Write a short story. The second sentence of the story must be, "And then the murders started."
I used to have a lot of friends. And then the murders started.
Don't get me wrong. Nobody ever blamed me, or thought I was responsible. It's just that after a certain point, you start to acquire a "reputation", and a lot of the people you thought were your friends just don't want to deal with it. It's simpler for them to close their eyes and avoid you.
For example, I used to hang out with this guy named Diggy. We were playing soccer, just like we used to do back in first grade, and I was goalie, and our team was ahead for once with twenty seconds left on the clock, but then Diggy gets the ball and he's driving right for me, right? And he fakes left and I buy it and dive in the wrong direction, and the goal is totally open and he kicks the ball... and a fat man's body falls out of a passing airliner and *splats* right on top of the ball, creating a huge mess and winning the game for my team.
Don't worry by the way, the guy was already dead before he fell out. Apparently it was some kind of insurance scheme. The guy's deadbeat brother worked for an airline and thought a plane's landing gear wheelwell would make a good hiding spot for the body. Don't ask--I never do any more.
After that Diggy never played another game of soccer with me. At first he made excuses and pretended to be busy, and then he started pretending not to see me when we passed each other in the halls.
On the other hand, you can tell who your true friends are because they stick with you. Take Elaine, for instance. Not only is she my best friend, but she's also helped me bury more bodies than I can count. It's true that most of them were just roadkill animals, which I also seem to attract, but the severed head we found in the cabin on our 6th grade field trip was definitely human and it was really gross, but she just helped me deal with it and didn't make it all weird or anything. I'd learned by that point not to literally _bury_ any bodies because the police get all upset if you disturb a crime scene, so we just moved the head outside and closed the door so we couldn't smell it as much.
Murders are the things that seem to bother people the most, but there's actually all kinds of weird stuff that happens. I sometimes wonder if these things happen to other people too and they just don't talk about it because they're embarrassed or something. Like that time last Tuesday when I was biking home from school and I found this map marked with a buried treasure X, and I followed the map and found an old treehouse in the woods and two twenty-dollar bills and a rusty old iron dagger with a skull carved on the crosspiece. And then as I was heading home, this raggedy bearded guy runs out of the woods, holds a gun on me, and steals the bike and the iron dagger and rides off. So I walked home. I guess I didn't mind that much--it was a pink girlie bike anyway.
When I got home, my mom said, "How was your day, Vladimir?"
"Fine, Mom," I said. "I got an A on my calculus test, and I made forty bucks adventuring." I went to my room and that's where I found the message from the Mouse King.
"No! More. Spiders! -M.K." read the tiny gold letters on red velvet.
[That's as much as I've got so far. -Max]
--
I could not love thee dear, so much,
Loved I not honor more.
I used to have a lot of friends. And then the murders started.
Don't get me wrong. Nobody ever blamed me, or thought I was responsible. It's just that after a certain point, you start to acquire a "reputation", and a lot of the people you thought were your friends just don't want to deal with it. It's simpler for them to close their eyes and avoid you.
For example, I used to hang out with this guy named Diggy. We were playing soccer, just like we used to do back in first grade, and I was goalie, and our team was ahead for once with twenty seconds left on the clock, but then Diggy gets the ball and he's driving right for me, right? And he fakes left and I buy it and dive in the wrong direction, and the goal is totally open and he kicks the ball... and a fat man's body falls out of a passing airliner and *splats* right on top of the ball, creating a huge mess and winning the game for my team.
Don't worry by the way, the guy was already dead before he fell out. Apparently it was some kind of insurance scheme. The guy's deadbeat brother worked for an airline and thought a plane's landing gear wheelwell would make a good hiding spot for the body. Don't ask--I never do any more.
After that Diggy never played another game of soccer with me. At first he made excuses and pretended to be busy, and then he started pretending not to see me when we passed each other in the halls.
On the other hand, you can tell who your true friends are because they stick with you. Take Elaine, for instance. Not only is she my best friend, but she's also helped me bury more bodies than I can count. It's true that most of them were just roadkill animals, which I also seem to attract, but the severed head we found in the cabin on our 6th grade field trip was definitely human and it was really gross, but she just helped me deal with it and didn't make it all weird or anything. I'd learned by that point not to literally _bury_ any bodies because the police get all upset if you disturb a crime scene, so we just moved the head outside and closed the door so we couldn't smell it as much.
Murders are the things that seem to bother people the most, but there's actually all kinds of weird stuff that happens. I sometimes wonder if these things happen to other people too and they just don't talk about it because they're embarrassed or something. Like that time last Tuesday when I was biking home from school and I found this map marked with a buried treasure X, and I followed the map and found an old treehouse in the woods and two twenty-dollar bills and a rusty old iron dagger with a skull carved on the crosspiece. And then as I was heading home, this raggedy bearded guy runs out of the woods, holds a gun on me, and steals the bike and the iron dagger and rides off. So I walked home. I guess I didn't mind that much--it was a pink girlie bike anyway.
When I got home, my mom said, "How was your day, Vladimir?"
"Fine, Mom," I said. "I got an A on my calculus test, and I made forty bucks adventuring." I went to my room and that's where I found the message from the Mouse King.
"No! More. Spiders! -M.K." read the tiny gold letters on red velvet.
[That's as much as I've got so far. -Max]
--
I could not love thee dear, so much,
Loved I not honor more.
