Subj: Designing Shadows Conclusion
Date: 2/5/01 9:24:53 AM Central Standard Time
From: N.E. Collins

And now for the exciting and long awaited for conclusion of Designing Shadows: Georgia On My Mind and The Dark Shadows Theme play simultaneously. I haven't heard it myself, but I bet it's just awful!

Charlene's shriek brought Julia Sugarbaker and Anthony out of their hiding place as well as some of the other work crew. Suzanne Sugarbaker was not interested in running to anybody's aide and Dr. Julia Hoffman was in no condition to. Julia and Anthony rounded the corner and entered the foyer of the great house and there they saw the horrid sight that had Charlene frozen with fear! Julia spoke in a hurried hush tone to Mary Jo. "Mary Jo, move forward and be QUICK about it!"

Mary Jo stumbled slightly in her stance and got a big stupid grin on her face as she bellowed, "HEY, JULIA! WHAT'S CHARLENE SCREAMIN' ABOUT? SHE'S MAKING SO MUCH DAMN NOISE SHE'S GONNA WAKE THE DEAD!" Mary Jo laughed out loud at her little joke and she swung her arms around in drunken glee and with wild abandon. One of her hands was clenched in a fist and by some weird happenstance the fist landed an actual blow on the ghost of Quentin's chin, knocking him cold on the floor! Mary Jo saw Quentin for the first time laid out on the stonework. "JULIA! THERE'S A DEAD MAN ON THE FLOOR!"

With Quentin out of it the spell he had held over the house lifted. The front doors flew open banging on their hinges. Julia Sugarbaker flew into action. "Anthony, pick up Mary Jo and take her out of here. One of you boys grab Charlene! SUZANNE! Suzanne, get Dr. Hoffman and come on. We are leaving!"

Suzanne came out in a hurry with poor crazed Julia Hoffman in tow. "C'mon, doctor! We are GOIN' to town!"

*****************************************************************

"Well, mama, I better get off the phone here. I bet we've run up a DOOZY of a bill! Give everybody my love. Give 'em all a hug! Bye, I love you!" Charlene hung up the phone on her desk at Sugarbaker's Design House. "Mary Jo, it's so excitin'! Mama says that what happened to us in Collinsport has everybody in Poplar Bluff jealous with envy! Why this ghost story is even more important to all them than the girl in the blue mist and the lady of the lake combined!"

Mary Jo just shook her head as Charlene reached into her desk drawer and took out a copy of The National Enquirer. She had it sealed in a plastic cover and she just set it on her desk and gazed at it adoringly like it was a sacred document. Mary Jo spoke up then. "Charlene, you better put that away! You know how angry it makes Julia to see those pictures of us! Why, I don't believe I ever SEEN her turn that shade of red before? And she SWEARS she gonna sue the pants off of all those publications not to mention those nosy reporters. Are they still out there?" Mary Jo inquired.

Charlene took a cardboard cutout of Casper the friendly ghost and stuck it through the curtains. Camera flashbulbs popped excitedly. "Yeah, they're still there."

There was a commotion from the back of the establishment and Suzanne Sugarbaker entered the room wearing a multitude of crosses and waving a mojo wand around her person. She had on dark sunglasses, a dark floppy hat and a dark trench coat. The ghost of Carl Collins had taken such a liking to her that he had tagged along when she left Collinwood. He had been so tickled to think that she believed he was a cat that he continued the charade. He had convinced Consuela, Suzanne's maid, that he was the disgruntled spirit of a cat and that he was haunting Suzanne. Consuela had provided her mistress with the appropriate religious paraphenalia, but it would only protect her from the spirit of a cat, and not the ghost of Carl Collins. He gave a growling purr in her ear right before he pinched her on the behind! She screamed and landed on the couch!

This brought Julia to the forefront. She came down the stairs with a loaded sawed off shotgun. Without a word she opened the front door of Sugarbaker's and fired off a round. She closed the door and blew the smoke off of the barrel. "There. That ought to do it." She had a strange smile on her face and it was not as much a happy one as it was a crazy one. She walked by Charlene's desk and snatched her copy of The National Enquirer up. Charlene protested, but stopped in mid sentence when she saw the wild look in Julia's eyes. "I'm so sorry, Charlene, but I NEED this magazine. You see, I had Anthony and some of the boys go all over Atlanta, and I had them buy every copy of this...this thing with this...this story. This story that has RUINED our very LIVES! Do you all realize that we are the laughing stock of Atlanta yet AGAIN!"

"I don't know, Julia," said Charlene without thinking. "I think we've become more like local folk heroes. I mean, it's not like that time you mooned all those people at the fashion show. Now THAT was bad!"

Julia got a look in her eyes that even made Charlene pause and go silent. The look said it all in great big letters: NOT ANTOHER WORD! Julia turned and strode majestically out into the yard where the giant pile of newspapers awaited her. Suzanne retorted with, "Well, she has just LOST HER MIND!"

Mary Jo spoke up in Julia's defense. "And this coming from a woman who looks like a cathedral on two feet, hmph!" The ghost of Carl Collins couldn't resist taking a few tweaks on his lady lovely.

Suzanne jumped up and ran out into the yard screaming, "And I have just lost ALL PATIENCE!" Mary Jo and Charlene looked at one another and broke out into huge laughter.

The National Enquirer bonfire burned steadily through the dark Atlanta night.
The End

Dark Shadows is a Dan Curtis Production.