The Straithorn Home For The Emotionally Challenged

Mr. Jamison spittles at the slightest outrage until his face turns red. Mrs. Hathaway displays a particular shade of pea green--reminiscent of the Sunday soup--every time her medication’s late. Mr. Dunn has lived so long in the grips of his melancholia that even his clothes radiate the same empty shade of gray.

However, don’t mention these harlequin insights in the presence of Dr. Straithorn. She would never admit to her color-blindness, but it’s really the only explanation for all the torture. Even the idea of color is abhorrent to her. The patients all suffer for her jealousy.

This Vast Never-Ending Emptiness

The open expanse frightened more than exhilarated him. He often dreamed of what it would be like for a snail, firmly enclosed inside the safety of its own home. Or for a prairie dog, living in the tight spaces of its underground burrow, surrounded on all sides by dirt.

He had heard of the concept of claustrophobia but could never imagine such a feeling. Maybe the confinement would oppress him in a similar manner to this vast never-ending emptiness. Doubtful. He almost welcomed being smashed underneath a boot.

Such is the life of a cockroach living in an airplane hangar.

Florida

Every morning, Tom Hopperwell awoke to find his garden in disarray. It looked as if a miniature battle had been fought among his tulips and vegetables.

Tom was a careful man, and it disturbed him greatly to see his garden did not share the sentiment. His wife urged him to call the exterminator, but Tom had a grander scheme.

Tom first set fire to the house, making sure the blaze completely incinerated the garden. Then he and his wife relocated to Florida. Some might call him extreme, but Tom had a hunch Florida would be too hot for the ants.

No Explanation Necessary For Looking Good

Detective Stephens surveyed the scene, trying to make sense of it. He could be certain of only one thing. The man was dead.

Stephens could find no explanation for the manner of death. The victim was fully dressed in a suit and tie, but had died from several bullet wounds to his heart. His clothes did not have any holes or blood on them. No one reported hearing any gunshots. A note read that despite his death, he refused to leave the neighborhood.

The mystery was never explained, but the man’s ghost never did leave. At least it was well-dressed.

Something Wicked

She had only one weakness, but as with others of tremendous power--Achilles, Samson--it would be that weakness that would be her undoing.

Her body was a desiccated husk, a mere formality, an inaudible whisper. Her shadow had more of an essence. It was the dryness of her corporeal form that allowed her to create her greatest feats of magic. It was the dryness of her soul that led her to evil.

In the end, it was a bucket of water that occasioned her demise. Once she had tasted water, it was impossible to continue life as a witch.

The Dog Days

These are the dog days our grandparents warned us about. So it is that the canines now rule the streets. They rollick and bark and go alpha male on anyone they see.

With everybody locked inside their homes, the neighborhood is mostly empty. The occasional bark fills the air, but the packs stay hidden after dark. It's during the daylight when they roam free.

The people who have been good to the dogs will get a free pass. The dogs piss on their front porch so the others know this family should be spared.

Most will not be so lucky.

The Girl With So Many Tattoos

Brad saw her the first day of class and immediately fell in love. She was cool. She had tattoos on every part of her body. The tattoos made her an outcast as much as her attitude, but Brad loved her for both.

It wasn't until much later that he began to see the truth. She wasn’t tattooed. She was a tattoo herself. A living, walking tattoo, capable of speech, inclined to violence. She was the ultimate artistic rendition of pure vengeance.

Brad loved her all the more. As he told his friends, “True love is not concerned with surface things.”

Inheritence

Chet’s father was mercilessly slain by the evil usurper. Chet himself was spared, spirited away to a remote hideaway where he was raised with only one aspiration: revenge.

Chet never knew his father. Not his face, not his voice, not even the tenor of his character. He was just the postulation of a father, present in his life simply as the motivation for retribution.

Nor did Chet know anything about the evil usurper. There was no map to lead Chet to his kingdom. No instructions on how to defeat the evil scourge. There was simply the name: Congenital Heart Disease.

Awkward

It was another one of our awkward silences. We stood their staring into the distance, afraid to make eye contact. We sedulously avoided entering each other's personal space. We danced around each other with delicate steps, on tiptoe, a deeply ingrained choreography learned after years of rehearsal.

Words only came painfully, weighed down with uncertainty and despair. The forced cohabitation doomed us to this daily ritual at least twice a day, and though our encounters were always brief, a few minutes at most, the memories of them lingered.

The question always hung between us, why we ever agreed to marry.

Scissors

Who invented scissors? I have often wondered.

Something about scissors fascinates me. They give me the irresistible urge to stab something, anything. My wrist, your wrist, the baby's head. I can't help myself. I mean, I can, because I've never stabbed anything, other than the pumpkin a few Halloweens back. But I can't help the urge.

Sometimes I dream about scissors.

We don't keep any scissors in the house. My wife says they are dangerous to have lying around, especially with the baby. I don't know why she's so paranoid all the time.

It turns out the Egyptians invented scissors.