Unexpected

By Trisha M. Wilson

Unexpected:
Behold sixteen short stories. Different themes, different genres. Some light and fluffy, others darker. Yet all have some element of the unexpected in them...if you are willing to look for it.

***Author Note: All of these stories have been individually published and are available individually.***

Books included in this anthology:
Battle on the Stairs, The Magic Celebration Day Parade, Teddy’s Escape, Destiny Inc., Delivery, Spot For Sale, Figurehead, The Story Of..., Night of the Almost Dead, The Executioner, The General, The Wheel, Village X17, Real Life, Ruth’s Family, The Last Broken Sword.

Battle On the Stairs
While away, the Blair family was unaware of the daily carnage occurring in their home. Watch the magical, mystical events unfold in a battle which will never end.
This is a short story, 2000 words long.

The Magic Celebration Day Parade
Feast your imagination with the 6217th annual Magic Celebration Day Parade. Experience the elaborate floats, the enchanting music, and the charismatic characters of the Bowling Dragons, the Secret Society of Trolls, the unicorns, and pixies, a few participants who spread their magic and joy for the world to relish in their jubilee. Grab a seat and immerse yourself into the party of the year, the Magic Celebration Day Parade from the comfort of your own home. Next year, join us in person to bring happiness to the world.
This is a short story, 2200 words long.

Teddy’s Escape
Teddy is missing and nowhere to be found. After searching every corner of the antique shop, Martha and Elmer report their beloved pet missing. Will Teddy be found? Was he kidnapped? Or did something else inspire Teddy to run away?
This is a short story, 3300 words long.

Destiny Inc.
Doe is the voice of destiny. However, do others desire to know what their future holds?
This is a short story, 1600 words long.

Delivery
A mistaken package delivery turns into more than ordered, an order that could cost Honey and Cherry their lives.
This is a short story, 4400 words long.

Spot For Sale
A spot holder outside Club Custodela, Isis makes a decent living along with her employees. A competitive, lucrative business, trouble makes an entrance and does the unthinkable. Will Isis outmaneuver her adversaries?
This is a short story, 3300 words long.

Figurehead
A forest dweller his entire life, his existence was one of necessity to nature. One day the children came and took him away from the only home he knew, loved, and nurtured.
Why? Why would they do such a thing?
This is a short story, 1300 words long.

The Story Of...
A book buyer who reads proposals comes across a book written by a true literary genius. Determined to learn the identity of H.N.A., the book buyer is unstoppable in her pursuit.
This is a short story, 2700 words long.

And more...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trisha M. Wilson
• Release date: Mar 19, 2015
• ISBN: 9781310984730

Trisha M. Wilson

Trisha M. Wilson lives in Wisconsin. With a degree in History and minors in Math and Business Administration, Ms. Wilson still has no idea what she wants to do with her life. When not regularly contributing on Colbyjack.net, she leads the life of a happy hermit with her three cats and family.

Book preview

Unexpected

By Trisha M. Wilson

Edited by Colby Trax and A.J. Wallace

A Short Story Anthology

First Serialized at  WWW.COLBYJACK.NET

Copyright © 2014, 2015 by Trisha M. Wilson

Cover by Trisha M. Wilson

All rights reserved.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

A Colbyjack.net Serial Tale

Smashwords Edition 2015.11.23

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only.

This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people.

If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient.

If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy.

Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Table of Contents

Unexpected

Battle on the Stairs

The Magic Celebration Day Parade

Teddy’s Escape

Destiny Inc.

Delivery

Spot For Sale

Figurehead

The Story Of...

Night of the Almost Dead

The Executioner

The General

The Wheel

Village X17

Real Life

Ruth’s Family

The Last Broken Sword

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

About The Author

Works from Colbyjack.net

Battle on the Stairs

The Blair family’s morning started out in its normal fashion. Mr. and Mrs. Blair woke their children only a few minutes later than planned.

They proceeded to encourage the children to hurry for they were late, though how exactly always seemed to be a mystery. No matter how early or prompt the waking was they ended up rushing.

Mr. Blair packed the children’s lunches, leaving out money for the eldest daughter to buy her own. She was too good for the lunches her father made for she was a big girl now. Big girls bought their lunches.

As Mr. Blair worked on the lunches, Mrs. Blair scolded the youngest two, telling them that if they continued to bicker they would be in trouble. They were constantly squabbling about who should have the bathroom first, or who’d used the other’s toothbrush. Petty, normal disputes, which would be forgotten in minutes.

As their children continued to argue, heedless of their mothers warning, Mrs. Blair gathered up her work papers. She had another busy day ahead of her and hated forgetting anything at home. The times she did forget items always seemed to coincide with her most important meetings. If only there was a way for all the papers to get in her bag by themselves, bypassing the morning rush.

Finished with the lunches, Mr. Blair silently encouraged the washer to hurry up. If it did, he’d be able to get one more load started before dropping off the children. That would be a godsend considering all he had to do today. How much he had to do every single day.

At every opportunity, the parents encouraged their children to move just a little faster. If they didn’t move quicker, they’d never make it to school and work.

When everything was done, including a last minute brushing of the teeth and rushes to the bathroom, they were ready to leave.

The Blair family hurried out of their house at seven fifteen. They were fifteen minutes later than normal. Usually they were only five or ten minutes late, but fifteen minutes late? Only when the moon and stars aligned against them.

After the normal last minute runs back into the house to grab something forgotten in the morning shuffle, their car pulled out of the driveway and drove down the road.

Barely stopping for the stop sign at the end of the block, they turned the corner and went on their way for the day.

The house, which had been the hub of so much activity minutes before, stood quiet.

Solemn.

Lonely.

As had happened every day before, since the first day the house had become a home for the Blair family, all remained silent and undisturbed as if the home was waiting for the return of the family.

With the first ring of the Church of St. Olga’s bells, things suddenly went off schedule.

At the first and second ring, there was a barely perceivable twitch of Blair house’s wall. It was like a woman who was asleep but coming awake slowly. She twitched and shifted, but didn’t immediately wake.

At the third and fourth ring, the house rose and shrank by a few inches like a stiff woman working the kinks out of her joints. If you listened closely, you could hear the popping of her joints and her moans of relief.

During the fifth and sixth ring, the walls of the home shifted from concave to convex and back again. The house was breathing so those within could have life.

The seventh and eighth ring came with the house twisting and flexing along its joints. The house was alive and testing its limits.

The ninth, and final ring, came with a settling of the home. It knew it was alive. Now, it was time for those inside to come to life.

At the toll of these bells, the inside of the house went from complete and utter stillness to a sudden knowledge that movement was possible. Movement didn’t occur yet, but it could at any moment.

The ninth stroke of the bell rang throughout the house and there was a pregnant pause before anything happened.

When it did, it happened in concert.

In the kitchen, two drawers of silverware suddenly opened. Knives, forks, and spoons rose from their resting places. One by one, they made their way out of the drawers and onto the countertops.

Cabinets, which held plates, glasses, and all other manner of cookery, sprang open. These objects left their beds and made their way to the now crowded countertops, waiting for what would come next.

In the upstairs bedrooms, sheets and pillowcases were rolling off half made beds and popping out of drawers. Clothes, along with their hangers, dropped to the floor. Knickknacks and other incidentals from inside closets and on nearby dressers joined the group of fabric on the floor.

All gathered as if waiting for instructions.

In the nearby bathroom, the same type of gathering was happening: toilet paper, soap, towels, scissors, and makeup of every kind was assembling in front of the bathroom door.

In the laundry room, the washer and dryer had stopped working, their doors opened. Clothes, both wet and dry, spilled onto the floor, leaving behind a soapy trail as the clothes marched as one single-minded entity.

In the living room, couch cushions, pillows, and blankets picked themselves up, leaving their comfortable existence to congregate in the middle of the room.

The dining room china and seat cushions met in the middle of the table.

Books, magazines, reading glasses, and pens picked themselves up to flock around the ottoman.

Every room in the house came to life and gathered together, with the exception of the front hall. There peace and stillness reigned. It felt as if this area of the house alone was a sanctuary free from activity.

When the grandfather clock chimed, indicating fifteen minutes had passed since the top of the hour, every door in the house flew open, allowing the troops within free reign over the entire house.

In one spirit, the ground floor troops made their way toward the bottom of the stairs, while the second floor troops went to the top.

Once each side assembled, they waited for the signal to attack.

The signal came in the form of more chiming from the grandfather clock.

Even before the clock finished, the sides were on the move, rushing toward each other, unmindful of anything except their enemy.

The first to clash were the pillows, their cases, and the blankets verses the spoons, glasses, and books.

The pillowcases had no chance against the books, being flattened before they knew what had happened.

The spoons had just as much luck as the pillowcases when going against the blankets for the blankets could cover them, smothering all the fight out of them.

The only real fight in the first clash was between the pillows and the glasses. The glasses had the upper hand in strength, but the pillows were light and nimble, able to evade even the craftiest of attacks.

Their comrades quickly joined these first combatants. Clothes, hangers, soap, cosmetics, stuffed animals, diaries, and everyone else they’d been able to gather attacked their enemies as if there was no tomorrow. It was as if they had a long standing feud which had to be avenged.

The silverware, china, books, pens, magazines, spatulas, toaster, and their own troops were just as relentless. They had their own vendetta to appease.

But with the vendetta and feud came casualties and the stairs quickly became a scene of carnage. Bodies of every shape and size lay where they had fallen on the stairs while their fellows trampled over them in order to get to their enemy. There would be no pause to move them out of the way.

On the floor next to the stairs, more bodies lay. They had been thrown through the stair rails, unable to hold onto anything to stop their doomed dissent. Their deaths had been painful and prolonged, though a few could be seen twitching, holding onto life by the thinnest of threads.

The opportunistic enemy dispatched their lives quickly.

The fighting continued and the loss of life grew until there were only two combatants left: the hanger and the encyclopedia.

The hanger knew she was in trouble. The encyclopedia was a trained fighter, defeating every opponent she had come across. She had battle scars all over her covers and spine. She’d even ripped out pages when they’d become damaged and were in the way. She was merciless.

The encyclopedia went for her usual move against a seemingly weaker opponent. Not giving the hanger even a second to plan her attack, the encyclopedia jumped at her, trying to pin her underneath her heavier body.

The hanger was able to jump back, avoiding such a devastating fate and slashed out with her metal hook, giving the encyclopedia a new scar upon her back.

The encyclopedia ruffled her pages in anger and lashed out, trying to use the hanger’s hook against her.

The hanger was ready for she had seen others fall to this trick. She knew the encyclopedia would grab her and pull her in to crush her within the encyclopedia’s covers. She dogged the maneuver, lashing out at the pages in question, inflicting more damage.

There was more howling from the encyclopedia as her mind became clouded in anger. This anger made her take dangerous risks, but the hanger stayed levelheaded, keeping out of range for most of the attacks.

That doesn’t mean the hanger stayed uninjured. On more than one occasion, she took a hit from the encyclopedia’s spine. These hits created dents in the hanger’s body.

Time passed slowly and it looked as if the encyclopedia would be the victor for the hanger was pinned by the stair railing.

The encyclopedia rushed forward to deliver the killing blow when the hanger moved out of the way. The encyclopedia tried to catch its covers on the railing, but she missed, plunging to her death.

There was an eerie silence through the stairwell as the sole remaining figure stood. The hanger had won, defeating a seemingly undefeatable opponent. This was the first time a hanger had ever been the last one standing, and never had a battle been as inspiring as hers was.

The hanger stood proud in the middle of the stairs. She’d won the battle for the upstairs. Her people were the victors. This hadn’t happened in three dozen battles.

Before celebrations could commence, and what celebrations they would be, the entrance hall made a noise.

Someone was coming.

The seemingly dead combatants stirred, coming back to life. They straightened themselves out, getting rid of all evidence that they’d been injured. They scurried back to their rooms. They could not be found out.

The ones closest to the front door could hear the jangling of keys as they made their way to the lock. The lock, however, refused to open, giving every soldier a few more precious seconds.

Finally yielding to the pressure put on it by Mr. Blair, the front door swung open, revealing the undisturbed home. Every item was in its place, in the exact same shape they’d been in when the Blair’s had left only a few hours before.

The upstairs waited with bated breath for Mr. Blair to leave again. They’d earned their hard fought victory with soap and hanger. It was their turn to be celebrated.

The celebration commenced five minutes after Mr. Blair left, never suspecting what happened daily during his family’s absence.

The Magic Celebration Day Parade

Welcome to the 6217th annual Magic Celebration Day Parade! I am Acorn –

– And I’m Merril, Acorn’s co-host said.

And we are happy to be your hosts for this momentous parade. Acorn smiled at the floating camera.

On the ground for us is Lilac and she’ll get you the in-depth story on all the parade floats, Merril said. Lilac, how’s it going out there?

The image of a windswept dragon appeared on the screen. Windy, Lilac said with a laugh. According to the Rememberer, there are going to be some strong gusts this Magic Celebration Day Parade, so anyone coming out today is reminded to hold on tight to their chairs and hats and children, or they might just fly away.

Behind Lilac, a flock of twinkling balloons suddenly floated into the sky with no one attached to them.

Thanks Lilac, Acorn said, the camera coming back to the announcers. "We will have more reports from Lilac as the parade floats