One Night In Green Bay
or
Were-Cow? There Cow.
a short story by Bill Bibo, Jr.
I don't believe that you have to be a cow to know what milk is.
Ann Landers
When the first razor thin beam of moonlight filtered through the bedroom blinds Harriet felt the internal agony that preceded each of her transformations. Quickly she bolted from her bed, her arms and legs already showing the traces of fine black-white fur, leaving her husband snoring in oblivious contentment.
As she ran through the doorway to the living room she felt her back alter and straighten. With a tormented "pop!" it was painfully realigned. The sudden transference of additional weight caused her to fall forward, but she caught herself as her arms rotated forward to her chest and formed a solid pair of strong forelegs. Her tail emerged as she raced to the kitchen, an involuntary switch nearly knocked over a treasured family heirloom, a majestic hand-blown glass statuette of a frog.
But she had moved too slow. She needed to get outside fast. No longer able to operate the door, she was nearly trapped in the kitchen. Lowering her newly formed muzzle, she attempted the only means left to her. Tom would be upset in the morning, but she had no choice. She charged the door. The hollow wood splintered easily, giving way to her force. She was free.
An accident at her uncle's dairy farm outside of Green Bay had been the initial cause of her troubles. While helping inject the herd with what she had believed to be vitamins, Harriet had been bitten by a cantankerous heifer. When the wound had taken on a strange pallor, her uncle confessed that they had actually been administering an experimental growth hormone, one which had been designed to enable the cows to produce more milk. It never worked as it was designed.
Now standing in the backyard of her suburban home, she looked up at a full Wisconsin moon. A curious thought muddled through her bovine/human mind. If the moon really was made up of green cheese, a hell of a lot of milk must have been needed. Her udder was swollen and sore. She let out an angry "Moo" and headed out into the night.
She was no longer Harriet Smith, housewife. Now she was Harriet Holstein, and tonight she had an attitude.
With the harsh light of the morning comes payment for the secrets of the night. With this in mind Detective Monroe stood quietly on the front porch of the Smith household and listened to the staccato sounds of hammering coming from within. He shook his head. Just two years out from retirement and they give me all the crazies, he thought. He waited for a brief pause in the early morning construction and when it finally occurred he knocked loudly on the front door.
A droopy-eyed, middle-aged man answered. Disheveled and tired, he stood leaning against the door. A wrinkled white undershirt peeked out of a ragged bathrobe held together by the loaded tool belt at his waist.
"Mr. Smith?" The officer put on his best professional smile. "I'm Detective Monroe. Your wife is at the university hospital under observation. We have reason to believe that she was involved in a disturbance on campus last night. May I come in?"
Silently the little man backed away from the door and trudged off toward the kitchen. Detective Monroe followed him in. Mr. Smith poured two cups of coffee, sat down at the kitchen table, and proceeded to add three spoons of sugar to each cup. The tool belt thudded loudly against the wooden chair as he indicated that the detective should sit also. As he did Detective Monroe noticed a large piece of plywood was partially nailed to the back wall of the kitchen, blocking what looked to be a large hole to the exterior.
Yes, this is the right house, thought Detective Monroe. He looked down into the sweetened cup. Crazies, all of them.
"Mr. Smith, we have reason to believe that your wife, Harriet Smith, was involved in the brutal murder of three pledges at the Alpha Alpha Alpha fraternity house last night."
The little man raised his tired eyes from his cup. "You mean, triple A?" he asked.
"Yes, each boy died in a horrible, yet different way. One had a large wad of partially digested hay - cud, if you will -forced down his throat and two large sticks of butter thrust up his nose. He suffocated.
"The second had been branded repeatedly with a clothes iron and then was strangled with a cow bell.
"The third was dragged back to the kitchen, his buttocks put through a meat grinder, and was then hung from a hook in the walk-in freezer. When police arrived at the scene they found what appeared to be a large Holstein, standing upright, and writing on the door of the freezer in the victim's blood, 'This one's for you, Elsie'.
"Mr. Smith, this may be difficult for you but we believe that your wife may have the ability to transform herself into the shape of an animal, a cow, that is."
Mr. Smith took another careful sip of his coffee.
Detective Monroe looked hard at the man across the table. "You don't seem surprised," he said and glanced over at the back wall of the kitchen and its plywood cover.
"No," said Mr. Smith, "I've known about it for some time, since we've been married. She's always been very gentle. Oh, she had an occasional attack on a dairy or butcher shop, but those were usually just acts of minor vandalism. She's never been violent before. My only complaint had been that her tongue was too rough."
"Do you have any idea what might have set her off tonight?" the detective asked.
"I do remember that we saw on the news last night that three of the boys from that fraternity had been arrested for cow tipping. Forcibly knocking over a sleeping cow can seriously hurt or damage the animal, you know. Harriet was pretty upset when she heard that they had gotten off without even a fine."
"Those were the same boys. Mr. Smith, we'll need you to come down to the station and make a statement. But do you mind if I ask you just one more question now?
"If you knew about her transformations, why did you stay with her and not say anything?"
"Well, Detective, to be udderly truthful, we needed the milk. Would you like some cream for your coffee? It's fresh?"
the end
With numerous short stories in publication and 2 novels for middle grade readers coming out soon Bill's slightly skewed sensibilities are widely read and enjoyed. Caldwell Vineyard thought so highly of his work that they put his short short story "Saturn Five" on the label of every bottle of their 2007 vintage Rocket Science Wine. Bill was paid with a case of the best wine he ever tasted. Now, well stocked and happy, he is on his way to becoming the drunken best selling author he's always dreamed of.
Follow his blog, Bibo Madness, at https://billbibojr.blogspot.com/
Special thanks to my wife and best friend, Laurie, for her understanding and patience, and for making my life very interesting. Smooch.
Read on for an exclusive excerpt from “Dr. Zombie Lives Next Door”
Other works by Bill Bibo Jr
"Emergency at St. Anthony's"
in Zombie Nation: St. Pete, Zombie Nation Publishing
https://www.zombienationpublishing.com/
“Digging for Buried Treasure” for ages 7-10
“Do You Want to Be a Kangaroo?” for ages 2-4
interactive short stories at www.storysomething.com
Winner Caldwell Vineyard Rocket Science Wine
“Saturn Five” 2007 vintage Rocket Science Wine
https://www.caldwellvineyard.com/
100 Days of Monsters by graphic artist Stefan Bucher, HOW Books
short stories for Monsters 49, 56, 69, 78, and 99
COMING SOON
"The Wrong Side Of The Rainbow"
in Groanology:Amusing Monster Mashups
Summer 2011, The Library of Horror Press
"Death Bites"
in Groanology 2: Monsters, Madness, and Mayhem
Fall 2011, The Library of Horror Press
“Hamburger Madness”
a children’s novel for ages 8-12,
The first book in The Madness Series.
CJ, a vain silver droid, and Murray, his all too human partner, own and operate The Burger-Naut, a fast food franchise on the dark side of the moon. Business is good. Too good. They need to hire some help. And the only place to find someone is Earth.
It's star broiled adventure with extra pickles.
“Dr. Zombie Lives Next Door”
a children’s novel for ages 6-10
When a new family moves in next door, Jenny Thompson believes the father to be the notorious Dr Zombie. Is he plotting to take over the world from his basement? Can she save the world, win back her best friend, and still ace her science project?
Read an exclusive excerpt on the next page.
Please enjoy a sample chapter from
“Dr. Zombie Lives Next Door”
Summer 2011
The day for the science fair finally arrived. We were ready, or so it seemed.
A brilliant flash of light shot through the window and into the gymnasium illuminating the far wall. Victor stopped piecing together the experiment table we had made and looked up at the ceiling.
"One thousand one, one thousand two," he counted.
When he reached "one thousand fifteen" the walls of the building trembled slightly under a loud blast of thunder.
"The storm is getting closer," he said, a little nervous.
"I'm just glad we were able to unload all this stuff before it started to rain. We've got to hurry, though, and set this up. There's only twenty minutes before the judging starts," I said and went back to testing a string of colored lights.
I decided to put everything that had happened out of my mind. Now all I wanted was to do the best science fair project that Miss Sanstone, the judges, or anybody else had ever seen.
Working on the project had surprised me. I had enjoyed it. It had been fun doing the research, finding materials, and drawing the machinery. Poking around in our basement I had found an old doll bed. With a sheet draped over it the bed looked just like the lab table from the movie.
Luckily in those last few days everything had been fairly quiet. I hadn't seen Bobby around too much except for at school. Whenever I did he just ignored me. Also, there had been no more strange men hiding in the bushes.
All the spots in the gym for the science fair were on a first come, first serve basis so I had my dad drop us off early. At least we thought it was early.
Many of the teams were already setting up when we arrived. They wanted to be the first ones everybody saw as they entered the gym so they had chosen spots by the entrance.
Victor headed for one not too far away from the door but I had other plans. I pulled him to the back corner. The perfect spot was waiting just for us there, next to a tall window. There was a crack in one corner that gave the window a menacing look.
"This is perfect. The better to see the lighting," I said, following Victor's questioning gaze.
There was plenty of room for all of our cardboard machinery. Electrical outlets for our special effects, the Christmas lights, were well within reach. It was perfect.
We went straight to work. As we organized our presentation Victor kept an eye on the approaching storm. Another flash was followed by the echoing boom of thunder. The windows rattled above us.
"One thousand five," Said Victor.
"Relax," I said, "it's only a thunderstorm. Besides it adds to the creepy mad scientist look we've got going. It'll be great. You'll see.
Victor nodded as he placed a couple of lights under our model table. Then carefully reaching into the box on the floor he pulled out a large glass jar. The swirling solution caused its contents to turn and face me. Two large vacant eyes stared back at me.
"I don't know why you had to bring the largest one," I said. A cold shudder ran up my back and across my shoulders.
Victor ignored me. He removed the frog and carefully laid it on the table. The faint odor of preservative drifted through the air. I covered the frog with another white sheet.
Sara Belker's team was setting up next to us. They looked at us like we were crazy. Their exhibit, measuring the effect of different liquids on the growth of tomato plants, seemed quite tame. I yawned accidentally, but she saw and left in a hurry.
"Great," grumbled Victor. He was looking through the box at our feet. "I think I left the lab coats at home."
"Oh, no. There's no time to go home and get them. Everyone’s here. And the judging has already started," I said.
"Maybe, if we can find Ms Sanstone she'll let us borrow two from science class," he said.
We ran off to find Ms Sanstone as another loud tremor shook the gym.
"One thousand two," said Victor.
“Dr. Zombie Lives Next Door”
by Bill Bibo Jr.
coming soon in Summer 2011
“One Night In Green Bay
or Were-Cow? There Cow.”
by Bill Bibo Jr
Copyright 2011 Bill Bibo Jr.
This is a work of fiction. Obviously there are no such creatures as housewives that turn into Holsteins by the light of the full moon. The city of Green Bay is real and quite nice actually. My wife’s uncle lives there. I have been there a few times though usually for football games. My family is crazy for the Packers. (I root for a different team and they have never forgiven me.)
The photograph of the cow on the cover was taken by publicenergy/Dave Wild from his Flickr account and used under the Creative Commons license. He has many excellent photos showing there. Only a few feature cows. Please check out his work.
Don’t expect too much
and you won’t be disappointed.