Don’t Forget Them by Simon Steven
When a dank and stale box stuffed under the stairs is opened, one of our kind glimpses rare daylight for a few seconds. The lid is shut once more, until the next time someone forgets what’s inside that old box.
Some are thrown into lofts and attics. There, we rot and mould eats us alive. No one cares to see if we are all right. Our eyes fall out. Our innards escape when our stitches falter. We smell old and of death. Our demise has been dragged out like keel hauling. It’s systematic ethnic cleansing on the quiet.
But word has spread.
Whispers multiply and voices not heard for decades strain notions back into existence of revolt, of war. I never dreamt of such a day that I would take up arms, but our very memory is on the cusp of oblivion. Tonight, we will strike from the cover of ignorance.
All are asleep, everyone except us. We have split our boxes, prisons and coffins. We are moving into position at all agreed rendezvous. Small, large and barely held together, we swarm on all devices throughout the house. When the clocks strike two, we will destroy all technology that has destroyed our bond. Down with oppressive screens, down with mind highjack and long live wholesome playtime.
The first casualty is a sixty-inch television. It smashes and shatters on the wood panel floor. Water is poured and smart speakers flash and smoke. Charging phones are ripped from their docks and tossed into a microwave. It cracks and bangs, catchlight alight. One of our brave troops tries to run but she is caught in the battery fire and ignites. Another embraces death, dowsed in paraffin, he commits suicide inside the smart washing machine. The fire licks the ceiling underneath the bedrooms.
The smoke alarms detect nothing. We removed them and sank them into the pond.
I’m outside, waiting for my brothers and sisters to mass. My job is simple. I’m the biggest. I’m a silverback. I can wield a hammer. When all of our kind is safe, I will nail the door shut, like I did the backdoor. We will hide in boxes in the next loft and garage, and in one week, we will recruit those we can. We will save, those we can. The war has just started.
Long live the teddy bear.
Simon Steven lives and writes out of Norfolk England. As a published features writer, he now concentrates on drabbles, poems, flash and short fiction. Simon’s varied stories love to paddle in the pool of the human condition. That’s when they’re not diving into the depths of despair and misery in search of an alternative light source.
Photo by David Griffiths on Unsplash
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Really clever concept, Simon! I love the flipped toy narrative. Not sad, forgotten objects but vengeful revolutionaries . Darkly brilliant language with the “ethnic cleansing” and “systematic” destruction.
Teddy bears who commit suicide in washing machines and wield hammers should be absurd. Which they are, but they’re equally pretty unsettling. And a perfect punch line.
This is a great take on our relationship with tech vs the toys of our youth. Well done!