DAY 28 OF FLASH AUGUST FICTION. Going to re-organize when this is over. I had a thread in a post with that he wrote about the movie LongLegs. That is a scary movie with cool camera aesthetics. Stories about cameras are always interesting. Here is one I did during April about a birthday party gift. Here is another one I did in February about some old found footage. Interesting how cameras come up in my stories. Here is another one today. If you are, or know any independent, non-corporate media people, refer them to me and if they want, I’ll gift them a paid subscription to my substack. I’m broke, but at least I can do that.
You’re welcome. I’m Herschel Sterling, and I’m here to help.
Home Movie Camera
One Take
790 WORDS, WRITTEN IN ROUGHLY AN HOUR.
Phil found an old movie camera in his granddad’s attic. He hadn’t been around their old house since he was a little kid. He remembers the camera. It was one of the first camera’s of its lightweight type that was meant for home use. It had a plastic casing, and it was a VHS camcorder.
What a relief to the family when the granddad brought that thing out instead of the massive camera he had with the expansive rack of bright lights. People would have to squint when being filmed at the holiday gatherings, and when the movies would be shown, they looked like they were in pain. They’d put their hands up to avoid being blinded. It was always funny to watch those movies.
Phil’s sister, Francis, was downstairs. The two of them decided to see their grandparent’s house and get any leftover things before the house was sold. They were the last ones in the family to be there before it goes on the market. Phil descends the pull-down steps from the attic and find’s his sister in the backyard.
“I can’t believe I found this. It was in the case, nestled between rafters.” He tells her. “It wasn’t in a box or in the dresser, and it was all dusty, camouflaged, I think if someone else had seen it, they would have taken it.”
Francis replies. “I can’t believe no one took a dresser. Is there any film with the camera?”
“I can’t believe anyone even told us about granddad dying, or that the house is going to be sold.” Phil said.
“I think gramma and granddad loved us.” Francis said. “Gramma used to tell me every time I saw her how lucky she felt to have an extra granddaughter. She would pull me aside and say things like that.”
“Me too.” Phil replied. “Granddad never really talked to me about it, though. He was one of those hard old guys. I think he thought adoption was a sensitive subject, better left unspoken about.”
Francis agrees. “Yeah, he always seemed a little uncomfortable about it. Maybe the reason we even found out about any of this is because they all know that’s what gramma and granddad would want.” She says
Phil finishes wiping clean the case, and he opens it. There are a couple of unused cassettes, and there is a partially used cassette in it. The powder cord is in there as well.
“When this came out, it was the biggest thing, remember?” We could watch the movies granddad made right away.” Phil said.
“That kind of took the fun out of it, because at each gathering, we would watch the film from the year before, that was kind of fun too.” She replied. “Everything started becoming so instant after that. Everything had to be instant this and instant that.”
“Well, the power cord is here. If this thing works, we can see what’s on this cassette, we don’t even need a TV.” Phil says. “We can watch it right on this flip-out screen. I know for sure we aren’t going to find any batteries around here for this, let’s plug it in.”
They go to the kitchen and plug the camera in and check the cassette. What they see is some nice footage of grandmother doing some work in the kitchen, while she and the granddad joke around. “Turn that thing off.” she says and puts her hand over the lens.
“That’s so sweet.” Francis says. “I’m so glad we got them.” She adds.
“Me too.” Says Phil. “I think you are right about granddad, I think he didn’t know how to talk about it, but I remember the way he looked at me, and it made me feel OK, I know he accepted me. I remember it like he’s here right now.”
“Me too.” Says Francis, it’s a warm feeling.
“Let’s test the record function on this old thing. I’ll put one of these new cassettes in here.” Phil says.
The two of them move into the living room and Phil aims the camera at the mirror. “Say cheese!” He says, as they both look in the wall mirror as he films them. They watch the playback in the flip-out screen.
As they play back the short footage and watch on the little screen, a faint image of their granddad appears. He puts his arms around their shoulders, and he kisses each of them on the head, and smiles at them the way he did when they were kids. His image is gone as fast as it appeared. They play it back several times, but it never reappears, it was just that one take.
The End.
You probably figured it would be something like that. I figured out they were adopted about a third of the way through and backtracked and put the end together. The other camera related stories I linked above are different. One of them is actually a script rewrite in story form, and the other one has a crazy, unnecessarily twisty ending. I like these sweetly ending ones though. I have a few. I have all kinds.
Thank you to all the independent, non-corporate media people out there. I hope I can give you some light entertainment once in a while. Thank you so much for listening, or reading. This is the Smell the Inside of Your Nose. Do it Right Now podcast. I hope you might get a free or paid subscription, or buy me a coffee, or donate some bitcoin. I wish you the best. I’m Herschel Sterling, and I’m here to help.
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