{"id":23558,"date":"2026-02-22T06:48:54","date_gmt":"2026-02-22T11:48:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/?p=23558"},"modified":"2026-02-22T07:14:27","modified_gmt":"2026-02-22T12:14:27","slug":"hard-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/flash-fiction\/hard-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Hard Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, get this right? My mate Jay and I are walking. Slow like. He\u2019s going on about how he dealt with some fool who tried him. And I\u2019m telling him about the bird I got with last night. Real fine <\/em>she was. And then\u2014<\/p>\n

BAM!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m on the floor. I can taste my own blood. Here’s this little dude. He\u2019s kicking me. Ow! That really hurts!<\/em> He\u2019s pulling my J\u2019s off!<\/p>\n

I say, \u201cwhat the fuck, man?\u201d<\/p>\n

He goes, \u201cfuck you,\u201d so I go, \u201cno, fuck you.\u201d<\/p>\n

He kicks me in the nuts.<\/p>\n

Those were real nice kicks, man. My ma got \u2018em for me. I had to ask her like “Yo ma, I need new 1s.” And she was like, “no,” and I was like, “please ma, I gotta look nice for the ladies,” and she was like, “okay, sweetie.”<\/p>\n

Now, where’s Jay? Little shit ran away! And we’ve known each other since we were nine. Here I am lying in an alley between Ninth and Hardwood with no shoes. So, I get up, right, and I am like, shit! Gotta go to a hospital<\/em>. So, I walk over to this massage parlor with a clinic in the back, and I say, “doc, I’m bleeding out!” So, he pushes out this chair, puts on some rock \u2018n\u2019 roll, and he pulls out my tooth.<\/p>\n

I am like, \u201cwhat the fuck?<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n

He is like, \u201ccavities, man.\u201d<\/p>\n

I am like, \u201cfuck you, that’s my tooth!\u201d<\/p>\n

He fucking sprays me.<\/p>\n

I am not even kidding, man. I wake up on a table, right? Everything hurts. Here’s this cross-eyed dude with a cleaver\u2014flike the ones from Home Depot, you know? I am like, \u201cwhat’s going on?\u201d He is like, \u201cwe are taking out your kidneys.\u201d I am like, \u201cno, I need my kidneys!\u201d Like those are important, man.<\/p>\n

So I say, \u201cfuck<\/em> you,\u201d he says, \u201cfuck<\/em> you,\u201d I say no, \u201cf-u-c-k<\/em> you.\u201d<\/p>\n

So here I am, I got no shoes, no teeth, no kidneys, and I need a cab ride back to my ma.<\/p>\n

Spot me a twenty?<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here’s this little dude. He\u2019s kicking me. Ow! That really hurts! He\u2019s pulling my J\u2019s off! I say, \u201cWhat the fuck, man?\u201d He goes, \u201cFuck you,\u201d so I go, \u201cNo, fuck you” then he kicks me in the nuts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":182,"featured_media":24509,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3530],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23558","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-flash-fiction","writer-vinayak-das-gupta"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/182"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23558"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23558\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24512,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23558\/revisions\/24512"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24509"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mrbullbull.com\/newbull\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}