Horror Story Spotlight: Wordprocessor of the Gods

 PLOT SUMMARY: When Richard turns on a word processor his late nephew made for him, he finds the device has some unexpected surprises.

As a writer, it is deeply satisfying to be in complete control of the story, the situations and the characters. For a little while, of course. After the first few pages, the muse takes over and the story turns into an entity that demands it go a certain way and then the writer is no longer in control and can do whatever they want. They must then appease this new entity by coming up with an acceptable and believable plot.

But just before all that happens, being a writer feels powerful. The words a writer writes has immense power.

Now imagine if whatever the writer types comes true. Imagine wielding that power.

WORD PROCESSOR OF THE GODS Plot

Richard is a writer who lives with his wife Lena and his son Seth. He's deeply unhappy with his unappreciative wife and impudent son.

He's also lamenting the death of his nephew Jon and his sister-in-law Belinda, although Richard shows no grief for his brother Roger who also died in the crash.

In fact, Richard has no fond memories of his brother who tormented him since they were kids and stole Belinda from him.

Richard was then given a word processor his nephew Jon had cobbled for him. When he turns it on, Richard notices it barely works but is enough to see that Jin had intended to give the device to Richard as a birthday present.

The Happy Birthday message pops up and Richard begins to test it by typing up random things.

When he accidentally finds out that things he has been writing about and deleting leads to actual omission of the object, he realizes the word processor may have supernatural powers.

Richard is experimenting with this when his son Seth returns home with his friends. He overhears him talking about his father in a degrading manner in front of his friends and grows irritated.

Rather than admonishing him or delivering a disciplinary punishment, Richard types Seth's name in the processor and deletes it.

Poof! He no longer hears his son or his friends outside. He goes out to investigate and sure enough, there isn't a single trace of his son's existence, not even his shoes.

Richard doesn't show any regret for his son's "deletion" and that shows how truly unhappy he has been with his life and how much resentment he had accumulated over the years, all against his family.

He notices the word processor practically smoking and realizes he will only have a couple more "wishes" to execute.

His wife Lena returns home and she is fatter than when she left. Apparently, when she never had Seth she grew really fat. There is no actual reasoning behind why she does become fat. Did she not have to stick to a diet in order to conceive? Or watch her weight in order to be attractive to Richard?

For some reason Lena simply gains so much weight she has trouble fitting through doorways. Her behavior is so foul and atrocious that Richard has no qualms writing her full name on the processor and then pressing delete.

Poof! She's gone too.

Richard has become supercilious and too caught up in this unexpected power to remove people from his life.

But can he add (insert) people too?

He notices the word processor is really smoking now. He has only one last wish he can play out.

He wants nothing more than wanting a son like Jon and a wife like Belinda who he is still in love with.

He's already asked for gold after all.

Richard types up his wishes and he finds Jonathan behind him, calling him dad.

Richard has never been happier. Jon is even concerned about his father when the CPU makes an exploding sound. Jon thinks about reusing parts before throwing it away and then casually remarks that his mom has hot cocoa prepared for them.

It will no doubt be Belina of course. Richard puts an arm around his son and walks into the house.

Word Processor of the Gods isn't a typical horror tale and quite a turn from Stephen King's usual short stories that strike terror and induce nightmares.

Although it does have horror elements where Richard's deranged desires are shown as he mercilessly deletes his family from his life just so he could have the one he always wanted.

In any other story I would have expected Richard to get his wish only to find out it hasn't come out the way he expected.

Perhaps the word processor didn't just die down but actually exploded and killed Richard causing him to live out his dream in the afterlife.

Or maybe Jon and Belinda didn't come back the way they were when they were alive, just like in Pet Sematary.

Or maybe Richard has completely gone insane because of how unhappy he is in his life and so is imagining all these situations coming true while sitting in his room in an asylum.

But none of these are true and for once, the protagonist in a Stephen King story gets a true happy ending. Rare as it is.

This story can be read in the anthology Skeleton Crew by Stephen King.

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