Month: February 2025

Frustration

782 words

This was a little easier today but it’s still not something I’m particularly proud of. The exercise here was to use as few identifying words as possible, and only use specific nouns that might be repeated enough that Toby would know them. If I were to continue this story, I think Toby would get into some real trouble or find something he shouldn’t.

It was just a matter of time and patience. Toby knew that, if he kept at it long enough, the solution would present itself, and he would be free. He suspected it had something to do with the mechanism attached to the crate door. He sniffed it, then licked it. No real clues there. Its smell and taste was cold and sharp, causing Toby to sneeze, a sound that—for some reason—caused the humans to make high-pitched, “ooooooh” noises. Toby tried not to sneeze around them. But for right now, in the dark, when the humans have gone off to their own dens, Toby was alone. He was free to sneeze as much as he wanted without attracting attention.

He pawed at the mechanism. Toby knew it had to be this part of the kennel that released him, because the humans would fiddle with it before the door swung open wide, and Toby was allowed to roam the perimeter of their home. He especially enjoyed the place in the home where they made the food. Not only was it full of wonderful smells, but he often found delectable treats on the floor. Tangy shreds of cheese, shards of crispy things that came out of rustling bags, even a crumble of meat or two, if he was very lucky. The humans often stood next to the large piece of furniture in the middle of that room and chopped vegetables (Toby could take or leave most of those, but he did like the crunchy ones), assemble their meals, and every once in a while, prepare Toby’s food, if he was a very good boy (and he usually was), or if his stomach wasn’t feeling well.

But Toby wasn’t in that room now, and he desperately wanted to be. It was in that in-between time between night and day that Toby often awoke and became bored. Toby missed his littermates in these moments; he could pounce on them and play before the light streamed into the room. But those littermates were gone now, or rather, Toby had been taken to a new home, and he was left to entertain himself. The humans had given him things to hold his attention, but he soon became tired of them. They hid food in hard, plastic balls or in fuzzy mats, and Toby quickly figured out the tricks to extract the treats efficiently and neatly.

He was still trying to decipher the sounds the human made. He was beginning to recognize some of the utterances they repeated: “Toby,” (they said this one a lot, and Toby understood that was the word they used to identify him), “sit,” (he was expected to plop down on his haunches), “stay,” (don’t move), and, “no!” (this was used for general displeasure). He was also starting to hear the sound “smart,” usually after a particular action he completed, but Toby had not yet figured out the pattern. He also noticed that the word was paired with human body language that sometimes showed pleasure, sometimes displeasure. More study was needed.

Toby renewed his efforts with the mechanism, first with one paw, tentatively, then with both paws, scrabbling at the metal with his soft pads. The whole crate was shaking now, rattling and bouncing off the floor, but the door stayed shut. Toby exhaled in frustration. He looked at the mechanism, considering it. There were many parts to it, but there was one part that was different than the rest of it. He nudged it with his paw. It moved a little. Aha. Toby nosed it, first hesitantly, then with more pressure and vigor. He could actually feel it, there was something that was supposed to give. He continued, but found that it wasn’t quite the right way to do it. It was almost as if he needed to push down more. He abandoned using his nose, and used his paw again, this time with more focus and strength rather than the frantic swimming motion he’d used.

Toby sat on his haunches, studying the mechanism. He placed one paw on it, pressing down. Almost. He did it again, but this time including a waggling motion as he pressed. So close. One more time and—success. There was a give and a click, and the door opened wide. Toby bounded from the crate, ecstatic with the joy of having figured something out, along with the intoxicating feeling of stolen freedom. He ran happily to the food room, sniffing and snuffling the floor, feathery tail sailing and swaying behind him. A noise made him stop in his tracks and look up suddenly—expecting a sound of displeasure from a human—but there was no one in the room with him. The noise must have come from outside.

Far too many

503 words

This is awful and it was hell and it was stupid. I’ve been up since 2:30 am and I figured if I started writing, something would happen. lol no. And then I got caught up in what the thing was that there was far too many of; first I went to the Star Trek tribbles, then gremlins, and then nanobots (a They Might Be Giants song). But then I hyper focused on the reality of nanobots and what they actually are and had to look that up and… ugh. I hated every second of this.

Angela frowned at the screen. She supposed she was experiencing cognitive dissonance, she told herself, because what she was seeing did not match up to what she was expecting. “Or what I had hoped for, let’s be honest,” she said aloud. She cradled her mug in both hands and took a long pull of the cold coffee. Her coworkers made fun of how she liked her brew, the repeated quip about how she should have a little coffee with her cream and sugar long since predictable and humorless. Angela ignored them. She had no time or patience for coffee snobs, or really, anyone who cared so much about others’ personal and harmless habits. 

“Run them again,” she said to herself. She knew it was useless, but that’s what you do, right? You check and recheck to make sure it’s accurate. She ran the numbers again and pushed back from her desk, watching the computer do its terrible calculations across the screen. She finished her coffee and stood up, looking around the room. It was quiet and empty, but then, it usually was this time of night. Even the most diligent engineers had gone home, or, if it weren’t home, off to the nearest bar or speakeasy. Are we still doing the speakeasy thing? Angela thought, remembering it was all the rage at one time. You had to know a guy and there’d be a secret door and a password, all to access overly complicated drinks made by someone with overly complicated facial hair. It was very silly to Angela, but she kept those thoughts to herself. Who was she to care so much about other people’s personal and harmless habits? 

Her back was to the screen, but she knew enough time had elapsed for the computer to complete its task. She didn’t turn to look at it right away. Was she afraid, she wondered? “Yes,” she said aloud. “Yes I am.”

She sat down slowly, as if her chair might suddenly dart from underneath her. Her movements were deliberate and reverent, as if she were attending a funeral. Studying the screen, she confirmed her respectful demeanor was, in fact, appropriate for the occasion. 

“That’s far too many,” she said. “Far too many.”

Angela did something then that she almost never does—and certainly not at work. She laughed. It was a chuckle at first, but bubbled into something wild and uncontrollable. Her gasps and wheezes echoed through the empty office, bouncing off the brick walls and desks loaded with Funko Pops. “This is it,” Angela thought. “This is the moment I actually lose my mind.” The thought sobered her a bit, and she wiped her eyes as her laughter sputtered and died.

When Cortexis started down the nanobots path, Angela was cautiously excited. It’s something she believed would truly make a difference in human life; the advances in healthcare just the tip of the iceberg. And she believed leadership when they said they would develop it ethically and with safety foremost in mind. She thought back to that day. She remembered being ushered into the board room, just herself and the CTO.

Give it a minute

768 words

I have no idea what’s going on here. Your guess is as good as mine. I don’t know why I talked about eggs so much. I might be hungry.

He could feel it. He was surprised he could, he was told it might take a while. But there it was, the fizzing and buzzing through his veins. The feeling wasn’t unpleasant, but the overall impression was a bit like anxiety. Or maybe he was just anxious. It was hard to distinguish what were just Cole’s own feelings and what was… whatever it was. He’d been told its actual name at least a dozen times, but he could never remember it. It was like with medical terms; they seemed to slide off of his brain like a fried egg from a pan. He was sure it had to do with something from Dungeons and Dragons or the Hobbits or some other nerd shit.

Cole shifted his weight on the table, clasping and unclasping his hands in his lap, being careful not to disturb the complicated highway of tubes and attachments. He wondered what would happen if he pulled them off right now, right in the middle of it. Would he die? Probably not, he thought. Probably he’d just ruin all of Faith’s work, and hoooooo boy, he didn’t want to experience another round of Faith’s temper. Still, the thought wouldn’t go away, kind of like when you drive across a bridge and briefly entertain slamming the steering wheel to one side and propelling your car into the water below. That’s normal, right? Cole thought, considering one tube running from his bicep. Everyone has those thoughts. 

“Okay,” Faith said, and was that a note of uncertainty in her voice? Cole watched her carefully. Her dark hair was pulled back from her face as it normally was, her eyes sharp and alert. But was that a small worry line on her high forehead? Was that… was that sweat? Cole’s heart started beating faster. Faith noticed.

“You got to calm down,” Faith said, looking at the monitor rather than Cole’s face. Cole took that as another sign of trouble—why was she watching the monitor so closely?—and his heart beat even faster. 

Faith sighed, and turned to look at Cole. “Dude. You have got. To. Relax. Take a deep breath.”

Cole did what he was told, but his breath stuttered and shivered. He tried again, and realized that he might hyperventilate. This realization, of course, made his heart beat faster, and Faith let out an aggravated grunt.

“Oh my god,” Faith said, grasping both of his knees and shaking them, making Cole’s feet sway. Cole steadied the heels of his palms on the edge of the table to keep his whole body from rocking. What if she loosened one of the tubes?

“I’ve neer seen such a big baby,” Faith said, still shaking his knees, but not as vigorously. “I’ve told you a hundred times. This is perfectly safe.”

Cole grit his teeth. The fizzing in his veins intensified; it was less a fizzing and now more of a simmer. He remembered when his brother got really into cooking and was teaching Cole how to poach an egg. He said you had to wait until the little bubbles started to form around the edges of the water. Not a rolling boil, he had said, waving a slotted spoon at him, but just a nice simmer. That’s exactly what was going on in his body right now, Cole thought, a nice simmer.

“When does it actually happen?” Cole said, trying to keep the anxiety out of his voice. He had never thought of himself as an alpha male, but he didn’t like to be called a big baby either.

Faith ignored him, having let go of his knees and was fiddling with the monitor. 

“Faith. Faith?”

“Give it a minute,” she said, and this time he could definitely hear the tension in her voice. He absolutely wasn’t imagining that.

“Is everything—” The simmer erupted into a boil. What could only be described as a rolling sensation rippled through Cole’s body, his tendons and muscles jumping and quivering. Cole opened his mouth, but found he couldn’t say anything; his jaw was locked into place and his tongue frozen. Everything seemed far away, but he could still hear Faith’s voice. “Oh no. Oh no no no no no. Oh god no.”

Somewhere in Cole’s brain, there was a sense of vindication. Between the bouts of confusion, independent thoughts like, “I knew there was something wrong” and, “Who’s the baby now?” presented themselves then floated away. There seemed to be a final push through his spine—Cole had time to think, “The eggs are done!”—before Cole’s body shuddered and collapsed to one side of the table.

Forgotten Map

900 words

Oof, I am tired this morning and this was a struggle. I thought this prompt tied nicely with the “Middle Child” prompt, so I’m continuing the story. Of course, I’d need to go back and edit “Middle Child” if I wanted to put these together; for instance, Tina wouldn’t be wearing shorts if they’d set out in the early morning, and Susan can’t read in the dark. But it’s looking more and more likely that Tina’s going to be left at a gas station.

Tina gave Susan a final shove, earning a glare from her mother. Susan curled up next to the window in exaggerated comfort, smiling as if this seat was the most luxurious situation she’d ever experienced. Tina slumped forward, wedging her face between the two front seats. The front of the car smelled like the Juicy Fruit gum, her mother’s Oil of Olay lotion, and, faintly, old cigarette smoke. Neither of her parents smoked, but her mother would sometimes drive her friend Barbara to doctor’s appointments, and Barbara smoked a lot.

Tina’s mother was staring out the window, worrying a crochet project in her lap. She wasn’t working on it, she was feeling the rust-orange yarn between her thumb and forefinger as if she were checking its quality before purchasing it. Tina watched her mother. Her expression said she was someplace else, reliving the past or daydreaming. Tina had a moment of wonder: do parents daydream? If so, what do they daydream about? It was like the time she’d seen her soccer coach at the movie theater and had the realization that all kids have at one point or another. Parents and teachers and coaches were actually people.

Tina cleared her throat. Her mother turned and was startled by the closeness of Tina’s face. “Tina, sit back,” she said, stuffing her yarn and hooks in the colorful plastic bag on the floor in front of her. Tina had seen many projects emerge from that bag: plant hangers, baby blankets, even a stuffed owl a couple of times. These items were distributed to friends and relatives; Tina thought hard but couldn’t think of a single item that stayed with the family.

Tina did was she was told, sitting back with such velocity her back bounced off the seatback before she settled dramatically with an audible sigh.

Her dad looked at Tina through the rearview mirror, smiling a little. “Kid, you’re in for a long day,” he said. “Better just accept it.”

Tina scowled, which made her dad chuckle. They’d left home in the middle of the night—well, it was dark, so it was the middle of the night to Tina—but now they were more than an hour into the drive, and tendrils of orange and yellow were sneaking into the sky. The novelty of the drive was already wearing off. When her parents woke them from their sleep and bundled them into the car, Tina could pretend they were escaping a great evil like a monster or enemy attack, and they were on the run with all of their worldly possessions. But after a while, the facade was difficult to keep up, mostly because of her mom humming along to Linda Rondstadt and The Captain and Tenille. As good as Tina’s imagination was, she couldn’t reconcile “Blue Bayou” as a thrilling getaway soundtrack.

The landscape devolved from their suburban neighborhood to the outskirts of town to the industrial warehouses to nothing. They were in the part of the drive that Tina found excruciatingly boring, miles of desert scrub, sporadically dotted with ancient gas stations, seedy-looking motels with cool neon signs, and occasionally a roadside attraction boasting real turquoise jewelry and rocks and gems. They never stopped at the attractions, so Tina was left to imagine those shacks filled with what she assumed was gleaming, sparkling diamonds and rubies, much like the mines the dwarves worked in Snow White.

“Okay, Cass, what’s our next turn?” her dad said, glancing at her mom briefly before turning back to the road.

“What?” her mother said.

“The map. What’s the next turn? I always forget.”

Her mother laughed. “I don’t have the map, Robert.”

“Ha ha, very funny. It’s in the glove compartment.”

“No it’s not. I was just in there.”

Her father sighed. “Yes it is, Cassie. I put it in there myself.”

Her mother popped the latch on the glove compartment, and it fell open heavily. Her mother pulled everything out in a single bundle as if it were packaged for sale. Tina watched as her mother took inventory: paperwork, pens, hard candies, gum wrappers, a single sock, a plastic comb, blurred credit card receipts.

“No map,” her mother said, presenting the collection in her lap as evidence.

“Jesus Christ. Cassie. What did you do with it?”

Her mother’s head snapped back as if she’d been bopped on the forehead. She smirked. “What did I do with it? Me? I didn’t do anything with it.”

Tina could see her father’s knuckles on the steering wheel go white. “Okay, Cassie. So, what? The map just flew out the window like a bird?” He removed one hand from the steering wheel long enough to flap his hand around like an escaped sparrow.

Her mother laughed, but without humor. Tina knew that laugh was the start of a fight; it was full of the precise amount of scorn that enraged her father.

“No, Robert, I don’t think it flew out the window. But you think I just took it from the car for shits and giggles?”

Tina had a horrible, sickening feeling in her stomach. She had a memory from last week playing in the backyard with Amy. The two of them had spent a considerable amount of time making pirate’s booty by coloring dried cherry pits with metallic Crayolas, fashioning a treasure chest with a shoebox, and burying it in the soft ground beneath her mother’s bird of paradise shrubs. The only thing they were missing was a treasure map.

“Yes, and”

820 words

When I first sat down to write this, is was going to be about a boomer who had to take improv classes to better fit into the corporate culture because his ideas were too rigid, and then found he couldn’t stop saying, “Yes, and,” to everything with disastrous results (again, way too much Twilight Zone during my formative years). I still think that would be interesting, but the character I created below is pretty much a flat stereotype who would have no interest in self-improvement. But I think Rod Serling would be happy to hand this boomer’s own ass to him. 

He remembered a time in which what he said was how it went. Because let’s face it, he thought, glancing briefly at the neatly stapled stack of forms in front of him, most people are stupid and want to be told what to do. He remembered all of those eager young workers just starting out—thinking they knew everything, thinking that there was a democracy to decision-making around here—and how he needed to set them right, and set them right quickly. 

He watched them come and go; first those they called “Gen X” (Generation Slacker, more like), then the dreaded, coddled Millennials and now the screen-addicted Gen Z. They came into his space, newly educated and eager, trying to change things. None of them understood. None of them got that the workplace was a different world, and their mommies and their daddies were not here to give them a participation trophy, a pat on the head, and bail them out when things got tough. Well. He wasn’t their mommy or their daddy, or maybe one of the two mommies or daddies they had, he thought with an almost imperceptible grimace. He was the boss, he was in charge, and what he says goes.

A finger tapped the top sheet of paper in front of him, lightly, but with authority. The finger was younger than the ones on his own hand, and he resented it. It didn’t help that the fingernail was slicked in a purple varnish and attached to a woman. 

“I really need you to look at this Bill,” she had stopped tapping the collection of papers and pushed it closer to him. Bill glanced at the papers, but made no move to collect them.

“William,” he said, looking at the human resources representative evenly. 

“I beg your pardon?” she frowned.

“I prefer William,” he said, not breaking his gaze.

She frowned. “I’m really sorry,” she said. “You sign all of your emails ‘Bill.’ I just assumed—”

‘Well, there you go,” Bill said, sitting back in his chair, still ignoring the papers in front of him, keeping his eye contact steady with what he thought was an expression of strength and authority. “You know what they say when you assume something.” 

The HR rep said nothing, but sat back in her own chair. Bill thought he saw something shift in her expression. It reminded her of his daughter, during one of the last conversations they had a year ago. Or was it two years ago? He couldn’t remember. But it was a look of calm and understanding. He had celebrated a victory in that moment; he had finally won, he was finally going to have a respectful, and productive relationship with his daughter. Her utterance of, “Okay, Dad,” were the last words he heard from her in possibly two years. She’d come back when she needed something, Bill thought. They always do.

“And what’s that?” The HR rep was speaking to him, but Bill had lost his train of thought. 

“What?” he said, blinking for the first time in what might have been several minutes. His eyes stung.

The HR rep sighed. “Never mind. I’ll remember to call you William from now on. Now, William,” Bill thought he heard a tone in the way she said his given name, a name no one had called him since his mother had died, “What you have in front of you is a performance improvement plan.”

“Yes. And?” he said, continuing to pretend the papers didn’t exist.

“And,” she said, pushing the papers toward Bill, this time with clear intent. The paper curled over the edge of the desk and threatened to fall to the floor. Bill decided in advance that, should they do so, he would not pick them up.

“And,” she said, “I need you to look them over and sign them. Now. I believe your manager,” she looked at her laptop screen to confirm, “Joshua. Your manager Joshua has already gone through the information contained in this paperwork during your annual review, correct?”

Bill felt himself getting warm. Yes, Joshua had indeed gone over the information contained in that paperwork with him. Joshua. At least 20 years his junior and full of fake empathy and wishy-washy opinions. Apparently, it’s no longer acceptable to do one’s job. Apparently, one has to wrap everything one says and does with flowery language and with consideration to everyone’s feelings, no matter how fragile they are. Apparently, doing the actual work was no longer the main reason everyone was here; it was about “culture” and “connection” and other C words they painted on the walls and put on posters. Bill smiled. He had a C word for her.

“Joshua has gone over the paperwork with me,” he said, still smiling. His calculated expression had the desired effect; he thought he actually saw the shiver physically run down her spine. Her words and tone, however, suggested otherwise.

Middle Child

777 words

My first foray into 750 Words since 2018. Life, y’all. This one came easily; I just intensified actual memories. In reality, we got the “way back” to ourselves and I’m sure there were land wars, but they didn’t include as much overt violence. But it is true I was relegated to the middle seat because I was the middle child. Make it make sense.

If I were to continue this story, I’d probably find a way to make that middle seat the place to be. Or Tina would get left at a truck stop or something.

And yes, those Tiger Beat “kissable pin-ups” were a thing. Ew.

It didn’t make sense, Tina thought as she squirmed in her seat. Well. It wasn’t a “seat” as much as it was a “designated spot” on the sticky vinyl bench. She was always in the middle, even though she was not the smallest child. “You’re in the middle because you’re the middle child,” her older sister Susan insisted, and those in authority did not disagree. To her left, her younger sister Amy slept, curled up comfortably with her head protected from the hardness of the window with a pillow procured from her bedroom, festooned with Holly Hobbie visages. A stuffed version of the plucky prairie girl rested between her arms, her once luxurious yarn braids shorn and unraveling. Tina watched as Amy’s head bounced lightly with the movement of the car, and Tina wished with all of her 9-year-old might for a giant pothole.

At Tina’s right, Susan flipped through a Teen Beat magazine. She had a subscription—she proudly told anyone who would listen like that was some big whoop—and it seemed to Tina that she would take on a sort of smug look when she flipped through it, as if she was reading Popular Science rather than about the dating preferences of Donny and Marie. She was envious of Susan in this moment; Tina had never been able to read in a car without getting nauseated. She wondered if sitting by the window helped. She watched as Susan flipped the page to a “kissable pin-up” of Lee Majors, lingering for a moment, then turn the page again. Tina had long since stopped wishing nausea on Susan, because that could turn out very bad for herself.

Tina looked down at her legs. They were clad in her favorite corduroy shorts that were admittedly getting too small. This was probably one of the last times she’ll be able to wear them, she thought, plucking at a piece of lint. Her legs jangled from the fuzzy lime-green fabric, bony and tanned and freckled. She had to straddle the “hump” in the floor well, each of her flip-flopped feet on either side of the hump. Many a war were started over that hump. Tina maintained that, because she didn’t have a place to put her feet, she was owed space on either side of the hump. Susan said that because it was possible to put both of her feet on the hump, she should really do that, and furthermore, she should cradle both of her knees together with her arms so there’s less chance of one of her legs brushing her. 

“For 6 hours?” said Tina, loud enough for her parents to hear, in the hopes they would intervene. They would not.

Susan would shrug and turn the page of her latest magazine. “I bet the astronauts who went to the moon were more uncomfortable. You can do it.” These kinds of statements were usually punctuated with a crack of gum and a sickly whiff of strawberry.

“Well, I’m not Neil Armstrong and we’re not going to the moon,” Tina would say, and slide her foot into what Susan deemed her territory. 

“Stop it,” Susan would say, putting down her magazine, and physically lifting Tina’s leg and attempting to throw it. Tina would double her efforts. “Manifest destiny,” she grinned, and locked her muscles into place, her rigid leg now more difficult to maneuver. This would escalate the land war further, and Susan would resort to illegal warfare. She’d ball up her fist, with her middle knuckle protruding like a knot on a hardwood tree, and plunge it into the tender muscle of Tina’s right thigh. It hurt—it always hurt—but it was a point of pride that Tina didn’t cry out or make a sound. If it wasn’t agony, Tina would even try to laugh, and when she succeeded, it would enrage Susan. Susan would put her whole weight on her fist, pushing and digging until Tina had to concede. When she did so, she’d grab Susan’s wrist with both of her hands, twisting vigorously in opposite directions, hoping she had improved her “snake bite” technique. Susan didn’t have the same dedication to nonchalance as Tina, and would yell far more than was necessary. This would wake the always-dozing Amy, and finally earn a notice from their mother.

“Girls, this is a small car,” she’d say, not even turning around completely. “Knock it off.”

“Knock it off,” their dad would echo in a more stern voice, but it was clear he had no idea what was going on. His eyes were focused on the long, shimmering road ahead, and he was chewing on his own gum, but his was Juicy Fruit-flavored.