The Stories of DTS

Scared to Death; a short story

Scared to Death is my attempt at science fiction. I had an idea for a sleep study story bouncing around in my head for several months and then I watched a Twilight Zone marathon -- the result was the story I present to you now.  It was originally published on a writers' forum website called Writers' Hood, but this version is different, and I hope better, in many key ways.  It's longer than what I've posted here before, so please get comfortable.  As always, thanks for reading.  Word count ~ 4700; estimated reading time: 20 minutes.   

Scared To Death

After sixteen hours the bus station was a welcome sight for young Carter Fonda.  Carter nudged the old lady sleeping on his shoulder.  He had moved her head five or six times, but it always ended up on Carter’s left shoulder, on the “07” of his high school jacket, to be exact.  He finally gave up when the sun went down.  The bus stopped with a jerk, and the old lady slumped forward, barely catching herself before her head struck the seat.  The lady departed and Carter followed.  The air was stale with exhaust but he was glad to be off the bus.  Only now, he had nowhere to go.

Short Stories

Does anyone even read short stories anymore?  It seems to me that short stories are not as popular as they were back in the day.  Also, I doubt many people read short stories on-line.  After all, to read stories one must lounge.  While on the Internet, one surfs, which is quite different from lounging.  I still read a lot of short stories, the shorter the better.  I recall reading Skeleton Crew in the order of story brevity.  I did the same thing with The Mammoth Book of Pulp Fiction.  Of course, my attention span is nearly non-existent.

So, now that I've established that nobody but me reads short stories, and certainly nobody reads them on-line, I’ll be posting one of my short stories, “Earth Follies,” on Thursday.  I’m a glutton like that.