Category Archives: Friday Fictioneers

March 19, 2014

My Secret Wife – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

My Secret Wife

“We had a report of some missing Genetico property here.”

“Sorry, it’s just my wife and I.”

“Ah, your . . . wife. How did you meet?”

“eHarmony.com.”

eHarmony, ha! I found her terrified in an elevator shaft. I fed her, taught her to speak, ignored the corporate barcode tattoo on her arm. We may have no marriage license, but the bands that connect us are stronger than gold.

“Is it okay if I look around?”

“Of course not,” I say. “This is my house.”

The door shuts and I see dark, fearful eyes peering from behind the couch.

“It’s safe,” I say.

82 Comments | tags: fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, Genetico, genetics, science fiction, secret, wife | posted in Friday Fictioneers

March 12, 2014

Viruses Anonymous – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

Viruses Anonymous

The meeting was held in a backroom server.

“Hi, I’m ILOVEYOU.”

“Hi ILOVEYOU!”

“I’m a virus. It’s been 10,036,651 seconds since I’ve infected a computer. I looked in the mirror one day and realized: I’m a worm. Nobody likes me. My whole life is a lie, even my name.”

“You can mutate,” Code Red said. “You can still become a good .exe.”

ILOVEYOU nodded. “I’m trying to make amends. Now I steal private information from gangsters and send it to the Red Cross. It’s just so hard.”

Code Red gave him a hug. “It’s a long trail to walk, man.”

63 Comments | tags: AA, anonymous, computers, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, funny, quirky, support group, virus | posted in Friday Fictioneers

March 5, 2014

Rapacious – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

This is a hard week for me and I found this picture rather hard to turn into a good story. While pondering various story lines, I was musing over the idea of flash fiction. Rochelle, in her rules for the Fictioneers, always says that the challenge is to “Write a one hundred word story that has a beginning, middle and end.” I’ve been religious with the 100-word rule but I’m sure I’ve broken the beginning-middle-end rule quite a few times, although I try. What I also try to do is: 1) make sure there is some conflict and 2) make sure the characters want something. Without these, especially conflict, it’s not a story, it’s only a scene. Of course, Rochelle makes sure to point out that no one is ostracized for breaking the 100-word and she is very forgiving with other rule bends too. And now, on with the story…

Rapacious

The Mountain is killing me. I feel the life leaching from me into the pitiless walls. The Mountain claims all: innocence, youth, health, time. The walls are fat with my wasted years.

I knew it would take my life, but I vowed it would never take ME. I feel it, though, clawing at my soul. The ME is slipping away, no matter how much I clutch it.

When they bury me, write no name on the headstone, for what they bury is not me, but merely the husk of what the Mountain has devoured.

(found scratched into a prison wall)

51 Comments | tags: fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, mountains, prison, prisoner | posted in Friday Fictioneers

February 26, 2014

I Killed Rapunzel – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

I Killed Rapunzel

I killed Rapunzel.

The hair, it finally got to her. Some say it was the five hours of brushing a day that sent her mad; others, that her conditioner was cursed. All I know is she started strangling people.

She got five cops down on Brown Street; broke their necks with a single tug. Nothing there when I arrived but five corpses, and a single, 90-foot strand of hair.

I finally got her with a poison-tipped comb. No reward; they just handed me a pair of scissors.

Now what am I going to do with thirty bales of flaxen hair?

58 Comments | tags: crime, dark humor, death, detective, fairy tale, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, funny, hair, murder, quirky, Rapunzel | posted in Friday Fictioneers

February 19, 2014

The Last Few Seconds – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

I was quite surprised and pleased to open up Rochelle’s post today and see my picture. For the curious among you, this picture was taken in a small country school in Korea. In the two years I worked there, the enrollment ranged from 14-20 students from Grade 1-6, usually with 2-3 students per grade. Only two were from the area and the rest came from bigger cities and lived in a dorm as a sort of countryside exchange program. The school did have a electronic bell, but it couldn’t be heard well outside, so they hung up this bell to let the kids know when recess was over.

The Last Few Seconds

One minute remaining.

Brent Brianson stares at the clock, willing it to go faster. His lip trembles in anticipation, like a chinchilla caught in a hurricane.

Thirty seconds.

He is doing stretches, running in place.

Ring!

Out the door he goes, shoving aside the secretary coming in. A congratulatory cake smashes to the floor, like an egg fired from a howitzer. Gravel sprays the building as Brent peels out of the parking. A distant rumble indicates that Mr. Brianson has just broken the sound barrier.

The math class stares after him, aghast.

“Mr. Brianson couldn’t wait to retire, it seems.”

(This story is also dedicated to one of my high school math teacher, Mr. Bingle, who vowed he would leave as soon as his retirement came, even if it was in the middle of class. I think he’s retired by now, so I hope he’s enjoying it.)

58 Comments | tags: bell, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, funny, Korea, retirement, school | posted in Friday Fictioneers

February 12, 2014

Fructocidal – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

After the creepy story last time, I decided for something a little lighter…kind of. I had a few people last week ask for more of the story, Jasper’s Lamp, so I wrote it. You can read the longer and creepier version of Jasper’s Lamp here, if you’d like.

Fructocidal

“I heard they found him with a bag of apple seeds. Then they discovered a banana in his basement, peeled and sliced lengthwise.”

“Come on, you’re gonna make me hurl.”

“You know what was in his pantry? Hundreds of jars . . . of jam.”

“Stop, or I’ll tell Mom.”

“They say he ate it on toast.”

“Quit it!”

“You don’t even want to know what he was drinking, but it had chopped up strawberries and oranges in it.”

“I’m gonna have nightmares now about getting picked.”

“Way up here on the top branch? Don’t worry, you’ll live to a ripe, old age.”

57 Comments | tags: cannibalism, death, fantasy, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, fructocidal, fruit, funny, quirky | posted in Friday Fictioneers

February 5, 2014

Jasper’s Lamp – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

Jasper’s Lamp

Great-grandmother

“Jasper left me the lamp. It had a glass globe underneath it, a single eyeball floating inside. Creepiest thing I’d ever seen. “Keep it warm!” he said. He never came back, for me, the lamp or his daughter.”

Grandmother

“Mama gave me the lamp when I moved out. I had grown up with it, that little lump of flesh and two bulging eyes.”

Mother

“I didn’t want it, but I took it. The curled-up monster inside freaked me out.”

“‘Its eyes just opened,’ my daughter screamed from the basement. Then she screamed again and I heard glass shatter.

70 Comments | tags: creepy, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, horror, lamp, monster | posted in Friday Fictioneers

January 30, 2014

What Does This Button Do? – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

First of all, apologies to all the Fictioneers whose stories I didn’t get a chance to read last week. I’ve been doing a lot of traveling and it’s hard to read and comment on my phone. However, this week I’m going to make up for it by reading all of them.

Also, this story may seem a bit confusing, but stick with it to the end.

What Does This Button Do?

Just before the bombs struck, Patty pressed the button.

The high-pitched whistle above meant imminent death.

As she reached the workshop, she heard the dreaded drone of bombers above.

There it was, half-buried.

Penny scrambled over wreckage, biting back the scream that kept trying to rise.

The workshop! Was it still untouched?

She peered out of a burning hole into a hellscape littered with bodies and burning cars.

The next day, the bombs fell; Patty woke to heat and smoke.

“Ok.”

“It reverses the flow of time,” her uncle said. “Don’t touch it.”

“What does this button do?” Patty asked.

45 Comments | tags: bombing, death, fiction, flash fiction, Friday Fictioneers, science fiction, scientist, time reversal, time travel, war | posted in Friday Fictioneers

January 23, 2014

Just One Step Ahead – Friday Fictioneers

By David Stewart

Well, this week I’m on the road again, hiking by myself in rural Korea. I was planning to write this one on my phone, like last week, until I walked into my hotel and saw a computer. Nice serendipity.