Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category
Careful…
Wednesday, February 11th, 2009
DISCLAIMER: The story below uses the names of real celebrities. If you think any of the events portrayed even vaguely resemble real events, please contact me—I have a magic lamp to sell you.
Eventually they found me. The media. I figured they would sooner or later, what with everything that had been going on. So I explained to them about the lamp, and about the genie and the three wishes. And I explained about how my first impulse had been to wish for the general selfish things that everyone thinks of, but then how I’d thought about it a bit and done what I think most people would really do if they’d been in that situation.
First I wished for lasting world peace.
Second, I wished for the eradication of all diseases and ailments.
“What about the third wish?” asked Dan Rather, who seemed to be the ringleader.
“I haven’t decided what to do with it yet,” I said. Which was true.
Things got rather ugly after that.
Matt Lauer started smashing my stuff with a baseball bat he’d brought. Crash. Crash. Crash.
“You better wish it back, you bastard!” Keith Olberman shouted.
Bill O’Reilly was sobbing into his hands, just repeating “I’m doing pet detective segments,” over and over.
“Wish it back!” They took up the chant, started advancing on me. “Wish it back!”
“You have any idea what you’ve done to my ratings?” Larry King had a knife.
In retrospect, of course, I should have turned them all into chickens or something, made them feel inner peace. I don’t know exactly, something. But I panicked. Katie Couric had a very vicious looking cleaver and kept letting out short yelps. And, yeah, I panicked. And I put it all back.
So that’s how that all went down, and how things all got messed up so bad again. Of course, nobody in the news is letting me get my story out, which is why I’m putting it here. I guess I just wanted to say I’m sorry. I guess I wanted someone to know.
Foundation
Tuesday, February 10th, 2009
They buried me beneath the foundation, watered the earth with my blood and all my decaying fluids.
They built a hill-fort over me. I held it firm for many years, kept its walls strong against all enemies, protected all those who bore my blood. Listened to them lead lives denied to me. Their time ran out eventually and it didn’t matter how bravely I held the walls. The elements took their toll; roofs fell in, walls tilted out of true, stones tumbled.
The earth shifted as the years rolled by. The hill flattened, levelled out, my bones moved with it, my bones and the fine dust particles that had been my clothing and my skin. I let the walls crumble, let the hill sink down; sank down with it myself. There was nothing, no one to care about; no one to protect, no blood calling to mine, no family.
The land lay fallow for a long time, cattle grazed above me, foxes barked, badgers dug, grass grew, died, grew again. A farmhouse was built. The sounds of children startled me out of sleep, making my bones dance with forgotten joy. I loved the foundation once more, reached upward, threaded myself through the floors, walls, stretched my soul across the ceiling, wrapped the home.
Three hundred years passed, six families sheltered inside, each personalising, making it home. After the last left (the children grew and flew, the parents stayed until they could no longer negotiate the crooked stairs), the farmhouse lay empty until a new family came: a father, two sad children and a new wife, a not-quite-mother.
I heard the noises of a family uncomfortable with each other, trying, learning, failing to find steps to a dance none of them knew; how to be together. How to be happy.
The new wife cries a lot, wallows in self-pity. She doesn’t know how to live. Her tears seep through the boards into the earth, are sucked down to the place where the last of me lies. I whisper to her as she lies on the cool flags of the kitchen and listens. Soon enough I will rise, making my way upwards as particles of dust; I will settle on her skin, sink into her as I once sank into the earth. I will make her family a foundation upon which they can rely.