Short Story Example

As I destroyed my room like a tsunami, looking for a clean pair of underpants, I had a premonition - A flash of future that swept across my vision for a fraction of a second. Me, Caleb Mozier, facedown on the cement, blood pooling around my head like a melted cherry popsicle. It was sorta freaky, not gonna lie, but I brushed it away. It had to be the result of my fatigue. Staying up ‘til midnight on Reddit will do that to a guy.

My phone beeped and buzzed to let me know that I was unequivocally late for school and I cursed my laundry-doing skills. Giving up on the hunt for clean undergarments, I pulled on a pair of my least stanky boxers, then the rest of my clothes, and bolted from my house. That was too bad. Less than twelve hours later, my mother would fall into a dark pit of depression. She would think she was a terrible mother for letting her only son die in a pair of skid-marked undies.

I had taken a turn too fast on my skateboard, flipped over the curb, and landed in the middle of Colfax Avenue. Because my life was nothing but one sucker punch after another, I was hit by a minivan full of the hottest girls in my school - The Pom Squad. My only hope is that they remember me as the cutest boy in junior year and not who I really was, A stoner dweeb barely scraping by with his 2.0.

I’m thinking about those supremely hot girls jumping up and down with pom-poms only to distract myself from what is really happening. Reality is freaking me out in that way that causes the back of my neck to prickle and my stomach to churn. I’m in what I can only describe as a cloud. It’s not one of those nice puffy white ones either. It’s dark gray, almost black, cold mist spraying my face, and every time I take a step, my foot plunges into ice-cold water. I half want to stop moving, hunker down with my arms pulled into my hoodie and my hood tied tightly around my head. But I can’t. I’m in a line, a never-ending line, of mostly old people and we’re all shuffling along towards something. I doubt it’s heaven because I’ve never been inside a church in my life. I doubt it’s hell too because when you smoke as much weed as me, you don’t have the motivation to do bad things. My regular activities included smoking, eating my weight in hot Cheetos, and watching stupid stuff on YouTube. That doesn’t seem very hell-worthy to me.

I pull my mind off the pom squad to listen to the buzz of chatter from the people around me. Some of them are grumpy, complaining about the cold, others are crying, and a few are introducing themselves to the people around them. A little boy with a shiny bald head, no older than six years old, skips past me wearing nothing but a hospital gown. He does a cartwheel, giggles, then disappears in the mist. Behind me, an old couple bickers about things only old people care about.

“I cannot believe you gave Sheryl my casserole recipe, George!” says the old woman.

“It’s green beans, Barbara,” says George.

Barbara grabs my shoulder with her icy hands and I jump around to stare at her. She looks like my grandma, white short hair, and a sweater that reads World’s Best Meemaw.

“Young man, tell my husband how wrong he is.”

And then she starts in on the flirtatious love story between George and their neighbor Sheryl that spanned the fifty years they lived on the same block. By the time she reaches their death, carbon monoxide poisoning, the clouds have lightened and a warm breeze swirls around us.

She stares at me, waiting for me to take her side, but all I can think about is how sad it was that George and Sheryl never got to bang. I’m saved from telling her this by a loud gong. I look up. We’re standing in a huge meadow, little golden flowers all over the grass, my body suddenly dry and warm.

“Welcome, Welcome, everyone!” says a deep soothing voice that seems to come from the meadow itself.

“My name is Bill Walters and in case you haven’t realized, you’re dead.”

The criers cry louder but other than that nobody speaks.

“Some of you may be expecting me to be God or Alla or someone from whatever scripture you were taught as a child but unfortunately I’m just the doorman. I welcome you new spirits, show you what The Meadow is all about, and if you’re lucky, you never have to step foot inside The Creator’s realm. He’s scary, folks, so mind the rules up here!”

A murmur of whispers swells within the group until Bill speaks again.

“When I call your name, you’ll be transported into The Meadow, and your guide will meet you at your dwelling in your neighborhood. We start from youngest to oldest. Don’t fret if you have the same birthday as others, we go by the millisecond of one’s birth.”

He begins calling names. The infants go first. I didn’t notice them on our walk but apparently, they were floating along with us, in golden bassinets, the whole time. Then little bald cancer kids begin disappearing, then preteens, and then we get to the sixteen-year-olds. The January birthdays go, then the February, the March, until Bill gets to July 22nd. A skinny Indian boy’s name gets called, a portly Russian girl, and then he says it.

“Caleb Mozier of Denver, Colorado, United States.”

The moment he finishes the word “States” my body glows bright orange, my bones turn gelatinous, and my internal organs vibrate. Then everything goes black.

I wake up on a memory foam mattress in a room full of old-school arcade games with posters of my favorite bands covering the walls.

“Hey sleepyhead,” says a girl in the corner. She’s propped up on top of a Mrs. Pacman machine, wearing a pair of old school chucks, fishnet tights, a jean mini-skirt, and a Nirvana T-shirt. Her cornrows are braided with strands of shimmery gold ribbon and her skin is the color of melted Hershey’s kisses. I’ve never seen a prettier girl in my life.

“I’d ask for your Snap but my phone’s down on earth,” I say and then I wink.

She looks at me like I’m insane and says, “Why do you want me to snap?”

As always, I instantly regret putting on my player persona. It’s never worked before. Why did I think it would work now? I’m still a dweeb, just a dead one this time.

“You know...Snapchat…”

She snaps and says, “You’re weird,” at the same time and I give up on ever getting her to date me.

“So you’re Caleb Mozier from the year-,” she looks at her notepad, “Holy, it’s been a hella long time.” She scratches her head, eyes me, then continues, “Anyway, I’m Erica. I died at a Nirvana concert in ‘93. I’m sixteen just like you. Actually, I’m your guide because we have the same birthday.”

She died in 1993 and she’s sixteen. That makes her born in 1977. She’d be my mom’s age if she were still alive. She’s a Walkman-jamming, roller rink-going, POGS-playing, old lady. But she’s an old lady that makes butterflies flap in my gut.

“Do you want me to give you a few hours to stare at my chest or do you want me to show you The Meadow?” Her voice drips with sarcasm.

“I wasn’t--,” I start, but she interrupts me.

“Sure you weren’t. Let’s go, Home Skillet.”

She jumps off Mrs. Pacman and leads the way out of what I can only assume is my house. The outside is graffitied with my favorite movie quotes and there’s a mini skatepark in my front yard. Death ain’t too shabby!

As we walk down the sidewalk, she explains that this neighborhood is for people born on July 22nd who died at age sixteen. My neighbors range from a ripped kid, shouting numbers in Czech as he does pull-ups on his outdoor gym, to a Chinese girl reading Harry Potter on her large deck. She explains that there are huge neighborhoods full of ninety-year-olds, smaller neighborhoods full of four-year-olds (with Meadow caretakers of course) and that the neighborhoods for teenage folks are considered mid-sized. She stops to reinforce that “mid-sized” is still about the size of Maine and that The Meadow as a hole spans for millions upon millions of miles and is growing larger by the second.

After the tour, Erica leads me to a giant cafeteria, tells me she’s craving a Slurpee and bounces. I’m left standing outside, staring at sixteen-year-olds meandering in and out of the large double doors. I walk in and get in line behind a boy with a mop of long ginger hair. He turns around as I grab my silverware, sticks out his freckled hand, and says, “Oy, me name’s Patrick O'Reilly. Died during the potato famine in Ireland. You a new bloke?” I nod because I can barely understand him through his accent.

As he tells me all about his life during the 1930s, practically reminiscing about how great it was to not be here, I grab a tray and pile food onto it like I haven’t eaten in a millennium. I grab an entire deep-dish pizza, a lobster claw, a stack of Reese’s cups, two authentic Big Macs, and a mountain of Jelly Belly’s. Holding my tower of food like a waiter, I follow Patrick to a lunch table in the corner of the room.

He’s telling me how very bored he is of The Meadow after so many years here, and really getting into it too, when Erica slams her tray down and sits right next to me, drowning me in the sweet scent of vanilla.

“Li jing told me she doesn’t want to eat with me if I’m slurping my Slurpee so loud so I guess I’m stuck here. Hi Patrick.”

“I’m telling Caleb here about how boring this lot gets after so many years. I want excitement. This is brutal!”

“You’re preaching to the Choir Pat. Nothing is exciting anymore, dammit. I’ve done everything there is to do in this place. I feel like I’m in assisted living biding my time until death, EXCEPT I AM ALREADY DEAD,” Erica says, sucking the last of her Slurpee from the end of her straw.

“I even tried me hand at volunteering with the tots down in Neighborhood 2 but you get covered in sick so many times you quit. Plus weans are always crying,” says Patrick.

“There’s nothing exciting to do here because we can literally do anything we want except break a rule of course. Being able to do anything makes everything boring,” Erica grumbles.

I can not relate to their conversation whatsoever. This is honestly the chillest place I’ve ever been. What do I want to do today? The options are limitless. I can play basketball with Ghandi, be taught to drive by MLK Jr, bungee jump with Steve Irwin...What’s not to love?

“But why?” I ask, “If you can do anything you want then like do it, right?”

“Mate’s a Meadow virgy,” Patrick laughs.

“I’m telling you now Caleb, it gets boring. The point of limits on earth is that if something is out of reach, it’s automatically enticing but nothing here is out of reach,” Erica says.

“That makes sense I guess...It’s sorta bumming me out though,” I say.

“You know what, Caleb...We’re going to make your first day here rad,” Erica says, her hazel eyes twinkling.

“How?”

“We gonna break a rule!”

Patrick drops his spoonful of mashed potatoes and says, “The lass is codding us.”

“As if, Patrick!” Erica says, eying him like he’s a felon she ran into in a dark alley.

“Not a big rule. We’re not going to hurt anyone. Just something minor to give our lives a little pizzazz,” She says this with a hint of don’t-mess-with-me attitude. “There’s this rule I’ve always been curious about anyway.”

“Let’s hear it then,” says Patrick.

“So you know how we’re not allowed to leave the human-designated neighborhoods…”

“Human designated?” I ask. What other neighborhoods would there be? Golden Retriever neighborhoods? I did love that movie All Dogs Go To Heaven as a kid. My mind gets caught up with Rottweilers on a never-ending trip to the dog park, then Erica speaks again and I’m bounced back to reality.

“That’s why I’m curious! What else could there be?” She says and Patrick whistles.

“Maybe I can see my Matilda again. She was me tabby when I was a wean.”

It takes a lot less convincing than I would have expected for Erica to convince us to join her on this rule-breaking adventure. I did make her promise that I wouldn’t get booted from The Meadow for this but the moment she shook my hand in promise my mind stopped caring about anything but the softness of her skin.

An hour later, Patrick is decked out in a pair of hiking boots, Erica has her cargo pants pockets full of trail mix, and I’m holding a giant canteen of water.

It takes us an entire day to leave our neighborhood even though we choose to ride the fastest light rail available. We take a luxury plane ride through five more neighborhoods and I just about die as Erica sleeps with her head on my shoulder. After she wakes up, I plaster my face against the window for the rest of the ride watching the elderly ladies having a Mahjong competition in one of the old person neighborhoods, and groups of children playing with water guns in one of the kid neighborhoods. After I’m forced to witness what looks like a replica of my very awkward 8th-grade dance, I remove my nose from the glass, thanking whoever runs the Universe that I am no longer an earth-bound thirteen-year-old. Five days, a few arguments, and a heck of a lot of fun later, we’re almost there.

We’re breathing heavily, what feels like fire in my lungs, as we climb over a giant boulder. We left the last human neighborhood an hour ago, climbed under the electric fence with only minor electric shocks, and began our trek over this very steep and very dusty mesa. According to Erica, the other neighborhoods are on the other side.

Once we’re down, pants ripped, shirts torn, eyes itchy as all hell, we’re faced with a frightening sight. Between us and the other neighborhoods is a 100-foot-deep canyon with sharp rocks jutting out on the bottom, ready to impale us. The only way across: A long plank of plywood, a foot wide, stretching out between our side of the canyon to the other.

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph this isn’t a dooter. You sure about this, Caleb?” Patrick says.

Before I can answer, Erica steps forward, puts her foot on the board, and tests its strength.

“This is dank! Let’s go!” She says and before we can stop her, she’s skipping along the board without a care in the world. It occurs to me then, that I can’t die twice.

Patrick follows her at a slow and steady pace and then it’s my turn. I shuffle along, barely lifting my feet from the wood, chanting to myself to not look down. Halfway across a neon sign swings down from thin air reading: WARNING: You Are Entering A Non-Human Neighborhood. Proceed At Your Own Risk and I almost topple into the chasm.

“Are you sure about this?” I call but all Erica does is wave her hand at me.

When all three of us are across, we stand, staring at a wall of ancient oak trees. Erica links arms with us like we’re freaking Tinman, Dorothy, and Scarecrow, we take a breath and walk into the darkness.

I half expect a pack of friendly mutts to greet us, wagging tails, licks, and all, but what we walk into explodes my mind and turns my life upside down. We’re standing in a world straight out of a fantasy movie. A purple dragon, with a hairy mane like a horse, screeches above our heads and sends high winds our way with every flap of his wings. A two-foot elf, with pointy ears and a bulbous nose, dances a jig with what looks like a fat little gnome covered in cheetah print hair. Normal-sized children with neon blue skin and brilliant red curls chase each other around a man in a trench coat demonstrating the levitation potion he’s selling. People walk through the sky like they’re on invisible stairs and a group of young goblins in pink tutus stand with their giant noses pressed against a window, staring at the glittering color-changing nail polish display.

“Wait a second, Lassy,” Patrick gasps, “How did you find out ‘bout this?

“I volunteered in the records hall two years ago and got so bored sorting papers that I went exploring,” Erica squeaks.

“Blimey,” Patrick breathes.

I’m about to sob out of pure joy and absolute excitement when I blink. When I open my eyes again everything is gone. The three of us are standing in what looks like a drawing room, in front of a frazzled man in his mid-thirties. His hair stands on end, his tie is askew, and the back of his shirt is untucked from his stone-washed jeans.

“Welcome, welcome, please sit,” he says as he sifts through the mountain of manila folders on his desk. He pulls out three as we sit on the lumpy couch in front of him.

“You three,” he stares at what I can only assume is our files, “Caleb Mozier, Erica Banks, and Patrick O’Rielly, have broken one of my most important rules.” He scratches his head and glares at us from behind his smudged glasses.

“Your rules?” says Erica.

“Yes, yes, I am The Creator. Oh wow, you say, he’s not an old guy with a long white beard, blah, blah, blah. No time for that. Let’s talk about your punishment.”

He scratches his head again and sighs. “I can’t send you back to The Meadow because the humans can’t know about the hidden world on earth and therefore the hidden Magic Meadow up here. I can’t send you back to earth because there are no do-overs permitted, I can’t send you to live in The Magic Meadow because that sets a bad precedent, and I can’t---”

He begins to mutter to himself at an inaudible volume so I let my mind wander, thinking about the absolutely amazing things I just saw. I’m thinking about riding that badass dragon when The Creator shouts, “AHA! I’ve got it! No do-overs back to your old lives but who says you can’t go to--”

Before any of us can ask what he’s talking about, he snaps his fingers and everything goes black.

******************************************************

My alarm goes off at 6:00 AM like it does every blessed morning and I bury my head under my pillow, trying to drown out the noise. The last thing I want to do is go to school and sit through classes teaching me how to be a contributing member of society. I don’t want to sit at a desk, take notes, and deal with other sixteen-year-old morons. Maybe I can play sick?

I lay there in what feels like a catatonic state until the sound of my alarm annoys me so much that I roll out of bed. Today already sucks. My shower is too cold, my school slacks are stained, and my sneakers are still wet from the puddle I fell into last night. To make matters worse, by the time I’m dressed, my mom is pounding on my bedroom door telling me to stop my alarm before I wake up my dad.

I shuffle to my bedside table but my alarm has wandered off since I got up. I can’t blame him. My showers are always long. I spot the little guy climbing the drapes and as I pull him down he hops onto my skull and begins to jump, long talons scratching my scalp. My mother says I can’t chuck my Alarm Harpys into the pile of clothes in my closet anymore, Workman's Comp rules or something, so I tug his claws from my hair and say, “As you can see I’m up. I’ll go to school just shut up, bro.” He gives my arm a squeeze, jumps to my bed, and curls up on my pillow in the soft morning light.

Twenty minutes later, I’m walking through the sky, to avoid the traffic of dwarfs heading to work, and mentally preparing myself for my dumb midterm on shapeshifting. There’s a pretty girl with shimmery cornrows marching in front of me, giving dirty looks to this talkative redhead boy to her right. I have class with her but haven’t had the guts to say anything. I’m trash with the ladies and the moment I say something to her my chances will plummet faster than my grade in Elf & Fairy Biology. I actually have that class with the redhead dude but if I’m being honest I don’t care much about making friends. What’s the point? I don’t do anything fun and I’m a burden to be around most of the time.

Life is so boring. Sometimes I wish those fantasy stories were true. You know, the ones about teenagers, playing things called video games, texting on things called iPhones, learning to drive things called cars, but it’s all just folklore.

But sometimes, sometimes I feel like it’s real like I’ve lived in that world before.