Buffalo

“I am a buffalo,” he said, standing at the bus stop, leaning forward with his arms hanging, perhaps reminiscent of a buffalo’s front legs.

“Are ya now?” asked the bus driver. “Yer not the guy who just crashed that fancy car into my bus?” Delayed passengers stood around and glared.

“Definitely not,” said the man. “It’s imperative that I be a buffalo just now. The herds are thinning. I must protect the cows.” He fidgeted. “Also, it wasn’t my car.”

“Then whose was it, I wonder,” said the driver.

“I’m just a buffalo,” said the man. He lowed. “I couldn’t know it was my brother’s car.” The buffalo figure shrank a little. “If he finds out, he’ll make the buffalo extinct.”

The driver stuck her hands in her pockets. Looked at the sky. Tried to balance mounds of paperwork against the soft lowing of this gentle, majestic creature.

“Well,” she said, “looks like whoever rammed me ran off. Someone who didn’t look anything like a buffalo. Probably stole the keys off a friendly buffalo.” The buffalo smiled up at her. “Who should get outta here and, uh, protect some cows.”

The buffalo lowed gratefully as it swayed through the crowd.

Short and Sweet

She ran all out. Dogs ran after her. She leapt to climb a wall; it crumbled, and she rolled. Back on her feet. Lead dogs snapped at her; she turned, snapped off one shot, two. Two dogs dead, the rest scared. For now.

Others would hear. She had little time. Climb a tree? Die treed by dogs. Keep running? Die exhausted. Stand and fight? Die torn to shreds and shot. She stopped on the bridge over the gorge. Jump to the river below? Die wet and broken.

Looking ahead, lights and sirens at the compound gate. Looking behind, fire and smoke of her distraction. In her pocket, a microchip that could end the world—or so she’s told. So, the mission: to return it to the authorities. At least they wouldn’t end the world.

Barking and motors from all sides. She looked over the edge of the bridge again. One chance….

Hours later, after the furor had died, the scent tracked to the middle of the bridge, the river searched, her broken gun found, her broken body not, she climbed out from the lattice beneath the bridge. Time to get the rest of the way out.

All in a day’s work.

Worst Nightmare

A fist the size of my head pulled me by my shirt into the alley. An atavist whose ugliness shone through the near-total darkness slammed me against the wall. With his meat-breath he said, “I’m your worst nightmare.”

“Yeah?” I said. “Which one?”

“What?”

“Well, I have a few. I think the worst is where I’m a scorpion, and I get captured by a child who forgets to poke me any airholes and I suffocate while this bratty kid is all fisheye against the bottle shouting at me to sting some poor beetle he’s stuck in with me.”

“Shut it!” He bounced my head off the wall. “I’m the nightmare where you get pounded into ground beef in a dark alley for sticking your nose where it don’t belong!”

“Nah,” I said. “That’s not a nightmare.” He sneered. It looked natural on him, but I could tell he’d practiced it. “That’s a good dream, the one where I tell the villain about my real nightmares until he gets confused and gives up.” The brute shook back and forth a bit and fell down. “Or until I reach the taser in my pocket. Now lie there while I call the cops.”

Maybe That Was a Mistake

I shook the snow globe and dropped to one knee to show my daughter. “Do you see the snow falling on the little village?” She nodded.

I handed her the globe and she shook it, sending the snow into another flurry. “But where are all the people?”

“Oh, they’re all inside their little houses. It’s so cold and snowy there that they want to stay by the fire,” I said. “Or they’re in the kitchen, making something delicious.”

“How many are there?”

“Oh, lots,” I said. “A whole town’s worth of families, some with little girls like you.”

“So when it’s summer, will they come out and play with me?”

“I bet they’d like to, but it’s always winter in there.”

“No summer? Can they come visit us in the summer? I bet they’d like the summer.”

“Sorry, honey. They’re stuck in the snow globe.” I put it back on the shelf. Her eyes followed it with a sad look I misinterpreted. “Don’t worry. You can look at it whenever you want. Just ask.”

And that bit of fancy is probably why I woke up at two am to the sound of breaking glass and my daughter shouting “Be free!”

All in the Timing

“Well? What are you waiting for?”

“Uh, well, I guess I’m looking for the right moment. You know, it’s kind of—.”

“The world doesn’t wait for you, girl! Go! Do it!”

“Well, it’s a big decision, right, so, um, I’m just not sure—”

“You can’t always wait to be sure!”

“Yeah, but there’s only one first time for this—well, I think—”

“Everyone only gets one first time at anything in this experience called life! What makes you so special, that you need to think so long!”

“I just, um, I guess I have to decide when—”

“Now. The answer is now.”

“Wait, no. That doesn’t—”

“You have to seize life by the balls, my friend. With your teeth.”

“It doesn’t matt—”

“Seize the balls of life in your mighty jaws—”

“That’s not what I’m—”

“—and hang on like a pit bull. Start now. Never stop.”

“You really don’t understand.”

“I understand that no one ever baked bread without lighting a fire! Come on, my friend! The time is now!”

“God, you’re so annoying.”

She got into the time machine she’d been trying to set and went back to stop herself from inviting this walking self-help book to her unveiling.

On Neologisms

“Snake-lunking.”

“We’re not calling it that.”

“Okay.” She hummed. “Snake-diving!”

“Why do you feel the need to give this a catchy name?”

“Why are you such a stick-in-the-ass?” she returned.

“I dunno, maybe because we’re in a steel cannister sheathed in sheepskin and doused in vole pheromones hoping to be swallowed by a giant snake.”

“Didn’t you volunteer for this?”

“Yes,” he nearly shouted.

“Why?”

“Because snakes the size of subway trains start appearing worldwide, and it’s got to be studied.”

“And?”

“And, I know more about anomalous snakes than the next three herpetologists combined.”

“Annnnd?”

“And if we don’t figure these snakes out, the world crumbles because they eat us all, and I’m the best chance we’ve got.

“Right. Now own that. Be proud, and keep breathing.”

He sat taller. He might’ve smiled. “What about you?” He nodded to her. “Why’re you here?”

“Because I’m the only way you’re getting out alive.”

“Oh.”

“Besides, I’ve always wanted to blow up a giant snake.”

“Really?”

“Since I was a little girl.”

They sat in silence for a couple minutes. Then their cannister rustled, shook, and filled with a damp smell. As they strapped on their breathing masks, she said...

“Serpentsploring?”

HR 3466

The bill was a throwaway. A criticism of the uselessness of the legislature in recent years, and the obstructionists making it that way. Though the legislation itself was useless, the point was popular and supported by the administration. So when the Posthumous Spirit Visitation Rights Act hit the president’s desk, he signed it.

No one expected the dead to be bound by it. Worse, the bill didn’t permit one visitation per deceased spirit to a close relative of choice, it made the visitation mandatory. Half the time, the bodiless soul didn’t want to say anything to anyone, or what it did have to say wasn’t the least bit pleasant. Being cussed at by your racist, homophobe grandpa isn’t exactly a treat for most people.

Still, a few people enjoyed it. Some folks want tearful goodbyes, or to make one last apology, or clear up some issue with the will. Courts are still arguing over whether ghosts can testify as to who killed them. So far, the answer is no, especially as they almost never show up at the right time to take the stand or be legally deposed.

But I hear Congress is passing legislation that will address the issue.