|
Hey we don't need to wait for judgement this week is a non-week it doesn't count paging Chili
|
#
¿
Apr 6, 2020 08:06
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 25, 2024 12:03 |
|
|
in  double flash
|
|
#
¿
Apr 6, 2020 21:41
|
|
|
Unburdening 1466 words The insufferable thing about immortality is it never ends. When an old man moved into a vacant shop on the old Rue de Montmorency, no one paid much attention. Bonn kept to himself and rarely went out. He might greet the grocer a few times a week, or tip his hat to the neighborhood children, but otherwise he never said a word. He had converted the ground floor space into something of a laboratory, full of glass jars and pipes and three kinds of stoves. His shop never opened its front door for business, but he sometimes had an audience nonetheless, dirty faces pressed against the glass, watching him work. The children all watched in rapt attention for a time, came back another day or two, then soon lost interest... all except for one. One day, as he was inflating a glass vessel, Bonn saw a small child with disheveled hair watching from behind the door. He was a short man, with a white ring of hair starting from his temples, and only small tufts of hair above. He must have left the door to the alley unlocked, but he couldn't stop now. He glared at the urchin and kept working. The globe at the end of his stick was a creamy golden orange, dropping to red as the surface cooled and he manipulated it with other long tools. Once he was happy with the shape, he moved the glass to a clamp and worked the long stick out of the end. Then he picked up a short straw and a few other tools for fine manipulation. When his work seemed to be nearing an end, the girl poked her head inside. "Monsieur..." "Mm." He didn't turn around. "Do you always make your own glass, monsieur?" she asked, blinking, trying to get the stinging sensation from the coal smoke out of her eyes. The smell of sulfur permeated the room. "No. But sometimes I need something in an unusual shape or size. I find it best to make them myself, not leave it to others." "You don't trust other people." This got him to turn around. He squinted at her through a pair of spectacles. "I... prefer to do what I can with my own hands, when I can. I haven't often had the chance. But... I'm trying something new. And I certainly have the time now." "Seems to me you're down here every day." "As I said. I've been very lucky, lately, to have the opportunity to do this." "And why..." She stopped dead. A shadow had appeared in the doorway, tall and capped with a wide-brimmed hat. "Racine," the shadow said, in a voice laced with thorns. "I'm going." She ducked past the shadow and slipped outside. "My apologies, Monsieur," he muttered, then was gone. The door was still ajar. Didn't even say goodbye, Bonn thought to himself. He tromped back to shut the door. But he had learned not to trust or expect anything from anyone, over the years. He took an old glass cylinder he had made earlier in the week and a long rubber hose. He stuck the hose through the opening and the end of the cylinder and went back to work. But Racine did come back the next day, once her chores were done. And the next, watching clear liquid bubbling in glass jars suspended over small flames, and white fluid snaking through long tubes. The day after that, Bonn opened the front door and invited her inside. "Taste this," he said, pushing a cup into her hands. "What is it?" She looked inside. It was white. Bubbles appeared on the surface as she watched. "Milk..." She took a sip. Bubbles fizzed up into her sinuses. "Aughh," she sputtered. "Are you all right?" She nodded, eyes closed. "You said it was milk," she said, then opened her eyes to glare at him. "It's not milk." "It is milk." He stood over her, peering down at her, as if monitoring her to watch the effect it was having. "Carbonated." Racine shook her head to try to clear it. "Monsieur Bonn—why would you do such a thing?" "To see if it could be done." She was leery the next week, the next time he offered her a drink. Something dark, in a ceramic cup. "It's coffee." It was cold. "Is it bubbled?" It bubbled. She wouldn't touch it. But she came back often, after completing her daily chores—or in the middle of when she was supposed to be donig them, and Bonn had more experiments for her to try in the coming weeks. A cheese with the airy consistency of soft pastry, but the sweet creamy flavor of a soft brie. A bread that grew more flavorful and delicate every day it aged. Some of them, she even liked. But Bonn appreciated her most for when she didn't; when she hated his latest concoction, and told him so, without mincing words. "This is disgusting." Racine's eyes darted around, found nothing, and went wide. She spat the frog leg, twice brined, breaded and braised in duck fat, into her hand. "What's the problem with it, exactly?" She screwed up her face. "It's slimy." "Well, it is a frog..." Her look could have stopped a clock. "Very well, mademoiselle. You have an exacting palette." Bonn went back to try something new. He also liked her because she never questioned where his ingredients came from. These days, if a chef tried to serve half of what he experimented with every day—or even tried to buy them, in some cases—hew was liable to be pilloried, or worse. But Racine did try to find out more about him over the years—"Why do you make these things?" "I wanted to do something I wasn't good at. Something I had no experience with—no idea at all what I was doing. Humanity is... well... I'm not a good judge of taste." —"I never see you sell these things. I can't believe you won't take money for this. It's actually good, for once," she said through a mouth full of raspberry truffle tart crumbs. "How do you keep yourself, monsieur?" "Ah... I knew a king, once. But to answer your question, I accumulated a great deal in my past life. Enough to live off the sum, with arrangements made with a few Parisian bankers. —"Monsieur Bonn..." She must have been about thirteen at this point. "How old are you?" He only smiled. "Try this brandy. You're old enough to appreciate it." "There's something moving in it." "Just try it." He saw her less and less, now. He was about to let it go, consider her yet another disappointment. Maybe it was time for him to relocate, stake out a new lair somewhere else, seek out new experiences once more. Not to mention that these people's activity out on the streets was growing irritating. More than once recently the singing and torchlit processions had interrupted his sleep. It was bad enough they had changed the name of the street on him, because it honored the wrong old dead man. Then one night she ran into Bonn's shop for the last time, head bleeding, shirt torn, missing a shoe. He looked up from his workbench, genuinely alarmed. "Please, monsieur," Racine said, and grabbed his hand before he could react. For a brief moment she felt something cold and hard there, then it suffused with warmth as he rose from his chair. "I..." She stopped, took a step back, collected herself. She stood nearly as tall as him, staring straight into his eyes. "I need to hide." "Mademoiselle, what have you gotten yourself into?" She shook her head, tears stinging her eyes. But the blue and white rosette pinned to her cap told the story. "Please, monsieur. The soldiers are coming. They're marching through the Sections, looking for—" "You." His eyes were yellow. She'd never noticed that before. "—all of us," she said. Bonn sighed. He walked past her to the door. "I believe I mentioned before, I was once in the service of a king," he said without looking back. "But these people have already killed their king. I certainly owe nothing to them. So, yes, if they are coming—" and there was a growing commotion outside "—then they'll have to get through me." He looked back now and smiled at her, kind and gentle, wistful, with too many teeth. Then he flung open the door, stepped outside into the smoky haze, threw off his skin, fell down onto his claws, unfurled his wings, and took a breath—
|
|
#
¿
Apr 13, 2020 08:01
|
|
|
Chili posted:Crittin as I go. Thanks Chili!
|
|
#
¿
Apr 15, 2020 02:09
|
|
|
Something Else posted:Folks, i song me
|
|
#
¿
May 5, 2020 09:57
|
|
|
We Must 711 words Burt was out in the garden, hacking at the weeds around the turnips, when the strange message appeared. He came into the kitchen to find the scrawl written on an old receipt. There was something odd about it. It was written in a strange ink, not quite black but something off, the color of coffee left in a pot on the burner overnight. And it wasn't indented into the paper, but raised up slightly above the surface. Burt picked at it, and a piece broke off under his fingernail, and—did it just move? He ran a gnarled had through the wisp of hair on his head. He wasn't losing it. Too young for that. “Hello,” the letters read, with long and lazy loops. “We visit.” Burt crumpled up the old receipt and threw it in the trash. The next day at lunch, Burt was at the kitchen counter, a cup of coffee steaming in his hand, nibbling at a buttered lunch meat sandwich he held in the other, looking out over the fields of grain waving in the breeze. Then, a flash of movement, blue, out by the path. He picked up a shovel and edged the door open and stepped out onto the porch. “Is somebody out there?” he yelled. Then his wife stepped out from behind the hedge. Of course, it wasn't his wife. Her hair was still black. She had been dead fifteen years. That dress had gotten lost in the last move, misplaced in the excited rush after they bought the farmhouse. He had sat beside her in the hospital everyday for five weeks, waiting, hoping, pleading with his eyes to every nurse and doctor that walked through the door, but from every one found the same unspoken response. It wasn't his wife. She wasn't here. She couldn't be. She was. She took a step forward. “Burt.” “No.” He clutched at the door beside him. The shovel wobbled in his hands, wavering out in front of him like a talisman, as if he was going to launch it like a spear. The shovel clattered on the porch boards as he pushed back inside. He slammed the door shut. Then he sat down hard, pushing against the door as if he didn't trust the deadbolt. Burt didn't know how long he sat there, head down in his arms, trying to forgot, trying to ignore. At some point he fell asleep. Had there been a knocking? A voice—her voice—calling his name? He ached, from the small of his back on down. His legs were numb and they roared in disapproval as he started moving again. Stupid. He shouldn't have sat like that so long. He climbed, slowly, wincing, to his feet, cursed, grabbed the rim of the sink in a death grip. He looked up. She was still standing out by the garden, hair blowing softly in the breeze, ringed by the light from the setting sun. He stared. Was there something moving back there, by the hedge, under her feet? Burt clenched his fist, closed his eyes, reached for the door. He looked down at his feet as he walked, dust kicking up from dry grass. Then the grass gave way to bare dirt, and a pair of shoes he hadn't seen in years. He looked up into dark pitted eyes. “I know it's not you, Claire,” he said, but his voice broke into a rasp. There was an earthy smell, with a tinge of something else. Must. A metallic taste in the back of his throat. His wife opened her mouth and her lips moved and something like words came out. “We have been watching,” she said. The voice was wrong. It didn't come from her, but somewhere behind. “You're not her,” he whispered. “You're not her.” “We came,” she said. “We can be—we—” She reached a hand out stiffly. “We must bloom.” He took her hand and felt a jolt of energy. Warmth suffused his mind, all sensation fell away, and his perception shrank to nothing. There was only her. Burt Arnold, 88, was found dead in a field outside his home, one hand covered in a previously unknown species of fungus, and with a wide smile on his face.
|
|
#
¿
May 11, 2020 08:00
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ Apr 25, 2024 12:03 |
|
|
Something Else posted:Mostly stream of consciousness crits for my sweet bakers. Yoruichi posted:Bread Week Crits Thank you both
|
|
#
¿
May 13, 2020 10:25
|
|