I’m not sure how others go about writing and editing their ficlys, but heres how my process works…
1. muses give me story idea 2. i write story in msword 3. I paste story into ficly 4. I cuss my muses for going over 1000 character limit by several thousand characters 5. I butcher story to make it fit ficly limit 6. my muses bitch at me for the hack job on what think was a perfect story. 7. I ignore my muses bitching and publish 8. my muses ignore me for several weeks 9. I start drinking and don’t write for weeks because of lack of inspiration from my muses
anyway, this ‘redux’ is actually the original story I wrote before I stupidly tried to make it fit into one ficly. So the ‘redux’ parts one and two, aren’t a sequel or a retelling but rather the “original, unedited author’s cut” and the first story is the “edit to fit your ficly-vision” version.
I like this. I’m considering both stories at the same time. There’s a skip in reality. You end this one with only the birthday boy hearing what the clown is saying. In your second story, that fact gets lost, since all the other kids react to what’s been said.
Still, a total riot! My favorite line is your cake line, I don’t know why, but it made me double up in laughter. In Everybody Love Raymond, Robert joins a cult. His mother Marie asks him “Why would you join a cult, wouldn’t you rather have some cake?” or something like that.
Very stripped down version of what this must have been, I’m guessing, to fit the ficly. It works— enough of the essential gist remains.
My process is different. I write somewhat fast right here on ficly and then publish immediately. Then I look over what I wrote, become extremely embarrassed + disgusted, and spend the following hour frantically editing until my back is sore from sitting and my ficly has slipped off the most recent list.
Krulltar 
32 ^2 
Riley 
Tad Winslow