An exercise in extemporaneous writing

First draft, no outline or preconceived ideas, editing only for grammar and punctuation.


This is the story of a gopher named Constance Mathers. Constance was a normal gopher who enjoyed burrowing into the ground, eating plants, and avoiding hawks. On roughly the 523rd day of his life, he was foraging by a stream when a nearby hunter took a shot at a deer. Constance was so startled that he fell into the stream and was carried downstream for several yards before he could clamber his way out. Unfortunately, he climbed out of the bank into a small overhang in the roots of a large tree, where a viper made its home. The viper slithered out from his home and stared at Constance. "Hello, Constance," said the viper. "Hello, Franklin," replied Constance. "Do you remember," Franklin the Viper asked in a casual sort of way, "our time together in primary school?" "I do," replied Constance. "I seem to recall," Franklin continued, shifting his coils ominously, "that you took issue with the scaliness of my skin in a most verbal fashion." Constance had no reply to this. "I would like to let you know, Constance, that I have forgiven you. You are a small and stupid creature, and it is simply unfair of me to expect you to conduct yourself in a proper fashion." "Oh," said Constance. "Thank you." "As a matter of curiosity, Constance dear, may I ask you what your feelings are of those distant days?" Constance stuttered: "I, ah... don't actually think about it very much. I have rather a lot of foraging to do, you see--" "Oh, I see, I see!" interjected Franklin. "You are the very Busy Beaver, sss-sss-sss," said Franklin, snickering at his own wit. One of Franklin's undulating coils began slowly, in a pulsating fashion, to slide nearer to Constance's flank. "It is a funny thing, old friend, how some move on in life, while others seem to stay behind. You live for today, but I live in yesterday, steeped in memory, plagued by the past. It is only with a deliberate and concentrated effort that I am able to let go. Many a day I spent on a sunny rock contemplating time and aging, intelligence and morality, culpability, justice, and other such obscure and academic things. In my long reverie I came to some conclusions, which I would like to share with you now. Will you hear me out, Constance?" Constance had begun some time ago to shuffle slowly backwards. "Err, you see, the sun is beginning to set, and I really should be in before the wolves are out, you see..." Franklin's far coil had already slithered its way behind dear Constance, and with it he gently nudged the gopher towards him. "Don't worry, old friend, you can stay with me tonight; we will take our tea together and have a grand time remembering the old days. We can talk of the finer things, of philosophy, and science, and art." "That's very kind of you, Franklin, but really, I can't stay out tonight--" "It wasn't a question, dear friend. You will hear me out." Franklin locked eyes with the gopher and began to sway his head from side to side, speaking in a low, slow voice. Constance was obligingly occupied. "If we let today's injustices become tomorrow's memories, Constance, then nothing is ever done. How long must we let pass before crimes can go unpunished? A year? A month? A day? Seconds? You see, time is an illusion; it is arbitrary. So long as I have memory of an event, it occurred. Justice does not grow stale; if anything, the oldest injustices are those which most cry out for resolution. Forgiveness, you see, is another way of simply capitulating to the injustices with which this world is filled. I apologize, friend Constance, for having lied to you, albeit unintentionally. I have for some time been under the impression that I forgave you long ago, but now that I see you here before me, I think I could do with just a little piece of justice." So saying, Franklin lashed out and bit Constance in the side, who squealed with pain and fell back onto the ground, scrabbling towards the bank. With his coils Franklin lashed out and shoved Constance into the water, wherein he floated away.