Velvet Verbosity herself may be on the DL, but her 100 Word Challenge, thanks to a little help from her friends, is on the 25 man roster and is playing every day. This week's word is "Game" and my entry is called "Rules To Live By"
There were rules to this game. Nobody told you, nobody wrote it down, but you just knew.
Don't be too happy, because Sara lost two in the last two years.
Don't be too sad, because Cindy has four and judges you if you're anything less than thrilled.
Don't be too matter of fact, because Andrea hasn't been able to have any of her own.
Don't be evasive, because Karen will grill you for every last detail.
Don't say that a tiny part of you wishes you weren't.
Just say "I'm pregnant".
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
A Barrel Of Awesome
The barrel of awesome that is Matt Potter's "Pure Slush" magazine has elected to publish a story of mine, "Campfire Story", a thankfully fictional work that you can read here.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
Indie Ink Writing Challenge: Don't Be Cruel
This week, my challenge("New York City") goes out to the Cheshire Cat (and/or her smile) and I get the following from Transplanted x 3: "You (or your character) attend an auction for the left-over contents of a storage unit. You purchase one and discover 3 things. A dead body, a suitcase filled with money and a box of love letters from Elvis Presley." I cheated a wee bit- the body's not exactly dead- but hopefully it's still a tale worth reading. I call it, naturally, "Don't Be Cruel".
Kayla was a screamer. Not that kind of screamer, you pervert.
Wait. Well, she was that kind of screamer, too, if you must know, but this isn't that sort of story.
Let me start again.
Kayla screamed a lot. She screamed if she saw a spider, or a mouse, or a dead animal by the road. She watched those crime shows where someone gets killed in the first five minutes, and she would scream when they showed the body, every single time, even though anyone who watched those shows more than twice knew it was coming. She startled easily, and when she was startled, she screamed. She was a screamer, so it wasn't shocking when we pulled up the grey corrugated steel door, and she screamed.
She had been sealed up in our room, playing "Darkness at the Edge of Town" over and over, working on finishing the latest version of her novel. I was content to let her be. I could watch all the sports I wanted while she was shut away, and she could be a bit cranky when the juices were flowing. We ate our meals together, and she emerged to help me with dishes, trash, and laundry, but otherwise, we just kept to ourselves. I figured that was the way she wanted it- and when she wanted to be touchy and girly again, she knew where to find me.
So it was novel behavior when she was pulling on a short blue dress and dressy sandals early that Saturday morning. I was staring at the morning SportsCenter, hoping the Royals' 9-3 loss last night would have somehow changed by the next morning. She told me that her father Claude, a squat, intimidating man who always had money but never seemed to have a job, had an abandoned storage unit sale to go to this morning and wanted her help. She proposed a joint trip, and having no more pressing task than mourning the Royals' losing streak, I joined in.
The auction was conducted blind- you bought the contents, sight unseen, and were responsible for taking or throwing away whatever was inside by the end of the day. We pulled up to a dozen or so people, from senior citizens to eager young people like ourselves, and we sidled up to Kayla's father, who was, as usual, silent.
"Here," he said to his daughter. "I already got 433. You two go down and check it out while I try to snag another one." She handed him a couple of legal looking papers, and the two of us were soon walking down the rows of evenly spaced orange and black buildings. We reached the fourth building, and then circled it until the unit came into view. The owner had snipped the padlock that held it shut, and Kayla was standing before it, waiting for me to pull the door up.
I knew how she was, so I stepped in front, pulling the door open, hearing the rattle and bang of the ancient mechanism. I had let go of the handle, letting it settle into place above my head, when she screamed.
There was a dead guy in what I could only describe as a sarcophagus- a full length, floor to ceiling, Plexiglas lined coffin, leaning so that he was the first thing you saw when you pulled the door open. You think a lot of things when you see a dead person, I found out. First, you feel guilty, even though, as much as you may have drunk the night before, you're pretty sure a murder would have stood out. The second thing is that you start cooking up your alibi, even though you didn't kill him, and you didn't have possession of the dead guy until about ten minutes ago. I looked him over closely. It was Elvis- a full bodied, fat Elvis, with the rhinestoned white jumpsuit and the greasy pompadour and the whole thing. It lent the whole thing an air of unreality, and I had a half second where I wondered whether the whole thing was real or not. But I could feel sweat trickling between my shoulder blades, and I could hear Kayla sucking in air to scream again.
I turned to her quickly, focusing in on her beautiful green eyes. If I held her gaze for a second, I could usually talk her in off of most ledges. "Kay? Baby? It's a mannequin, hon. Look at it. The skin isn't right, and the body would spoil, and, well, Elvis is buried in Memphis, baby." I didn't know that for a fact, but it certainly was the only logical conclusion. She looked at me curiously, her head shaking very slightly, like she was trying to say "no" without moving her head. But she wasn't screaming, so I was pretty sure I had her.
"Breathe, honey. Breathe. It's OK. It's just a mannequin, babe. Promise." I looked at it again. No question it was a mannequin, I thought. It has the Elvis wig, but the skin was plastic, fake and wrong looking in the morning sun.
I looked back at her. She took a deep, shuddering breath, color returning to her face under the super short haircut that she loved, I hated, and I knew better than to complain about. I stayed locked on her eyes until I was pretty sure she had her faculties again. "It's OK, hon. Kay? You alright?"
"Wow," she said weakly.
"Yeah," I agreed, stepping back to take her hand. "You want to go find your Dad? This suit alone probably pays for the cost of the whole thing."
"I bet it does, wow. Yeah. Um, in a minute, maybe. I'm kind of freaked out."
"OK, sure," I agreed. "You want me to wait here with you?"
"Oh, no," she said firmly. "He's going to want to know what else is in there. You better start going through it."
I did, looking through cartons of books, Elvis biographies and "As Told To" tomes from hangers on. There were boxes with video tapes, bootleg concerts and TV specials, and, of course, the movies, along with the beginnings of the same collection on DVD. Then there was the audio, albums, then cassettes, then remastered CD versions. Obviously, a pretty serious fanatic. I had my own obsessions, though, so I couldn't really judge.
One box had only a smaller box inside it, about the size of a shoe box, lined with soft fabric. Inside were torn envelopes with tissue thin paper inside. Love letters, obviously. I took one out and began to read,
"13 June 1957
Fraulein Maria-
I miss you terribly. Things are pretty crazy around here, but I think about you all the time. I wish we could be together here, live like man and wife the way we are supposed to-"
I stopped reading, my eyes jumping to the bottom, scrawled simply, "Love, E." I was staggered by the thought. Actual love letters written by Presley? If they were real, this could be worth thousands. I didn't know enough about the King to imagine what they would actually fetch, but the figure had to be enormous. There was also a suitcase, a black, hardened plastic thing that reminded me of the typewriter my father used to bang out science fiction stories on so he could add to his rejection letter collection.
There was a silver clasp at the top, and I released it, expecting to find the familiar, murder weapony heft of the ancient writing tool. This storage closet was not done surprising us, because inside was pile after pile of rubber banded stacks of what appeared to be hundred dollar bills.
"Holy shit," I gasped.
"What?," Kayla asked, her fear lessened enough to let her take a few steps into the container with me.
"Look," I said, and leaned back, letting her see the cash.
"Whoa," she said. "Can I see that?"
I lifted it onto a box full of Elvis records so she could see it more clearly. It was heavier than you thought it would be.
"Is that money?"
"Sure looks like it," I said.
"There must be...thousands," she said breathlessly.
"If they're all hundreds," I said. There was a shiver of nausea in the pit of my stomach. Something was wrong. That much money doesn't accumulate because of anything good.
Kayla shut the case and fastened it. "I'm going to go find my Dad," she said firmly.
"Well, leave that here, don't you think? Don't go showing it around."
"I'm not STU-pid," she said mockingly, swinging the case from one hand as she walked out of the storage unit. I watched her hips twitch under the short dress as she walked away from me.
When Claude walked in 10 minutes further on, I assumed she and her father had missed connections- she had walked in another direction, or she was looking by the exit while he stood over me, sweaty and tan. I showed him the haul, and he reprimanded me gently for handling the letter, but he was thrilled with the haul, as I knew he would be. He promised me a generous cut, and I was spending it in my head when I noticed our car missing from the lot at the storage complex. Claude shrugged his shoulders, and we commenced loading his truck with the treasures. He drove me back to our tiny apartment, and it finally came home to me what had happened when I saw that her toothbrush, her books, her clothes, and her laptop were all gone.
I was still trying to assemble the whole picture in my head, and trying to understand how I was going to tell Claude what had happened, when I saw it. On the back of one of my business cards, in the refrigerator leaning against a Rolling Rock bottle she knew I would go for, she had left a note.
In her simple, girlish hand, she wrote in purple ink, "Don't Be Cruel".
Kayla was a screamer. Not that kind of screamer, you pervert.
Wait. Well, she was that kind of screamer, too, if you must know, but this isn't that sort of story.
Let me start again.
Kayla screamed a lot. She screamed if she saw a spider, or a mouse, or a dead animal by the road. She watched those crime shows where someone gets killed in the first five minutes, and she would scream when they showed the body, every single time, even though anyone who watched those shows more than twice knew it was coming. She startled easily, and when she was startled, she screamed. She was a screamer, so it wasn't shocking when we pulled up the grey corrugated steel door, and she screamed.
She had been sealed up in our room, playing "Darkness at the Edge of Town" over and over, working on finishing the latest version of her novel. I was content to let her be. I could watch all the sports I wanted while she was shut away, and she could be a bit cranky when the juices were flowing. We ate our meals together, and she emerged to help me with dishes, trash, and laundry, but otherwise, we just kept to ourselves. I figured that was the way she wanted it- and when she wanted to be touchy and girly again, she knew where to find me.
So it was novel behavior when she was pulling on a short blue dress and dressy sandals early that Saturday morning. I was staring at the morning SportsCenter, hoping the Royals' 9-3 loss last night would have somehow changed by the next morning. She told me that her father Claude, a squat, intimidating man who always had money but never seemed to have a job, had an abandoned storage unit sale to go to this morning and wanted her help. She proposed a joint trip, and having no more pressing task than mourning the Royals' losing streak, I joined in.
The auction was conducted blind- you bought the contents, sight unseen, and were responsible for taking or throwing away whatever was inside by the end of the day. We pulled up to a dozen or so people, from senior citizens to eager young people like ourselves, and we sidled up to Kayla's father, who was, as usual, silent.
"Here," he said to his daughter. "I already got 433. You two go down and check it out while I try to snag another one." She handed him a couple of legal looking papers, and the two of us were soon walking down the rows of evenly spaced orange and black buildings. We reached the fourth building, and then circled it until the unit came into view. The owner had snipped the padlock that held it shut, and Kayla was standing before it, waiting for me to pull the door up.
I knew how she was, so I stepped in front, pulling the door open, hearing the rattle and bang of the ancient mechanism. I had let go of the handle, letting it settle into place above my head, when she screamed.
There was a dead guy in what I could only describe as a sarcophagus- a full length, floor to ceiling, Plexiglas lined coffin, leaning so that he was the first thing you saw when you pulled the door open. You think a lot of things when you see a dead person, I found out. First, you feel guilty, even though, as much as you may have drunk the night before, you're pretty sure a murder would have stood out. The second thing is that you start cooking up your alibi, even though you didn't kill him, and you didn't have possession of the dead guy until about ten minutes ago. I looked him over closely. It was Elvis- a full bodied, fat Elvis, with the rhinestoned white jumpsuit and the greasy pompadour and the whole thing. It lent the whole thing an air of unreality, and I had a half second where I wondered whether the whole thing was real or not. But I could feel sweat trickling between my shoulder blades, and I could hear Kayla sucking in air to scream again.
I turned to her quickly, focusing in on her beautiful green eyes. If I held her gaze for a second, I could usually talk her in off of most ledges. "Kay? Baby? It's a mannequin, hon. Look at it. The skin isn't right, and the body would spoil, and, well, Elvis is buried in Memphis, baby." I didn't know that for a fact, but it certainly was the only logical conclusion. She looked at me curiously, her head shaking very slightly, like she was trying to say "no" without moving her head. But she wasn't screaming, so I was pretty sure I had her.
"Breathe, honey. Breathe. It's OK. It's just a mannequin, babe. Promise." I looked at it again. No question it was a mannequin, I thought. It has the Elvis wig, but the skin was plastic, fake and wrong looking in the morning sun.
I looked back at her. She took a deep, shuddering breath, color returning to her face under the super short haircut that she loved, I hated, and I knew better than to complain about. I stayed locked on her eyes until I was pretty sure she had her faculties again. "It's OK, hon. Kay? You alright?"
"Wow," she said weakly.
"Yeah," I agreed, stepping back to take her hand. "You want to go find your Dad? This suit alone probably pays for the cost of the whole thing."
"I bet it does, wow. Yeah. Um, in a minute, maybe. I'm kind of freaked out."
"OK, sure," I agreed. "You want me to wait here with you?"
"Oh, no," she said firmly. "He's going to want to know what else is in there. You better start going through it."
I did, looking through cartons of books, Elvis biographies and "As Told To" tomes from hangers on. There were boxes with video tapes, bootleg concerts and TV specials, and, of course, the movies, along with the beginnings of the same collection on DVD. Then there was the audio, albums, then cassettes, then remastered CD versions. Obviously, a pretty serious fanatic. I had my own obsessions, though, so I couldn't really judge.
One box had only a smaller box inside it, about the size of a shoe box, lined with soft fabric. Inside were torn envelopes with tissue thin paper inside. Love letters, obviously. I took one out and began to read,
"13 June 1957
Fraulein Maria-
I miss you terribly. Things are pretty crazy around here, but I think about you all the time. I wish we could be together here, live like man and wife the way we are supposed to-"
I stopped reading, my eyes jumping to the bottom, scrawled simply, "Love, E." I was staggered by the thought. Actual love letters written by Presley? If they were real, this could be worth thousands. I didn't know enough about the King to imagine what they would actually fetch, but the figure had to be enormous. There was also a suitcase, a black, hardened plastic thing that reminded me of the typewriter my father used to bang out science fiction stories on so he could add to his rejection letter collection.
There was a silver clasp at the top, and I released it, expecting to find the familiar, murder weapony heft of the ancient writing tool. This storage closet was not done surprising us, because inside was pile after pile of rubber banded stacks of what appeared to be hundred dollar bills.
"Holy shit," I gasped.
"What?," Kayla asked, her fear lessened enough to let her take a few steps into the container with me.
"Look," I said, and leaned back, letting her see the cash.
"Whoa," she said. "Can I see that?"
I lifted it onto a box full of Elvis records so she could see it more clearly. It was heavier than you thought it would be.
"Is that money?"
"Sure looks like it," I said.
"There must be...thousands," she said breathlessly.
"If they're all hundreds," I said. There was a shiver of nausea in the pit of my stomach. Something was wrong. That much money doesn't accumulate because of anything good.
Kayla shut the case and fastened it. "I'm going to go find my Dad," she said firmly.
"Well, leave that here, don't you think? Don't go showing it around."
"I'm not STU-pid," she said mockingly, swinging the case from one hand as she walked out of the storage unit. I watched her hips twitch under the short dress as she walked away from me.
When Claude walked in 10 minutes further on, I assumed she and her father had missed connections- she had walked in another direction, or she was looking by the exit while he stood over me, sweaty and tan. I showed him the haul, and he reprimanded me gently for handling the letter, but he was thrilled with the haul, as I knew he would be. He promised me a generous cut, and I was spending it in my head when I noticed our car missing from the lot at the storage complex. Claude shrugged his shoulders, and we commenced loading his truck with the treasures. He drove me back to our tiny apartment, and it finally came home to me what had happened when I saw that her toothbrush, her books, her clothes, and her laptop were all gone.
I was still trying to assemble the whole picture in my head, and trying to understand how I was going to tell Claude what had happened, when I saw it. On the back of one of my business cards, in the refrigerator leaning against a Rolling Rock bottle she knew I would go for, she had left a note.
In her simple, girlish hand, she wrote in purple ink, "Don't Be Cruel".
Thursday, June 16, 2011
100 Word Challenge: The Nuts
Velvet Verbosity's 100 Word Challenge did not skate a single shift, but is willing to take credit for helping the Boston Bruins win their first Stanley Cup in 39 years. This week's word is "perfect", and my Wheel-of-Fortune-in-Las-Vegas inspired tale is called "The Nuts". ("The nuts" is a poker term. If one has "the nuts", then, given the arrangement of cards on the table, one has the best possible hand and cannot be beaten.)
Casinos are always bright and loud- the sounds and the smells and the lights make you feel like you've had too much coffee. I couldn't think about the checks that were about to bounce, the sick feeling I get when I buy my daughter's formula with a credit card.
But all that was over-it was time to win my way out. I had it all set up- I had played possum, luring the other players into a pot they couldn't win. It was a perfect plan- as long as that last card isn't a seven.
Casinos are always bright and loud- the sounds and the smells and the lights make you feel like you've had too much coffee. I couldn't think about the checks that were about to bounce, the sick feeling I get when I buy my daughter's formula with a credit card.
But all that was over-it was time to win my way out. I had it all set up- I had played possum, luring the other players into a pot they couldn't win. It was a perfect plan- as long as that last card isn't a seven.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
IndieInk Writing Challenge: N-V-T-S
This week on the Carousel of Bloggery Goodness which is the one and only Indie Ink Writing Challenge, I ask Amy to write something about a single kiss, and the inexorable Sunshine tells me "Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't".
"You're nuts," she told me. "N-V-T-S, nuts!," she said, using the old joke from the Mel Brooks movie. Her brown hair, intensely curly, framed her face in attractive ringlets. She looked hurt at what I had just said. "You can't do that," she said firmly, her mouth open slightly. She recrossed her legs, one leg moving smoothly over the other. Her body was amazing for someone with 3 kids. My eyes lost focus in the brown and white print of her dress.
"You're letting David come back? After what he did? You're joking, right? He cheated. He cheated, and then you took him back, and he cheated AGAIN. You know a leopard can't change his spots! Once a cheater, always a cheater!" Her voice was getting impatient, kind of lecture-y. When I saw her with her kids, she could sound like that now and then. I supposed it was a byproduct of constant corrections: "Don't touch that! That's not yours! Where are you going? What are you doing? We don't do that!"
"How can you do this to yourself? How can you do this to me? Don't you remember that first night, the way I stayed up with you until 3AM, listening to you cry? How I was almost late to drop the kids off the next morning?" She wasn't wrong. I had caught them, the curvy blond intern and David, kissing frantically in his car right outside our condo, then barricaded the door with a bookshelf and called her, breathless with hot, angry tears. Like a friend, she talked me down off the ledge, at the expense of her own functioning the next morning. Interesting, a part of my mind noted, how it became something happening to her, instead of something happening to me.
"He doesn't love you, hun. He never loved you. People who love you don't cheat. They don't mock you, or belittle you, or make fun of you when you twist an ankle. People who love you put your interests in front of their own. They make it all about you." She didn't really understand. Her, with all her years with clueless Clarence, didn't know what it was like. Yes, David sinned. He cheated on me with the 19 year old intern from the office, 40 year old women from bars, the woman who sold sneakers at Foot Locker. I took him back because he was someone to complain about Sarah Palin to, someone to make dinner for, someone to watch movies with. He gave my life drama, gave me something to complain about at work, kept me from obsessing about myself and my loneliness. If I hated him, I wasn't hating myself.
David wasn't enamored like Clarence was, in love with the idea that someone that gorgeous would spend time with him. David knew I was disposable- I was cute enough, but no cuter than 10 other girls who would come along as soon as he dropped me. I wasn't tall and gorgeous and secure and firm like she was, rooted into place with the man and the situation and the minivan, driving to soccer and ballet and Scouts. I was just another woman, to be used up and disposed of when I was no longer useful. I didn't know what to say, so I didn't say anything, looking down at the salad on my plate. I had no appetite. I hardly ate, which made me feel constantly dizzy and a little unhinged. I knew if I was ever going to have a body like hers, I had to either have children or add some fat to my diet. The prospect of either was nauseating.
"Honey, you can't do this. You can't let him hurt you again," she said, her voice now pleading, like she wanted me to finish my broccoli. Her cheeseburger was already gone, and she sipped gently at a Diet Coke. She didn't understand, with her devoted husband, cherubic kids, and perfect, organized life, how it felt when you were this close to the borderline. Taking him back was awful, but not taking him back was worse.
"You're nuts," she told me. "N-V-T-S, nuts!," she said, using the old joke from the Mel Brooks movie. Her brown hair, intensely curly, framed her face in attractive ringlets. She looked hurt at what I had just said. "You can't do that," she said firmly, her mouth open slightly. She recrossed her legs, one leg moving smoothly over the other. Her body was amazing for someone with 3 kids. My eyes lost focus in the brown and white print of her dress.
"You're letting David come back? After what he did? You're joking, right? He cheated. He cheated, and then you took him back, and he cheated AGAIN. You know a leopard can't change his spots! Once a cheater, always a cheater!" Her voice was getting impatient, kind of lecture-y. When I saw her with her kids, she could sound like that now and then. I supposed it was a byproduct of constant corrections: "Don't touch that! That's not yours! Where are you going? What are you doing? We don't do that!"
"How can you do this to yourself? How can you do this to me? Don't you remember that first night, the way I stayed up with you until 3AM, listening to you cry? How I was almost late to drop the kids off the next morning?" She wasn't wrong. I had caught them, the curvy blond intern and David, kissing frantically in his car right outside our condo, then barricaded the door with a bookshelf and called her, breathless with hot, angry tears. Like a friend, she talked me down off the ledge, at the expense of her own functioning the next morning. Interesting, a part of my mind noted, how it became something happening to her, instead of something happening to me.
"He doesn't love you, hun. He never loved you. People who love you don't cheat. They don't mock you, or belittle you, or make fun of you when you twist an ankle. People who love you put your interests in front of their own. They make it all about you." She didn't really understand. Her, with all her years with clueless Clarence, didn't know what it was like. Yes, David sinned. He cheated on me with the 19 year old intern from the office, 40 year old women from bars, the woman who sold sneakers at Foot Locker. I took him back because he was someone to complain about Sarah Palin to, someone to make dinner for, someone to watch movies with. He gave my life drama, gave me something to complain about at work, kept me from obsessing about myself and my loneliness. If I hated him, I wasn't hating myself.
David wasn't enamored like Clarence was, in love with the idea that someone that gorgeous would spend time with him. David knew I was disposable- I was cute enough, but no cuter than 10 other girls who would come along as soon as he dropped me. I wasn't tall and gorgeous and secure and firm like she was, rooted into place with the man and the situation and the minivan, driving to soccer and ballet and Scouts. I was just another woman, to be used up and disposed of when I was no longer useful. I didn't know what to say, so I didn't say anything, looking down at the salad on my plate. I had no appetite. I hardly ate, which made me feel constantly dizzy and a little unhinged. I knew if I was ever going to have a body like hers, I had to either have children or add some fat to my diet. The prospect of either was nauseating.
"Honey, you can't do this. You can't let him hurt you again," she said, her voice now pleading, like she wanted me to finish my broccoli. Her cheeseburger was already gone, and she sipped gently at a Diet Coke. She didn't understand, with her devoted husband, cherubic kids, and perfect, organized life, how it felt when you were this close to the borderline. Taking him back was awful, but not taking him back was worse.
Friday, June 10, 2011
100 Word Challenge: After The Thrill Is Gone
Velvet Verbosity's 100 Word Challenge wouldn't play an entire NBA Finals 4th quarter and take only one shot. This week's word is "compliments" and the title is "After The Thrill Is Gone"
Some were simply too tight, the buttons pulling at the buttonholes, soft diamonds of skin showing through. Some were too loose and shapeless. She knew which ones brought compliments from leering men or jealous women. She tried a dark red, and then a creamy bone white, then light blue, looking for the right amount of curve without falling over into outrageous. "We're not quite lovers, but we're not quite friends...," the radio said. That was true. She didn't how how she felt about him any more, only that being with him felt better than being without him.
Some were simply too tight, the buttons pulling at the buttonholes, soft diamonds of skin showing through. Some were too loose and shapeless. She knew which ones brought compliments from leering men or jealous women. She tried a dark red, and then a creamy bone white, then light blue, looking for the right amount of curve without falling over into outrageous. "We're not quite lovers, but we're not quite friends...," the radio said. That was true. She didn't how how she felt about him any more, only that being with him felt better than being without him.
Wednesday, June 08, 2011
IndieInk Writing Challenge: Survival Gear
Opera Mouth challenged me this week to tell a story about being stranded on a desert island, while I challenge Christy with the single word "Balance". Here's my contribution, "Survival Gear"
I said I wanted to be alone. Well, I got that much of what I asked for.
Flying cargoes of I Don't Want To Know from God Knows Where to Not Even God Knows Where, being paid in cash to keep my ex wife's lawyers out of my pocket, I learned to ask for very little. I wanted a clean plane, simple and straightforward (if extralegal) instructions, and some hard currency in a duffel bag when I was finished. Other than that, I wanted no conversation, no entanglements, no deals- just cold beer and a comfortable place to sit by myself and relax during my downtime.
I missed out on the beer, but I got the alone part right. Jerry, my contact, part time mechanic and full time alcoholic, had assured me the plane, which looked like it had been assembled from discarded parts of other planes, was fine. "It may not look like much," he said, quoting Han Solo, "but it's got it where it counts." After a routine beginning, a sudden squall blew me off course, and then a fuel leak gave me all the drama one could ask for, 1200 miles from civilization and suddenly flightless. I tried all the emergency tricks they teach us to, quickly realizing I was about to become a smallish grease spot on the ocean surface.
A distress call was pointless- not only was I not exactly carrying Christmas ornaments, I couldn't even tell the searchers where to look. So I jumped, stuffing my gear into a waterproof bag and parachuting out of the plane's wake and into, eventually, the unforgiving water. I cut myself free, then crawled and sputtered and eventually swam my way to a tiny strip of land. It was large enough to play American football on, as long as you didn't mind the end zones being underwater. I spread out the gear I had managed to haul out of the sinking plane before it made an anticlimactic smack, sinking like the heavy object it suddenly was once the engines quit.
Windup radio/cassette player, a Johnny Cash cassette, a couple of paperbacks, some pens and writing paper and survival gear-poncho, canteen, dried fruit, flint and steel, fishing line and hooks, evaporator to collect fresh water, frying pan and eating utensils- this was my world, this and this tiny spit of dirt, trees and shrubs. I was alive, wet, but whole and relatively hearty. It beat being dead, but not by a whole lot.
I thought about the movies, TV shows and books about being stranded. "Hatchet", and "Gilligan's Island", and "Lost", and Jack London stories, and "Cast Away". They all managed to put it together, and make it work where they were until they got rescued. I had doubts about my own abilities, but with my equipment laid out in front of me, I felt more prepared, more ready to make a go of it. Besides, what choice did I have?
I was looking around for a place to keep my stuff safe from rain and sun, some sort of a cave or outcropping, when I heard what for all the world sounded like an airplane. It can't possibly be that easy, I thought. Rescue on Day One? No movie producer in the world would approve that script. But the more I listened, the more it sounded like an airplane, until suddenly one popped into view, a yellow and white seaplane, turning left, dropping out of the sky towards my tiny little outcropping of land.
It couldn't be. But it was, as the seaplane dropped lower and lower, finally dipping its long, angular skids onto the water's surface, slowing down, bleeding off momentum by using the friction of water against metal and fiberglass. Were they following me? In that gale, I could have been followed by the RAF and I wouldn't have known it. If so, why me? Were they aware of what I was carrying? If so, they certainly had something on me. Were they intending on stealing it, and my crash had spoiled their plan?
The engine slowed and finally stopped, two men getting out of the cabin carrying rifles. It suddenly occurred to me what their agenda was- whether their plan involved theft or monitoring, it had now changed. And it certainly didn't now involve rescue. I didn't bother running- there were two of them, with guns, and there wasn't any place to hide. They didn't say anything. The taller one made a long shadow against the desert sand.
Being shot wasn't like in the movies- it really felt like a punch, a startling, rude blow into my upper chest. The strangest part was the sound of it- I could hear the wet slosh of my tissues as the bullet punched through them. They didn't say anything, and as my life drained away onto the equipment I had so carefully unpacked, it struck me as funny how useless all this survival gear turned out to be.
I said I wanted to be alone. Well, I got that much of what I asked for.
Flying cargoes of I Don't Want To Know from God Knows Where to Not Even God Knows Where, being paid in cash to keep my ex wife's lawyers out of my pocket, I learned to ask for very little. I wanted a clean plane, simple and straightforward (if extralegal) instructions, and some hard currency in a duffel bag when I was finished. Other than that, I wanted no conversation, no entanglements, no deals- just cold beer and a comfortable place to sit by myself and relax during my downtime.
I missed out on the beer, but I got the alone part right. Jerry, my contact, part time mechanic and full time alcoholic, had assured me the plane, which looked like it had been assembled from discarded parts of other planes, was fine. "It may not look like much," he said, quoting Han Solo, "but it's got it where it counts." After a routine beginning, a sudden squall blew me off course, and then a fuel leak gave me all the drama one could ask for, 1200 miles from civilization and suddenly flightless. I tried all the emergency tricks they teach us to, quickly realizing I was about to become a smallish grease spot on the ocean surface.
A distress call was pointless- not only was I not exactly carrying Christmas ornaments, I couldn't even tell the searchers where to look. So I jumped, stuffing my gear into a waterproof bag and parachuting out of the plane's wake and into, eventually, the unforgiving water. I cut myself free, then crawled and sputtered and eventually swam my way to a tiny strip of land. It was large enough to play American football on, as long as you didn't mind the end zones being underwater. I spread out the gear I had managed to haul out of the sinking plane before it made an anticlimactic smack, sinking like the heavy object it suddenly was once the engines quit.
Windup radio/cassette player, a Johnny Cash cassette, a couple of paperbacks, some pens and writing paper and survival gear-poncho, canteen, dried fruit, flint and steel, fishing line and hooks, evaporator to collect fresh water, frying pan and eating utensils- this was my world, this and this tiny spit of dirt, trees and shrubs. I was alive, wet, but whole and relatively hearty. It beat being dead, but not by a whole lot.
I thought about the movies, TV shows and books about being stranded. "Hatchet", and "Gilligan's Island", and "Lost", and Jack London stories, and "Cast Away". They all managed to put it together, and make it work where they were until they got rescued. I had doubts about my own abilities, but with my equipment laid out in front of me, I felt more prepared, more ready to make a go of it. Besides, what choice did I have?
I was looking around for a place to keep my stuff safe from rain and sun, some sort of a cave or outcropping, when I heard what for all the world sounded like an airplane. It can't possibly be that easy, I thought. Rescue on Day One? No movie producer in the world would approve that script. But the more I listened, the more it sounded like an airplane, until suddenly one popped into view, a yellow and white seaplane, turning left, dropping out of the sky towards my tiny little outcropping of land.
It couldn't be. But it was, as the seaplane dropped lower and lower, finally dipping its long, angular skids onto the water's surface, slowing down, bleeding off momentum by using the friction of water against metal and fiberglass. Were they following me? In that gale, I could have been followed by the RAF and I wouldn't have known it. If so, why me? Were they aware of what I was carrying? If so, they certainly had something on me. Were they intending on stealing it, and my crash had spoiled their plan?
The engine slowed and finally stopped, two men getting out of the cabin carrying rifles. It suddenly occurred to me what their agenda was- whether their plan involved theft or monitoring, it had now changed. And it certainly didn't now involve rescue. I didn't bother running- there were two of them, with guns, and there wasn't any place to hide. They didn't say anything. The taller one made a long shadow against the desert sand.
Being shot wasn't like in the movies- it really felt like a punch, a startling, rude blow into my upper chest. The strangest part was the sound of it- I could hear the wet slosh of my tissues as the bullet punched through them. They didn't say anything, and as my life drained away onto the equipment I had so carefully unpacked, it struck me as funny how useless all this survival gear turned out to be.
Friday, June 03, 2011
100 Word Challenge: Assume
Velvet Verbosity's 100 Word Challenge is busy growing its playoff beard. This week's word is "unconscious", and my story about unconscious bias is called "Assume".
Her pregnancy had been a seemingly unending series of bad news, restrictions, and rules. You can't do this anymore, you're not allowed to have that. I was sitting next to her, facing her as she sat. The curtain parted and a tiny woman with tight brown curls and cute glasses came through, holding a chart.
"We've decided we're going to induce you in the morning," she said firmly in a little girl voice.
I had come quickly to my feet. "When did the doctor decide that?," I asked.
"Just now," she said. "I'm the doctor."
Her pregnancy had been a seemingly unending series of bad news, restrictions, and rules. You can't do this anymore, you're not allowed to have that. I was sitting next to her, facing her as she sat. The curtain parted and a tiny woman with tight brown curls and cute glasses came through, holding a chart.
"We've decided we're going to induce you in the morning," she said firmly in a little girl voice.
I had come quickly to my feet. "When did the doctor decide that?," I asked.
"Just now," she said. "I'm the doctor."
Wednesday, June 01, 2011
IndieInk Writing Challenge: Ashamed
This week, as part of the IndieInk Writing Challenge, I challenge Manju, asking her "What do you want from me?", while I am challenged by The Onion, not the satirical newspaper but instead someone with lots of layers (onions have layers, as Donkey told us). This tear inducing vegetable asks me to write about a time when I felt shame. There are no shortage of those, for sure.
I don't typically write about personal things. (I used to. In my archive are post upon post whining about my personal problems.) I do this because I'm a coward- I find it easier to put my feelings into people that don't exist. I've been wrestling about this challenge, because I'm not sure exactly which event would both fail to cause terminal embarrassment and somehow provide edification and/or entertainment.
But I'm going to try.
Evan Dando would argue that it's a shame about Ray.
Billy Joel would instead argue that he is Shameless.
John Lennon, quoting Fats Domino, would ask us Ain't That A Shame?
I've been thinking about this question all week. I've tried approaching this question politically, poetically, fictionally, and factually- and all my efforts have come out pathetically.
What is wrong with me? There are so many blogs, full of confessions about rape, pregnancy, incest, abuse of all sorts. Brave people, baring their souls to try and comfort humans they have never met. And then, there's me: unwilling to tell even the smallest embarrassing story. What am I afraid of?
I guess, in the end, the thing that I feel the most shame about is my inability to talk about anything meaningful. I wish I had the bravery to show my vulnerabilities.
- Posted using BlogPress
I don't typically write about personal things. (I used to. In my archive are post upon post whining about my personal problems.) I do this because I'm a coward- I find it easier to put my feelings into people that don't exist. I've been wrestling about this challenge, because I'm not sure exactly which event would both fail to cause terminal embarrassment and somehow provide edification and/or entertainment.
But I'm going to try.
Evan Dando would argue that it's a shame about Ray.
Billy Joel would instead argue that he is Shameless.
John Lennon, quoting Fats Domino, would ask us Ain't That A Shame?
I've been thinking about this question all week. I've tried approaching this question politically, poetically, fictionally, and factually- and all my efforts have come out pathetically.
What is wrong with me? There are so many blogs, full of confessions about rape, pregnancy, incest, abuse of all sorts. Brave people, baring their souls to try and comfort humans they have never met. And then, there's me: unwilling to tell even the smallest embarrassing story. What am I afraid of?
I guess, in the end, the thing that I feel the most shame about is my inability to talk about anything meaningful. I wish I had the bravery to show my vulnerabilities.
- Posted using BlogPress
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Terrible Minds Challenge: More Noodles, Please.
New Dad and old superhero Chuck Wendig has posted yet another Flash Fiction Challenge, the first one since the birth of Little Dude Wendig. The subject is "an uninvited guest" and my story is called "More Noodles, Please".
"So did you send that packet off?" My mother had washed her makeup off, but she still had her real estate expression on, all false fronts and illusory control over events. She got this tone, a brassy, too loud edge to her voice that said she was asking your opinion, but she didn't really want it.
"Yup." That seemed safe. I hadn't. It was still tucked into my school bag like an unexploded bomb. I was supposed to mail it after school today, to make sure the admissions office got it by the end of the month. In the press of events, I had forgotten all about my promise to send it off. Now I had one more secret to conceal from Miss Snoopybritches over there.
Lea, my over investigative younger sister, piped up. "But she was home at-," she said, choking off her reply when I shot her a look.
"3, yeah," I finished for her. "The line was short," I lied desperately.
My mother was serving us our pasta. My guts clenched at the thought of eating, but I would have to force something down. She was supersensitive to the symptoms of eating disorders, and she would start to fuss over me if I stopped eating. That was one thing I couldn't have, her monitoring every shift in my biology.
Who are you kidding? By graduation, your biology is going to be the main topic of conversation!
It was like those stages of dying we learned about- denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. I had moved through them all in about a week. Ironically, it's not dying that I'm worried about. More like the opposite.
Yeah, that's one way to think about it. Another way is that it doesn't matter whether or not you send off that packet. You're going to be taking tests in the fall, just not ones that grade on a curve. They are more pass/fail type things.
Lea was babbling, something about how this boy was cheating off her paper, except the teacher didn't believe her and he wouldn't stop. Lea, theatrical to the last, carried on about how unfair it was. That's not the only thing that's unfair about boys, I thought.
What, you mean how they tell you all these sweet wonderful nothings, then leave you once they get what they came for? How they can just go, leaving the damage behind them like it was a messy room or a unpaid cell phone bill? How they just forget about you, making you feel used up and ignored? You mean unfair like that?
My mother served herself last, settling in at the head od the table. She wore a semi attentive face, letting Lea think she was being fascinating. I knew the face, kind of a bland face, with eyes that held her gaze so she thought you were listening. I used the same gaze on her too. You couldn't listen to everything she said, not and still stay sane.
You've got something to say that will definitely be listened to. So just say it.
I cut a piece of chicken, then slid it into my mouth. It was fine. She tried to make it sweet and sour, and it came out fairly well. As I chewed, my stomach fluttered nervously. I tried to calculate how much I could eat to keep her suspicions at bay.
Honestly? How much longer do you think you can keep that game going? Two weeks? A month? You already don't fit into those nice black jeans you just got. You have to tell her. You'll feel better if you just say it.
"I saw Kelly at lunch," Lea said accusingly. "She didn't eat anything at all."
"Honey? Is that true?" My mother turned to me with her concerned face on. It registered concern, along with a little bit of Rottweiler "I'm going to keep after you until you spill it" mixed in. "Are you sick?"
That's one word for it. It is something you go to the doctor for.
"I had an apple," I said defensively. "I was just nervous about a test." That was half true. I didn't eat an apple, but I did have a test. English. I barely remember it.
"How did you do?," my mother asked. Her features softened. She seems to have bought that.
It was positive. Tell her. Tell her the test was positive.
"Fine," I lied. It was on Macbeth, and I hadn't read beyond Act I. I left almost half of it blank.
You're not accomplishing anything by doing this. Lea already made a crack about your breasts spilling out of that top you wore yesterday. It's going to get more and more obvious, until you can't hide it at all. You can see it in the mirror when you get out of the shower. How much longer until you can't hide it from anyone anymore?
"You look upset, Kel. What's wrong?" My mother's tone changed instantly, right back to the detective pressing a suspect tone.
She can tell. Just say it.
Lea turned her tiny face to look at me. She looked smug, secure in the knowledge that someone might be in trouble, and it wasn't her.
"I'm fine," I said, shoveling in a mouthful of noodles. My stomach ached at the thought of the food making it's way down there. I had the distinct, odd feeling it would be making the return journey. Soon.
Just say it.
"Mom?"
"Yes, baby?"
"Are there more noodles?"
"I think there's one more spoonful," she said, taking my plate up to the stove.
Lea eyed me suspiciously, like she knew something was up.
She doesn't know how right she is.
- Posted using BlogPress
"So did you send that packet off?" My mother had washed her makeup off, but she still had her real estate expression on, all false fronts and illusory control over events. She got this tone, a brassy, too loud edge to her voice that said she was asking your opinion, but she didn't really want it.
"Yup." That seemed safe. I hadn't. It was still tucked into my school bag like an unexploded bomb. I was supposed to mail it after school today, to make sure the admissions office got it by the end of the month. In the press of events, I had forgotten all about my promise to send it off. Now I had one more secret to conceal from Miss Snoopybritches over there.
Lea, my over investigative younger sister, piped up. "But she was home at-," she said, choking off her reply when I shot her a look.
"3, yeah," I finished for her. "The line was short," I lied desperately.
My mother was serving us our pasta. My guts clenched at the thought of eating, but I would have to force something down. She was supersensitive to the symptoms of eating disorders, and she would start to fuss over me if I stopped eating. That was one thing I couldn't have, her monitoring every shift in my biology.
Who are you kidding? By graduation, your biology is going to be the main topic of conversation!
It was like those stages of dying we learned about- denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. I had moved through them all in about a week. Ironically, it's not dying that I'm worried about. More like the opposite.
Yeah, that's one way to think about it. Another way is that it doesn't matter whether or not you send off that packet. You're going to be taking tests in the fall, just not ones that grade on a curve. They are more pass/fail type things.
Lea was babbling, something about how this boy was cheating off her paper, except the teacher didn't believe her and he wouldn't stop. Lea, theatrical to the last, carried on about how unfair it was. That's not the only thing that's unfair about boys, I thought.
What, you mean how they tell you all these sweet wonderful nothings, then leave you once they get what they came for? How they can just go, leaving the damage behind them like it was a messy room or a unpaid cell phone bill? How they just forget about you, making you feel used up and ignored? You mean unfair like that?
My mother served herself last, settling in at the head od the table. She wore a semi attentive face, letting Lea think she was being fascinating. I knew the face, kind of a bland face, with eyes that held her gaze so she thought you were listening. I used the same gaze on her too. You couldn't listen to everything she said, not and still stay sane.
You've got something to say that will definitely be listened to. So just say it.
I cut a piece of chicken, then slid it into my mouth. It was fine. She tried to make it sweet and sour, and it came out fairly well. As I chewed, my stomach fluttered nervously. I tried to calculate how much I could eat to keep her suspicions at bay.
Honestly? How much longer do you think you can keep that game going? Two weeks? A month? You already don't fit into those nice black jeans you just got. You have to tell her. You'll feel better if you just say it.
"I saw Kelly at lunch," Lea said accusingly. "She didn't eat anything at all."
"Honey? Is that true?" My mother turned to me with her concerned face on. It registered concern, along with a little bit of Rottweiler "I'm going to keep after you until you spill it" mixed in. "Are you sick?"
That's one word for it. It is something you go to the doctor for.
"I had an apple," I said defensively. "I was just nervous about a test." That was half true. I didn't eat an apple, but I did have a test. English. I barely remember it.
"How did you do?," my mother asked. Her features softened. She seems to have bought that.
It was positive. Tell her. Tell her the test was positive.
"Fine," I lied. It was on Macbeth, and I hadn't read beyond Act I. I left almost half of it blank.
You're not accomplishing anything by doing this. Lea already made a crack about your breasts spilling out of that top you wore yesterday. It's going to get more and more obvious, until you can't hide it at all. You can see it in the mirror when you get out of the shower. How much longer until you can't hide it from anyone anymore?
"You look upset, Kel. What's wrong?" My mother's tone changed instantly, right back to the detective pressing a suspect tone.
She can tell. Just say it.
Lea turned her tiny face to look at me. She looked smug, secure in the knowledge that someone might be in trouble, and it wasn't her.
"I'm fine," I said, shoveling in a mouthful of noodles. My stomach ached at the thought of the food making it's way down there. I had the distinct, odd feeling it would be making the return journey. Soon.
Just say it.
"Mom?"
"Yes, baby?"
"Are there more noodles?"
"I think there's one more spoonful," she said, taking my plate up to the stove.
Lea eyed me suspiciously, like she knew something was up.
She doesn't know how right she is.
- Posted using BlogPress
Redlight King
This is Redlight King, a new Canadian group I learned about, of all places, at the movie theater while waiting to see "Thor". The first single, "Old Man", samples Neil Young's song of the same name, and really appeals to me.
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Flash Fiction Friday: The Greatest Discovery
Flash Fiction Friday has a challenge up this week, involving conspiracy theories. The challenge is to write a story involving a conspiracy that turns out to be true. This is based on one of the given conspiracy theories, the idea that drug companies possess the cure for all known diseases, but they bury them, preferring to sell drugs to fight symptoms.
I should say that I don't believe that. I don't believe in any conspiracy theories. I prefer Franklin's dictum that three can keep a secret, if two are dead. We can't keep anything secret.
That said, here's a little tale imagining what might happen if one were true.
Jeanette expected headlines, her boss appearing on the Today Show, her lab the lead story on every news show. After all, their compound had done it- taken down the Big C. Cancer was gone, consigned to the footnotes of history like scurvy. But there was nothing about it that morning on TV as she dressed for an early meeting.
They had high hopes for the compound, of course- they always did. Biomedical research was like that- you were sure a molecule had promise, but it always failed- it caused problems in humans, or it was chemically too delicate, or it was expensive. When reality met the whiteboard, reality always won.
But this one was different, Jeanette thought, carrying her lab notebooks, her morning Starbucks, her favorite pens, and her MacBook in a public radio tote bag up to the lab. They had an 8:00 meeting, and it was 7:56. She quickened her pace a little bit. Obviously, the meeting was to set their media strategy- all nine of them were about to be very famous.
The results they were getting were astounding. They tested the patients for everything- no kidney problems, no liver, no nothing. No side effects at all. And it stopped everything- lung cancer, skin, uterine, breast, everything they tried, it worked- zapping the cancer like it was a video game. Total remission, no side effects, as easy to take as Tylenol.
Jeanette filed into the lab, the last one to arrive. Dr. Hay began as soon as she shut the door. "Ladies and gentlemen, we have had a setback. I need all your notebooks. We have scrubbed the servers of your emails. PK53 is no longer a project of ours."
Jeanette, never a quiet sort, spoke without thinking, "What setback? We haven't had any adverse events in the trials. None!"
"Ms. Wong, I have my orders. Everyone pass your notebooks to the front."
"We are releasing, right? We're applying for compassionate use. We have to be! People are dying!," Jeanette spat.
"Ms. Wong, I dont need to remind you you signed an NDA. You can't speak about this drug to anyone. Ever."
"But Dr. Hay! You can't do this! Lives are at stake!"
Her lab mates were sheepishly handing in their notebooks. Jeanette slammed her coffee cup down, tan liquid sloshing out the top.
"You're burying this? Burying the greatest advance in public health since penicillin?"
"Ms. Wong," her boss began. "There are forces at work here you don't understand."
Jeanette looked up at her boss, stamping her foot once with rage, a gesture that made her boyfriend giggle, no matter how serious she was. "I won't let you do this. I can't," she said firmly.
"You breathe a word of this to anyone," he said, "you'll regret it."
Jeanette grabbed her purse and stalked out the door. He can't do that, she thought in a white hot rage- this drug could save people! This drug could have saved my mother! She thought about who to tell, taking the stairs to the street two at a time. Brian, she thought. Brian worked on "Fresh Air", he'll get someone on the story. He'd probably think I want to get back together with him, she mused, but once he hears this, he'll know how important it is, and he'll get some attention on it. Jeanette was fumbling for her phone, walking up Eighth Avenue towards the subway, when she felt a man, dressed in black, suddenly looming up beside her and shoving her roughly into the gap between two buildings. Jeanette opened her mouth to cry out, then felt the heavy thump of something on her head. She saw red inside her closed eyes before everything went black.
I should say that I don't believe that. I don't believe in any conspiracy theories. I prefer Franklin's dictum that three can keep a secret, if two are dead. We can't keep anything secret.
That said, here's a little tale imagining what might happen if one were true.
Jeanette expected headlines, her boss appearing on the Today Show, her lab the lead story on every news show. After all, their compound had done it- taken down the Big C. Cancer was gone, consigned to the footnotes of history like scurvy. But there was nothing about it that morning on TV as she dressed for an early meeting.
They had high hopes for the compound, of course- they always did. Biomedical research was like that- you were sure a molecule had promise, but it always failed- it caused problems in humans, or it was chemically too delicate, or it was expensive. When reality met the whiteboard, reality always won.
But this one was different, Jeanette thought, carrying her lab notebooks, her morning Starbucks, her favorite pens, and her MacBook in a public radio tote bag up to the lab. They had an 8:00 meeting, and it was 7:56. She quickened her pace a little bit. Obviously, the meeting was to set their media strategy- all nine of them were about to be very famous.
The results they were getting were astounding. They tested the patients for everything- no kidney problems, no liver, no nothing. No side effects at all. And it stopped everything- lung cancer, skin, uterine, breast, everything they tried, it worked- zapping the cancer like it was a video game. Total remission, no side effects, as easy to take as Tylenol.
Jeanette filed into the lab, the last one to arrive. Dr. Hay began as soon as she shut the door. "Ladies and gentlemen, we have had a setback. I need all your notebooks. We have scrubbed the servers of your emails. PK53 is no longer a project of ours."
Jeanette, never a quiet sort, spoke without thinking, "What setback? We haven't had any adverse events in the trials. None!"
"Ms. Wong, I have my orders. Everyone pass your notebooks to the front."
"We are releasing, right? We're applying for compassionate use. We have to be! People are dying!," Jeanette spat.
"Ms. Wong, I dont need to remind you you signed an NDA. You can't speak about this drug to anyone. Ever."
"But Dr. Hay! You can't do this! Lives are at stake!"
Her lab mates were sheepishly handing in their notebooks. Jeanette slammed her coffee cup down, tan liquid sloshing out the top.
"You're burying this? Burying the greatest advance in public health since penicillin?"
"Ms. Wong," her boss began. "There are forces at work here you don't understand."
Jeanette looked up at her boss, stamping her foot once with rage, a gesture that made her boyfriend giggle, no matter how serious she was. "I won't let you do this. I can't," she said firmly.
"You breathe a word of this to anyone," he said, "you'll regret it."
Jeanette grabbed her purse and stalked out the door. He can't do that, she thought in a white hot rage- this drug could save people! This drug could have saved my mother! She thought about who to tell, taking the stairs to the street two at a time. Brian, she thought. Brian worked on "Fresh Air", he'll get someone on the story. He'd probably think I want to get back together with him, she mused, but once he hears this, he'll know how important it is, and he'll get some attention on it. Jeanette was fumbling for her phone, walking up Eighth Avenue towards the subway, when she felt a man, dressed in black, suddenly looming up beside her and shoving her roughly into the gap between two buildings. Jeanette opened her mouth to cry out, then felt the heavy thump of something on her head. She saw red inside her closed eyes before everything went black.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Blatant Self Promotion, Volume MCMXVIII
Pure Slush is a web only literary magazine founded and edited by my brother from another mother, fellow 52/250 alum Matt Potter. Matt has kindly posted today (or yesterday, or tomorrow- he's one of those non American time traveler types from overseas) a piece I wrote called "Just Ahead". Faithful readers of this blog (both of you) may note this piece has never appeared here.
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