Posts Tagged ‘Oblivion’
Apr
Drunk
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
First, there’s a moment when you are just crossing the threshold from complete oblivion, wrapped in blankets and darkness, to reemerge into the light of the living. You are not a person yet. You have no recollections or anxieties. This is probably what it was like right before you were born.
You don’t realize you have a hole in your memory until you’re halfway to the bathroom. How did you get home last night? Where’s your car? Why is the floor slanting away from you?
You stare at yourself in the mirror and promise you’re never going to drink again.
Jun
Ghosts
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
There’s a refraction of light that occurs in the brightest sun, causing apparitions to appear. The superstitious call them ghosts.
People rarely fear these daytime ghosts. For most, hauntings happen after dark, when even the slightest sound or flicker at the edge of their vision can set their hearts and imaginations racing.
Philip knows better. His ghosts are worst at high noon. The more there is to look at, the less you’re able to see. And so the ghosts of all those enemy soldiers he killed in the War attend him daily, and he can only drink himself to oblivion.
Oct
Self Help
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Whenever he did curls on the bench, he had to resist the urge to look at himself in the mirror. He was always disappointed.
Everything he tried, varying his routine, increasing his dosages, upping his protein intake, failed to have the desired results. He’d even cut back his work hours because being here was more important.
Barbara didn’t understand. His parents didn’t understand. His professors definitely didn’t understand.
Every second of his existence was a battle against his oxidizing cells as they gradually lost the ability to replicate.
The gym was not an addiction. It was a fight against oblivion.
Sep
The Mouse
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
Robert and Rebecca arrived home to find a dead mouse on their kitchen floor.
It was an old building, so Rebecca was not surprised there would be rodents. Rather than being grossed out, she began reflecting on her own mortality, wondering if she were better or worse off than the mouse for having knowledge of her impending oblivion. It was a thought that often kept her up late into the night, as she listened to Robert’s light snoring and choked back tears.
Robert could only think about the mess that must have attracted the mouse, and began a thorough cleaning.
Jul
Absent Samaritan
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
He used the lamppost to drag himself to his feet, having groped for the muddy spectacles.
“Help,” he thought he called, clamping the damaged frame to his face to supplement the remaining arm. “I’ve been mugged.”
But he couldn’t have made a noise. Surely the trio who passed would have stopped if he had?
He steadied himself against pain and dizziness and tried to focus his remaining energy into a shout for aid.
He watched through smeared lenses as they faded into the rain: ghosts into oblivion.
He couldn’t be sure they’d heard.
The blood seemed the only irrefutable fact.
From Guest Contributor Perry McDaid
Dec
Shifting The Blame
by thegooddoctor in 100 Words
When Jackie found the caterpillar crawling in her front lawn, it precipitated a world war. The war began with nuclear warheads dropped on several strategic locations, including Jackie’s house. She and her parents were killed instantly, without understanding her role in the sudden collapse of human civilization.
Jackie’s family lived near a top-secret military installation that was critical to the nation’s defense. That caterpillar was a nanobot from an enemy state. When Jackie picked it up, thinking it was an actual bug, the remote handlers panicked.
That did not stop the world for cursing Jackie as it slipped into oblivion.