Category Archives: Writing

Short Story of the Day, Flash Fiction, Drive by R. M. Janoe

Posted on by Bill Chance

“I come to a red light, tempted to go through it, then stop once I see a billboard sign that I don’t remember seeing and I look up at it. All it says is ‘Disappear Here’ and even though it’s probably an ad for some resort, it still freaks me out a little and I step on the gas really hard and the car screeches as I leave the light.”

― Bret Easton Ellis, Less Than Zero

Wrecked Car waiting for the decision – scrap or repair

From my blog (I called it an “Online Journal” then), The Daily Epiphany, Sunday, December 16, 2001, Twenty Years ago today

Driving and cussing

The directions were bad.

I hate diving. I hate driving in North Texas. I hate driving in North Texas in the dark. I hate driving in North Texas in the dark and the rain. I hate driving in North Texas in the dark and the rain and at Christmas time….

…especially when I’m lost.

The rain poured down – making the dark streets slick and murky, smearing the windshield, making me run the defogger ’til the car heated up like a steam room.

The traffic was horrible – endless lines of cars reduced to smears of white lights on the right, red on the left. Who are these people? Where are they all going? How can they possibly all move so quickly, honking and passing – making high-speed lane changes a way of life, so aggressive – and still miss each other? How can they all miss me?

The panic and fear welled up – especially with my son in the back seat. Driving with a child in the car is different than driving alone, at least for me. Images of disaster have to be fought back and down. Nick started out whining ’cause I wouldn’t turn up the radio loud enough when his favorite songs came on the teeny-bopper station he insists on. As we descended the concentric rings of hell I began to curse, muttering, “Shit” or yelling “Cut it OUT, motherfucker” at some honking jerk in a pickup assholing his way into the stream. I don’t usually cuss like that and Nick picked up on it, even saying stuff like, “That’s all right Dad, it’s not your fault.”

We were lost along Highway 75 in Plano – the cold dark heart of consumer America – writhing in its pre-Christmas, last-minute, gift-giving, feeding frenzy. The roads are lined with massive strips of big-box retailers – suburban SUVs and giant pickup trucks swarming like ants on spilt honey. I had the name of the place and the address, but nothing along the highway even had numbers on it. I went inside a Party City store and asked for directions but nobody knew where the place we were going was exactly, though one guy thought is was on the other side of the freeway. Out we went, once more into the breach, with me muttering, “How he hell are we supposed to get over there?“

As I waited at a stop sign on a branch to the feeder to the frontage road leading to the freeway I watched a giant pickup truck whip out into a fast U-turn at the same time the car next to me shot into a daring left. Neither one was watching – neither one saw the other.

To me the amazing thing about a car crash is the sound. There’s the quick squeal of rubber on pavement – the prelude. At first impact there is a double whack of metal on metal with the concurrent crunch of panels caving in. Next comes the unholy whine of steel scraping against itself and the groan of heavy members deforming. In a second the cacophony is done, leaving only an echo in the mind and maybe a little tinkle of glass still showering the street.

The pickup and the sedan moved together off to my right and disappeared into the murk, leaving only a solitary hubcap rolling on its own, strangely peaceful in the yellow glow of my headlights.

I pulled out and continued on my quest – nobody else seemed to have even seen the accident.

And a piece of flash fiction for today:

Drive by R. M. Janoe

From Flash Fiction Magazine

R. M. Janoe Facebook

Sunday Snippet, It’s You by Bill Chance

Posted on by Bill Chance

That man’s silence is wonderful to listen to.

—-Thomas Hardy

My Toshiba Netbook – rode my bike to a coffee shop.

It’s You

I was behind in my work – the magazine needed some short fiction from me – so it was a good thing I was able to get in my usual Saturday morning two hours of writing at Starbucks.

The voyeurism of overheard conversations at that Starbucks on Saturday morning was fun, interesting, and sometimes a creativity starter. It seemed that there was a penchant for confession – people came to the coffee shop to own up to the sins they had committed on Friday night. Lately, the quality of the conversation overheard at nearby tables has been slack but today it was fairly good.

Behind me two guys were having a long one-sided discussion. When I first sat down one said in a clear voice, “I still love you, and I hope we can still be friends, but there are issues.” I thought this would be really juicy, but it turned out to be a discussion about friction within a local Baptist church.

I could not help it, I had to look. Twisting in my seat I pretended to gaze at the board that displayed the coffee selections but I was really glancing at the two guys talking – well, the one guy talking and the other taking the abuse. I noticed there was another coffee-drinker sitting close to them – she wasn’t pretending, she was staring.

While I wrote, I listened to this guy go on for over an hour. The other guy was leaving the church and the talker wanted him to stay, I guess. The talker was the kind of person I want to bitch-slap. He thought he was a good talker – but he was a terrible listener, which is very important for a church person. He never shut up; never let the other guy get a word in edgewise.

I was able to make out a list of all the people associated with the guy’s church and their failings, weaknesses, and shortcomings. He complained how nobody ever stuck to his or her course, nobody was “a stand-up guy,” and how people were leaving for the big Baptist churches in Rockwall and Garland. He kept saying how the “church world” is the same as “the business world,” and would expound at length on his ideas and theories for expansion and success. He kept using phrases like “fundamental commitment to leadership.” I thought about how he bloviated about a church for over an hour and never mentioned God, Christ, or Faith.

Then, suddenly, a loud screech of a weighted chair rudely scraped across a stained concrete Starbucks floor, a breeze of motion and a gap of very loud silence.

I whipped around to see what was going on. The woman that had been sitting near them had slid her chair back, jumped up, and advanced on the men. She was red as a beet. She began to yell.

“Hey! Dude! It’s you! It’s you! It’s you! They can’t stand you, you run the place, you tell everybody what to do; you don’t listen to what they need… what they want – what the hell do you expect!”

“Excuse me?” the guy creaked out.

“Excuse me? Excuse me! Excuse the fuck you! I’ve been listening to… No, no, I haven’t been listening, I’ve been sitting here trying to enjoy my coffee, the high point of my week, and your bile and self-serving crap has been pouring over me. You are ruining my day! People like you… Men like you are ruining my whole life!”

The man made some quiet clucking noises while the entire coffee shop broke out in applause. The woman stormed out while the two men sat in shoulder-hunched silence.

I clapped a bit myself – but I never said anything. I had a short story to write.

Short Story of the Day, Flash Fiction, Mr. Burley by T Kira Madden

Posted on by Bill Chance

“I have never created anything in my life that did not make me feel, at some point or another, like I was the guy who just walked into a fancy ball wearing a homemade lobster costume.”

― Elizabeth Gilbert, Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear

Trilobites

From my blog (I called it an “Online Journal” then), The Daily Epiphany, Sunday, April 25 1999

Tourist Day

Today was a day to be a tourist

I even went out for breakfast. A local southern-fried kind of place. Grits for breakfast with iced tea so sweet it makes your teeth ache. In Texas tea is served in big plastic tumblers, free refills, no sugar unless you put it in yourself and watch the crystals fall bouncing off mountains of ice cubes. Someone here asked our Carolina waitress if they had unsweetened tea and she looked like she’d been hit in the back of the head.

Then we were off to the area’s biggest attraction, the Battleship North Carolina . It was an interesting visit. The ship is very well preserved and a lot of work is done on the upkeep. A lot of the below deck areas are accessible and this might be the most interesting part; seeing how the daily life on the ship was done. We toured sleeping quarters, stacks of folding canvas bunks, giant kitchens, huge steam pots, dining rooms, post office, movie projector, convenience store, heads. An entire city below decks, behind armor plate.

Up above though, that illusion of a busy but tranquil life is destroyed. Crawl into a cramped gun turret and it isn’t hard to conjure the image of young men, still teenagers, fresh off the Iowa farms, crammed into the steel chambers. Humid air, hot South Pacific sun beating, heating the metal. Tremendous loud sound as the guns fire. Zeros drone overhead, dive suicide toward the ship. Anti-aircraft crews pray a shell will find its way as they stare straight into the onrushing enemy. Imagine the smell of fear sweat as every one goes about their job wondering if the bombs will hit the ship, if the armor will hold.

I’m thankful that I could simply walk off, over a gangplank and through the gift shop. Thankful I could sit for awhile on a bench. Thankful the most dangerous thing around was Charlie, the semi-tame local alligator trying to soak up some spring sun.

That evening we all went out to a regular dinner at the Marina’s Edge, a local seafood emporium. The food was excellent, I had Jerked Mahi Mahi, nice and spicy.

They did have something at the restaurant I hadn’t seen. You know those games where you put money in and a crane will move over and you try to get a piece of candy or a prize? They had one there, but it was mounted over a live lobster tank. It was called The Lobster Zone . Put in two dollars, use the crane to try and grab a live lobster. If you caught it, you eat it. Pretty weird .

I’m not surprised, but the animal rights folks aren’t too happy about this.

And a piece of flash fiction for today:

Mr. Burley by T Kira Madden

From The Rumpus.net

T Kira Madden Homepage

T Kira Madden Twitter

Sunday Snippet, The Dream Screen by Bill Chance

Posted on by Bill Chance

“That which is dreamed can never be lost, can never be undreamed.”

― Neil Gaiman, The Wake

Dallas Heritage Village

The Dream Screen

All his life, Sam could never remember his dreams – he would wake up with a vague feeling of frustration and discontent, but whatever was causing it would fade so fast he could never get his mind around it. For the last month, however, he had been having the same… or rather similar… dreams and they haunted him all day long. The dreams were especially bothering him because in the dream he was lying in his own bed, just like he was in real life. That made the line between dream and reality blurred and Sam was afraid that he would lose track on which side he was on.

When he was a child his parents had insisted he sleep on his back, arms at his sides, under a smoothly made sheet and comforter. They would pop into his room several times a night and if he had turned on his side or mussed his covers, they would wake him, berate him, and make him set everything back as it was.

“If you are to be organized and follow the rules while you are awake, you must follow them while you are asleep,” they would tell him.

And the training worked. For a half-century he slept on his back, with his arms at his sides, without tossing or turning.

But now, in his dream, he was on his side, with one hand extended holding a wireless track ball. In front of his face, glowing in the dark, was a screen – a tablet of some sort – with the internet on it. He couldn’t see what was holding the tablet up, but it stayed steady, almost filling his field of vision. He could use the trackball and its buttons to move around the internet, but he didn’t seem to be able to decide what to watch – his hands did if for him.

He told his grief counselor about the dreams.

“Is it disturbing to you?”

“Not during the dream itself. It bothers me when I wake up.”

“Why?”

“I don’t like not being under control. And now, I’ve been waking up in the same position, with my arm out, cradling an unseen object.”

“Why does that bother you.”

“It is so unorganized.”

His grief counselor was a doctor and he gave Sam a prescription to take before bed. Sam was certain that it was some sort of a placebo, but he took it anyway. It didn’t help.

When his counselor asked him what appeared on the screen, Sam obscured the reality and gave a deceitful answer.

In truth, the screen was showing, forcing him to choose, a very specific set of scenes. The screen was replaying moments from his life, some short, some longer. Some of these scenes were events in his past that he thought about often, but most were episodes that he didn’t consciously remember, until the dream screen showed them to him, and he they would arise from the depths of his memory, suddenly clear as day.

He remembered all these scenes after he woke. Even the ones he had previously forgotten, became a big part of his life, anew.

Sam finally decided to open up to his counselor. “Are these disturbing scenes, fearsome events, that you have subdued in your memory?” his grief counselor asked.

“No, quite the opposite. They are the little golden moments of my life. The happiest times. Most are not any big deal – as a matter of fact, when they happened I usually didn’t even understand their importance. It wasn’t until later, or even until the dream-screen brings them back, that I realize how happy and meaningful they are.”

“Well, Sam,” his grief counselor said, “I think your subconscious is simply bringing back the best memories of your past to give you some relief from the awful terror of the present. Maybe it is reminding you that things were better once, and maybe, they can be again.”

Sam nodded his head. He was being polite – he knew the grief counselor was wrong.

As time went by, Sam became used to the dreams. He bought an expensive pillow designed for people that slept on their sides so he would be less sore when he woke up. Sam began to sleep longer and longer until his day was made up of sleeping with only a quick meal and other necessities that he rushed through in order to lay back down and enter the world of his dream-screen as quickly as he could.

Sam was amazed at how many wonderful, tiny things had happened during his life. He knew that his supply had ended, however, there would be no new ones. Eventually, the scenes began to repeat. He realized he was watching something the dream screen had showed him before.

The second… and third… times through the memories were not as happy, they somehow faded with each showing. That was when Sam realized that his time was growing short.

Short Story of the Day, Flash Fiction, A Time There Was by Hastings Kidd

Posted on by Bill Chance

“A bone to the dog is not charity. Charity is the bone shared with the dog, when you are just as hungry as the dog.”

― Jack London

Bark Park Central Deep Ellum Dallas, Texas

From my blog (I called it an “Online Journal” then), The Daily Epiphany, Monday, March 11, 2002

Back

Driving back, I had a choice of several routes. Not really country but not city, the area is dominated by tony horse ranches (complete with billboards advertising the best quality of equine semen) interspersed with developments complete with gigantic Tudor-style mansions surrounded by acres of rolling lawn and artificial ponds. I saw one guy riding a four-wheel ATV down to his mailbox to get the afternoon missives.

Checking the radio reports, the traffic in the city sounded nasty – with rush hour building. The helicopter reporter called in a handful of accidents – all right along my route home. So I decided to keep moving outside the city, going east through McKinney on to Farmersville. It’s farther that way, but at least I was able to avoid the city traffic, which I didn’t really want to fight pulling the popup.

It really was a nice drive, getting a little tour of the countryside north of the Metroplex.

And a piece of flash fiction for today:

A Time There Was by Hastings Kidd

from Flash Fiction Online

Sunday Snippet, Mall from Hell by Bill Chance

Posted on by Bill Chance

“Civilized life, you know, is based on a huge number of illusions in which we all collaborate willingly. The trouble is we forget after a while that they are illusions and we are deeply shocked when reality is torn down around us.”

― J.G. Ballard

Toad Corner, Dallas Arboretum

Mall from Hell

He dreams of a shopping mall from hell
At the center, the intersection of walkways
Is a lobotomy kiosk
Crowned with a shiny silver
Ball peen hammer
Youths with untied shoes
Line up in front of the food court
Where the famous
Deep Fried Toad Dicks on toothpicks
Are cooked and served up by
Lolita in a paper hat

Sunday Snippet, Insomnia by Bill Chance

Posted on by Bill Chance

“How to Commit the Perfect Murder” was an old game in heaven. I always chose the icicle: the weapon melts away.”

― Alice Sebold, The Lovely Bones

8 50 Caliber Machine Guns, Commemorative Air Force, Wings Over Dallas

Insomnia

I ride the trains at night. I can’t sleep and I have a monthly pass, so why not.

It was almost three in the morning and I was sitting on the Darkwater platform on one of those little seats that fold down.

There was a maintenance worker, a tired looking old man, washing the platform with a faded green hose. He pretended not to notice me and I pretended not to notice him.

The thief came from nowhere, pulled a gun on the maintenance man, and demanded in a loud and obscene voice that he hand over his cell phone.

He did hand it over, without hesitation. I was thinking how big of a loss this was to him, how many platforms he would have to hose down to buy a new phone when the thief shot him, twice, and he went down in a quickly expanding pool of blood.

The thief turned and ran down the stairs. I followed, not slowly but not running either. At street level I saw the thief disappear down an alley between two dilapidated brick industrial buildings. I followed.

The thief was waiting for me. He was yelling something at me – but I couldn’t make out the words. His gun was big – I recognized it as a Glock 21 forty-five caliber. It was a real hand cannon and it was pointed at me.

My Walther PPK 9mm dropped from the holster in my sleeve into my hand. It is a lot smaller than his Glock. But I am practiced, very fast, and I never miss.

Short Story of the Day, Flash Fiction, How Difficult by Lydia Davis

Posted on by Bill Chance

“If your kid needs a role model and you ain’t it, you’re both fucked.”

― George Carlin, Brain Droppings

Window sign, Tattoo Parlor, Deep Ellum, Dallas, Texas

From my blog (I called it an “Online Journal” then), The Daily Epiphany, Wednesday, November 7, 2001 – a smidge over twenty years ago:

Feng Shui

The other day we were driving around, talking about this and that, complimenting someone (I don’t remember who) on their house and how it was decorated.
Lee piped up from the back seat, “I like that house, it’s very Feng Shui!”
“What did you say?” Candy asked.
“It’s very Feng Shui,” Lee replied.

Where does a nine-year-old learn about Feng Shui? It was a bit of a shock to hear a little kid use that term.

“It’s from Doctor Dolittle Two,” Lee said.

And a piece of flash fiction for today:

How Difficult by Lydia Davis

from fwriciton

A cartoon version of How Difficult

Short Story of the Day, Flash Fiction, Keeping an Eye on You by Robert Garner McBrearty

Posted on by Bill Chance

“But the thought of being a lunatic did not greatly trouble him; the horror was that he might also be wrong.”

― George Orwell, 1984

My bicycle locked up to the TRex in Exposition Park, Dallas, Texas

From my blog (I called it an “Online Journal” then), The Daily Epiphany, Friday, January 31, 1997

Real dinosaurs

I’ve been thinking about Lee at the Dinosaur play we went to last week. Thinking about the start of the second act when the dinosaur, the three-horn, the Triceratops, no- the actor, no- the actress wearing the Triceratops costume emerged from the rear of the theater and moved down our very own aisle, making dinosaur-type noises (what kind of noise does a dinosaur make?) and glaring and gesticulating at all the enthralled children.

Lee was grinning, smiling, waving back with a little half wave. His radiant face was plastered with an unbelievable expression, one of absolute wonder and amazement, he looked like, well, he looked like he had seen a dinosaur. In the play, the protagonist (a paleontologist) and her daughter had traveled back in time by way of an incantation the daughter intoned. They ended up at the very nest of the dinosaur whose remains (egg shells and bones) they had been unearthing at the beginning of the play.

Lee knew this wasn’t a real dinosaur, he knew it was an actor inside an attractive, but not very realistic dinosaur suit. What was it? A Dinosaur or an Actor? What’s the difference? None to him. As an adult I, of course, hold no illusions of it being real, I could tell that, not only was it not a dinosaur, it was evenone of the other actors in the play, an actress, the actress playing the museum president. Actress-Dinosaur, ThreeHorn-Triceratops, DinoActress-MuseumPresidentActress, which is it?, which is real? and which is the illusion?

Children accept the fact that for all practical purposes there is no distinction between fantasy and reality. Adults forget, or choose to ignore this fact.

No difference you say? Reality and fantasy, no distinction? Run across this street then and get hit by that cross-town bus, there’s your distiction.

Yeah, that bus is real, all right, I think we can agree on that point. But why did it hit me? Bad luck? Destiny? Did the Tarot cards predict this?

“Yes, I can see it now, the cards will predict your future. You have drawn the Greyhound Card, along with the Hanged Man. I predict you will be smacked by the Lexington Avenue Cross-Town bus at seven thirty AM June 23rd 1998, after leaving Starbucks, looking at your watch, trying to catch the train.The bus will have an ad on the side, for Tyrone’s Seafood (Plate O’ Shrimp – $4.99), the driver’s name is Roger Slothrop.”

“But that can’t be true! I don’t even drink coffee!”

Our daily struggles we blame on the stars, on our parents, on the government, but who is to blame?

I suppose we need to watch out for that bus, but it would sure be nice to be able to pay for a ticket to the children’s theater and get to see a real dinosaur.

And a piece of flash fiction for today:

Keeping an Eye on You by Robert Garner McBrearty

from Flash Fiction Magazine

Robert Garner McBrearty Webpage

Sunday Snippet, No Throwing the Corn by Bill Chance

Posted on by Bill Chance

“You spend your whole life stuck in the labyrinth, thinking about how you’ll escape one day, and how awesome it will be, and imagining that future keeps you going, but you never do it. You just use the future to escape the present.”

― John Green, Looking for Alaska

On the way to Toad Corners

No Throwing the Corn

Amanda found an article in the newspaper about some guy that had cut a series of mazes into his cornfield, about a half -hour east of the city – and was charging folks to walk around and get lost. It sounded like fun, so we bundled the kids and a friend up and headed out of town.

It was getting late, the sun was setting as we pulled up. It was a fun place, although everyone was tired and grumpy.

They have a number of mazes. One made out of hay bale tunnels – with instructions posted on the hay. It’s more of a puzzle than a maze. Then there are three labyrinths made up of fencing right near the parking lot. Jim liked those the best.

The main attraction, though, are the two labyrinths cut into the cornfield itself. They are huge, covering about a square mile or so. One maze is more twisty and complicated, the other more open, with long straightaways.

The rules are simple: no running, no pulling the corn, no picking the corn, no throwing the corn, no cutting through the corn. The smell of the ripe, dry cornfield was wonderful.

I can’t speak much of what it looked like because by the time we hit the cornfield maze the night was pitch black. A lot of people were in the maze had flashlights and/or glow sticks – plus some light (and noise) filtered across the freeway from the drag races going on there.

It was fun, wandering around in the dark, dodging the clumps of screaming kids (many ignoring the rule about no running), and trying to figure out the overall layout of the corn. It was easy to get truly lost, especially in the dark. There are clues to help you find your way out, plus a lot of workers in there checking on the customers… though we never needed any help – simply a lot of walking.

It took us about forty minutes to get through the Phase I maze – we probably walked two miles or so. Jim’s knee was aching, so he sat it out while Amy and I made it through Phase II a little quicker.

The kids kept getting frustrated in the maze when we would hit a dead end or realize we were at a spot we had passed before. I told them not to be so bothered, to relax and keep moving. “You have to walk down the wrong paths to find the right ones,” was my fatherly-zen advice.

They groaned at that.