Fly On The Wall: Fairy Tales From A Misanthropic Universe, Vol. I Read Online Free PDF

year, they'd gotten
married, in two they'd replicated, in three they'd even bought a
house. It was in that fateful fourth year that disaster would
strike. Their child, a fragile being, would be forthrightly crushed
by a pane of poorly installed glass. It will happen as they walk
down the street, hand in hand in hand, ever the happy family. As
their child skips, the pane will slip and fall. He won't know what
to do so he'll hold her bloodied body tight against his and whisper
“Be brave”. She won't stop crying though, she will be too pained.
She will clutch the body of her progeny, and then he'll clutch his
chest. His arm will stiffen, and then she'll have to stop crying
all alone.

18 – To Care Or Not To
Care
    Why should she care?
Everybody always demanded that she care about every damn little
thing out there. What did it matter to her if people starved? It
didn't concern her in the slightest. She didn't understand why
everyone seemed so enthralled by every morbid story they came
across, why their attentions were easily captured and yet easily
lost too. She simply didn't understand. Even world leaders feigned
caring. In some ways, she thought it funny. Despite the faux
empathy and real pity, people didn't care. The irony of celebrities
speaking about African orphans from cavernous cliffside mansions
struck her. Heartless, cold, uncaring, bitch, an imbecile, an ass,
a social Darwinist. All things which she had been called. She could
not comprehend it. She spent most of her time alone, minding her
own business, as did everyone else, the only difference was that
she was outwardly honest about her views. Money mattered not to
her, so she led a simple life.
    All claimed to care, but
what is caring without action? Empty words, empty gestures, and
empty cash-filled wallets, nothing more. As more tricksters built
more houses for their friends, the sick and poor watch another
unaffordable neighborhood appeared. Why should she care? Would it
not be of more benefit to just to live her own life instead? Surely
it would. Then again, wouldn't that make her less human, less kind,
less alive? That was what she had always been told...it must then
be true. To care or not to care, twas that which so often befuddled
her. Would she bow down to the will and demands of society? Would
she feign resistance with great insistence only to soon after
forget her emotion? It was an outrageous fortune which had seen so
many lives belittled, but such was life, and her feigned empathy
would neither fix nor even serve as slightest solace. It would
merely remind the remainder of a painful memory which they strove
to forget. It didn't matter anyway, not in the end.
    What drove most to claim
they truly care were selfish interests. They desired to fit in, to
have friends, to feel good without doing anything of value, all the
while basking in mass adulation. For what? For more to come and
view the pale cadaver left behind? For more flowers to be lain on
the grave for longer? For more tears, for more sadness, that those
others might pretend that they too care? She would not go down this
path. The best way to show she cared was not to care at all. Her
burial would not be well attended indeed she would no longer even
be able to afford a richly-grained coffin, not after having given
away so much. Rachel didn't care. This was true, but she was at
least honest. Her stone was spartan, left simple to preserve what
wealth remained for those who lived and struggled still. Her
weathered coins were for the worthy, not her own joy, they always
had been.

19 – The Flower
Bringer
    Every year on this day the
flower bringer carries with him a single pink lily.
    Every year on this day he
lays it by her resting head.
    Every year on this day he
sheds tears over an ever smaller mound of dirt.
    Every year on this day the
flower bringer sits, alone, and remembers the past.
    Every year on this day the
flower bringer begs to feel again; yearning for respite from an
emotionless