This week: Quick! Hide the evidence! Edited by: Leger~  
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This week's Short Story Editor
Leger~
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Quick! Hide the Evidence!
The knife...the drugs...the bloody glove, where do you hide them? Under the sofa? Behind the bookshelf? Down the toilet!
Why do we always flush the evidence? Okay, not always, but it's definitely a "go to" disposal site. Burial is probably the most popular way of disposing of "things", but sometimes there isn't enough time. I read a few articles about the things sewer workers find in the sewers. Thomas Crapper, the inventor of indoor plumbing would be amazed. There are tossed things that I personally find understandable...like an iron, or a school bell, even a golf bag. My favorite was a traffic cone. I'm sure it was washed down in a storm, but I could imagine road rage taking part in a disposal like that. Valuable stuff has been found down there - a watch, diamond ring, even false teeth. I'm not sure one would want them back in your mouth. Phones are popular sewer detritus, either lost in the stormwater drain or tossed there by an angry dining companion. It probably went down to join the sewer gators and goldfish that had a burial before they were actually dead.
Then there are toys...my son, when he was young, went through a period of wanting to flush things. He wasn't flushing them to try to clog the toilet; he just wanted to see what happened to them. One of the more interesting calls from my house to the maintenance department was for the removal of a rubber duck. While the rubber duck looks all cute and innocent, I swear he was in on the deal. The telltale sign that my morning was going sideways was the sound of a flush, and then my son bolting from the bathroom. I investigated and there was a rubber duck, smiling up at me from the bowl. So I reached in to pull the offender from the trap and pulled and pulled. The duck stretched and stuck. The suction of the drain had pulled that little demon tight and would not let go.
So I called and told rental office of my apartment I had a duck stuck in my toilet. After a bit of hilarity, they sent their man over. My usual maintenance hero shows up and steps into the bathroom thinking this was an easy fix. He asked if I tried to get it out. Of course I did. So he reaches down and tugs on the duck. Then he yanks on the duck. Then he straddles the bowl and does a two-handed dead lift on the duck in the toilet. The duck just smiled back at us. I swear it was mocking me.
He stares at the duck and says to me, I'll have to cut it apart. Did you think I wanted it back??? I told him to do what he needed to do. So he took a box cutter and slashed the duck to release the suction. He dropped it into the bucket with the drain snake he'd brought. I swear the piece with the beak was still smiling. I know the maintenance guy was. My son and I had a serious discussion about flushing things. No more flushing. And to be truthful, only one more thing went down. It was a little toy fire truck with a siren. He wanted to hear the siren as it went down. It did sound kind of cool.
So before you flush the hand grenade, the lighter or your football, give it a second thought, it's been done. The evidence is there in the sewer. Now what would you do with it?
This month's question: Where would you get rid of your incriminating evidence?
Send in your reply below!  Editors love feedback!
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Excerpt: "MUHUHAHAHAHAHA!"
Skylark Xavier Chesterton VII threw his head back and laughed at the ceiling. There was nothing particularly funny about the ceiling; it was merely what he happened to be looking at after he threw his head back.
“Eureka!” he shouted, throwing his hands up in the air. After all that throwing of body parts, he paused for a moment to collect himself, then laughed again.
Excerpt: My friend from high school, Edi, is a self-proclaimed witch. I don’t mean like a I’m-having-a-bad-day-get-out-of-my-way-pmsing-witch or a I’m-playing-around-with-the-goth-thing-witch. Edi is a witch. She does spells, curses, brews - the whole nine yards. She wears dark make-up, resents authority, claims she’s been on earth for 314 years, and has a pet duck that apparently once was her brother, Nate.
Excerpt: I stood at the kitchen sink, sipping my cup of joe, moaning as the bitter taste tantalized my taste buds. My eyes began to gradually focus on the view out the kitchen window into our backyard. As I began to process what I was seeing, I set my still-full mug down on the counter and leaned on the sink with both hands to get a closer view out the window.
Oh, she did not!!!
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Excerpt: There once was a beautiful cove hidden away amongst cypress trees and Spanish moss where many ducks and geese made their homes. The water was a light emerald green that matched the lillypads that floated on the surface. Beautiful reflections dazzled off the water that looked like hundreds of diamonds and emeralds. The frogs would sing songs to the lady geese and swans nearby. Not too far away all the loon ducks lived.
Excerpt: The home of Deidra Moorhen resided in an almost separate part of the pond, beyond the bombardment of white lilies. She raised her five ducklings in a secluded patch of reeds far from the fishing region of the pond. Ruffling her feathers and flapping her wings, Deidra swung her red bill back and forth, squawking at her ducklings to hurry with their morning wash. “Please my young ducklings. Hurry yourselves in your wash. The Mallard, himself, is to escort us to the pond any minute now.”
It was another chance to find a mate, thought Deidra to herself. The father to her kin vanished one winter and did not return. It was suspected by the community that he had been stuffed and mounted after being gunned down by a traveling huntsman in the woods. Deidra hatched several ducklings with her late husband, except for one who mysteriously wandered into the family.
Excerpt: I walked eagerly down to the shore of the lake and stood for a long moment looking out into the darkness. The air was fresh, cool and pure. I took a long breath and then let it release back into the atmosphere from which it came. After a few short moments my eyes adjusted to the dim light of the dawn and I could see the far shoreline. It was far too early for me to make out the familiar shape of ducks floating on the surface of the lake, but somewhere deep within my mind’s eye I could see them out there in large flocks inviting us to come out for a closer look. My blood began to pump faster and faster as the adrenaline eased itself into my veins and out into the entirety of my body. How many ducks sat out there in the darkness? Ten? Fifteen? Forty? I could only hope and dream for the time being, but soon the sun would betray the ducks their advantage.
Excerpt: I hate funerals. Only thing I hate more than funerals are hangings. Only thing I hate more than funerals or hangings is having a whole townfull of folks thinking the dead man told me where he hid his gold before he was called to Glory.
But that part’s another story. Let’s get back to the funeral.
Well, all the way back to the hanging.
Excerpt: Becca loved to play games at recess. I don't mean like basketball or four-square. I mean story games. She always came up with great ideas for what we could do. For half an hour a day we were princesses or hunters or characters from a book she was reading. Usually Becca was the hero and I was the sidekick but I never minded. It was still fun.
Excerpt: This story takes place on Lake Lure in North Carolina. The lake is located in the Appalachian mountain range in the western part of the state. The source of the clear mountain lake water is the rain fed fresh water springs. The days are hot but the nights and early mornings are very cool. The lake sits in a deep valley that is lined with tall mature pine trees. The clear still water reflects the blue sky and creates the illusion you could actually fall into the sky. The pine scent is subdued in the morning but as the sun comes up the warming trees secrete a sap that releases a fresh pine smell. Occasionally one of these pine trees falls in to the water. The trees rot very slowly over time, thus providing a shelter for the fish that love them.
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This month's question: Where would you get rid of your incriminating evidence?
Send in your reply below! Editors love feedback!
Last month's question: What methods do you use to control pacing in your writing?
Replies:
Quick-Quill  : When I read of an incident in a family memoir, I couldn't let the idea go? Why? Why? did this happen? After asking permission to use just the incident I wrote my own version of that story. It drove me. I've never felt that way about a story since. Why? I had to punch up the story to write it so the reader didn't feel they were slogging along while I set it up. Then rein it in when the action burst out at the climax and still pace it to the ending. Will I ever find another story like that? I'm struggling to write. Trying to pace the new story. What if I'm a one hit wonder?
Thanks for your reply! |
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Short Stories: April 03, 2019 Issue [#9475]
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