Brain Freeze & Other Stories

By David R. Michael

Brain Freeze & Other Stories - A collection of eight Speculative Fiction and Slipstream stories by David Michael, with illustrations by Don Michael, Jr.

"Brain Freeze" - Crouched on all fours, eye nubs just over the edge of the curb, Boollf's ear bones vibrated with the sound of the low churning, the sirens's song, the goal of tonight's mission...

"Callisto" - She came out of the hut and the butt end of a spear hit her in the face. She had only an instant to see the two men, strangers, one of them holding her boys, pinning the boys's arms...

"Indian Summer" - Anna, hurting from the death of her best friend, isn't ready to give up the gray gloom of autumn for the sunshine of Indian summer. But maybe more than just the sun has come back to her.

"Constellation" - The Great Bear looks down on the world and sees a woman, a mother like herself, whose children have been taken from her.

"The Perfect Hiding Place" - The house next door has been sold and the new neighbors are moving in. Do you think they're religious? They seem to have a lot of kids. Do you think they're hiding something? They look ethnic. Do you think they might be worth robbing? No, obviously, they can't be *monkeys*...

"Selene" - Her village is burned, her beloved husband is dead. Only she can save her sons. The Moon bears silent witness as she runs through the night and the storm to reclaim what remains of her life.

"Nostalgia" - Two yellowing Polaroids, snapshots of a little girl at the fair. Two different childhoods separated by the death of her father. One childhood she can't remember, ruined by the one she wants to forget. When her boyfriend's "birthday surprise" turns out to be a date at the same fair, Sharon finds herself face to face with both.

"Evanescent" - She's the girl you meet every year for the first time. She has red-gold hair, sky-blue eyes, and just a splash of freckles across her cheeks. She's as young as you are, or as old. She dances in the rain and splashes in the puddles. She jumps in the leaves and spins with the wind. She steps out of the fog to smile at you, then disappears before you can ask her name...

• Language: English
• Publisher: David R. Michael
• Release date: May 12, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458105509

David R. Michael

Most days, David Michael is a software developer and a writer. Some days, he’s a writer and a software developer. Other days, he’s an amateur photographer. Because, really, who is the same person every day?David is the designer and developer of The Journal, personal journaling software for Windows. He has also designed and developed video games, and has written two nonfiction books and numerous articles about video game development.David lives with his wife and kids in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

Book preview

Brain Freeze & Other Stories

Stories by David Michael.

Illustrations by Don Michael, Jr.

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2011 by David Michael.

Published by Four Crows Landing.

Brain Freeze & Other Stories. Copyright © 2011 by David Michael. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information contact Four Crows Landing: [e-mail]

Brain Freeze, Callisto, Constellation, and Indian Summer Copyright © 2009 by David Michael. Evanescent, Nostalgia, Selene, and The Perfect Hiding Place Copyright © 2010 by David Michael.

Paintings Brain Freeze, Callisto, Constellation, Evanescent, Indian Summer, Nostalgia, Selene, and Until Death Do Us Part by Don Michael, Jr. Copyright © Don Michael, Jr. All rights reserved.

Designed by David Michael.

Cover artwork and layout by Don Michael, Jr.

Published by Four Crows Landing.

1.0-2011.05.12

This is a work of fiction. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Most of the locations are made up too.

Table of Contents

Brain Freeze

Callisto

Indian Summer

Constellation

The Perfect Hiding Place

Selene

Nostalgia

Evanescent

Brain Freeze

Crouched on all fours, eye nubs just over the edge of the curb, Boollf watched–and hoped. His ear bones vibrated with the sound of the low churning, the sirens’s song, the goal of tonight’s mission. His muscles twitched and his tongue flicked in anticipation. He could feel a similar tension up and down the line. Everyone could hear it. Tonight for sure–

Movement along the line, one of his crew–Grennf, probably–jumping up to the curb without waiting for the word. Boollf’s right eye rotated and he could see it was indeed the idiot Grennf already creeping along the concrete surface toward the big glass doors where the man Jeremy had pushed the woman Jessie. Behind Grennf, other eye nubs appeared over the edge of the curb, and tentative finger pads, wanting to follow. Stupid newbie wogs.

Down! Boollf snapped, his voice croaking low and angry. The other eye nubs disappeared and the finger pads pulled back out of sight. Get back behind the curb, you stupid wogs. Nobody moves until I say. Grennf froze, his big eyes on the man and the woman, who had their faces pressed together and their hands all over each other, moaning. Grennf! Get your wet, wagging tail back here, you idiot.

The woman Jessie pulled her face away from the man Jeremy’s. What was that? Did you hear something?

No. The man Jeremy’s face reconnected with hers.

Grennf still had not moved, and Boollf could see a dark wetness growing under the other as Grennf wet himself. Grennf should be scared. And not just scared of the man and woman. Boollf was going to serve the idiot up fricassee if this mission was ruined.

Stay! Boollf told the others, then pulled himself up and over the curb. He reached the still-comatose Grennf in a leap, wrapping his long fingers around Grennf’s mouth to squelch any further stupidity. Grennf’s neck swelled beneath his fingers. Snarling low in his own throat, Boollf picked up Grennf and heaved him back toward the curb.

Grennf spun through the night air, long legs stretching out, hands trying to grab nothing. He landed with a wet thud, the breath knocked out of him. Boollf leaped back to curb as the rest of the team pulled the twitching Grennf back into the shadows. Grennf found his voice then and let loose with a loud croak of pain and fear that caused the nearby crickets to stop their noisy dancing and the cicadas to stop their–whatever it was cicadas did, the noisy bastards.

Did you hear that? The woman Jessie had pulled free again and was looking into the darkness of the parking lot.

The cicadas started up again–nothing kept them quiet for long–and the crickets followed their lead.

That was just a frog, the man Jeremy said. There’s hundreds of them in the ditch. He paused. Ah, crap, that reminds me … The man started to disentangle himself from the woman Jessie.

Boollf had his big hands on Grennf’s mouth again, clamping the mouth closed while he pushed Grennf’s head down against the asphalt. He leaned down so his mouth was right beside Grennf’s left ear bone. If you’ve ruined this mission, he whispered, "I swear I will have you deep fried."

Now it was the woman Jessie pulling the man back to her. No no no, she said, punctuating each No with a kiss. I’ve already had to wait an hour for you.

I really should …

"Fric … ass … see," Boollf whispered to Grennf, who wet himself again.

Let’s just go, Jeremy, the woman Jessie said. I have to work lunch tomorrow, and I’m already tired.

My boss is gonna kill me, the man Jeremy protested, but he let himself be led away to the side of the store where their car was parked. The car started, the lights came on, and the lights moved back and away.

Boollf let Grennf go, then slowly raised his eye nubs over the lip of the curb again. The humans were gone, leaving only an odd-shaped clean-ish smudge in the grime on the glass doors. Below the other sounds of the night, Boollf could still hear the low churning and grinding.

It’s your lucky day, Grennf, Boollf said, then to the others, Move out!

They came over the curb like a green wave and reached the glass doors in three long leaps. In quick succession Treef, Carpf, and Feerf were lifted and their backs pressed against the glass. The glass hissed and bubbled as their slimes mingled and interacted. Within seconds, the corner of a glass door had been reduced to a silicon gel that dripped to the floor.

Boollf entered and his crew followed him in one at a time. They passed the tall racks of shiny plastic bags, leaping toward the swirling, grinding blue and pink lights in the back of the store and the nectar of the gods that they represented.

Boollf picked the pink one, the fuller of the two, and left his crew to bicker about who would be first on the blue one. It took three leaps, back and forth across the dark aisles for him to reach the spout. He wrapped his legs around the neck of the spout and let gravity spin him so his mouth was below the spout. He reached up with his hands and grabbed the lever and pulled.

Cold, sweet flavor rushed into him, overflowing his mouth faster than he could swallow. He worked his long tongue up into the spout, the pain of the cold balancing the extreme thrill of the taste experience. He choked, but he did not let go. He would never let go–

The freeze, the rush, the orgasm of cold and sugar and natural and artificial flavors overwhelmed him. His eye nubs felt as if they might explode from the pressure in his head. His hands and feet went numb. His sight went pink then white from the sensory overload. It was heaven.

He didn’t even feel it when he fell to the floor, the breath pushed out of him from the impact. He had no way of knowing or caring if another of his crew had taken his place at the spout. He couldn’t think anymore. Just feel. He watched pink and