Winnifred, Winnifred
Winnifred stared into the mirror, wild-eyed, witnessing her own reflection balloon, the head stretching and growing out of her neck. It bobbed to and fro, a horrifying grinning bobblehead doll named Winnifred. She couldn't help but laugh, a chilling sound that echoed the evil within.
A lonely little girl, born into a family of modest means, she had no siblings, no friends—making her a freak. The neighbors pointed and whispered, forcing her family to move. Amid the chaos, pounding on the door disrupted the eerie scene. "Police! Open the door!" the voices demanded. In panic, Winnifred retreated, closing and locking herself inside a closet, the darkness enveloping her.
"Behave, stop those awful things, and we'll let you out!" they shouted. The echoes of accusations followed her, haunting as she grappled with the darkness within.
The voices outside persisted, accusing her of unspeakable deeds, the weight of their claims closing in. "We are in the house, Winnifred."
Winnifred was slammed against the wall, handcuffed, and dragged into blinding daylight. The light seared her eyes as she stumbled outside, falling into an abrupt silence that lasted just ten minutes.
"Winnifred, please stop screaming," someone pleaded amidst the chaos. But the plea was drowned out by the gruesome sound of an axe splitting Denise's skull in half. The crowd outside, armed with cell phones, reveled in the unfolding horror, cat-calling Winnifred.
The blood smeared the walls and ceiling, a gruesome testament to the brutality. The
crowd, curious and bloodthirsty, demanded answers. "Where is Denise? Where is Winnifred hiding?"
"I'll find you, you horrid girl," a voice declared, echoing the condemnation. The dirty, bloody hands became a symbol of guilt, the crowd's disgust palpable.
"Drowned in the bathtub, oh Winnifred, what have you done?" The accusatory voices merged into a cacophony, urging Winnifred to leave. "Get out! I can't look at you, horrid girl, get out!"
The police station was crowded with vagrants, hoodlums, and thugs — derelicts grinning at her with that horrid grin. The doctor had warned not to leave her alone, but who could watch her every minute? She found herself in a cold, dirty cell, isolated and haunted by the echoes of her daughter's screams.
"If you knew time as well as I do, you wouldn't talk about wasting it. It's him, that dirty boy with his hands touching Denise," a voice echoed in her mind. Locked in her own cell, she couldn't escape the shadows of accusation.
"Stop screaming. Be a good girl, and there will be no more beatings," a distant voice promised. "I have to beat time when I learn music. That accounts for it. He won't stand beating and murdering the time!" The confusion between reality and delusion played out within the confines of her cell.
She stood accused of murdering her daughter with an axe. "Keep an eye on this one. She is to be feared or loved." The philosophical pondering continued, "Is it better to be feared or loved?"
The narrative shifted, echoing an otherworldly realm where demons lurked in Winnifred's head. "Off with her head! But consider, my dear, she's only a child like I've never seen. Winnifred, what is in your head? Off with her head! Not right in the head, and she is hated."
The passage ended with a chilling assertion, "She can very well endure being feared whilst not being hated. But when it is necessary to cause a great commotion among the people, off with their heads! Visit the sins of the father on the heads of the
"Children in a normal stage of development don't display these symptoms. I'm afraid there is something terribly wrong with Winnifred," the voice of concern echoed through the sterile room.
"Your lawyer is here. You have time, Winnifred," came a cold reassurance. "I dare say you never even spoke to time."
"Time in prison will be extensive, Winnifred. Your crime is murder. I will present to the court your reasons for taking a life, reasons more difficult to find than one who is feared, one who is feared by all."
"Fear this child. We can't keep her anymore. She must go away. Oh, go away, you are far too frightening," the distant voices declared. "Deliver us from evil in such a way that if she does not win love, she avoids hatred and vengeance."
"I know what you've done. I know the lives of two innocent young people. You are cowardly, and today you will become acutely aware of your fears. Oh, God! How loathsome it is!"
"You are loathsome, Winnifred. A loathsome, evil freak like me taking up the cross I bear. In another week, another month, I shall be driven in a prison van over this bridge. It was distasteful to be in this crowd, yelling, throwing sticks and stones."
"Knelt down in the middle of the square and bowed down to the earth, kissed that filthy girl—horrid girl with that horrid grin—and the words, 'I am a murderer.'"
"I killed Denise and the dirty young boy. I took an axe and gave her mother forty whacks. When she saw what she had done, she gave Denise forty-one—years old today and tired, so tired. I feel all my forty-one years plus forty-one whacks, years more."
"When I reach the gallows, it will be as if all the solid ground went from under my feet—kicking and dangling in the air. No one to mourn for, no one to care for, which was why I The judge brought the axe down on Denise and that dirty boy, the fragments of skull and brain clinging to the walls and the ceiling. In the courtroom, a declaration echoed, "Stay of execution by reason of insanity. You are quite out of your mind!"
"You are free to go. You may leave the court. You are free to go. Out, damn spot!" The Winnifred head, a dreadful grinning bobblehead doll, bobbed to and fro, withering and shrinking like a balloon back into Winnifred's neck.
In the haunting recollection, the scene played out—Winnifred necking with that dirty boy when she found him touching Denise with those dirty hands. Denise turned and smiled at her with that horrid grin. "Hi Winnie," she said.
Denise always called her that.
Winnifred, Winnifred
Lisa Lahey is a Toronto, Ontario writer. Her work has appeared in 34th Parallel Magazine, Spaceports and Spidersilk Magazine, and will appear in the April issue of Literally Stories.