November 13, 2010

• Scattered Story #1

  10:59 PM, 11/12/10
  He paused, out of breath, scarcely able to believe that the hut he had sought for so long was before him. Crossing the clearing, he put his hand on the door and gently pushed it open. Just as the dream had foretold, he saw the old man with the long white beard, seated at the table.

  "Father," he started, then stopped, unsure of the proper mode of address.
  The old man looked at him with a bemused twinkle in his eye. "Yes, yes, Father will do quite nicely. I get one or two of you lads each week. What is it you want?"
  He started slowly, but his rapidly pumping heart sped every word faster and faster.
  "Father, fast-forward this year for me, I beg you. Make this year disappear, and may my body collect the scars and flab of another year without my mind being awake to taste each moment. Let me awake to find him still alive, to find her a year older and finally wiser, to find it in better shape than when I left it. I just need this year to pass from me. Spare me from these torturous days, from these memories that so torture me now but will be but dust and cobwebs this time next year. Give me this, Father, I pray thee!"
  "Well, you certainly are an unusual young man," the old man said thoughtfully. "Most young men plead to be sent back in time so that they can be reunited with some young lady they fancy. Of course, being young men, they find a way to mess it up yet again. But I haven't seen a young man ask to be sent forward in quite some time."
  "You'll do it, then!" the young man exulted, rising from his formerly kneeling position. "Oh, thank you, F..."
  The old man interrupted. "Oh, just one moment, young fellow. I will send you exactly to the place and time your heart most desires, confused though you may be." The old man got up and rummaged his hand along the top of a nearby cabinet. He grabbed what seemed to be a little box and sat back down. "Here is a gift for you, young man" he said. "It has a special name."
  "What is..." the young man began to inquire, when suddenly the old man reared back his arm. "It's called THE PRESENT!" the old man shouted, and threw the box at the young man's head, knocking him backward against the door of the hut, which opened and spilled the young man outside.
  11:00 PM, 11/12/10
  The young man started, and realized that he should go to bed instead of writing stories solely designed as vehicles for ridiculously silly wordplays. Good night all.
  EDIT: Yes, the joke is that the old man is Father Time, and the young man must live in the present, not the past or future. I didn't want to belabor that point too much, so I was a little vague about it.

  • 4:10 pm
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