In the Shape of a Man ~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp

In the Shape of a Man image

In the Shape of a Man
~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp ~

(This is a repost. It has been published in The Literary Hatchet.)

Alexander comes to Marceline in the night, undresses in the dark, and gets into bed beside her. She smells his clean man smell and is aware of the mere animal presence of him: a torso, a head and shoulders, two arms and two legs. The mattress sags under his weight and she sinks closer to him, huddling beside him under the blankets. Timidly she runs her finger along his pectoral muscles and when he seems annoyed she stops.

She can’t, of course, do all the things she longs to do, but it is enough to just have him there in the bed beside her, to watch his handsome profile in the dark. She is reminded of the phrase from the Bible: My cup runneth over. She is too happy, too fulfilled, to sleep well, but it doesn’t matter. She can work on very little sleep or no sleep at all and nobody will notice her heavy eyelids or how sloppily she is dressed or the mistakes she will make in her typing.

When she wakes in the morning he is gone. She sees at once that she is going to be late, but she doesn’t care. She places her hand on the bed where his body has lain and she believes she can still feel his warmth. When she feels herself starting to drift off to sleep again, she throws back the cover and jumps up with alarm.

After performing the necessary ablutions in the bathroom, Marceline dresses hurriedly and goes into the kitchen. Mother is sitting at the table underneath the chicken clock with her back to the wall. She still holds her cards from the gin rummy game the night before. Her glasses glint and her fingernails glisten in the morning light coming from the window.

“Good morning, mother,” Marceline says as she sets about making her morning cup of tea. “I didn’t get much sleep last night. Alexander was with me last night. He’s very passionate, such a wonderful lover. I’m a lucky woman.”

A quick look at the chicken clock tells her she doesn’t have time for breakfast, only her scalding cup of tea. Oh, well, she isn’t hungry, anyway. She can get something out of the vending machine at work.

Before she goes out the door, she takes a quick look at her mother and blows her a kiss. “I’ll be home at the usual time!” she calls cheerily. “God willing, of course!”

She misses the early downtown bus and has to wait fifteen minutes for the second one and when she gets on the bus she doesn’t get a seat and has to stand the whole way. When she walks into the office, half-an-hour late, Mr. Frizzell frowns at her and points at his watch. She smiles and goes on to her desk, ignoring the inquisitive glances of her co-workers.

“Late night last night?” Miss Arlette asks archly.

Marceline ignores her, hangs up her coat and sits down at her desk and begins working.

She despises Ivan-Bello (she has worked there for twelve long years) and the people in it. Her days are routine and uneventful. Her real life seems at times like a prison sentence from which there is no reprieve. The building she works in is old, dreary and dilapidated. Rats run along pipes hanging from ceilings. Plaster and paint rain down on people’s heads. Elevators are permanently out of order. And the people in the company are well-suited to their environment; they are unimaginative, unoriginal, colorless and not worthy of interest. Marceline knows, however, that in describing them in this way, she is also describing herself.

Some of her co-workers, especially the younger women, look upon Marceline with suspicion because they know nothing about her and they think there is something fishy about somebody who isn’t friendly with them. They make jokes behind her back about her sack-like dresses, unflattering hairstyle, and lack of makeup. Knowing she isn’t married, they speculate about whether or not she is a virgin or even if she is a woman. They play little tricks on her, like breaking the lead points off all her pencils or putting a rubber spider on her shoulder while she’s sitting at her desk.

At lunch she buys a sandwich and a bottle of pop in the employees’ lunchroom and takes them to the mannequin storage room. It is cool and quiet in the mannequin room—only the mannequins—and she can have a little time to herself away from ringing phones, clacking typewriters and the self-important voices of those around her.

She goes to the back of the room where the mannequins are closest together, hip to hip and shoulder to shoulder. Some of them are clothed but most are unclothed. Even with no clothes, their painted-on faces are always the same. The men are handsome and the women are beautiful. Some of them have brilliant, life-like eyes and mouths showing pearl-like teeth. They’re lifelike (but not in the way of real people), agreeable and pleasant to be near. They make her feel happy in her life and less alone. Sometimes she kisses one of the more appealing male mannequins full on the lips; she enjoys the sensation and never thinks how peculiar such an action might appear to the casual observer.

She finds a place to sit on a display case where a mannequin has recently been removed and eats her sandwich slowly and when it is gone she finishes her bottle of pop. The empty bottle makes a convenient ash repository, so she lights up a cigarette and blows the smoke out luxuriously. People in the mannequin factory are desperately afraid of fire and she would probably be fired if management knew she was smoking in the highly combustible mannequin room, but that doesn’t keep her from smoking. She is not careless the way some people are; if there’s ever a fire it will be through no fault of her own.

As she leaves the mannequin room, she conceals the pop bottle with her ashes and cigarette butt in it in the folds of her dress. On the way back to her desk she throws the bottle away in one of the tall trash cans, hiding it underneath a mound of papers. Nobody can ever claim she isn’t careful.

In the half-hour or so that she has been away, Mr. Frizzell or somebody else has piled more work on her desk that has to be finished by the end of the day. She never hurries herself because she knows in the world of business everything is always urgent. They’ll have the completed work when they have it and if that doesn’t suit them, well, they’ll just have to go up to the roof and take a sixty-foot dive into the trash cans in the alley.

When the day is finally over and Marceline goes back home, mother is still sitting at the kitchen table holding her cards. She lifts mother up—so light!—and carries her into the living room and sets her on the couch and turns on the TV. Mother enjoys the chatter, the endless commercials, the applause and the mindlessness, of late-afternoon TV fare.

She cooks a modest dinner for herself and mother and when it’s ready she carries mother into the kitchen again and slides her up to the table in her customary chair. She has a full place setting for mother—knife, fork, spoon, folded napkin beside the plate—but the truth is mother doesn’t eat much because she isn’t real. She weighs fifteen pounds. She is a life-size doll; that is, she is one of the mannequins from Ivan-Bello, wearing her real mother’s clothes, wig and glasses. Marceline brought her home from work on the bus one day, paying the fare for her as if she were a real person. People on the bus looked at her if she was a crazy person, but nobody said anything and she just smiled to herself at her little joke.

Her real mother, not the mannequin, has been dead for a year and a half. All that remains of her on this earth is an urnful of ashes on the dresser in her bedroom. She died in her bed, in her sleep, not knowing anything, at age seventy-six. For the last twenty years of her life, she had been in what might modestly be described as “poor health.”

Mother was Marceline’s only friend and companion. They never fussed or quarreled in the way of other mothers and daughters. They were together always, each an extension of the other, and when mother died Marceline couldn’t bear coming home every day to an empty house.

Not long after mother’s death, when Marceline was eating lunch and smoking her Camel cigarette in the mannequin storage room, she noted the resemblance between mother and one of the  female mannequins. They each possessed the same small, pointed nose, the same high cheekbones and the tiny dimple in the chin. When she looked at the mannequin for long enough and squinted, she saw her mother and heard her voice. That’s when she decided to claim the mannequin for her own after office hours and take it (her) home with her on the bus.

When dinner is over, Marceline returns mother to her TV in the living room and washes the dishes. She lets mother watch her favorite programs throughout the evening. When it’s time to go to bed, she undresses her, puts her nighty on over her head and tucks her comfortably under the covers.

The man who comes to her that night is Tab. He isn’t beefy and muscular like Alexander but tall and thin, with blue eyes and flaxen blond hair. He whispers Marceline’s name when they are in the throes of passion and she is embarrassed to think that mother might hear them through the thin wall. When it is all over, Tab leaves and Marceline falls, with the help of a pill, into a blissful sleep that is broken only by the harsh buzz of the alarm clock at six-thirty in the morning. It is time to begin another day.

Another lunchtime in the mannequin storage room (nobody has a clue where she is or what she is doing), she spots a male mannequin she has never seen before. He has dark-red hair and long-lashed, amber eyes. He has broad shoulders (but not too broad), a narrow waist, and stands about five feet, ten inches tall. He is in almost every way the perfect man, except, of course, that he isn’t a real man but a facsimile of a man. Marceline knows at the moment she sees him that she must—she simply must—have him. Sensibly or not, she names him Finch.

The next day she brings to work in a shopping bag an old tweed suit that belonged to her deceased father, as well as shirt, bow tie, belt, old-fashioned union suit, overcoat and hat. After five o’clock that day, when everybody else has gone home, she goes up to the mannequin storage room and dresses Finch up in the clothes she has brought, takes him down to street level by way of the fire stairs and home with her on the bus. People look at her and snigger but she doesn’t care.

At home once again, she puts Finch in her bedroom and closes the door. She isn’t ready just yet for mother to meet him. She expects a honeymoon period with him before he and mother become acquainted.

She enjoys undressing Finch at bedtime and putting him to bed and getting in beside him. All night long, she tricks her mind into believing she is not alone in the bed but with a man. And while he may not exactly be a real man, he has dimension. He possess the bodily proportions of a real man—meaning, of course, that he is made up of more than air. She finds that Finch is more satisfying than either Alexander or Tab.

In the middle of the morning Mr. Frizzell summons Marceline to his office and gestures for her to sit in the chair in front of her desk.

“I’m going to ask you a question,” Mr. Frizzell says, “and I want you to tell me the truth.”

She smiles, wishing she could stub out her cigarette on his veiny nose.

“Have you been stealing property belonging to Ivan-Bello?”

“Why would I do that?” she asks.

He sighs, folding his pudgy hands on the desk in front of him. “Somebody saw you leaving the building with one of our mannequins.”

“Who was it?”

“It doesn’t matter who it was.”

“I’ll bet it was Miss Arlette, wasn’t it?”

“I doesn’t matter who. Did you steal one of our mannequins?”

“No, I didn’t steal it.”

“But you took it?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I wanted it.”

“To sell?”

“No, not to sell.”

“For what, then?”

“I wanted it.”

“It’s company property. We can’t have people stealing from the company. It’s grounds for immediate dismissal.”

“You’re firing me?”

“You have the rest of the day to say your goodbyes.”

It’s a little early for lunch, but she goes immediately to the employee lunchroom and buys a sandwich and a bottle of pop and takes them up to the mannequin storage room.

She knows she will not be seeing the mannequins again, so she says goodbye to as many of them as she can. She tenders an apology to the room in general and then smokes the last cigarette she will ever be smoking in the place.

All the way in back of the huge storage room are some old barrels containing papers, books, cloth samples and mannequin clothing. She picks up a little wedge of wood and lights the end of it with her cigarette lighter and throws it into one of the barrels. She isn’t sure if the fire will take hold or not, but after she leaves the building and goes home for the last time she doesn’t give it much thought.

The next morning she gets out of bed and dresses for work at the usual time, careful not to disturb Finch in the bed. She has her cup of scalding tea, gives mother a tiny goodbye peck on the cheek and walks the three short blocks to catch the downtown bus.

The bus can only go so far. It’s four blocks or so from her destination when it becomes snarled in traffic. Rather than waiting for the traffic problem to resolve it, she gets off the bus and walks the rest of the way.

Right away she notices the stench of burning.

Ivan-Bello has been burning all night long and has just about burned itself out. While the outside walls still mostly stand, all the floors, from six on down, appear to have collapsed in on each other. Police keep onlookers back at a safe distance.

As Marceline stands with dozens of other people and watches the fire, she is thankful for many things, not the least of which is that Ivan-Bello is a thing of the past. More importantly, however, mother and Finch are safe at home. She’ll see them again in just a little while and the three of them will be together forever.

Copyright © 2026 by Allen Kopp

by allen0997

The Spring He Built the Garage ~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp

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The Spring He Built the Garage
~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp ~

(This is a repost. It has been published in The Literary Hatchet.)

Richard Eddington served in the navy in World War II. When the war ended and he received his discharge in 1945, he didn’t have much reason for wanting to go home. His mother and brother were both dead. His father moved to Texas to marry a woman he hardly knew. There was no other family. To make a fresh start for himself, Richard moved to a new town in a different state.

He had been a radio man in the navy. Radios were the big thing after the war. There was at least one radio in every home and the damn things were always breaking. People would pay good money to a repairman who could keep them in working order.

While readjusting to civilian life, Richard rented a room in a boarding house and landed a job in a shoe-company warehouse. It wasn’t much of a job, but it would keep him afloat while he took night classes in radio repair.

After a year of classes, he received his diploma. It meant more to him than his high school diploma because he put a lot more effort into it. When he went for his first job interview in a radio-repair shop, the old man who owned the place gave him a broken radio and told him to do what he could with it. He fixed the radio in just a few minutes and the old man offered him a job as counter man, meaning he had to wait on customers in addition to the repairs he did.

Business picked up at the radio shop. The old man increased Richard’s pay two times in a year. When the old man broke his hip and could no longer work and had to give up the business, he offered to sell the shop to Richard for three thousand dollars. Richard went to the bank and, because of his steady employment record and his honorable service in the navy, got a loan for enough money to buy the shop and also to buy a small, five-room, frame house on a pleasant street in town. He bought a used car with money from the nickel-and-dime bank account he had had since he was twelve years old, and soon he was a regular tax-paying, going-to-work-every-day, small-business-owner living in his own home.

He modernized the business, buying new fixtures, painting the walls and adding a line of big and small radios for sale. Business doubled and then tripled. Richard hired a full-time salesman, another repairman, and a girl to do the books and handle invoices. For the first time in his life he was somebody instead of nobody.

The girl was one Delores O’Dare. She smoked a lot of cigarettes and was quietly efficient, keeping to her work until time to go home. When any of the fellows around the shop tried to flirt with her, she gave them the brush-off.

Richard was shy and had never been much of a ladies’ man. He had a girlfriend or two in high school but could never be serious about them. They only wanted to get married and have babies, and that kind of responsibility scared him off. When he asked Delores O’Dare out to have a hamburger with him after work, he was surprised when she not only accepted but seemed pleased to be asked.

He told her about his time in the war, his family and his plans for the radio shop. She listened politely to everything he said without seeming bored or impatient. He found himself opening up to her in a way he had never done before with another person. Before he knew it, three hours had gone by. When it was time to leave, he offered to take her home, but she said she was fine on her own.

Richard and Delores began seeing each other regularly. She told him her secrets just as he had told her his. She was married at seventeen and divorced at eighteen. Her two brothers were both killed in the war; the younger brother was still missing in action and presumed dead. She lived with her parents to keep from living alone, but it wasn’t a happy situation. Her mother wasn’t right in the head and never had been. Her father was disabled and never stopped complaining because that’s about all he felt like doing. When Delores saved a little money, she planned on getting herself a little apartment and getting off by herself where she could have some peace and quiet.

After three months, Richard asked Delores to marry him and she surprised him by accepting. They obtained their license and were married by a justice of the peace a hundred miles away from home and spent a three-day honeymoon in a cabin at a lake resort. Neither of them fished or swam, so after they admired the scenery they were ready to go back home.

Delores brought with her to the little five-room house a double-bed, a dresser, a couch and a kitchen table and chairs. She hung curtains in every room, including the bathroom, and in a little while it seemed like a real home. Richard expected they would wait a few months and have a baby, but Delores told him she had had an infection when she was younger and was unable to bear children. He was a little disappointed that he would never be a father, but he thought they might consider adoption a little later on when they were more settled.

Richard and Delores went to work together every day and were together all day long in the shop. They went home together, ate dinner and slept together in the same bed. They were together every minute of every day and night. Richard accepted this as the natural order of things, but after a year Delores began to show signs of restlessness and moodiness. She began drinking to excess; she told Richard she didn’t like working in the shop anymore and wanted to quit. He’d need to hire himself another girl to keep the books.

He thought it best to indulge her, at least for the short term. Every morning when he left for work, she was still sleeping, having stayed up half the night sitting at the kitchen table, reading magazines, smoking cigarettes and listening to the radio. He would give her a month or so of doing what she wanted at home and then he was sure she would want to return to the shop.

The drinking became worse. On Saturday when they went to the store to buy food for the week, she loaded up the cart with beer, wine and whiskey. When he asked her why she drank so much, she said drinking was the only thing that calmed her nerves and made her feel like getting out of bed and putting one foot in front of the other.

“A person who drinks every day is an alcoholic,” he said.

“What of it?” she said. “I come from a long line of them.”

“I want you to see the doctor and tell him what’s going on with you.”

“I don’t need a doctor. I’m not sick. Maybe you’re the one that needs the doctor.”

“I didn’t know I was marrying a drunk.”

“There’s nothing wrong with drinking. If you weren’t such an old stick, you’d drink too. To keep me company.”

She began going out at night. After a hurried supper, she’d go into the bedroom and put on one of her best dresses, spend an hour or so in front of the mirror doing up her face and hair, and leave without a word. He never knew if she’d be back by morning. Some nights he had the feeling he’d never seen her again.

During one of her sober periods, he talked to her about adopting a baby, or maybe two, but she laughed and said it was the worst idea she ever heard. The last thing in the world she wanted was to raise somebody else’s brats.

He stopped sharing the bed with her and started sleeping in the back bedroom. He moved his clothes out of the closet and the drawers and lived as separate from her as he could in such a small house. He tried not to notice her comings and goings. When he heard her come in in the middle of the night or toward morning, he would refuse to look at the clock. He didn’t want to know what time it was. He told himself he didn’t care.

He thought about seeing a lawyer to file for divorce, but he could see she was on a downward spiral to her own destruction and he knew that he was the only person in the world who might help her, if only he knew how.

One Sunday morning after a late Saturday night, she cooked breakfast for him and sat down opposite him at the table while he ate it. The kitchen was full of her cigarette smoke and he could smell what she had been drinking the night before.

“I’m in love with someone else,” she said. “I want a divorce.”

“I don’t even know you,” he said.

“We need money so we can go away together.”

“If you leave, I want you to promise me you’ll never come back,” he said.

He gave her seventeen hundred dollars, which was all the money he had on hand. “That’s the last you’ll ever get from me,” he said.

He expected every day that she would leave, and would have been glad to see her go, but she didn’t go. Two weeks later she was still sleeping all day and staying away all night. One day when he came home from work in the middle of the afternoon, he heard her crying behind the closed bedroom door. He pushed open the door without knocking.

She was lying on the bed on her back in her slip. There was blood all over the bed and the floor.

“What’s this?” he said. “What’s happened?”

 “Sit down,” she said.

“I don’t want to sit down! I want to know why you’re covered in blood!”

“I had an abortion.”

“You had a…”

“Something went wrong.”

“You’re bleeding to death! I’m calling an ambulance!”

“No! I don’t want anybody to know what I did!”

“I can’t just let you lie there and bleed to death!”

“No, it’s what I want. It’s what I’ve wanted for a long time.”

“To bleed to death?”

“Just sit and hold my hand.”

He sat down on the bed; she took his hand in hers and wouldn’t let go.

“I know I’ve been a terrible wife to you,” she said. “I’ve been so awful. So mean and unfair. I hope someday you’ll forgive me.”

“I don’t care about that,” he said. “I’m going to get some help.”

“No! I don’t want you to leave me!”

She drifted in and out of consciousness. Her breathing slowed and then stopped altogether. She died at ten o’clock that night in the middle of a thunderstorm.

Richard called the radio shop the next morning and told Vic, the salesman, that he was going to take the rest of the week off and they would have to manage the best they could without him.

“Everything here under control,” Vic said.

Richard wrapped Delores’s body in sheets and canvas and put it, temporarily,  underneath the stairs in the cellar. The official story, if anybody asked, was that she went away to pursue a different kind of life. He didn’t know where she went or how to reach her. She didn’t want to be reached but wanted only to be left alone.

He called the police and filed a missing person’s report. A couple of officers came to the house and asked some questions. Was it a happy marriage? Did the wife show signs of discontent? Had she ever talked about leaving? Was there any reason to suspect foul play? The officers seemed satisfied with the answers they received and went on their way.

Richard had always wanted to build a garage in back of his house and now was the time. He went to city hall and got the building permit and then ordered the materials, which were promptly delivered. Doing all the work himself, he built a handsome brick garage with a thick concrete floor in about six weeks.

More than sixty years later, the little five-room house where Richard lived was torn down, as were all the surrounding houses, to make way for a new highway extension. While Richard’s garage was being dismantled, the skeletal remains of a female were found interred in the concrete floor. The police, naturally, wanted to know who the female was and how she came to be there. As the property owner, Richard would, of course, have been the person to answer these questions, but he had moved on to a happier existence and was no longer available for comment.

Copyright © 2026 by Allen Kopp

by allen0997

Mrs. Biederhof ~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp

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Mrs. Biederhof
~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp ~

(This is a repost. It has been published in The Literary Hatchet.)

In 1945, my friend Maggie Biederhof didn’t mind going around with a married man as long as his marriage was in the trash heap anyway. It was all pretty innocent with Burt, although to the casual observer it might not seem that way. He came over in the evening, she’d fix him a sandwich or a salad, and they’d have a few drinks and a few laughs and maybe play some gin rummy, but mostly they talked. He talked about his wife, whose name was Mildred, his job as a real estate agent (things weren’t going so great at the time), and his two daughters, Veda and Kay.

The way Burt talked about Veda, she sounded like the real debutante type. She was pretty and she knew it and, already, at the age of sixteen, was a real snob. Veda saw her father as a failure because he wasn’t rich and she knew he’d never be rich and could never give her the things she thought she deserved, like a limousine and servants. She wanted to be a rich girl but the sad truth was her family had to struggle to live from day to day, from week to week. With the real estate market in the shape it was in, Burt barely brought in enough money to make a living for four people. His wife, brave struggling soul that she was, baked pies and cakes in her own little kitchen and sold them to the neighbors for a dollar here and a dollar there. She made enough extra money to buy Veda an occasional new dress and to pay for Kay to have piano lessons with an old woman down the street. Kay didn’t really care for the piano—she’d rather be playing baseball with the boys in the neighborhood—but Mildred wanted both her daughters to have some culture, which was something she’d missed out on entirely.

Mrs. Biederhof was fond of Burt. She liked entertaining him in her home and liked spending time with him. He was a few years younger than she was, but what did that matter? When he moved out on his wife, she told him he could move in with her. She knew the neighbors would talk, but they had talked before and she didn’t care. Because of his daughters, though, because of Veda and Kay, he didn’t think it was a good idea for him to live in the same house with a woman he wasn’t married to, even if it was all perfectly innocent. That was one of the things Mrs. Biederhof liked about Burt. He was a good man and she hadn’t known many of those in her life. She hoped to marry him after his divorce with Mildred went through, although neither one of them ever talked about it.

She knew Burt’s wife, Mildred, or at least knew of her. She recognized her when she saw her. She was a straitlaced, noble thing, long-suffering, a martyr for the cause. Just what the cause was, nobody quite knew. She was pretty enough but didn’t seem to care so much about herself. She lived for the two daughters, Veda and Kay. She wanted them to have all she things she missed out in when she was growing up in Kansas City. Her mother scrubbed floors and her father, well, he was a drunk and spent most of his time in jail and was of no use to anybody, himself included. Mildred left Kansas City as fast as she could and moved West, where she took a job as a salesgirl and met Burt. He was modestly good-looking, moderately ambitious, and she saw right away he would make a decent husband. They’d never be rich, but there are a lot of people like that. They married six months after they met and a year after they were married, the little bundle known as Veda arrived.

Right away Veda was the spoiled child. Mildred doted on her. Burt was only human, though, meaning he was a little jealous of Veda. Mildred lavished so much love and attention on Veda that there wasn’t much left over for him. All day long, from sun-up to sleepy-bye time, there was nothing but Veda, Veda, Veda. Burt knew a little about child psychology and he knew that Veda was one day going to be an uncontrollable monster. When the second child, Kay, came along, he thought it would be a good thing for Veda to have a little competition and for Mildred to have another person besides Veda to think about.

Mildred spoiled Kay, too, but nothing like Veda. With two children to take care of and still baking her cakes and pies to bring in some money, she was busy all the time, but Veda was still uppermost in her thoughts. Mildred would never admit it, of course, but she preferred Veda over Kay. Kay just wasn’t as pretty and feminine as Veda. When she started to grow up and be something other than a baby, she showed a tomboyish side that Mildred didn’t care for. She liked rough-and-tumble games, the kind of games that boys played, and she didn’t care much for dolls and frilly dresses. It’s not that Mildred neglected Kay, but Veda was always the apple of her eye.

Mrs. Biederhof happened to meet Veda on a Saturday morning in spring, and not under very happy circumstances. She had been out with some friends the night before celebrating somebody’s birthday and she was nursing a hangover. It was about eleven in the morning and she hadn’t found the will to get all the way out of bed yet. When she heard someone knocking, she thought it might be Burt, but when she went to the door and opened it she saw a pretty, dark-haired, girl standing there with a petulant smirk on her face. She had never seen the girl before but she knew who it was before she even opened her mouth.

“Yes?” Mrs. Biederhof said. “Whatever you’re selling, I don’t want any.”

Veda didn’t speak for a minute. She seemed to be taking in the sight of slightly overweight, middle-aged, bleach-blonde Maggie Biederhof, slightly the worse for wear and in her none-too-clean dressing gown.

“I just wanted to see what you look like up close,” Veda said.

“Who the hell are you?”

“Not that it could possibly mean anything to you, but I’m Veda Pierce, Burt Pierce’s daughter.”

“Oh, yes. I’ve heard all about you, Veda. Would you like to come in?”

“It won’t be necessary. I just wanted to inform you that my mother and I know all about you.”

“I’m so happy for you,” Mrs. Biederhof said, putting her hand on the door to close it.

“You’ve been seeing my father, I believe, for quite a long time.”

“I don’t think it’s any secret that Burt and I have become friends. We’re both adults.”

“Yes, but he’s still married to my mother.”

“Only because the divorce hasn’t gone through, yet.”

“Don’t think for one minute that he’s ever going to marry you.”

“I don’t think that’s any of your business, Veda. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have something on the stove.”

“He would never marry a cheap, common woman like you.”

“Excuse me?”

“How many times have you been married, Mrs. Biederhof?”

“Now, wait a minute!”

“Oh, yes. We know all about you. My mother is a lady and I’m sure that’s something you would know nothing about.”

“Now, look here, you! I’ll give you about five seconds to get away from my door. I keep a gun in the house and I don’t mind using it.”

“I also have a gun,” Veda said. “It’s right here in my bag. Would you like to see it?”

“So, you came here to threaten me? You want to kill me?”

“No, I don’t think that will be necessary. I’m just telling you I don’t mind killing you if it comes to that. Some people can kill and others can’t. I’m one who can.”

“Well, thank you for that insight into your character, Veda, but I don’t know how it could possibly interest me.”

“You’ve had your cheap, tawdry, little love affair with my father and I think it’s time for you to drop out of the picture and leave him alone.”

Mrs. Biederhof laughed in spite of herself. “You make it sound as if I’ve been pursuing him the whole time. He comes over here of his accord. We laugh and talk and have a good time. We have become very dear companions.”

“If all he needs is a drinking companion and cheap sex,” Veda said, “I’m sure he could do much better than you.”

“Now I wish you had come in,” Mrs. Biederhof said, “so I could have the pleasure of throwing you out!”

She slammed the door in Veda’s face, locked it, and, for good measure, closed the curtains and blinds. She was so angry she wanted to kill someone and the someone she wanted to kill was Veda. The nerve of that little tootsie, she thought, coming here and talking to me that way. I’d like to wipe up the floor with her pretty little debutante face.

By the time Burt came over that evening after work, she had calmed down and decided not to tell him about Veda’s little visit. Somebody had to be the grownup and it would be her if it had to be. She cooked him a steak and after they ate she turned on some music and they just sat on the couch and smoked and talked. He put his head in her lap and before long he went to sleep. Poor dear, she thought, he’s exhausted from his miserable life at home. We could be so happy together if it wasn’t for Mildred and that little witch Veda!

A few days later there was some good news about Mildred. She opened a restaurant and it was certain to be a big success, pulling in the customers day and night. Not only that, but she had a new boyfriend, a man named Monte Beragon. He was plenty good-looking and from a rich family, Burt said. He didn’t do much of anything except go yachting, swimming, riding and to dances at the country club. A real society boy. He seemed better suited to Veda than to Mildred, but Mrs. Biederhof pretended to be happy for Mildred.

She was thinking, of course, of Mildred marrying Monte Beragon and leaving Burt entirely free to marry her.

It wasn’t long, though, before disaster struck and life took one of its ugly little turns. Mildred was spending the weekend with Monte Beragon at his beach house, and Veda and Kay were staying with Burt in his new bachelor apartment. He was going to take them to the lake for an overnight camping trip, but Kay complained of a sore throat and pains all through her body. As the day progressed, she became more and more sick. Not being used to taking care of kids on his own, Burt panicked and, not knowing what else to do, took her to Mrs. Biederhof’s house.

Right away Mrs. Biederhof saw that Kay was plenty sick and put her to bed in her spare bedroom. She wanted to get her to the hospital, but Burt said the hospital would only scare her and make her worse, so he called a doctor friend of his. The doctor came over with a private nurse and began ministering to the sick child.

When Burt saw how sick Kay was, he put in an emergency call to Mildred at Monte Beragon’s beach house and arranged to meet her and take her to Mrs. Biederhof’s. Mildred ran to Kay’s side, but the doctor made her stay back. Veda was also there with Mildred. When Mrs. Biederhof looked at Veda, she didn’t look back. Nobody would ever know that just a week earlier they had been on the verge of a gun battle at Mrs. Biederhof’s front door.

Kay died within a couple of hours. The doctor said it was meningitis and it was contagious. Mildred, Veda and Burt were all terribly broken up about it. Mrs. Biederhof remained in the background, offering help where it was needed, feeling utterly helpless. When it came time for the funeral, she thought she should go, but Burt told her it wasn’t a good idea. She sent an arrangement of snapdragons instead.

To heal her broken heart, Mildred threw herself into her business. Her restaurant had done well so she opened a second one and was considering a third. Now that she and Burt were successfully un-married, she married Monte Beragon in a small church ceremony with three hundred guests (mostly Monte’s friends and family) in attendance. Burt bought a new suit and went to the wedding alone.

The marriage was written up in all the society columns, Monte being a bonafide member of the social register. It was his fifth marriage and Mildred’s second. After a week-long honeymoon in Acapulco, they took up residence in Monte’s family’s estate, which was badly in need of renovation. Monte let Mildred take charge of all the repairs and remodeling, seeing as she would be paying all the bills.

Veda, of course, lived with Mildred and Monte and she was flying high. Finally she had all she had ever dreamed of: A beautiful, palatial home; servants to satisfy her every whim; plenty of money to spend on clothes and trips; endless country club dances, weekend parties, swimming and riding. Mildred bought her an expensive convertible and wondered how long it would be before she smashed it up.

All principal parties were happy and satisfied for a few months, but then the inevitable happened. Veda fell in love with her stepfather, Monte Beragon, or thought she did. She always wanted the thing she couldn’t have and would do anything to get it. Monte played along, flattered as he was by the adoration of a pretty young girl half his age. He didn’t see—or didn’t want to see—how serious Veda was and how dangerous she could be if didn’t get the thing she wanted. Mildred also refused to see it until she was confronted firsthand with the proof: she walked in on Monte and Veda when they were naked together in bed. (This scene was relayed to Mrs. Biederhof by way of Burt by way of Mildred.)

“I’m glad you know,” Veda said, getting out of the bed and putting on a dressing gown. “Finally the truth comes out!”

“Veda, how could you!” Mildred said. “He’s your stepfather!”

“I think that makes him even more desirable, don’t you?”

“Veda, you’re a very sick person and I don’t know what ever made you the way you are!”

“Well, we could stand here all day and all night and analyze the situation, but the truth is that Monte and I love each other. He wants you to divorce him so he can marry me!”

“What’s this?” Monte said, pulling on his pants. “I never at any time said I’d marry you, Veda!”

“What?”

“Your mother is a perfect wife for me. She’s a fount of ready cash and she always looks the other way and doesn’t ask any questions.”

“I can’t look the other way this time, Monte!” Mildred said. “If a divorce is what you want, I’ll accommodate you!”

“What do you mean you don’t want to marry me?” Veda shrieked.

“Very simple,” Monte said. “I’d rather be dead than married to a spoiled, selfish little brat like you! You’re a dime a dozen, kid!”

Monte continued to get dressed. He put on his shirt and put his necktie around his neck before tying it, trying to avoid Mildred’s gaze. Feeling faint, Mildred sat down on the edge of the bed and put her head forward.

Unnoticed by either Mildred or Monte, Veda went to the dresser and opened the drawer and took out a small object. When Mildred saw the object was a gun, she stood up from the bed and was about to speak when Veda pointed the gun at Monte and fired, once in the chest and two times in the abdomen. He pitched forward and before he fell to the floor, he spoke one word: “Mildred.”

“Veda!” Mildred screamed.

Veda looked coolly from Monte to Mildred and back to Monte and when she seemed to suddenly be aware that she was holding a gun, she threw it on the floor.

“You’ve killed him!” Mildred said.

“I don’t think I meant to kill him, mother!” Veda said.

Mildred went to the phone and picked up the receiver.

“Mother, what are you going to do?” Veda said.

“I’m calling the police.”

“Oh, no! You can’t do that!”

“You’ve killed a man! You can’t just walk away and pretend it didn’t happen!”

“Mother, we need to talk about this first. You don’t have to tell them I killed Monte. Tell them the gun just went off. Or tell them you killed him. Accidentally, I mean.”

“Veda, you have to be an adult for once and take responsibility for your actions.”

“They’ll put me in jail!”

“We’ll get the best lawyer we can find.”

“Oh, no, no, no, I can’t let you call the police. You’ve got to give me all the cash you have in the house and let me get away. I’ll go to Mexico and you’ll never see me again. I promise!”

“I can’t get you out of this, Veda.”

The police came and took Veda away and later that night she made a complete confession. There would be no sensational trial. Her lawyer promised to try to get her off with a manslaughter charge. If she was lucky, she’d spend ten years behind bars.

The murder was all over the front pages: Society Girl Kills Stepfather. The public ate it up: Sex, money, infidelity, a love triangle involving an older man and a younger woman, and the fact that she was his stepdaughter made it even spicier.

Mildred went into hiding to keep reporters from hounding her, making herself available only to the police. Veda was in the county jail and would be transferred to women’s state prison after sentencing. She called Mildred every chance she got and berated her and blamed her for Monte’s death. “You’re the one that should be in jail!” she said. “Not me!”

Mrs. Biederhof didn’t hear from Burt for five days and when he came over again, looking tired and grim, he told her that he was going back to Mildred. He still loved her and believed she loved him and, with both Kay and Veda gone, he was all she had left in the world. The two of them would spend every dime they had to get Veda’s sentence reduced.

Mrs. Biederhof had been in California for twenty-five years. She was sure she had had enough sunshine to last her a lifetime. She had a sister living back East and planned to go stay with her for a while, maybe for the rest of her life. She sold her house, put her furniture in storage, packed her bags and got on the train for the long trip that would take her to the other end of the continent. She didn’t even bother to tell Burt goodbye. In time she would forget him, as she had all the others.

Copyright © 2026 by Allen Kopp

by allen0997

I Am Skippy Wellington ~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp

 I Am Skippy Wellington image 2

I Am Skippy Wellington
~ A Short Story by Allen Kopp ~

I had fifteen minutes before bus time, so I sat down on one of the ratty seats with part of the stuffing coming out. It was Friday night of a difficult week and I felt terrible. My toothache was killing me, I felt a cold coming on, and I had heartburn from the spicy goulash I had for dinner. I took another pain pill for my tooth and was beginning to feel sleepy when somebody sat down beside me. I turned my head and saw it was Skippy Wellington.

“How are you, Dickie?” she said.

I was surprised, not only that she would speak to me, but that she knew my name.

“Just wonderful,” I said, sounding more cheerful than I felt.

“I’m Skippy Wellington,” she said.

“Yes, I know.”

“Isn’t it funny that we should both be at the bus station at the same time?”

“Yes, isn’t it?”

“I hate the bus station, so it’s good to have somebody to talk to while I wait.”

“Yes, the bus station is, uh, ugly.”

“How do you like college so far?”

“It’s all right.”

“You’re in your first year?”

“Second.”

“I’ll bet you’re finding college much different from high school, aren’t you?”

“Well, I have to study more.”

“What’s your major?”

“I haven’t decided yet.”

“I guess you can decide that later on, when you’re farther along.”

“That’s the plan.”

“As for me,” Skippy said, “I have a double major. English and drama. I want to be an actress and if that doesn’t work out, I guess I’ll teach English. I was in one Drama Guild production in the fall. Now I’m studying another part in another play, to be staged in the spring. If you’ve ever carried the lead in a play, you know how much work it is.”

“No, I haven’t ever done that,” I said, realizing how stupid I sounded.

“And, you know, I don’t like the roommate I have now. Her name is Rocky. Isn’t that absurd? A girl named Rocky! If I can make it through another week without strangling her, it’ll be a miracle!

“Why don’t you ask to move to a different room?”

“I have, but there isn’t a vacant room for me to move to now. I’ll have to wait until somebody drops out.”

“I was lucky to get an end room,” I said. “No roommate.”

“Yes, that was lucky. Where do you room?”

“Prentiss Hall.”

“Well, isn’t that a coincidence? That’s where my boyfriend rooms. You must know him. His name is Peter Piper.”

“Yes, I know him. He’s on my floor. I mean, we both room on the same floor.”

“Isn’t Peter something? He’s just the all-American boy, isn’t he?”

“The truth is, I don’t know him all that well. We don’t move in the same circles.”

She laughed. “You are funny, you know that?”

“No, I didn’t realize it until now.”

“He’s very good-looking, don’t you think, with his blond good looks?”

“I haven’t ever thought about it.”

“Hah-hah-hah! Oh, Dickie! Come on, now! You can admit to me that you find Peter attractive. I won’t think you’re gay.”

“Well, I guess the casual observer might find him attractive.”

“The casual observer! Hah-hah-hah! You are original!”

“Is that my bus? I think I just heard my bus! I don’t want to miss it!”

“No, it isn’t your bus yet, Dickie. Do you talk much to Peter? You know, man to man?”

“I hardly talk to him at all. A couple times in the TV lounge is all. He offered me a cigarette one time, but I didn’t take it because I don’t smoke.”

“You never heard him talk about girls or dates he’s been out on or anything like that?”

“No, nothing like that.”

“You see, I’m terribly in love with him. We’ve discussed getting married when we’re both finished with school, but I’m not too sure about him. I know a lot of people find him as terribly attractive as I do. When he tells me he’s in love with me and wants to spend his whole life with me, I’m not sure how seriously I can take him. Do you know what I mean?”

“I think I do.”

“You’re never heard him say anything about a girl named Doris? She’s a biology major.”

“No, I don’t know her.”

“I’ve heard that Doris calls him up all the time, and she makes sure she’s in the places where she knows he’ll be. She is so forward! She’s such a swine and will do anything, I’m sure, to take him away from me! I’m terribly jealous. Oh, this is all too much! You probably think I’m just being silly, don’t you?”

“No, it’s okay.”

“I’d like to strangle Doris.”

“I won’t tell anybody.”

“If we wait two or three years before we get married, I’m afraid I’ll lose him. I won’t be able to hold onto him that long with so many different girls after him.”

“That’s a tough one.”

“But if I go ahead and marry him now, I can kiss my acting career goodbye. You see, he doesn’t approve. He thinks women should be traditional like his mother and not be interested in bettering themselves. He thinks I’m just being silly when I say I want to be an actress. He doesn’t take me seriously as a person. Do you take me seriously as a person?”

“Sure.”

“I’m terribly serious about my acting. After I’ve acted on the stage for a few years—and I mean the real stage and not college productions—I plan to go to Hollywood. I think I have what it takes to make it big. People have told me I have talent; I know I have talent. I also have the drive and the ambition, which are just as important as talent.”

“Do you have your bags packed? That’s important, too.”

“Hah-hah-hah! Since you and Peter room on the same floor, I was wondering if you’d be willing to help me out.”

“Help you out how?”

“Well, it’s kind of a delicate situation. Keep your eyes and ears open and see if you see or hear anything.”

“Like what?”

“Well, boys love to talk about their conquests and things. They love to brag.”

“Peter would never brag to me.”

“I know, but you room on the same floor with him. You’re bound to see and hear things. Not only from Peter but from somebody else.”

“Are you saying you want me to spy on Peter for you?”

“Oh, no! Nothing like that! I just thought that if you do happen to come by any knowledge that you think might be of any interest to me you wouldn’t mind passing it along.”

“Oh, I don’t know…”

“I’d be willing to pay you!”

“Oh, no! I couldn’t take…”

“I know this is asking a lot, but you’re such a sweet and sensitive boy that I was certain I’d be able to talk to you about just anything.”

“This is not really what…”

My phone number is in the student directory. Skippy Wellington. Call me any time, on any subject. It doesn’t have to be only about Peter. I knew the moment I started talking to you that you and I are simpatico. If you’re ever having trouble finding a date, I know dozens of girls who would be thrilled to death to go out with you!”

“Finding a date has never been my problem.”

“Hah-hah-hah! You are so funny!”

“Here’s my bus,” I said. “I have to go.”

I stood up and she stood up beside me.

“Have a wonderful weekend!” she said.

She surprised me by putting her arms around me and kissing me on the lips. Her lips tasted like wax. I didn’t especially like it, but I can’t say I disliked it, either.

The bus wasn’t crowded; there were plenty of empty seats. I took a seat close to the back on the left side. I had a three-hour ride ahead of me and I hoped to spend most of it sleeping.

My conversation with Skippy Wellington had reinvigorated me; I felt better now. I was sure she was flirting with me. Nobody ever said to me the kind of things she said, about how I was sweet and kind and any girl would be lucky to know me. I considered Peter Piper an arrogant jerk, and I was sure Skippy could do better than him. What if she found she preferred me over him? What is she just gave him the go-by and told me she wanted to be with me instead of him? It’s true I wasn’t as good looking as he was, but I had other things that he didn’t have. I had depth and sensitivity and maturity. I used good English and I bathed regularly.

The bus hit a bump in the highway and jolted me out of my reverie. When I looked out the window, I couldn’t see anything. We might have run over a person or a grizzly bear, for all I knew. This stretch of highway was hilly and curvy and worse in the dark. As we rounded the curves and slowed for the hills, I always wondered if we were going to make it or not.

And then it started to rain, at first a little bit and then a lot. Soon the rain was pounding the windows mercilessly. The tires hissed, as if holding on to the highway for dear life. I had felt better, but now I felt worse again. My stomach was churning. I’d try to sit still and not think about anything and, if I was lucky, I’d go to sleep and not wake up again until we reached our destination.

I did drift off to sleep, but it didn’t last long. The bus hit an icy patch and veered off the highway on a curve, first the front tires and then the rest of the bus. Some of the passengers near the front of the bus screamed.

The driver struggled to get control, but it was no use. From where I sat, I could see he was losing the battle. The bus tipped over; we rolled down an embankment. It was while we were rolling that I lost consciousness.

I might have been dead because I didn’t know anything after that. I wasn’t aware when they lifted me out of the wreckage of the bus and took me away.

I woke up in a strange place. I was in a high bed. I thought I was back at school, but I didn’t recognize anything. My mother was standing over me, looking down at me.

“What are you doing here?” I asked her.

“You were in an accident.”

“What kind of an accident?”

“The bus you were in rolled down a hill and crashed.”

“Is Skippy here, too?”

“Who is Skippy? Is he a friend of yours from school? You’ve been babbling about Skippy the whole time.”

“What whole time?”

“You’ve been out.”

“Out where?”

“Unconscious. You know.”

“Am I going to die?’

“The doctor says you’ll be all right, but it’s going to take some time. You have a fractured jaw bone, a broken collar bone, and your right arm is broken in two places.”

“I need to get back to school. I need to see Skippy.”

“And besides all that, you have a brain concussion. I think you can forget about Skippy for a while.”

“I’m afraid Skippy might be hurt.”

“You don’t need to worry about anything now except your own self. You’re going to have a long road to recovery.”

“Skippy. Skippy. I need to see my Skippy.”

“Don’t you worry about your Skippy. I’m sure he’s all right, or we would have heard.”

I groaned and turned my head on the pillow to keep from having to see my mother’s face. I saw a nurse with red hair and a clock on the wall with a blank face, and then I fell back into a deep sleep.

Copyright © 2026 by Allen Kopp

by allen0997