Today's #Scifi #fantasy short story #TheLaughterFairy

I had a power outage today so I couldn't work on the computer as much, this story is probably not edited too well so sorry but its still pretty good though. And the post is probably pretty late depending on your time zone. (For me it is which is why it is also rushed.) Anyway onto the flash fiction!

The Laughter Fairy

            “So those ogre, they're so green right? Right?” I looked at the audience praying for a laugh. I was so hungry. I needed them to laugh. I'm a laughter fairy and I feed off of laughter. I needed them to laugh. I was so hungry. My stomach was groaning. I needed the energy. Why can't I come up with any decent jokes. A laughter fairy can absorb the energy from recordings, but it's like eating stale bread for a human. Absorbing real laughter is better but still not good. Real sustenance is gotten from laughter than you cause yourself.

           When I was a kid I was one of the cutest kids in the world so anything I did would entertain the audience. When I was older my parents help me by making me parts of comedy groups where I would get more minor roles where I would specialize, usually slapstick where I was the guy getting hit. Or any other bit part. And now that I was an adult I had no one to give me help. Though I do perform on the streets and people do watch laughter faries with reputations for bad humor to give them second chances out of charity because they need it more than the funny fairies. Some government programs as a sort of welfare. Today's audience was provided by one the government programs, and I still couldn't entertain them. All my jokes entertain them.

          Looked like I would be eating a recording again tonight.

So I absorbed the energy from the recording. And I went to bed with my stomach rumbling. I thought of all my bad jokes. I drifted off sleep. When I slept I dreamed of people laughing at a routine I was doing. Though the routine I was doing was of jokes stolen from other faeries. Stealing jokes and creating stolen laughter could actually make a laughter fairy sick. Poison them even. I was so glad I was doing it in a dream.   

          If I had done that in real life I could have died.

The next morning I had no idea what to do. Would I go hungry again? I looked at my joke notebook. I poured through it. Nothing but terrible jokes. I've tried so many of them in front of audiences. No matter what audience, humans, trolls, ogres, dragons, fellow faeries or anyone else they never got anything. I showed some jokes to a cousin and I remember one joke that actually got a reaction besides a blank stare.

        “I know an animal that's really good at sports.” I told him.

          “And what animal is that?” he responded.

          “A baseball bat!” I delivered my punchline with my usual fake smile. It's always been obnoxiously wide, like a cartoon character's.

          He laughed. “I'm sorry dude. That joke is laughably bad. You can't use that.”

I didn't use that joke because he said it was bad. But that laughter he gave me was delicious. And he did laugh. I remembered that people even watched movies that were bad just because they were laughably bad. Even if accompanied by a groan people did have a taste for badness.

         I had a solution to all of my problems.

        My joke notebook was full of terrible jokes that were laughably bad that I didn't use because of my cousin's advice. Delicious lameness was at my fingertips. I could imagine it now. Sweet, delicious laughter.      My stomach growled, but instead of in complaint, now in anticipation.

        I started on my character. Every comedian needed a character. I couldn't deliver the bad jokes. I was good at making up characters for comedians, that why people valued me on comedy teams in high school. Perhaps an arrogant man who thinks his jokes are the best in the world? No. Even if that's funny for a bit that would get annoying because the audience could think I'm really arrogant.

I then remembered my childhood.

           I was cute not only because of my adorable looks but because of clumsiness and awkwardness. I decided my character would be a sort of awkward, clumsy, and incompetent man, implying why the jokes are so bad(Hey! I'm really smart otherwise! I'm just bad at making normally clever jokes!). So I'll be like one of those bumbling comic fools. I'll make the audience build a sort of empathy with me. Which they should. I am really screwed if they don't laugh.

        I was so nervous. If this didn't work I didn't know what I would do. I flew onto stage sweating, purposely bobbling, almost like I was drunk. I landed a bit off center. I purposely put on hilariously unfashionable clothes. My terrible tie fell off. I began to tie it back on. I purposely failed. I purposely failed again. I looked so pitiful and dumb doing it people were resisting laughing. They know us laugh faeries live off laughter but they didn't want to offend me. But they burst out laughing.

It was delicious. After they laughed for a bit I then yelled at them.

          “Don't laugh yet!” They grew silent. “The show hasn't started yet!” I looked dead serious. They all shut up. Although the laughter was delicious I wanted to establish my character of being an strange man which demanded them to stop laughing. I kept failing to do my tie a few times then I did it right. “You can all laugh now. I'm starting now.” I then let out a big smile contrasting the loud, yelling face I gave earlier.

I then put my hand in my right pocket and fished around for a minute. Then I smiled and put my hand in my hand in my left pocket and pulled out my note cards. I then one of my bad jokes. Though it wasn't one of my laughable bad jokes. I didn't get a response then waited.

          “Where's the next joke?” Someone from crowd asked.

             “Someone laughs then I tell the next joke.”

            “Well this joke wasn't funny.” The person responded.

           “Yes it was.” I responded, not in an obnoxious tone like some people do when they insist something, but like I was earnestly convinced of it, like a baffled child.

            “No it wasn't.” He responded.

I kept up the “Yes it was, no it wasn't” exchange until a single person laughed at it.

           “Someone laughed now I can tell the next joke” I said, many people laughed when I said that.

            Now I started telling my laughably bad jokes while being as awkward as possible playing my incompetent character as well as possible. People loved it. All the laughter was delicious.

            I never went hungry again.

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