A story of coworkers and courtesy, and a librarian in a pickle.
This story is my first round entry in the NYC Midnight 2016 Flash Fiction Challenge. You get prompts for genre (Fairy Tale), location (library) and object (coffee pot) and have 48 hours to turn it into a 1,000 word max story. I had a major block until 4 hours before deadline but it snapped together just in time. This is as submitted with only rough editing.
Hope you enjoy!
This short is built from the Fiction is Life #2 prompt: Newly elected mayor found dead in locked room.
“Wake up, Jonathan” she said sweetly. You need to be awake now, sweetie.”
“Hrmfrg?” I managed, or something closely aproximating that.
“Get up, lover. I have to tell you a few things before I head out.”
I fumbled my way to a sitting position, but it was damned hard. Did I drink last night? This felt like the mother of all hangovers. Like the election morning hangover.
“Sure, Gailbaby. Just let Daddy get some aspirin first.”
She handed me a tumbler, one of the ones from the bathroom sink that had a paper disk on top to assure you of its sanity.
Sanctity?
Sanitized. Yeah. Why was it so hard to think?
When I had a firm grip on the glass (firm might be a bit sketchy of a description) she handed me two green pills.
“I’ve got aspirins in my bag. I’m not really feeling up to an alternative cure at the moment, Baby.”
It was hard to be polite about it with a raging headache. This was not the time for crystal herb magic. She just looked down at me from where she sat on the edge of the bed and smiled that beautiful smile. The one that had years ago stolen my heart, then later my honor.
“It’s real medicine, love. Prescription for migranes. You know I look out for you.” She motioned for me to take the pills. I did so, swallowing the glass of water in gulps. My mouth felt incredibly dry.
“Are you feeling fluish? You look feverish” she said. She took a thermometer from the night stand, one of those instant-read ones, and brushed it across my forehead.
“You are feverish” she said with an oddly satisfied look. “Okay. I’ve just got a few minutes to talk to you, then I’ll be leaving.”
“Baby, what are you talking about? You sound deadly serious. Could we wait until my head is straight?” When you can barely track enough to drink a glass of water you shouldn’t be getting into relationship discussions. With my tongue swelling up I had barely managed to get that out. No way could I have a meaningful discussion now.
“I’m sorry, no” she answered. “It’s now or never. I’m never going to see you again after this.”
She stood up and walked across the room. I loved the way her legs looked when she walked, the juxtaposition of beautiful motion as one ankle passed the other and the slim flexibility of her dancer’s step. Her feet made even this horrible carpet look good, and this was one of those horrid designs meant to disguise stains instead of appealing to the eye. A version of it was in every hotel I’d ever stayed in. We’d ever stayed in.
I tried to stand up to follow her but instead lost my balance and fell back into the bed. I felt so weak!
“Don’t try to get up. You won’t be able to now, or ever again. You probably can’t talk anymore, if the major muscle failures have already started. Can you talk, Baby?”
“Wuh” I replied. “Wuh. Wuh.” Or something that closely approximated that. What I was trying to communicate was more along the lines of /Holy hell! What is going on here?/
“What was in those pills? Oh, that was scopolomine.”
“Wuh” /What? Scopolomine is for migranes?/
“Why did I drug you? To hide the poison I gave you. When they pump your tummy and find partially digested scopolomine tablets in there, well they’re going to come to the very logical though incorrect conclusion that you died of a scopolomine overdose.”
“Wuh” /Wuh?/
“I told you if I ever found you were with a woman besides me or your wife that I would kill you dead. Well, your ‘campaign financer’ is not as discreet as she probably should be, especially considering that you won the election.”
“Wuh” /No! There is nothing between Stacey and I! That’s completely political, Baby! There’s nobody for me but you. Well, you and Rebecca, but that’s just political too. I love you!/
“It will look like you got pills from a mail-order pharmacy and overdosed on them because the prescription was wrong. I was going to get really vindictive and set you up for a big scandal but I lost heart. Once I realized it wasn’t just an angry game, when I realized I really was going to kill you, I just got really businesslike.”
She went around the room and collected the glass she had used last night and her panties from where I’d thrown them across the room. She hated when I did that, which was why I did it. It was one of those annoying little games we use to show our affection.
“Anyway, scandal would mean investigation and I certainly didn’t want one of those. So you get a tragic but not eyebrow raising mistake instead.”
She didn’t need to do much cleaning up. She seldom brought more than a toothbrush to our assignations.
“Wuh” /This is all a misunderstanding! Can you antidote me? Oh, you’re going to be so sad when you find out the truth. I hope./
She put the panties and the glass in her purse, along with a washcloth she had used last night. She walked back to me with that angry strut she used to drive me wild and win arguments. She bent down and kissed me gently on the lips, then positioned me so I could see the hotel room’s door. She grabbed the thermometer from the bedstand and strutted to the door.
Damn, she was fun to watch move.
“Goodbye, Jonathan. I love you. Sorry I killed you.”
She walked out the door. On her way though she draped a string around the little security bar you could throw closed for imagined security. With the door almost closed she wiggled the door and bar until it engaged, just as if I had thrown it before heading to bed and an overdose of scopolomine.
Gail always thought of the little things.
“Wuh” /I love you too, Gailbaby./
The door closed.
My father passed away yesterday after many years battling Alzheimer’s. I wrote this story for him a few years ago. I don’t know if he was at a point to understand it when I gave it to him, but I like to think he was.
This story is a bit dated and I may come around one day to clean it up, but probably not.
Prompt: Centenarian veteran of a famous battle dies.
“What was it like that day, Geepaw Davit? Really, what happened? We hear about it in school but it’s just a paragraph in a book. Mumma said you were there. Were you really there? Really? Were you at the Flatts?”
My teachers called me precocious, but I think that was just teacher code for “uncontrollable”. But great grandpa Davit always had a soft spot for me and indulged my every childish whim. When I heard that he had been at The Flatts I just had to hear it from the source. I mean, seriously! That was the battle that sparked the Five Powers War. How could our books tell us so little about it? As if the deaths of those first men and women could be reduced to five sentences? I had to know more!
But in this one thing Grampa refused me. He told me he would never speak of that battle again until the day he breathed his last.
He was true to his word.
He told me the story yesterday, and now he’s gone.
CRACK! My dream explodes in red fiery pain. My waking mind is engulfed in it, drowning in it.
CRACK! My ass burns, so hot where I’ve been struck that it feels cold.
CRACK! The paddle strikes me higher, across my lower back. The icy fire spreads like liquid poured on my skin.
CRACK! I struggle to get away and discover I am bound. My arms pulled together behind me and strung to my neck, my legs immobilized by his weight.
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! My back, my shoulders, my arms are seared with living fire. I scream and hear nothing, my mouth filled with fabric bound in place by a leather strap. The taste tells me they are my panties, soaked by my juices and his ministrations mere hours ago.
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! My ass roars with pain as he returns his attentions there, striking my already inflamed cheeks over and over. It’s no longer on fire. Fire is not hot enough to describe this sensation. I squirm, desperate to get away but there is no escape.
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! CRACK! My thighs, my ass, my arms, my legs, my shoulders, my tail. The paddle strikes randomly, obscenely, anywhere, everywhere. There is no escape. I squirm desperately, like an animal. I cannot dodge. I cannot predict. I cannot even flinch away for the strikes are irregular. Chaotic.
CRACK! One final massive blast across my ass completes his assault. My backside glows from neck to knees. I am one fiery slab of tingling, living pain. I feel every inch of me pulsing along to my frantic heartbeat. He lays down atop me, grabs a fistful of hair, forces my head to one side. He slides the fabric gag from my mouth and quickly replaces it with a fleshy one of his own. His tongue explores my mouth frantically, beautifully, desperately, pushing inside me in welcome violation. After an eternity far too brief he withdraws and lays tender kisses across my lips.
“Good morning, beautiful girl” he says. “That was your new alarm clock. Are you awake now or should I hit the snooze button?”
What happens when you cross Shaft and Chuck Norris? This happens, that’s what.
ALERT: Lots of profanity. You probably already figured that out from the title, though.
This is my take on the Bloody Mary curse. As fairy tale’d.
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Maire sat in her abject emptiness, waiting, waiting, waiting, for her hero. Somebody would free her, it had been promised. So many had come to challenge the curse, all had failed. But Maire knew that some day there would be one who would rescue her. It was fated. It was foretold. Some day there would be one strong enough to release her. Strong enough to face the unquenchable fears of their own selves, strong enough to face the horror of their own being, strong enough to set her free.
“I curse you, Maire of the Vale. I curse you once, twice, thrice. I curse you and all that look upon you. Naught shall you see but yourself and never shall you see the Laird of life nor death.” Continue reading “Mirrors”
This short was written and published in 2003 in a now-defunct horror zine. Hmm…hope that wasn’t my fault. Anywho, it has a multi-option ending that I really liked. Think “choose your own adventure” meets the Brothers Grimm. Part 1 is the common body and parts 2-4 are the different conclusions. Does Todd escape? Does Terry finally achieve his elusive goal? Only you can decide.
(#3 is my favorite) Continue reading “Hunting Todd”
This is an erotic short story from 2003. It came about from an argument with a friend over the difference between pornography and erotica. My argument was that erotica should not only titillate, it should entertain. If there’s no story there then it isn’t really erotic. I was challenged to show what I meant and this was the result.
Just in case it needs to be said, this story has explicit sexual content. Continue reading “The Somnolence of Clouds”
Ages of the Seed 