In the last post, we found out what happens when Quentin Norris tells Lindsay Thompson to write a story about magical penguin cults. In this post, we'll see what happens when the tables are turned.
After Lindsay Thompson had finished writing her harrowing tale of adventure and suspense, she gave Quentin Norris a prompt, which was: Write a story about a dandelion named Alex who is depressed because everyone is allergic to him.
More or less, Quentin followed these instructions, and thus:
The Utterly Depressing Life of Alex The Dandelion
By Quentin Norris
Once upon a time, there was a little Dandelion named Alex. His parents were two flower seeds named Sophia and Charles. They were planted too close to each other in the wet ground by two small human children whose parents warned them to spread the seeds away from each other. As the two seeds grew, their roots eventually became entangled and they sprouted from the earth as a mutated Dandelion of whose name you are already aware.
Because Alex was a Dandelion that was borne of two different flower seeds, he was very much unlike the other dandelions in the field. His stem was as thick as a small tree trunk and he was almost as tall as a 5-year-old human child. Large, pulsating veins wrapped themselves around his body and green, thick mucus oozed from the pores on his face. Instead of shining with a bright yellow hue, like all the other perfect, pretty dandelions, Alex’s petals were the color of lukewarm vomit.
The field where Alex grew up was quite popular among the people in the little town on the other side of the hills that surrounded his home. Various kinds of humans from the small community would spend their days in the field, from laughing children to courting lovers. They would skip and giggle and run through the field, smelling each unique dandelion, until they got to Alex of course. Alex loved the sight of the humans; they were so beautiful and happy. All he ever wanted was for someone to smell him. He would call out to them with his deformed, snaggle-toothed mouth, “Hello there, humans! Come smell me!” As soon as the sound of his raspy, cracked voice would reach the unsuspecting ears of the humans, they would always react differently, and it was always in a negative fashion.
The children would scream or cry. When the courting lovers saw him, the bride to be would cry out and faint into the arms of her barrel-chested man. This always hurt Alex deeply, for all he wanted was for someone to smell him. Little did they know that Alex’s flowery petals contained the most intoxicating smell in the world. Finally one day, a small, elderly blind woman wandered into the field. She walked past every other dandelion crying out for her attention until she reached Alex, who quivered with excitement when she approached him. She could smell something beautiful, but she couldn’t put her finger on what it reminded her of. She came face to face with Alex, who was so happy that he was about to be smelled that he could hardly speak. It was the first time that the depressed dandelion had ever felt joy.
The woman leaned close to Alex and inhaled deeply. His smell was so beautiful that she regained her vision instantaneously. Approximately two seconds later, she toppled to the ground, dead as a petrified mouse. Unbeknownst to Alex, he contained deadly, mutated spores that caused immediate allergic reactions in the lungs of humans. Alex became even more depressed at discovering this horrifying truth about his body. He decided that he would never bring harm to another human being ever again.Alex thought long and hard about what he should do. Finally, he came to a decision about what needed to be done. He took a deep breath, held his nose and mouth, then exhaled with great force, the way someone does when they are trying to pop their ears on a long car ride. At that moment, Alex’s disgusting head exploded, green mucus flying all over the field and the faces of the pretty dandelions. Unfortunately, Alex hadn’t thought about the fact that as soon as his life ended, the deadly spores inside his brain filled the air with a polluted cloud that spread throughout the world and eventually infected and killed every human being on the planet Earth. 20 years later, the empire of cockroaches had grown strong and mighty. Finally, insects took their rightful place as the rulers of Earth.
The End
Note: Quentin would like to apologize to anyone who is annoyed or slightly offended by any scientifically incorrect statements about dandelions or flowers in general.Much love,
Quentin Norris
