{The busy ministrations of Leeroy and his human novelist pal Lance produce another 100 Word Song this week, the Afghan Whigs' "Debonair". This is called "Prom Night".}
"You're going to be careful?," she said for the seventh time.
"Yes, Mom," I said. She knew we would be careful, but she said it anyway. I was obsessively smoothing the front of the black jacket. Wendy was standing in front of me, her legs primly together, her eyes shining with promise.
"You look good. Handsome. Debonair," she said. "You both look perfect. Like you belong on a cake." Wendy smiled.
"Thanks, Mom," I said. I wasn't the sort of man the tuxedo would suggest.
We stepped outside, heading for my car, ready for some things, but not for this.
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Wednesday, January 09, 2013
Master Class: "Stuck"
{The magical Eric Storch offers yet another Fiction Challenge, this one called the Master Class, which gives you a starter sentence and lets you go where you wilt. His sentence this week is from Dodie Smith's "I Capture The Castle", and the sentence is "I write this sitting in the kitchen sink."}
I write this sitting in the kitchen sink. I wasn't planning to do this- it is an uncomfortable place to sit. It's not designed for that. My life feels like that- like it was ill designed, poorly planned, intended for another. Living in a trailer was not part of the plan, having a baby in high school wasn't part of the plan, and having them take the baby because you couldn't take care of it wasn't part of the plan. None of this was as I intended.
"Failing to plan," my history teacher said, "is planning to fail." He said it so much he bought a frame and hung it on the classroom wall. Or maybe somebody got it for him. I don't know. I had stopped listening to anyone but myself and my hormones at that point. I had thought about him, Mr. Archibald, a lot recently. One day he stopped me as I was leaving class and said to me in a very solemn voice that some day, I was going to regret the path I had chosen.
I was thinking about him because, as much as I laughed at him that long ago afternoon, the old man was right. I did regret the choices I made. Or the choices i failed to make. All the lies I swallowed, the things I believed not because I thought they were true, but because I was too stubborn to admit that I could be wrong about him. Too stubborn to admit I didn't know everything.
He was lying on the floor in front of the sink. The blood was pooling on the floor, a giant purple mass that was already starting to make everything smell bad. I thought about running, of course. I guess everyone does. When your on again off again boyfriend insults your cooking and pushes you as your fat ass crosses in front of him to wash the dirty dish he made and you turn and bury the steak knife you had in your hand into the center of his beer belly, you think about running.
I couldn't think of any place to run to, no place that would take me in and let me explain, so eventually I just climbed up on the counter as the blood spread, inch after sickening inch, after he finally stopped moving and collapsed. Now I was trapped up here, in my nightgown and underwear, unwilling to step down into the blood that was soaking everything in its path. I hadn't planned to do any of this, but as surely as night follows day, I had, so I sit here in the sink, waiting.
I guess I can take out my phone and call the police. It seems unfair to make them chase me down, and I'm too tired to run. I look down at John, his head turned to the side, his eyes staring at nothing. I've known him longer than I've known anyone except my parents, and I've alternated loving and hating him for all that time. Sitting in the sink, looking at my lover, my tormentor, my batterer, my only friend, I tried to think of a reason to get down. But I just couldn't.
Saturday, January 05, 2013
SPE: "OK"
For the Scriptic prompt exchange this week, Tara Roberts gave me this prompt: "Like it never even happened." I gave Melissa this prompt: "So much of how we live consists of making meaning out of a bewildering jumble of images, of attempting to move as seamlessly as we can from one stage of life to the next." -Nick Hornby
"Do you want to stay in the car?," my mother said. Ever since I had told her, her features had been covered with this mask. No matter what she said or did, I could see the disappointment etched there, as clear as the nose she had passed on to me alongside my pasty features and large thighs. She denied it, tried to pass it off as no big deal, but the more I looked at her, the more I saw it. Something had happened, I had incurred a debt I could never pay back.
"Sure," I said. She turned the key long enough to roll down the passenger side window and then got out. The air was warm, slightly humid but with a gentle breeze. It felt pleasant, the reality of the outside air flooding in to replace the artificial cool of the air conditioning. I was actually chilly as we drove, but I didn't feel entitled to complain.
She disappeared from beside the window without another word. I could hear her shoes tap as she walked, echoing weirdly as she got farther from me. It was nice to finally be alone. Mom had picked me up in school, and since then she had been disturbingly close, hovering like I was a toddler again.
I understood why- she had always given me my space, understanding that I need privacy at times, which I appreciated. Since I had told her, there was none of that. She would open my door when I had closed it, quiz me about every phone call, and insist I account for every moment. I wasn't sure I would trust me, either, but it was stifling. It felt like I couldn't breathe without her there, silent, judging, watching.
I saw a girl and a guy walking by in front of the car. She was long and shapely, tossing long black hair away from her face as she laughed. He had tattoos on his shoulder and looked rough and a little mean. I could catch fragments of what they were saying, but I couldn't pick up the words. They seemed happy with each other, walking close enough that they seemed to be a couple. Or they wanted to be.
I watched her listen as he mumbled something only she could hear, and then she laughed again, too loud this time. I knew that laugh. It was a love me laugh, a pay attention to me laugh, a don't you think I'm so charming laugh. It was a laugh of want, a flirtatious laugh. "No," I wanted to yell to her. "Don't listen to him! It's all lies!"
I didn't know that. i didn't know him, and I didn't know her. He could be a sweet, gentle guy despite the scowl. He could be her cousin from out of town, or her brother's best friend. As many books as I read, as many things as I tried to understand, I had to remind myself that I didn't know everything. My experience wasn't universal, even though it felt that way to me.
My phone buzzed, and I took it out of my purse and looked at it. It was him. I stared at his name, the four simple letters. I didn't put a picture there, even though my phone lets you do that. The more I looked at him, the less I wanted to say no. And right now, although it's far too late to do any good, I'm going to learn to start saying no. His face was kind, thin and soft with a tiny cleft in his chin, and his eyes entranced me. I was pleased that he wanted to call, to check on me, but the thought of actually talking to him revolted me slightly.
He was sweet, but when I told him, it was like he was paralyzed. He seemed to have no feelings at all, just saying "OK," and "I agree", and "whatever you want". Which you would think would be fine, except you wanted some feeling. Some emotion, some fire, some energy of some sort that seemed appropriate for the event. Something had happened, and now it was over, and I felt strongly that it should be commemorated with something important. But nobody talked about it. But he, even he, the only other person who could possibly understand, he didn't give me that. He just kept saying, "OK."
It wasn't OK. I was glad he wasn't opposing me on this. But it wasn't OK.
My mother got back into the car, handing me a paper bag, stapled at the top.
"All the instructions are inside. Do you remember what the doctor said?"
"Yes," I said softly.
"Good," my mother said, sliding her bare foot out of her shoe and onto the brake pedal as she started the engine. "Are you in any pain?"
"Some," I said. It wasn't that bad, just sort of a gnawing discomfort. I knew to expect it, and it certainly wasn't pleasant, but it wasn't anything I had never experienced before. "Not that bad."
"OK," she said. "Pretty soon this will all be over, honey, and it will be like it never happened."
No, I thought. No it won't.
Tuesday, January 01, 2013
SPE: "Tumbling Dice"
(For the Scriptic prompt exchange this week, Eric Storch gave me this prompt: "Cindy said that Mike was really a vampire, but I didn't believe her. Mike didn't sparkle.." I gave Julia Mae this prompt: "I'm on the edge".)
[Author's Note: I appear to be writing again. I guess art is the only defense against madness. Or maybe I'm just too dumb to know better.]
"I'm serious." Cindy said that a lot. It was dulled by her repeated usage, to the point where I nearly forgot what the words meant. She was looking at me now, her dark brown eyes wide and lined with glittering eyeshadow. I wasn't following her. It was a bad habit, not listening, but I couldn't help myself. She would repeat herself, she always did.
Cindy answered our phones, and she didn't even do that very well. Her main qualification seemed to be wearing tight clothes. Her blouse glowed faintly purple in the half light of the bar. Nick's was the closest place to work to get a drink or something that approximated food. It was a hole, but it felt like home. She talks, and I half listen, until she finds the part of the conversation I really need to hear, and she doubles back to it. I had known her for years, and it was always the same routine.
"He's a vampire," she said. That's what I thought she had said, but I assumed I hadn't heard her correctly. That was a strange sentence, even by her relaxed standards. Cindy was always certain, but rarely correct. Somewhere in the background, I could hear a Rolling Stones song.
"You're not serious," I said. "Vampires aren't real, Cin."
"I am serious," she insisted. "He's a vampire. My boyfriend Jake said he is."
I sighed, watching her earnest face. She was sweet, always meant well, but she wasn't the brightest person. She swore, as I prepared to leave for the day, standing by her desk, trying to sneak a peek at her cleavage, that she had something very important to tell me, something she couldn't say in the office, so we adjourned to Nick's to discuss it. I needed a drink anyway, and she had the sort of body you didn't mind spending extra time in the vicinity of.
The bartender slid a pair of beer bottles in front of us. The barkeep was a redhead, tiny and mean in tight pants and a half unbuttoned blouse. I watched her walk away, somehow displaying disdain in her stride.
"What makes you...what makes Jake think so?" I could hear Charlie Watts, holding down the center of the song. Quiet, unassuming, absolutely essential. Subtle. It floated at the edge of my awareness, barely audible. "Tumbling Dice," I thought.
"He always comes in late and leaves early."
"That's when he is scheduled," I said. I was fighting a chuckle.
"He's always pale," she added. She looked at me, her eyes full of life.
"He doesn't get sun, working at night." Something caught her eye, and she half turned, like she expected him to jump her from behind.
"He never eats."
"He's a private person. Some people don't like eating in front of other people," I said.
"He talks with that accent." I nearly choked on my beer.
"He's Rumanian. You'd talk with an accent too if you learned English as an adult."
"He sparkles." She took a long, lingering drink.
"He what?," I asked. She had said a lot of things, and that was pretty close to the top.
"He sparkles," she insisted. "Yesterday, he walked by my desk and he sparkled."
"He sparkled."
"Yeah," she said. "On his arm."
"On his arm," I said flatly. "The arm that was resting on your desk? Next to the birthday card with the glitter on it? Is it impossible that had something to do with it?"
I knew as soon as I said it she wouldn't follow that sentence.
"Yes!," she said, exasperated. "Why won't anyone believe me?"
"Well," I said, "because it's nonsense, that's why. Vampires aren't real." I couldn't believe I was having this conversation with an adult human.
"Why would Jake say that, then?," she asked.
"I think Jake was having a little fun at your expense, Cindy." I couldn't say that I blamed him.
"I hate that," she said, her face hardening into a frown. "I hate it when people think I'm dumb."
"I don't think you're dumb," I said. That turned her head. It was a lie, but I let it sit, like the piece of bread nobody wants.
"You do," she said, but there was a hint of a smile at the edge of her mouth.
"I don't. Just because you know about different things, that doesn't make you smarter or dumber. Just different." I felt the click of something in her eyes. I had to watch carefully, but the odds were in my favor.
"Thanks," she said. Her eyes shone at me a little. Our beers were empty.
"Do you want another?," I asked.
"No, I better not," she said. I paid for the drinks, and we walked through the maze of tables to Nick's front door. She still had her work clothes on, a trim, clingy knee length skirt and black tights with knee length leather boots. It was cold outside as we walked to our cars. I watched her walk carefully.
We were parked two cars apart. I wondered what was going to happen. She was as dumb as a box of hair, but I didn't plan on asking her about Proust. There was hesitation in her walk, like she was waiting for me to ask.
"Where are you going?," she asked.
"Home," I said.
"Me too," she said. "Jake has to stay late tonight."
She stared at me for a long moment. I held her gaze. I had rules about pens and company ink, and rules about women who can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality. I had rules, and the wind blew. Her skirt flapped once when a breeze hit it. I looked at her face, open and honest, with her lips the color of ripe plums. I couldn't, and I shouldn't, but it had been a long time since any voice but my own was heard in my apartment.
"See you tomorrow?," she said, half a statement and half a question.
"Sure," I agreed, and she got into her car.
"Damn rules," I said to myself, my breath fogging in front of my face.
[Author's Note: I appear to be writing again. I guess art is the only defense against madness. Or maybe I'm just too dumb to know better.]
"I'm serious." Cindy said that a lot. It was dulled by her repeated usage, to the point where I nearly forgot what the words meant. She was looking at me now, her dark brown eyes wide and lined with glittering eyeshadow. I wasn't following her. It was a bad habit, not listening, but I couldn't help myself. She would repeat herself, she always did.
Cindy answered our phones, and she didn't even do that very well. Her main qualification seemed to be wearing tight clothes. Her blouse glowed faintly purple in the half light of the bar. Nick's was the closest place to work to get a drink or something that approximated food. It was a hole, but it felt like home. She talks, and I half listen, until she finds the part of the conversation I really need to hear, and she doubles back to it. I had known her for years, and it was always the same routine.
"He's a vampire," she said. That's what I thought she had said, but I assumed I hadn't heard her correctly. That was a strange sentence, even by her relaxed standards. Cindy was always certain, but rarely correct. Somewhere in the background, I could hear a Rolling Stones song.
"You're not serious," I said. "Vampires aren't real, Cin."
"I am serious," she insisted. "He's a vampire. My boyfriend Jake said he is."
I sighed, watching her earnest face. She was sweet, always meant well, but she wasn't the brightest person. She swore, as I prepared to leave for the day, standing by her desk, trying to sneak a peek at her cleavage, that she had something very important to tell me, something she couldn't say in the office, so we adjourned to Nick's to discuss it. I needed a drink anyway, and she had the sort of body you didn't mind spending extra time in the vicinity of.
The bartender slid a pair of beer bottles in front of us. The barkeep was a redhead, tiny and mean in tight pants and a half unbuttoned blouse. I watched her walk away, somehow displaying disdain in her stride.
"What makes you...what makes Jake think so?" I could hear Charlie Watts, holding down the center of the song. Quiet, unassuming, absolutely essential. Subtle. It floated at the edge of my awareness, barely audible. "Tumbling Dice," I thought.
"He always comes in late and leaves early."
"That's when he is scheduled," I said. I was fighting a chuckle.
"He's always pale," she added. She looked at me, her eyes full of life.
"He doesn't get sun, working at night." Something caught her eye, and she half turned, like she expected him to jump her from behind.
"He never eats."
"He's a private person. Some people don't like eating in front of other people," I said.
"He talks with that accent." I nearly choked on my beer.
"He's Rumanian. You'd talk with an accent too if you learned English as an adult."
"He sparkles." She took a long, lingering drink.
"He what?," I asked. She had said a lot of things, and that was pretty close to the top.
"He sparkles," she insisted. "Yesterday, he walked by my desk and he sparkled."
"He sparkled."
"Yeah," she said. "On his arm."
"On his arm," I said flatly. "The arm that was resting on your desk? Next to the birthday card with the glitter on it? Is it impossible that had something to do with it?"
I knew as soon as I said it she wouldn't follow that sentence.
"Yes!," she said, exasperated. "Why won't anyone believe me?"
"Well," I said, "because it's nonsense, that's why. Vampires aren't real." I couldn't believe I was having this conversation with an adult human.
"Why would Jake say that, then?," she asked.
"I think Jake was having a little fun at your expense, Cindy." I couldn't say that I blamed him.
"I hate that," she said, her face hardening into a frown. "I hate it when people think I'm dumb."
"I don't think you're dumb," I said. That turned her head. It was a lie, but I let it sit, like the piece of bread nobody wants.
"You do," she said, but there was a hint of a smile at the edge of her mouth.
"I don't. Just because you know about different things, that doesn't make you smarter or dumber. Just different." I felt the click of something in her eyes. I had to watch carefully, but the odds were in my favor.
"Thanks," she said. Her eyes shone at me a little. Our beers were empty.
"Do you want another?," I asked.
"No, I better not," she said. I paid for the drinks, and we walked through the maze of tables to Nick's front door. She still had her work clothes on, a trim, clingy knee length skirt and black tights with knee length leather boots. It was cold outside as we walked to our cars. I watched her walk carefully.
We were parked two cars apart. I wondered what was going to happen. She was as dumb as a box of hair, but I didn't plan on asking her about Proust. There was hesitation in her walk, like she was waiting for me to ask.
"Where are you going?," she asked.
"Home," I said.
"Me too," she said. "Jake has to stay late tonight."
She stared at me for a long moment. I held her gaze. I had rules about pens and company ink, and rules about women who can't tell the difference between fantasy and reality. I had rules, and the wind blew. Her skirt flapped once when a breeze hit it. I looked at her face, open and honest, with her lips the color of ripe plums. I couldn't, and I shouldn't, but it had been a long time since any voice but my own was heard in my apartment.
"See you tomorrow?," she said, half a statement and half a question.
"Sure," I agreed, and she got into her car.
"Damn rules," I said to myself, my breath fogging in front of my face.
Sunday, December 23, 2012
Gorging One's Self
Matt Potter, who should not be confused with his twin brother Glossy Potter, has announced that "Gorge," a novel in stories, is available for purchase here. It contains a story by yours truly, as does a previous compilation, "Slut". I need not add that these books make outstanding holiday gifts, assuming you can rent the Millennium Falcon in order to get them to your house in time. I also assume you can divine the fact that these are grownup books written by grownup people that talk about grownup themes. (The fact that one of them is called "Slut" was a clue.) There are also other books that do not include me, along with a forthcoming one that will, "Obit."
{On a personal note, I have not written any new fiction to post here since my last post. I'm starting to think that I may start again soon. You'll be the first (well, the second) to know.}
{On a personal note, I have not written any new fiction to post here since my last post. I'm starting to think that I may start again soon. You'll be the first (well, the second) to know.}
Sunday, December 16, 2012
SPE: Empty Chairs At Empty Tables
{For the Scriptic prompt exchange this week, Tara Roberts gave me this prompt: "(Character name)'s contribution to the holiday cookie exchange shocked all of us." I gave Julia Mae this prompt: " 'Critics can say horrible things. It only hurts when I agree with them.' -Jon Cryer" }
[The following post is written about the fact I can't write a post about this. Besides being meta, this is a little bit unfair, because the SPE game involves composing prompts on Thursday and early Friday morning to be distributed on Saturday. Obviously, the events on Friday have changed my point of view. I don't mean to imply anything is wrong with Tara, whom I respect to the point of abject worship, or the quality of her prompt. Her prompt was written and intended for a different headspace than the one I occupy at the moment. This is not her fault.]
(To steal an idea from Charlie Pierce, optional soundtrack for this post is available here.)
I can't write about Christmas cookies today.
I learned about the events in Connecticut on Friday through a text message from a friend, which seems to be a very au courant way to get news. Perhaps it isn't. I don't know. I went onto Twitter, which was, of course, full of bulletins and news stories and rumors, name calling and accusations and jokes in poor taste. Calls for fewer guns, calls for more guns, calls for mental health care, calls for more God in schools, calls for bans on video games or television or movies- nearly everyone knows the answer and feels compelled to share. This is as it usually is. You don't expect table manners in a saloon, and you don't expect reasoned discussion on Twitter. Among the cacophany, my friend Erik Fisher advised that he was dropping off the grid for a while- he couldn't take it. I didn't listen. I didn't follow his example. I should have.
I have tried not to watch any television coverage, or read much about it, although in the way things do in the modern age, phrases and images and facts find their way to me, from the TV in the next room, or on the car radio before I shut it off in favor of music from my iPhone. My pal Leah Peterson pointed out that one of the most chilling sentences she encountered was "An entire kindergarten class is unaccounted for." I quickly found partners for that, overhearing "the state does not have enough medical examiners for all the dead" and "one of our nation's leading authorities on mass murder". (We have authorities on mass murder? And there is more than one of them?) Like everyone, I am hurt, shocked, saddened, and furiously angry. It's one of those odd angers, the kind where you know you're angry, but you can't find anything adequate to the rage. (If you haven't seen it before, please watch this, the scene where Martin Sheen on the "West Wing", playing the President, tries to voice this sort of inchoate rage against senseless loss.) Among the many thoughts I have entertained, I wonder why it is this slaughter that stirs my blood, as opposed to so many others?
As my wife correctly points out, more people died in Philadelphia, the city closest to me, this year due to gun violence, only they did it one or two at a time. There have been slaughters since Cain and Abel, and probably way before that. Even slaughters in school are nothing new, sadly. Gun slaughter itself predates me by centuries, and even mass slaughter can be traced back to the University of Texas shootings in the 1960s, if not farther than that. Fort Pillow. Cold Harbor. Borodino. Lynching and race riots. World War I. World War II. Vietnam. Korea. Iraq and Afghanistan. As soon as we had guns, we started using them to kill each other, and as the guns got better, so did the killing. (It would be unfair, but not totally wrong, to note that a slaughter in a so called "white" community evokes my rage, but not the slower genocide against poor children that happens worldwide every single day. I don't have anything to say to that except that I am human, and I can't control what provokes me.)
I don't have any particular connection to this event. The most convenient way to get from my in law's house to my mother's house is Route 84, which essentially cuts the state into two triangles, giving me a knowledge of the state's rest stops, if nothing else. My brother lives there. I raised a kindergartener once, long ago. (My son was in kindergarten on 9/11, the last event that I can compare to this, at least in terms of my own emotional response to it.) I have friends with kindergarteners, and my dear nephew is a kindergartener, and his little brother soon will be. I also have a niece who was in kindergarten not too long ago, and two more nieces who will be.
When my son was a kindergartener, I used to advise him, when a video game or school assignment or some other complex task was frustrating him, to try and channel his anger into something useful. Instead of getting mad, try to step back and think. Ask for advice. Attack the problem another way. Or even stop and get a glass of water and let your brain rest for a moment. Just getting mad doesn't help. This advice doesn't apply here. No advice does. There isn't anything to be done. Or, more properly, there are a dozen things to be done, all advocated loudly and vigorously, on and on, from all angles. And if previous slaughters are any guide, we, as a society, won't do any of them, or the ones we do won't work, and this will happen again. There's no place to put this rage against an uncaring universe that created all this sorrow. (With all due respect, if God is your thing, I won't belittle that. It just doesn't work for me. Not right now, anyway.)
I have opinions about what could and should be done. So do a lot of people. If you want to know them, and I can't imagine why you would, you can email me or follow me on Twitter- just look at the boxes on the right. But I feel like this isn't a place for it, exactly, and I don't feel up to it, frankly. I'm just tired of all the talking, and I don't have the energy to engage in debate right now. A blog, you might say, is exactly the place for that- it is one's own personal web space, to be filled with whatever one desires. And that is true. When this blog began, it was much more of a personal blog. It got very political for a while, and then it talked about sports, and right now it is a host for my short fiction. I don't know if I don't want to interrupt the flow, or confuse my readers (either one of you), or what, but I don't feel like I can go off on a rant about guns or mental health or anything like that. Not now. I can't write. I can only ache.
I understand the argument that art, at best, may be the only possible response to heartbreak and madness. "Guernica." Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young's "Ohio". Bruce Springsteen's "The Rising". "A Farewell to Arms". I keep thinking about wrapped presents in closets or attics or car trunks that 20 little kids are never going to open, and everything tastes like ashes, and I can't tell made up stories about people who don't exist. Not today.
An author named Thomas Larson calls this the saddest piece of music ever written, and I'm inclined to believe him. I'm going to go visit my nephews tomorrow, listening to sad music as I drive, and I'm going to hug them both, which is not a bit out of the ordinary. I may tear up some, which is quite unusual. They won't know why, and I'm not going to tell them.
I will work, and sleep, and then drive, and hug, and pray that the world they grow up in will not know this particular kind of heartbreak.
But right now, I can't create anything.
I can't write about Christmas cookies today.
Tuesday, December 04, 2012
SPE: Time To Go
{For the Scriptic prompt exchange this week, Jordan gave me this prompt: The crowd had seemed so friendly a moment ago, but now they took on a meaner cast, and seemed to swell with a bit of menace. I gave Julia Mae this prompt: "My philosophy is that if you don't feel like what you're creating is the best work you've ever done, it's time to throw in the towel." -Bernie Taupin}
She was the kind of person who would tell you it was not raining, even as the water poured down in buckets. She wasn't exactly delusional, but she was very sure of herself, and when reality conflicted with her beliefs, she would often insist that the real world was in error, often to the extreme. I was guiding/tugging her across the mall parking lot, to her increasing displeasure. She knew as well as I did that it was time to go.
The parking lot wasn't crowded, but there were people coming and going, couples headed into the movies, older people who look determined to go for a walk, formless groups of teens intent on hanging out and posing for one another. Everyone seemed happy to be outside in the bright sun, but also pleased that they would soon be in air conditioned cool.
"Come on, babe," I said gently. "We have to go." I put my palm on her bare upper arm, as if I were guiding a recalcitrant toddler.
"Get your HANDS off ME," she insisted loudly. She jerked her arm away, and then folded her arms over her chest. She said it too loudly for what was really a fit of pique on her part. Or at least, I thought so.
A couple was walking along the opposite line of cars, a man and a woman with a 5 year old skipping between them. The moment her voice rang out, I froze, jerking my hand away from her as if she were electrified. The threesome also froze, and I watched the man bristle. He turned and looked at me, and then at her. She was frozen, her eyes angry and glaring, looking at him and at me in turn.
"Is there a problem?," he said from across the aisle. He was older than me, and fat, but he looked hard, like he lifted and carried things for a living. I didn't lift anything heavier than a paperclip.
I looked at her, her proud nose, her fiery blue eyes, the tiny gap where her striped top ended and a quarter moon of brown, flat belly showed above the waist of her dark, tight jeans. I was waiting for her to explain. She looked at him, and then at me.
"Is there a problem?," he said louder. He was coming closer, while the woman and the child stayed by the cars on the other side. To my right, a boy and girl my age were walking straight towards me. I shifted backwards, trying to keep everyone in view. The boy had a baseball cap on backwards, and I could see muscles bunched in his upper arms. Using that sixth sense some men have, he sensed trouble and was putting himself between his girl, a cute, thin Asian, and whatever was to come.
My thighs hit the bumper of a truck. I stopped, looking at the two men. Their faces were set, not unfriendly, but even and blank, not sure if there would be a fight, but ready in case there were. My heart pounded in my chest. I clenched both fists, working my keys into my palm. I remembered a self defense book I had read once that suggested using keys as a flail. My palms began to sweat.
The fat guy had a brown shirt on, stretched over a beer gut. "Torricelli Lawn and Garden Centers," it said. The teen had a concert shirt from a recent AC/DC show. I calculated quickly that if the balloon went up, I would hit the fat guy as hard as I could and hope I could turn before the teenager was on me. She stood there, 2 feet from my elbow, but she could have been a million miles away. Her beautiful eyes flicked from me, to the two men, and then back to me.
The fat guy gestured with his right arm, looking above my head. I heard a car engine excitedly revving behind me. "Are you OK, sweetheart?," he said to her, not looking at me, but tracking me carefully, like I was about to steal second base. "You can come with us if he's hurting you. We'll call the cops on him. Don't worry." The teen had caught up to us, his own eyes dancing, his girlfriend several steps back, eyeing him with a mixture of pride and disgust.
I looked at my girlfriend briefly. Her eyes were very wide, her pupils very small in the sunlight. The word "miosis" swam into my awareness from my physiology lessons. I could feel the sweat rolling down my back. I spread my legs apart slightly, getting my weight forward. Around the corner whipped a squat white SUV with "Mall Security" painted on the side. A woman got out with blonde short hair with a blue shirt and gray pants, carrying a walkie talkie in one hand. She gave me a hard edged look. I hadn't done anything to her. I wanted to shake my girlfriend, scream in her beautiful, open face. "Tell them!," I wanted to say, "Tell them I don't hit you! Tell them that!"
"What's up?," the mall cop said evenly.
"I'm not sure," the fat guy said. "I heard her yell for him to take his hands off of her, so I came over to see if something was wrong." The teen came a little closer on my right. The mall cop was standing right in front of me. She looked paunchy, but rough, like she had done more than pinch shoplifters. The fat guy took another small step forward, pinning me in. Everyone was staring at me with menace, daring me to say something, to hit her, to try and escape, to earn the enmity that they all had for me.
"Do you need the police, ma'am?," the mall cop said, her walkie talkie coming to her lips. She was looking right at my girlfriend, her own thighs parted slightly, her other fist balled. She knew how to fight, I was sure of it. I could smell the hate coming off them. I got ready.
With the mention of the word "police", it was as if the spell had been broken. "Oh no!," my girlfriend said excitedly. "No, no. No. I'm fine. No. This is my boyfriend. I was just mad at him because I don't want to go home. That's all."
"Really?," the mall cop said. "You can tell us the truth, honey. I can have the police here in less than 5 minutes. You don't have to put up with being hit. " The fat guy folded his arms over his chest. His arms looked like hams.
"No," she said with a small giggle. "Oh, no. He would never hit me. Not ever." She unfolded her arms and crossed one leg primly in front of the other. The decorative gold chain on her shoe glinted in the sun.
"You're sure?," the fat man said. The teen seemed to be backing away.
"Positive," my girlfriend said calmly. She was half smiling.
The mall cop stepped back towards her vehicle. "You don't want to come with me?," she asked my girlfriend.
"Nope," my girlfriend said. "I'm fine."
The fat man backed away, his wife staring daggers at me over his shoulder. The teen went back and collected his girl, giving me a wide berth, his face still even and hard. I breathed deep, trying to get enough air, trying to bring my blood pressure back down. I looked at my girlfriend, her perfect pointed toe, the way her jeans followed her long, womanly curves. I didn't hit her, and I never would, but just for a half second, I pictured doing so. I shook my head to clear the image.
"We better go," I said.
"Yup," she said, and I watched her infuriating, manipulative, perfect little ass walk in front of me as we returned to my car.
She was the kind of person who would tell you it was not raining, even as the water poured down in buckets. She wasn't exactly delusional, but she was very sure of herself, and when reality conflicted with her beliefs, she would often insist that the real world was in error, often to the extreme. I was guiding/tugging her across the mall parking lot, to her increasing displeasure. She knew as well as I did that it was time to go.
The parking lot wasn't crowded, but there were people coming and going, couples headed into the movies, older people who look determined to go for a walk, formless groups of teens intent on hanging out and posing for one another. Everyone seemed happy to be outside in the bright sun, but also pleased that they would soon be in air conditioned cool.
"Come on, babe," I said gently. "We have to go." I put my palm on her bare upper arm, as if I were guiding a recalcitrant toddler.
"Get your HANDS off ME," she insisted loudly. She jerked her arm away, and then folded her arms over her chest. She said it too loudly for what was really a fit of pique on her part. Or at least, I thought so.
A couple was walking along the opposite line of cars, a man and a woman with a 5 year old skipping between them. The moment her voice rang out, I froze, jerking my hand away from her as if she were electrified. The threesome also froze, and I watched the man bristle. He turned and looked at me, and then at her. She was frozen, her eyes angry and glaring, looking at him and at me in turn.
"Is there a problem?," he said from across the aisle. He was older than me, and fat, but he looked hard, like he lifted and carried things for a living. I didn't lift anything heavier than a paperclip.
I looked at her, her proud nose, her fiery blue eyes, the tiny gap where her striped top ended and a quarter moon of brown, flat belly showed above the waist of her dark, tight jeans. I was waiting for her to explain. She looked at him, and then at me.
"Is there a problem?," he said louder. He was coming closer, while the woman and the child stayed by the cars on the other side. To my right, a boy and girl my age were walking straight towards me. I shifted backwards, trying to keep everyone in view. The boy had a baseball cap on backwards, and I could see muscles bunched in his upper arms. Using that sixth sense some men have, he sensed trouble and was putting himself between his girl, a cute, thin Asian, and whatever was to come.
My thighs hit the bumper of a truck. I stopped, looking at the two men. Their faces were set, not unfriendly, but even and blank, not sure if there would be a fight, but ready in case there were. My heart pounded in my chest. I clenched both fists, working my keys into my palm. I remembered a self defense book I had read once that suggested using keys as a flail. My palms began to sweat.
The fat guy had a brown shirt on, stretched over a beer gut. "Torricelli Lawn and Garden Centers," it said. The teen had a concert shirt from a recent AC/DC show. I calculated quickly that if the balloon went up, I would hit the fat guy as hard as I could and hope I could turn before the teenager was on me. She stood there, 2 feet from my elbow, but she could have been a million miles away. Her beautiful eyes flicked from me, to the two men, and then back to me.
The fat guy gestured with his right arm, looking above my head. I heard a car engine excitedly revving behind me. "Are you OK, sweetheart?," he said to her, not looking at me, but tracking me carefully, like I was about to steal second base. "You can come with us if he's hurting you. We'll call the cops on him. Don't worry." The teen had caught up to us, his own eyes dancing, his girlfriend several steps back, eyeing him with a mixture of pride and disgust.
I looked at my girlfriend briefly. Her eyes were very wide, her pupils very small in the sunlight. The word "miosis" swam into my awareness from my physiology lessons. I could feel the sweat rolling down my back. I spread my legs apart slightly, getting my weight forward. Around the corner whipped a squat white SUV with "Mall Security" painted on the side. A woman got out with blonde short hair with a blue shirt and gray pants, carrying a walkie talkie in one hand. She gave me a hard edged look. I hadn't done anything to her. I wanted to shake my girlfriend, scream in her beautiful, open face. "Tell them!," I wanted to say, "Tell them I don't hit you! Tell them that!"
"What's up?," the mall cop said evenly.
"I'm not sure," the fat guy said. "I heard her yell for him to take his hands off of her, so I came over to see if something was wrong." The teen came a little closer on my right. The mall cop was standing right in front of me. She looked paunchy, but rough, like she had done more than pinch shoplifters. The fat guy took another small step forward, pinning me in. Everyone was staring at me with menace, daring me to say something, to hit her, to try and escape, to earn the enmity that they all had for me.
"Do you need the police, ma'am?," the mall cop said, her walkie talkie coming to her lips. She was looking right at my girlfriend, her own thighs parted slightly, her other fist balled. She knew how to fight, I was sure of it. I could smell the hate coming off them. I got ready.
With the mention of the word "police", it was as if the spell had been broken. "Oh no!," my girlfriend said excitedly. "No, no. No. I'm fine. No. This is my boyfriend. I was just mad at him because I don't want to go home. That's all."
"Really?," the mall cop said. "You can tell us the truth, honey. I can have the police here in less than 5 minutes. You don't have to put up with being hit. " The fat guy folded his arms over his chest. His arms looked like hams.
"No," she said with a small giggle. "Oh, no. He would never hit me. Not ever." She unfolded her arms and crossed one leg primly in front of the other. The decorative gold chain on her shoe glinted in the sun.
"You're sure?," the fat man said. The teen seemed to be backing away.
"Positive," my girlfriend said calmly. She was half smiling.
The mall cop stepped back towards her vehicle. "You don't want to come with me?," she asked my girlfriend.
"Nope," my girlfriend said. "I'm fine."
The fat man backed away, his wife staring daggers at me over his shoulder. The teen went back and collected his girl, giving me a wide berth, his face still even and hard. I breathed deep, trying to get enough air, trying to bring my blood pressure back down. I looked at my girlfriend, her perfect pointed toe, the way her jeans followed her long, womanly curves. I didn't hit her, and I never would, but just for a half second, I pictured doing so. I shook my head to clear the image.
"We better go," I said.
"Yup," she said, and I watched her infuriating, manipulative, perfect little ass walk in front of me as we returned to my car.
Saturday, December 01, 2012
FFF: "Walking After Midnight"
(Annnnnnnnnd we're back. NaNo consumed me, as it usually does, but I won (see sidebar!), and while it was a worthy journey, I'm also glad it's over. Normal (ish) posting should resume anon.)
(This week's Flash Fiction Friday is about milestones, and this story is called "Walking After Midnight".)
They said on the TV that the blizzard was coming, but for now, it was just another cold December night. She struggled to hold her black wool coat closed against the wind as she walked. It didn't fit her anymore, and only two of the buttons were left, but it was the coat closest to the door, so she shrugged it on and left. At that moment, speed trumped warmth, but the farther she got down the road, the more that equation tilted the other way. She had to leave, so she left. She wondered if they would look for her, but she also didn't care.
The cold seemed cruel, as if it meant her ill will personally. She knew weather wasn't like that- it didn't care about her at all. But she felt the wind attack her, knifing under the thin coat, chapping and burning her face and hands. She felt persecuted, assaulted by the cold, but she just kept walking, her thin Uggs making tiny incremental gains along the long, straight street. There was a tiny space reserved for pedestrians, due to the absence of a sidewalk, and she looked down at it carefully, trying hard to keep her footsteps inside it.
But the cars kept driving by, driving harder than seemed necessary, the moving headlights casting evil, sharp shadows over the ground. The disrupted air as they moved past her hit her like a wall each time, making her stumble and almost fall. The air was bitter and cold, and it smelled like gasoline. She felt the buffeting winds, and wondered how much more she could take. The smell made her nauseous and sad, but she wasn't sure if that was entirely the smell.
She kept walking, hunched against the wind, her head down to try to protect her face. She saw Bozo Donuts, glowing like a lighthouse amid the closed stores on either side of it. She looked at the giant clown in front, the hedges that surrounded the building, and the red and white decor inside. There was a long counter, with red stools empty in front of it, behind which were gleaming racks of donuts and coffee rolls and danishes behind glass. She steered herself down the driveway without thinking. She wasn't hungry, but her feet, seemingly of their own accord, wanted to be out of the wind.
A bell tinkled gently when she came in through the door. She closed her eyes with pleasure as the dry, stuffy heat started to thaw her skinny jeans and the quarter moon of bare skin at her belly that her sweater revealed when she stood up straight. Her hands and cheeks began to burn with a diffuse, tingling pain as she felt the blood returning to the damaged tissue. There was an Indian woman behind the counter, mopping at the already clean surface with a dirty rag. She was older, perhaps in her 50s, but looked kindly and small, with a tendril of perfectly white hair hanging over one eye. She had a red dot on her forehead, and she was wrapped in a giant turquoise sari with plastic beads and bangles on it.
"Coffee?," she said in accented English.
The cold girl didn't say anything for a moment, then finally opened her eyes and looked at the woman.
"Yes," the visitor said. "Decaf. With cream and sugar." She didn't like coffee, but it would be hot, and she could add enough sugar to make it taste decent.
"Donut?," the woman behind the counter said.
The visitor patted her pockets swiftly, then dug into one, leaning to one side to get her fingers deep enough to reach it, coming out with a tattered five that had seen better days. She looked at the prices on display and appeared to make a calculation. "Yes," she said. "Glazed."
"I give you two for one," the woman said. "So I don't have to throw out."
"Oh," the girl said with surprise. "OK. Thank you." The girl didn't really want the donuts, but it was food, and it might mean she could stay in the glorious heat a little longer.
The woman behind the counter produced a steaming china cup of coffee, a spoon, and a glass sugar dispenser with a silver top, and a three small plastic cups of non dairy creamer. She placed a pair of donuts on a tan plate, along with a silver and black napkin dispenser. "$4.50," the handwritten bill said.
"You don't have car," the woman said.
"No," the girl said, pouring sugar into the steaming black liquid. "I walked."
"Too cold to walk," she said. "Why you walk?"
The girl took a bite of the donut while she thought of something to say, letting the sugar melt on her tongue. She settled on taking another bite.
"Men problems? You have a secret? You look like you have a secret," the woman said.
The girl stirred her coffee and took a sip, wincing at the heat and acidity, then added more sugar.
"Girl walk by herself, freezing cold night, no purse, no phone, no gloves, men involved," the woman said.
The girl took another bite of donut.
"Men always cause problems. Like my mother always say, 'Men always want one thing, women only want one thing. Trouble is, not same thing!,' " the woman said, laughing politely at her own joke.
The girl smiled, and took another bite, finishing the first one, followed by a sip of stinging, still bitter, coffee.
"I no let you walk home," the older woman said. "I get phone for you."
She went behind the donut case and emerged with a silver portable phone.
"Here," she said to the girl. "You call home. Tell him you sorry. He come pick you up. It too cold for little girl to walk."
The girl looked at the phone, and up at the woman's creased, aged face, the misadventures of sons and daughters and grandchildren etched there. The girl wanted to explain, to amplify, to show how she was right and he was wrong. But it was cold, and it didn't seem as important now.
"Women always have to say sorry," the woman said. "Even when we right. Especially when we right."
The girl swallowed, tried to say something, and then swallowed again. She picked up the phone and dialed.
"Daddy?," she said. "It's Jenny......Yeah....I'm sorry, Daddy......No, I am, really........I'm at Bozo Donuts, on Madison.......yeah, I walked here.......I know.........Yeah, I know we have to talk when we get home.....OK, Daddy.....Yeah........I know......I'm sorry, too........Bye."
She set the phone back on the counter. She finished the second donut in one bite, folding it into her mouth. She left the five dollar bill on top of the bill, and used one of the napkins to wipe her mouth.
"Thanks," she said.
"Thank you," the woman replied, watching the girl stand inside the front window. The two stayed where they were, without speaking, until a pair of headlights jerked their way into the driveway and stopped. The girl went out the front door and climbed into the passenger's side of a Ford truck. The woman watched the truck leave, then sadly turned out the lights and locked up for the evening.
The woman knew of the many cruelties men can inflict on women, and parents on children. She had experienced most of them. She didn't know if it was right to send the girl back where she came from, but she didn't know what else to do, and it was cold. Sometimes, the woman thought, that's all you can know.
(This week's Flash Fiction Friday is about milestones, and this story is called "Walking After Midnight".)
They said on the TV that the blizzard was coming, but for now, it was just another cold December night. She struggled to hold her black wool coat closed against the wind as she walked. It didn't fit her anymore, and only two of the buttons were left, but it was the coat closest to the door, so she shrugged it on and left. At that moment, speed trumped warmth, but the farther she got down the road, the more that equation tilted the other way. She had to leave, so she left. She wondered if they would look for her, but she also didn't care.
The cold seemed cruel, as if it meant her ill will personally. She knew weather wasn't like that- it didn't care about her at all. But she felt the wind attack her, knifing under the thin coat, chapping and burning her face and hands. She felt persecuted, assaulted by the cold, but she just kept walking, her thin Uggs making tiny incremental gains along the long, straight street. There was a tiny space reserved for pedestrians, due to the absence of a sidewalk, and she looked down at it carefully, trying hard to keep her footsteps inside it.
But the cars kept driving by, driving harder than seemed necessary, the moving headlights casting evil, sharp shadows over the ground. The disrupted air as they moved past her hit her like a wall each time, making her stumble and almost fall. The air was bitter and cold, and it smelled like gasoline. She felt the buffeting winds, and wondered how much more she could take. The smell made her nauseous and sad, but she wasn't sure if that was entirely the smell.
She kept walking, hunched against the wind, her head down to try to protect her face. She saw Bozo Donuts, glowing like a lighthouse amid the closed stores on either side of it. She looked at the giant clown in front, the hedges that surrounded the building, and the red and white decor inside. There was a long counter, with red stools empty in front of it, behind which were gleaming racks of donuts and coffee rolls and danishes behind glass. She steered herself down the driveway without thinking. She wasn't hungry, but her feet, seemingly of their own accord, wanted to be out of the wind.
A bell tinkled gently when she came in through the door. She closed her eyes with pleasure as the dry, stuffy heat started to thaw her skinny jeans and the quarter moon of bare skin at her belly that her sweater revealed when she stood up straight. Her hands and cheeks began to burn with a diffuse, tingling pain as she felt the blood returning to the damaged tissue. There was an Indian woman behind the counter, mopping at the already clean surface with a dirty rag. She was older, perhaps in her 50s, but looked kindly and small, with a tendril of perfectly white hair hanging over one eye. She had a red dot on her forehead, and she was wrapped in a giant turquoise sari with plastic beads and bangles on it.
"Coffee?," she said in accented English.
The cold girl didn't say anything for a moment, then finally opened her eyes and looked at the woman.
"Yes," the visitor said. "Decaf. With cream and sugar." She didn't like coffee, but it would be hot, and she could add enough sugar to make it taste decent.
"Donut?," the woman behind the counter said.
The visitor patted her pockets swiftly, then dug into one, leaning to one side to get her fingers deep enough to reach it, coming out with a tattered five that had seen better days. She looked at the prices on display and appeared to make a calculation. "Yes," she said. "Glazed."
"I give you two for one," the woman said. "So I don't have to throw out."
"Oh," the girl said with surprise. "OK. Thank you." The girl didn't really want the donuts, but it was food, and it might mean she could stay in the glorious heat a little longer.
The woman behind the counter produced a steaming china cup of coffee, a spoon, and a glass sugar dispenser with a silver top, and a three small plastic cups of non dairy creamer. She placed a pair of donuts on a tan plate, along with a silver and black napkin dispenser. "$4.50," the handwritten bill said.
"You don't have car," the woman said.
"No," the girl said, pouring sugar into the steaming black liquid. "I walked."
"Too cold to walk," she said. "Why you walk?"
The girl took a bite of the donut while she thought of something to say, letting the sugar melt on her tongue. She settled on taking another bite.
"Men problems? You have a secret? You look like you have a secret," the woman said.
The girl stirred her coffee and took a sip, wincing at the heat and acidity, then added more sugar.
"Girl walk by herself, freezing cold night, no purse, no phone, no gloves, men involved," the woman said.
The girl took another bite of donut.
"Men always cause problems. Like my mother always say, 'Men always want one thing, women only want one thing. Trouble is, not same thing!,' " the woman said, laughing politely at her own joke.
The girl smiled, and took another bite, finishing the first one, followed by a sip of stinging, still bitter, coffee.
"I no let you walk home," the older woman said. "I get phone for you."
She went behind the donut case and emerged with a silver portable phone.
"Here," she said to the girl. "You call home. Tell him you sorry. He come pick you up. It too cold for little girl to walk."
The girl looked at the phone, and up at the woman's creased, aged face, the misadventures of sons and daughters and grandchildren etched there. The girl wanted to explain, to amplify, to show how she was right and he was wrong. But it was cold, and it didn't seem as important now.
"Women always have to say sorry," the woman said. "Even when we right. Especially when we right."
The girl swallowed, tried to say something, and then swallowed again. She picked up the phone and dialed.
"Daddy?," she said. "It's Jenny......Yeah....I'm sorry, Daddy......No, I am, really........I'm at Bozo Donuts, on Madison.......yeah, I walked here.......I know.........Yeah, I know we have to talk when we get home.....OK, Daddy.....Yeah........I know......I'm sorry, too........Bye."
She set the phone back on the counter. She finished the second donut in one bite, folding it into her mouth. She left the five dollar bill on top of the bill, and used one of the napkins to wipe her mouth.
"Thanks," she said.
"Thank you," the woman replied, watching the girl stand inside the front window. The two stayed where they were, without speaking, until a pair of headlights jerked their way into the driveway and stopped. The girl went out the front door and climbed into the passenger's side of a Ford truck. The woman watched the truck leave, then sadly turned out the lights and locked up for the evening.
The woman knew of the many cruelties men can inflict on women, and parents on children. She had experienced most of them. She didn't know if it was right to send the girl back where she came from, but she didn't know what else to do, and it was cold. Sometimes, the woman thought, that's all you can know.
Tuesday, November 06, 2012
Watch This Space
Everyone who follows this space closely (both of you) may have noticed a deafening silence coming from these parts. Well, folks, it's NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), and with that plus impending revisions and publication to The Thing That Had No Name, time for regular 'ol balderdash has gone the way of the Eagles' playoff chances. Normal (well, what passes for normal) activity should resume by December at the latest, or earlier if I give up the way I typically do.
Sunday, October 28, 2012
SPE: "Rider On The Storm"
(For the Scriptic Prompt Exchange this week, Kurt gave me this prompt: "It was a dark and stormy night (for Halloween's sake)". I gave the mighty Jester Queen this: " 'The things you should have given to the relationship, you give to the work' -Billy Joel")
It was a dark and stormy night. Every time I write that phrase, or even think it, I invariably picture Snoopy, banging away on his typewriter on top of his doghouse. H e never wrote the big book he was starting, and neither had I. But it really was dark, and it really was stormy, as I sat in the big old green house on the top of the hill to wait out the storm.
I had given in to the inevitable power loss, lighting up a few candles and settling in on the couch for a long night of reading and the radio. I had found a country station that was coming in pretty well, despite the occasional bursts of static. I turned it down low, giving me a nice background hum.
The DJ, whomever it was, was playing a lot of old stuff, from Glen Campbell and Johnny Cash to Hank Williams and Waylon Jennings. It wasn't my style of music, totally- I tended towards men that they influenced like Bruce Springsteen and U2, but it was the station I could get, and I was enjoying the low fi feel it gave to the evening.
I was tucking into a volume of Borges stories that I had been trying to tackle for some time, listening to the wind lash the windows and the rain hammer the roof. Suddenly, there was a pounding at my front door. It was so shocking I couldn't figure out, for a moment, what to do.
I got up and walked haltingly across the living room. I opened it to a woman in a deeply inadequate rain slicker. Her shoulders were hunched against the wind, and her dirty blonde hair was plastered to her head. She looked up at me, her eyes wide with something more than fear. She was tiny, with a dancer's tiny feet, but with enormous, expressive features.
"Um, I'm sorry," was all she could say before I ushered her inside.
"God, get in here," I said. "It's not fit for man or beast out there."
She came inside. Her jeans were nearly black with absorbed water, and her fashionable, worthless plush boots were soggy. She had a sweatshirt on under the jacket, which I took away as soon as she unzipped it.
"Let me get you a towel," I said, taking the jacket into the bathroom and emerging with a pair of towels I had thankfully just laundered.
"Thank you," she said, rubbing vigorously at her piles of blond hair. Her roots revealed her true color, a dark mousy brown. "My car flooded right in front of your house, and I hoped I could call for a ride or something?"
"Well, you could certainly do that," I said, "except the phones went out a couple of hours ago."
"Seriously?" she said. She looked stricken.
"Yes," I said. "Try it if you don't believe me."
"No, I believe you," she said. "It's just that I..damn it. I don't know what I'm going to do."
"Well, even if we could call for a tow, or a taxi, nobody would come out in this anyway."
"I bet you're right," she said, looking down at her feet.
"Stay here," I said.
"Oh, I couldn't," she said quickly. She looked panicky.
"I don't think there is anything else you can do," I said. "What are you going to do, walk?"
She looked at me, and then out the window. The wind blew alarmingly hard against the glass, howling with rage.
"I suppose you're right," she said. She looked small suddenly, defeated and alone.
"If the storm is over in the morning," I added, "like it is supposed to be, we'll see if your car will start. If it will, you can be on your way. If not, I'll give you a ride."
"Really," she said, "you'd do that?" She shivered.
"Sure," I said. "Go in my bedroom and change. I've got plenty of clothes in the drawers. Put on something dry and I'll make some tea."
She looked out at the dark sky, as if she could will her car to start. "Thank you," she said, and she squished into my bedroom.
The power was still on, for the moment, so I started a kettle and got down some tea bags from the cupboard. Since my wife had been taken by cancer and the kids to college and the Navy, the old house was too drafty and troublesome for one person. But I stayed, mostly out of provincial stubbornness, because I could.
I heard drawers opening in my bedroom. She could have ill intent, of course. I was dangerously naive about women in general, and young ones in particular, but I wasn't stupid. There wasn't much in the house to steal, and something about the improbable earnestness of her encounter made me think this was genuine. I peeked through the window through the slanting rain, and thought I could make out a car shape near the bottom of my driveway. She was real, I thought.
She came out in ludicrously large sweatpants and a huge t shirt with a Red Sox logo on it. She appeared to be bra less.
"I'm Sam," I said.
"Jessica," she said.
"Did you hang up your stuff in the bathroom?," I said.
"Yes," she said. "It looks like a girl's dorm in there now. Sorry."
"That's okay," I said. "It's been a while, but it's not the first time women have dried clothes in there."
The water was hot, so I shut the stove off and poured two cups. We both prepared our drinks, finally sitting at the dining room table together. I looked at her eyes, dark ringed and scared. Outside, the wind lashed away.
"Why were you out in this awful weather?," I said.
"It's a long story," she warned.
"We have time," I noted.
"I'm tired," she said.
"I understand," I said. "The offer still stands, whether you want to talk about it or not."
She took a sip of tea, wincing at the heat. She paused for a moment. "Have you ever been so scared that you just had to get away?," she asked.
"Sure I have," I said. She was looking at the tendrils of steam coming off of the surface.
"You shouldn't have to be scared," I said. "It's a terrible thing, to be afraid."
She was quiet.
"If you need to stay here beyond the storm...," I said.
She looked at me, her face a mask.
I listened to the wind howling. Somewhere, a branch cracked.
"I'm tired," she said again.
After a brief battle, she took my bed, which I had made two weeks ago and hadn't disturbed since, and I went back to the couch. It didn't take long for sleep to take me, and I awoke to sun coming through the branches in my back yard. I stretched and listened for my night visitor, but I heard nothing.
I got up and walked across to my bedroom door. I knocked gently, and then more vigorously. "You hungry?" I asked, trying to sound friendly. I tried the knob and it was open. I opened the door slowly.
"Hey," I said. "You up?"
I looked inside the bedroom, where my bedspread, tucked like always, looked back at me. Puzzled, I continued in, finding the bathroom as I had left it, no underwear drying, no jacket where i had left it, an old Esquire in the magazine rack. I went back to the front door, smelling the delightfully clean air and looking for the car I had seen by the road. It was gone, utterly gone, like none of it had ever happened. I surveyed the limbs that would need removal that were in my front yard, looking around for someone to explain what had happened.
I slid on some old Nikes and walked down to the bottom of my driveway. Not only was there no car, in fact the worn area of dirt that marked the edge of my yard was a sea of mud, only just beginning to dry in the apologetic sunlight. Not a tire track in sight.
I walked back up to the house, thankful that the power was still on, and wondering if I would ever see that Red Sox shirt again.
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
VV/TWC: "Slash"
[I decided to go double dutch this week. This story, "Slash", is submitted to Velvet Verbosity's 100 Word Challenge for the word "distancing", as well as my triplicate obsessed friends at the Trifecta Writing Challenge, for the word "sinister".]
Elisa worked her pocketknife into the black rubber right under the "G". She had to push, leaning with all her weight, but eventually the blade made its way forward. She heard a hiss of escaping air into the cold night. The music from the party pounded the air. Elisa started to sweat. He had been distancing himself, nothing sinister so far, just somehow managing to not be home when she called, or not at the store when she dropped by. Elisa wasn't going to have that, and she smiled as his Corvette began to cant forward on the ruined tire.
Elisa worked her pocketknife into the black rubber right under the "G". She had to push, leaning with all her weight, but eventually the blade made its way forward. She heard a hiss of escaping air into the cold night. The music from the party pounded the air. Elisa started to sweat. He had been distancing himself, nothing sinister so far, just somehow managing to not be home when she called, or not at the store when she dropped by. Elisa wasn't going to have that, and she smiled as his Corvette began to cant forward on the ruined tire.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
SPE: "Somebody Save Me"
{For the Scriptic prompt exchange this week, Talia gave me this prompt: "I want you to save me." I gave dailyshorts this prompt: " 'Guitar is the best form of self expression I know. Everything else, and I'm just sort of tripping around, trying to figure my way through life.' -Slash."}[This is called "Somebody Save Me"]
When she woke up, she drew her knees up towards her chest. The hospital gown was nearly translucent, revealing her bare flesh in places. It was taking her a while to focus, but after a few seconds, she saw that the curtain was pulled and it was just me, sitting there next to her bed beside the open window where the December sun struggled to show itself. Snow was just beginning to melt on the hospital roof, and every so often there would be a single, sad drop that flashed by. She relaxed, letting out a deep breath. Whatever else had passed between us, we had seen enough of each other's bodies to kill any thoughts of modesty.
Her knees had made little mountains of the bed sheet, which shrunk as she straightened her legs. She had IV lines in both arms. Occasionally, something whirred, clicked or beeped. Her pulse made a wavy, even line on a video screen above our heads.
"Hi," she said, her voice cracked and squeaky. She reached for a plastic cup of water on the bedside table. I stood up and helped her with it. She drank gently from the lip.
"Hi," she said again, her voice sounding softer and more natural.
"Hi," I said. Her hair was matted with sleep, and I could smell her sweat.
"Thanks for coming," she said.
"Of course. Not a problem."
"Nobody wanted to let you in. I had to tell the nurses that I wanted to see you." I heard a car turning out of the hospital drive onto the highway, tires spinning on some slush.
"Well, thank you. As long as you wanted to see me, I wanted to be here."
"My Mom kind of blames you. For what happened."
"I understand," I said. Her mother had been cold, but polite, on the phone when she gave me the news. "I probably would, if I were her."
"I told her it wasn't totally that. It was everything. I mean, that was part of it, but...you know."
"Yeah," I said. She had taken half a bottle of her mother's sleeping pills just over a week ago, and she had only been conscious for the last 2 days. We had been engaged up until Thanksgiving, when she gave me the ring back in a wine fuelled haze.
"I was making you crazy."
"Well," I said, swallowing. "No more than anyone else."
She chuckled, a soft little sound. "Come on. I was driving you nuts."
"Don't forget," I said, forcing a smile. "I was halfway there."
"True," she said. "I'm really sorry, Steven."
"I know."
"If I could undo it, you know I would." A nurse laughed as she walked away down the hall.
"I know."
"It's like...it's like...I don't even know why I do it. It's like there's this monster, and when it gets off the leash, it takes over. You were the only person who could talk to me when I was like that. The only one. When it's in control, I do stupid things. Awful things."
"I know," I said. It seemed like the only thing I could say.
"Dr. Sheffield says she's going to help me tame it. That it's going to take some work, but she will teach me ways to control it."
"That's great news," I said.
"I'm scared," she said. "What if I can't?"
"I'm sure you can," I said. "You can beat this. You're plenty tough enough."
"I wanted Jacob to save me. Then I wanted you to save me. Now I want the doctors and the pills to save me."
"You're worth saving," I said.
"I wish I believed that," she said. "I want you to save me, though. Still. Even though I know you can't. I know I have to save me. That's what they say. I have to do this for me."
"You will. Eventually, you'll want to save you. And the doctors will teach you how."
I reached out my hand. Her hand was resting on the mattress. I slid my fingertips underneath hers. The number that displayed her pulse increased slightly.
"Do you think, maybe, once I'm better...," she said.
"I'm not sure. Let's focus on healing for right now."
"Do you still have the ring?," she said. Her pulse climbed again.
"Yes," I said. It was still in the box I bought it in, underneath my clean socks.
"Do you still love me? Even after what I did?"
"Of course," I said. I did, too. Despite all the madness, I clung to her like a refugee.
"Then maybe we can start over?"
"Sure," I said. "You'll have to ask me out this time, though."
She laughed softly, then coughed once. "Deal."
Someone cleared her throat outside the curtain. She pulled it back slightly. It was the head nurse, a red faced Irish woman. "You have to go, son. Bath time."
"But he's already seen...," she began.
"Tssh!," the nurse hissed. "I've already broken the rules letting him in. He can come back during proper visiting hours. 2-4 tomorrow."
"I'll be back," I said. "Goodnight, Marlena."
"Goodnight, Steven," she said.
I walked down the hall, listening to the sounds, snatches of conversation about sex and death, work and money and fear. All around me, babies were being born, and people were slipping off into nothingness. I thought about tiny, perfect Marlena, all her rages and fits and reckless decisions, and tried to imagine a world without her. My own heart gave a nasty thump under my breastbone. When you can't live without someone, I guess you have to live with them.
When she woke up, she drew her knees up towards her chest. The hospital gown was nearly translucent, revealing her bare flesh in places. It was taking her a while to focus, but after a few seconds, she saw that the curtain was pulled and it was just me, sitting there next to her bed beside the open window where the December sun struggled to show itself. Snow was just beginning to melt on the hospital roof, and every so often there would be a single, sad drop that flashed by. She relaxed, letting out a deep breath. Whatever else had passed between us, we had seen enough of each other's bodies to kill any thoughts of modesty.
Her knees had made little mountains of the bed sheet, which shrunk as she straightened her legs. She had IV lines in both arms. Occasionally, something whirred, clicked or beeped. Her pulse made a wavy, even line on a video screen above our heads.
"Hi," she said, her voice cracked and squeaky. She reached for a plastic cup of water on the bedside table. I stood up and helped her with it. She drank gently from the lip.
"Hi," she said again, her voice sounding softer and more natural.
"Hi," I said. Her hair was matted with sleep, and I could smell her sweat.
"Thanks for coming," she said.
"Of course. Not a problem."
"Nobody wanted to let you in. I had to tell the nurses that I wanted to see you." I heard a car turning out of the hospital drive onto the highway, tires spinning on some slush.
"Well, thank you. As long as you wanted to see me, I wanted to be here."
"My Mom kind of blames you. For what happened."
"I understand," I said. Her mother had been cold, but polite, on the phone when she gave me the news. "I probably would, if I were her."
"I told her it wasn't totally that. It was everything. I mean, that was part of it, but...you know."
"Yeah," I said. She had taken half a bottle of her mother's sleeping pills just over a week ago, and she had only been conscious for the last 2 days. We had been engaged up until Thanksgiving, when she gave me the ring back in a wine fuelled haze.
"I was making you crazy."
"Well," I said, swallowing. "No more than anyone else."
She chuckled, a soft little sound. "Come on. I was driving you nuts."
"Don't forget," I said, forcing a smile. "I was halfway there."
"True," she said. "I'm really sorry, Steven."
"I know."
"If I could undo it, you know I would." A nurse laughed as she walked away down the hall.
"I know."
"It's like...it's like...I don't even know why I do it. It's like there's this monster, and when it gets off the leash, it takes over. You were the only person who could talk to me when I was like that. The only one. When it's in control, I do stupid things. Awful things."
"I know," I said. It seemed like the only thing I could say.
"Dr. Sheffield says she's going to help me tame it. That it's going to take some work, but she will teach me ways to control it."
"That's great news," I said.
"I'm scared," she said. "What if I can't?"
"I'm sure you can," I said. "You can beat this. You're plenty tough enough."
"I wanted Jacob to save me. Then I wanted you to save me. Now I want the doctors and the pills to save me."
"You're worth saving," I said.
"I wish I believed that," she said. "I want you to save me, though. Still. Even though I know you can't. I know I have to save me. That's what they say. I have to do this for me."
"You will. Eventually, you'll want to save you. And the doctors will teach you how."
I reached out my hand. Her hand was resting on the mattress. I slid my fingertips underneath hers. The number that displayed her pulse increased slightly.
"Do you think, maybe, once I'm better...," she said.
"I'm not sure. Let's focus on healing for right now."
"Do you still have the ring?," she said. Her pulse climbed again.
"Yes," I said. It was still in the box I bought it in, underneath my clean socks.
"Do you still love me? Even after what I did?"
"Of course," I said. I did, too. Despite all the madness, I clung to her like a refugee.
"Then maybe we can start over?"
"Sure," I said. "You'll have to ask me out this time, though."
She laughed softly, then coughed once. "Deal."
Someone cleared her throat outside the curtain. She pulled it back slightly. It was the head nurse, a red faced Irish woman. "You have to go, son. Bath time."
"But he's already seen...," she began.
"Tssh!," the nurse hissed. "I've already broken the rules letting him in. He can come back during proper visiting hours. 2-4 tomorrow."
"I'll be back," I said. "Goodnight, Marlena."
"Goodnight, Steven," she said.
I walked down the hall, listening to the sounds, snatches of conversation about sex and death, work and money and fear. All around me, babies were being born, and people were slipping off into nothingness. I thought about tiny, perfect Marlena, all her rages and fits and reckless decisions, and tried to imagine a world without her. My own heart gave a nasty thump under my breastbone. When you can't live without someone, I guess you have to live with them.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
SPE: "Crippled Inside"
[For the Scriptic prompt exchange this week, Jester Queen gave me this prompt: "Cold air blew in from the front of the house, and I knew before I went into the kitchen that the door had been open all night." I gave Eric Storch this prompt: " 'Sometimes I don't consider myself very good at life, so I hide in my profession.' --Kurt Vonnegut"]
I didn't have many visitors. On a hot day, my mailman would sit and drink some ice water with me, and I had a few neighbors who would check in on me. But generally speaking, I was alone most of the time. It suited me well enough. I had always been a solitary sort of person, even when my house was crowded. My wife was stolen, first her soul, then her body, by breast cancer, and then my son left to chase his dreams, living with 4 other animators in a rented house outside St. Louis. So I was alone, mostly, and that was by choice. Mostly.
So when the cold air blew in from the front of the house, I knew before I went into the kitchen that the door had been open all night. I knew I hadn't left it open- my nighttime ritual involved shutting all my doors and windows, then giving both doors a ritual tug to be sure they had latched. I didn't lock them anymore- there wasn't anything for anyone to steal, and our neighborhood was quiet and paranoid enough so that any unusual visitors would stick out.
I had glanced at the clock as I walked through the kitchen. It was 3:45, bringing to mind the old Fitzgerald quote about how, in a deep dark night of the soul, it is always 3 o'clock in the morning. I didn't have to be anywhere in the morning, but this time of the night always troubled me. 2 o'clock is somehow still part of the previous night, and 4 o'clock always belongs to the next day. 3 is a hermaphrodite, half here and half there, and when I find myself awake at that hour, I am always haunted by a vague anxiety, a feeling that nothing good can happen.
I came into the front room and stopped short when I saw her. She was sitting in my recliner, which faced vaguely towards the television, her legs crossed primly at the knee as if she was waiting to be called on. She was in that indeterminate spectrum of age- she could be a tall 12 year old, or a slim lass of 20. Her legs were bare, and she wore only what I assumed was a nightshirt, along with those comically functionless boots that were still in fashion- too slight to be any real protection, and too common to be truly fashionable. It wasn't freezing- in my New England boyhood, we'd call this a warm winter day. But it was too cold to be outside in nightclothes.
I shut the door gently, continuing to look at her as she sat. Her hair was a rat's nest of disorder, tufts and tangles galore. I could see her nipples pushing at the fabric, taut and hard, but her face was a mask of dreamy unconcern. I knew two things that would produce that face, being stoned and sleepwalking, and I assumed it was probably the latter. I had lived with a sleepwalker in college, and we all got used to steering him back to bed at all hours of the night.
"Hi," I said, my voice syrupy from sleep. She didn't react, simply kept staring at my television like she was waiting for someone. She looked familiar. I knew she belonged in the neighborhood, but which kid belonged to which house was a daily puzzle that I never exerted myself enough to solve. Emily, I think her name was.
"Emily?," I tried. "Honey? You're in the wrong house, sweetheart."
Nothing. She could be an android before you pressed the on button. Not happy, not sad, just blank emptiness.
"Emily?"
Silence.
I walked over to the couch and picked up an Afghan my wife had knitted years ago. I walked over to her and tried to wrap it around her shoulders. She was still unresponsive, so I settled on draping it over her as best I could. At least I couldn't see her nipples anymore. What kind of thoughts were running through her head? Was she escaping from something? What made someone walk through the cold into a stranger's house? I knew the old wives' tale that you couldn't wake up a sleepwalker without causing insanity was false, but I didn't want to wake her up even so. She would be entitled to be panicky, waking up in a stranger's house, barely clothed.
I dialed 911, keeping an eye on her as I waited. Once I explained, the dispatcher chuckled.
"Oh, Emily? Yeah, this isn't the first time. About once a month, she escapes whatever traps her parents lay and gets out. She's visited everyone on the block at least once. I guess it's just your turn tonight. Hold tight, an officer is on the way."
I set the phone down, looking at her empty, open face. Her face was flushed red, probably from the wind as she walked. I knew intellectually she had a disease, no more or less than an ear infection, one that would probably clear as she aged. But I had a sick feeling, a deep disquiet that something was wrong with my nocturnal intruder.
The police knocked politely as I pondered. The officer at the door was a young looking man, slightly tense, giving me a long hard look. We exchanged greetings, and I stepped back, letting him and his partner, a squat, muscular looking blonde woman, into my house.
"There she is," the woman said lovingly. She walked in front of me, scooping the girl up as if she were a sleepy toddler. One of Emily's boots fell to the floor as the officer lifted her up. Her toenails had ragged dots of polish on them. I picked up the boot and handed it to the male officer.
"Is this her blanket?," the woman said.
"No," I said. "It's mine. Let her keep it."
"OK," she said. "I'll give the parents your address. You should get to know each other."
With no more strain than lifting a case of soda, the woman walked past me carrying the girl.
I looked at the male officer. "Pedersen," his uniform said.
"Do you think she's OK?," I said. "She's not being abused or anything?"
"I thought that, too," he said. "My partner, there, had a long talk with her the last time we had to pick her up. She swears up and down everything is fine. Until she says boo, there's not much we can do about it."
"Aha. Well thanks for coming out."
"No problem. Thanks for not shooting her."
"Good night, Officer."
"Good night. And lock your door," Pedersen said.
The three of them left. My heat cycled on, trying to eliminate the chill. I thought about her foot, bare in the still chilly air, so vulnerable. My heart ached briefly for all the lonely people I could not protect, and then I sighed and turned the TV on.
That Thing That I Do? I'm About To Do It Again.
"Yesterday it was my birthday-
I hung one more year on the line-
I should be depressed-
My life's a mess-
But I'm having a good time."
-Paul Simon
"Have A Good Time"
Tuesday, October 09, 2012
100 Word Song: "Gone"
(Lance, who is nobody's fool, and whose blog can beat up my blog, allowed his infinitely patient better half, the lovely Bobina, to select this week's 100 Word Song, Snow Patrol's "Chasing Cars". Since I am an Oldy McOlderton From Oldville, I assumed that this would be another of the selections that I had never heard of, but I was pleasantly surprised to learn that I had in fact heard it. It was one of those, "Oh yeah, THAT song" situations. This story is called "Gone". )
It was one of those moments cat owners know. The house was quiet, and Bella jumped up onto the bed, eyeing me suspiciously. I was dressed, but just laying there, passively resisting my to do list.
"Do you want to come have a rest, baby?," I said, speaking softly. She was very skittish. She looked into my eyes.
"Do you want to lay here with me?," I said.
My phone rang. It was sitting on the bed, and as soon as it vibrated, she was up and off, down onto the floor and jetting into the kitchen.
"Damn," I thought.
It was one of those moments cat owners know. The house was quiet, and Bella jumped up onto the bed, eyeing me suspiciously. I was dressed, but just laying there, passively resisting my to do list.
"Do you want to come have a rest, baby?," I said, speaking softly. She was very skittish. She looked into my eyes.
"Do you want to lay here with me?," I said.
My phone rang. It was sitting on the bed, and as soon as it vibrated, she was up and off, down onto the floor and jetting into the kitchen.
"Damn," I thought.
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