Modern Day Andromeda

I just wrote this short story for a 48 hour flash fiction contest where you don't know the genre/location/focal object until the contest starts. Mine were Horror/Planetarium/Ribbon. 1000 Words Max.

Modern Day Andromeda

Synopsis: A janitor working an overnight shift meets a stranger in need of help getting home.

She's not real...

The screen erupts with cosmic explosions and intensely realistic depictions of faraway galaxies, complimented by a deep, strident voice booming out veritable facts about the unknown that usually began with “since the dawn of time...” The rich history of the constellations paint pictures of a past that in no way conforms to the tame normalcy of today's world, leaving you to question its validity.

Did she ever exist?

This is the only time Ted is able to experience the magic of this place without it being ruined by children with short attention spans or the elderly gasping at how far technology has come since they were in diapers. There's something quite phantasmagorical about being here after hours. The planetarium feels infinitely larger when you're the only one in it. And the voice, the voice most would associate with how they expect God would sound if he were lecturing you, reverberates throughout the theater. Uninterrupted by mindless, idle chatter, you alone are his captive audience.

Once midnight strikes, Ted usually turns off the lights, allowing himself to be fully immersed in his own private spectacle. On this night he rolls out a heavy fleece blanket he keeps in his car instead of cramping himself into one of the wooden seats designed to keep people uncomfortably awake. The vantage point from lying down creates a more visceral experience.

This is the primary if not the sole reason Ted took the job. No one really chooses to be a janitor for the glamour or the potential. The fringe benefits, however, are just begging to be taken advantage of. Sometimes you just want the luxury of being alone, and for Ted there's no better place or time.

But sometimes isolation takes its toll.

Sometimes the imagination gets carried away by its own vivaciousness.

Or sometimes you just don't want to see what you see.

I'm alone and afraid...

He didn't have to get up to feel her presence. There was a chill in the air prompted by a sudden gust of wind normally felt whenever someone walks by. It's odd but you can always sense if you're alone or in the company of some other entity without actually knowing.

She sat there, staring up at the giant projection in the midst of explaining the origins of the galaxy. She couldn't have been more than nine or ten... if that, but she had the poise of someone much much older. The look on her face was one of awe and childlike wonder... the kind of look that would normally fill you with ease, but considering the circumstances, had filled Ted with anything but.

“Miss?” he attempts to call out confidently but knowing he has failed miserably.

She doesn't answer, her haunting eyes remain fixated on the screen above. He comes closer, unsure of what to do. “Excuse me, Miss?”

“It's amazing, isn't it?” She replies, indifferent to his presence. Her eyes still captivated by the show.

With his rapidly overwhelming fear undermining his genuine concern, he cautiously sits in the row directly in front of her. Close, but not too close. Her mere presence leaving goosebumps on his arms. How can an innocent child inflict such dread?

“Are you lost? Where are your parents?”

Slowly, she turns her head, gazing deep beyond his soul. Her facial expression never changing, but it is her eyes that tell a much more ominous tale. The darkness within spoke of unending sadness and terror.

“I lost the ribbon for my hair,” she responds matter-of-factly. “Mommy told me not to come home until I find it.”

The nonchalance in her tone and demeanor are beyond unsettling. So much that he didn't realize the looped video had finished and restarted. The voice booming out, startling him, prompting his head to snap back towards the direction of the words. Something seemed unfamiliar though. The voice spoke much slower... deeper. Like a record playing at the wrong speed. He turns to look back at the child, but she has seemingly vanished.

“L...little girl? He whispers out as loud as he can, looking all around the giant empty space for signs of life.

“Mommy gets very angry,” the deep, slow voice from overhead clamors out repeatedly. Taunting him.

As if on cue, a spool of sheer blue ribbon bounces down the steps adjacent to where he sits, unraveling as it went as if presenting a path. He watches as the spool meticulously makes its way behind the giant ancient wooden lectern stationed near the back of the hall.

Convinced he has no other choice, he slowly makes his way down the stairs to the lectern, finding a mysterious staircase he never noticed before.

or was it always there...?

Ted feels his heart racing as he edges closer to the darkness. Crouching down, he stares deep into the haunting abyss, allowing his eyes time to adjust.

“Please help me get home, Ted,” the eeriness of hearing his name followed by a childish giggle sends shivers down his spine. But something or someone won't let him stop. He wants, no, needs to know what is down there. He follows the trail deeper into the darkness until he is completely enveloped by the blackness. Panicked, he looks back up from where he came but sees nothing.

“Hello??” he shouts out, paralyzed with fear. “Please help me!”

He reaches out, attempting to find something, anything to grab on to. Resigned, he falls to his knees. “Please...” he cries out to no one.

“Mommy said I can come home now,” is the last thing Ted hears before feeling the silky presence of a ribbon wrap tightly around his neck. His arms struggling to no avail to remove the tension as he feels life slowly ease away. The darkness somehow becomes even darker.

Up above, the faint, muffled sound of a familiar voice begins once again.

“Since the dawn of time...”

The Nights Alway Haunt

Written in 27 minutes in a coffee shop

The nights would always haunt me. The chatter of the trees outside, swaying was a humbling reminder of just how insignificant we are in the grand scheme of things. Constant deafening banter sharing secrets in the wind always made me feel completely and utterly inferior to nature's unlimited potential. Sometimes I think it would just be easier to hide in the shadows, but even that didn't really feel safe. There was nowhere and everywhere. It's just a question of perspective and even that's really just a question of where your head is at. But life has never been about doing the "safe thing" or at least it shouldn't be. It's like they say, you live a thousand times but only die once. Or something like that.  And we all secretly hope to live by that mantra but the cold, harsh truth is that we're so afraid of that one death that we truly deprive ourselves of living... actual living. Does that already make us dead? Well, that's one way of looking at it I suppose. It's easier to picture it like you're standing by an open window, watching ordinary people do extraordinary things and you're paralyzed to do anything about it. It's easy to be envious of the living but in order to truly be among those it's absolutely necessary to be able to let go of your perception of what it really means to be alive.

To live means to embrace death.

Granted, it sounds rather morbid, doesn't it? But believe me when I say this, it's not meant to. Quite the opposite in fact. We all die. That is the only real guarantee in life. We all know this, but it's obviously much easier to ignore this reality. Instead, we prefer to live the lie that we're infinite, immortal, indestructible. Ironically, the moment you accept that the less you truly live.

This loaded .38 in my steady hand serves as a grim reminder that we are indeed mortal, vulnerable, inevitably dead.

There is no escape, no bargaining chips, no cheat codes.

"You're fucking insane, Todd!"

I wave the loaded harbinger of death in front of his very clearly panicked face, gently pressing the barrel against his temple as yet another reminder of the fragility of life and how quickly it can all be taken away from you without much choice. He frantically shakes his head side to side, clinching his eyes shut as if that's a feasible elusion to the particular situation. I can hear the sound of the plastic zip ties rubbing against the skin on his wrists and it stirs up a feeling of nausea deep in the pit of my stomach.

"This is the most fucked up thing you've ever done, you psychotic son of a bitch."

I haven't always been like this, or perhaps I secretly have. It's tough to tell who I am anymore. All I know is I'm no longer the person I used to be. It's hard to explain, but then again, I don't really have to now do I? I used to be a mild-mannered, typical white suburban male just living out my existence for everyone else. I had my small one bedroom condo and my economically-pathetic little automobile required to drive me to and fro my miserable job selling blankets for a boss who probably wouldn't have cared if I would have blown my brains out in the employee bathroom outside of the clean-up and ensuing hiring process. I mean who would really want the job recently vacated by someone who would rather be six feet underground? I'm sure you're telling yourself, "my god, this guy needs professional help," but the truth is it all saved me. Saved me from that inevitable outcome.

One day I woke up and decided this wasn't the story I wanted to tell anymore. I was tired of the complacency and all the bullshit I put up with that came along with being born without a backbone. I remember looking in the mirror and yelling at the soulless entity that stood before me. And, like it did for everyone else, it just stood there and took it.

"Untie me already for Chrissake," the voice coming from Erik's bulbous mouth no longer intimidated me the way it did at the office.

I could have done the noble thing by walking into work and giving my two weeks' notice but I decided if I was going to make serious changes in my life, I was going to turn the page with a little more panache than just saying "I quit." Besides, I know myself well enough to know that there's a more than likely chance I would have chickened out at the last second and adhered to the same bullshit conformist torture that I've become accustomed to for the last 50 some-odd years. No, I needed something with a little more... flare.

"You don't have the balls to use that thing. You were a spineless piece of shit when I hired you and nothing's changed. Look, just let me go and we'll never speak of this again."

Of course my original plan wasn't to kidnap and tie up my boss... excuse me, ex-boss in my bathroom, but that's life I suppose. Honestly, I just wanted to go in there, maybe make a couple of idle threats Fight Club-style and then see what happens next, but things sometimes have a tendency to take on a life of their own. I'm not a murderer. Hell, I have a hard time watching movies about war. But, like anyone else, I had my limits. Rarely do you know what they are until they've been surpassed.

"Fuck you!" He barked out, spittle oozing down his chin, nervously annoyed that his demands have been met with complete nonchalance on my part. It's funny how even in this situation, he still cannot stop himself from treating me like a peon. Maybe that's the only way he knows how. Does he treat everyone in his life like this? His wife? Kids? I know he treats everyone else around the office with the same disdain. Is he simply incapable of compassion or empathy? Is intimidation the only way he can disarm a situation? If so, am I doing the world a favor by removing this bastard from society? Am I a hero? Seems like a fucked-up way to rationalize an even more fucked-up situation.

Am I thinking too much about this?

Don't let him get inside your head.

Just fucking do what you were meant to do.

I removed the safety from the small weapon and jammed it against the side of his head. All I hear are the muffled pleas and the sniveling of a weakened monster.

The nights will never haunt me again.

9 Lives and 1 Country

The receipt printed out slowly, deliberate, as if the amount wasn't truly official until it was on a flimsy piece of paper folded in my wallet.

"Jesus," I muttered to myself. "$127.60? This better be worth it."

I'd never filled up a tank in an RV before, but I should have known it wasn't going to be cheap. I also imagine it wasn't going to be the last unexpectedly steep expense on this little journey, and I did my best to prepare financially for any worst case scenario I may eventually encounter. I've dealt with enough bullshit in the months leading up to this existential crisis trek to clear my head and I sure as shit wasn't going to leave it up to chance to get the most out of this experience.

I stood on my toes in order to be able to peak inside one of the side windows to see what was going on and was immediately met with nothing but vulnerable stares. Three sets of eyes returned my gaze. Six very timid yet inquisitive eyeballs still unsure of what to make of their new, temporary housing situation.

"Meow?" I'm greeted with. "Meow, meow?"

When faces with any sort of life-altering situation, most people try to make life-altering changes in their day to day lives. Now, that obviously means different things for different people depending on the circumstances. New job, location, vices... it really could be just about anything. I, on the other hand, decided it meant everything. I was married for six years, living a very generic 9-to-5 life consisting of the occasional post-work beer with co-worked commiserating about the day that just past. But mostly my life was a steady dose of coming straight home after work to a homecooked meal followed by a very relaxing and needed evening lounging on the couch with my significant other, watching... well it never really mattered what we watched. That part was irrelevant. At thirty, it wasn't exciting by any means but it was exactly the type of life I craved. Simply put, I was happy and was still a ways away from facing and sort of midlife crisis... or so I thought.

"This is what I want," I would tell myself repeatedly, not in an attempt to convince myself. It was more of a reminder to appreciate it even though I never really needed it.

But then one seemingly uneventful March evening everything changed. I still remember exactly where I was sitting and, ironically, what I was watching, when the most devastating words came out of her mouth.

"I don't love you anymore..." she venomously spewed out without even having the courage to look me in the eye.

"I don't love you anymore and I don't see the point of even trying to continue this charade."

 It was so blunt and came so far out of left field that I couldn't even decipher if it was even happening or just a bad dream. I couldn't even fathom the severity of what was being said that I just continued watching TV. I was afraid to move or think or even breathe. I was an empty vessel numbed to the point of indifference.

From there, the only sounds I remember hearing was her noisily gathering a few necessities, her laptop and changes of clothes and then the sound of the front door being closed rather hastily. I never even looked back or tried to convince her that she wasn't acting rationally. The words were brief but filled with conviction. Her mind was made up. This wasn't the life she wanted, at least not anymore.

That was six months ago.

We haven't spoken since.

We never even said goodbye.

It took a while before it hit me like a ton of bricks. The delusions that this was all just temporary were like band-aids on a gunshot wound. Once reality set in, the process of reclaiming who I was became a long, arduous climb that, at times, felt impossible. Every step was an exhaustive. I wasn't ready to deal with pretending life would go on.

Something had to change.

That's when I decided to step outside my comfort zone and end that chapter of my life. I'm not just talking about our chapter, I'm talking about that chapter of my life in general.

That's when I decided to sell everything, buy an RV and treat my cats to a cultural experience most cats would never dream of.

"Meow," I whispered back. "Fucking meow"