Another Short Story I Wrote

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Walter Jid in: The Movie Mystery
I approached the Heptaplex’s ticket booth with my friend Tom Taggart and my twin brother Joey Jid.
“Three tickets for Undersecretaries of the Universe 2,” I told the ticket man, whose name was Louis.
“Sorry, no can do,” said Louis, wrinkling his mustache. “I’m afraid that Theatre 5 which screens that particular movie is out of order due to inappropriately bizarre projections.”
“Spectral projections?” I asked.
“No, just the regular type,” said Louis. “Jeez, how many comic books you reading, lad?”
“Why don’t you just fire the projectionist and hire a new one?” asked Joey.
“Excuse me, Tweedledum,” said Louis. “Do you work for the Heptaplex? Have you ever worked for a movie theatre? No? Then don’t tell me how to do my job.”
“I worked for a porno theatre once,” said Tom. “Actually it was just a front for the m—oh, never mind,” said Tom.
“Okay, now that you’ve all made your smart-alecky wisecracks, is there another movie you all want to see?” asked Louis.
“How about How to Be a Semitic Sex Machine?” asked Joey.
“If you have to ask, you’ll never know,” said Louis. “Oh sorry, I’m not allowed to make remarks like that after last time.”
“How about the three of us help you solve the mystery in Theatre 5?” I asked.
“Sorry, Walnut, it’s just not that simple,” said Louis. “You’ve got to have previous experience solving mysteries.”
“The three of us have plenty of experience,” I said. “We helped President Calvin Eddino catch Lednerg Cainsen, the infamous Washington Ghost, and before that we saved the Los Angeles Dodgers from the ghost of ‘Electric Bill’ Johnson.”
“Hey, I was working for the Dodgers when that happened,” said Louis. “I knew you looked familiar. Step right inside.”
The Heptaplex was an old building, designed in the 1990s by Mexican-American architect “Brick” Maldonado. Here a teenage goth girl was selling popcorn and there were posters for upcoming films like The Kosher Crab Nebula and The Lurg-O Batperson Movie on the walls.
We entered Theatre 5, noticing the hastily scribbled “out of order” sign on the door.
Inside, the theatre was showing trivia questions like “Who starred in Once a Picture Will Be Mine?”
“Tom Cruise,” said Joey incorrectly.
“Who’s that?” asked Tom.
“Guys, let’s stay focused on solving this case,” I said, and we began walking down the aisle. Nobody was seated except for a shadowy figure in the front row which appeared to be rattling chains. The projection suddenly shifted from the trivia questions to a disturbing mess of pornographic images accompanied by text in a Cyrillic alphabet.
“It’s probably Louis,” said Joey.
“What makes you say that?” I asked.
“He was the first person we saw here. Don’t you watch Scooby-Doo?”
“I did when I was a kid,” said Tom. “I remember he had a nephew, Scrappy-Doo.”
“Jeez, and they said I had ADD,” I said. “Tom, can’t you read Russian?”
“Not quite, I had a boyhood in Czechoslovakia but this appears to be Ukrainian which I learned as part of a legal crime syndicate. It reads ‘Jeremy Rastik will have his revenge on Walter Jid.’”
“So it’s Rastik’s ghost,” I said, and approached the shadowy figure, quickly unmasking him. I was surprised to see it was a young man, not the old man who Jeremy Rastik was.
“Are you Jeremy Rastik, Jr.?” I asked the man. “Are you avenging your father’s death?”
“I’m not Jeremy Rastik’s son, you fool. I’m Kenny Cronmaker.”
“Who’s Kenny Cronmaker?” I asked.
“I am,” he said unhelpfully.
“You told me you could read Ukranian,” I told Tom.
“Sorry, it was Iranian,” said Tom.
“Iranian isn’t a language,” I said.
“Oh yeah,” said Tom.
“Why are you acting like such an idiot?” I asked.
Tom reached for a zipper in his head and unzipped it to reveal the ghost of Jeremy Rastik.
“Then where’s Tom?” I asked.
The once-shadowy figure who claimed to be Kenny Cronmaker unzipped the zipper in his head to reveal Tom.
“I’m confused,” I said and headed back to the ticket booth to get a refund.
“You didn’t buy a ticket though,” said Joey.
“Yes, I did, it’s right here,” and pulled out my ticket as well as those for Tom and Joey.
“Those are for Beatty and the Boost,” commented Joey.
“Whoops,” I said, and was accosted by a security guard.
“You went into Theatre 5 when you were supposed to be seeing the movie in Theatre 3.”
“But Louis told me I could!” I said.
“You lie for I am Louis,” said the security guard. “Oh, Dr. Mengele, there you are.”
“I do experiments on ze twins,” said Dr. Mengele, and Joey and I began to scream.

That was actually quite a fun read. The writing was spare and quick, and yet inspired great imagery. My only criticism is that I thought the ending could have used a bit more description, as it came off as simply telling rather than making me see it.