I CAN'T DO IT

“I know I have to try. There has to be away, some way to actually do it, some way to actually finish a flash fiction without someone dying.” I tell myself as I pause at the keyboard.

It’s not easy.

Behind my eyes people die, people explode or get crushed under falling debris, but not tonight, tonight, no one dies.

My friends have told me I’m odd, weird, a freak maybe. Unable to process the world without seeing death at the end of the tunnel, but I know there has to be a way. I can feel my fingers twitching as I type, trying to make me kill someone, to tighten round their imaginary necks. It wouldn’t matter who, I wouldn’t even need to name them, I could just kill them, and slowly watching as their life leaves the now dead shell I hold by the throat.

“Stop it!” I clench my hands into fists. I must do it; I just have to make it to the end without a blood curdling scream. `You’re, special. ` I’ve was told, but they paused on the word `Special` for a few seconds to long for it to be in a good way, the addition of the `Very special` a moment after, whispered under their breathe for fear of what I might do.

I suppose I should be please, fear is a power, a power I can use if I can focus it. I know I’ll never write children’s fiction; even my poetry is dark and soulless. Its not that my life leads me to it, on the contrary, my life is good. A good supporting family, a beautiful wife and two wonderful children, so its not there that’s the problem.

I did fall on my head as a child; recently I’ve almost cracked my skull on a piece of steel. That’s a story for another day though; I need to focus on the job at hand. I just don’t know if I can do it, I really don’t. It’s starting to worry me a little, even my dreams contain murder most foul, or death by gerbil.

The problem is though, if I’m honest, that I don’t really want to be fixed, to be made normal. Normal looks so dull and boring, so… so very… well, normal. I don’t know if I can live in a world where there’s no death, no Ninja squirrels hell bent on destroying the world, no small bed bugs ready to lay eggs up your nose or behind your eyes.

The pistol feels heavy in my hands, so cold and solid in a world of thought and death. I wish I could write a piece without someone dying. I really do. I just don’t know if I can finish something without bloodshed. I cock the firing pin and place the barrel under my chin. I just can’t do it…

TIME

After costing him many years of his life on research and almost all of his fortune, Darren had finally realised that immortality itself was not possible. The basic fact when you boiled it down was that the body wore away as time passed, so therefore, the best you could hope for after 300 years was to be a blob of muscle, mucus and membranes that once upon a time was labelled as your body. Each test, each theoretical model he ran ended up with the same, jelly like state.

            He felt a little let down to have spent so much of his life trying to find the answer that actually switching off and having what others would have called a normal life was impossible to him, and, even though he’d tried, the scientist in him always came back to the basics again.

            If only he could slow down time, he reasoned, then a hundred years could be stretched to maybe a thousand or more, therefore the body would survive longer. It wasn’t quite immortality, but it was close, and after so many years, he was happy with close.

            That being said, he’d started to study the passage of time, not only how certain people seemed to get more done in a day than others, how those certain people felt the day lasted longer than the normal 24 hours, but also those that the day blinked passed after what felt like five minutes.

            His theory was that time must be a certain size, and some people would absorb time faster than others and he’d taken blood from those who claimed time went faster for then, and those whose life dragged on and from the blood he’d found a chemical, a single chemical bond that those whose days passed more slowly possessed that the others did not, a simple anti-time mixture.

            The chemical had not been easy to replicate though, but the last of his inheritance and the sale of his estate had finally brought him to this point, this point in time when he would be able to slow time around him. If all went well, he’d be a step close to immortality, the very elixir from the fountain of youth itself.

            The Perspex container he’d designed would allow him to work in the gas, thus giving him more hours in the day and therefore more days in the year. Jubilantly he stepped inside and closed and sealed the door behind him, and with a final smile of satisfaction he sat down with a copy of War and Peace and took a note of the time on the clock outside the container.

If everything went well, he would be able to read the total book in the next few hours, or minutes even. Pressing the button on his console, he flooded the chamber with the chemical and relaxed back as he breathed it in.

As the toxic gas filled his lungs he realised his error, but by then it was too late to stop it taking effect. The irony was that he’d aimed to become immortal, that the gas would keep him alive longer, but, as he started to spasm and his mouth to froth, the next minute actually did last him the rest of his life, so it wasn’t a total failure.

35 SHADES OF PURPLE

Chris put the rope down carefully with shaking hands, his arms ached from the strain but it had to be done despite the scratch marks down his back. There comes a point when things just go beyond, and then, a man has to act, a man has to show his dominance, to show his power.

                Now, Sally lay before him on the bed, her eyes staring towards the ceiling, she didn’t move, she couldn’t now, not now, now she was the quiet one, the submissive, now she understood the power that a man can have and he wiped the sweat from his brow as he stood over her.

                He could leave her there now, there was no escape, no where she could go, she wasn’t going to leave the bed unless he allowed it and he gently pulled her negligee back down over her legs, brushing an imaginary fleck of lint from the scarlet red material, there seemed no point in it but he hadn’t meant it to go this far, but after the fist initial squeals and the failed attempt at resistance, he’s found he couldn’t stop, he couldn’t stop until he’d finished, despite the noises she made.

                He left the room, looking thoughtfully back at the bed, back at Sally. He’d have hell to pay later, but that was later, for now, the house was quiet again as though the walls had held their breath. His friends at work would understand, they’d discussed things like this before, they’d told him he should take charge, show her who was in charge, at the end of the day he worked the hours and paid the bills, so it was only fair he had his own way.

                He boiled the kettle and poured himself a cup of Earl Gray, the adrenaline of the previous actions still pumping through his veins and the spoon clattered against the side of the china. He’d not meant to be so animalistic, so primal, but the clothing she’d worn had been to lead him on, to soften him up, well, he’d certainly showed her.

                He walked back upstairs listening for signs of movement, but he’d done his job well, and as he walked back into the bedroom, he was pleased to see she was still in the same position he’d left her in. The rope mark round her neck looked deep and nasty, but when she’d asked him to go shopping for carpets, damn her, she knew he hated shopping, and that’s when he’d strangled her, could you believe there were over 35 bloody shades of purple to view, that would have taken hours and there was a footy match on the TV tomorrow.

CHICKENS

George pulled his balaclava down over his face and quietly opened the gate. He felt excited and nervous at the same time, which for George, was possibly the most things he’d done at once, ever.

            As he tiptoed down the gravel path towards the chicken coop, he smiled to himself on the perfection of his plan. His boss, Big Mike would be happy when he heard what he’d done, this was the crime that would give their gang the recognition and praise they needed. Yes, Big Mike would be very pleased indeed.

            When he reached the end of the path he stopped and checked the house for any signs of movement and he crouched down behind the car as he watched the windows, holding his breathe so he could hear any sounds other than his own. Finally, satisfied that he’d made it this far without being discovered he moved swiftly towards his target.

            Slowly pulling open the door to the coop, he slipped silently inside, his night vision goggles down and in place as he surveyed the task ahead of him. The coop contained over a hundred bantam chickens, all sitting silently on their nests. 

            George reached into the first cage, and with hands like slabs of meat he wrung the first ones neck. Hardly a noise came from it as the life left its body, and he dropped it before moving onto the other one. After an hour he’d managed to silence almost all of them, and sweat beaded on his forehead below the Balaclava. The thought of so many dead chickens didn’t bother him, but the physical effort of wringing so many necks made his hands ache.

            Eventually, with all the chickens now dead, he slipped back out of the door and back to his car, feeling proud of a hard job well done. Big Mike was going to be so please, so happy that not only had he done what was needed on his own, but he’d planned it too. Maybe he’d get the Rabbit he’d been after now, and he so wanted that rabbit.

            Although it was early he knew the gang would be around so he drove straight to the hideout and parked outside. The old warehouse looked deserted, but he knew they’d been in the cellar, and he giggled to himself as he pushed open the door and slipped inside.

“I done it, Boss, I done it.” George bounced excitedly as he stood before Big Mike. “I done what you wanted. Now the `Gambinos` will have to take us seriously.”

            “Calm down, George.” Big Mike removed the cigar from his fat lips, “What have you done. I thought I told you to clean out the bins, where have you been, and why are you wearing that balaclava.”

            “I killed 125 of them, Big Mike. I done it on my own. I did it for you.”

            “What!” Big Mike stood up. “You killed 125 what?”

            “Chickens.” George smiled “I killed 125 chickens like you wanted, you said you needed to impress the Gambino family. So I went and did it.”

            “You Idiot!!!” Big Mike did not look happy. “What I said was that in order to get in with the Gambino Family, we had to plan a murder most foul.”

NEW JOB

It wasn’t that Neil wasn’t qualified for the job. He knew only to well how many others he’d had to beat to get in. No. What worried him was that he just didn’t seem to be fitting in at all. It wasn’t as though he hadn’t tried, it really wasn’t. 

He’d started his first day by taking cakes into work, hoping to make new friends, but it had only made things worse. His colleagues laughed at him, and not even to his back, which would have been bad enough, but no, they laughed directly at his face.

            For the past four years he’d diligently learned everything his tutor had told him. He’d explained to them how he’d passed first place in everything, aced his practical exams, including the correct use of the Latin names.

            That had not helped either though. They called him goody two shoes, and spat in his coffee. He’d brought his “Worlds best son” cup home after that, for fear they would break it and make him eat the pieces. 

            They’d done the usual job humour on him. His partner sent him for a long stand in the cupboard. That hadn’t been bad enough in itself, but they locked him in for nine hours, he’d only got out because someone needed something from inside.

            He got in early the next day and cleaned and polished all their tools, laying them out in a neat pattern on the tables for when they arrived. He even went as far as to get fresh flowers, and each work area had a different style. But that hadn’t worked. Within ten minutes of them arriving, they’d broken the heads off them and set them on fire, he’d sworn he’d seen at least two of them eating theirs. Within half an hour, it looked like a blood bath in there; they’d even torn up his `Hang in there Kitty` Poster.

            Well, today would be different. Neil was determined to make this work, to settle in and be just one of the guys. He tried not to cry as he’d walked in, but they all stopped as he entered, staring and growling at him like he was some sort of freak. The boss came out of his office.

            “Neil!” He’d barked. “Get in here. Now!” 

            “Have I been bad?” Neil held his head down, afraid to look his boss in the eye.

            “No. And that’s the problem. You can’t work here with the attitude you have, we can’t have a happy environment, it just doesn’t work. I promised your old man I’d give you a fair crack of the whip, and even then, you dropped it.”

            “It was wet,” Neil started to explain “and…”

            “No. Enough is enough. Just get out. You’re just not cut out to be a demon. ”

THE SURE THING

“Honest, Bob. Honest. This time it’s a winner for sure.” 

“Like all your last money making ideas, No thanks, I think I’ll pass, Joe.”

“Aw, Bob. Don’t be like that. I may have some…er… minor hiccups in the past, but this one is a real winner.”

“Minor! You call buying 500 HD players a week after Blue ray took over, as a minor hiccup? You lost over three hundred pounds on them…What the hell would be a major hiccup?”

“They might have come back, retro style. Retro is in.”

“They’re not bloody retro, they’re unwanted. They are the losers.”

“Okay, so maybe I’ve made some bad choices.”

“Are you for real Joe? You really think I’m going to invest in anything you do. Anything. How much am I still out for on the last sure fire winner?”

“twohundredandfifty….”

“What? Don’t mumble Joe. Two hundred and fifty pounds was that? And what did I get for my investment?”

“That’s not gone though, there’s still a chance…”

“Don’t be a stupid fool all your life. The Nigerians are not going to send ten times the money back to you for laundering their cash. You’re an idiot, pure and simple.”

“That’s not nice. Sometimes you really know how to hurt someone you do, Bob. I’m trying.”

“Too bloody right you are. You’re nothing but a pain in the arse…”

“You promised, Mum you’d watch out for me, help me, On her death bed you promised, Bob. On her death bed…”

“…Okay…Okay… I did, I did promise her I’d keep an eye on you, help you where I could. God help me, what’s your big idea then?”

“Thanks Bob. You’re the bestest brother a man could have.”

“I’ve not agreed anything yet. Let’s hear your idea first.”

“Here.”

“You telling me, Joe, that your big idea is a bottle of brown water?”

“Taste it. Honest, I’ve seen this stuff selling off the supermarket shelves. And it’s dead easy to make. I can see that for at least a quid fifty. And I can make as much as you want for about thirty pence.”

“You want me to taste this? It’s got bits floating in it for god’s sake. What that bent piece of metal at the bottom?”

            “Well, that’s what makes it Spring water aint it. I could only find rusty ones.”