Friday, September 26, 2008

September 26th Topics



Hypochondria
What disease are you just positive you have right now?



Locker
She heard the noise and then looked and couldn't believe what she saw inside her locker because ...
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2 comments:

ItsNaughtKnotty Cannned said...

The Noise in the Locker
She heard the noise. She looked. And she couldn't believe what she saw inside her locker.

Alan Johnson, the biggest brat in the history of the universe, was standing inside it.

"Get out Alan! The buses are outside and I have to go."

"Close the door. I'm staying in here all night."

"You can't stay in the locker all night. Get out."

"Please Natasha, just close the door. I'm afraid I can't go home."

He looked sincere but she thought it must be a prank. Besides, he probably lived by the school someplace and as soon as she left the building his friends would let him out. She'd never missed the bus and it wouldn't happen today either.

"Whatever Alan."

She slammed the door, clicked the lock, and ran up the hallway, down the front stairs, along the sidewalk and the row of idling automobiles, and found bus number 233. She always sat in the front seats since she'd always been first in the line, but today she ended up almost all the way in the back because of Alan.

She fumed.

Stupid boys. Stupid Alan. I wonder how his friends will get him out. They don't have the combination to my lock. I wonder if they'll call the custodian and cut the lock off. My mom will be very mad if they cut the lock off. What if they all leave the school and he really does spend the night? He might die in there. I'll be in big trouble if he does. It would be his own fault though. I should tell somebody he's in there.

When the bus stopped at its usual location, Natasha ran all the way home. She could hardly breathe as she tried to tell her grandmother about the boy locked in her locker.

"Yes, Mrs. Preston? This is Alice Worthington; I'm Natasha Worthington's grandmother. She says a boy named Alan is locked in her locker and she's worried he can't get out. That's right. Alan. He apparently said he was afraid to go home and wanted to spend the night in her locker. Yes, it's 36-24-13. That's right. All righty then. Thank you."

Natasha's grandmother hung up the phone and looked reassuringly at Natasha. A few minutes later the phone rang. The conversation with the caller only took a few moments punctuated by "I see" "you don't say" "I understand" "well my stars" and then Natasha's grandmother looked stern.

"They've gone down and opened up your locker, dear, and they said it was in remarkably organized fashion. They don't recall a girl of your age ever having such a nicely arranged locker."

Natasha beamed.

"But they also said there was no boy in the locker. In fact, there is no boy named Alan going to the school. Now what in the world were you thinking when you made the story up?"

Natasha lowered her eyebrows and a far away gaze settled into her eyes.

What was I thinking when I made up the story about Alan?

"I was thinking I might be a fiction writer someday, grandma.”

September 26, 2008 at 2:44 PM
WolfieWolfgang (Colin Bell) said...

Hypochondia by Wolfgang Glinka

His stomach knotted and a deep, darkly sinister chill ran through his veins. It might have been another symptom or merely anxiety but his chest tightened and his breathing became effortful. Again that dark chilly feeling spread through his body and his brain pushed tightly against his skull.

Is this the beginning of my death? he thought. I am going cold like they say you do on your death bed. Cold yes but also feverish...hot even.

The brain, so swelling within his cranium, any doctor would tell him, was sending conflicting messages to his rapidly panic stricken consciousness.

Hot and cold, isn't that a fever? A temperature maybe...certainly he felt faint, giddy and a desperate need for the comforting warmth of a blanket or a friendly hug.

No one to clasp their arms round him here..no nurse to put a reassuring hand on his brow. You are fine...just a little over-wrought perhaps.If only a thermometer could be placed under his tongue tasting reassuringly of aniseptic, the great curer.

But no...no nurse, no body... just the growing fear that swelled with the intensity of his pain.

His ribs so aptly called a ribcage, enclosed a raging beast that was gasping and roaring for release. He was struggling to breath. This was to be death. There was now no question.

Keep breathing, don't let it get you, he muttered with that voice that is never vocalised.

The more he struggled, the more he panicked.

Lack of breath, it was well known, deprived the brain of its oxygen. Panic, anxiety, hallucinations were a common side effects.

This must be why he was trembling...but why so extreme? He was taken over by a whole body tremor, teeth chattering, limbs shaking and, worst of all, the disorientating twitching of his face.

He was not a brave man, he knew that. He had hidden his head under the duvet when he thought someone had broken in once; just lying there trying to control his breathing and hoping that he had escaped.

No he was no brave man but why this descend into hysteria? And why, for God's sake, why the tears?

Don't die crying like a baby...it is just not the way. Prepare yourself, enter the great unknown with some dignity, some alertness even. None of us know what to expect.

But not this..not those tears, that streaming mucous from the nose. Surely this is not the way to end it all.....and, even if the best is to happen in that great unknown. Even if we do walk out into those Elysian Fields. Don't do it with tears in your eyes, trembling and shaking.

Gather up your strength, a Biblical memory mumbled somewhere in that chaos. Take a deep breath, like teacher said when his cat had died. You can control it all with your breath - just as your mother did when you came screaming from her womb.

He tried...yes...a deep breath and then another..just let some fresh air into those swelling veins. They will take life's balmy breath through his body and bring him back form the brink

His eyes could offer up no more tears, only burning dry memories of tears just as his chest heaved out of time with his recovering lungs.

Breath,that nurse that he had prayed for, began its task. His chest relaxed, his brain stopped pushing against bone and stomach muscles released their grip.

Panting and then sobbing, he saw the truth.

He was not ill...there was no fear of death - not at least from natural causes.

A letter cannot do this. A piece of paper with man's most magnificent accomplishment scrawled across it with careless ease. A simple sentense or two ending everything. Breaking the bond of love.

No illness this.

Wolfgang Glinka

September 30, 2008 at 3:20 PM

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