Category: My stories

Flounce

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It all started with flouncing.
“Gathered or pleated?” asked the forum moderator for The Dressmaker’s Dummy online community portal.
Some dressmakers swore by gathered material, but others insisted that pleated was best.
That’s when the YouTube videos appeared, demonstrating one style’s superiority over the other.
Others used the opportunity to drag out dead horses to beat, deriding materials like suede and burlap, even though they were completely off-topic.
Finally, someone posted “Hitler liked gathered skirts!” and Godwin’s Law was invoked.
Everybody flamed everybody else.
The forum moderator posted a long and dramatic resignation.
I guess it ended with flouncing, too.

Astonished

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Nobody was astonished when Missy Johnson ended up in prison.
She was the black sheep of the family, the first kid to be sent to reform school kindergarten.
When other children were learning to count and watching Sesame Street, she was running guns to Belize and ruled the city’s drug lords with an iron fist.
In between Nap Times, of course.
Pretty soon, all organized crime in the world was under Missy’s thumb, and her babysitters became her lieutenants, helping her run a global prostitution ring.
And then, prison.
She turned herself in voluntarily.
Safer behind bars, opulent accommodations nonetheless.

Creative Juices

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We let the children play with their toys and draw with crayons for an hour.
Then, the valves open and knockout gas puts them to sleep.
Nap time.
When they wake up, they have no memory of our hooking up the spinal shunts and draining them of their creative juices.
Looking around the room, they pick up the crayons and stick them in their mouths or put them up their noses.
The toys are used to smash other toys or hit other kids.
Eventually, they learn to play and draw again.
And we are ready to harvest more creative juices.

Where do babies come from?

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Where do babies come from?
After the Cobalt War, they come from The Baby Factory.
Deep underground, shielded from the radiation and toxins in the air and soil, geneticists assemble the next generation.
Or, if we can’t remove enough of the contaminants, the last generation.
This time, the scientists are working on adding thick hides, culled from rhinoceros genes.
The babysitters have a high suicide rate, watching wave after wave of monsters come from the labs, dying from horrifying diseases and tissue rejections.
The ants crawl over their tiny, broken corpses.
“Looks like it’s your turn now,” I tell them.

The Gliders

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Observer gliders soar through the clouds, spreading the latest batch of chemicals cooked up by the Weather Division.
“Rain will be purple today,” they said.
The chemicals are meant to turn the rain purple, but the rain is more pink than purple.
And when we catch it on our tongues, it burns.
Everybody runs for cover, and we watch the streets sizzle with acidic fury.
Then, the storm passes, and we wander the pock-marked streets stained with the melted-off paint from cars.
The Weather Division promises orange rain tomorrow morning.
We put on our gas masks and go to sleep.

Vagrant

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Of all of Zeus’ guises, he enjoyed taking the form of a vagrant the most.
There was something strange about having a body, but still being invisible to everyone around him.
Nobody sees what they don’t want to see.
People would pass him by, only noticing him if he were in their way, blocking their progress through their pointless mortal lives.
“Get out of my way, you bum!” growled a merchant. “Can’t you see I’m busy shopping for my wife?”
Leda, isn’t it? thought Zeus.
He smiled a rakish smile and took the form of a swan.
A well-endowed swan.

the Needle

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I prefer analog to digital displays.
There’s just something about watching a needle pulse inside a dial, crawling slowly up the scale into the red.
You don’t get the same sense of urgency when you see a bunch of numbers laid out on a console. Or a set of colored LEDs, lighting up in series.
The needle throbs and twitches, like it’s alive.
You forget it’s just a measuring device, wired through miles of circuitry.
That’s what happened to me and the temperature indicator in my capsule.
Down…
Down…
Down…
How could you betray me, needle?
You were my friend.

The Music Man

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Don Music was a puppet on a children’s show who’d get so frustrated trying to compose a song, he’d bash his head against the piano keys and give up.
Sadly, some children got the crazy idea that the proper response to frustration is to bash your head repeatedly against it.
These kids would bash their heads against their desks, balefully moaning “I CAN’T DO IT!”
One was the son of a florist, and after school he’d help out in the shop.
No matter what he tried, he never could keep a cactus alive, so he-
On second thought, don’t ask.

Beating

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My stomach is growling.
But I just ate.
I just ate a dog. And the dog is growling.
It’s a small dog, so I could still be hungry.
And if my stomach is growling because I am still hungry, the dog might be growling back at my stomach.
I will beat it with a hammer until it stops growling.
(The dog, not my stomach)
(Although if I beat the dog, I beat my stomach, since it is inside my stomach.)
I should never have eaten the dog.
But I was hungry and my stomach was growling.
Like it is now.

Troll

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Every time I need to cross the river, I look forward to crossing the troll’s bridge.
He does a fine job of keeping the bridge maintained, and has recently strengthened it for heavier cart traffic.
Commerce and trade are booming now.
Today, I’m delivering kegs to his tavern.
“More ale!” cheers the troll.
Every patron stands up and raises their flagons in respect to the host.
Hungry? His wife bakes the most excellent pies. Sometimes I come here just for the pie.
We unload the kegs and unhitch three goat from the front of the cart.
Love those goat-meat pies.