The Contest

This Month's Winner - Sarah Eddenden

Hiccup

hing is, he wasn't so smart. If he'd been smarter, he would've gotten away with it.

Started with him trying on his new coat and thinking how nice it felt when all he had on underneath was y-fronts and socks. So he wandered around the house like that, until his mother started asking questions, then he started looking for his own place. Found a cheap bedroom about a mile away, his mother told him to come home for Sunday dinners, now he wandered around his room in his coat and y-fronts whenever he pleased. Except it started not being enough. So he went for walks at night, in his coat and his y-fronts and socks and shoes and felt the breeze and it was almost more than he could take. So next, he left the y-fronts at home and went on longer walks, missed Sunday dinner once and that's when he decided, go all the way. Leaned against a tree, giggled at himself, he looked like one of those 'Psst, buddy' guys cept he wasn't flipping a quarter, and a lady walked by, maybe forty with a shopping bag and he cleared his throat and she turned and he showed her his goods. She shook all over, looked away, ran off, dropping a bag of apples and he brought them back to his room, ate four of them and smiled.

Did it more and more, they start calling him The Phlegm Flasher, he appreciates the alliteration.

So he's standing outside an old folks home by the bus shelter, and he spies an old white-haired lady coming off the bus, he waits, bus drives off, he clears his throat, she looks, his coat's open, the cool breeze soothes, she actually hiccups, he runs.

Headlines next day and if he isn't shocked looking at the front page in the coffee shop waiting for his decaf latte no foam, the old bag's identified his implement in intricate detail. Enough so's he goes straight back home with the paper and his coffee and has a good long look himself and damned if she wasn't right about the twist and also about the marking.

So as he's coming out again, with his lukewarm coffee, he's already late for work, Tammy from next door opens her door and asks him, could he fix something for her first. Turns out she has a broken toaster, she's dying for something to eat so he goes back to his room and toasts her bagel and brings it back and she's naked.

Cops are waiting for him by the time he gets to work, seems he left the paper with the bagel and Tammy read it and seeing as how she got what you might call a bird's eye view of it, the aforementioned (in)famous implement, there's no doubt about it, they got him this time.

Old bag's quoted, she's grateful as that hiccup was the last one after she'd been hiccuping for going on twelve weeks.