Harold Patch
“Here I am” he thought, unable to speak, unable to move. “But she couldn’t have”. He started to think of earlier; how he kept nagging at her, complaining about her. Why couldn’t he just appreciate her? Why couldn’t he see that eventually she could blow up, or worse… “I guess I can’t blame her” he thought, looking around. He noticed he was with the harvest crops. The pumpkin patch to be exact. “So what am I doing here? She’ll come back for me, we’ll sort this out” but somehow he knew that she had put up with him for too long, that maybe this time it wouldn’t end well. He tried again to move but to no avail. He saw her coming out of the house, walking towards him. “This is it”. She bent low and grabbed him. “Why is she holding me? Why am I so light?” She brought him into the house and passing a mirror he saw what he was. He began to tremble in fear as he noticed she had walked into the kitchen, the oven on with a cookbook on the table. He looked and saw it opened to the page for “pumpkin pie”...
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The Rebirth of Francis
Francis was thoughtful, conscientious and, on the whole, concerned that he not compromise his morals in any aspect of his dealings with his fellow man. Since nobody is perfect, it fell to Francis’ subconscious mind to set about forgetting many of the smaller offenses that he committed on a daily basis, so as to keep him from a lifetime of mental self-flagellation. Still, recollections of minor offenses committed managed to slip through the cracks from time to time.
When awareness of moral failure reared its head, there was much pain to be distributed to his extremities. Often Francis would awake uncomfortably on the floor, a dull throb emanating from the area of his lower legs. Such is the life of a man of absolutes.
It was then, a bit of a shock to his circle of brotherly support
on the day that he walked in to the small, cramped community center basement where they met weekly, arm in arm with someone in a poorly made bear suit.
