Every time I do laundry, I always find an extra sock or shirt in there.
Extra knives show up in my kitchen drawers. Strange keys and wallets on my nightstand.
It’s frustrating, but it happens to everyone, right?
My grandmother told me about a place where things disappeared all the time: socks from the laundry, keys from your pocket, and even pickles off of hamburgers you got from the drive-through window.
“And they show up here,” she said.
People called her crazy, and one day, she wasn’t in her room.
I wonder if she showed up in the other place.
Tag: mystery
Snowglobe
I may look young, but I’m really over one hundred years old.
What’s my secret?
I drink nothing but the fluid from snowglobes.
You see, they fill those things with water from The Fountain Of Youth.
That’s where the sparkle comes from.
Ambrosia. Nectar of the Gods.
Oh, sure, it looks like ordinary water.
But it’s not. It’s powerful magic.
And it’s kept me alive for over one hundred years.
Crack it open… drink right from the snowglobe, don’t pour it into a glass.
Feel the tingle. Feel the burn.
Live forever.
Just try not to choke on the snowman.
Resolve
Breakfast, lunch and dinner: I always eat at the diner.
The moment I open the menu is when my resolve fails.
Honestly, I have no idea what I want. The more choices, the less able I am to choose.
Help.
I ask the waitress what she suggests, and she says “Well, what are you in the mood for?”
“Surprise me,” I say.
She takes the menu with a trembling hand, backing slowly into the kitchen.
The lights go out.
There’s a scream and then a thud.
Then, I hear sirens.
I shout “On second thought, I’ll have eggs over easy!”
River City
The conman broke into the library at night to do his research on the town.
Henry Hill may have been an awful music teacher, but he was brilliant when it came to the field of meteorology.
Studying the flood records, he calculated the perfect window in which to roll out his music lessons scam.
The final parade would coincide with the biggest storm of the season and massive flooding.
Henry put his notes in his pocket and went to the librarian’s desk.
Nice perfume, he thought. But he was strictly business on his scams…
Oh, such a pretty name… Marian.
Die In A Fire
Did I ever tell you about my friend Diana Fire?
Parents can be cruel, choosing names.
When she was a child, she liked to play with matches. Every year, she’d ask for a new Barbie Dream House, but by Valentine’s day, Barbie would be back in her shoebox, hair singed and skin scorched a bit more.
Through the years, she blazed a trial through homes, jobs – burning every bridge.
I got a call this morning. Had to identify her body.
Froze to death after getting locked in a walk-in cooler. Ruined the irony potential there.
So we’ll have her cremated.
Hit Somebody
Every February 29th, we celebrate St. Punch Somebody In The Face Day.
Everybody gets to throw one punch.
But there’s no limit on how many punches you’ll take.
It’s fun to look out the window, watching the neighbors run around, frightened and excited at the same time.
Me, I’m a masochist, because I walk down the street, smiling my shit-eating grin and daring people.
By the time I get back home, not a single punch.
Well, not this year.
In the past, I got my share. Messed me up good.
Now they turn away, disgusted at what they see.
Cowards.
Hear The Horns
The world is out of sync.
Maybe God got the speed of sound and the speed of light got mixed up this morning, but now I hear things before I see them.
The alarm going off before the clock showed 6.
Birds singing on empty telephone wires.
I try to cross the street and I hear cars honking, the screeching of brakes.
But it’s a red light. The WALK sign is lit.
I am crushed to the curb.
Hit by a car?
People shouting. Sirens. Unseen hands lift me.
So much pain.
I still haven’t seen what hit me yet.
Laminated
Flat Stanley became flat when a bulletin board fell on him.
You believe that he went on a series of wild adventures, right? Catching art thieves, sliding under doors, and mailing himself to far-off distant lands?
What really happened was a quiet, closed-coffin funeral.
His little brother Arthur was traumatized, shipped off to a mental hospital.
Every time his parents visited, he’d hand them another book he’d written about Stanley.
Alive. Adventuring.
Under his hospital bed, they found crushed and laminated mice.
“Experiments,” said Arthur, grinning
He escaped last night. Stole a steamroller.
Oh my God! The Mall!
Stop him!
Pulsation
“Pulsation: Pulsation is the act of pulsating,” mumbled Dictionary.
Dictionary is Steve’s little brother. He’s retarded or something, but special.
You can tell him a word, and he’ll give you the definition.
We ask him a few bad words and laugh at him.
Then we ask him a few nonsense words, and he holds his head and screams.
But then, hearing “Zuatha” he stopped.
“Zuatha: Zuatha is a insectoid hive-mind species that has developed faster-than-light technology and routinely observe-”
That’s all Dictionary said before the room was filled with a bright white light.
The light vanished.
And so did Dictionary.
Can you keep a secret?
Can you keep a secret?
I can’t.
That’s why whenever someone says they want to tell me a secret, I stick my fingers in my years and jump up and down, shouting I CAN’T HEAR YOU!
This makes things difficult at work. I work for the government.
Well, used to.
Because they say I can’t keep a secret.
Sure, I say I can’t, but then, I’ve never given any away.
That’s what my lawyer says. He says I have a good case.
The government wants to settle out of court.
If we keep the terms of the settlement a secret.