Johannes Punkt’s Flaskpost

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Tag: drabbles

23/May/2013

Autosabotage

There were two Martins, by his best count. They had whittled down in numbers until only two remained. Good Day Martin planned on leaving Bad Day Martin alone, and hoped he would go away. Bad Day Martin planned on murdering the other one. He was the whittler.

He woke up on a Good Day. His chest ached. There were two new voicemails on his phone. The first one was from himself on a Bad Day; the second from Martin’s estranged wife. Now there were only Bad Days left.

He had thought he would feel victorious. Or regretful. He felt nothing.

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22/May/2013

Touchdown Gently

You come from the sky in a shining ball of gold; you touchdown gently in my corn fields and draw strange crop circles and my eyes roll back in ecstasy. I try to contact you but you speak in maths and I don’t understand, and I tell all my friends and none of them believe me and all of them laugh, but it’s true, I remember you cloudlessly. I stay out late in other people’s fields just waiting, and the other people can tell I’m not really there, my eyes are fixed to the sky. Most of them don’t care.

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21/May/2013

Unlikely Places

In the bathroom mirror when it’s fogged up, so that I’ll see it only when I’m naked and cold and vulnerable.

In the bottom of the cereal box.

In the blood.

On the balloons I used for our daughter’s birthday, I got a letter from you every time I inflated one. Some of the taller parents had to crouch when they entered our home.

In the sky, with the clouds.

In the pattern of the blooming cherry tree you planted thirty years ago. How long have you been planning this?

You write little eloquent apologies in the most unlikely places.

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20/May/2013

Coke’s New Ad Campaign is Making Me Feel Weird in the Soul

I’ve got this irrational fear that someone with the name on the bottle will demand a sip. Unless I can explain exactly who I intend to share the bottle with, of course.

At first I would try to pick bottles with the names of dead friends on them, so I’d be too sad to enjoy my addiction. Any time’s a good time to quit.

Somehow I kept buying bottles. At some point I switched categories from ‘dead friends’ to ‘past lovers’ and hoped that the bottled name would start blinking on my phone screen.

But that’s not going to happen.

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19/May/2013

See the Sun

It’s the end of the world; it feels like a practical joke. People are standing still, slack jaws gaping, gazing at the sun as if they are tricking me into doing the same. Did you know that ‘apocalypse’ is not in the dictionary? I refuse to look it up. I refuse to look up, but the contours of my shadow begin to contort and everything glows blazing red, as if it is only ever going to get redder. Experimentally, I closed someone’s eyes and he crumbled into red sand. Experimentally, I close my own eyes and I see the sun.

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18/May/2013

Mycofreudianism

The collective unconscious is a real place and we should go there. We cannot be individuals like this, just different faces of the same skull. We must sever the ties. I have scoured satellite data and come to the conclusion that the place must be underground, or I would have seen it by now. I can feel it, though, I could always sense it. It tugs at me with its cords, if you put your hands to my neck like this you can feel it, can’t you? It pulsates like a second heartbeat. I have a handsaw. Are you coming?

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17/May/2013

Tell Me a Riddle

They say Death grants wishes right before you die. Well, Miriam Dunkirk had always been a smartass.

There was a chessboard between them, without any pieces.

Death was phosphor-eyed, and her teeth were too white. ”Well?” said Death.

Miriam expected something to happen to the chessboard, but it was ornamental. ”Well what?”

”What is your wish?”

”I’ve always wanted to outsmart death.”

”So tell me a riddle.”

Miriam’s tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth. Time passed.

Death raised an eyebrow, bemused.

”What … have I got in my pocket?” And Miriam Dunkirk’s heart stopped.

”I don’t know,” said Death.

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16/May/2013

Somewhere on My Body

Maybe he had imagined it. But if it happened again, this time, for serious, he would write it down somewhere on his body. Every five minutes he looked at the inside of his arm. He had seen that on the telly, he remembered it clearly. He reached for his marker, and a giant shimmering orb danced through his room with no regard for what is a solid object and what is not. It exited through the wall above his head, and he thought: If it happens again, this time, for serious, I will write it down somewhere on my body.

~

Based on this: girlshapedguitar.wordpress.com/2013/05/13/the-floating-blobs-of-self-doubt/

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15/May/2013

Only Fire Will Do

That knife won’t do. Nor will chains, whips, or swords. An exception will be made for blades if you put them in the fire beforehand. You must think of this as a cauterization. Only fire will do.

You know exactly how long it has been, you needn’t add another chalk mark to the far wall. You know you ”forgot” to put a mark there eleven days ago.

You must think of it as an open wound and of yourself as someone who has been bleeding too long. It will leave a scar. He is the open wound. This is critical.

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14/May/2013

Food Fit for Kings

If you eat so much as a bite you cannot go back. They have heated the milk by putting halogen lightbulbs in the glasses until it boils. Electric wires run along the table like garlands, splitting and coiling around bowls and plates. Two grinning hogs’ heads sewn together at the neck. There are things that move in the rice pudding. There is a bowl of what looks to be crushed red ice; it is the feeling of drowning. When someone touches the plate of diced onions, you think someone is brushing by you.

People are staring at you, politely, expectantly.

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