Awards

It must be award season. This past week I received both the Fabulous Flash and One Lovely Blog Awards. The latter award marks the first time anyone has used the word “lovely” to describe my blog, and possibly anything about me.

Before I play along with the rules, I’d like to thank my benefactors. Thanks to Jon Strother for the Fabulous Flash, and thanks to T.S. Bazelli for the One Lovely Blog.

The request with One Lovely Blog is that you give seven things about yourself. Here we go:

1. Since age 13 I have struggled with a crippling neuromuscular syndrome. The syndrome initiated from a mix of my body going into puberty and a rare adverse reaction to steroids. One month before the doctors put me on the regimen that would unwittingly destroy my body, I received the only chain letter of my life. I threw it away.

2. I distinctly remember spending one Christmas Eve alone. Realizing the quiet was a good opportunity to hit the ten-page assignment I had for High School English, I began writing an extremely violent fantasy. I became so enraptured in writing that I jumped when my family came through the door. I’d lost track of everything: the story was thirty pages, and I’d been writing for four hours. That night I decided that I had to become a writer.

3. I also distinctly remember spending one random afternoon alone. I lay on my bed, trying to think of what occupations would make the most money and require the least effort. Art, directing or being president were possible, but authors seemed to have it the easiest. That day I decided that I had to become a writer.

4. A few years after college I began walking for exercise. On the first day a police car stopped me just twenty meters from my house. I’d been alternately either away at college or so sick that I was a shut in for so long that none of my neighbors recognized me, and they phoned the police that there was a suspicious looking man wandering on the road.

5. Walking was part of a diet and exercise regimen that allowed me to lose 60 pounds. I was very proud until I started having acute pains in my side. It turned out the rapid weight loss had ruined my gallbladder, requiring a surgery that almost bankrupted me.

6. It took me two months to recover after the surgery. On my first day returning to exercise I had a leg spasm and tore cartilage in my left knee. I could not walk for months.

7. The night before my gallbladder surgery I cleaned up my room so it would be easier to traverse post-op. There was so much bare floor that I could actually dance in my room. I did. It was a combination of waltzing and boy band nonsense, lasting five minutes before I entirely lost my wind. It felt wonderful and probably looked idiotic. In the coming months, including both the surgery recovery and the knee injury, I often reflected how smart it had been to dance when no one was watching. Remembering it often took the sting out of immobility, because I knew I’d used the gift well while I’d had it.

There you go. You now know everything about me. People will feel silly reading my autobiography in a few years when they could have just read that.

The rules of Fabulous Flash are to share the award with four flash fiction writers you admire. One Lovely Blog seems to have a malleable number, so I could cheat and give both awards to four people.

Instead we’ll do a little compromise. I gave you seven bits of information, so I’ll give you seven award winners. The first four people below are flash fiction specialists. The last three are also talented flash writers, but their blogs tend to feature other material as well. What material? Read on.



1. Peggy MacFarland is a lively speculative fiction writer I encountered about a year ago on the Habringer*33 project. She tends to share a new tale about once a week, spanning ghost stories, aliens, incompetent house painters – you know, the usual.

2. Gracie Motley, author of Crone’s Cauldron. She posts at least twice a week, once with her Fantasy “Fire and Water” serial, and once with the weekly #fridayflash offering. Since going twice-weekly she’s displaying admirable versatility.

3. Laura Eno is a funny lady. Her Death and Chronos series was one of my favorites. Though she’s buried in a novel right now, she continues to share amusing flash fiction.

4. Karen Schindler. I’m putting her last in the Fabulous Flash category because she’ll have an amusing comment about it. She is pell-mell and free. If you think my sense of humor is wacky, she may be even further out there. Or perhaps we're like Saturn and Uranus - two planets so far out there that it doesn't even matter anymore, because the Sun doesn't talk to us that often anyway. Did that not make sense? Well it did to us.



5. Eric Krause is branching out all the time. He writes speculative fiction flash, but has also included book reviews and writing prompts.

6. Anthony Venutolo’s “Bukowski’s Basement” may have a short story about life in America, or the latest trailer for an HBO series, or a reflection on Harvey Pekar. A news editor elsewhere, this is the destination for his personal creativity and whatever relates to it.

7. Mark Kerstetter. He probably won’t appreciate that I cognize his name as “Marker Starter.” Mark’s blog, The Bricoleur, features some of the finest regular free-to-read literary essays around. He is cultured in fiction yet enamored with that culture, rather than mourning it in the way scares off so many young readers. His fiction has distinct art about it. I won't bother describing it. Just read it.

T.S. originally worried about giving me an award that was pink. I've now given it exclusively to men. She didn't know about my historic support for pink's manliness.

Bathroom Monologue: Fox, goose and grain riddle

The wizard swept his hands over the three items. The first was a bag of grain. The second was a goose, which immediately stuck its bill into the bag. The wizard pulled it out and thrust it aside, at which point the third item, a fox, leapt up and bit the goose. The wizard grumbled, grabbed each by the neck and held them apart.

Struggling with the animals, he continued.

“So this is your challenge, boy. You must get all three of these items across the river safely, but there is only one slot for items in the canoe. Take the fox, and the goose will stay behind eating the grain.”

The boy nodded along. “And if I take the goose across first, then the fox second…”

The wizard beamed in that malicious way that old folks learn when their grandchildren don’t visit often enough.

“Then one will eat the other while you’re paddling for the third item. Exactly. This is your riddle. Pass it, and then I’ll let you live and cross my river.”

The boy rubbed his hands together, studying the goose and fox. The wizard released them, and immediately the fox bolted for the bird. The boy stepped in, sweeping the fox into his arms. When it nipped him, he rapped it on the head to pacify it.

The wizard raised an eyebrow. “Going to try that one first?”

“Sort of.”

The boy picked up the sack of grain, letting it yawn open. Then he dumped the stunned fox inside and drew the string tight. Before the wizard could complain, he climbed into the canoe and dropped the sack into his one item slot. The fox pawed at its burlap prison while the boy started rowing.

“I think I’ve got this riddle!” he called. “Can do it in two trips.”

“You’re very clever, sonny! I’ll let you keep the goose as a reward.”

When the boy was out of earshot, the wizard grumbled and waved his wand over the goose. A poison spell would teach that brat.

Bathroom Monologue: The Apologies of a Shit Head

Thank you all for meeting me here today, especially members of the media whose microphones are forming this black bouquet in front of my face. I appreciate both the support of my many fans and the outrage of so many individuals.

I want to take this opportunity to apologize for being a shit head.

I apologize that so many of you read and/or heard the horrible things that I said to my girlfriend. You don't know either of us and you shouldn't have heard it. I cannot apologize enough for, in pursuit of being a shit head, enabling your addiction to voyeurism.

I apologize that in having a private dispute I failed to notice myself being taped. I apologize further for not bribing my girlfriend with enough money to prevent her from selling those tapes to media outlets. Had I taken either precaution, you would have been spared this dark national day of hearing a man be an unforgivable shit head to the mother of one of his children.

I apologize to all the women who will be the victims of gender-based violence in the next few weeks, for having my outburst publicized when your stories should lead. In my hateful rant I also used some racial epithets, and I would like to apologize to all of the people of any color who will be unfairly treated in the next few weeks, for similarly my story will lead while yours will almost certainly go underreported. Even if my story wasn’t there, the media and nation would ignore you, but I can only apologize on my behalf.

Similarly, I apologize to spokespeople from organizations that help battered women, mistreated minorities and other valuable projects, because the few of you who will be selected to appear in media outlets will be pressured to discuss my story, largely in utter ignorance, rather than your vital work, which deserves more public support and awareness. If somehow bashing my name, image or the very idea of me helps drum up more money and attention for your efforts, please do.

I apologize for having some talent in film. Had I not built such a strong career, it would not have pained so many strangers to hear my bile spill. In fact, you would not have heard it at all.

I apologize most strongly for the illusion I've allowed you to create. Before, when you thought me an eccentric member of Hollywood who was handsome and probably troubled, frankly, I enjoyed it. But now you think me some unusual domestic monster. I have enabled an illusion in which every one of you doesn't personally know somebody who has used the same language and been equally awful to a loved one, and by the distant nature of your illusion of me, I've allowed you to pretend that when those horrible things happened near you that you didn’t voice nearly so loud an opinion as you did about me. This in no way excuses my language or behavior. I am a shit head. I was before you heard these tapes and, barring miracle, I will continue to be a shit head until my death. However, I am not rare or exceptional in any of these ways. I apologize to everyone who I allowed to think, even for a minute, that if they were recorded at their worst and broadcast across the nation that they would not be reviled.

My closest associates in the film industry have urged me to apologize to my ex-wife here today, on camera, before the entire world. I won't, because it's none of your business. As I see it you are either using gossip about my personal life for entertainment purposes or you have an unhealthy obsession. In neither case are you an audience that deserves to hear me apologize to the mother of one of my children.

Thank you all for meeting me here today.

Bathroom Monologue: Doing the Undoable

Jenkins scooped it up as soon as he saw it. Its smooth swirl pattern made this dog shit perfect. He stored it in a hot room all week, with liberal use of air freshener. When it was properly dried out, he sprayed it with a few firming chemicals and snuck it into work in a cake container. While everyone went to lunch, ignoring him out of anger for not sharing his cake, he jimmied into the supply room and laminated it. He gave the dog crap three gentle coats, until the surface had a stable sheen. With this achieved, he took out some clear nail polish and the lightest brush he could find, and made for his boss’s office. He lay in wait by the secretary’s desk. When his boss emerged from the elevator, Jenkins dipped the brush in the nail polish and began rubbing it gently over his prize.

“Mr. Dumas,” he called. “You said something about promotions for anyone who could polish a turd?”

Bathroom Monologue: “I’d rather be a rising ape than a fallen angel.” –Terry Pratchett, interview with The Guardian

The demon watched as hairy mammals played on the forest floor. Their forelegs had nearly evolved into arms, and in a few more strokes the species would adapt hands.

“They grow up so quick,” the demon said wistfully to himself. His wings, so dark they were invisible, fluttered. For a moment, he wished he were one of those rising apes.

Then he reflected on his amazing physique, eternal existence, and knowledge of the meaning of life. Boy, was the lack of those three things going to fuck with the primates’ descendants. He used his cosmic awareness to look ahead, chuckling at the inventions of skirts, headscarves and landmines. There was culture coming, that was for certain, but in all that culture he saw himself. There he was tormenting thousands of primate descendants, in naughty dreams and vivid visions, in unmedicatable madness and morning wood. He even caused a war.

“Which is only fair,” he told himself. The primates had caused his kind a nasty war, one cosmic week ago. The trouble he’d start by puppeteering a European oligarch would be payback. And besides, they’d cause themselves a thousand wars for any one his kind dropped in the bucket.

Across the ether, a succubus waved at him to join the coming poker game. He looked down at the mammals, which were now feasting on each other’s young.

“No,” he decided. “I think I’d rather be me.”

Bathroom Monologue: Literary Heritage in Five Lines

The teacher says, "For Monday I want you to read up to page 102 in Melville's Bartleby."

The student perks up. She asks, "China Mieville?"

The teacher thinks, "When did Melville go to China?"

The student thinks, "If I get out early enough I can get in line for the midnight showing of Inception. I hear the comic book was great."

Inception was not based on a comic book.

Bathroom Monologue: When the World Stops Vibrating

"We want to take your word over theirs..."

"Everyone in the department is heartbroken over Janet..."

"If there's anything we can do..."

"Just for now..."

"...and your badge."

"I understand."

He rose from the table and looked down at the captain. The captain said nothing.

He opened his jacket. He unclasped the holster and put his service revolver on the table. He removed the badge from his belt and placed it above the trigger and beside the barrel of the gun.

He pulled the wallet from his pants pocket. He opened it and removed his unit identification card. This he placed next to the badge.

He returned his wallet to his pants and buttoned his jacket back up.

The captain pushed a pen and papers across the table. He did not read them. He picked at the lower right corner of the pages, looking for any blank line. He signed his name, complete with a line instead of a dot over the i's.

He pushed the papers and pen back to the captain. The captain took them and looked them over.

"Thanks, Tim." "What are you going to do now?"

"I'll fill the time. There are still two Mendez Brothers left."

Bathroom Monologue: Excerpt from Imaginary Submissions Guidelines

Expect responses within 4-16 weeks. We regret that most of our rejection letters are pre-typed "form" letters. Please do not be discouraged by them as they do not reflect on the quality of your writing.

Alright, they reflect a little bit. One out of every ten thousand stories we get is so hilarious and creative that we five out of six house editors will quote it for in jokes, spontaneously pull out the MS to hug it, and pool together on a brief personal rejection letter explaining why it doesn't fit our magazine's theme. So if you get a form rejection, it reflects that you didn't write that 1/10,000 story.

On the flip side, one out of every five hundred stories winds up on Ted's desk and is so rife with typos, grammatical errors and cliches that he writes a personal rejection that reads more like a political attack ad. You can tell it’s Ted and he’s angry because your envelope will have been stapled shut. If the offending story is about zombies or Tolkienian elves, he may even blow his nose on your MS before mailing it back. So if you don't get a snot-strained personal rejection letters, it reflects that you aren't that bad or Ted didn’t read it.

If you do not hear from us in 16 weeks, feel free to query.

Bathroom Monologue: A Necessary Getaway (Redux)

He moved north at the first opportunity. Way north. He cut all ties, even to his mother, which was the hardest on him. He was a mama's boy. His hair went white from all the stress, including his beard. He took that as a sign to change his appearance and began dressing in pants as soon as they were invented. All the sedentary hiding made him gain tremendous weight, face filling out, giving him rosy cheeks in the snowy environment. He stayed in doors as much as possible, but always came out around his birthday. It was too lonely, even with the elves that had found him and made camps all around his house. They fashioned him thick, orthopedic boots and gloves that comforted his scarred extremities. It allowed him to take up carpentry again. The gregarious wee folk did so much for his spirits that he reached out to a similar-sized people: children. He still only went south around his birthday, but brought a sack of the toys from his workshop for those boys and girls who had the right attitude. There were always more gifts to give, too, as the elves copied his work and began production for every good child. And associating with children turned out to actually help, for in his old life he had been an average-sized Jew, but to them he was a giant. So his new identity was a jolly mammoth with a white beard and a bag of presents. He was safe. No one down there ever guessed that Santa Claus was an alias.



Today's story is a redux. Above is a slightly modified version of one of my favorite Bathroom Monologues. I've re-posted it for three reasons: to show the touch-ups, as an entry in Deanna Schrayer's Birthday Contest, and in celebration of its Honorable Mention in the Lands Edge Holiday Contest. You can see the republication of the original at Alan Davidson's Lands Edge (and all the wacky comments) by clicking here.

Bathroom Monologue: People Are Worse Than Clowns

"Clowns make me a little nervous, but they’re not bad. Some are really talented. They’ll follow you around trying to get you into the carnival spirit. Those ones? Okay, yeah, they wig me out. But clowns only scare me because they're people under that make-up. If they were demons, or shapeshifters, or juggling incubi, there'd be a chance I just didn't grasp what they were really like and this was their way of communicating goodwill. They could have their own nature. They could all just be misunderstood aliens. But clowns are people, and I understand people. There was one famous clown who turned serial killer; there are dozens of active people who are horrible serial killers. Sometimes a guy uses a clown mask to hide his face in a bank robbery; every day people shoot each other to death in muggings. There’s a song, “Send in the Clowns,” that jokes about sending a brigade of clowns to fight; people are currently carrying out more than a dozen wars across this world. Clowns can make me a little nervous. People scare me."

Bathroom Monologue: Dialogue for two soldiers sweeping for snipers in Iraq, OR, Things John mumbled to himself watching Hurt Locker

"Gunman spotted on the minaret!"

"Where?"

"11 o'clock! On the minaret!"

"What's a minaret?"

"The tall building. Eyes up!"

"Why didn't you say tall building?"

"Because it's a fucking minaret!"

'The Sea' over at 10Flash

Today's story is "The Sea in Which the Most Men Have Died." It's about Foreman and Aftman, two servants perplexed by a riddle: what is the sea in which the most men have died?

It was published in the July issue of 10Flash. 10Flash is a semipro-paying venue that cares more about theme than genre. The theme for July is "Are we there yet?"

You can read The Sea in Which the Most Men Have Died by clicking on this text. You can leave comments here or over on the 10Flash site.

Bathroom Monologue: Ogre/Troll

Many people have trouble telling the difference between ogres and trolls. They’re terrifying and come in a range of deformities that make taxidermy more difficult than figuring out if the emo teen with super strength and whose skin sparkles in sunlight is a vampire. There is a handy test, though. If the troll/ogre isn’t eating you, engage him in a conversation on things that matter (discounting topics like when or why he might eat you – these are dangerously suggestive). Make some platonic remarks about the gulf oil spill or the state of contemporary religion. It may respond with a dull stare, in which case it is an ogre. If it responds with clever but offensive observations that incite you into rage, it is a troll. Terminate conversation immediately. Trolls do this to upset people to the point where they can eat them and claim self-defense. Do not feed the trolls.

Bathroom Monologue: Tomorrow Man

"I’m not going to magically become competent tomorrow. That’s not the point. When all us residents run around celebrating like we’re becoming adults, we’re indulging in metaphor. We changed the bedpans and fixed the blood bags. We oversaw the surgery and broke the news to the widow. We earned our God-damned metaphors. I’m already competent, which is why I’ve been covering your rounds while you sneak off to hit on your ex. Tomorrow, do I transform some magic being? The Tomorrow Man, who’s never worried his diagnosis is wrong? Whose every patient has deluxe insurance to cover whatever she needs? No. Tomorrow I have more responsibilities, I get paid better, guaranteed steady employment, and you off my shoulder every time I meet a new patient. I will be no smarter, no braver, and no more confident than I am tonight. The Tomorrow Man will be the same guy I am every day. But if I want to put a red and yellow ‘T’ in the Superman font on my lapel, I can. Because I’ve earned that. So put on a party hat or run back to Sharon. Tell her I said hi and to close your blinds."

Bathroom Monologue: Thor the Jetstream

So Thor sits down next to Odin. Ever since Loki moved out, Thor’s been coming up with wackier conversation starters to keep dear-old-dad on his toes.

He says, "I'm thinking of being a jet stream."

Odin’s one eye widens. Even his eye patch looks perplexed. "A what?"

"A jet stream.” Thor takes his hammer and waves it around, illustrating the idea very poorly. “It's this thing air currents move along, building and carrying storms. I have a great resume for it, if there's an opening."

"You're the god of lightning!” thunders Odin, unironically. “What do you need with manual labor?"

"There's not so many worshippers, pappy. It's a bit dull out here."

"I bet just as many people believe in you as this jetstream business."

"That's only because they haven't heard what a jetstream is. They’ve all heard of me and the best I get is a slot in a superhero team-up movie."

"Now they'll hear of Thor the Jetstream and they'll think it's a new military bomber plane."

Odin throws a raven at him, but Thor catches it. He strokes the bird’s black feathers in the nefarious way his brother used to.

"That'd be pretty fun, though, wouldn't it?"

Bathroom Monologue: Pitch for “Odysseus: Dumb ****ing Author Killer”

After thousands of years, the craftiest hero in Greek history is back. And no, he’s not here to fix the government: he’s here to fix publishing. Odysseus ventures the wine-dark seas to slay godless writers who sent zombies to Regency England and turned Abraham Lincoln into a vampire hunter. His literary odyssey will take him to any corner of the globe with Creative Commons and authors who trample on it. See him trapped by a one-eyed publishing executive; see his men reduced to mindless pigs by a witch from Maxim Magazine; see the hilarious look on his face when he reads Clive Cussler’s remake of The Iliad. This summer, Odysseus is going to pop culture… right in the face.

Bathroom Monologue: Change

He said nobody changes. I shot him between the eyes. He looked surprised, but even if he thought I'd always been capable of murder, he suddenly couldn't talk anymore. That's change I can believe in.

Bathroom Monologue: Off

This story has been redacted. There was an offer to publish it. So here's hoping!

Bathroom Monologue: Total #eclipse of the Heart

Dear Steph,

I recently saw a commercial for your third movie and hope it isn't too late to recommend some changes. Now, I haven't read any of your books, but being a consumer I feel entitled to opinions. It looks like you've got brutish werewolves and emo vampires duking it out for your cipher white chick. So far so good. But while the boys battle, you should have a mummy roll up in a Rolls Royce. Sex him up however you want, but I think bandages imply sensitivity and girls love feelings, so there's that. He sweet talks your cipher like no other, because the slaves pulled his brain out through his nose, but they left his heart intact. While she's looking at a werewolf licking his own butt, the mummy's talking about a penthouse on top of a pyramid. While she's looking at a Seltzer-brand sparkling vampire, the mummy's reciting hieroglyphic poetry to mad jackal back beats. Naturally she runs off with him because pharaohs are rich and women are vapid, but you can tease it out for drama.

Sincerely,
Imhotep

PS: All mummies are loaded. Call me.

Bathroom Monologue: In a Few Short Months

One legal clause you have to be wary of is "in a few short months." This sounds like it takes very little time, or at least, a reasonable amount of time. It does not. Months come in three varieties: 31-day months, 30-day months, and the once-yearly 28-day month of February. 31-day months like July and December are clearly the long months, leaving 30-day ones like June and September as shorter, but not shortest. 30-day months are not short in comparison to February. Thus when someone promises something in "a few short months," they are referring to multiple Februaries. Anything that takes that long is actually going to take years, and the speaker is disregarding all the long-ish and outright long months that will pass alongside the few short ones. And because "a few" is vague, the contracted party can take two, three, or even five Februaries to pay you back. You're left waiting through January after January just to see if this is the short month he had in mind, all because you didn't make him be more precise in his wording.

"Exposure by Community" at Mad Utopia

Thanks to everyone who read and voted for "Exposure by Community." You made my little essay the first prize winner in the What #fridayflash Means To Me contest. In celebration it was republished today over at Jon Strother's Mad Utopia. You can read it by clicking on this text. Pop over there to join in the festivities or to tell me I'm too hard on editors.

And thank you all again. The turnout was very flattering and I'm glad to have touched on so many people's feelings about Twitter communities.

Bathroom Monologue: Uranium Plot

"This will cause international friction, but hear me out. Our neighbor states do not like us. They think us too brutal, even though half of them rose to power climbing a pile of bodies. What we will do is make our stockpile of 5% enriched uranium public knowledge. We will not say that it is mostly scrap and garbage that is unsafe for proper use in a bomb. Instead we will float rumors that we are seeking to enrich it to 90%, which the entire rich world associates with nuclear bomb manufacturing. We will build no such enrichment centers, but let them think we are. Their satellite photos will convince them of anything. Their assumptions will scare the neighbor states back into their petty holes. When the rich world comes to beg and browbeat us into not building the horrible weapons that they already have? We will resist for a year or two, showing our historic strength. Eventually they will offer assistance in building nuclear reactors and giving refined but non-weapons grade 20% enriched uranium rods. What they will build and give us will be magnitudes more expensive than the radioactive piss we will begrudgingly hand over. In five years, our country will have modern energy systems. A few rumors that we enrich weapons grade uranium, preposterous with what the U.N. or U.S. will actually offer, will go right to their hearts of our neighbors. They cannot help but believe the worst about us. Meanwhile, as a new friend of the rich world, we will have its military sympathies in case anything should break out. By the time our oil supply expires, we will be energy independent on nuclear power, and with no need for bombs.”

Bathroom Monologue: Macroscope

Carl looked again. Now there were two purple blobs on his slide. Blobs he’d expected, but these looking up through what looked like a telescope.

“Macroscope?” Carl muttered. One blob waved a flange and more blobs wobbled to the macroscope. They pointed up.

Were they looking at him?

He couldn’t tell the teacher. It’d be embarrassing if this was a prank.

Carl pulled the slide out, shook it, and returned it under the mircoscope.

He adjusted the dial until he saw a swarm of purple blobs. Several swarms. They worked around little silos with bullets sticking out of them.

“Missiles? Wait, I didn’t mean to piss you guys off!”

The girls at his table gave him ugly looks.

Carl sighed and peered in again. A silo fired. Its missile left Carl’s field of view. A second later, the entire table shook.

“What is wrong with you?” screeched one of the girls.

“It’s not me!” he protested.

The table jolted again. The teacher started coming over and Carl put up his hands. Then the world went black.

The microbes were too late. Several orders of magnitude above the giant mammal, God scraped His slide.

“Nothing interesting today….”

"Rorschark Attack" in Branded Words Anthology

Today's story is in an anthology. It's my first appearance on Amazon.com, which is a thrill in itself. The anthology is Branded Words, featuring the best stories of 2009 from the Short Story Library.

The editors have flattered me by including "Rorschark Attack" as one of the best. "Rorschark Attack" is about a shark that people can't see as a shark - instead seeing playing cards, an ice cream truck or a Math teacher.

You can get the Branded Words anthology at this link: Best of 2009.

Bathroom Monologue: Eat My Gun, OR, “…or I will eat my gun.” –Popular wager in the mythical Wild West

The right side of his face burned pink from riding against the east since dawn. Bad James had to hit town today or be called a welch, and that was one of the names he could not abide. He tied off his horse, grabbed a bag and pushed through the bar’s swinging door.

Red waited for him at the nearest table, a quarter-full bottle of whiskey keeping him company. He leaned up to see inside Bad James’s holster.

“I don’t see your gun, James. Are you welching?”

James scowled.

“I keep honest.”

“Looks like you’re trying to keep your six-shooter.”

James dropped his bag with a clank and sat on the chair opposite Red. His palms rested on the edge of the table like he might flip it over.

“You cheated on that wager, pretending you were drunk so you could win.”

Red’s lips twitched into the closest thing to smiling these sorts of men did.

“Sure sounds like a welch.”

“I’m not trying to welch.” James scratched his scruff. “Just riled. I never lost a bottle shooting match before.”

“Wonder how many of your past opponents were drinking cider instead of beer.”

“Well I got some questions about the terms.”

Red tipped his hat and poured another whiskey. “Ain’t many terms about it.”

“So if I was to set down and eat the gun, could I take it apart first?”

“Sure. Want me to get you a knife and fork? Some catsup?”

James did not rise to the bait.

“Could I eat it slow? Say, a piece a day?”

“You want to eat the trigger today, swallow the barrel tomorrow? That’s fine. You’ve just got to eat that whole gun eventually or you welsh. It’d be downright disrespectful of you to live through so many gunfights and then die shitting one out.”

“Well then.”

Bad James leaned down. Red stiffened, looking around the side of the table for a threat.

James’s collected his bag. He set it on the table, tugged the strings and let it yawn open.

Red looked inside. It was half full with little metal pellets, smaller than rabbit crap.

“That don’t look like a gun,” said Red.

James reached in and picked up a single pellet. He held it for Red’s scrutiny.

“It’s the shooter, melted down to once daily vitamins. Should only take a hundred days to finish her off. Now as I recall, your terms gave you buying me a beer to wash it down. Would you like to pay for a hundred now, or should the keep set up a tab?”



John is away this weekend. If you're a #fridayflasher, please a leave a link to your story so he can read it later. All comments are welcome on this piece, except Wales-bashing.

Bathroom Monologue: Make Her Reaper

Tragedy tonight at a downtown theatre when a magician made his assistant disappear. The Russian stage man was making his first English-language performance. After a few minutes of having the audience look for her, he gave an incantation “to make her reappear.” Because of his heavy accent, the assistant instead returned in a robe and scythe. There were no survivors. Commuters who absolutely must drive through downtown should be on the lookout for a buxom vision of death in a sequined cloak.

Bathroom Monologue: Vampire Heart Attack

“One of the boss's few weaknesses is his heart, right? A stake through it and all that. I was thinking the heart is pretty easy to target so long as it's in his chest. So I figured, for his birthday, we'd extract it while he was sleeping and hide it in one of those safety deposit boxes in airports. A random airport. I sent it to a guy who sent it to a guy who hid it in some country, and there's no way anybody could find out which since even the guy I hired doesn't know where the guy he hired went. I thought I was bound for a promotion, because now all the boss had to be afraid of was sunlight and crosses. But it turns out these vampire rules are kind of general. Maybe a stake through the heart was an example of stuff that would kill a heart, and unfortunately... well, being stuck in a safe deposit box several thousand miles from its body will also kill a heart. So I was wondering if you had any ideas of how to find it, or if I can file for Unemployment when he kicks?”

Fleming-Mayer Aid Drive At The Bijou

Today I have a guest post over At The Bijou for the Fleming-Mayer Aid Drive. Please stop over and give it a look. Jemma and Shelly are in a rough patch and could really use a hand. You can read my guest post by clicking here.

At The Bijou is a blog for the thirty-three authors involved in the upcoming Harbinger*33 anthology. I'll have one or two stories in there and will keep you up to date on its release.

Click on this text to see "John Wiswell Stages Serious" on At The Bijou.

Bathroom Monologue: The Monomyth

There is a theory that all the great stories of human literature are the same, sharing a humble origin, a journey, a heroic relationship to the world and/or the divine, conflict and resolution of cultural resonance. This is called the "monomyth" because, since the first physicians and philosophers, it has been believed that the muses suffer from intransient cases of mononucleosis. This causes acute fatigue and pain, the sorts of things that make it difficult to inspire truly novel art. The muses try their best, giving twists like Quetzalcoatl banging a nun and hobbits carrying the one ring to rule them all, but they're sick people and can only be asked so much. It is believed that the muses so often inspire immortality or long life into stories out of psychological fears that they'll never live long enough to recuperate and do totally fresh work. There was a time when they hoped humans would pick up the slack for them, but if you chain a million authors to a million typewriters all you get is social satire and poetry that doesn't rhyme. That's why they invented the million monkeys/typewriter scenario, though the monkeys have yet to reach the end of their monomyth.

Bathroom Monologue: She’ll Come Around

She fell in the puddle in front of his house, and he fell in love. He got his Pa and they helped her dry off. While her folks came, they played with his anthill.

The next day, she said ‘Hello’ passing by him in the hall. She’d never done it before. He beamed all the way through Algebra.

A week later, she’d forgotten he existed. His brothers elbowed him to do something about it. Go ask her out. Go ask if she’s started that ant collection. Go pretend to bump into her.

He did none of it. “She’ll come around,” he said.

She did great in Math, so he tried hard and made it into Advanced Placement with her. He’d watch her from the other side of the room and struggle to figure out the number of degrees in a pentagon. She never offered to collaborate when they assigned group work.

“She’ll come around,” he said.

She liked puppies, it seemed. She got a summer job at the Hearth Animal Shelter, the one with the uncomfortable location across from a cemetery. He lit right up and got a job as the assistant groundskeeper. She never came over to chat.

“She’ll come around,” he said.

She left town for college. He went to the bar when he knew her sisters were there, to overhear things about her. She switched from Mathematics to Education. She was a teacher. She got her own house. She got tenure. She got cancer. She beat cancer. She still got letters from that first year of kids she’d taught. She was thinking of writing a book.

In time, she passed. Her remains were shipped back to the town where she’d grown up. There was a big service with her sisters and cousins. A lot of crying and nice stories. He stayed out of the way, listening and offering the occasional box of tissues.

After the service, he came up and filled in the grave. When he finished, he patted the dirt with his shovel and said, “I knew you’d come around.”