# The Devil's Wedding (Flash Fiction)



## MrTickle (Jun 26, 2016)

*A little piece of experimental flash fiction. Thank you for reading! *

Steven James always asked for a short back and sides and settled for a 9 to 5. On weekday evenings when he returned home from the gym he did school homework for Joe, while Joe insisted he wanted good grades. Steven James frowned and said, “Joe, play your games, this is what fathers my age do.” Joe shrugged and went to his room to do whatever boys his ago do. Which followed was Cathy echoing Joe’s concerns. Steven James beamed a smile forgetting his eyes, like a smile you’d see on an advertisement for buying bread, and said, “boys will be boys.” In a robotic way as if he’d learned it from a family soap.

Steven James after all, was the kind of guy you’d see in soap, at least to vague on lookers. He was the neighbour you’d allow to look after your cat while you went on holiday. The guy who’d smile and ask how you are with the interest of a dedicated Vicar. The husband to cook dinner and to be at his kid’s school play. The kind of guy you’d ask when there was a problem. Maybe that’s why no one ever asked why Steven James didn’t engage in the things men his age do. Why he was never mowing the lawn on a Sunday, or drinking beers with Bill, Arnold and Daz. Why he wore a snake skinned leather jacket while he drove his Cadillac down the drive, towards the desert, on Friday’s at dusk.

What was it about that wide, empty desert road that drew Steven James’ mouth to a sinister grin and sent the needle for a spin?

Maybe his soul would tell us - like a neglected drunk thrown out under a wishing highway - that Steven James likes an empty desert road because it can fit all the cans on the back of his black Cadillac. The cans he could let blew in the wind, never touching the floor, so his wife Mary would never hear a scrape or a drag. So she would never look inside his car  and notice red lips smudged into the backseat, or ‘snow’ lining the brown leather seams, or the smell of tobacco when you wound down the car window. 

But today Steven James let the cans catch sparks on the tarmac like a planes vapour trail. Him and his Cadillac heading to the devils wedding.


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## Grim_L (Jul 5, 2016)

This might be a stupid question, but is he a serial killer?


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## dither (Jul 5, 2016)

For me, it reads as though he might be the devil himself.

Intrigued.


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## MrTickle (Jul 5, 2016)

This flash fiction is open to interpretation really.


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## Grim_L (Jul 5, 2016)

dither said:


> For me, it reads as though he might be the devil himself.
> 
> Intrigued.



What was it that sparked that view?


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## dither (Jul 8, 2016)

The whole scene. It's a front. Mr. Ordinary, Mr. Respectable, 9-5. Nobody notices, cares even less. Then he cuts loose on Fridays. Out into who knows where? And why a black Caddy? Why not i suppose. Like something from an aliens movie. The guy's a creep.


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## MrTickle (Jul 8, 2016)

dither said:


> The whole scene. It's a front. Mr. Ordinary, Mr. Respectable, 9-5. Nobody notices, cares even less. Then he cuts loose on Fridays. Out into who knows where? And why a black Caddy? Why not i suppose. Like something from an aliens movie. The guy's a creep.


 Boom! That is pretty much what I was getting at. The cans he drags on the back of his car are like a dark twisted version of what peope do at weddings when the bride and groom drive off from their wedding. 

Steven James, for each sin he commits, gains a metaphorical can onto the back of his car, at first it was easy to conceal them, but now he has gathered too many, and has finally given into hiding them.


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## dither (Jul 9, 2016)

MrTickle said:


> Steven James, for each sin he commits, gains a metaphorical can onto the back of his car, at first it was easy to conceal them, but now he has gathered too many, and has finally given into hiding them.



Sins or lost and stolen souls?


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## MrTickle (Jul 9, 2016)

dither said:


> Sins or lost and stolen souls?


Sins. He has enough sins (cans) to be qualified for the Devils wedding. HIS Devils wedding where he openly accepts his sins and marries them.


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## Stone Angel (Aug 2, 2016)

I think it's great - poetic and dark. A mask easily donned and tossed. No conscience is evident at all, and that is evil enough.

There's real depth for such a short piece, more than I realised after reading your comments. Really great.


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## MrTickle (Aug 2, 2016)

Thanks Stone Angel! I'm glad you liked it


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## Stone Angel (Aug 2, 2016)

It's clever as hell. Thanks for writing it. I want to write something like that.


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## MrTickle (Aug 3, 2016)

Ah thanks stone angel! Thats really encouraging to here  im sure you can write something like this!


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