GEORGIE

 

Photo Copyright: Al Forbes

NOTE:  I’m back after taking a week’s vacation. Actually, I had a root canal with an abscess and the infection was no fun. The tooth had to be removed so I decided to take the time off while I healed. Pulling myself up 43 steps in our building with no lift was worse than the infection.

On a happier note, I recently was notified I’d won 2nd Place in a short story contest in an international publication, the free online CQ Magazine. On pages 55 and 56 the prize winners are announced. It’s a good magazine with interesting stories, articles, and artwork. My story and the other stories from the contest will be printed in the February 2017 edition. If anyone wants to see the magazine and list of winners, just look on Google Search for CQ Magazine and the article “Look at what’s inside CQ Magazine Articles on Calgary’s years…”. Click on the cover of the magazine shown, and wait until a smaller version is shown. Clicking on that will bring up the November issue of the magazine. You can adjust the size. On the right side is an arrow to open the issue. You can go to pages 55 and 56 to see the contest winners listed.

This week’s story was written for Sunday Photo Fiction–October 30th, 2016. Each week the host, Al Forbes, provides a picture prompt. The challenge for each member of the group is to write an original story or poem with no more than 200 words, not including the title and inspired by the prompt.

To read the other stories written by group members, just click on the link below, then on the little blue frog in the blue box.

The link to the other stories this week is a follows:

https://sundayphotofictioner.wordpress.com/2016/10/30/sunday-photo-fiction-october-30th-2016/

Genre: Humor Fantasy

Word Count: 200 Words

GEORGIE by P.S. Joshi

Georgie was only famous once a year. He was a Halloween decoration.

He’d always wished he could have been scarier but was friendly-looking. He looked with envy on the decorations that made the children scream.

He could have been scary if he’d been made to, for instance, frown and show pointy teeth.

Every year he was dug out of the basement and stuck in the yard. Every year children laughed.

He did enjoy seeing the many different costumes. Some were even similar in looks to him.

Some of the children asked if he had a name. They were told it was Georgie. For crying out loud that had been the name of the deceased family dog. They could have named him Phillipe. That was much better than Georgie. He got that name because the family 3-year old liked it. He seemed to miss the dog. So, Georgie, it was.

This Halloween was made better by a tiny child who walked up to him and said, “Hello, Georgie. How’s it going? You’re looking good. I like your smile. You make me feel happy. I’m usually afraid of the dark, but when I look at you I’m okay with it. Happy Halloween.”