by Ann Crystal
Brisk Little Stories
Written and published by Ann Crystal
Copyright 2015 Ann Crystal
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. Unless otherwise noted by author.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission by author.
View my pages at, www.pagesbycrystal.weebly.com
Table Of Contents
About The Stories
Tiny Town Kurts
ManKind
It's a Numbers Game
About The Stories
Hi readers,
Thanks for downloading this little book of short stories. I have these stories posted on my website, but wanted to offer them as an e-book.
These three shorts are from a pile of numerous stories that I’ve written, which I call my raw story collection. The stories that I have in my raw story collection are the stories I wrote for fun and have since done little to no editing.
Many of the stories from my raw story collection will probably never be published. But I guess I should never say never.
I hope you enjoy these brisk little stories.
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Tiny Town Kurts
After twelve years, Parker Porter returns to his hometown to check on his little sister. He is met with a ghost town, a house in disrepair, and the undead.
ManKind
A hit man who discovers that his latest hit is not human.
It's a Numbers Game
Two brother's. One doesn’t want to share an inheritance that they will one day inherit from their parents. The other just wants to survive.
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Tiny Town Kurts
**Author's Note**
Please don’t ask me where this story came from LOL, because I have no idea. I do not like zombies, never have, never will. Why I would write a story about zombies is beyond me. However, I do like witches, heroic dogs, and deadly reunions. I hope you enjoy :-))
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The town was small. No, small was not the right word. The town was tiny.
There were only the necessities; a grocery store that doubled as a post office, a veterinary, and a diner. Two of the buildings were on the left with a paved road that separated the vet clinic from its neighbors. The paved road began and ended within the tiny town.
“When you said you lived in a small town,” Henry Wallace told his friend, Parker Porter, “I just assumed it was one that did not belong to the ghost.”
“Ha, very funny.” Parker drove his white SUV into Kurts Town, TX and pulled to a stop at the center of town. “Has gotten a bit dead-”
“You mean there were once people in this godforsaken place?” Henry said.
“Everything we need is just 45 minutes up the road, but Kurts was never this vacant.”
“You left because it was a dead end,” Henry looked out the tinted windows and into the fifty-style diner. Dimes Diner had a counter that ran the length of the 23-foot-long building; there were no booths or table and chairs.
The place was dressed up in black and white, with the kitchen somewhat visible in the back. “Who said others didn’t get the same idea?” He could see chips and post cards in the windows of the grocery store that was properly named, Food and Postal. He could see nothing in, Kurts Vet across the street, its windows
darkened in black.
Henry tried to imagine people in the diner, eating burgers or sipping at steaming coffee. The people in his imagination were from the wrong era, they were from the old western movies he had loved as a child.
“I guess twelve years can really change a place.” Parker sighed, looking into the diner.
“You mean there was something more to these old building blocks?” Henry wondered.
“Yeah, people.” Parker drove straight past the town and took the first left off the main road of dirt and mud.
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When they came to the house, Henry looked at Parker. “Why did I have to be a friend and accompany you to this scary, old, creepy house?”
Parker laughed, “You think?”
“It looks abandoned.”
Shutters hung from single hinges, window panes were missing, black sheets of plastic covered sections of the roof. The second story looked like a top hat atop the first story. The roof was caving in on the wraparound porch. It was a house about to fall in on itself.
“Am I permitted to tell you what a terrible brother you are?” The two men stood in front of the SUV, both in t-shirts, jeans, and tennis shoes.
“I don’t understand,” Parker said, “I mean, I’ve been sending her
money.”
“Well,” Henry looked at the overgrown weed that covered the land and over to the barn that stood behind the house. “Maybe she’s dead-”
“For the sake of-“
“What?”
Parker started for the house when movement caught his eye; near to the house, where the brush was less thick.
“Hunk?” Parker mumbled, squatting down, “Hunk, I can’t believe you’re still-” He said a bit louder.
The German shepherd looked up from a chew toy that he was busy with, giving view of the side of his face. Bone and raw flesh outlined the right side of his face, his eyes were black, his canines yellow and intact.
“Does that chew thing have fingers?” Henry grabbed Parkers by the arm and pulled him to a standing position.
“You stupid beast!” A raspy growl came from the back of the house. “Give me back my arm.”
Dirty as someone who dug his way up from his own grave, a man came toward the front of the main house. Grumbling nonsense, he dragged his body through the tall weeds like someone with a bad leg.
He paused for an instant when he saw the two men. The weeds swayed slightly in the wind as the strangers observed one another.
“Flesh.” The man broke into a run, throwing his arms into the air like a wild child. “Hungry, hungry, hungry.”
Parker stood there watching the corpse wobble toward them, barely realizing his friend was no longer beside him until his SUV came rushing past him and ran over the zombie.
“Natalie…” Parker made his way to the house, “Natalie? Natalie are you there?” He pounded at the door. “Natalie?”
Henry strolled up behind him, watching the dog as the beast chewed away at the thumb of his chew toy.
“Natalie!” Parker said, and the door swung open.
Natalie was a small, young woman with hair braided in two strands and a long thin face that looked rigid and witchy.
“Natalie,” Parker stepped into the house, took her into his arms, and spun her in a circle. When he set her down, she smiled up at him like a little girl admiring her father’s return from a long business trip.
“Parker?” She said, “What a surprise.”
“It was meant to be a surprise,” Henry said, “But it looks like the
surprise is on us.”
“Come, come in.” She pulled Parker into the foyer and Henry stepped in just as she closed the door.
“Am I a ghost?” Henry snapped.
They ignored him as Parker took in his family’s home. The stairs were directly ahead of the foyer, the living room to the left. Under the stairs was the door to the kitchen and somewhere along the way was a bathroom.
Beige wallpaper with red flowers pilled all along the ten-foot walls; wood splintered along the oak stair rail; parts of the ceiling bellied.
Bookshelves lined the wall opposite of the stairs with a desktop compute
r at its center. Facing the bookshelves was a couch positioned in the middle of the room with beige covering and red pillows.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were living this way?” Parker looked at his sister but Henry interrupted before she was able to answer.
“Yeah, I get you two have a ton of catching up to do,” Henry grabbed the brother and sister by the arm. “But let us not forget about the dead guy I just rammed and the dog chewing away at someone’s arm.”
“Oh…” Parker walked over to the coach and sat down, “Oh no…”
“It’s not my fault,” Natalie said, sitting beside her brother as Henry took the computer chair. “Not really?”
“What do you mean?” Parker asked.
“Well, when Hunk died I found that I was all alone. I was heartbroken, just devastated. So I went online and bought an old book that claimed it had a spell to bring the dead back to life.”
“You did what?” Parker leaned forward.
“I used up nearly all the money I saved up,” Natalie continued, “From the money you’ve sent me.”
At first Parker simply stared at her, until finally he asked, “What?”
“I told you why,” Natalie brows curled, “Hunk died, I had to do
something.”
“No!” Parker, threw his face into his hands, “With all the money I
sent, you could have built yourself a whole other house-”
“And another dog,” Henry added.
“No,” Natalie chimed, “No dog could replace Hunk, and no house could ever replace this house.” Natalie shook her head, “How dare you both.”
Parker and Henry looked met eyes but were too stunned to speak.
“It wasn’t a bad investment,” Natalie went on, “It brought Hunk
back.”
“And that mutant?” Henry said.
“Well, that was Hunk’s doing,” Natalie explained, “He came back acting funny,” Natalie sank back into the couch, “Not wanting his food, and you know I only give him the best kind of food.”
“Human flesh?” Henry asked. “What he wanted was human flesh.”
“He was only protecting me,” Natalie curled her blond strands around her left index finger. “That drunken fool…” Natalie nodded, “After that, Hunk wanted more flesh, and more, and more.”
“You mean it’s like a virus?” Parker asked, “It’s contagious?”
“Oh, but that’s only because I did something wrong.” Natalie answered, “It wasn’t supposed to turn out this way.”
“Okay, I’ve heard just about enough,” Henry stood, “Let us put some miles between us and this town.”
“What?” Natalie blinked at her brother as though she had just awoken from sleep. “Parker?”
“He’s right,” Parker said, “We want to get out of here before dark so hurry and get some things together.”
“But, I haven’t left the walls of this house in years.”
“Well, now your big brother has come home to get you.” Parker stood and pointed to the stairs, “Go now and pack.”
Natalie stood and slowly walked toward the steps, just as she was about to climb the stairs she turned back around, “Oh, Parker. I’ve been waiting a long time for you to return home.”
Parker offered a smile, but didn’t manage to curve but one side of his mouth. “I’m just sorry I waited so long.”
“Just before you came I put on a cup of tea,” Natalie moved toward the kitchen, “Let me make you and your friend a cup so you can sip while I get ready.”
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Thirty minutes later, Natalie came down the stairs. Her brother was stretched out on the coach, his friend on the floor just under the computer chair.
Henry’s white teacup was on the desk beside the computer, while Parker’s cup had fallen and was in four pieces on the floor beside the couch.
“I’m sorry,” Natalie said, “But I couldn’t leave our house behind the way you did.” She walked to a section of the bookshelf and pulled down a large, heavy book that was bound in red leather. She hugged the ten by fifteen inch book to her and turned toward Parker.
“Don’t worry my brother,” Natalie said, “I’m sure I can get it right this time.”
The End
ManKind
**Author's Note**
I wrote this story back in 2012. My father once told me a story about when he was a child, about watching the moon landing of July 20, 1969 with his father and family. I have written this story in the memory of my grandfather, Martin.