Round 6

So, national public radio has this contest called Three Minute Fiction where ordinary people submit short, fictional stories. They have several rounds, each round judged by a different person, each judge setting certain parameters the author must write within. Round 6 stories must contain someone telling a joke, and someone laughing. I read several stories from Round 6, but my favorite one went by the name of Soft-Shoe by Cynthia Gunadi. A father lies in his hospital bed, unable to answer to his 6 year old son's jokes, unable to ask his weeping mother-in-law to leave. He describes his son, Joseph, and his routine, how Joseph would ask him a joke, and he would return with another. The narrator describes himself as "practically vegetal" but able to respond with groans, twitching limbs, hoping Joseph realizes he's trying to "convey all the knock-knock [he] knows." The thing that gives him away, communicates to Joseph and his mother-in-law that he is still there, is when he breaks wind, reaching through his mother-in-laws sobs and causing her to snicker.
The really sad part about this tragic, yet quietly funny story is that this little boy has practically lost both of his parents. Apparently his mother already passed away and now his father is trapped inside his own body. While I'm always up for a sad story, I like the way Gunadi inserted humor at the end, lifting the characters spirits and mine along with it.