Marian crossed her arms hard, her purse slamming against her thigh. “I’m not going in there, not with two dead bushes on either side of the door. How disgusting and unwelcoming is that?”

Merle agreed to some extent, but this was the address they were directed to. Their son, a movie buff, was a week away from moving into his dorm and they wanted to get a few movie posters for him. “Fine, I’ll go in and see what they have.”

Marian never could wait long and her husband knew that, he was comfortable in knowing she’d be in shortly. But those bushes! Marian thought, isn’t it strange that dead thorns are more violent than live ones?

Twenty minutes later Marian marched into the building. Why, it’s a huge multiplex! she shouted to herself, well I’ll be! Following the handwritten signs, she made her way down a dim south wing. Entering theater 17, she froze. Shivering between the outer and inner doors, she heard her husband’s screams. Her iced bladder let loose along with one chilly whisper… “Merle?”