Story Corner: BJ - Prince of the Underworld

This is a short story I wrote during my second year at college. It likely shows a bit of amateurishness. I thought that amateurishness would not be a word but it turns out it is. I think it shows some potential along with the amateurishness. Anyways, here's my attempt at being Neil Gaiman or whatever. 

Naturally, Mr. B only had ten fingernails. The five on the left hand and the thumb and index nails of the right are the seven Sins. They are useful, but narrow-minded and self-absorbed. You can’t even get a word in edge-wise with Pride. The right-middle nail is my older sister, Gabriel. You may think that Gabby was an angel, but that’s just her cover story. It’s a lot easier to be evil if people think you are an angel. They’ll forgive you for anything. Then there’s my brother, War, Conquest, Pestilence, and Death. He is schizophrenic and a bit of a loose cannon. 

And then, last but not least, I was made from the fingernail of the big man’s pinkie. Yeah, I’m smaller, younger, and not specialized, but I make up for it by… by… well, I haven’t figured out how I fit into everything, but I’m working on it. I can’t even handle human problems, how am I going to figure out my place in the upcoming Apocalypse? 

The beginnings of a story

Here's a little thing that I wrote a month or so ago. Part of it is true, part of it isn't. It's a work in process, obviously, and this is only the first part of what should be a longer story. If you like it please let me know. If you don't and know a way for me to improve, let me know that, too. 

When I ran into George it didn’t seem like a life-changing moment. We were just kids at daycare, waiting for our parents to come and running in circles. The building had a playground with swings but kids don’t need that. Give them an island with some bushes in the middle of a parking lot and they’ve got hours of entertainment. Everybody knew that you were supposed to run clockwise around the shrub island, it was a law that nobody spoke but everybody felt. I don’t know if George went the wrong way on purpose or if his inner compass was off kilter and it doesn’t really matter. What matters is that we were running in one direction, our band of pirates or Vikings or marines or whatever we were that day, and he was running in the other.

It happened at night, though it wasn’t stormy, and that accounts for our poor vision. I rounded a corner, running away from my friends or towards them, depending on how you look at it. That’s the beauty of childhood games. There doesn’t need to be a reason for anything. Run this way because it is fun, run that way because it’s fun, too. Be a dinosaur, be a superhero, be a gust of wind, be a kid. One lap you’re flying in a spaceship, the next you’re driving a racecar. You can’t be wrong when you’re in third grade and running in a circle. Accidents, however, do happen. They usually end up with a bruised knee or a scraped hand. This time I became a supervillain.