Johannes Punkt’s Flaskpost

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Tag: short stories

26/Aug/2013

The Death of a Half Witch

He was part witch, and quite the charlatan. These days he performed card tricks with only a spark of magic in them, on streetcorners, for loose change and people’s waning attention. He was becoming less impressive, sleeping in an abandoned observatory, wearing the same red-and-black tux every day after having sold the others. Sometimes his bones would creak a sad melody, and he had to pause in the middle of a trick to just breathe.

He was part witch, so he knew how to sleep with one eye open, pressed against the disused telescope. One day he stopped waking up.

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25/Aug/2013

A Vision I Had of You

A cloud loses all its willpower and drops out of the sky, dispersing when it hits the sea like ants dropped on a hot metal floor. The mood of the weather is this: depressed. Even the stars seem to droop, lingering for longer than they have to in the paling sky. You’re standing on the beach where it is actually too cold to be barefoot, but you’re letting the ice-cold water lap at your feet as your legs slowly sink into the sand. You stand triumphant. You become a monument. Trumpets sound, and the sunrise cleaves you neatly in half.

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24/Aug/2013

This Bartender, Always

This bartender always gives me slightly more liquor than I ask for, I like that about her.

Today, the bank was robbed by three men in gruesome clown masks. They were counting on us remembering nothing but their masks. But without the distraction of facial muscles contorting and sweat beads forming, I noticed verything about him, the man with the gun pressed against my cheek. Mustard stain on the tie. Egyptian cotton shirt. The leather shoes. Tomorrow I will let the police know all that I know, and receive a protection detail. Tonight, this bartender will get me very drunk.

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23/Aug/2013

Urban Legend

If you find yourself in a certain park at night, there will be a man in a black trenchcoat, standing on a tree stump, holding out his arms. You can ask to buy ‘product’ off him, and he will take your money and leave and you will stand there feeling stupid.

Three days later, when you’ve forgotten all about the incident and moved on, you will wake up with the urge to look yourself in the mirror. It’s dark so your pupils have dilated, and you can see what’s inside them.

Don’t do that; it will know that you’re there.

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22/Aug/2013

Quarantine

There is a giant circus-like tent hanging over it, ridiculously. See-through plastic windows have been clumsily sewed to the sides. Red graffiti tags adorn the hemline. The ship’s been out there twenty-nine days now, a stone’s throw from the harbour, and officially we need to wait another eleven days. There are no faces staring out at us from the windows, we know we need to burn it on the fortieth day, and we are anxious to. But rules are rules. On the forty-first, the ship will shrug its sheets off, hoist its ropes up, unfurl its cloth and sail away.

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21/Aug/2013

Crimes of Style

Every criminal shall be fitted with a new conscience, as their old one must be malfunctioning. This will make them feel properly awful if they attempt to commit an immoral or unlawful act; this feeling will spill over to certain acts of buying or appreciating “bad” brands. If, despite these measures, a criminal is caught committing more crimes, they will be fitted with a new moral and aesthetic compass, which will let them better discern what is “right” and also what is “cool.” If trends change, the implant will gradually change the brain.

You may also volunteer for this treatment.

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20/Aug/2013

The World Shatters

The world shatters, no piece larger than a clenched fist is allowed to be. The world was awful and big. I am tiny, I can fit inside a suitcase, I can make myself smaller, I can fit inside your pocket. They left the moon alone. The big dark looming shadow of the planet is no longer upon its visage, every night is the full moon, and I can see all the new pockmarks and craters. Micro-scopic. I have to learn them anew. I am floating in space, unfolding myself, gravitating toward the moon. I would like to think I am.

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19/Aug/2013

Red Clown Nose

He is very adamant that he be allowed to keep the red nose on for his passport photo and he starts crying. He ignores that the tears do not smear his make-up one bit. He claims between gulps of air that this nose is part of his religion, his culture, part of his twelve steps. But he knows it is just for play. Like there is a strict line between what is for real and what is for play. He is worried that if he takes the red nose off, the black-purple around his eyes won’t come off with it.

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18/Aug/2013

Tribal

If you scan deep enough, deeper than where the blood comes from, you will see where the ink spills out. It finds its creases and grooves, and it flows down the inside of your skin until it reaches your ankles, where it fades out.

If you look at the sky, you will see where the ink runs, you will see patterns in the criss-cross, and you will know the names of the brightest lights.

Everybody’s blood is the same colour. However –

You and I stare at the sky the same way, we have the same tattoos hidden under our skin.

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17/Aug/2013

Statue

There is a statue in Whale Park, inconveniently placed right next to a big wall like some shady dealer. It has too many teeth and they are all too sharp for something that supposedly is modelled on a human being. The statue tells me about my future, if I ask it, two truths about my future plus one lie. It’s always one line about my family, one about money, and one about love.

And I guess this is me, hedging my bets that the one about love was right, because I can’t control my father’s heartrot. Will you marry me?

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