R. – Page 159 – The 100 Word Stories Podcast

Weekly Challenge #839 – TRAIN

LISA

Happily ever after

She jolted to a halt halfway down the aisle. Smiling faces looked on worried. Her sister sent what she hoped was a sympathetic look from a flower festooned pew.

The best man approached.

“Y’alright Rach?”

“Erm.” She turned, about to say that her train was caught on something and could he go to unhook it.

“C’mon. It didn’t mean anything. It was only one night…he’s not going to see her again” He’d whispered it so her Dad couldn’t hear.

At that bombshell the butterflies she’d felt flew off and she turned to release her own dress and left the church.

Deflating Ride

My boss called me in before three. I was being promoted, getting a hefty raise, and being told to take the rest of the day. I called my wife, who had off from school. My excitement contagious, we decided to meet and celebrate at our favorite spot.

I flew out of the office, down the subway stairs, and immediately onto a train. What luck! And then I looked around. Not a single smile or joyful face. No eye contact from anyone.

This can’t be right, I thought. I blew out a breath, deflating as the happiness seeped out of me.

RICHARD

Train Driver

I always wanted to be a train driver.

I don’t know why, it just appealed to me, maybe because I was a bit of a train nut at the time, and I figured that if trains were cool, then driving them would be even cooler.

So, I’m living my dream. I’m a train driver.

And let me tell you, it sucks. Big time!

Antisocial hours, constant mind-numbing health and safety checks, and the boring routine of the same routes, same places, every single day.

I always wanted to be a train driver, but now, I’d rather be anything else!

LIZZIE

“The pilot wasn’t trained properly,” said the inspector.
“I trained him myself. I’ve been training pilots for 30 years, as you know.”
“I think you’re losing your… skills.”
Silence.
“How about the huge hole on the side of the plane?!”
“It’ll go in my report, but it wasn’t the cause of…”
“Not the cause?! Five people were sucked out.”
The inspector smiled and walked away.
Thirty years. He waited, thirty years. He had always wanted to be a pilot, but the idiot flunked him again and again. He ended up becoming a mere scribe. This is how you get even.

SERENDIPIDY
They say that those with tormented souls may be called to wakefulness in the dead of night, by the evocative sound of a distant, mournful train horn, echoing through the still night air.

Those called, are drawn, with faltering steps to the old railroad crossing on the edge of town, to await the arrival of the train of the damned.

None will return.

That’s what they say, anyway.

The truth is, nobody goes down to the old railroad crossing in the dead of night…

There is no railroad crossing.

Which begs the question.

Where did all those missing people go?

NORVAL JOE

Still holding his bed sheet to him with his left hand, Billbert reached out his right. “Okay. Take my hand and let’s get this over with.”
Sabrina smiled, took his hand, and leaned forward for a quick kiss.
“Hey!” Billbert shouted, jerked his hand from hers, and wiped his lips. “You said we only need to make contact to be protected.”
“I also said that kissing is better. I’m just trying to train you properly.” Sabrina headed to the door.
Billbert slumped back in his bed and grumbled, “I don’t need training.”
“Right,” Sabrina laughed. “I’ll be back tomorrow morning.”

PLANET Z

I like going to baseball games, but I hate driving Downtown.
And parking there is an absolute nightmare.
So, I’d take the bus, since there’s a bus stop nearby.
But the bus doesn’t go all the way Downtown anymore.
Now it terminates at the main train line, and you take the train Downtown.
There was a another bus line that went Downtown about 15 minutes away.
But it stops at the same train station now.
For a few bucks more, I can order an Uber or a Lyft.
I shrug, turn on the TV, and watch the game from home.

Bob Hopeless

Bob Hope took his show to the soldiers time and time again.
He also did NBC specials.
He’d read cue cards while his costars were expected to memorize lines.
It looked disconcerting when he’d talk to an off-camera cue card instead of the other actors.
As he got older, his vision got worse, so he couldn’t read the cards.
And his hearing got worse, so he couldn’t hear the prompts in the earpiece.
At his funeral, the eulogy was read off of cue cards.
While one blank cue card was held by the coffin.
To remind him to remain quiet.

Dallas Loves You

For the most ironic words ever spoken, you have to credit Nellie Connally, the wife of the Texas Governor sitting next to JFK in the limo as they drove through the streets of Dallas.
Crowds cheering. People waving.
The people in the open-top vehicles in the motorcade waving back.
And then, she said those words: “You can’t say Dallas doesn’t love you.”
Kennedy agreed, just as bullets ripped through his body.
You could say that Lee Harvey Oswald was from New Orleans.
And spent time in Russia and other places.
So maybe Dallas loved him, but that crazy jackass didn’t.

Bob Ross Greatest

Bob Ross was a good painter.
He was also a good presenter and narrator.
An excellent teacher, too. He taught art classes around the country.
Selling his brand of art supplies.
Like a Johnny Appleseed, but with art.
Planting art in so many talented minds.
When not on tour, he painted for 30 series of his television show, all at a grueling pace in a tiny university television studio.
Popular and in demand, but exhausted.
The stress wore him down, made him sick.
The greatest painting of them all, Bob Ross had painted himself in a corner.
Unable to stop.

Somewhere under the rainbow

After the storm, the farmhands found Dorothy in the road.
Bandaging the delirious girl’s head, bringing her home.
The stories she told.
Flying monkeys? Witches?
“Madness,” said the doctors.
She spent the next ten years in one hospital after another.
Always asking about her dog. “Where’s Toto?”
Long ago euthanized by the county.
Her aunt and uncle, crops ruined, lost the farm.
They went out to California, died in the desert.
After she was released, Dorothy would watch for storms.
Running into the winds.
Screaming. Laughing.
They never found her body.
Maybe she made it back to Oz after all?

Don on tour

It’s been a while since Don Domino went on tour.
The band’s all wanting it.
He can fit into his old suit.
Sounds great in the studio and in rehearsals.
But when the promoters and managers come up with a tour plan, Don goes to the bathroom and locks the door.
And he won’t come out.
When people ask him why he does that, Don won’t answer.
They had to take the hinges off of the door to open it, and then Don went to another bathroom and locked himself in.
We’ll just air the rehearsals on pay per view.

Frankenstrat

Eddie Van Halen never liked the sound and feel of his guitars, so he tore them apart and built his own out of the parts.
Covering it with red, white, and black paint, he dubbed it Frankenstrat.
And it sounded awesome, although a lot of that had to do with the fact that it was Eddie playing it.
Over the years, he’d modify and swap out parts, trying to make it even better.
And yet, his kids say he’d pull it out, play with it a bit, and toss it on the sofa.
Imagine, Arthur doing the same with Excalibur!

Weekly Challenge #838 – Every good intention

LISA

Line

Sam had worked at the museum for decades, so long he was like one of the artefacts. One day, in the Modern Master’s Gallery he noticed a nasty smear on one of the pictures. The painter was a local man, long dead and one of the founders of the modern movement The piece was called Line. As the title suggests it was a single black line on a white canvas.

Sam had every good intention as he approached it with his bright orange duster.

But as he left the painting it was less of a line, more of a nothing.

LIZZIE

Every good intention starts with a candle, he thought… at first. The solemn emptiness was cold and the minute light gave him hope, a nervous flicker betraying the uncertainty of the moment. Was he really good enough? Was he worthy? He shifted his weight from one leg to the other. Every good intention starts with a candle. But he doesn’t think that anymore. The nervous flicker turned into a blazing nightmare. No one asked. So, he never mentioned his candle. And when someone said “Shall we light a candle, Father?”, he always remembered the cold horror, crawling up his back.

RICHARD

Every good intention

It always starts with good intentions, but every good intention has a downside.

Be nice to someone: They’ll take advantage. They’ll spread the word you’re a pushover, and before you know it everyone’s taking you for a ride.

So, you stop being a nice guy, and what happens? People treat you like crap and make out you’re doing them wrong.

You can’t win.

I try though, goodness knows I try, but it just comes out wrong.

Like this story. I had every good intention to write something positive and uplifting, but I guess, today is just one of those days!

SERENDIPIDY

You know how it is when starting a relationship. You try to show your best side, smile cheerfully, consider the other person’s feelings, and, difficult though it is, you don’t fart in bed.

You’ve every good intention to cover up the real you, but it’s not long before the cracks begin to show.

And I’m not talking about farting in bed, this time.

You see, cannibalism is a compulsion, not a choice: You can only keep it under wraps for so long.

Up to the second meet up, in my case.

Yes, I’m sorry to say, I ate my date!

NORVAL JOE

Sabrina reached out to Billbert. “You need to take my hand.”
Billbert clutched the bed sheet closer to his chest. “Can’t this wait until later? Like, after I get dressed?”
Sabrina sighed and shook her head. “The sooner we make contact, the sooner you’ll be safe.”
Billbert hadn’t know he was in any danger. “Safe from what?”
She blinked her eyes dramatically. “Demons, of course.”
Billbert gasped. “Demons! You never mentioned demons before.”
“I had every good intention of telling you, but the time never seemed right,” Sabrina shrugged. “Once we’ve connected magically, demons will start trying to kill us.”

PLANET Z

I didn’t mean to hurt you.
But you were going to leave me.
And I didn’t know what to do.
So, I locked you in the basement.
And threw away the key.
Which, I guess, wasn’t a smart idea.
Seeing as how I couldn’t open the door to give you food and water.
I tried to slip them under the door, but other than thin tortillas, I couldn’t get any food under the door.
I’d axe down the door, but my axe is in the basement.
Oh, what’s that noise?
You found it.
And you’re chopping down the door to-

Swimming competition

I know there’s a lot of noise about competitive swimming right now.
I don’t swim. Competitively or recreationally.
And I’ve never been in a situation that the gym teachers warned me about.
Falling off of a boat?
I hate boats.
If there’s racing, I’d think you would want to outrace a shark.
Or outrace others also fleeing that shark.
As for the rest, I really don’t know.
I think a lot of people don’t know.
But they feel compelled to say something.
I suppose this is saying something.
Irrelevant, sure. Which is what a lot of what people say is.

The Neutron Dance

I’ve been to a lot of shitty concerts, but the shittiest was The Pointer Sisters at the Boston Palisades.
Early Eighties. After the Neutron Dance.
They had just enough left in them to sell out and be One Hit Wonders again.
My aunt and uncle had gotten tickets and they were excited.
Of course, being selfish assholes, they’d only gotten tickets for themselves.
The rest of us were stuck wandering outside the venue, listening to badly-echoing sloppy seconds for the unwashed masses.
I sent them a Best Of The Pointer Sisters CD for their anniversary.
Well, okay. Just the case.