Here’s the beginning of a short story, “Baby Bay.” The whole thing will appear in The Doug Skinner Dossier, to be published next month by Black Scat Books. You can read this while you wait…

BABY BAY

High up in the treetops, old Mr. Stork shuffled into the Baby Bay, and peered over his specs at the day’s deliveries.

Now, you may not know this, but when a man and woman copulate and produce a baby, either by accident or design, it goes to old Mr. Stork’s Baby Bay for delivery. There, old Mr. Stork’s young assistant, Henry, sorts all of the infants by zip code, and lays them in the outgoing bins for delivery. Old Mr. Stork wraps each one in a reasonably clean piece of cloth, and then flies off with the bundle in his beak. If he doesn’t sneeze or something, he leaves it under a cabbage leaf, where the new parents track it by its smell. This is easier than pushing it out through a vagina.

As old Mr. Stork looked over the squalling infants, he blanched, which is difficult through feathers.

“Criminy!” he expostulated. “This is the ugliest bunch yet.”

Henry shook his head sadly. “Another church picnic,” he explained.

“I need some coffee,” muttered old Mr. Stork, backing out of the room.

Storks don’t usually drink coffee, but old Mr. Stork had a difficult job, and needed his stimulants.

Henry fell into a reverie, daydreaming about his intended, Samantha, and her inviting cloaca. Maybe some day they would have four yellowish eggs of their own…