Tagged: brother

Soon the Hammock Held Four Fire Eaters Sitting Side By Side

  • by jen“It’s stuck on something.”
  • hiding in the foliage
  • and rubbed it
  • you know I look like a woman
  • much of it will be excruciating

Tune in next time part 291      Click Here for Earlier Installments

Soon the hammock held four fire eaters sitting side by side, all young women dressed in skintight mylar. “Push us!” they cried in unison, heat shimmers accompanying their words.

The burly male fire eater behind them struggled to get them moving. “It’s stuck on something.”

I could tell that the real problem was that the four of them together weighed too much for the Mizzenpriestess’s flimsy hammock. It had stretched until their bottoms touched the ground.

The rest of the fire eater clan seemed shier. They hung back around the edges of the village, hiding in the foliage, although their mylar suits made hiding quite difficult.

Something didn’t seem right about all this foliage. I could have sworn it was much closer to the solar panel huts than when we arrived. I took Tessa’s hand and rubbed it, imparting a message to her through my thumb motions. “We are surrounded by ninjas camouflaged as jungle plants.”

The Mizzenpriestess reached the end of her dance and turned to the fire eaters in her hammock. “You know I look like a woman, a harmless old woman” she said in an affronted tone, “but I’m much more than that. I am the Mizzenpriestess of this village!”

The fire eaters looked unimpressed and continued to try to make the hammock move.

Jason grabbed Tessa and me each by the hand and started to rub out his own message. Somehow even his thumbs lisped. “Shit is about to go down, and much of it will be excruciatingly tedious negotiations for the proposed Fire Eater-TechnoPagan alliance.” He waggled his greasepaint-smeared eyebrows at Tessa. “Why don’t we conclude our ritual?”

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I Wanted to Stop the Man in the Pink Bathrobe

  • by jenthey castrated people all the time
  • no choice but to watch him go
  • the only dollar he had
  • stepped purposefully out into the living room
  • the blue of an equatorial sky

Tune in next time part 273                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

I wanted to stop the man in the pink bathrobe and ask him if my brothers still ruled this island, and if — as they did a decade ago — they castrated people all the time, but he moved so quickly that I had no choice but to watch him go through the door like he was chasing the only dollar he had left in the world.

Tesla and I looked at each other, then turned to flee and ran straight into the arms of our beefy mime escorts. The two of them were utterly silent as they twisted our arms behind our backs and marched us through the door into the shack. Inside was a sort of cloak room, with another door at the other end. The mimes blocked the exit and glared at us until we opened the inner door and stepped purposefully out into the living room of the shack.

The walls were painted the blue of an equatorial sky, and the ceiling was obscured by multitudes of tropical birds fashioned from colorful balloons. Across the green shag carpet from where Tesla and I stood, my brothers Jupiter and Jove sat regally side-by-side on the backs of prostrated clowns, casually toasting marshmallows with their fiery exhalations.

But what made my blood run cold was their matching ringmaster garb. Things were much more dire than I had ever imagined.

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I Am Well-Versed in the Pianist’s Code

  • by jen“I’ve known her since grade school.”
  • just across the Mississippi state line
  • the extraordinary nature of his luggage
  • her late husband’s secret torments
  • and now wears a hood to protect his identity

Tune in next time part 267                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

I am well-versed in the pianist’s code, so reading the message on Tesla’s fingernails would have been easy if only she’d kept them all in view. Instead she played me like a piano, her delicate fingers dancing all over my body.

“I can’t believe this is happening,” I thought. “I’ve known her since grade school.”

Tesla’s fingers continued their intricate dance, down my torso and just across the Mississippi state line, if you will, which was currently obscured by layers of balloon animals. She seemed pleased with what she found there, and said many flattering things about my package.

“What’s going on?” I heard Jason lisp from the hatch overhead. “I can’t see past all these balloon animals.”

William Sausage sighed. “She’s cooing about the extraordinary nature of his luggage at the moment.”

Jason called down, “We’re twins you know. Identical. My ‘luggage’ is just as nice as his.”

Tesla somehow ignored all the chatter going on over our heads. Between the squealing shrieks of the balloon animals, she murmured to me about her late husband’s secret torments.

“Yves is dead?” I asked in surprise.

“He might as well be,” she said. “He’s so ashamed of himself for breaking the vows of mime by speaking, that he changed his name and now wears a hood to protect his identity.”

She kissed me and I tasted grease paint. Grease paint and something else.

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Wrestling With My Twin

  • by Kentbeing sure to pull it out at the angle at which it’s embedded
  • the greasy men come back
  • this intriguing technique
  • “Ow! Bill!”
  • as beautiful as the city itself

Tune in next time part 264                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Wrestling with my twin was frustrating, and I’m sure Jason felt the same way. No matter what either of us tried, the other saw it coming, as if neither of us could insert a move without the other being sure to pull it out at the angle at which it’s embedded. As boys, we’d keep at it past nightfall sometimes, or “until the greasy men come back” as the old expression goes. But this time I was losing. Jason had developed some surprise moves involving his elbows, and by this intriguing technique he subdued me and pinned me to the floor.

Soon the other two were standing over us. Tesla looked like she was about to ask me a question, but then the man with the reedy voice stepped on her toe.

“Ow! Bill!” She shoved him back.

Aha! That made him William Sausage, famous by association with his supermodel daughter Vienna, who was named for where she was born and was as beautiful as the city itself.

Jason did another intriguing thing with his elbow and I passed out wondering how to use this new information to my advantage.

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Looking at the Scalpel

  • by jennot in any way compromise your sister
  • three sons and two daughters
  • rural lava fields
  • asked Henri how his vacation was going
  • now that I’ve read it

Tune in next time part 213                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Looking at the scalpel I remembered my father’s last words to me, Jason, Jim, Jemma, and Jemima: “I would not in any way compromise your sister against her wishes. You know how Freya is. She’s game for anything! I can’t believe that of all my children I have three sons and two daughters who are so uptight and inhibited. You five should try to be more openminded like your other siblings. Why, when I was a youth in the rural lava fields of Iceland, it was anything goes! Our little village was a popular holiday destination for broad-minded Frenchmen, and they taught me much. It was always educational when I ‘asked Henri how his vacation was going‘– if you know what I mean. But you handed me this petition, and now that I’ve read it I think that you don’t, in fact, know what I mean.”

He shook his head and expelled the lot of us from the Oval Office. I don’t know about my siblings, but I never saw my father again.

Until today.

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Standing Just Inside the Door

  • by jengirl with brown hair
  • People do.
  • no one knows where he went
  • “There are balloons.”
  • thinking it was kind of funny

Tune in next time part 207                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

Standing just inside the door was a girl with brown hair and a bright orange pinkie on her left hand. That was a sign that she was a very high ranking Pinkie Swear, and also tough. She’d endured the agony of having her entire little finger tattooed a shade of orange too bright for most hunters to look upon. It’s hard to believe that anyone would voluntarily do that, but people do. People do.

“I can tell you’re not Jason,” she said, taking in my crocs, “but you’re probably looking for him. He was here about half an hour ago and no one knows where he went. We were preparing to celebrate his tattoo ritual,” she gestured around the black-lit room. “There are balloons.”

“Yes there are,” I agreed. The floor was knee deep with them, all glowing under the unnatural illumination.

I was thinking it was kind of funny that the Pinks expected Jason to pledge fealty, when for as long as I could remember he’d been more of a thumb wrestling kind of guy. Back at the Academy, he’d been thumb wrestling champion four years running.

If there’s one thing my association with my twin had taught me, it was that you should never trust a thumb wrestler. It takes a certain psychopathy to excel at the sport.

Had Jason’s foray in this group been benign? Was he merely studying this foreign faction the way Dian Fossey studied gorillas? Or had his mission been more sinister?

I looked around at all the fanciful balloons. What might Jason have hidden beneath their glowing childish joy?

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I Didn’t Want to Take the Proffered Hand

  • by jenget your hands out of your pockets
  • — or a lover
  • Are you two brothers?
  • notwithstanding the absurdity
  • Then things got worse.

Tune in next time part 203                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

I didn’t want to take the proffered hand until I knew to whom it belonged. For all I knew these clowns had jeweled daggers of their own and wanted to use them on me. I hauled myself higher.

“What the?” said the voice above me. “Are you climbing with your toes? It’d go a lot faster if you’d get your hands out of your pockets.”

There was something so familiar about the voice. Did it belong to an enemy — or a lover? I had so many of each, and many people qualified as both.

I finally did pull my hands from my pockets so that I could grab the floor where these mystery individuals stood and haul myself out of the shaft. I found myself face to face with my identical twin, Jason. Beside him stood a man I’d never seen before.

“Hey wow,” the stranger said. “Are you two brothers?” He elbowed Jason. “You never told me Charlie was your brother.”

“Never seen this guy before,” Jason said without his lisp.

“But he looks just like you!”

Things were looking up, notwithstanding the absurdity of pretending I didn’t see the resemblance between myself and my twin.

Then things got worse.

 

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If I Went Back the Way I’d Come

  • by jensitting there, all puckered up
  • there was this guy there
  • surreptitiously unbutton the top of your shirt
  • It was implied.
  • “Truly.”

Tune in next time part 201                           Click Here for Earlier Installments

If I went back the way I’d come I’d end up in the rocket surgery with Jim, the Professor’s girlfriend, and the remains of poor Absinthia. I hated the thought of seeing her sitting there, all puckered up and bloody, so I began to search for another exit. There were no other visible doors, but perhaps there was a hidden passageway. I ran my hands along the walls, feeling for seams, and eavesdropping on Jim’s conversation.

“But who was that guy?” asked a feminine voice, probably the Professor’s one-legged girlfriend.

“What guy?” drawled Jim.

“When I got here with the ransom note, there was this guy there with your sisters!” the woman said. “I saw him!”

“I didn’t see a guy,” Jim lied. Whatever his reasons for lying, he was doing me a favor. I kept up my search. Maybe he was in on the Professor’s kidnapping.

“Don’t you surreptitiously unbutton the top of your shirt at me, Jim,” the woman said. “I’m not going to be distracted by your muscles and all of your sexy chest hair. You can’t seduce your way out of this one.”

“Who says I’m trying to seduce you?” Jim purred.

“It was implied. By the striptease. And by the way you’ve got your hands on my hips now.” She sounded distracted.

“I’d never use sex as a distraction,” Jim said. “Truly.”

I heard kissing noises.

Just then my fingers found a hidden button near the top of the wall, which, when pressed, caused a panel to slide open, revealing a fire pole. The problem was I was standing at the base of it. I peered up into the darkness above, trying to gauge how high it was and whether I had the strength to climb it.

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I Heard No One Else

  • by Kentdecided to sit down and use my legs to
  • parched and cracked
  • silent graveyard barren of trees
  • and all to no purpose
  • Your brain forges a link

Tune in next time part 196                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

I heard no one else in the rocket surgery, and if the clamorous calamity that finished off Dr Belladonna hadn’t drawn Jim’s attention I didn’t have any theories as to what would. With luck that meant he wouldn’t turn up.

The paralytic had not fully worn off, even after my nap, so I decided to sit down and use my legs to get the pants on in a bicycling motion. The shirt and jacket I donned without using my legs at all. The shoes matched the outfit splendidly, but there was no way I could cram my parched and cracked feet into the tiny wingtips. Yoda’s Crocs were infinitely less stylish and didn’t coordinate at all, but they were better than going barefoot.

My plan was to find a way back to the surface, and hope not to encounter Jim along the way. I found another door and opened it to reveal a moonlit, silent graveyard barren of trees. How could that be? It couldn’t. What I’d taken for headstones were paper shredders, dozens of them arranged in rows throughout the large room. The full moon was merely a large, round fluorescent bulb.

“Figured it out yet, big brother?” Jim’s amplified voice seemed to be coming from the false moon. “You’ve gone and killed Absinthia, and all to no purpose.”

“That was an accident, one she brought on herself,” I muttered. I had no way to know if he could actually hear me.

Another eerie, echoey transmission boomed out in Jim’s bayou drawl. “Don’t imagine you know Jason’s whereabouts? Save me some time and trouble. Since there’s no way out of here, I can go ahead and spell out what I have planned, and you won’t be able to stop me. Twins, such as you and Jason, you know what happens under the perfect conditions? Your brain forges a link to his.”

“Yippee.”

“And once that happens,” Jim said, “I’ll have what I need to defeat Mother once and for all.”

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My First Impulse Was to Flee

  • by jenninja assassin on the prowl in west LA
  • twine marks on only one wrist
  • they said he was not the type of person
  • scabs and scars
  • “What’s the matter?” screamed the ladies.

Tune in next time part 195                             Click Here for Earlier Installments

My first impulse was to flee the scene as quickly and quietly as a ninja assassin on the prowl in west LA, to get far away from the stench of burnt flesh, and all of the blood. But I had been on the run for so, so long, and I was exhausted. I felt like a man with twine marks on only one wrist, which is the Contrarian way of saying ‘burning the candle at both ends.’

I locked the door to the rocket surgery to make sure no one walked in on me while I slept, then I curled up on the operating table and took a nap. When people described my brother Jason, they said he was not the type of person who could sleep just anywhere, that he was very finicky about where he bedded down, but they would never say that about me. The slab of stainless steel was an island in a sea of Absinthia’s blood, and upon it I slept like a baby.

When I awoke, I spent a few minutes counting all my scabs and scars, cataloging the myriad ways I now differed from my twin. It wasn’t just our sleep habits that would enable people to tell us apart any longer.

Self-examination complete, I leapt from the table and onto Absinthia’s desk chair. My momentum and the chair’s excellent casters carried me away from the gore, and around a corner. Here was Absinthia’s apartment, replete with bed and shower. If only I’d explored last night I could have slept in comfort. At least I could still get clean.

After my ablutions, I rifled through Absinthia’s closet, hoping to find something a little more dignified than my calico pinafore. In addition to the doctor’s clothes, none of which would fit me, I found a cache of men’s clothing that fit me a little too well. It was as if they’d been tailored for me, which meant they’d probably been tailored for Jason. But the shoes were too small.

“What’s the matter?” screamed the ladies. That’s what I call my intuition, my gut feelings. ‘The ladies’ had never let me down. And right now they were trying to tell me something important. If the shoes were too small for me, they were too small for Jason. That meant, the ladies assured me, that these clothes had been tailored for my younger brother Jim.

I froze.

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