Mercy Loomis

When a former student, now an adult, attends the elementary school's yearly carnival and open house, one of the students' chalk drawings leads to a rapidly-growing obsession. Is the child artist just a disturbed youth, or something more sinister?

Published in the anthology The Big Book of Bizarro from Burning Bulb Publishing (2011).

Read an excerpt below!

As I take a step back I see that it's not as monochrome as I first thought. Among the black and white and grey are smudges of color; a dark blue blending into black here, an underscoring of burnt umber there, creating a surprising feeling of depth. Sinuous lines rise out of the swirling background to writhe across the paper and beckon me closer. I oblige, one slow step at a time, until my nose is inches from the surface. There's something to this drawing that's not familiar, exactly, but I feel as if I should understand it, as if it's one of those 3D pictures that will at any moment snap into focus if I can just figure out how to see it right. And yet, it's not like that at all; these arcs and shades and highlights define something concrete, not some seemingly random explosion of colors. I'm giving myself a headache staring so hard, the edges of my vision going dark, black and grey and deep vibrant blue, until it feels as if those great sweeping lines are curling around me, about to envelope me and drag me into the picture and drown me in that roiling chaos…