Short Little Stories

In a dusty brown house in the heart of the city, on Holiday Street just down the road from the park, there lives a poor little brownie named Sheldon.

It’s been three months since the previous owners moved away to safer quarters in suburbia, and Sheldon has been sitting sad and alone in his little room hidden under the stairs.

No sense in cleaning and dusting when no one is home; no pots or pans to repair, no children to make sure sleep soundly, no jobs to do for the resident family. Nothing at all for poor Sheldon to do but listen to the scritch and scratch of rodents running around the empty floorboards, and remember the days when he had the drive to keep such vermin away with clever tricks and little magics.

But cheer up, little brownie! Drug lords have bought the place!

Sure, they won’t be quite what a house fairy is used to, what with the illegal meth lab and wild orgies and so forth. And sure, once they finally emerge from their drug-induced haze to actually notice a little brownie offering the services such beings are famed for, they won’t exactly set out the most common tasks. Stirring up dangerous chemicals together, keeping a watch for observant passerby, cleaning up stains a bit worse than some simple spilled milk…

But it will still be two more months of activity, two months without the numbing depression of being alone and useless. That will more than make up for the times they are tripping on acid, and doing their best to kill off what they see as a strange talking mosquito!

Things won’t be nearly as exciting once the police break down the doors and drag them all off to jail. It will be back to a few more weeks indulging in the sorrow that only faeries can feel. But squatters will take up residence eventually, so maybe there will still be hope for little Sheldon, the Brownie on Holiday Street!