Roger had just graduated
from charm school, his mother insisted he be “properly educated in the art of
charm”. It had been an interesting experience,
learning how to charm people out of pretty much anything. He had become quite good at it, in fact. He enjoyed the power he had over people when
he worked his magic. It had all become quite
easy for him. Now, with school done, it
was time for him to sit down and focus his attention on his novel. All of this charm would certainly come in
handy finding a top notch publisher for his amazing masterpiece of literature. He wasn’t worried in the least.
It was a beautiful day. Roger was ready to begin. The words flowed through his fingers and onto
the screen. He smiled as page after page
filled with the wonderous things he wanted to say. By quitting time, he had completed the first
two chapters. Roger clicked save and
went to bed.
The next day was just as
beautiful as the one before. Roger
settled down at his desk, ready to complete many more chapters. He opened the document and it was empty. How could it be? He closed it and reopened, still blank. He searched his computer but not other copies
were on it. He restarted the computer, still
blank.
“No!” Roger shouted slamming his fists on the desk.
“Heh Heh Heh!” A strange voice seemed to drift on the air
around him.
“What? Who’s there?”
Roger’s eyes darted around the room.
“Show yourself.”
“No!”
“Did you delete my novel?” Roger searched the room.
“Yes!”
“Why?” Roger stopped in the middle of the room trying
to locate any sign of the owner of the voice.
“Because!”
“Because why?” Roger struggled to keep calm but his anger
threatened to boil over.
“I didn’t like it!”
“What do you mean you didn’t
like it?” Roger yelled.
“It sucked!”
“No it didn’t. That was only the beginning of the next #1
bestselling novel of all time!” Roger
puffed out his chest and put his hands on his hips.
“It sucked!”
“Then don’t read it.” Roger stood still.
“No one will ever read
it!”
“I’ m going to write
this novel and publish it and sell millions of copies.” Roger stated.
“No!”
“Yes. I will.” Roger sat down in his chair. “And you can’t stop me.”
“Wanna bet.”
Roger ignored the voice
and started typing again. He set the
document to auto-save just to be safe.
Just as he put a period at the end of the sentence, it disappeared.
“Stop that!” He demanded.
“No!”
Roger typed it again,
and again the sentence disappeared. He
typed and re-typed but as soon as one sentence was complete it would
disappear. No matter how fast he typed
he could never get more than the one sentence on the page before it
disappeared. After hours of battling,
Roger finally slumped over onto his laptop.
“I give up.” Roger cried.
“Good!”
“Will you leave now?” Roger begged.
“Ok, but if you try to
write a novel, I’ll be back.”
“Fine.” Roger dragged himself off to bed and slept.
