Happy…

The clock ticks down.

He’s shouldering through the crowd, trying to find her.  Faces half-seen, hair swinging in the cold air, a shift, a smile – he sees her a thousand times, but she’s never really there.

He wants to tell her he loves her.  He has to be there at midnight.

Ten, nine, eight.

She’s not here.  He can’t find her.

Seven, six, five.

Then she’s there, at the railing, her head tilted up, the light shining in her eyes.

Four, three, two.

He’s too far.  The crowd closes around him, their voices rising.  She’s just out of reach.

One.

The Eye of the Tiger

The box sits on the pedestal like a cat ready to spring.

“That’s it,” says Trisha.

“We’ve travelled so far,” Andreia sighs. “Well, I mean, like, from the bar.”

“Far-ish,” nods Christine. “And now we’re here.” She eyes the doorless walls.

Alan lifts an eyebrow. “How do we know it’s the real thing?”

“Tigers on the walls,” Trish lists on her fingers. “Tigers on the box.  Dude at the entrance saying, ‘Enter ye the room of the Tiger’s Eye.’”

Andreia points.  “Plus it’s right there on the plaque.”

Then they hear it: a jungle growl that rumbles in their hearts.

How Rick Found the House in New Orleans They Call the Rising Sun

He’d come from Lansing because his mother, over cereal one day, told him the name of his real father.  A google pulled up a listing in the French Quarter, and, without thinking about it, he got on a bus headed south.

On the way he befriended a one-eyed man, lost his money to a little girl, won a secret in a card game, smoked pot for the first time, and saved a cat.  The cat followed him.  Its name is Dog.

His first night, he gets drunk, lurches through a door with red curtains, looking for a bathroom.

That’s how.

Happy Christmas

Merry Christmas, everyone. I’m not going to try to write a Christmas story, in part because it’s been a busy day, but also because I’ll never write one better than Neil Gaiman’s “Nicolas Was…”

So, I hope you’re all having a wonderful time, however you celebrate, wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, whoever you’re with.

(The stories will resume either tomorrow or Monday.)

The Rules for Mafia

The rules of the game aren’t like he remembered.

“And if you have the Prince of Rings,” says Jack, who’s teaching the new people, “that means you’re the Castellan.  If the Infiltrator points at the Castellan during the night round, he has to surrender his Fate Card.”

“Wait,” says Pete.  “Wait.  So, how do I know if I’m in the Mafia?”

Jack gives him a look that could burn a hole in paper and sighs.  “If your card has writing in it when viewed in a mirror.”

“Oh,” says Pete, furrowing.  “I thought the red cards, maybe.”

Jack ignores him.

Jasper

Jasper huddles, his hands clasped behind his head.  There’s a french fry a few inches from his face that looks like it’s been sitting there too long.

“Just put your fucking wallets in the bag and no one gets hurt,” says the guy.  He’s standing on Jasper’s table now, so Jasper can’t see him.

He catches the eye of the girl huddled under the table across the aisle.  She has deep blue eyes and they’re wide with fear.  He smiles at her, and she almost maybe smiles back.

Some dude’s talking to them now, quiet, calm.  Jasper strains to hear.

Narniwho?

Larry takes the snake home and puts it in his wardrobe, which he has shoved into the corner of his cupboard under the stairs.  His aunt screeches at him to sweep the kitchen floor before his cousin and uncle get home.

“Hey,” says the snake.  “You want me to go out there and bite her?  I’m hella poisonous.”

Larry thinks about it.  “No,” he sighs.  “I’d get blamed.  Just let me know if you find a secret passage in that wardrobe into a frozen wonderland, with talking beavers and a fawn.”

The snakes shakes its head.  “You have problems kid.”

The Time Machine

You follow the Creepy Proprietor down a flight of stairs so narrow you almost have to crabwalk, into a dirty basement lit by a single bulb.  You’re beginning to think this was a bad idea.

“There it is,” he says in that grasping voice, pointing long fingers at the corner. The time machine looks like an overlarge beer keg with a bulkhead on the front.  You stare at it, and then he spins the handle.

You ask him if it’ll work.

“Yes.  Just not the way you want it to.”

You get in; the door shuts.  There is a humming.

Parselwhat?

“Hi,” says the snake, and Larry couldn’t be more delighted.

“Ohmygod,” he squeals, pressing himself against the glass.  “I knew it.  You’re a snake, right?  Like a real snake.”

“Yeah,” it hisses.  “Listen, could you find me a mouse or some-”

“‘Cause this means, like… I’ve had this scar my whole life, and my aunt and uncle are terrible, and I’ve got this stupid cousin.  See?” He brushes his blackish hair back to reveal a sort of S-shaped thing.  “And now you’re a snake and you’re talking to me.  So I’m a wizard.”

“What are you, retarded?” asks the snake.

Bad Timing

Zarknahk is in mid-probe when the Mothership calls – he can tell by the multi-tone, long-distance ring. She always does this at the worst times.

“Hewoh my widdle Zarkey,” booms her voice, like the buzzing of a trillion locusts.

“Hello, Mother.”

“So what, you can’t pick up a tachyon transmitter and call your overlord?”

“Listen, Mom, I’m sort of in the middle-”

“…I understand.”

There is a terrible silence.

“It’s just one of the other Hive Queens tells me her offspring all call her every day.”

“Mom, I doubt trillions of warri-”

“That’s what she said, Zarkey, I’m just telling you.”