Category Archive

You are currently browsing the category archive for the ‘Childhood’ category.

Afterschool Bomb Club

February 7, 2026 in 299 Words, Afterschool, Bomb, Childhood, Class Work, Community, Crime, Danger, Death, Disability, Flash Fiction, Memory Loss, PTSD, Short stories, Survivor, Terrorism, Violence, War, Weapon | Tags: , | by | 1 comment

When I was going-on-six we nearly blew up the railroad station. By my birthday, we’d managed it. I only know because it’s gone. The rest, including these scars, is fog in the attic. Back then we got explosives easier than rum. The ten-year-olds figured out how to render the volatile agent from unexploded land mines in boiling water and pack it into cakes they could ignite with an improvised fuse, knowledge I had to earn with heroics. That I remember like a verse. A stand of birch trees loomed like soldiers to our West. We chopped them down with submachine guns cleaner than chainsaws. The woods we defended were chunky with abandoned munitions. Once gathered and sorted, to keep them from rivals, we stowed them under floorboards in a shed outside barracks that were once a country church. We’d meet after school, grab arms, wrestle with their rusty actions, and hike down to the tracks. Grenades were for kids with all their fingers, but I had my own Uzi and a Colt sidearm nobody else wanted with plenty of bullets. If we’d been school shooters, the mothers would have wailed about who armed the killer instead of where he got his motivation. We played with the toys we were given. For the freight station exercise, the older boys set blast cakes beneath the stationmaster’s desk and laid a powder trail as a fuse. They wouldn’t let me see. Survivors say I took it badly, that I fired into the treetops, that something crashed through the branches, that it thudded onto the roof. They wouldn’t let me see. Next they say I threw my pistol to the ground, a round discharged, another thud. Again I demanded to see. But then the blast. Then here. Then now. Wherever whenever this is.

Original Copyright © February 13, 2007
Revised Copyright © February 07, 2026

Trade Rumors (for the screen)

January 16, 2026 in 299 Words, Adoption, Baseball, Business, Child, Childhood, Dialogue, Family, Fiction, Flash Fiction, Humor, Nuclear Family, Parent, Sports, Very Short Novels | Tags: , , , , , , , | by | Leave a comment

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

Blog Stats

  • 988,838 Novel Readers

299-WORD NOVELS

Character, conflict, emotional impact. And sentences! Everything you want in a novel, without one extra syllable.
  1. davidbdale's avatar

    This is a close relative of a Very Short Novel titled Short for Family from 20 years ago. The revisions…

  2. davidbdale's avatar

    This is a close relative of a Very Short Novel titled Red Water from 30 years ago. It's different enough,…

  3. grantman's avatar

    Interesting piece which touches on many aspects of getting old especially the part where we don't fit anymore. Having worked…

  4. davidbdale's avatar
  5. davidbdale's avatar

    This is a close relative of an early post titled Something Delicious from 20 years ago. This revised version is different enough,…

Behind the Pseudonym

The pen name davidbdale honors my mother Beatrice (Bea) and my father Dale

Search by Date