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 Posted: Mon May 04, 2009 5:18 pm
Baby on the Brain
881 words Quinton Moreau rolled his eyes as the large biker in the leather jacket left. Honestly, what was the world coming to these days? Large, buff manly-men asking for unicorn tattoos? Really? Quinn shook his head, but counted the money. A dollar was a dollar. He set the coffee pot to brew another batch, and leaned against the counter.
Life was getting too dull. Too repetitive. He needed a way to spice things up a bit. Every party he went to was the same, every tattoo he applied was just as boring as the last. Things weren’t changing. Where was the rapid-fire pace of life? Where was the tornado of chance to come whisk him away from the metaphorical Kansas of monotony?
He couldn’t help but wonder if the biker with the unicorn on his thigh had a more interesting life than him. Probably. Biker by day, cross-dressing prostitute by night? There was a good chance of that; the man HAD asked him to be certain the horn pointed towards his junk. Ah, well, such is life in the big city.
He temporarily forgot about his brewing coffee and headed outside, his hair blowing in the wind. It was long, and blonde, except for the random streaks of rainbow. He couldn’t shake the biker’s words out of his head.
“Yeah, so, my boyfriend and I” that was Quinn’s first hint. ‘My boyfriend and I.’ No, it wasn’t the blatant statement of his homosexual relationship, it was the proper grammar. No real, self-respecting heterosexual biker would say anything other than ‘Me and my boyfriend’. “Just recently adopted a kid. She’s adorable. Her name is Sheila.” Of course.
“A kid? Really?” He mumbled, focused solely on the hoof of the unicorn.
“Yep. Cute little thing, three years old. She calls me ‘Daddy-two’. Isn’t that cute?”
“Yes, very,” The hoof was causing problems. Why did horses have to have such weird feet?
“Though, I don’t know why I’m not ‘Daddy-one’. I’m the cooler Dad.”
“I’m sure.” Some people just couldn’t shut up while they were being given tattoos.
“You almost done?” No, shut up, impatient man! I’m busy!
“Yeah. Just a bit more.”
Quinn shoved open the door to the bakery. It was a French bakery, a genuine one. The owner was a cute little French woman with a sharp tongue and hands that he was sure had some sort of mystical connection to Jesus, or something. ‘By the power of God I doth bake thee!’ etc.
“Bonjour, Madame.” He smiled down at her.
“Bonjour, Quinn.” She waved dismissively at him from behind the counter while she kneaded a loaf of bread. “Qu’est-ce que tu veux?” Quinn looked around, but decided to go with the clichéd, easy route.
“Trois croissant, s’il vous plait.” The woman nodded, and packed three in a bag, handing it to him.
“Cava?” She asked.
“Comme ci, comme ca.” He shrugged.
“Porquoi?” He thought hard about it for a second. What was wrong, exactly? The woman seemed distracted, though, as a boy who looked a few years younger than Quinn walked out of the back room with a tray. The woman turned and inspected them, then hit the boy on the head, yelling something about how he didn’t preheat the oven all the way, or something. How she knew that, Quinn had no idea.
Her son was cute, though.
Son. That’s what it was. Kids. He didn’t want a kid. Did he? No. That’s stupid. He was young. Young and free!
And bored.
And besides, he didn’t have anyone to share the experience with. No significant other. No real prospects, even, at the moment. And adoption was messy, and people always gave you weird looks if you didn’t have a girl anywhere in the equation.
He took his bag of croissants and left without answering her question. He couldn’t have given a good answer, anyway.
Maybe he should get a dog. No, not a dog, dogs were messy and you had to train them. And you couldn’t put a diaper on a dog until they learned to use the yard.
Could you?
No, no, you couldn’t. Even if you did, the neighbors would always look at you funny. It was like saying ‘I’m too proud and powerful to clean up my dog’s messes, so I buy special diapers with a hole for a tail.’ They’d probably be more expensive, which was stupid, since they probably used less material thanks to the tail hole. He shook his head. That train of thought was getting him nowhere.
Quinn found his way back home and slumped down in his chair with a cup of coffee.
He took a sip and a big bite out of his pastry. It was still warm. He closed his eyes and reveled in the wheat that he was pretty sure had to be mentioned in the bible somewhere. ‘Painiticus 11:13’! He was proud of that pun.
“Get it? Pain is the French word for bread, and Leviticus is—Ah, nevermind.” He waved his hand in a submissive gesture to the bird outside the window he was talking to. “You don’t really care, and it isn’t funny if I explain it.”
Then he realized what the bird was doing. It was tending to its nest.
Full of eggs.
Quinn groaned.
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Posted: Mon May 04, 2009 6:22 pm
What to Expect when you Aren't Expecting
594 Words Quinn was not a vegetable person. This was a proven fact. Hold up a vegetable, and then hold up anything else you could possibly think of ever in the whole history of ever in the world in its entirety and he’d pick the other thing. So, when he saw a cabbage in a pot in his windowsill, his first instinct was to throw it and then run in the opposite direction. Run as fast as he possibly could have. Thankfully, though, he managed to still this primordial urge and inspect the vegetable closer.
It seemed perfectly normal, for a cabbage. He wasn’t exactly certain what was normal for a cabbage, to be fair, but it seemed pretty normal. It was in a small pot full of dirt. He prodded the leaves, as if he could somehow discover all of its secrets through the tip of his finger. Needless to say, it didn’t work. He hefted the pot up under his arm, and exited his house. He would need to find who had lost a cabbage.
Not I, said his next door neighbor.
Not I, said the other one.
Not me, hon, said the biker with the three-year-old.
Sweetie, who’s out there?, said his partner.
Pas Moi, said the baker. Her son was still cute.
Do I look like I have time for cabbage? Get out of here! Out!, Said the grumpy old man down the street.
Quinn gave up, and came back to his house, setting the cabbage down on his table. “Plants need water, right? Yah. Water. They need that.” He went to the kitchen and filled a cup up with tap water (filtered, of course). He tilted it carefully into the pot and added some water. “There. That way, when someone comes looking for you, you won’t be dead! That’s always nice, right? If I lost my cabbage in the middle of someone else’s house, I would want them to make sure it was kept safe. At least for a while. Though, I don’t know why I would leave a cabbage in anyone else’s house. I wonder who was in here. The door was locked. I would have seen them pass through the parlor, wouldn’t I?” He sighed. The plant was providing no answers.
What secrets did its leaves hold? Tantalizing ones, he was sure. Tantalizing secrets about the mysteries of the universe, and what it held. About a strange person who collects cabbages and leaves them in the middle of houses they weren’t invited to in the first place.
He could see the news headlines now! Mysterious Cabbage-Leaver-In-Peoples-Houses apprehended by brave citizen! No longer shall people live in fear that a perfectly harmless cabbage will be dropped, unsuspecting, on their furniture. No longer shall cabbages live in fear of being planted to be randomly plopped onto people’s doorsteps!
He would be doing the tabloids a favor by taking this to the police. It would give them something to talk about that wasn’t celebrities, celebrities’ diet issues, celebrities’ relationships, and low-fat pasta recipes. The police could fingerprint it and apprehend whoever it was.
But the cabbage was kind of cute.
He had sort of wanted a kid. Maybe taking care of a cabbage was similar? I mean, you had to water it. That was like feeding. And you had to change it’s dirt eventually, probably. Which was like cleaning up its messes. Right? Sort of?
He sighed. It wasn’t a kid. But it was something.
“Responsibility, here I come!” The bird tweeted outside. He really needed to stop talking to no one.
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Posted: Thu May 07, 2009 7:00 pm
Just be grateful it doesn't know 'Iwon Tail'
489 Words Quinn reached instinctively for his alarm clock, slamming the top. This caused it to actually start going off, and he winced. His alarm hadn’t been what woke him up, but he was definitely awake now. He glared at his alarm clock until he remembered where the ‘Off’ button was, and he flipped it off.
The best thing about mornings is that they only happened once a day.
What had woken him up? He groggily pushed himself to a sitting position, and was vaguely aware of a noise downstairs. He slid out of bed in his boxers, and slunk across the floor towards the stairs, knuckles practically dragging along the ground.
“Pika!” Quinn blinked. Who was in his office? It sounded like a kid. There were needles in there! It wasn’t safe for kids! “Pikachu!”
He saw the plush before he saw the kid. It was bright yellow. It looked like a rat of some kind. A child was hugging it in a death grip. The kid was wearing pajamas covered in pictures of…pills? Children shouldn’t promote drug abuse! His parents should be ashamed.
Quinn made his way over to the kid, and awkwardly picked it up.
“Uh, hey, kid.” The child nibbled on his plush’s ear.
“Pikammf!” It said, while nibbling on the ear.
“Pika-what now?”
“Pikachu!” The boy lifted up the plush in Quinn’s face. Quinn nodded.
“I get it, I get it. Pikachu. It’s cute. Who’re you?” The kid looked puzzled.
“Pikachu.” Quinn sighed. “Daddy?” The boy was looking at him, now.
“Daddy?!” His eyes widened, alarmed. “Nonononono! I’m not your Dad! I’m just a guy. We’ll find your parents soon, alright?” The kid didn’t seem to want to listen to him.
“Daddy!” He wrapped his arms around Quinn’s neck. He couldn’t help but smile.
“That’s cute, kid. I guess you can stay here for tonight. But what should I call you?”
“Pikachu.” The boy repeated. Quinn laughed.
“No, that’s not a good name for you. You’re a kid, not a rat.” He brought the baby up to his bed, and laid him down on the pillow. The kid snuggled up next to his plush toy, and fell asleep. Quinn patted his head.
“I’m going to call you Ashley.” He wasn’t sure why.
Quinn couldn’t fall back asleep, now. He headed downstairs to start up a pot of coffee. His mind still wasn’t functioning properly. It was much too early. Later on, he’d look around to see if anyone had lost a child. He figured it would work about as well as the cabbage, though.
Quinn fell asleep on the couch before his coffee was even finished. Mornings were not his favorite. He was awoken by the feel of a plush rat beating him in the head. The newly named Ashley was hitting him with his ‘Pikachu’.
“Pika! Pikachu! Funderboat.”
“Funderboat?”
Ashley hit him again, with more urgency.
“Funderboat!”
It was going to be a long day.
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Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2009 9:43 pm
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Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2009 9:46 pm
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Posted: Tue Aug 04, 2009 9:51 pm
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