Free Zippered Flesh 2: More Tales of Body Enhancements Gone Bad by Kealan Patrick Burke, Charles Colyott, Bryan Hall, Shaun Jeffrey, Michael Bailey, Lisa Mannetti, Shaun Meeks, L.L. Soares, Christian A. Larsen

it.”
    Mr. Parker flipped open the box. Then he handed it to Mrs. Parker.
    “Where did you get all this money, Lucinda?” Mrs. Parker demanded.
    “From working. I know things are pinched around here financially, so I thought I’d help out. That money is for you.”
    They melted immediately, just like she knew they would.
    “But honey,” her father said, counting the cash. “There’s over five hundred dollars here. You earned all that baby-sitting?”
    “Sure, and doing other chores for people. It’s amazing what people will pay someone else to do because they’re too lazy to do it themselves. I just wanted to help you guys out, that’s all. I mean, we’re a family, right? And family members should help each other—at least, that’s how I feel about it. So please, take the money. I don’t want it.”
    Her father sat back in his chair. “You are one impressive girl, you know that? How many other kids would try to help out their parents like this?”
    Report card forgotten. Mission accomplished.
    Her mother just shook her head in wonder. “I wish we could tell you to put this money away and that we don’t need it, but we really do. With Dad’s hours cut at the plant and mine at the flower shop, we’re a month behind on the mortgage, and this will catch us up. Are you sure about this, sweety?”
    “Absolutely, Mom.”
    “Then thank you, love. Thank you ever so much.” Her mother stood and gave her a warm hug, followed by her father.
    Oh yeah, they owed her now, boy.
    Over coffee, milk, and pie, a détente was reached in which Lucinda would cut back on her after-school jobs and pull her grades up where they belonged. A workable schedule was arrived at that everyone could live with, and that was the end of it.
    That night in bed, Lucinda smiled, happy that her backbreaking after-school odd jobs were now over. She hated working that hard, but she had to accumulate as much money as possible quickly, because she knew that once that report card showed up, it would be coming to an end—which was the plan all along.
    She’d continue to babysit Charlie and run errands for Mrs. Habbershaw, a kindly widow with six cats and one Chihuahua named Max—who was a nervous wreck—probably because the cats were all bigger than he was. Mrs. H. needed cat food and litter almost every day, and hauling that junk was hard enough work, as far as Lucinda was concerned.
     

     
    She put on her depressed act for exactly one week before approaching her parents about the blue contact lenses and getting the unsightly moles on her neck and ear removed. The tinted lenses cost four hundred fifty dollars and the procedure for the moles another eleven hundred, but Mr. and Mrs. Parker didn’t bat an eye. After all, who had a better daughter than they did? Mrs. Parker would drive her old car for an additional year.
    Over the next few years, as Lucinda learned more about manipulation, her parents learned more about state bankruptcy laws. She managed to get a number of the more minor surgeries done—dusting, cleaning, and tweaking as Lucinda called it—pouring additional bills over the heads of her already fiscally drowning parents, who just could not say no to their darling girl.
    Talk about a huge ROI on a measly five hundred.
    Just before her eighteenth birthday, Lucinda’s mother sat her down in the kitchen for a “little talk.”
    “Lu, honey, I know you were counting on that earlobe reduction for your birthday this year, but frankly, we just don’t have the money for it. We’re still paying off all the other surgeries, and you’re graduating this year. There’s nothing left for college, Lu, much less more plastic surgery.”
    She studied her mother. The more Lucinda’s looks improved, the worse her mother’s became, it seemed. She was stick thin and gray. “Oh, don’t worry, Mom. It’s okay. I know you and Dad are struggling. There’s no reason why I can’t go to work and help out ... again.”
    Mrs. Parker hung her