Sunday, November 27, 2011

Stories from Nothing 2

The catalyst: "So I got home at 3:30am, stumbled into my house and run over my cat."

The story:

I don't know why I was driving in my house. The plasterboard walls crumbled and fell around me. A long furry tail stuck out from under the front, right wheel. The chandelier swung back and forth on the ceiling. An arm stuck out from underneath the wheel, too. Which was odd, because I'd run over my cat. Turns out dad was sitting in the living room watching late night TV. I guess that's what you get. Now his favourite chair was broken, too.
Why was I home so late? Because I was out before, that's why. Stop asking so many questions.
I got to bed and fell asleep. A rock undisturbed.

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Stories From Nothing

I've decided, since I haven't posted in a while (sorry, by the way) that I am going to set myself a deadline for posting and each week I will have to post at least one what I am deeming, a "Story from Nothing".

This is where - with my mushy, crazy writer's brain - I extrapolate a plausible (or, hell, even an unlikely) story from a seemingly minute detail or event in my or my friend's lives.

This week's is brought to you courtesy of J.J., where she "[f]inally got [her] suitcase after 2 days...only for it to be delivered at 11pm last night by a creepy looking man in a suit. A suit. What kind of courier wears a suit? [She] half expected him to look at [her] with a scary grin before devouring [her] soul. Think slenderman meets the Gentleman from Buffy."

So, I extrapolated an (incredibly unlikely story) from this tiny event:

The Courier

Maybe he was going to a dinner where he was proposing to his wife-to-be but his boss yelled at him because he wanted to take off a minute or so early to swing by the ring place and pick it up before the dinner was supposed to start but his boss didn't let him and so he had to put on his suit in the car and drive super fast to get the suitcase to you so he could get to the ring store and pick it up before his dinner with his wife-to-be was completely ruined. And what if he didn't make it, huh? What if dinner was ruined? No one thinks about poor courier man!

Then he's hit by a truck just after he delivers your suitcase.

He's whistling. He's happy. Nothing can kill his feeling. Sure, he had to make an extra delivery and now he has to rush, but hell, he's gonna marry the love of his love. Sandra, he thinks to himself, God I love you. He goes around the side of his car to open the door but drops his keys. He bends down to pick them up when he hears the loud honking. Turns his head in time to see headlights. A truck driver who fell asleep at the wheel. Wham. G'night, Johnny.

Meanwhile, Sandra sits alone in the restaurant. She cries, wonders what she's done wrong. What could she have done to drive Johnny away? No, it's not her, she realises, it's him. He's a pig! She leaves the restaurant, but not before calling and leaving the most hate-filled message on his answering machine.

Little did she know, though, that the ringing phone was in Johnny's fingers, an unsent text saying he might be a little bit late. He pulls the phone to his ear to hear her voice for the last time, and it's an angry tirade. "I hate you!" she yells, rain starting to fall on them both. The same moon beams light down on them. "You're a bastard! I fucked Roger anyway!"
A tear streaks down Johnny's face. This is the last thing he ever hears. Sandra hangs up before she can hear his last breath.

The next day she gets the phone call. Johnny's been killed. Sandra's head is in a spin. A spiral of self-hatred and resentment destroys her life and she turns to alcohol. No one will speak to her - she has driven them all away.

Decades later, in her studio apartment above an old Chinese restaurant, she quietly dies from a heart attack in her sleep. No one finds her for days. When they do, it's because the chefs downstairs are complaining of the smell and a stain on the ceiling coming from her room.

They're not even buried together.