic. “Open your hearts to a Cabbage Patch Kid … each sold separately,” I hummed as I worked.

I shook my head. “I need help.”

Then I pulled out a blue quilt from my baby days and covered the toy with it. Once my trap was set, I pressed play on a Sony Walkman I’d hooked up to a little portable speaker and I climbed up a nearby tree.

The Cabbage Patch cries rang out in the night.

“Here I am,” I muttered to myself again—or maybe I was complaining to my dead wife just in case she was listenin g—“a grown man sitting in a tree, literally waiting for the bogeyman to show up because she told me to do it. I didn’t really listen to her when she was alive, so why start now?”

I felt a pang of guilt whenever I thought about Bella in such a callous way. She was the love of life, my soulmate—if such a thing exists—and she was gone forever. I loved her and her being dead hadn’t changed that one bit.

And the fact that I dreamed of her every night proved that, too. Right? I mean, why else would my dreams be filled with her?

Not because I couldn’t let go. I can let go. I’m well adjusted.

Seriously.

But even I couldn’t deny that dangling from a tree, in the dark, broadcasting a toy baby’s cries, was case in point to the contrary. Still in love, yes. Well adjusted? Hardly.

Certifiably insane? Most likely.

At least the “bogeyman” part didn’t make me crazy. He’s real—thank the GoneGods.

And not just him—they’re all real. Legends, fables, mythical creatures—all of ’em, real as you and me. And all currently living amongst us ever since the gods decided to pack up and leave, closing their heavens and hells and forcing their “Other” creations onto Earth—the only remaining plane of existence they left open in this universe.

As if Earth didn’t have enough problems with just humans, we now have to add on the divine complications that elves, trolls, oni demons, dragons and all the other Others brought with them. You name it, we got it!

I listened as my Sony Walkman cried on a loop. The recording was OK, given that I got it from a YouTube video and had to really work some cross generational technical hook ups, but it worked in the end.

Not the best baby crying in the world, but good enough for the mission, at least.

If only the bogeyman would show up. Where the hell was he? I knew the guy hung out around these parts and my source told me that he frequently cut through the park at night on his way to what he referred to as a “gathering.” It was night, and this was the park, so why wasn’t he gathering?

Then again, my source could be wrong. He was, after all, a drunk fallen angel who lived in my attic. Still, it was quite literally in Penemue’s nature to know things—

Bells. Chiming in a chaotic rhythm, like a dozen nearby churches ringing their Sunday bells a few hours premature.

The chiming drew closer and my heart sped as I waited for the bogeyman to appear. I had one chance to get this guy in my trap or suffer the consequences. And according to my source, this particular bogeyman travelled with a shelleycoat … and pissing off a shelleycoat had all kinds of nasty, bad-for-your-health consequences.

Legend has it that shelleycoats dealt with those who crossed their path by getting the offender so lost and confused that they would literally die of starvation as they wandered aimlessly, looking for the path back home. Even Hansel and Gretel, those clever bastards.

Stories of bodies lying dead only a few feet away from a clearing or a road littered the shelleycoat’s past. And I was determined not to add my own to the shelleycoat’s present.

The chiming grew louder and I heard him say with a heavy Scottish brogue, “What’s this? A wee lad lost in the park?”

So he was a Scottish bogeyman. Cheers, mate.

The shelleycoat took three steps closer to my Cabbage Patch doll. Another step and he’d be in my trap … and the—Wham! Bam! Pow! Holy shelleycoat trap, Batman!

But the shelleycoat didn’t take that last step. Instead, he looked around. And around.

Until his eyes fixed on me.

Hell … Hell-le-lujah.