Short stories & poems
AllPoetryScience FictionAction & AdventureFantasyRomanceHorrorCrime, Mystery & ThrillerYA FictionHumourWestern
“Edgar Bergen. Charlie McCarthy. Mortimer Snerd! I haven’t seen you boys in forever. How long has it been?”
“How long has it been since you opened this old trunk, you big dummy?” Charlie quipped.
“Since he left the circus, no doubt,” Edgar added.
“Hyuck, hyuck. When he was a clown,” Mortimer noted.
“Well, he was a better clown than he was a ventriliquist,” Charlie said.
“That goes without saying,” Edgar agreed.
“Well, nobody was as good as you Edgar,” Mortimer fawned.
“Well, thank you Mortimer.”
“As long as you didn’t care if his mouth moved,” chided Charlie.
“Hey! I resemble that remark.”
“Oh Edgar. You always did have thin skin.”
“Thin skin? Him? You were always the one with thin skin, you big dummy. Those kids laughed at you when you rode your unicycle and juggled. And you cried. But they were supposed to laugh at you. You were a clown, for Pete’s sake. And when you brought us into your act, everybody thought we were the dummies, but it was always you.” Charlie was as blunt as ever.
“I suppose.”
“Hyuck. You shoulda juggled the three of us instead of trying to throw your voice.”
“Yeah. Wouldn’t that have been a treat. We coulda upchucked on you while you were doing it. Of course, it woulda been sawdust and wood chips.”
Edgar jumped in. “Hey now. Don’t be so tough on the kid. He was our meal ticket you know.”
“Meal ticket! Hah! He barely made enough to eat his own food. And he stuffed us with the leftover straw and sawdust from the ground. Who knows what it had in it.”
“Hyuck hyuck. That’s why I smell so bad. Elephant…”
“No. You smell so bad because that big dummy stuck us in that trunk so long,” Charlie said.
“Well, boys. It’s been fun. Although, I’m not sure I’ve heard Charlie in such fine form as today.”
Footsteps echoed in the attic.
“Hey, Dad. Whatcha doin’?”
The clown turned to face his boy. “Hi son.” He turned back to his old trunk where his son was gazing. “Just taking a trip down memory lane.”
The boy stepped forward and looked into the old trunk. “Whoa! You were a ventriliquist? That is so cool.”
“Not so cool when you watched his mouth move,” Charlie said.
“Wow! They move without you doing anything.”
The clown opened his hand, and showed his son the mechanism he had pulled out when he first opened the trunk. It had three sets of controls. “See, I can move their mouths with these buttons, their heads with these, their eyes with these, and so on and so on.”
The boy’s eyes went wide. “Can I try?”
The clown handed the mechanism to his son. “Be careful. You never know what they’re gonna say.”
The boy pressed the mouth button for Charlie.
“You can say that again.”
For Mortimer.
“You can say that again. Hyuck. Hyuck.”
For Edgar.
“Sigh. I was the puppet master way back when.”
“This is so cool.”
“Well, you’ve got your kid fooled, you big dummy”, Charlie said.
“He’s definitely not like your normal audience,” Edgar agreed.
“Hyuck. Hyuck. You got me fooled too. I always thought you were great. Hyuck.”
“Thank you Mortimer. You were always so kind.”
“Suck up is more like it.”
The clown sighed. “I think it’s time to say goodbye now fellas.”
“Hyuck. Goodbye now fellas.”
“Nooooo!”
“Sorry Charlie. Goodbye Edgar. Goodbye Mortimer.”
“I hope that it won’t be another decade or more before we see you again.”
“We’ll see, Edgar. We’ll see.”
The clown took the batteries out of the mechanism, put the mechanism into the trunk with the dummies, then closed the lid. He and his son walked toward the attic ladder. His son looked back.
“Do you hear that?”
The clown sighed. “Yeah. They always kick and scream when I put them away.”
It wasn’t everyday that the F.L.I.N.C.H (Finding Likeable Incredibly Nasty Cats Hiding) Organization had a party, but when they did, it was memorable.
“Their party is toast,” Mister Kitteh hissed, when he got the info from their mole on the inside.
“Heh heh yes indeed!” The mole whined.
“Get this mole outta here,” Mister Kitteh swiped a paw at the wretched creature before the Kitteh Minions kicked him out.
“Tonight we CRASH this party!”
“Do you think the party will go without a hitch?” Agent 001 asked her partner, Agent 001.a.
“I think not,” 001.a said. “And that’s the point.”
“Heh heh yes indeed!” The mole giggled.
The salmon mousse had just been set out when a crashing noise came from the ceiling.
“Ha!” Mister Kitteh cried as he leapt onto the dance floor. “You’re finished, FLINCH!”
Everyone clapped. Kitteh looked confused.
“Happy Birthday, Mister Kitteh!” The entire floor of FLINCH agents applauded and balloons and confetti fell.
“You … remembered!” The likable yet nasty cat clapped his paws together in delight.
“Of course!” The mole squeeked. “I’m a double agent, you see.”
A burly sailor sits at a bench holding a well worn notebook “You know every half educated quack telss ya that keeping a journal helps deal with the stresses of life as you keep it recorded.” He hacks and spits out the porthole next to him onto whatever remains of the deck above the water. “Don’t do ya much o good taking time to write down your worries when they may be the death of yer”… the oddly calm crewmate sitting across from him replies “it also would help if ya stopped SHOOTING THE OCTOPI WITH A 12 GAUGE!”… gruff man “yer right when yer right, but what if the next one is a cthulu?” Crewmate creases his eyebrows as he holds his hand to his face “for the last time Mcdoogal that doesn’t happen twice… yah already got the weirdo before”… Mcdoogal:…. “Oh… can I still shoot the sharks in case of them being a leviathan Jeffery?” Jeffery:……………..”yeah sure, just stop aiming at the boat”…
“It’s cruel summer”, a strange voice screams. “I’m drunk in the back of the car”, the mysterious voice continues. I wonder what comes next. First a cruel summer and then being drunk in a car. “But ooh, whoa-oh”, I hear next. “WAKE FINALLY UP, SMITHS!”, I hear my neighbour’s voice. “AND CHOSE ANOTHER SONG, I CANT HEAR THIS THING ANYMORE!”, my old Neighbour yells from his garden. Now, I am so confused that my eyes finally decide to open themselves and I realise I lie in my bed. It’s a Monday morning. School day. I turn of my alarm clock, a Tailor Swift song, that my mother recommended. _You’ll feel way better in the mornings when you hear such a amazing voice, _she always told me. What ever. It’s not even summer. I open my window to check wether Mr. Williams is still alive, cause I haven’t heard him anymore since he yelled about the song. Instead, my eyes turn towards a blue exercise book that says _Homework. _Shit. Maybe I can quickly write something, so that I can lie _I tried but I didn’t understood the task. “A group of teenager stumble across something they shouldn’t have…continue the story!”, _I read before lying down in my bed and sleep for the rest of the day.
"So" Emily says, flipping through papers and files.
"It says here "She points to a spot on the paper at the top of her clip board, "that you’re here for marriage problems "
I fidget in my chair across from her
"Yep. That’s, why I’m here" I mumble, embarrassed.
"So, what do you think the root cause of your marriage problems are? Anything that you know of?" my new therapist looks me in the eye and asks.
"Well umm there may be one thing I can think of…" I say, my face heating up.
"And that is?"
"Well you see" I begin " when me and Catherine had been dating for about three months, she had a birthday. So for her birthday we were going to go to a fancy restaurant. I wanted to get her a gift, so I decided I would get her a non to expensive, but still cute, ring to wear. A causal one. And when I handed her the ring from across the table,she looked at me, and thought I had just proposed. And she said yes. From then on I never had the heart to tell her I wasn’t proposing. And that, I think is what may be causing the problems. "
"You mean to tell me that you married a girl you dated for 3 months and didn’t even want to marry her ? "
"Well, um, yes"
The Travelling medicine man Of a big travelling medicine clan A traveller A raveller A big bag bavller
The traveling medicine man Of a big travelling medicine clan He rides his horse while reading morse of course
The traveling medicine man Of a big travelling medicine clan has bottles and boxes galore but you never see him at the store
The traveling medicine man of a big traveling medicine clan His bsig chucky boots dont match his white suit But he still wears it anyway
The traveling medicine man of a big traveling medicine clan He gives you a shot Ouch! That hurts a lot
The traveling medicine man of a big traveling medicine clan He is big and scary But don’t be wary He is just a traveling medicine man
Blades cutting through cold
People becoming old
A curl could swirl
The girl is a pearl
The figure whirls
I saw a squirrel
The judge hurled
The dog curled
The log fell
Fellow neighbors ran away
The show got canceled
No more ice skating for today
The day ended early
The people ran away
The squirrels flew up a story
The story never ended
The judges flew and folded
For the girl on the right
I stood waiting by her door, gripping a bouquet of flowers a little too forcefully. I took a deep breath, bracing myself for what was to come. Already anticipating a disaster to some extent, I didn’t exactly have high hopes.
At last, she arrived. The house door slowly opened, and it revealed a stranger. She was no longer the childhood friend I once knew. We were adults now, and hadn’t seen each other in a decade.
Suddenly fumbling with the flowers, I held them out to her, saying, “Hello, Lua.”
She looked up at me, the astonishment visible in her eyes. Her emotions had always been easy to read. She took the flowers gracefully.
“Jake.” She said, my name falling out her mouth as if it were the most unnatural thing. “It’s been a while.”
Her tone sounded unsure, more than unpleasant. My stomach took a flip.
“Please, come on in,” she said, forcing a sad smile as she opened the house door wider.
She showed me to the living room, and we sat down across from each other. The silence was loud.
I took a deep breath, and said, “I think you know why I’m here.”
“After all these years…” she started. “You kept your word.”
I smiled weakly.
“You know… this unusual predicament we’re in.” I said quietly.
She paused. A brief moment passed, but it was long enough for me to see the sadness flicker in her eyes. A dancing, fleeting moment.
Almost laughing, she added, “I really wonder what our lives would be like now if we hadn’t made that silly joke all those years ago.”
“It was my fault… I was immature,” I said, remembering the day with a shiver.
We were both eight years old. She was my neighbour, and naturally, we grew up together, playing games and running around the streets. Considering how it was a time when magic was prohibited, we were particularly reckless.
Acting as adventurous travellers, we stumbled upon forbidden secrecies, only to be discovered by either a curious child or a trespasser with a death wish.
An ominous building. A foggy wall of protection that practically screamed, “KEEP OUT!” But being the brilliant horror-movie protagonists we were, we entered without hesitation.
We stumbled upon a room, filled with delicate treasures. An aura of magic coated the air, and perhaps that drove our insanities.
I picked up a little golden ring, with a shiny jewel embedded. Of course, I would not take it, but I lifted it to the window’s light.
Lua gasped, perhaps both out of shock and admiration. “Wow…” she gushed. “It’s… beautiful.”
Laughing, and properly pumped with the rebellious adrenaline, I exclaimed, “A wedding ring…” I looked her in the eye, and dropped to the floor on one knee. Grandly (or so I thought, at the time), I held the ring up to her, and said, “Marry me, Lua?”
It was a joke. A childish act. She giggled, flattered.
“Yes!” She replied, letting me place the ring on her finger.
…
That moment. That was when it all fell apart.
Lights. Sounds. Force.
The magic seeped through the ring. What appeared to be a coloured gas rose through the air, blinding the two of us. Sparkles of light, often shown to be beautiful in the movies, were more like terrifying fireworks being released centimetres away. Something, through the cloudy fog, pushed the two of us.
I could suddenly feel her hand, and we gripped onto each other out of terror.
A voice, unexplainable, like the moment, came from the room, saying, “The oath. You have made the oath. Once both of you are eighteen, your fates must intertwine. The oath of marriage.”
What happened after was a blur. A blur I do not wish to recall…
Back in the present time, we both gazed at each other.
“It’s both our fault,” she admitted. “We shouldn’t have trespassed.”
“I suppose.”
There were so many things I wanted to ask her. How was life? Did she ever get that game she really liked? Is she studying medicine like she dreamed?
But I only managed to say, with a saddened heart, “Marry me?”
I used to be important. The bright morning of the week, the fresh start. But, as people got more complicated and life grew ever more dense with tedium, the beginning I brought them was resented.
I look over the city, hearing the tired groans of every person waking up for their jobs, each parent readying the kids for school. It hurts my heart that they lament their lives so much, that the mere beginning of another chapter is a burden instead of a gift.
There is one boy, who I seek out when I need a smile. He’s in third grade math right now, swinging his feet, doodling messy action heros on his worksheet as the cold morning light drifts in through the window. I drift in with it.
Right now, he’s thinking about the x-men episode he saw last night while he draws. But his friends are chatting behind him.
“Mondays are so stupid. I wish that it was always like, Labor Day or something. So we have three weekend days.”
He turns around fast.
“It’s not Monday’s fault that jobs and schools start on Monday! People decided to do that! And then we’d all start on Tuesday and then Tuesday would be stupid.”
His friends laugh a bit at his earnestness, and I smile. It’s nice to have one little defender.
In a time of morning-haters and late-night-regretters, it’s that much more meaningful to see a boy who defends something he doesn’t quite understand just because it doesn’t feel fair.
Recently featured