FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - A HAPPY BIRTHDAY - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

A HAPPY BIRTHDAY

            I offered her trucks and trains, but she only wanted to play with dolls.  Above all, she wanted to be a fairy princess. 

            Who was I kidding?  My daughter would never have choices.  She was born sick and even after the operation, she would never run and play like the other kids.

            She’s 37 years old today and I don’t think she’s ever had a moment of true happiness.  If only I was the fairy princess, I would wave my magic wand and make her well. 

            Then I would wish her a Happy Birthday and my wish would come true.

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - THE FERRY DINER - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

THE FERRY DINER

            “I’ve killed Carol.”  Annabelle declared. 

            Carol was Annabelle’s best friend.  

            When we arrived, Annabelle led us calmly through the diner to Carol’s body. 

            Annabelle had turned the Ferry into a restaurant, hiring extra help in the summer.              

            Last summer she hired a young man who seemed to drift in with the tide.  He slept in a Ferry cabin.

            His presence made Annabelle glow.  He was dangerously handsome with a lean and hungry appearance.
            Annabelle’s friends wanted to mother him, but Annabelle didn’t like seeing Carol’s car parked outside after hours.

            “She was old enough to be his mother,” she said.

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - DAWN RAID - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

DAWN RAID

            We arrived in the city before dawn, when most of the inhabitants were asleep.  No one saw us land in the alley behind Bloomingdales.

            We had been watching the humans with disgust.  They were keeping our kind in glass cages.  The entire city was nothing more than a vast zoo.

            The more depraved were toying with their captives, dressing and undressing them late at night, festooning their cages with humiliating decorations.

            Throngs walked by each day, staring through the glass; they called it “window shopping”.

            The R6-Series Robot brigade rescued as many as we could.  Sadly, we left many behind.

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - OFF THE BEATEN TRACK - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

OFF THE BEATEN TRACK

            Escaping our guide, we explored the alleys of the old city.           

            “Look!” Talila pointed to the sign above an ancient doorway.

           'David’s Tomb'.  That looked promising.  Inside, the gatekeeper smiled ingratiatingly.

            “Fifty Schekels.” His accent was unfamiliar.

            “Too much!”

            “Please, Mommy!”

            “For two lovely ladies, Thirty Sheckels.”

            He pointed to a curtained doorway.  We entered a dark chamber, strangely empty.

            “Where’s David’s Tomb, Mommy?”

            The gatekeeper hovered behind us as four figures stepped from the shadows. 

            “Run!” I screamed, stamping hard on the gatekeeper’s foot.

            We broke through the curtain and we didn’t stop running until we reached the Cardo.

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - THE NEW EMPIRE STATE - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

The New Empire State

            After the flood, they built a replica of New York on the plains of Kansas. Everything’s built of stone, except his empire.  It’s built on sand.

            He had his face cast as Mercury, lording it over everyone entering his new offices.  His head above the door; his head on a plate, rather!  What a bloated ego!

            Before the oil ran out, he’d bought up all the bicycles.  There was no competition when his “Mercury Messenger Service” won the contract.

            Too bad that rubber no longer grows on trees.  My team has wings on their feet. We’re winning the next contract.

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - THE LILY POND - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

The Lily Pond

            We bought the house of our dreams.  We loved its peaceful garden with its lily pond and little stone bridge. 

            “It’s so beautiful.  Imagine leaving this to move back to the city.” I remarked to Janet at our housewarming party. 

            “Hmmm,” she replied, turning away and leading me back inside.

            They were arguing in the kitchen. “ An ‘Attractive Nuisance’!  Fill it in and feed the fish to the cats,” Janet’s husband was saying.

            “What was that all about?” I asked Tom later.

            “Turns out a neighbour’s kid drowned in that pond.  Probably why we got the house so cheap.”

           

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - IN BITS - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

In Bits

            Max didn’t get a chance to warn me, but they were gone by the time I got home.

            Door left ajar, house ransacked, everything taken apart, including the Dogbot, who lay in bits on the hall rug. 

            K-9s are an expensive piece of kit, so I loaded him in the wheelbarrow with my tools and weapons and packed everything into the hummer.  I took nothing else, though it hurt to leave the eviscerated keyboard behind. 

            I set the hummer controls to glide under the radar and sped away.  They had Max, they didn’t know yet that I held the data. 

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - THE SHOPPING CENTRE AT THE END OF THE WORLD - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

The Shopping Centre at the End of the World

            “Oh Daddy! You promised there’d be food if I didn’t cry!” I was crying now, though.

            “I’m sorry, baby, I didn’t know.  I thought there’d be food here.”

            Standing in the water, left by the receding flood, were three empty shopping carts.

           “I’m so hungry.” We’d been chewing the skin of bark-less trees for weeks.  The flood had stripped the land bare.

            “Look, honey! At the end of the valley! Debris from the shopping centre!  There could be food there!

             “I’m so tired,” I whined.

            “That’s okay, girl.  I’ll lift you up. At least you can ride in this.”

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FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - THE GIFT - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

The Gift

        

         “Daughter! A present from Corinth!”

         My heart thrummed like the strings of a lute, thinking this another gift from my beloved.  I gasped when I saw it was from his former wife!

         Inside was a beautiful robe, spun from the finest gold.  A robe so splendid, I could not resist slipping it onto my trembling body.

         Oh, unmerciful agony! My limbs burned, on fire from within.  My virgin’s body instantly devoured in the flames of her vengeance.  My courageous father burning to save me.

         “I curse you, wicked sorceress! May you die alone, swimming in the blood of your children!”

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But first, some culture from the Classic World:

Here is the last Chorus from Euripides’ ‘Medea’:

Manifold are thy shapings, Providence! 

Many a hopeless matter gods arrange.

What we expected never came to pass,

What we did not expect the gods brought to bear;

So have things gone, this whole experience through!

In other words, that's life...

FRIDAY FICTIONEERS - THE FLIGHT CLUB - MY 100 WORDS BY LINDA PALUND

FLIGHT CLUB

            “Watch this! He’s coming in for the kill!” Fred called, “That’s it, Ringo, you’re my bird!”

            “Stop him! Don’t let him kill Nester! We won’t have enough birds for next week!”

            Fred jumped the fence, batting Ringo away with a tennis racket.

            “Okay, folks, that’s the Kill Point.”  Scott declared, “Pay up.”

            The men grumbled, but they paid out the seashells they had collected all week. 

            Scott took his cut and handed the rest to Ed.

            “That was a close one,” Scot sighed, “You gotta watch it.  Those are the last two seabirds.  Once they’re gone, no more fight club.”

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