Modeled after Giovanni Boccaccio's classic from the 14th Century, this collection similarly brought 100+ short stories to Wattpad readers. The original's premise was simple: ten individuals entertained themselves over a span of ten days by telling a...
The growing group around the fire were cheered by the latest offering, but all too soon the deep abiding silence of the world crept in again.
"What about you?" Heather asked David. "You must have a story about misunderstandings. You're the one who brought it up "
David slowly cleaned his glasses while he thought. "Actually, Maaja's tale brought one to mind. It's a story about what happens when someone is mistaken for someone else and joins in with a group of strangers, whose motives he misunderstands. I will leave it to you to judge if it ends well for him or badly."
VENICE IN DEATH
By @DavidJThirteen
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Crispin Nash was hopelessly lost and verging on sunstroke. The infernal August heat drove him to the shadows. Rushing through the narrow alleyways, he shied away from the sun and clung to the darker, cooler walls.
That morning the fog had laid low over the canals and Crispin basked in the dawn as he drank cappuccino and nibbled at his bomboloni. The hotel's patio was separated from the water by an iron fence. Few things disturbed the stillness. Only the occasional motorboats with people heading to work came down the canal and one lumbering barge stacked with cartons and packages. The air had been fresh and gave no hint of the broiling day ahead.
The guidebook he'd purchased at the airport sat on the table barely skimmed. Crispin had little interest in history and museums, no urge to purchase chandeliers or paper-mache masks. His European trip was about "absorbing the atmosphere," as he put it. This was the indistinct term he applied to breaking his rut, seeing the places he had only read about, and seeking romance and adventure. With youthful optimism, he hoped to return with a patina of worldly wisdom which others would sense and admire.
But secretly he hoped to never go back to his nine-to-five cubicle. He wished fate would set him on a more exciting path.
His first stop had been London, where he enjoyed himself by wondering in weak rain through the complex chaos of the metropolis. Crispin was supposed to go to Paris next, but he roamed further south into Italy in hopes of warmer weather.
Here he found the heat and his adventure, if you could call the futile panic rising in his gut adventure. The day had become a miserable death march through tourist crowded streets and bridges, while the sun plastered his black shirt to his back and his Doc Martins dragged across the cobblestones. The respite of his hotel seemed forever beyond his reach. The lofty dreams he had over his morning coffee were forgotten. All he wanted now was to crawl into his coffin-sized rented room and let the air-conditioning wash over him until he shed the blistering fever which crawled over his skin. Despite its utter lack of "atmosphere," the canned air would be heavenly compared to the heavy miasma sitting on the city.
Venice was proving itself to be an exotic hell—an M.C. Escher labyrinth of spiralling streets, bridges of stairs, and blind alleys. All filled with hordes of grotesque tourists in graphic T-shirts, carrying ubiquitous selfie-sticks.
