The Mosquito by B.A. Paris

Part of a collection of short-story books connected by the theme of obsession, this is the story of a nice man who becomes the obsessive focus of two very irritating things - a mosquito and a widower with whom he shares a holiday.

The original plan was for three couples to share a holiday in a house in the south of France, but one man lose his wife to illness and the other man's wife left him because he was weak and "too nice". Far from bonding as single men, one irritated and goaded the nice man during the day, and during the night a mosquito did the same thing but left huge bite marks just for good measure.

The story is a tad slow to start with too much exposition explaining the relationships, but once that is out of the way the irritations make this quite a fast story. It's really quite surprising how minor things can send sane people quite mad in the end. Feeling the nice man's humiliation, he is a character it's easy to identify with and the suspicion that soon he will reach a boiling point.

​A fun read and a story largely well told. We have all been there at some time or other. Recommended.

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Part of the Obsession series of short stories

Published by Amazon Original Stories on 25 July 2023.