To whom it may concern

At 3:33 a.m. on a wet Wednesday morning in June, every church bell in Eerie began to chime.

In the Eerie Cemetery, stiff-necked corpses rolled over in their coffins, moaning in protest and pressing skeletal hands over shrivelled ears while beneath Lake Eerie, things with tentacles and gills and other, less-easily described attributes clutched tight to crucifixes made from driftwood and barnacles. Janet Donner pulled her coverlet over her head, ears straining for the tell-tale clink of milk bottles, and Melanie Monroe awoke shrieking out a scream that only she could hear.

Mary B. Carter was getting married. Again.

Ongoing Verse: Andrea/Marisea

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Ongoing Verse: The Children

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Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: Euclid

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The moray eels in their human skin suit surveyed the locked doors of the Eerie Museum of Aquatic Mysteries with suspicious eyes and downturned mouths. They carried a backpack, though technically not on their backs, and the straps hung strangely over lopsided and sagging shoulders supported by no scapula or collarbone.

In the backpack was a recipe book, old and worn and much-repaired with sticking tape and the best efforts of creatures without opposable thumbs. Or any thumbs. Or digits at all, really.

"1001 Atlantean Delicacies for the Discerning Piscivore" was a best-seller, and they were determined to use it.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Janet Donner stood at the edge of the lake, feeling the salt breeze play across the exposed skin of her bare arms and tug at the loose curls of her long red hair. In one hand, she held a bottle that had once contained a tiny replica frigate, a frigate that was even now setting sail from the dock outside the Eerie Baitshop and Sushi Bar.

In her other hand, she grasped a clump of wet sand, which she poked into the narrow mouth of the now-empty bottle. It might not work, but she needed what help she could get.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Melanie let herself in through what, Janet had reliably informed her, was called the Eel Hole.

Apparently in the olden days, long before fishing was invented, a man on a horse-drawn aquarium would call once a week to deliver thousands of live and wriggling eels directly to the Baitshop's basement levels, tipping his squirming cargo into a little hatch 'round the side of the building. From there they would slither onto the waiting blades of the Baitshop's staff, to become chum or sushi depending on the cuts made and the quality of the meat.

Janet had probably been kidding, though.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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The lake was hungry. Not just the things in the lake, the mermaids and sea hags and the squishy squid-like things that signed her paycheques, but the lake itself. Janet could feel it, gnawing at the pit of her stomach and sending a cold ache through her bones, turning her muscles to rusted tangles of barbed wire that caught on the underside of her skin with every moment she spent above the waves.

"I'm not ready," she whispered into the white and hissing surf, and, "I need more time." And, perhaps most damningly, "the tourist season will be here soon."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"Fine, ghosts," Marshall said, apparently to empty air. "I'm going. But I'll be back, and I'll be bringing my bed."

Tod, who had replaced Simon on the evening's stakeout due to a scheduling clash with some turn of events that involved Harley, one of the higher-ranked Courts of Hell, and a truly staggering amount of seaweed forced into and then out of a very small blender, blinked.

"What?" asked Marshall.

"Nothing," said Tod. "Just, you could have phrased that literally any other way and it would have sounded less weird."

"They're ghosts," Marshall explained. "They're more comfortable with the weird."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: Holmes Brothers

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Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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"Oh good," said Janet, with the sort of sarcasm that would have struck the nigiri dead in their tanks if she'd turned it towards them. "The sun's out, so obviously it's time for every idiot in Eerie to stand around their idling cars with the radio blaring. Apparently this year's Sound of the Summer is just dipshits and exhaust pipes."

"You could just drown them out," suggested Melanie, motioning to the Baitshop's ancient and dusty tape deck.

"I could just drown them, period," said Janet. "But management have said I need to wait and see if they buy anything first."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"It's not surprising, really," said Melanie. "Apparently all the land around the Loyal Order of Corn lodge is fake."

"...fake?" said Simon, eyes wide.

Melanie shook her head.

"Sorry, not fake... like when it's world that isn't really world? It used to be part of the lake and the town just kept dumping soil in until some of it stuck."

"Oh," said Tod. "Reclaimed land."

Melanie snapped her fingers.

"That's the one," she said. "Reclaimed. Although I imagine the things in the lake take a different view of it." She glanced at Janet, eyebrows raised.

"They certainly do," said Janet.

Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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The sun was high and hot, and around the lake the air smelled of salt and had a thick, cloying texture that coated the inside of her mouth with every breath, leaving her throat dry and her tongue tingling.

Janet Donner stood at the end of the boardwalk, wooden planks warm against her bare feet, feeling every minute shift of the water around her as it worked with slow and endless patience to erode the rotten pilings that sank deeper into the muddy lake bed with each day that passed.

It would get her eventually, she knew. But not yet.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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The raw and weeping thing at the bar jumped a little at her outburst, as did Janet, though she controlled hers in time to stop the neatly-plated nigiri from sliding off her serving tray.

"There you go, sir," she said to the skinless corpse, setting the dish down in front of it. "Wasabi, soy sauce and ginger are on your left. Let me know if you need anything else."

She smiled, bright and breezy, then turned to Melanie.

"Mel," she said carefully. "Are you doing okay?"

Melanie took a deep breath, trying to calm herself. This was not the time to go all Marshall Teller on her best friend just because...

Just because...

Because there was a revenant sitting at her place of work, carefully separating a set of disposable chopsticks with bloody fingers that left red-brown smears over the cheap alder wood.

Janet's expression became one of concern.

"Do you need to sit down? We're kind of crowded today because of the King Tide, but there's room at the counter."

Melanie swallowed hard, shook her head, and forced her expression back to something that, if not cheerfully unconcerned, was least pleasantly neutral.

"No," she said. "I'm good. Just stopped by to say hi and pick up some takeout is all."

"It'll be a bit of a wait," said Janet. "Fred's compulsively impersonating a high-strung perfectionist right now, so there's a lot of drama going on in the kitchen. I'm actually hanging out with the customers for some peace and quiet, if you can believe that."

Melanie Monroe looked from her friend, to the heavy steel door that lead to the kitchen, to the bloodied tatterdemalion peaceably eating sushi dipped in way too much soy sauce, and raised an eyebrow.

"Seriously?" she asked.

"Trust me," said Janet. "It's that dire."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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The ground beneath the Eerie Municipal Pool had collapsed, sucking two dozen swimmers and thousands of gallons of water down into the echoing chasm below.

Marshall Teller peered out over the raggedy edge of the hole, feeling broken blue-white tile crunch beneath his feet and wishing there was a safety rail to hang onto.

"What's your theory?" asked Dash. "Giant moles? Shoddy workmanship? Human sacrifice to something with an aquatic theme? Do we need to call your ex down at the Sushi Bar?"

Marshall shook his head.

"Smell that chlorine?" he asked. "No way Janet's bosses eat anything that tainted."

Ongoing Verse: Microwave

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Ongoing Verse: Janet

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There was a pause on the other end of the line, during which the static crackle of Raudive voices increased in volume and urgency.

"I take it you mean something more dramatic than the usual unfortunate predation of mermaids upon the Summer People?" Chisel asked.

"Yes," said Janet. "This isn't a case of blood in the water, it's blood literally replacing all the water. There's a herd of vampires over by the boat shack already, and come nightfall they'll be like antelope at an oasis."

Chisel sighed.

"Tell your Gods that I'll have a team down there shortly," he said.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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"Thanks for helping me out," said Janet, as she and Tod dragged the unwieldy sheet of corrugated metal across the slippery and still-bleeding earth around Lake Eerie.

"It's cool," Tod told her, navigating a small copse of trees who glared at him from a thousand yellow flower eyes. "I was planning a trip out here anyway - I'm planning to make blood pudding with some of the lake water."

"Bert and Ernie will love that," Janet said, her enthusiasm for the idea almost making her miss a shallow pool of leeches lying in wait in the shade of a bush whole leaves were lined with tiny human teeth. She dodged it at the last minute and continued, "They're getting really into this local sustainability thing."

"Bert told me they're going to reach out to the 666H Club again," said Tod. "See if they can lay to rest some of those old rivalries, get some community gardening off the ground. Or, into the ground, I suppose."

"That'd be cool," said Janet. "Let me know if you need a hand." She nodded over his shoulder. "Little to the left, just by the boat shack."

Tod changed the direction of his carful backwards shuffling, backing up until the heel of one heavy black boot bumped against the salt-warped boards of the boat repair shed.

"Made it," he said, letting his corner of the heavy metal sheet drop with a sigh of relief.

Janet set her end down too, then moved towards the red and viscous tide that lapped at the shore.

She rapped lightly on the closed door of the boat shed. There was no answer, though Tod thought he heard something move.

"Hi," she said. "I'm from the Baitshop. We thought, as long as the water is blood anyway, you might like some shade between here and the lake."

A susurration of voices, mingled with the distinctive sound of dozens of high-collared black silk robes rustling in agitation, burst from inside the rickety structure.

Finally, after what sounded like a short but intense debate, a single voice piped up.

"Yes please," it said. "That would be very nice."

Another voice, older and somewhat crackly, mumbled something, and the first voice added:

"You're not going to leave any iron nails lying about the place, are you?"

"No," said Janet. "No iron, no garlic, no scattered seeds or grains of rice. No tricks."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"You know," said Melanie, eyeing the pile of bloodstained jewellery on the counter with something that was as close to fear as she came these days, "Just because I technically have a dead man's heart doesn't mean I want everything I own to come from corpses."

Janet shrugged, continuing to pick waterlogged flesh from between the links of a fine gold chain.

"Suit yourself," she said. "I thought those earring would look good on you, is all."

"You found them in a human skull," said Melanie. "Half it's face was still on. You had to rinse brains off them first!"

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"We're just clowning around," giggled the evil clown, around a mouthful of yellow and splintered teeth that curved the serrated knives from grey-green gums. "Just trying to have a little fun."

"Have a little fun in your own territory," said Janet, who was holding a very large cleaver but didn't want to risk chipping it on evil clown bones if she could help it. "This place exists to feed something other than you."

The clown simpered in mock sadness, and Janet thought it might be worth the loss of her favourite bladed instrument just to cut it's horrible face off.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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The doors of Grandma's Kitchen were open, and the sugar-sweet smell of patisserie cream wafted down Front Street, drawing pedestrians on their way to work towards the little shop, windows glowing yellow-gold in the early morning gloom of a winter's day.

The four identical old ladies who worked the counter were in full flight, packing pretty pink boxes full of crackling baker's parchment before laying them in sticky treats. The beaded curtain that led to the actual kitchen swayed slightly in the heat from the ovens hidden behind it, and customers queued patiently beside great glass cabinets that gleamed hungrily.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: The Powers That Be

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"Okay," said Devon, a spark of genuine enthusiasm colouring his voice, or at least the memory of his voice that had played in Melanie's head since the day she'd stolen his heart. "Now this is better."

"I remember these photos," she said. "I had some of these, before my parents decided it was probably unhealthy and put them away."

She walked among the various snapshots of Devon as he had been in life, candid Polaroids of him in motion next to moody black and white studio shots.

"This was my favourite," she said, stopping beside one mounted on an easel.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"It's a bit morbid, isn't it?" said Devon, standing in and around and a little to the left of Melanie as he always did.

As she always did, she turned to face him, although he was never there, and probably never had been there, and never would be there again.

"You think so?" she said. "I kind of like it."

Devon tipped his face up, saw the banner through her eyes.

"'Welcome to the Eerie Museum of Horology's Exploration of Lost Time'," he read aloud. "'An exploration into those Eerie citizens who died too young'."

He grimaced.

"Sounds kinda gloomy."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"How do you know so much about ovens anyway?" Melanie grumbled. "You work at a sushi bar. Sushi doesn't even need cooking."

"No," said Janet. "But it does need a degree of patience, which is something I never thought applied to preheating an oven until I met you."

"Patience," said Melanie, in a tone of voice that made the unspoken "pffffft" extremely clear. "Ovens should just know how to be. I don't see you preheating a puffer fish before you cut him up."

"I'd never cut up a puffer fish," said Janet. "Ever seen one? Way too cute to eat."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"I don't preheat," Melanie said. "I never preheat. Preheating is for cowards and members of the slow-squad only."

"First of all, that's not a real squad," said Janet, taking the tray of chicken cutlets out of the still-cold oven and setting a clean sheet of cheesecloth over them. "Secondly, messing with the cooking times on raw chicken is a good way to become part of the 'died from diarrhoea' squad, and there's no way that leaves a good looking corpse."

Melanie grimaced, but allowed the temperature to be set and timer activated.

"Stupid murder chicken," she muttered. "Just cook already."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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The tiny rowboats which made their home along the cracked and crumbling boardwalk running out back of the Eerie Baitshop and Sushi Bar were encrusted with barnacles that Janet was almost sure had not been there when she locked up the previous evening.

She returned to the kitchen, checked the clipboard that hung on the door to the stockroom, and flipped through it until she found the checklist that showed when the boats had last been descaled.

She glanced at it, then out of the round porthole-like window of the back door.

The barnacles opened their eyes and stared back.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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The weather was turning, and the four identical old ladies who worked the counter at Grandma's Counter were knitting. They had been knitting for days, and already a thick skein of purple-red fabric had gathered about their feet and tangled amongst the curved runners of their four identical rocking chairs.

"Hypothesis one," said Marshall. "They hibernate for winter and those things are their cocoons."

Simon dutifully wrote it down.

"Hypothesis two," he said, still scribbling, "They're Eerie's version of the Fates, knitting the New Year."

"Hypothesis three," said Tod, "They're Grandmas, and that's just what Grandma's do near Christmas time."

Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: Christmas

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She was only ten minutes into her shift when the gravity stopped working.

The soft clatter of side plates rising from the neat rows they'd been left in the night before mingled with the deeper rumbling of the serving platters shifting in the cupboard beneath the hand-washing station, and soon the whole kitchen was alive with the clinking and tinkling of a thousand sharp or breakable things straining skywards.

Moving like her sturdy rubber-soled server's shoes had magically transformed into seven-league boots, Janet lunged for the maki tanks, snapping heavy-duty locks into place just as the banging started.

Fucking gravity.

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Janet stared down into the forty-gallon bucket filled with vigorously-churning, slightly vinegar-scented water in silence. Something tentacular and many-eyed blinked back at her, visible for a single moment amidst the sloshing waves before it was re-submerged under the salty foam.

"Stock options," burbled the thing wearing a clip-on tie despite a noticeable lack of either a collared shirt, or a neck. It had a palm-sized scrap of driftwood pinned directly onto it's clammy skin, a rough approximation of the word "manager" scrawled upon it in black and stinking ink.

Janet shook her head.

"Pay rise," she countered. "And sick leave."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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"How are the hazelnuts?" asked Tod.

"They're good," Marshall said. He set the spoon down, the chocolate-hazelnut roulade on his plate still mostly uneaten.

Tod looked pleased.

"Harvested them myself - did you know they grow wild in the Eerie Woods?"

"I didn't," said Marshall, whose experiences within the borders of the Eerie Woods did not generally lend themselves to foraging.

"Every now and then, you find a sweet one," said Tod. "It's because that hazelnut lived a good and kind life, and it affected it's taste."

Marshall blinked.

"Are you messing with me?" he asked. "Because I can't always tell."

Ongoing Verse: Janet

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Ongoing Verse: Trusted Associates Inc

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