You are currently browsing the category archive for the ‘Child’ category.
Video versions of Very Short Novels are coming to your screens (one at a time and slowly). Trade Rumors is the first to be posted to our affiliated Must See Theater channel on YouTube. Life Line has been shot and is in post-production. And Eat the Air is on the schedule next. Check in often.
The Video Version in 299 words
The Print Version in 299 words:
—Dad, are you trying to trade me?
—What would make you say that?
—Mister Moyer said you offered me for his daughter.
—Not just his daughter, son. That was a package deal.
—Why would you want to do that?
—Do you mean why or do you mean why now?
—
—I don’t think you’ll ever be worth more.
—But I’m nothing but potential!
—
—What if I go somewhere else and thrive?
—That’s what I’m hoping.
—Oh, so you’re doing me a favor.
—
—Is it my grades?
—You think I care about your grades?
—I don’t know, but you can’t just trade your family!
—No? Your mother managed it pretty well.
—Is this something I can veto?
—You can beg. You know I like that.
—What if I’m not happy where you send me?
—I didn’t think you were happy here.
—I’m very happy here.
—You don’t act it.
—This is how a happy teenager acts, Dad.
—
—At least let me stay in the same school.
—With those grades?
—
—Anyway relax, there’s not much out there.
—Maybe your standards are too high.
—Why, because I won’t take on someone else’s liability?
—Dad, just admit you don’t like me and let’s move on.
—I couldn’t do that, son.
—You think it’s better not to say it?
—
—This isn’t fair.
—What, fathers and sons? It’s inevitable.
—If that were true, your dad would have traded you.
—Yeah, well. I might have been better off.
—Oh, Dad, is that what this is about?
—
—You think I won’t get enough chances living with you?
—
—Look. Grandpa was an asshole.
—Yeah?
—Yeah.
—Yeah?
—Yeah. You don’t have to be.
—So, what do you think of the Moyer girl?
—She’s cute, but she’ll never tell you the truth.
—Yeah.
—Yeah.
—Play some ball?
—Let’s play some ball.
print version Copyright © July 31, 2009
video version Copyright © September 2025
The Deputy Assistant has died for an analogy. Some will recall four years ago his boss, the Minister of Health and Family Welfare, boldly revived the discredited effort to eradicate polio from the provinces west and south of the capital—bold because several children had been paralyzed by the vaccine given to protect them. Those precious souls with their bent frames were the statistical necessity of a cure for the world, but they were pathetic, and no matter what the Deputy Assistant said, their parents were impossible to answer. For several seasons after that, whole provinces of five-year-olds had closed their mouths against the disreputable sugar cube. An ambivalent man might have been daunted; instead, the Minister wept for an audience at the new sanitation plant, but warned that an excess of love for the stricken few unfortunates would cripple thousands of children. His Deputy was moved as well but understood the numbers better. Only one child would be stricken for every three million successfully dosed. “It is as if,” he told the Minister, and the comment has cost him his life, “to banish the scourge to oblivion, you sacrificed your three sons.” The details of how he fulfilled his accidental prophecy are appalling, and there is evidence he tried to sabotage it, but the clarity of the plan is as strict as a gem. In the capital today, the Deputy Assistant has eaten a phosphine tablet and died. The job is two-thirds done now, new cases are rare, and the Minister’s third son travels with him to the regions of greatest concern, where skepticism of the vaccine might nullify the nation’s triumph over disease. The boy stands straight and tall alongside his brothers in their chairs, and the locals decide for themselves the extent of the Minister’s nerve.
This work by davidbdale is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Based on a work at davidbdale.wordpress.com.
Very Short Novels 