AcmeShorts

"Another fricken night-night story," thought Jonah Quailherder. He was perfectly willing to sit through ten more presentations of fluffy duck submissions, for knew he had best acquisition of the day with DARYL THE DUNG BEETLE MAKES A HOME. It had the smell of an instant classic. And it was character driven. Surely in a few years Daryl would be on the tip of every young tongue in the way that Jeffy the Kangaroo and Percy the stupid pig were now. But as soon as Jonah finished his presentation, he knew something was wrong. It was the silence. The vast, overwhelming silence and then…

“Well, that’s, um….interesting, Jonah, but…” here the publisher cleared her throat. “It’s not exactly ‘cute’ now is it…a dung beetle?”

He looked around the table at the other editors—all women. He knew they were in consensus. Daryl wasn’t cute.

“Cute.Cute, no it’s not….” Jonah picked up his notes and rearranged them. Suddenly, a certain ruthlessness came over him. He had something these other soccer-mommy editors didn't have and he knew it. He could feel it. He would make them see...

"So it’s cute you want, eh…” he said, opening his fly. “I’ll show you cute.”

And with that his great pud fell gleaming onto the conference room table. Again, silence. He looked around the table at only blank faces.Sheepishly, he zipped up, collected his things and left.

As the door closed behind him, he heard: “Now that was pretty cute....”