"…his stories are always sharp and compact and interesting." ——Angel Martinez "(One of) the hottest authors in the independent horror scene…" —-Hellbound Books
First, here’s the prompts for the July 2023 Flash Fiction Draw Challenge. Then my usual long-winded explanation:
A “Just So Story“
Involving a Plastic Elephant
Set at a Radio Station.
Now, on to the details.
Hi! I’m Mike Mayak, I also write as Jeff Baker and I’m the current moderator for the monthly Flash Fiction Draw Challenge, which was started by ‘Nathan Burgoine a few years ago and carried on by Cait Gordon and Jeffrey Ricker. It’s a monthly writing challenge mainly for stress-free fun that anyone can play.
Here’s how it works: the first Monday of every month I draw three cards; a heart, a diamond and a club. These correspond to a list naming a genre, a setting and an object that must appear in the story. Participants write up a flash fiction story, 1,000 words or less, post it to their website and link it here in the comments. I’ll post the results (and hopefully have one of my own written!) the week of July 17th, 2023.
As I’m no good making videos I did the drawing offstage and the results were the King of Hearts (a “Just So Story,” like Rudyard Kipling’s, but a folk tale thingie will do!) the Five of Diamonds (a radio station) and the King of clubs (a Plastic Elephant.)
So we will write a version of one of Kipling’s Just So Stories, set at a radio station involving a plastic elephant. (And I promise next year, no more pastiches of other people’s writing in the lists!)
So, get to writing and I’ll post the results next week!
Every week we post six lines of a story of ours, a work-in-progress or from someone else’s work we recommend that has LGBT characters on Rainbow Snippets here https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974
If there’s ever an anthology of original stories written to commemorate, say, ‘Nathan’s fiftieth anniversary as an author, I want to write the story about Lightning Todd. Todd was hit by lightning and now can see the future and goes “where I’m needed.”
And he has a website where he talks all about it.
In “Struck,” Todd is talking to Chris, a young bookseller who has already had a demonstration of Todd’s powers.
“Before you quit and never come back, you totally have to kiss the guy who won’t wear pink.”
“Kiss the…before I quit?” Chris said. Given his situation, that was rather unlikely.
“Because of the Titanic,” Todd said.
“Because of the Titanic.” Chris leaned forward. “Are you high?”
‘Nathan Burgoine has a knack for characters with some prescient psychic ability, but Todd is the only one of them I might go out for a coffee with!
I’ll be back with more snippets next week! —–jeff
(P.S. I usually don’t edit someone else’s work but I added the “Todd said” up there.)
Arnie Gilman shifted the loaf of bread in his arms. Real bread, he thought, not that processed stuff they grow in sheets. He should have probably gotten a cart, but hell, sixty-four wasn’t old. He could carry the big bottle of juice in one hand, the bread in the other and the spatula under his arm.
He glanced out the big grocery store windows as he walked up front to the checkout. Maybe he’d catch a glimpse of the Mars Shuttle that was leaving from the airport. He smiled. He and Mark had always talked about taking one to Mars for a vacation. But now…
He sighed.
He glanced at the lines in the checkout lanes. No, not there. And not at the odious self-checkout. (“Why do they still have those damn things anyway?”) He looked over at one end of the front of the store; off to one side was a checkout lane with nobody in it, just a youngish-looking guy with dark hair standing beside the register. A sign overhead proclaimed: Slow Checkout.” He remembered those. He was in no hurry. He walked over and put his items on the conveyor.
“Hi,” the young man said. “I’m Carlos.”
“Gilman,” he replied. “Arnie Gilman. You know I think I remember these from years ago, they were big in Europe.”
“Oh yeah,” Carlos said, not making any effort to check any of Gilman’s items. “This chain decided to bring them back. Just started this one up last week.”
“The idea was for there to be a lane for checkers to take their time and talk to the customers because a lot of older people are just lonely and come into stores for conversation.” Gilman said.
“Yeah, that’s the idea,” Carlos said. “It’s just been a week but I have some regulars who come by here. One lady comes in every day and just buys a bag of M & M’s. Talks for five minutes.” He grinned. “But I don’t mind.”
“That’s nice of you,” Gilman said looking around. “You know, I worked in a store like this back when I was in High School. Must have been about fifty years ago. And an afternoon I’ll never forget, it was in the middle of Summer and I was working back in the stockroom when we heard the voice come over the loudspeaker:”
Arnie cupped his hand over his mouth and intoned in a nasal voice:
“Attention. Any checker or manager. Repeat, any checker or manager. Self-checkout is down and I am the only checker on any register. There is a line of customers stretching back to the pharmacy. If someone does not open another register in the next three minutes, I will walk and there will be nobody checking out customers.”
Carlos laughed. “What happened?”
“Well let’s put it this way: I’m glad I wasn’t in the way of our Manager when he ran out of the stockroom headed up front!”
They both laughed again.
“Well, hey, I’d better get your stuff checked in, huh?” Carlos said.
“I’m not in a big hurry but sure,” Gilman said.
As Carlos scanned the three items and put them in a bag, he said “Next time you come by here I can tell you a couple of crazy stories about working here.”
“Sounds like fun,” Gilman said taking the bag and nodding goodbye, musing how Mark would have liked the young man and the whole idea of what he was doing.
But Gilman felt better. Happier.
“Bye, Sir,” Carlos said.
“Bye,” Gilman said waving a hand.
As Gilman walked out to his car he made a note to come back soon and buy some M & M’s.
NOTE: Yeah, this is probably more personal than I usually post, but I decided to put it up anyway. Written on June 29, 2023.
This may be more personal than I should post, but I will probably do it anyway.
Or I may just write it down. Here goes.
This has been a strange late Spring/early Summer. I am dealing with the recent passing of my much-loved Husband Darryl and am finding comfort in the little things. I have felt as Summer began that I have adjusted just a bit to being in a new phase of my life.
I’m up much of the night writing or reading/watching stuff online. Darryl and I used to watch old TV shows all night, but I’m not ready for that yet. It’s not as much fun without someone beside me to laugh at Dobie Gillis or Uncle Arthur and the like.
Anyway, late the other night (I call it that but it was like 2:30am) I wandered out to the kitchen to get something. I walked through the darkened living room, looked out the window on the front door, wandered to the kitchen for a can of (sugar-free) soda and then I was hit by a memory…
In the mid-Twenty-Teens I still had a delivery driver job; this one was four days a week with the big day being Friday. Consequently, I’d come home on Friday, have dinner, snuggle with Darryl on the couch in front of the TV and inevitably start to snooze. So, I would (sometimes at Darryl’s insistence) head for the bedroom to sleep. Usually around 10pm, sometimes earlier. Darryl would usually follow me a couple of hours later.
We would happily snooze together, but I would usually wake up around 2:00am, slip quietly out of bed and head to the living room and the silent lure of my laptop and e-mail. I’d quietly check that, go on Facebook, watch a few You Tube videos with headphones on (which is when I discovered that sweet werewolf cartoon “Dirty Paws.”)
And after an hour or two I would either be getting sleepy or just want to crawl back in that big, warm, husband-filled bed. So I would shut everything down and silently slip back into the bedroom and into bed next to my blissfully snoring husband.
He might wake up, or half wake up or not. If he did, we probably exchanged “I love yous.”
Then I would roll over, snuggle up next to him and in a few minutes the dark blanket of sleep would engulf us both. Maybe being the rising curtain to a world of dreams…
So that was the memory. And it made me smile and be very happy.
And I have been happy this last few weeks in spite of sorrow and grief. This is a process, I know and it isn’t cut-and-dried. So I’m grateful for the memories and the moments that still make me smile.
And it’s early in the morning and I’m heading to bed.
The bed still feels warm, occupied and filled with love.
Every week we post six lines of a story of ours, a work-in-progress or from someone else’s work we recommend that has LGBT characters on Rainbow Snippets here https://www.facebook.com/groups/RainbowSnippets
For the next couple of weeks I’m going to post some things from the recent short-story collection by ‘Nathan Burgoine “Of Echoes Born.” https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/37800605-of-echoes-born He is an excellent writer and short-stories just don’t get the attention they deserve. I’m putting this snippet up because the description is so vivid, and I did not know the history…
It’s late on a Thursday night and I’m watching Parliament burn down again. The heat is intense, the smoke makes my eyes water and I have to struggle not to cough.
I can’t get close enough. I’d like to figure out which wayward soul is stuck, what need or wrong has kept this echo repeating all these years. But the same quirk that lets me see these ghostly reenactments makes it too real for my flesh. I have enough scars from other souls. I don’t want to burn.
That’s from ‘Nathan Burgoine’s story“Elsewhen,” and if you’re looking up the Parliament building fire, take a moment to look up the statue of Sir Galahad. A moving, true story that ‘Nathan discusses in his introduction.
We’ll have more from ‘Nathan next week, a story that hits like lightning…——jeff
Millennia ago, an ancient race ruled the galaxy. Their power and potency remained unchallenged and the most feared of these was Astaroth. Then did the ancients rebel against Astoroth’s evil and use his own power to bind him and destroy him and to scatter his powers into oblivion.
And the legends of Astaroth spread across the Universe as tales of warring Gods., across countless worlds.
And one day, on one of those worlds, those scattered powers reappeared…
And now, when young Barry Easter speaks the name of “Astaroth,” he becomes heir to unimaginable power…the Secrets of Astaroth!
“Okay, Barry, hang on!” Bill Gray said as the balloon took off.
“I’m hanging,” Barry said, gripping the ropes attached to the balloon and bracing himself against the basket. He wasn’t sure going up like this was a good idea, even if Bill was pretty experienced for a High School kid.
Barry couldn’t be afraid of heights, he said. He could actually fly, he reminded himself.
“Take a look out there, Barry!” Bill said. “Isn’t this great?”
“Yeah, great.” Barry said.
But in spite of himself, Barry was starting to feel a lot more relaxed, even letting go of the ropes, although he kept a hand on the edge of the basket.
“Hey, how’d you get into doing this stuff, anyway? Barry asked.
“My Granddad, that’s my Mom’s Dad? He showed me. He’s been taking me up since I was a little kid. I did my first solo flight a few months ago, okay, solo with a passenger!”
“Wow.” Barry said.
“I saw that movie on TV when I was a kid,” Bill said adjusting something on the balloon. “Five Weeks In a Balloon.” He looked over and grinned. “We won’t be up that long! Hey, we were the first ones to take off at the balloon show!”
“Yeah,” Barry said. “I’m glad this isn’t a race. Hey, what’s that noise?”
“Just a little air letting out…”
The balloon’s sudden tilt and a louder rush of air cut Bill off.
“I think it’s a lot more air letting out!” Barry said as he lurched to the side of the basket and grabbed a rope. “There’s a big rip up there and…”
He looked over. Bill was curled up on the floor of the basket clutching his head where he’d hit it.
“Aw crap!” Barry said. “He’s out. Well, it’s better he doesn’t see this.” Barry took a deep breath and said “Astaroth.”
The ancient name, that of an evil alien overlord whose powers had somehow passed across centuries and a galaxy to Barry did their usual thing. There was a roaring wind which pushed the balloon from side to side and a blaze of light and the figure that stood there, seemingly wrapped in blurry gauze just wasn’t totally Barry anymore.
The figure looked down at Bill; he could somehow tell that he wasn’t injured and was still breathing. But the balloon was descending faster.
The figure stood in the middle of the basket and raised his (its?) arms. Wind rushed and supported the balloon, pulling it back the way they came and towards the ground. At the same time the balloon filled with enough warm air to keep it aloft. This wouldn’t look like anything other than a lucky landing.
The figure that wasn’t quite Barry could see the balloon show over the ridge of trees and another balloon ascending as he willed their balloon to land, gently in a huge clump of bushes.
“Can’t let them see me like this,” he thought as he ducked down and uttered a familiar word…
Barry stood there in the open field near the ridge of trees as the medic on duty tried to get Bill to cooperate.
“I’m fine! I’m okay,” Bill snapped from the folding chair as the medic dabbed more alcohol on his forehead.
“You’re gonna want to get that checked out,” the medic said. “I don’t think it’s a concussion, but it’s best to be safe.”
“Yeah, let’s be safe.” Barry said. “But I think you’re gonna be okay.”
“You’re just lucky the balloon landed back so near the balloon show,” the Medic said.
“Yeah,” Barry said. “I guess when the air started spewing out of it, we got pushed back here. Lucky we didn’t crash.”
“Soft landing in those bushes over there,” the Medic said. “We saw you coming down and ran over.”
“Yeah, thanks,” Barry said.
“They’re thinking about canceling any more flights after that big gust of wind just after you landed. That might have been part of why you got knocked over here,” the Medic said.
“Um, probably was,” Barry said.
“Hey, you guys quiet down and get me something for this headache okay?” Bill said.
“Okay,” Barry said grinning.
They helped Bill into the ambulance and Barry didn’t notice that he eyed him with a funny look, then closed his eyes realizing he was out of it right now.
—end—
AUTHOR’S NOTE: A sequel to an unpublished superhero story I wrote called “The Secrets of Astaroth,” remembering the superhero comics and TV shows of my childhood and wondering what really would happen to a kid who got super powers. —-jeff
From 2002 to 2018 there was a syndicated radio version/adaption of “The Twilight Zone,” the legendary series created by Rod Serling, with Stacy Keach as the narrator.
In addition to adapting most of the original 50s-60s episodes of the original “Twilight Zone” as hour-long (well, about 35 minute) radio shows with commercials, the series aired 21 episodes written or adapted for the radio show. Some of them had been planned for the original series but never used.
So, here’s an unofficial guide to the episodes.
Most of this fine series’ adaptions were done by the late Dennis Etchison, himself a fine author of horror and fantasy who had actually taken a class from TZ writer Charles Beaumont. The show aired its last episode in 2018 after 18 seasons and Etchison died the next year. Maybe that’s why the radio series ceased production. Too bad! A lot of the originals were wonderful!
Here then an unofficial list, compiled from Wikipedia and Reddit.
——-jeff baker
Mrs. Pierce is Praying For Me
And Cauldron Bubble
Beewinjapeedee
Free Dirt
(story by Charles Beaumont.)
Gentlemen, Be Seated
(Story by Charles Beaumont)
Missing Presumed Dead
Now You Hear It Now You Don’t
Pattern For Doomsday
Rest Stop
Snow Angel
Ten Days
The 25th Hour
The Amazing Dr. Kyle Powers
Nanobots
The Time of Your Life
The Walk-Abouts
There Goes the Neighborhood
Time Element
(Technically not an original, but an adaption of the TZ pilot that aired as part of Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse.)
Twenty-Twelve
Who Am I?
Another Place In Time
(Last radio episode.)
ADDENDA: I ought to post a link to one of those episodes. “And Cauldron Bubble” blends some humor, the theater and some spooky business. Here it is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ytsp2OkFAs
Went to Book a Holic on West 21st Street here in Wichita, Kansas and saw this fun rack of paperback reprints of comic strips that you used to see everywhere. I remember most of these!
Nice to see them again.
I highly recommend any of the store’s three locations!
Every week we post six lines of a story of ours, a work-in-progress or from someone else’s work we recommend that has LGBT characters on Rainbow Snippets here https://www.facebook.com/groups/963484217054974
I didn’t know what a “Hi/Lo” was until I read one to review it. Alison Lister’s “No Limit On Love” is what is called a “hi/lo,” meaning it is a “hi interest, low reading complexity book” meant mainly for young readers who do not have a high reading level for one reason or another. None of the book comes off as simplified or simplistic in either its prose or its tone. I found it charming. In this snippet, High Schoolers Dan and Levi meet when they are the only ones to show up for a clean-up after the derecho storm that hit Ottawa. Both of them qualify as non-binary. Here’s a link to the book which comes out in the U. S. later this year. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1459417178/ref=x_gr_bb_amazon?ie=UTF8&tag=x_gr_bb_amazon-20&linkCode=as2&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=1459417178&SubscriptionId=1MGPYB6YW3HWK55XCGG2
And here’s the snippet.
THE GUY SMILED AT ME as I approached.
“Hi. Are you here to help with the clean-up?”
That smile. Man.
I nodded, hoping my voice wouldn’t warble. “Yeah.”
He held out his hand. “I’m Levi.”
I grinned and took it, shaking it firmly. “Dan. Short for Danielle, but we won’t talk about that.” My name sounded strange to my ears, and I Levi 26 wondered why I hadn’t formally given it up. From what I’d heard, it was a simple process to change it on the school lists.
A little more than six lines, but after that long introduction, why not? See you next week as we explore another author’s collection. —-jeff
AUTHOR’S NOTE: I haven’t done one of these bar stories in about a year or so, possibly because the hostile and downright violent anti-LGBT mood in the country seemed to preclude a comedy set at a fictional venue similar to real-world ones that are getting attacked both metaphorically and physically. But I figured that enough was enough and so I wrote this; which is a bit of a nod to my favorite writers Henry Kuttner and C. L. Moore.
The grey-haired man in the tweed jacket pointed at his glass on the bar and said. “When you got a minute, I’ll have a refill.”
“Sure,” Zack the bartender there at Demeter’s said. “Comin’ right up.”
Zack was tall and built like a twenty-something soccer player with stringy red hair that hung down on his shoulders. He reached for the bottle below the bar with his bandaged hand and knocked over the stack of plastic cups.
“Dammit!” Zack swore. “Sorry, I’m still not used to this, this thing.” He held up his bandaged hand.
“I’ll bet you aren’t,” the man said. “What happened?”
“Some homophobic assholes jumped him in the parking lot the other night, that’s what happened.” That was from Paco, sitting at the end of the bar looking muscular and young in the tank top he wore after workouts.
“Are you okay?” the man asked, looking concerned.
“Yeah, they just caught me off guard,” Zack said, pouring the refill with his unbandaged hand. “I got a couple of bruises and this hand got bashed up against a car. One of the thugs caught the worst of it.”
“Yeah, Zack got him in the knee!” Paco said, giving him a thumb’s up.
“I was aiming higher,” Zack said, wishing he’d kept up lessons at the Dojo when he was in high school.
“I didn’t realize there was much of that violence going on around town,” the man said. “I knew the mood in the country was letting the hostile nuts think they have carte blanche now, but not everybody believes it.”
“Those guys the other night sure did,” Paco said.
“Did the cops catch them?” the man asked.
Zack shook his head.
“They probably won’t,” Paco said. “And he went downtown and filled out a report and everything.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t see anything. Sweats and ski masks. Nothing to identify,” Zack said.
“But I think they’ll be back,” Paco said, gesturing with his can of soda. “Mrs DeLeon thinks it’s probably the same guys who tore down their Pride flag in early June.”
“Isn’t there security in this shopping center?” the man asked.
“Not for a long time,” Zack said.
“I’d be here every night to walk out with him to his car but I have a delivery run to get on,” Paco said.
The man sipped his drink and smiled. “In that case, I may be able to offer you a solution, or at least loan you a solution. My name is Professor Simon Ginastera, and this all fits into a project I’ve been working on. Let’s call it Operation Homophobe.”
Zack and Paco exchanged glances.
The Professor smiled and sipped his drink.
Mrs. DeLeon stood open mouthed at the tall, grey metal figure that stood by the door of Demeter’s. It was about six-foot-four, built like a muscular Tin Woodsman and had a face of frozen grey features that she had seen on a statue somewhere. It was actually dressed in shorts and a tank top that would have made Paco look scrawny.
“What the hell is this?” Mrs. DeLeon asked, to no one in particular.
“Um, that’s mine,” Zack said rushing from behind the bar. “At least it’s a loaner. For now. I’m giving it back.”
“Back?” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“Remember that professor who was in here that I told you about?”
“Which one?” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“About a week ago. You haven’t seen me since then. Well…” Zack sighed and glanced around. The bar wasn’t open yet, they had time.
“About two nights after he talked to us, Professor Ginastera shows up right before closing. It was Tuesday so there weren’t a lot of people in here. And this…guy walks in right behind him. Metal. Professor said he called him Vengador. That’s Spanish for Avenger.”
“Yes, I know,” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“Well, he tells me this is a defense robot he’s been working on and that he figured I could help him test it out. For a week or so. Kind of like a test-drive.”
“Uh, huh. And you’ve been driving it,” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“Yeah. Kinda,” Zack said. “The Professor stood right where you are and said a long line of numbers to the robo…to Vengador and then told me he’d activated the Second Operator Program. Then he had me look Vengador right in the eyes and say my name. And to say ‘Stand Ready to Smite.’ From then on, it would protect me. And that’s how it was supposed to work.”
“Supposed to work.” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“Oh, it worked at first,” Zack said. “Vengador would follow me out to my car at night and nobody is gonna jump a guy with a six-foot-four metal bodyguard.”
“I take it things didn’t run that smoothly?” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“Yeah, I had Vengador in the car with me yesterday and some guy pulled out in front of me and I nearly wrecked the car. So when we pulled behind the guy at a stop light, Vengador gets out, tears off the guy’s car door, tosses him out in the street and punches a bunch of dents in his car.”
Mrs. DeLeon stared.
“The University is gonna pay for the repairs to the car, but the traffic cameras caught him driving recklessly so the other guy at least did get a ticket.” Zack said.
“Uh, huh.” Mrs. DeLeon said.
“But the real good news is they caught those guys who jumped me a couple of days ago.” Zack said. “They jumped some guy who had a rainbow flag decal on his car window. Turned out to be an undercover cop.”
“Maybe an off-duty undercover Gay cop,” Mrs. DeLeon said with a smile.
“Yeah,” Zack said. “Professor Ginastera will be here after lunch to re-claim Vengador.”
Zack headed for the kitchen. Vengador followed him, moving not at all like several hundred pounds of metal.
Mrs. DeLeon wondered if Zack could ask the robot to wash dishes, but then she shook her head.
Better to leave well enough alone.
—end—
ADDENDA: The title is from Milton’s “Lycidas,” the same passage where Kuttner and Moore got the title for their fine story “Two-Handed Engine,” to which my tale is an homage. —–jeff b.
authorjeffbaker 