The Virtue of Sloth by Steven Sheil
from Seven Deadly Sins: a PUNK NOIR Magazine series
Murdering my father had always seemed like such hard work.
Not the act itself – even at my laziest, the swinging of a hammer was not beyond my abilities – but the endless planning required to avoid detection, the meticulousness demanded to evidence-proof the crime scene. It all just seemed so exhausting.
But time has the habit of sharpening necessity to a fine point, and when my own funds began to dwindle, and I was faced with the choice of finding a job (unthinkable) or procuring my own rightful inheritance, the decision was made.
One night while my father slept I commandeered the kitchen in order to draw up my plans. The effort of maintaining concentration swiftly became tiring though and so I made myself a large stiffener which seemed to help. ‘One’ soon became ‘many’. My last memory of the night is slopping a colossal G&T across to the kitchen table.
I woke to find my father – delightfully – dead on the tiled floor beside me, head bloody and cratered. The court ruled it accidental, though the judge did chide me for my lax housekeeping, saying, “Had you bothered to clean up your spilled cocktail, your father might yet be alive.”
This story appears as part of Seven Deadly Sins, a PUNK NOIR Magazine series, originally published July 2025.
Bio
Steven Sheil is an Edgar-nominated writer of crime, horror, and weird fiction. His work has previously been published in Alfred Hitchcok’s Mystery Magazine, Black Static and The Ghastling, online at Fudoki, Horla, Horrified and Pyre, and as part of the Black Library anthologies Invocations, The Harrowed Path and The Accursed. He is also the writer and director of the feature film Mum & Dad (2008), the co-director of Mayhem Film Festival, and an enthusiastic collector and reader of vintage crime fiction. He lives in Nottingham, UK.
PUNK NOIR, the online literary and arts magazine that looks at the world at its most askew, casting a bloodshot eye over the written word, film, music, television and more.
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Irv got it right with the Hitch reference. This is exactly it! I love these things…
Grim and wry tale, Steven! With luck like this, no wonder your protagonist doesn't think he'd ever want an ordinary job. I can imagine Hitchcock giving one of his droll commentaries afterward if this were ever dramatized on his classic show!