Just Deserts

winner--10/23/08

ID: 896794   (Rated: 13+) Daily Flash Fiction Challenge  Enter your story of 300 words or less. Note new starting time! by arakun the twisted raccoon

         Julia nudged Earl to wake him. “I heard something,” she said in a whisper.

         Half awake Earl asked, “What did you hear?”

         “Somebody is in the apartment.”

         “You dreamed it,” he said and yawned, but then he heard it too.

         “Call 911,” she whispered.

         “And tell them what? That we heard a noise? It might not even have been in this apartment.”

         “I heard somebody,” she insisted.

         He was reaching for the phone when the bedroom door swung open and hit the wall. Earl gasped. “Amy!”

         Amy came into the room. “I thought I’d find you here! Where else would I go looking to find an erring husband? From what I hear a lot of erring husbands come here. Right, Julie?”

         “W-what are you going to do?” he asked. In the dark he couldn’t make out what she had in her hand but it looked like the pistol he bought some time ago.

         “When I first came here I didn’t know what I was going to do, but I know now. You’ve cheated once too often, Earl. I know now you’ll never stop. And I have something for Julia, too.”

         Earl sat up. “Don’t do anything stupid, Amy!”

         “I’m not going to do anything stupid. I’m going to do the smartest thing I ever did.”

         Earl shivered. The gun was pointed right at him.

         “Amy, listen, this won’t solve anything.”

         “Oh, yes it will! It will solve everything!” I told you, “I have something for Julia.”

         Julia peeked from under the covers and quavered, “Are you going to shoot me?”

         “I was,” Amy said. “But then I thought, that’s too good for you. I’m going to do a lot worse to you than kill you.” She laughed and lowered the gun. “I’m going to let you have Earl!”


295 words