Status Updates May 2018

“There is something terrible inside you,” the witch whispered to Boy.

“I think, Boy said after he thought it over, "you mean my conscience? Bess says that not everyone has one and Mr. Fox would probably call it a burden. Do you mean that?”

“Oh, child. If only it was that simple. The world holds many evil people who would be quite less evil were they entirely devoid of goodness.”

Once upon a time there was a king who wasn’t assassinated solely because no one else wanted the thankless task of trying to run the poorest kingdom in the world. The generational plan to make the royal family immune to assassins and coups had succeeded, but even the king sometimes privately wondered if it had been worth the cost.

He says every scar is a battle he lost, with a laugh that breaks to hear. He says burn marks aren’t victory laps, showing the places on his thigh where his uncle stopped smoking. Hre knows enough to know that to survive is not the same as to live, but he knows the lesson too well. There is something almost cruel in how he turns away from love as though it were another form of pain.

The head of the agricultural division of the company did not take kindly to learning their position had them listed as the CIEIEIO in the executive hierarchy

Partial contents of a cover letter:

“But you don’t [redacted]. Or swear.”

“It might be a failing. Point is that I can’t just get a job. Every place wants resumes, interviews, sometimes even cover letters that don’t feel as dull as ditch water. Which isn’t dull at all.”

“You could have said as dull as tap water, but we all know about fluoride.”

“...this was a really bad idea, wasn’t it?”

“I have no idea. YOU are Josh. I don’t even know who I am meant to be in this narrative. You’d think an English major would know that. Instead I’m just a voice in the ether. I can’t even be a muse since those don’t exist. Where were you? Right: applying for a job. You have been using Word and its variants for about twenty five years, and typing far too much fiction in that time. Use that. For once.”

“And reading. Being an English major means reading a lot. Sometimes too much.”

“The apartment is full of books, yes. I have no idea what you expect me to segue into from this. Especially when you don’t own a Segway.”

If gravity were real we would still be together.

“If we continue down this path, one of us will die,” Protagonist said.

“We could not kill each other.” Antagonist paused. “Or have you not considered that option?”

“I am the protagonist. You are the antagonist. We know how this story ends.”

“I’d argue that we don’t. I am an antagonist, yes. There could be others you can kill instead of me?”

“That’s not how this works!”

“What kind of protagonist are you if you can’t change the story?”

“You don’t understand. I’m the protagonist because I can’t.”

“You are dying. It’s not blood: you need some Vitamin D.”

“D? I do not know that one.”

“Pardon me?”

“When I was a child, vitamins only went up to B,” the vampire explained.

“No.” Protagonist pulled his hand free from his sword as the city guard moved toward him. “If I fight them, they are only going to lose.”

The city guard captain stared. “Who are you talking to?” she demanded.

“This isn’t important to you. Consider the Narrator a kind of god.” Protagonist looked about, snapped his blade out and sliced a pattern through the air before sheathing it. “I don’t have many skills, but I am very good with a blade. Better than four guards, and my ignorance of the law about keeping my blade peace-bound in the evening is not reason enough to attack me. You might not have heard of me, but you recognize that skill.”

“Are you talking to us now?” the captain asked.

“Yes. Fine. Call it a misunderstanding. I go my way, you go yours.”

“And if we say no?”

“Then I humiliate all of you and you’re forced to declare some foolish revenge I don’t want to deal with.”

That doesn’t have to happen, the Narrator protested, but the guard sheathed their blades, offered a warning and let Protagonist depart. Grudgingly.

Once upon a time there was a hero who never noticed their call to adventure because they were busy beating a game on their phone.

I ran away. They say there are things no one can run from. But you never know until you try.

I said I was drowning under the weight of your expectations. You just laughed and said I had no idea what drowning was.

And you were right.

The stories about the seariders focus on the fact that the builders are a small subset of them who made mines for reasons that were logical and involved making use of their short stature. The weavers in the woods never used bows and arrows at all.

Protagonist paused mid-stride. “I am on my way to the market for some fruit. Is there any particular reason I thought that?”

“This is dramatic emphasis. Making sure you know they are not dwarves and elves,” the Narrator snapped.

“...but I have no idea what a dwarf or elf is?”

“Good. Keep it that way. Also, Westrin is not set in Europe in the middle ages! That trope is done to death!”

Protagonist stopped. “I don’t even know what any of that means.” And surprised himself by adding: “Are you feeling all right?”

“I’m fine,” the Narrator said in a tone normally used to declare war.

Protagonist wisely continued to the market in the small hope that these were varieties of foreign food he would avoid eating.

I asked if you loved me.

But you said if I had to ask, then I already knew the answer was no.

“I haven’t followed politics in weeks. I just... I can’t keep doing this.”

“That’s how they win.”

“How is it that we burn out, but they never do?”

“I’m scared.”

“No, you’re not.”

“… what?”

“Everyone does a typo about that, autocorrects in their own head.”

“I don’t understand?”

“It’s sacred. Not scared.”

This isn’t the time for jokes!”

“I’m sorry, Commissioner. But as long as the Joker escapes from Arkham it’s always time for jokes.”

“Open up! This is the police!”

“I haven’t opened up to anyone in years.”

I have never written a poem about you, not even the ones that mention you by name.

For Sale: Conscience. Free to a bad home.

By age 35, you too should be a meme.

“There are two paths before you. Down one lies riches, down the other -.”

“I walk between them.”

I am updating my Privacy Policy because so many other places are. Please check your emails accordingly.

I wonder about jobs where you help animals act better in movies.

Imagine the fun of being able to say you'd given acting lessons to a goldfish.

“How do you stop being afraid, when it feels like that is all there is room for you to be?”

“There are other things, even if the fear waits under them. Even our shadows cast shadows. There can be a slim hope in that.”

The most important thing about writing a short story is deciding the name of a smog inside a bathtub is Sidney.

I think there must be a sherlock Holmes pastiche somewhere that goes like this:

"Good day, ma'am. Are you well?"

"I am afraid."

"Nonsense! There is nothing be afraid of. You got up around six because you always got up that early at the farm you lived on as a child for a brief formative time, had a small breakfast with only two eggs, put on your second-best dress, took two trains to get here, stopped at the Piccadilly line, read only the Times on the train and got lost at Clement Street on your way here and you're paranoid everyone is watching you. Oh dear."

“You’re not like other boys I’ve dated,” she said.

“I know – I –. You can’t trust me,” he said.

“You think that’s why?” she asked almost gently.