17 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “Comfort”
The air is sickeningly redolent with flowers.
Your black-clad partner is holding it together, grim-faced, as friends and family come up, hug or squeeze a shoulder, and whisper those six horrid words: “I’m so sorry for your loss.”
Your mother is clearly about to lose it. It wasn’t supposed to happen in this order. You were supposed to bury her. To compose herself, she fusses with the the food at the buffet, absently replating the ham and checking on the baked ziti, the scalloped potatoes. Comfort food.
The officiant orates about the hereafter. Truth revealed by a better god than the one that killed you? Or a lie offered up to make your passing easier on the survivors? Does it ultimately matter? I don’t know.
Funerals are a study in contrasts and strange passed-down traditions. We wear black, for death and mourning, but bring flowers, a symbol of life. We drink a lot of booze if it’s a wake, or eat a lot of starches and dairy if it’s not, because nothing says the death of a loved one like pasta, potatoes and melted cheese. We fall back on the same words – “I’m so sorry for your loss,” “if there’s anything I can do,” “in a better place.” And most importantly, we allow ourselves to feel miserable together. To touch each other. To take turns being the strong one and the one who just needs to cry right now.
“Comfort.” It’s a strange performance art piece we all engage in, with spoken words, with costumes, with food and set pieces and music and props. And it’s only the beginning of the process, of months or years of continued grief. And it’s so hard, this communal grieving we do, this attempt to snatch a moment of comfort when we’re reeling with loss and grief and mortality. And it’s so strange that anything about this process would help at all. It’s baffling that starches and flowers and mumbled catchphrases could do anything in the face of death. But you know, it’s funny, but sometimes they do. Heck, I’ve been watching videos of people cooking comfort food for the last half hour or so, and I have to say, I feel better.
I don’t know what death is like. I don’t know if there’s an afterlife. I don’t know if you can come back as a ghost, if there are paranormal planes, if it’s possible to communicate with loved ones once they’ve passed. But if you can, can I just say, don’t? Please. Let them have their baked ziti. Let them believe you’re in a better place. Let them try to move on. This is hard enough as it is.
16 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “A guilty pleasure”
He knows it’s so bad for him. But Abholos cannot resist deep-frying you.
15 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “The one thing you’re most ashamed of”
When the choice came down to “your life or hers,” you chose yours.
You tried to fool yourself in those few seconds. You told yourself you had a better chance than she did of overpowering the members of the Black Brotherhood, that sacrificing her life meant saving billions of others.
You were lying to yourself, of course. You were just afraid, and you didn’t want to die.
Your choice had no consequence whatsoever, of course. They killed you both. They were always going to kill you both. But at least you wouldn’t have looked like such a selfish jerk if you told them to save her.
14 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “You are a serial killer. What TV shows are on your DVR list? Why?”
Dexter. Unfortunately for you, you had no idea it was a documentary.
13 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “The person in your life you’re most jealous of”
That guy standing over your tied up body right now, holding the chainsaw. What you wouldn’t give to be in his shoes.
12 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “Ten years now, you meet up with an old friend you haven’t seen in a decade. Write the conversation you have.”
“So. How’ve you been?” Alan asks.
“We’re … really … doing this?” you ask?
“Well, yeah, we’ve got some time to kill,” he says.
“Uh, fine I guess. I was doing fine.”
He nods. “You still working at the same place?”
“No, I changed careers a while back.” Old habits kick in. “How are the kids?”
“Oh man, they’ve gotten so big, you wouldn’t believe!” he brightens up. “Josh is in high school now, can you believe it?”
“God, I feel so old.”
“And Emily, she took second place in a track meet last week. We’re so proud.”
“That’s great.” You pause. “So, you got into the whole cult thing, huh.”
“Yep! I suppose that sounds pretty weird, but, what can I say other than Cthulhu fhtagn!”
“Ha ha, I guess. Uh. Don’t suppose you could let me out of this sacrifice pit for old time’s sake.”
“Sorry man, no can do.” A long pause. “Hey, you remember that one time in high school when Lance painted a scrotum on the vice principal’s truck?”
You remain silent.
“That was pretty funny, huh?” Alan says.
You maintain your silence.
“Hey man, you don’t gotta be like that. Just because we’re sacrificing you.”
“Fuck off, Alan.”
11 May 2019
Today’s prompt: “You have a dream that you’ve murdered someone. Who is it, how and why did the murder happen, and what happens afterward?”
You wake up mostly immobilized, hands and feet tied with ropes to massive eye-bolts sunk into the concrete floor of a dimly lit basement, your outstretched limbs intersecting the edges of a crude pentagram. There’s a tall figure in the corner wearing a dark robe, hood covering his head, chanting something mostly unintelligible in a deep voice. You hear a “fhtagn” or two. As if you weren’t in enough trouble already.
You tug with your wrist. The knot feels slack, poorly tied, as though it wants to be undone. Given enough time, you might be able to twist your arm enough to loosen it, to free yourself. You set to work moving your wrist and the muscles at the base of your thumb, stretching the rope. You work your thumb down under the loops and stretch one of them up over your hand.
The chant is louder now, and you see the robed figure has turned around to face you. There’s a glint of steel in his hand.
You work faster, pulling another loop over your hand. And now you have plenty of slack to work with. You stretch your arm and force your thumb into the knot holding your hand to the eye-hook and start forcing it open.
The figure strides toward you, still chanting. He kneels down by your side and raises the knife.
The knot opens like a tulip, and as his arm comes down, you seize his wrist.
You have surprise on your side, and the way he’s holding his knife is awkward. Slowly, slowly, you turn his wrist. Slowly, slowly, you force your knife toward his heart. And then a push of adrenaline, and you force it in between his ribs.
You’re not sure if the blow was fatal, but he’s at least weakened. You force the knife in and out. When you’re sure he’s dead, you finally allow yourself to breathe deeply. You pull back your arm, and his body collapses across your chest.
And then you remember, you can’t rest. There might be others.
You pull the knife to your other wrist and cut yourself free. Then you push the man’s body off you and get to work cutting the rope around your ankles.
You rush up the basement stairs, still holding the knife. You want to burst out into the daylight, but you catch yourself in time. You listen at the door for voices, footsteps, anything. You think you hear breathing. You hold your breath, unsure if it’s you. The soft breathing sound comes again.
One guard, then? Hopefully? The door looks like it might be squeaky. Make it quick.
You open the door in one fluid gesture and stab with the knife. Another man in a robe falls to the ground.
At this point, you aren’t even aware of the layout of the building you’re in. You start running. Some hooded figures are in the far end of a room you pass. They see you. You hear a “Hey!” and the sound of running. You run faster.
A door. That looks like a front door. You bolt toward it, throw it open, rush through, and slam it behind you.
Through the corner of your eye, you see a bonfire in the side yard, and several vehicles parked out to the left. You run to the nearest one that’s not parked in, hoping against hope. You hear shouting from the direction of the bonfire and the group spilling out of the house behind you.
The window is open on the driver’s side door of the Jeep, and you pull open the door. Miraculously, the keys are in the ignition. You leap in, turn the key, and the engine roars to life. You throw the Jeep into reverse just as a robed figure from the house reaches the door and grabs hold. You stab his hand with your knife. He screams and lets go, and you pull away from the cultists’ house in a cloud of dust and gravel.
The knife enters your heart. Your blood pools across the cool basement floor and into the edges of the pentagram. The man in the robe chants louder for Cthulhu to come.