Volume 1
of “Short Happy Stories” by Evan Pellervo is now available. The book contains 50 compact stories for everyone. It’s a respite!
Order online — or ask about the book at your local bookshop.
“Short Happy Stories” was published by Manaatti Books, and is available in Paperback and eBook formats.
Askin’ Aspen
Aspen has worked at the radio station for three years—assisting show hosts with various aspects of their shows—and today it occurs to Mrs. Hammett that since Aspen has a nice voice and a nice personality, he himself could be a successful show host. She asks him if he’s interested in the idea, and he nods. And then, for clarity, he says “Yes.”
“What kind of show would you like to host?” says Mrs. Hammett.
Aspen thinks for a few moments. “I would like to host the kind of show where people with problems call in and ask for advice. I would like to give people good advice.”
A few short weeks later, the show Askin’ Aspen premieres. As Aspen starts to talk into the microphone—simultaneously entering countless cars and living rooms—he finds it very hard to believe that what is happening is actually happening. He has his own radio show! Askin’ Aspen! Wow!
This new reality exceeds anything he had ever imagined for himself.
Everything seems wonderful—until the first caller starts talking.
“Thanks for taking my call,” says the caller. “So my brother committed a terrible crime—I won’t go into detail here—and I don’t know what to tell my eight-year-old son. The thing is, my brother is a really terrific guy, and nobody ever expected him to do anything like this… But he did, there’s a ton of evidence… But, so, my question: What should I tell my son?”
“What should you tell your son?” says Aspen.
“Yes, that’s my question. He’s used to seeing my brother fairly often, and he recently asked where my brother was… I didn’t know what to say, so I changed the topic. But I need some kind of long-term plan here. Should I sit my son down and tell him the truth? Or should I wait for him to find out the truth on his own? Or should I invent a story that’s more… palatable?”
“Well…” Aspen has no idea what to tell the caller. “Inventing a story would… Lying is generally bad… The truth is generally the best… But, then again, if this is a really terrible crime it could be very disturbing for your son… I guess that’s obvious… Waiting for him to find out the truth on his own would definitely be the easiest solution… But maybe that wouldn’t be the right solution?”
“I don’t know. That’s what I’m asking you.”
“Well…”
Needless to say, Aspen fails to give the caller clear advice. When the call is over the caller still has no idea how to handle the situation.
Over the course of the rest of the show, Aspen takes many more calls. Aside from his answer to a question about carne asada tacos versus carnitas tacos, Aspen fails to give any caller any clear advice.
“I’m so sorry,” he says to Mrs. Hammett after the show. “That was much harder than I’d expected.”
“I thought you wanted to give people good advice,” says Mrs. Hammett. “Why didn’t you give people good advice?”
“Well… Whenever I had an idea about some advice to give, it seemed like there was other, contradictory advice that could possibly serve the caller better. It’s hard to know what advice to give, and I suppose I would rather give no advice than the wrong advice.”
That’s the first half of the story; for the rest, get a copy of the book “Short Happy Stories”!
Mai Tai
In The Seventh
“I’ll tell you what you want,” he says. “Mai Tai. Running in the seventh race. The return won’t be tremendous, but you’ll be happy. Trust me. Mai Tai in the seventh. To win.”
And then he’s gone and she’s alone with the statue of Seabiscuit and two swaying palm trees and a fluttering American flag. Well, she isn’t actually alone, there are quite a few other people around—some are hurrying with a clear destination in mind, some are ambling along with apparent aimlessness, some are discussing horses and jockeys with gravity, some are laughing, some are standing still and not making a sound and staring at their racing forms—but she is barely aware of their existence. For her, all of life has been compressed into one question: How do I win?
She doesn’t know that guy well, but she kind of knows him; a few months ago he gave her a tip that worked. That one turned out to be a hell of a horse. But that was then and this is now, and she only just got here and hasn’t yet reviewed today’s racing form for herself—which, as a meticulous bettor who hates to leave anything to chance, she must do.
Moving toward the grandstand, she begins to observe the people who happen to be in her field of vision. The variety is incredible; so many different kinds of lives are lived. And today they all ended up here, and she senses that none of them would prefer to be anywhere else on the planet. This whole place is infused with anticipation, with an eagerness about a future that feels likely and close: wallets will soon be heavier.
As she walks she lightly hits her left shoulder with her racing form, which she rolled up tightly, into a tube, without really noticing what she was doing. A shaggy dog sneezes and she remembers Lucky. What a fine dog he was! Time and memory are so strange. Lucky died over ten years ago, and for at least a year she thought about him multiple times a day—but then his absence underwent the transformation that everything undergoes upon establishing consistency: it became normal. When did she last think about Lucky?
Though she really tries, she is unable to remember when she last remembered.
The grandstand is not too crowded and she quickly finds a nice place to sit. The racetrack is pretty much empty and the mountains beyond the racetrack are pretty much empty. It’s good that those mountains are there, for their monumentality reflects the monumentality of what goes on at this racetrack: this is a place of grand transfigurations: this is where some dreams become reality and where some dreams become nothing.
It hasn’t been cloudy like this in a long, long, long time, and rain actually seems possible. She has always loved how rain heightens the drama of a race. Hooves sink deeper into the surface; fresh mud flies out in all directions; jockeys’ colorful silks get splattered, filthy; it’s all so beautiful.
In her mind the possibility of rain is an extremely good sign: at this point rain would be different and special in almost exactly the same way a successful day at the racetrack would be different and special: if the weather changes, her luck will change. For so long nothing—at the racetrack or anywhere else—has gone her way. Her life seems to be moving toward only one thing: destitution. Which is why it’s so important for her to win big today. Which is why it’s time for her to unroll her racing form, open it up, and get serious.
She crosses her legs and puts the racing form on her left knee and leans forward. If you work properly now, she tells herself, you will fix your trajectory.
So. Let’s see… Mai Tai in the seventh…
There it is! Right in front of her! Exactly what she has been waiting for has finally arrived—and with such clarity! She has found the horse that will gallop her into a better future—and it sure as hell isn’t Mai Tai. It’s one of the horses running against Mai Tai, and his name is Remember Lucky.
Remember Lucky! That’s what she was just doing, only a few minutes ago and for the first time in longer than she can remember. This can’t be just a coincidence. No, this is much more: this is spooky action at a distance.
Several times she has found herself reviewing books on quantum entanglement in the library. It’s a bizarre phenomenon that has been demonstrated with electrons and tiny metal drums, and it could be, she senses, a key to unlock the universe and look inside. To see deeper relationships and finally understand how this big cosmic machine really works. Spooky action at a distance is when […]
That’s the first half of the story; for the rest, get a copy of the book “Short Happy Stories”!
