She was a couch lump.
All day, she did nothing but sit and squint blankly at walls, as if trying to see one of those three-dimensional image things with the weird patterns that you have to look cross-eyed at.
After her parents kicked her out, she stared at trees instead.
“What’s our special tonight?”
“Soup.”
“What kind?”
“Borscht.”
“…Is that soup, or stew?”
“It’s soup.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah I’m sure. It’s under ‘Soups’ in the cook book.”
“What cook book?”
“This red one with the gold filigree.”
“That’s not a cook book. That’s an encyclopedia.”
“Oh. Yeah.”
“My bad.”
“So what have we learned today?” said Dan, standing over the aquarium.
“Whatcha doin’?” asked Tara.
“Teaching the fish to speak.”
“Is this some elaborate setup for a pun on how the fish are in ‘school’?”
“No. I’m seriously teaching them.”
“Whatever,” Tara scoffed, leaving.
“Jerk face,” said the fish.
“Will you love me forever?” she whined.
“Yeeeah,” he said, rubbing her head. “‘I’ll only be gone for an hour or two. I’ll be back.”
“Promise?” she whimpered.
“I promise.”
He did come back, and he brought a new collar and leash with him.
His wife liked going for “walks”.
“There’s so much to do, and so little time to do it all in!”
“That’s the whole point, though! It’s what makes life fun!”
“I never said I wanted fun. Never said I wanted life, either.”
“Don’t be a spoil sport. Eighty years, maybe ninety, and we can go home again.”
Gregory Plymouth poked his head into little caves and lifted leaves so he could peer underneath. He was an Explorer, and, dang it, he was going to discover something.
“Any luck?” asked a voice behind Gregory.
He thought he’d imagined it, so he didn’t meet the undiscovered Havarkian Talking Frog.
“I’ve become more powerful than you will ever be able to imagine!”
“That doesn’t even make sense.”
“Can you imagine telepathy?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Telekinesis?”
“Yes.”
“What about telepyrokinesis?”
Ever since being struck by lightning at the anime convention, Todd had been getting on a lot of people’s nerves.
“I can play guitar and trombone!”
“Ah, shaddup. I’ve learned and forgotten how to play more instruments than you know exist!”
“Like what?”
“Like Icelandic, Zulu, Narau…”
“Those aren’t instruments; they’re languages.”
“Languages? I’ve learned and forgotten how to speak more languages than you know exist! Like sitar, zither, didgeridoo…”
“Gennardy Tranctorblade, Julioust Dunyarctle, Crandulon Unctiferal, Yip Yip Doodle Tok, Fkaisl Ipsidav, Hourly Ablutions, Wreltstle Jujjax, and Michael.
“You have all been found guilty of Second-Degree Hookie (The Playing Thereof), and will be sentenced to mandatory summer school.
“Except Crandulon Unctiferal. He, like all repeat offenders, gets the firing squad.”
This story was based on a call on Twitter for the first five words of a story. @Honestlyspeakin provided the words, “Levilia’s wings started to burn”.
Levilia’s wings started to burn, sizzling and melting. Wind rushed past her face, ruffling her feathers but doing little to quench the flames.
“You can’t blow it out!” cried Natasha. “Use the fire extinguisher!”
There was a blast of compressed carbon dioxide. Levilia the self-immolating budgie cheeped in satisfied agony.