Friday, April 11, 2008

My Best Friend

My Pal

By

James Robert Smith

I was relatively

happy

when I sold that first

short story

to that first

big market.

My best friend asked me

the anthology title

and said he’d buy

a copy

when it came out.

When it did come out

I asked him, smiling, proud,

“Did you buy one?”

And he said,

“Your story was what? Four pages of the book? Five?

I couldn’t justify buying

that book

for just four or five pages.”

My best friend.

What an asshole.

2 comments:

  1. True friends would buy it no matter what. True friends buy your book, send you goofy drawings and funny books at no cost. True friends send you a book about big dino-birds and don't charge them. True friends.

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  2. Yeah, the guy's my pal, but some people are sometimes jerks without meaning to do harm. It happens.

    He's given me gifts, too. Sometimes stuff that I don't like, but I don't let on.

    Certainly not cool art, though.

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