Two Sentence Stories (Part 16)

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As the MRI machine started up, he hoped they would finally put their finger on the cause of his digestive issues, so that his spouse would stop bothering him to get tested. Hours later, the workers cleaning the viscera from the machine scraped together dozens of tiny ball-bearings.

She had bragged to everyone about her well-stocked bunker, so it was no surprise that when the sirens rang the entire neighbourhood piled in. After the sirens shut off, they realised one-by-one that their benefactor was not among them and that the door was locked from the outside.

He ran through his list once again: doors locked, windows shut, alarm on, family in bed. This house would be a challenge, but he’d crack it.

A Dark Path

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There were the sounds of panic
In the moment she had slipped
But the child searched in the dark
Until he felt his mother’s grip

This forest is much too dark
She had very often warned
And too dangerous to walk
Between the sunset and the dawn

But they had stayed late in town
And needed to travel home
And though the path was obscured
The gently-led child was not alone.

They walked in complete silence
Hand in hand, footsteps in sync
He pictured monsters watching
Staring from shadows dark as ink

He questioned when they turned left
Down a path unfamiliar
But mother lay dead miles back
And the silent guide did not answer.

Alone

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She should have been the one to move out.

It was his house, after all. He had convinced her to buy it with him, but it was all his idea. He wanted to buy that dilapidated shell and then renovate it all himself. They would save money for their future that way. The big white wedding she didn’t want, children he convinced her she would love.

It was quiet with him gone, but she kept expecting to hear his voice, his stomping feet, his anger. She dropped a glass a week after he had left and she found herself instinctively hunching over shattered glass, waiting for a fury that didn’t come.

It hadn’t been that bad at the beginning. He had never hit her, after all. But the holes in the walls and broken personal items had demonstrated enough to keep her quiet.

The worst parts were the accusations of infidelity. As he spent more time working on the house, he became paranoid about what she was doing alone. Or not alone. Phone calls turned to video calls, turned to surprise visits. After he stormed in during a video conference, she almost left. But then they sat and talked, and she found herself agreeing that it would be better if she moved in sooner rather than later.

Which is how she found herself moving into a half-renovated house. Some of the rooms were locked away from her initially. For the first few weeks she only had the toilet and the sink in the laundry to use. He had insisted on finishing the bathroom before letting her use it.

Over time, painstakingly, the house became finished. Without his energy spent elsewhere, the anger started rising again. There had been no Internet in the house, so she was a leech for having quit her job. She tried to help with the renovations, but asking for instruction made her a hindrance. The kitchen was the last room to be finished, but she was lazy for not finding a way to cook for him after a long day’s work.

Finally, the moment she waited for. He said they should just break up. Rather than begging him to stay, as she had a hundred times before. She stayed silent. He said it again, louder, prompting her for the correct response.

“OK.”

It was not the correct response.

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Cats Cake

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It’s been a while.

I have been settling back in Australia, reuniting with loved ones and trying to get back to working and living. It has been a huge adjustment, but it’s time to pick up the writing/baking/sketching mantle once again.

With no further ado: remember the Cats movie? It was the last movie I saw before the UK went into lockdown. It was a surreal experience and a great way to make sure I didn’t miss the movies at all. Or cats.

But then my horrible cake group got 10,000 likes around the time a dear friend wanted to watch Cats for her birthday. The choices for the cake rolled in:

  1. Fur.
  2. Teeth.
  3. Meat.

So it was time to killed two birds with a badly-scaled stone.

Step one: Carve Batman’s screaming face. Make sure this layer does not contain blueberries, because the eyes will bleed.

Step two: Hide the shame. Cover it with icing and pray God’s judgement cannot penetrate buttercream.

Step three: Flesh.

Step four: Let them emerge.

Step five: Let them see. Let them breathe. Do not listen to what they may whisper.

Step six: Teef.
Step seven: suddenly remember that one weird cake sculpting tool you have. What could it be for, other than fur? Was it always intended for this? Was it there before now?
Step eight: Take it to the party. Introduce them to everyone.
What a horrible night to have a cake.

Drifting

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She had arrived earlier that day
Weary and lost, exhausted and nervous
They had kindly offered her a place to stay
Provided she came to their service

She agreed and happily met the preacher
Who showed an icon of their God
A statue of a dripping creature
She laughed at what she thought was fraud

The boat is gently pushed from the dock
She sits still in her seat, face grim
Terrified as the boat gently rocks
Her limbs tied so she cannot swim

The boat floats to the centre of the water
Following a deep and unseen tide
From the shore she hears chatter and laughter
And there is torchlight on all sides

She had sought safe harbour
but knows now she will never leave
And as boat rocks harder
she sees something stir beneath

Quarantine

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We had our final PCR tests today. If everyone comes back clear, we should be out of the hotel on Tuesday.

The only horror concept I can think of tonight is finding out someone is sick and that we need to spend more time in quarantine. I wrote a poem but I deleted it almost immediately.

I am lucky to be home, lucky to have gotten a flight and to have made it to Sydney before the caps were cut. My fiance and I are healthy and ready to see out loved ones for the first time in months, even years for some.

I’ll update something more fun tomorrow.

Bump

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Pete had never been a slim man, so when he gained a few kilos he hardly noticed. A few more and he started to blame Christmas and New Years celebrations. Weirdly the only physical change was a swollen stomach, but that was not large enough to justify the extra kilos on the scales.

A few more weeks and even his most polite friends started expressing their concerns. He just slapped his expanding gut and joked about needed to run off some baby weight at the gym.

In private, he chose to ignore the growth. He hardly looked in the mirror, walking directly from the shower to cupboard to find some previously baggy clothes to wear.

He had convinced himself that it could not be too bad, as he had felt no pains, although he could swear he felt it shift sometimes. He refused to see a doctor, telling loved ones not to worry, that he would go if it got more serious. In his mind, the uncertainty that only flared up when he thought about it was better than living with the constant reminder of a death sentence that a doctor might give him.

The pain started below dawn. It was quick.

Pete lay in his bed, on his side. His stomach had burst, but he was unable to moved. He lay in a pool of his own cooling blood, paralysed by the pain. He looked at the phone on the nightstand, and impossible arm’s reach away. He heard skittering beneath the bed and saw a glimpse of something that stared back at him, before hiding again.

It had his eyes.