DAVID V. MATTHEWS

Flash Fiction #117 (Exactly 117 Words): Two VIP Tickets

12/31/2021: Tyler, having heard Betty White, the last surviving Golden Girl, had died that day, posted on his Reddit account those nude photos she’d posed for sometime in her twenties, photos where she shows her non-geriatric boobs and butt. His girlfriend Skyler, a Golden Girls fan, saw him post the photos.

“You think she’s hot?” she asked.

“Sure,” he replied. “I’d bang her.”

“I’d rather bang the young Bea Arthur.”

Whereupon Ty and Sky ushered in the new year by staying home and banging each other. Afterwards, screw COVID, they spent $105 on-line for two VIP tickets for the Golden Girls puppet show in January at that fancy theater. You can do anything when you’re in love.

December 31, 2021-January 1, 2022

Flash Fiction #116 (Exactly 116 Words): Some Vikings Get All Depressed

Sure, my brother’s a Vicodin addict, but at least his migraines have disappeared. And hey, he feels absolutely great; some Vikings get all depressed, even more depressed than the kids at my high school. (Vike-kings, get it?) Every time I drop by his apartment, his upbeat mood almost convinces me he’ll be okay. Almost.

Speaking of his apartment, how does he even pay rent? He won’t tell me; he lost his job months ago, and I sure as hell don’t give him anything. Maybe Mom does. She won’t tell me, either.

My last visit, he said “You should quit teaching and become a barista. Coffee keeps people sane. Homework doesn’t.” (I do puns; he does epigrams.)

Flash Fiction #115 (Exactly 115 Words): The Single Life

“You know what Mommy said?” my six-year-old son asked me during dinner at Dave & Buster’s. “She said the firefighters serve the people, the ambulances serve the people, and the cops serve the government.”

Later, after I’d returned him to my ex-wife, and he’d gone off to watch Trolls World Tour for the millionth time:

“Stop feeding him your anti-police bullshit,” I told her.

“Yeah, telling him the truth is bullshit,” she said.

“Keep it up, and I’ll sue for full custody.”

“Good luck with that. You’re lucky you get to see him at all.”

“A little too early for PMS, isn’t it?”

And then she really went ballistic. Even the single life stresses me.

Turhan Update

Turhan Bey Fan Club (2021)

Your Right Brain Will Thank You Profusely Today

Three piping-hot drawings by DVM:

So What? w/ Discounted Markers, September 15, 2021

Arteriosclerotic Lemmings w/ Bitchalittle, Bugga Shiff, and Jiff, September 15, 2021

Gushing Molasses w/ Abraham Lincolncar and Nonsense, September 15, 2021

Flash Fiction #114 (Exactly 114 Words): Keep the Troops Motivated

Another wildlife-related incongruous illustration.

“Wanna know why we lost in Afghanistan? We didn’t bang enough hookers. If we banged any. I don’t think they even have hookers there. When you invade a country, you gotta keep the troops motivated.”

“What about Vietnam? I saw Full Metal Jacket; we banged plenty of their hookers, yet we still lost.”

“Not really. According to Noam Chomsky—”

“Who’s he? A pimp?”

“No, a political writer. He said we actually won in Vietnam, ’cause we made it an example. Fuck around and find out. That philosophy kept us in charge around the world, long as we had hookers. But now—I doubt Afghanistan’ll ever get a Starbucks or even a Taco Bell.”

September 12-13. 2021

Flash Fiction #113 (Exactly 113 Words): Take Your Plane to Work Day

As we ate organic chicken taquitos in the employee dining hall during lunch, my coworker Brynn asked me if I planned to attend “that thing” commemorating the twentieth anniversary of 9/11.

I couldn’t resist. “You mean take your plane to work day?”

Brynn laughed. Then I think that bitch complained to HR, just as I think she’d complained when I’d joked about fundamentalist anti-trans nutcases. No sensitivity training this time, though—the company fired me, after those federally-enhanced unemployment benefits had expired. So much for the publishing business. Perhaps I had a death wish, saying anything around her. But I had gigantic balls. And I still do. In your mama’s mouth, ha ha.

September 10, 2021

Flash Fiction #112 (Exactly 112 Words): A Greased Palm or Two

Half the cops in town are honest, and the rest are smart. You can guess which type I prefer. A greased palm or two can work wonders. (Turn that into a meme, ha ha.) The honest cops either quit or get fired, or they eventually wise up and start getting their share. I think my son Preston knows how things work with law enforcement; he grew up here, after all. He’s at college, working toward an MBA. He’s ambitious as hell and thinks he’ll become the next Bezos or Zuckerberg. Maybe. I thought I could do anything at his age. Well, I did something. No regrets, though—regrets are for the poor.

September 4-5, 2021

Flash Fiction #111 (Exactly 111 Words): Five Cokes

My fiancé Delbert and I met my family for dinner one night at Eat’n Park. Soon after the waitress had brought our group’s beverages, five Cokes, my parents asked him how he expected to support me on an associate proctologist’s salary. “Quite well,” he said.

“Yeah, you make a hole lotta money, right?” my brother asked.

My parents laughed, drawing me closer to Delbert. He hated jokes about his profession. If my parents hadn’t laughed, who knows? I might have told him “Sorry” and married Hank instead, who actually ended up marrying my future lover Brenda. I might never have met her or even stopped drinking Coke. (She preferred mineral water.)

Flash Fiction #110 (Exactly 110 Words): Clarified

A week after the 9/11/2001 attacks, The Journal of Clarified Culture, an obscure quarterly based in Topeka, hired a new editor: a 23-year-old, right-wing Republican named Randall Sutphin. (No one else had applied for the job.) Soon the journal started featuring articles such as “Whack Iraq and Nuke Iran” and “We Need a New Blacklist, Just for the Blacks.” Controversy resulted, and so did free publicity. Readership increased by 0.6%.

Sutphin resigned in 2008 due to what his resignation e-mail called unspecified “editorial interference.” The journal returned to publishing apolitical content. Today he lives in Abilene, where he writes for the website White Victory. He’s never abused animals, especially kittens.