The house was all wrong for them. It never laughed at any of their jokes. This Victorian house with its severe, right angle bays, conical turrets, and choppy multi-room layout sat on three acres of hollow land.
Phil, the rodeo clown, and Donna, his bull-riding wife, built their relationship on laughter. The first time they met, he almost killed her. Entering the ring, he’d tripped over his new pair of rounded yellow shoes. She laughed and fell off El Raton, the biggest bull on the PBR circuit. El Raton gored her ample buttock, missing vital organs by millimeters.
At the hospital, he brought her the traditional plastic bouquet of red and yellow flowers. With her face down, rump in the air, and only a doughnut-sized cutout for her face, she spent her days counting beige tiles. Phil slid underneath the table and tickled her nose with the plastic tulips. No one noticed him and they spent the entire night talking and laughing.
Six months later he proposed while riding the mechanical bull at the Lucky Duck. Once married, they moved into the prudish Victorian.
“What do you call a fish with no eye?” Phil asked the house.
Silence.
“Give up? A Fish.”
Nothing. Not a creak or a moan.
“Why aren’t you laughing? That’s hysterical.” Phil snickered.
Donna chimed in, “Two peanuts walk into a bar. One was a salted.”
Again nothing.
The pair sat speechless. Why had they purchased this house? It refused to laugh at the whoopie cushion or the rubber chicken. Hadn’t the realtor promised it was the perfect house?
“We have to sell,” they said in unison. They put the house on the market. A banker wearing a wide-cheeked smile and a shirt that read, banker’s do it with interest, stopped by. Before the wellhumored man made it to the door Phil ushered him back to his car.
“Trust me, this house isn’t right for you.”
Phil waved off another man, his boyfriend, and their fleet of bichons. “You won’t be happy here.”
Phil and Donna rotated driveway duty, sending ill-fitting couples away. After seven days, a man drove up in a red corvette. “It’s not…” Donna said.
“I want to turn your house into a funeral parlor,” he said.
“You’re perfect,” Donna said.
“What?”
“Uh–I mean The house is perfect for you.”
Phil jogged out of the house wearing nothing but his boxers and a t-shirt. “Please come in. Take a look around. Stay for lunch if you like.”
Phil and Donna moved out of the Victorian and into a spacious, yet cozy, A-frame. It promised laughter.
“Shit.” Donna dropped the box of dishes as she tripped over the door jamb.
“Hee hee hee.” The house laughed.
Donna smiled.
“We’re home,” Phil said.
They stayed up for three days, sharing jokes, playing the harmonica and roasting marshmallows.
The A-frame laughed when Donna poured milk in the coffee maker. The house was downright giddy when Phil forgot to pay the electrical bill. There was laughter from the screeching of the birds to the darkness of the moonless nights. Day after day. Warding off virulent bulls and entertaining adoring crowds, Phil and Donna yearned for a break from the laughter.
Kimberly Medlin is getting her MFA in Creative Writing from Wilkes University and lives in Virginia Beach.
GD Star Rating
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15 Responses to “THE REAL ESTATE • by Kimberly Medlin”
Comments
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November 10th, 2008 at 12:52 am
Some typos are supposed to be there. “Give up? A Fish.” has been “corrected” – and unfunnyised – destroying the real punch line, “…A Fsh”. (I wouldn’t even know that if our corny local weather man hadn’t cracked that same joke not two hours ago on TV.)
I remember reading a collection of short-shorts that included a story about a vegetable vampire that had been buried with a steak through its heart. In that edition the moron sub-editor had “corrected” it to “stake”; it wouldn’t have made sense if I hadn’t read it elsewhere.
November 10th, 2008 at 1:17 am
I was prepared to like this; I loved the premise and all the little details. It’s clever and I laughed all the way through it, even at the corrected f sh joke (I had heard it before, too). And then I got to the last sentence, and felt as if I had been punched in the nose, not presented with a punchline.
I love twist endings; they are a mainstay in flash fiction, but there has to be set up, so that when you read the twist, you say “Ah ha!” What came before, in this story, didn’t prepare me for the ending.
Sorry.
November 10th, 2008 at 5:50 am
The story was pretty good … for a while … but the ending left me flat. Sorry.
November 10th, 2008 at 6:02 am
Kimberley, barring the punchline (I agree with what has been said, above) I thought this was a truly beautifully-written piece. You can write!
November 10th, 2008 at 6:09 am
I liked the premise and the entertainment value. It did what it was meant to do, entertain for a few minutes. Thanks for sharing.
November 10th, 2008 at 6:38 am
Funny
November 10th, 2008 at 6:39 am
I loved this, personally. At first I thought the couple wasn’t actually th funny themselves until I read about the “correction” of the jokes.
I guess this is just a standard tale of “be careful what you wish for.” Eithier way, I absolutly loved it and gave it five stars.
November 10th, 2008 at 7:10 am
It ends too abruptly and does not flow well with the set up.
November 10th, 2008 at 8:43 am
Enjoyable story. I felt better when I realized that some of the jokes had been accidentally corrected. I totally didn’t get the fish thing until I read the comments.
November 10th, 2008 at 8:44 am
I thought this was well-written and clever, and the characters zinged off the page. The ending though, as a few people mentioned above, felt abrupt. This “twist” didn’t fit the story – a happier ending would’ve worked better.
November 10th, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Actually, just for the record, we didn’t correct any of the jokes; they are printed as the story was submitted. I’d never heard the “real” version of the fish joke until it was mentioned in the comments here, and had thought that the couple were supposed to be really bad at jokes.
November 12th, 2008 at 5:55 am
I liked this. Goofy and ironical. The ending could be better though.
November 14th, 2008 at 1:46 am
I liked the story. It entertained.
Jennifer
December 4th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
I very much enjoyed this quirky story!
December 25th, 2008 at 6:19 pm
witty, clever, fresh – loved it!