It’s a Twofer!!!

Today Chuck Wendig threw down the Flash Fiction gauntlet and challenged his readers to write a piece based on the “I wanna do laser” portion of the search term “My beard come so fat I wanna do laser” that led some charming person to his blog. His rules were no more than 1000 words, and that phrase had to figure in the text somewhere. It’s an actual contest, with an actual prize, so I figured why not. Plus, my husband bundled my kid off to Lowe’s while the baby napped, so I had plenty of time to kill.

It comes in at 998 words.

I ran it through the edit machine a couple of times, and I now present to you:

Hoarders

“I wanna do laser!!”

Brian’s four-year-old brother Chad was a pest on the most average of days, but this July Fourth was taking the cake. The adults on the street had packed their backyard with patio furniture and charcoal grills, and from what Brian could see most of them were already feeling the effects of the two kegs that were tucked on ice into the corner of the patio.

Since the adults were busy playing grab-ass with spouses who were not their own, flipping burgers that had come to resemble incinerated sponges, and bitching at one another over who was going to drive up to the gas station for more ice, Brian had led the kids from the street into the garage to show them his new Laser Tag set. Brian wasn’t supposed to go in the garage by himself. His dad had made that very clear, and his parents stored the Laser Tag there because it was supposed to be a reward for when he’d been a Very Good Boy.

Brian decided going in with five other kids technically meant he wasn’t going in by himself, but they cut inside through the kitchen to avoid adult detection anyway. The problem was Chad saw them. The problem with that was that Chad had a big mouth, so to keep him from ratting Brian let him come too.

He led his friends past the steel shelves full of old car wax and paint gallons that had been mixed just a shade off. Brian’s dad threw away nothing, and he was too lazy to return anything to a store. He always said one never knew, it might come in handy sometime, so the junk in the garage just kept building: fireplace matches even though they had no fireplace (“I can use those to light the grill when the lighter runs out!”), jars and jars of random screws and bolts (“You never know, Shannon. Sometimes the little baggie is one short”)…

“Awesome!” Tommy O’Mara pointed to the stacks of colorful boxes on the workbench. Fireworks were illegal in New Jersey, but that didn’t stop anyone from getting them out of state. A short trip down I-95 and back and you had yourself an arsenal. Brian made a face. “Yeah, that’s Dad’s deal. When the sun goes down he’s gonna surprise everyone, and guess who gets to clean up when Scooter pisses all over the house…”

The Laser Tag set was hanging on the peg board. No one would notice if they snagged it and played across the street in the back of the Cassidy house. Chad wasn’t allowed to cross the street without an adult yet, so he had to figure that out. Brian got down the vests and guns and checked the batteries. All good.

The blast threw them all into the peg board.

Brian pushed aside the duct tape that had landed on his face and pushed up. He tasted blood, and when he put his hand to his head it felt like that time he had petted the pit bull around the block on a dare. Through the flames he could see that the workbench, along with the wall it had been screwed to, was gone. He wiped blood from his eyes and tried to take inventory while making his way to the garage door. Tommy was already halfway out. Pat Keane was trying to drag his sister Meghan out. Tony and Frankie Onofrio were still out cold. He squinted and looked for Chad, and then he realized he hadn’t heard Chad.

Chad cried over hangnails.

He didn’t see his little brother anywhere, so he grabbed Tony and Frankie and shook them until they were awake. Frankie had no eyebrows anymore, and his eyes were so red Brian couldn’t see the irises. As the sounds from the screaming parents and neighbors reached him Mr. Cassidy from across the street ran in, pushing Brian ahead of him while hefting Frankie and Tony in each arm. When they got to the yard Brian finally saw Chad. He was twenty feet from where the wall had been, and at least three of the moms were pouring whatever liquid was handy over the flames that were eating him. Brian watched Mrs. Petrullo toss an open can of Fanta over him, and he noticed that Chad’s right hand was gone.

By the time the ambulances arrived he was numb.

Over the next few months it got worse. After the funeral they got everything together to move in with Brian’s Aunt Michelle. His dad was gone; the police had said something about Criminal Negligence and Reckless Endangerment and other things Brian didn’t quite understand. He heard his mom crying to Aunt Michelle about there being no insurance because of something called, “causation.” His friends’ parents were suing his parents, but because there was no insurance there was no way to pay them.

He ended up spending a lot of time in his new room at Aunt Michelle’s. It was up in the attic, and there were no overhead lights, but he did have a lamp. He didn’t have to carry much up there. His mom had sold most of his things, so he had an airbed and the munitions box that had been his great-grandad’s. There was no special toy for being a Very Good Boy anymore. These days he was lucky if his mom even noticed he was there.

Brian walked through the kitchen and shut his ears to the tone in his mom’s voice while she complained to Aunt Michelle yet again about Disney World not letting them scatter Chad’s ashes in the safari park. He’d loved elephants. He made his way up the steps and cracked the door enough to slip inside. As he snapped on the lamp he pulled the munitions box to him and flipped the latches. He pinched his nose shut and reached inside, interlacing his fingers with what was left of Chad’s right hand.

“I’m so sorry.”