A fictional freewriting story, inspired by the daily prompts of @mariannewest.
Today I am diverting from my "regular" ongoing story.
Today's prompt follows three prompts, starting with a sentence, followed by interference, and then the conflict. When I saw the sentence with which to begin I knew I had to choose this option, and there was no way it would fit into my current story arc; hence, a standalone.
Standing on the chair, she and Tom had scratched away at the bones. She could not believe she had agreed to this. She absolutely could not believe she had agreed to this. Of all the stupid, insane, and absolutely disgusting ideas that have ever been suggested, she had to be on the receiving end of this one, and she actually agreed to it.
"Tom, this is dumb."
"You're the one standing on the chair," Tom deadpanned back.
Sarah let out a sigh and climbed down. She had been putting up Halloween decorations when The Package arrived, and Tom brought it over to her in a hurry. She had shuddered when she realised what it was, and had refused to come down off the chair, but Tom still handed her a bone for final cleaning.
"How many of these are there?"
"A good number." Tom gave the box a gentle kick and it rattled, indicating a good, large number of bones on the inside. She glowered at him.
"And we're going to do this? Really? This is beyond macabre."
Tom shrugged, but Sarah was positive that she saw the hint of a grin on his face.
"You're enjoying this, aren't you?" she demanded.
"I know there are lots of you who don't like government interference," Tom answered. "I thought you'd appreciate what we're doing."
Sarah thrust the bone she had in her hand back at him. "Whatever you think about government and regulations has nothing to do with this," she snapped. "This is not about sticking it to the man. This is about a grown man refusing to grow up."
"He grew up," Tom replied calmly. He placed Sarah's bone into the box and scooped out another. A skull. He held it up before his face to examine it and began to wax philosophical. "Alas, poor father. I knew him, Sarah, a man of infinite jest, of most excellent grilling. He grilled me a steak a thousand times, and each was better than the last."
That about did it for her. Not only was Tom being incredibly flippant, he was now misquoting Shakespeare, and doing it really badly.
"You're being an ass."
"Yes, but I'm also fulfilling my father's wishes, and I do not believe I could do that in this case without being an ass."
The blue envelope on the floor caught Sarah's eye. It had come with the box. She knelt down to pick it up and opened the letter that was inside. It was a copy of the Will. The Last Will and Testament of Tom's father, who was now placed rather neatly within a box at their feet. Her eyes glanced through it to find the key part that was instructing their current course of action.
Finally, for my son Tom and his beautiful wife Sarah to receive their allotment of my estate, I request and require they do the following. Upon my death they are to have my skeleton medically cleaned and shipped back to them to be wired together so I can be with them in perpetuity every Halloween. It is my hope that they will display my skeletal remains in a prominent location in the house so I can be with them, or place it outside of the house to scare the children coming for candy.
He was a bigger ass than Tom, Sarah thought to herself. And of course no hospital in the world would do this for them they ended up going to the grey market. When they met that 'doctor' Sarah was confident he was going to demand one of them give up a kidney! They did make it out of their whole, though, but the same couldn't be said for Tom's father. She's sure they could have defeated this entire clause in a court, but Tom was actually enjoying this. She let out another sigh, dropped the letter, and knelt down to scoop out another bone. It was the longest bone of the middle finger. She sneered and displayed it prominently to the box, using her father in laws own finger to flip him off. She could at least have that.
(c) All images and photographs, unless otherwise specified, are created and owned by me.
(c) Victor Wiebe
(design by remyrequinart: @remyrequenart)