Bad Signs

Shitload of foreshadowing.

  My name’s Peter, by the way.  Peter Rennings.   I’m an orphan.  I was told my parents were killed in a tragic accident, but no one ever told me what sort of accident it was.  I quickly tired of being bounced from foster home to foster home, and I filed for emancipation when I was 14.  I got a job at the grocery store in a festering bore-hole called White Rock.  I lived in a cheap apartment.  It was rather nice, but I couldn’t get it to stop smelling like old people.  I spent most of my extra money on books.  Three shelves full of well-worn fiction, as well as towering piles littered about the apartment, comprised my collection.  I was always reading.  Come to think of it, I was reading when this whole adventure started.  One of my favorite titles, The Feral Flying Ford Anglia of the Forbidden Forest, by R.J. Kinglow.  Fantastic book.  I was almost to the part where heroes duel the legendary Fighting Fir when I got a call from a good friend of mine, Sara Vosh.

 "Hello?"  I said, beginning the conversation in a standard way.
"Hey Peter!" my effervescent friend said, brightly.  "You going to the concert tonight?"
"No,"  I said.  "You know I'm broke."
"The summer concerts are free," she clarified.
"Really?"  I asked.  "Since when?"
"Since forever!  They've always been free!" she replied, clearly trying very hard to stifle a giggling fit.
"Oh... right..." I said sheepishly.  Sara broke into a giggling fit that lasted about fifteen seconds.  A record low for her.  "Yes, I'm a moron.  Can we move on please?"
"Yeah-hehehehehehe.... sure... hehehe..."  she forced through a gale of giggles.  I waited for the tide to subside.
"Who's playing?"  I asked.
"Let me see..."  she said.  I heard rustling papers as she looked up the show schedule.  "Black Kat and the Broken Mirrors."
"Never heard of them." I said.
"Me neither." she said.  "So are you gonna go?"
I mulled it over for a few seconds.  "Sure," I said.  "Why not?"  That was where I went wrong.  I took a good long look in the mirror before I left.  My clothes were reasonably clean, although they made my slim frame look somewhat bony.  My short, dark hair didn't need to be combed.  My glasses didn't have any spots on them.  I grabbed my jacket and left my apartment.  I ran into Conan Mastiff in the elevator.  He lived next door to me.  For an old guy, he's pretty cool.  He was always wearing one of those cowboy hats or a fedora.  I gave him a bowler hat for his birthday, but he never wore it.  We struck up a short conversation about the books we'd been reading on the way down.  He was reading The Demon Ring by R. Kielnot Jr. When we got to the lobby, he asked me where I was going.  When I mentioned the concert was at Ashley Pond, he seemed to get a little uneasy.

"Ashley Pond?" he said, with a tone that suggested he thought I was insane.  In retrospect, that was probably a red flag. "Why would you want to go there?"  I looked at him with a raised eyebrow. It almost seemed like the hair on the back of his neck was standing up.We parted ways.  "Be careful!" he shouted after me.  It sounded more like a command than a farewell.  
I met Sara at the curb.  "Hey again!" she said as I got into the car.  It was an electric car, specially converted from a hybrid by her parents for her seventeenth birthday.  To call the Vosh family green was like calling water wet.  Since the conversation we had about modern music versus classical has no importance to the story as a whole, I'll skip to the part where I tell you what she looks like.

Sara was, to say the least, stunning.  She had a slim, athletic figure.  She was reasonably tall, maybe five ten.  Her facial features were smooth, yet pointy, from the tip of her nose to her slightly pointed ears.  You might say she looked almost elven.  She dressed, as always, in bright colors that accented whatever color she'd dyed her hair that week.  It was almost cherry red today.
We parked about a block away from the pond.  Now that I think of it, pond is a misnomer.  Its an artificial concrete bowl with a huge fountain spraying up from the center of it.  But there are fish and ducks and stuff, so I guess its still a pond.  I sat down on the grass near the stage while Sara went and bought some snacks.  A few minutes later, the band began to play, and Sara plopped down on the grass next to me and handed me a bottle of green soda and a churro.  We sat and listened while we munched our churros, and soon the band began to play faster, more upbeat music.  Having finished our snacks, we got up and danced.  Sara was a great dancer.  People gave her a wide berth and watched as she twirled about.  Even the grass seemed fascinated, as if it was craning up to get a better view.  It was shaping up to be a rather nice evening.  The band was halfway through the tenth song when something tore a hole in the space time continuum.

Reviews

[Anonymous]

Really? You're going to leave me hanging at that...you suck *sticks togne out at you*
Well I like it a lot so far, but wouldn't be more appropriate to say that the old man ask Peter "Ashley Pond?" nervously instead of thinking you were mad at him?

[Nobel]

Great story. Nice allegories and great imagery. I really enjoyed the first two chapters of this short story because of the way it started. The reader gets pulled into the action right away and then, the story slowly subsides. I like the way the other also incorporates first person and metaphors; it gives the story a great twist. Thank You for writing!