Forget April; October is shaping up to be the cruelest month. I want to play with the contrasts between short story and fairy tale, and I want to try and create more modern fairy tales. Today is a bit of play–a first draft attempt at one. Pretty sure I don’t like it, but hey, if others do, that works. Next week will be the short story version.
*****
Once upon a time there was a box. It was plain and new, and held something important. It waited alone in the upper room of a house on a long sloping street in a bustling city until men arrived and began to fill the room.
“Oh joy,” the box thought. The men brought more boxes. A bookcase. A box spring. A mattress. And paintings. A desk and a chair.
“There,” said a pungent fellow who stacked the box with the other boxes. “All done.” Then he and the other men trooped away. The door slid shut with a click!
The next day, a couple came in and began to arrange the room. One laid a hand on the box.
“What’s this?” he asked.
The other looked over. “Dunno.” Then came the jiggle of metal and plastic and
“Ow!” the box wanted to cry, but without a mouth that wasn’t likely to be.
“What is that?” said the first man.
“I…wow.” said the second.
“Let’s just set this aside,” said the first, “we’ll deal with it later.” And into the closet the box went.
Time passed. Occasionally, one of the men would open the closet door, which creaked. Tip the box back. Lift a flap.
“Hm?” he would say, then put the box back.
More time passed. some days there were happy noises. Other days there were angry ones. The box heard it all, but trapped in the darkness, could never join in.
Until one day when the door was thrown open and everything emptied. The room had been filled with boxes, the bed stood up, the bookcase pulled down, and the desk chair set upside down on the desk.
“What’s that” said the man, his voice sounded crackly. “Is that… do you remember…”
“I do,” said the second, “and I think we should leave it.”
“Really?” said the first. “I don’t know. Let’s think a little more.” Then along came some men who hauled everything else away.
“They’ve left me,” thought the box until late in the evening, when one of the men snuck the box downstairs, and set it by the heavy front door.
But the next day, when the box awoke, it was back in the bedroom.
“Did you bring this box up?” he called.
A discussion followed.
The next night, the second man took the box downstairs, all the way out to the car.
But the next day, when the box awoke, it was back in the bedroom again.
An argument followed.
The third evening both men took the box out, each carrying one side.
Alas, the next day, when the box awoke, it was back in the bedroom.
The men stood in the doorway. One glared at the box. The other furrowed his ample brow and shrugged.
“I guess it stays,” the glaring one said. And they left.
The box remained alone until one day, some men arrived carrying boxes and bedsprings…
Nicanor Abbott 