Getting the Hang of This

If you've been keeping score at home, you may know that we’ve just passed the two year mark. My first post was February 2nd, 2016. I kind of forgot it was the anniversary, so I didn't plan anything special. I hope the next part of the serial story will be enough.

And yes, it's up late. I had to do adult things like buy a new microwave, and then less adult things like watch Star Trek. I'm trying to get back on schedule, I'm just really bad at it.

So here's Part Three:

The dusty remains of the thing settled on the kitchen floor. Patrick looked at his arm. Irregular teeth marks had been cut into either side. He wrapped it in a dish towel and peered out the kitchen window. There were probably more of those things out there. And he was probably supposed to fight them.

That bus station guy had been really vague on the details.

There was another knock on the door. Great, what now?

Patrick peered through the peephole. Not a ghoul faced monster, at least. Just a girl. He had seen her around, coming and going, around the mailboxes, but he’d never really talked to her.

He opened the door a crack. “Yeah?”

“Sorry, it’s just… I live right below you and I heard all this crashing. I thought, I don’t know, maybe somebody’s cracked their head and died or something. So… just being neighborly and… checking in.”

“Oh, no, I just, uh, got in a fight with some furniture,” Patrick replied. “Tripped over the coffee table. You know how it is.”

Her eyes flicked from his face to the room over his shoulder, and down to his towel wrapped arm.

“You okay?” she asked.

He glanced down at his arm. Blood spots had begun to soak through.

“Oh, yeah, fine. It’s just… it’s been a hell of a day.”

She nodded. “Okay. Just thought I’d check. Being a good neighbor and all.” She turned and headed for the stairwell.

He locked the door and turned back to his disarrayed apartment. He wrapped his arm in something better than a towel and started cleaning. Luckily, the creature had disintegrated, so his kitchen didn’t look like a crime scene. The only blood smeared on the cabinets and the floor was his own.

He picked up the steak knife. Its blade was coated in creosote and gave off a scent like an old fireplace. He tossed it in the sink.

If this was going to be his life now, he’d need a better weapon. Something bigger, better, and definitely cooler. Like a sword! No, not like a sword. You can’t just walk around town with a sword. Not to mention, he couldn’t afford one. He’d foolishly quit his job the day before on the assumption he’d no longer be needing an income. Clearly, he had been wrong.

Maybe he could get it back. It had only been one day. He could claim temporary insanity.

He headed out of the apartment and down the stairs, striding purposefully across the parking lot. He’d beg for his job back and everything would be fine and just like it was. Plus the bitey hell beasts, of course.

Patrick walked around a minivan on his way to the road and ran into someone. He reached out and started to apologize. The someone turned to him. Not a someone. A something. Blank face and hollow eyes.

“Shit, really?” he said. “I can’t even go twenty feet…”

The thing looked at him curiously, as far as he could tell. “You’re not supposed to be here,” it said, its voice echoing from the center of its skull.

Patrick backed away. “Let me guess, you’re going to solve that problem?”

The thing smiled, all teeth and darkness. “Gladly.”

In a second it had him by the shoulders and threw him onto the hood of a car, setting the alarm off. He kicked it in the goods, to no effect. That was just unfair. It pulled him off the car, and he used the momentum to throw himself into the thing, shoving it backwards into a fence.

The wooden fence had been broken for months. Tenants of the complex had been asking the landlord to fix it for just as long. It was a safety hazard. Someone was going to get hurt. But no one had, and so nothing was ever done. Random pieces of jagged wood continued to stick out from the fence.

And now, the blurry expression of the thing turned to confusion as it looked down at the piece of pine protruding through its chest. It looked back up at Patrick, and crumbled into dust.

Patrick took a few steps back and turned back to the building. He froze. The girl from downstairs stood in front of her door, staring at him.

He looked back at the pile of dust, and then back to her. “I swear there’s a perfectly reasonable explanation here.

Let me know what you think. I've got some ideas for the next part, so hopefully I'll get it done on time for once. I'll see you Wednesday for our regularly scheduled programming, whatever that is.