Ways of Dying
by Walter Campbell
Their bet was pretty standard guy stuff, really. Both contestants would come up with the worst possible way to die, and the loser would buy the winner a burrito.
Jeff had won their previous, more cheerful bet on the best possible way to die. Phil’s answer — smothered under ten gorgeous, large-breasted women — was no doubt a great way to die, but it had lacked the creativity of dying from a heart attack during the final throes of passion with the nation’s hottest woman after saving her from a gang of bikers in a three-hour fist fight in the middle of Times Square.
“That, my friends,” Jeff announced to his empty apartment, “is how you get a free plate a nachos.” As he chopped onions for a stir-fry, Jeff knew the burrito would be his, too.
Continue reading "DOP #50 - Ways Of Dying" »
The Real McCoy
by James Neenan
The neon bar signs beckon to me like a needle to a junkie. What day is it? Friday? Saturday? Who the hell cares. It’s time to drink. Time to wallow away the miseries of another long week.
The bar smells like stale cotton candy and peanut shells. There’s a man in the corner with a knight’s helmet on. It’s a goddamn circus in here. I’d like to roundhouse the shit out of this idiot. No time: I need a drink.
I slam a shot of Malibu. Another shot of Malibu. I pound a Mike’s Hard. “I’m fucking hard,” I tell myself.
Jezebel dances up on stage. The lights are dim as she meringues to If You Like Pina Colada. The fuck wearing the knight’s helmet is pounding on the stage screaming for her to shake it. I want to break his arm in twenty-seven places. If I grew a toe for every time I’ve broken someone’s arm; I’d have a shitload of toes to stand on. All the better to roundhouse with, my dear.
I signal for another shot. I slam it back like apple juice. Jezebel stops dancing. The knight helmet still pounds on the stage for more. This fucker’s going down.
“You finished, jackass?”
“What’s with the Karate getup?” he asks, motioning to my black belt.
“If you knew the answer to that, you’d already be dead.”
The fear in his eyes shines out like a nightlight from a pussy ass five-year-old’s bedroom.
I swing. He catches my arm and snaps it in twenty-seven places.
“Fuck.”
“All finished, Karate Kid?” he asks.
I walk away like the bigger man that I am. If I had a finger for every time this sort of thing has happened. I’d have twelve fingers. Twelve massive middle fingers to stick into his face while screaming, “Real fucking McCoy!”
I signal for a cab outside the bar.
“Where to?” he asks.
“My mother’s house.”
“What’s with the Karate getup?”
I smirk. “If you knew the answer to that, you’d already be dead.”
James is a creative writing/education major at the University of Colorado, Boulder. When he's not trouncing through horribly boring lit texts he inhabits a convenient, liminal space in which bumping uglies refers to hip-checking patrons of Walmart...try it sometime.
The Truth about Scooby-Doo
by David Hughes
To who sees diary if not burned upon maybe scheme fail: English not supergood, apparently I am being talking dog. I say last entry upwards reasoning described: tonight leash-master Shaggy will be chopped up and put in bucket. Then Daphne joins him, then Velma, then Fred when he finished watching. It Fred’s idea to put on leash, drag bare feet along pointy ground to find scary people.
Five years exactly since taken from house. Still I have belt around neck like dog. I boy not dog. Still new grownups name myself as “Scooby-Doo,” as talking dog. Purebred talking dog apparently betterer to handle than inbred talking boy.
Still I have no idea as to exact motivation behind capture. I eat vegetables required, I do homework. Perhaps not pleased that I take second grade as 15-year-old. I scary to see in front of mommy. Mommy not describe myself as scary. Don’t know. Just put on black tights break into window and drive me far far far that way for two days in green van.
Then we find ghost people and take off faces. I no want to find ghost people, take off faces. They make me. I tell jokes. “TELL JOKE SCOOBY. DO FUNNY THING SCOOBY. WE GIVE YOU SCOOBY SNACK.” Scooby snacks composed made with chicken bone plus old cereal.
Shaggy pull on leash. Acts like I obeying when not. Kicks face often.
Velma seem nice at first. I work out deal with Velma to go away. She lie, she tells Shaggy. Shaggy and Velma kick face more. Cut nose still sick. Scars in reflection pool now black and hurting.
Daphne angry a lot but mostly tell me things and not kick face too often. Makes me cry more than face kick. “FUCK YOU RETARDED DOG.” I be not dog. Not sure if other thing, but I know I be not dog. Fred likes her. They take off clothes for each other and refuse me sleep quiet.
Fred worst of all. Fred gets weird look across face back in van at night. Uses same rusty doctor things to fill my veins with things I can’t pronounce. Says I have rabies and needing shots. Shots burn like fire only skin not protect. Most of areas still brown underneath plus hurts to breathe. I get hurt and tired and I see things things I see not exist.
They keep hacksaw in van “IN CASE YOU GET TOO BAD SCOOBY!” They got too bad, they got too bad, I done being polite, I stronger. Tonight I go home after making stream in back woods red with the all four of them.
David Hughes is a Graphic Design/Playwriting student at Columbia College Chicago with a love of Finnish Folk Metal.
Over Poe's Dead Body
by Bree Katz
I didn't actually want to bring the professor along when we rightfully brought Poe back from stinking Philadelphia. But she just jumped in the trunk "to warm his bed for him," no different from every other fangirl I ever met. She spent the whole drive from Baltimore giddily relating the chronology of all the dead guy's stories. Plus something about how he'd boinked his dead, underage cousin or maybe hadn't because he was afraid of vaginal teeth. I told Jax to take the shovel and stick it one of her sets of teeth, upper or lower, to get her to shut up, but he only hit her over the head with it.
When we got to the museum they'd displayed the body in, the professor started making these moaning noises, so I hit her with the shovel again. We dragged Poe out to the car. The professor was of course no use at all, just chattered incoherently the whole time. One of the garbage bags we'd put Poe in tore as we were loading him in the trunk. I said, "I don't want no car that smells like no dead guy." The perfessor went all crazy and offered me a blank check for the car. It would've been a good deal, too, if she hadn't insisted that all he needed "to heal him" was "a woman's touch" and insisted on going "night-night" with him when we put him six feet under Baltimore's grit. And good for her and all, but even with all the Febreeze in the
world, Poe still lives on.
Bree Katz teaches English as a second language to unsuspecting young adults. In her generous amounts of free time, she writes absurd plays, stares at her computer screen while drooling, and yells at passing cars.
there are a lot of bugs
by josh byer
there are a lot of bugs
that collided with my
windshield today
i killed them
with this car
by accident
i wonder if they were
reincarnated people
those insects
who might i have hit?
shit,
hope it wasn’t ghandi
hey, ghandi
sorry if it was
no, seriously
Josh Byer has a headache. Recent work can be seen in the anthologies "Journey Prize Stories #17" (McClelland & Stewart) and "Can'tlit" (ECW Press).
Parakeets
by Ben Ellentuck
boy does that Harry like them parakeets lemme tell you. How many parakeets that boy got to keep. I mean how many goddamn parakeets that boy got to keep. I mean cause he got hisself too many parakeets. I mean that boy got hisself jus too many parakeets. Them birds be squawkin all night long I mean them birds them parakeets them birds all be squawkin too goddamn much. I mean what that boy be feedin them birds. Thats what I be wonderin. Cause them birds them parakeets got somethin wron I mean somethin wron in they heads. Somethin got to be wron in they heads cause they be squawkin an I don mean jus 2 parakeets or 3 parakeets or a couple a parakeets I mean all them goddamn parakeets be squawkin at 3 in the a.m. an I need my beauty sleep. I need me my goddamn beauty sleep but them birds keep wakin me up at 3 in the a.m. an how I supposed to get my beauty sleep if them stupid ass birds be squawkin on me at 3 in the a.m. Thats a question aint nobody know how to answer. Yall be livin in my house sleepin in my bed yall be sleepin in my bed yall be wonderin the same goddamn thing that same goddamn thing about why that boy got to be keepin hisself so many goddamn parakeets I mean why that boy keepin hisself company with them goddamn birds. An why them stupid ass birds got to be squawkin at 3 in the a.m. I mean what that boy be feedin them birds I mean that boy got hisself jus too many parakeets too many parakeets for anyones good. Boy does that Harry like them parakeets. Them birds be askin for a kick in they lil birdie ass. Them birds be askin for it. Them birds be squawkin at 3 in the a.m. lordy lordy. Sometimes I think a bad thought a bad thought pop in to my head jus pop into my head about them parakeets. An I jus push it away. But still them parakeets best watch they goddamn ass squawkin at 3 in the a.m. Them birds got no respect for no human decency no time specially not 3 in the a.m. Them birds aint got not respect. I tell you I don know how that Harry be sleepin at 3 in the a.m. with them goddamn parakeets squawkin they ass off I don know how that Harry be getting hisself any sleep. Them birdies be squawkin they lil birdie ass off at 3 in the a.m. make me mad as shit. Nothin to do now but sleep an I kick they lil birdie ass in the mornin. Nothin to do now but sleep an
Ben Ellentuck may or may not be illiterate.
Cupidol the Wonder Drug
by Paddy Shannon
It worked like they said. It was instant. As her withered lips parted round a toothless grimace I stood dissolved in light. Her greasy hair flaked snowstorms of loveliness as I clasped her scrawny yellow neck in my hands and pressed her limp, tea-bag breasts hungrily against my heart. It was love alright, at twenty credits a pill, guaranteed eighty hours, the best pharma-coitical ever produced. And at that rate, we told each other, we could be happy forever and avoid the draft.
For, young or old, only singles went to fight. Society in its humane wisdom thought it easier that way. Loving couples should be exempt, people thought, so long as there was a test for love. And with the hypothalamus MRI multiscan, you couldn’t fake the test.
But they reckoned without Cupidol, and it brought me and Deirdre together. I answered her ad, we took the pill, and ascended to heaven, all within ten minutes. Her brainless chat, my baboon laugh, it was all poetry. My fascistic, drink-fuelled ramblings were symphonies to her, my rancid farts wild roses in honey. She picked her nose with the flair and artistry of Leonardo. Oh love, oh careless love, the best there ever was.
But then came the side-effects. I didn’t expect the jealousy to be so intense. When I murdered her best friend it was a simple misunderstanding. As she nailed my limbs to the bed and started to embalm me through the large colon, she kept hissing in my ear, with that adorably bad breath, that she would have me forever and that love would never die. With my teeth in her jugular, I swore to our immortality.
Cupidol killed more people than the war. Love conquers all.
Paddy Shannon lives in Lancaster and has spent a lifetime developing the attributes of a real writer, which is to say: broke, antisocial and unemployable. He has recently finished an MA in creative writing.
