Realism

I’m alone this week, so it was nice to meet this friendly little chap while out exploring.

As long as there aren’t more of them, I’m not worried.

I’m almost ready to put The Squared Circle away to let it “breathe” for a month. During that time, I’ll be tackling some short stories that have been waiting to be written/finished. The book cover is also due any day now!

This week’s Main Feature is all about someone who, like me on my walk, may have taken a wrong turn somewhere, while my round up of recommendations includes NOT killling Hitler to cheer you up (#ImaginationNotMedication), and a podcast investigating reports of the supernatural world crashing into ours.

Enjoy!

(And drive safely)

Working Condition
He kept his anxiety medication a secret, which was stressful.

He couldn’t bear the gossip, if people knew: “I bet he only got the job, because he has ‘anxiety.’”

Alan knew what people were like. It was why he was taking tablets.

He worked hard to become branch manager of the bank, because the tablets were expensive, not because he liked the job. What he would have liked to do was sleep.

Just sleep all day.

Obviously, this meant he must be lazy, so he pushed himself hard to compensate for his laziness. The tablets he secretly took helped with the stress of working so hard.

Even his wife called him a workaholic because on weekends he couldn’t lie around in bed with her. He wasn’t, though: he hated work. But he was terrified that if he didn’t force himself to get up now, then he might never get up.

First thing he always did was take a secret tablet while peeing and trying not to think about a photo of the world’s fattest man he’d seen.

Whenever he thought of it, the man had Alan’s face. He looked happy, though, rather than trapped by his own body.

When news of the layoffs came, Alan tried to look as worried as everyone else, but he hoped they might get rid of him, too. He could relax if he had some time off.

Then he realised he wouldn’t have any deadlines or bosses, and would be relying on himself to muster up the energy to arrange job interviews.

He took a sneaky tablet at lunch and worked harder.

He got promoted to the main office and felt bad that he must have taken someone else’s job.

One day, he decided he wouldn’t keep his anxiety a secret anymore. He was high enough up the food chain now, and he could help others. Show them it was nothing to be ashamed of.

Being a role model made him feel good about himself.

But that made him feel bad about feeling good about other people feeling bad.

So he took another tablet.

Oh, and…
Read!

Here are 7 very short sci-fi stories. All free to read online. My favourite is “Wikihistory”. Check them out here!

Listen!

Uncanny is an invetigation of real-life reports of supernatural events from the BBC. I really enjoyed this. I recommend starting with episodes 1, 5 and 15, all of which deal with “The Evil in Room 611”. Listen here!

Look!

I just came across these awesome photoshop collages by Chemical Messiah. I like!

See you next week!

The slogan for this week’s flash fiction is MAGA: “Make Anyone Great Again,” (I’m going to copyright that, so don’t steal it).

But first, let me tell you about this self-help group I came across. Self-help is all the rage these days, and everyone’s doing it. Even people you wouldn’t expect…

Barry always stared at the speaker’s chin. It made it hard for me to gather my thoughts, when it was my turn. Like I was being burdened with the wieght of his attention. But we didn’t judge each other here. Or weren’t supposed to, anyway. We were all equal on the folding chairs arranged in a circle in community centre’s basement.

“My name is Alice, and I’m a serial killer,” said the newcomer to my right. We gave her an encouraging round of applause. It almost felt like we were applauding ourselves: Now, we had two female killers, which made us properly progressive. I’d never been to a group where there was more than one before. “I’ve been killing for over 12 years, and… are you staring at my tits?”

Barry jerked back as if he been given a jolt of electricity, then shook his head.

“I was just listening,” he said.

I could have said something, explained about his chin thing, but we had to learn to live with each other.

Alice killed other women (which felt somehow less progressive.) She was now a headmistress, having started as a substitute teacher.

“My name is Barry,” he said, when it was his turn. He kept his gaze on the ground. “And I’ve been killing for four years.”

“Four years?” scoffed Alice. She wanted to make her mark on the group, but it wasn’t acceptable to judge the other killers. We were all doing our best.

Alice hung around afterwards until Barry left. I hung around to clean away the coffee thermos and chairs, interested to see what she might do. She clearly still believed he had been ogling her, and I could tell what she was thinking.

I’d love to kill you.

But he just wasn’t her type.

If you liked this, I can recommend horror comedy Vicious Fun, which has a similar premise and very enjoyable. Or, if you prefer arty/highbrow films and don’t require entertainment, then check out the fantastic The Hours Of The Day, which I thought was fantastic.

We get up close and personal in this week’s piece of flash fiction. Sorry!

The TV studio lights were too hot. After 20 minutes, the sweat on my forehead was ready to breach the make-up caked on my skin.

Finally, they allowed the audience to ask their questions, after which I could escape to the dark backstage.

A man in a loose, brown suit, one which no longer fit, accepted the microphone from a girl in a short skirt and blonde hair which fanned down her back.

When he cleared his throat, I knew I was in trouble.

“How did you get the idea for your book?” he asked.

I gave him the usual answer about finding inspiration everywhere.

“No,” he said. “It’s my idea. How did you get it? I never showed it to anyone.”

The audience laughed uncomfortably. The man held up a scuffed, dog-eared notebook with its pages bound by a black elastic ribbon. “It’s right here. At least admit you stole it.”

“Is this a joke?” I demanded of the show’s host. They’d promised me simple questions, that all the guests would be fans.

He gestured for me to give an answer, a circling motion with his hand that told me I was wasting time. The cameras were still rolling.

The audience whispered amongst themselves.

“This is outrageous,” I said. “How dare you? Have any of you even read my book?” I stood to storm out of the interview, and the whispering turned to disgusted cries.

I wasn’t wearing trousers, and dropped back onto the chair, covering my lap with the tails of my shirt, while the audience asked their questions.

How come I got to be on the show?

Why had the dog been put down?

Hadn’t I realised that Mr Powell, the maths teacher, was close to a nervous breakdown?

How could you, how could you, how could you?

In the morning, I wrote the questions down in my notebook with the loose brown cover so they couldn’t get out.

We watched The Greasy Strangler on Amazon Prime this week. It said, “Free with ads,” but there were no ads. We enjoyed it: when you make a film that’s too tasteless for even marketing executives, then you’re really onto something!

Altogether now: Hootie Tootie, Disco Cutie! Hootie Tootie, Disco Cutie! Hootie Tootie, Disco Cutie!