Bonus Room
My parents once discovered an attic “bonus room” which had been walled off when their house was built. They remodeled it, converting the room into a guest suite.
I was taking a nap there one afternoon when a couple came in to look at the house. They circled below uncertainly before finally discovering the string for the pull-down staircase. But I countered by quickly grabbing the hatch from the other end. Speaking through the bright crack on the floor, I said, I'm sorry, but if you buy this house, you aren’t getting a bonus.
How Do You Spell That?
One gang member asks another, a graffiti artist, to write his nickname, “Robin Hood,” on the wall of a building for him. The artist just shrugs and spray-paints some random symbols inside a circle. Does that spell “Robin Hood?” The artist shrugs again.
I leave the two of them there and follow some stairs up from the street to a penthouse apartment.
Inside the room, a party is in progress. It is a Republican rally and attendees are writing inspirational slogans on large posters.
George W. Bush comes up to me, paintbrush in hand, and asks, Sir, in your opinion, should the name “Reagan” have an “e” in it?
Disney Princess
Once upon a time, at a Sea World kind of place with a tank full of large aquatic animals -- an orca, several seals, and a shark -- I found myself diving in to entertain an audience.
Then some joker called out in a loud voice that one of the creatures had started attacking. To the crowd’s jeers, I wasted no time in scrambling up the ladder!
I ended up in the stands, still dripping, seated next to a woman whose leg was in a cast. She had just appeared as a Disney princess in an ice show, but now her dream was done and she would have to bus back to her hole-in-the-wall small town.
After some mutual teasing about our failed ventures, we developed a genuine liking for one another. As I looked into her soft eyes, still framed by large faux lashes, I convinced her she would be better off in the city with me. Happily ever after? she asked, batting the lashes.
Well, within reason of course, I replied.
Black Dahlia
A surrealist artist was selecting models for his work. It consisted of human subjects fitted out with tubes to look like pipe organs. The tubes jutted out of different areas of the body and were color-coded to represent different anatomical systems: respiratory, circulatory, lymphatic, etc. But this artist had gone mad and was literally turning his models into victims, putting them into a trance and removing body parts.
One model awoke from her state of suspended animation and began shrieking before the artist had quite finished his operation. He just laughed, picked a yellow pipe up off the table, lifted it to his lips, and blew a crazy note through it.
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M.V. Montgomery's most recent collection of fiction is called Circle, Triangle, Square (NAP Publishing) and you can download it here.
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