Happily Ever After-Life

By Emma Idiot

What do you get when you cross a cult of zealous mice, the patron
saint of clowns and a cursed coat rack with today's technology? About
a zillion laughs!

Happily Ever After-Life is a wickedly funny take on Divine
Intervention, the techno-apocalypse, and the little known,
not-so-forbidden fruit: the plum!

Sit back, take a load off, and read a dark comedy by an author whose
style is a bit more tainted than sainted.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cheshire Grin Publishing
• Release date: Jan 14, 2016
• ISBN: 9781942182016

Book preview

Happily

Every

After-Life

By Emma Idiot

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For Rita and Shannon

Chapter 1

or

Ceiling Fans of Great and Glorious Destiny

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When Cliff joined Psychics Anonymous he was amazed at the fact that they held an introduction meeting. It felt just like the time that he wanted the Nonconformist Club in high school to start a union and they kicked him out simply for mentioning it.

Why, he asked himself would they need such a thing as an introductory meeting? Shouldn’t they have already known he was coming? As a matter of fact, after his first inexplicable happening in his new home wouldn’t it have been relevant enough for the psychic hotline to call him? The thought made him angry, but at the same time not being the brightest crayon in the box it somehow made him giddy.  He decided that after four chilli corn-dogs with full nacho status, perhaps a better word was flatulent.

He sat in the back row brooding and listening to the teachers to the best of his limited ability. His inheritance had turned into a nightmare.  The woman affectionately called Star that he had initially talked to on the phone had informed him that he was not living in a haunted house but instead he was ‘sighted.’

Of course, Cliff snapped, I never claimed to wear glasses or be blind in any way. My vision is perfect. What has that to do with anything?

No, Star had informed him, Sighted means that you can see into other time spaces; other worlds hidden behind this one.

As soon as she said that Cliff instinctively turned around to see if there actually was another world standing behind him. Upon seeing nothing but his coat rack given to him by his maternal Grandmother, he replied angrily, Um dude, what kind of psychic are you anyway? That’s a coat rack not Jupiter.

The line went quiet for a while until he finally heard, Look, if you just come to a meeting we have teachers that can explain it better, Star responded.

What’s to explain? Nanna kicked it and my sister got $30,000 in savings and I got a coat rack and a money-pit of a house!

I don’t think sir ... I don’t think that you understand fully what I meant. You can see things most people can’t. That means you’re probably psychic or sighted... teachers can explain it better and...

I already told you my vision is fine. What makes bad vision a pre-requisite? Cliff argued.

Um... one more time, Star grumbled her voice sounding strained somehow, "Yes but you can see things that other people can’t. They aren’t capable of..."

Hey! I’m not hallucinating if that’s what you’re implying. I’ll have you know I didn’t smoke the funny daisies when I was a kid. As a matter of fact by high-school I knew more about barnyard animals than anyone else in my graduating class!

I... what? I’m happy you became a veterinarian sir, but what I meant was... Star began only to be cut off once more as Cliff snapped, I didn’t become a vet or a farmer as a matter of fact they unjustly flunked me claiming the class was Geometry. I’m no dummy though; I can smell school-board politics a mile away!

Yeah. You musta been psychic or something. The meeting’s Wednesday, Star informed him and since it was clear to him that she was finally seeing reason he decided to give it a go. He still wasn’t quite certain however, what she had meant by the last comment, People like you are why I quit working in HR. Since he didn’t know whether or not she was being snide he decided to take it as a compliment and prided himself on how very many he received in the space of a normal day.

So in the back of the hall he sat, forcing each word into his feeble brain wherein most words never actually took root but instead opted to do some vague form of interpretative dance at which point they travelled across to the other ear and bungee jumped out of his brain like unfortunate lemmings. The teacher was busy telling the members to memorize a prayer that would help them release their souls in order to have an out of body experience.

Since only two weeks before Cliff had been to a concert hall so filled with smoke he was pretty certain he’d had one already with no real side effects (unless of course you count that he had apparently parked his clunker in some old lady’s living room and proceeded to streak around her rose garden catching thorns in unmentionable places and singing I Feel Pretty.) Since he had not died from the experience, and in light of the fact that rather than calling the police the old woman had started sending him fan mail he figured he could simply tune out most of what the teacher was saying and still possibly catch the end in the event there might be a pop quiz or something.

Before he knew