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"Eternal Flame" (continued)
by a nose. Mr Lee was not impressed.
He turned the radio off, screwed the paper up and threw it on the
ground. Then he did something that I'd never seen him do before -
he coughed. It wasn't a natural cough. It wasn't a smokers cough.
It was a forced cough. A purposeful cough. But what happened next
was the weirdest thing I've ever seen. A large flame shot out of his
mouth. A well directed flame - right onto the race guide. He was obviously
pissed off that the horse he bet on didn't win. Then he got up and
walked away.
I stayed behind the tree until he was out of sight. Then I walked over and stared at the ground in front of the park bench. I could still smell the smoke diffusing in the still air as I looked down at the news paper ashes. I looked at my watch, still thinking about what had just happened, not registering what the time actually was, just staring at the digital display. After about a five second delayed reaction I snapped back to reality, it was 9:15, damn, I was late for class. (end of excerpt)
Copyright © 2001 by Michael Groebel |