Peripeteia
"Come in," Marcus half-whispered to himself as he continued to flip through pages of the dictionary, his fingers spotted with dry blood. He was flipping through quickly, scanning the pages rapidly and then flipping again. Flip, scan, flip, scan. The knock at the door again, louder this time. Marcus's mind wandered away from the dictionary. Away from the words. "Come in!" he yelled this time. He stood up and huffed and headed towards the door. He went to grab the door knob, the door started opening before he got to it. "Hey Marcus," Anthony said as he opened the door fully and walked in. "Oh, hi Anthony. Sorry, I was busy," Marcus replied. "Still lookin' for the key?" Anthony asked as he shut the door behind him. He was holding a small cardboard box. "Still looking. What's that?" "I'm not sure," Anthony said as he held it up towards Marcus. "It was sitting outside your door." Marcus grabbed it and walked to his desk to grab his scissors. Anthony put his hands in his pockets and walked around the small studio apartment. Pages of old dictionaries had been torn and pasted onto the walls creating a makeshift wallpaper. Anthony looked at pages indiscriminately, locking in on words at random and reading their definitions. "Obstreperous; noisy and--" "Difficult to control," Marcus finished. He sliced open the tape on the box with one of the scissor blades, slid open the cardboard tab to open the box. Anthony chuckled and kept reading the page he was on for a moment and then faced Marcus. "So whatchya got?" Marcus was holding a small card in his hand. He looked up at Anthony. "It's--it's the word. The word to finish the phrase to open the portal to go back and save her." Anthony took a step forward, "It's the key?" "It's the key," Marcus said. He took a deep breath and said Please consider making a contribution to my Patreon if you enjoy these weird stories and are able to support them financially. No Happy Nonsense is 100% ad free and your donation helps keep it that way. |
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