The Endtimes

Prompt: Write a story/poem about what your life would be like if you didn't have Writing.Com.


Jonah is finally down for his nap. I toss two ice cubes into a tall glass and pour Coca-Cola half-way up. Gulping heartily, I turn on the ‘puter and plan my writing.com fun – but first I go to Media Player and put it on “shuffle” so groovy tunes can serve as eclectic backdrop for my creativity. Today’s first song is “Nugget” by Cake, which is quite yummy.

I settle and stretch in my chair. Then I click and scroll through ‘my favorites’ until I find writing.com…but the screen gives me an error message. Reloading doesn’t help. Rebooting doesn’t help. Again and again I try to go to writing.com, until, frustrated, I decide to shut down and come back later. I am nearing a toddler’s tantrum state of mind. I want my writing.com NOW!

Half hour later and I’m turning everything back on. Surely it was a glitch, some problem they’ll have fixed by now, I’m thinking. To my astonishment and horror, I am met with a different message this time…this one telling me that writing.com has been shut down permanently due to undisclosed circumstances.

All that exists is my strangled gasping. It is as if I’ve passed through a wormhole portal into a dimension of raw facts and colourless chaos.

Jonah wakes up at that precise moment and immediately starts screaming. I lift him out of his crib, and he kicks and yells as though his world were ending in a nightmare of pain. I am about to settle down with him on the couch to nurse, and he realizes this and quiets down for a moment….but the screaming continues in my ears. Confused, I run to the front door and open it wide.

People everywhere are screaming. Jonah and I take up the chorus of screams, crying in anguish and fear. The sky is darkening rapidly into shades of dinosaur, chalkboard, pond-scum, and rotten eggplant. Cars crash and people walk confusedly in circles. Birds fly crying in the air, diving and whirling and circling. Electricity fills the spaces like pulsing, angry threats of shock. All sounds are scratches on blackboards and squeaking styrofoam.

The ground heaves suddenly, angrily, tossing pets and bikes and sprinklers like popcorn in a sizzling pan. Heat fills the ashen air, and the devil is laughing scarlet fire into fractured winds.

Stars are winding up to throw sparks on the fire of Earth’s destruction. The moon shoots off into a cool oblivion, and black holes accumulate in time-continuums never before imagined. The sun bursts into infinite balls of obliterating flame, and in an instant the entire earth is vaporized. I fear nothing. Writing.com is gone. Life was over anyway.