Pink Snowbunnies in Hell: A Flash Fiction Anthology Read Online Free

eighteenth-century furniture. His short vest waved with each shuffle. He let out a deep breath and I knew what was coming.
    “Easy there, big guy, don’t get upset,” I said, a touch too late.
    Eugene tossed his head back and let out a wail like a lion’s roar and then the floodgates opened. It was like watching Shaquille O’Neal cry. Most unsettling.
    “Of course you wished for a million bucks. Who wants a million ducks?” He sniffled and wiped his nose juice on his bare arm. “I’ll never be a good genie. And there’s only one more chance!” He was bawling then. For some reason, he smelled like cinnamon when he cried.
    “What do you mean? What will happen?” I asked, easing him onto an old Persian rug. I handed him a handkerchief.
    Eugene looked at me and said, “I don’t know.” He glanced at the vessel that had introduced us, shook his head and blew his nose. “But I think it’s bad.”
    I had met Eugene a couple months ago on a trip to India. I was purchasing some tapestries, bargaining with the vendor, and he threw in a vase as an incentive. I thought I was hallucinating when the vase started smoking and Eugene emerged, offering me a wish. Being a bachelor in the middle of the desert (and not truly believing he was a genie), I wished to be surrounded by gorgeous snowbunnies. What I got were evil little creatures on skis, teeth like razors, fur like cotton candy, and practiced in the art of jujitsu. Pink snowbunnies from hell. That’s what they were.
    I’ve been saddled with Eugene ever since. Apparently a genie doesn’t move on until the job is complete. And that three-wish myth? That’s not for the wisher to overindulge, but rather so the genie has a chance to get one right. Why there isn’t a training program, I don’t know.
    Upstairs in the apartment that night, Eugene was cooking shrimp curry as I confirmed his audiologist appointment. He had been tested for metal toxicity, dyslexia, and a sinus infection so far. We had to figure out why his brain wasn’t processing what his ears were hearing—and soon. There would be a lunar eclipse next month—the day of my last wish.
    “You know, George,” Eugene said to me, his mighty arm tensing as he whipped the sauce. He was always cooking, always hungry. “It might not be so bad.” He stooped down to taste his work and slurped.
    I hung up the phone and said, “Thursday at one p.m. with Dr. Franklin, Eugene.” I crossed to the counter that separated the kitchen from the dining area. “What might not be so bad?”
    “You and I as roomies.” He grinned wide, his dark, bald head contrasting with his bright white teeth like a yin-yang symbol.
    “Don’t even think about it.”
    “Why not?” He stomped his foot and it went through the floor. “Oops,” he said.
    “You see, right there. That’s why not.” I ran around to peer down the hole. There were a few smashed ducks, but everything else seemed fine. I grabbed another twelve-inch board from the closet. “This apartment was made for human beings. Not genies the size of garbage trucks.”
    I grabbed my toolbox from the closet and sifted through the nails. Eugene was standing maddeningly still, pouting.
    I pushed my glasses up the bridge of my nose. “Stop that.”
    “Take it back.”
    “Fine, I take it back. Please finish dinner before the sauce burns.”
    A door opened downstairs and a voice said, “Hello, anybody here?”
    “Didn’t you lock the door?” I asked Eugene.
    He shrugged.
    I sighed. “Be right down,” I called through the gaping hole.
    The man standing in the shop was dressed in a suit I could never afford.
    “This your shop?”
    I nodded.
    “Kitschy.”
    “Looking for anything in particular?”
    “I’m shooting a coming-of-age, fish-out-of-water film.” He removed his sunglasses, looked around. “I need props for an apartment scene where the—” He stopped, looked at Eugene’s vase. “What a gorgeous hookah.” He picked it up, spun it around in his