"If you were being approached by four grizzly bears, would you stand still or run?" "Why four?" the engineer replied. "Is that quantity somehow relevant to the problem?"
He turned. She was already halfway up the hill.
Rain dripped down the side window in rivulets. Outside, a homeless woman held a sign. “Wealth is overrated. Anything helps.”
He sped away, window firmly up. Later, he’d make a note in his journal - a wise thought he’d had that day.
“Wealth is overrated.”
The underside of the water tower loomed large above her. Faintly, ever so faintly, runes glowed a dark violet.
"Nothing ventured, nothing gained." She held up her stencil and peered upwards through it.
The tower's pupil winked open.
"So you're a history buff," she said, gesturing with metallic fingers at his wall of trinkets. "Got anything cool?"
He pointed. She picked up a carton of cigarettes. Marlboros.
"They say those'll kill ya," he offered.
"Doubt it," she replied. "Got my lungs removed last week."
"I was a famous cellist, before the accident," he signed.
"If you're deaf, why are we at an orchestra concert?"
"See the conductor up there? Watch her closely. Watch her hands, her baton, the arch of her back. She's fantastic." He smiled. "I can see every note."
The astronauts didn't tire of the food first, or the music, or the vastness of cosmic space. It was something else that drove them crazy.
Somebody had miscalculated. They ran out of deodorant before they even passed Pluto.
Remember dating? Remember phone numbers, before our watches synced everyone within 50 feet? Remember apps, where you swiped, instead of the matchmaker AIs? Remember proposals, before they were blockchain contracts?
It's better now.
I miss letters.
A tiny speck of dust swirled through the air. Once, before the wind and the rain, it had been a mighty mountain, thrusting proudly from the earth. Now, its journey was finally at an end.
"Ah, crap, got something in my eye."
"This is it?" the salmon said. "This is barely a shallow puddle!"
"Maybe to you," the goldfish replied. "But to me, it's an ocean."
Behind that portrait lay everything I longed to find. It could swing out on hidden hinges and my search would be over.
It's still there, in the upstairs bedroom of a forgotten mansion in a forgotten town. It waits for me.
Waits for me to find the courage.
The boy stopped crying wolf after the second time.
His insurance premiums had skyrocketed.
"O ancestral spirits, what guidance can you give me?"
"Advice will come in time. But first, let's talk about your tinder profile."
"Please, I'm the real one!"
"Don't listen to him, he's a clone!"
Anne, clutching her gun, studied their faces. "I'll save the one who's willing to do the laundry."
"Deal," the man on the right said.
Anne shot him in the head.
"My husband would die before doing laundry."