THE RED SNO-CONES ARE NOT FOR SALE

by Emily C. Skaftun

Victor didn't hear the music anymore. Not with his ears, at least; they'd quit on him a long while back. More recently the fleshy seashells that people called ears had dropped off, first the right, then the left. Victor pulled a stocking cap down over the place where they'd been, and no one ever questioned it. It was cold in the van.

Still, another part of Victor heard every endlessly repeating note, singing along in a childish chorus of voices: See see, my playmate, come out and play with me… And they did, too. By the dozens on sunny days, one by one when it was cool.

It was cool today, an October day, and things were pleasantly eerie between the baring of the trees and the graying of the sky. It was no kind of day for ice cream, but he crept from street to street in the van, trawling for children like a mackerel fisher with baited lines. Sooner or later, one would bite.

And if everything went just right, he would bite back. It would have to happen soon; only three sno-cones remained and another finger was feeling brittle, threatening to let go like a loose tooth. It was his middle finger, this time. He thought he'd miss it most of all.

A child approached the van just after noon. A little girl in a shockingly yellow dress, it was no one he had seen before. Excellent, he thought, licking his lips before he saw a woman watching from the house's shadowy porch, eliminating any chance of snatching the girl. He'd seen her before, stalking around in long black dresses like a Halloween witch. Was the girl her daughter?

He stopped the van anyway.

And bring your dollies three. Climb up my apple tree.

When the girl neared, Victor saw fear in her eyes. His van looked odd, he knew, like it had feasted on the corpses of other ice cream trucks, assimilating them into its patchwork exterior. His sign was faded a light blue, prices years out of date. Still, most children never noticed any of it in their blind rush for sugar. It wasn't until they saw his sallow face and missing fingers that young ones became afraid, old ones mocking, and the rest probingly curious. "What happened to your hand?" they'd ask.