Shoelace

          Mom was the other shoe, but the other shoe is gone now.  Perhaps she’s marching off by herself somewhere, in the other realm, exploring uncharted lands single-footedly.  I like to think, sometimes, that maybe she’s having fun on her own, that she doesn’t miss us and so won’t be bothered still by the tedious proceedings of our lives.  Clouds must be lighter to walk on than pavement.  But even on pavement she was the leading foot, and I guess we fell out of line when she ceased to step.

          I am the shoelace, now, that pulls together the parts of what remains.  I know I am the shoelace because when I see the girls at school lacing up their sneakers, I think, there is Jamie on one side and there is Dad on the other.  The girls at school are always lacing up their shoes, especially the younger ones in Jamie’s year, because they tie loose butterfly knots and the knots come undone.  I watch them and I want them to pull harder, so that the sides touch over the dividing tongue.  I lace my own shoes tight.  I lace them so tight my feet hurt by the time I get home.  I lace and lace but there are always gaps where the tongue peeks through. 

          Home has become a habit.  Dad is tired most of the time.  The crease lines around his eyes that got there from laughter are sagging from disuse, and a new crease has set into the space between his eyebrows that I want to iron out.  He sits at his computer in his foldable office chair in the living room, which is also the dining room and also the room he calls his office, of our apartment, working out the details of the fund management business he is trying to start.  He thinks he is a failure.  I tell him not to think that.

          The strength comes, perhaps, from the memory that it was once different and the hope that it will be the same if I just string harder and close the gaps.  I remember one night when my palms were sweaty and the plate slipped, and Dad said “butterfingers” and Jamie laughed and laughed and helped me clean up the mess of mashed potatoes and even the gravy.  I stretch myself because I want moments like that again. 

          Jamie is usually sitting at her computer when I go in to bring her her dinner in the evenings.  She takes dinner in her room because she doesn’t have time to eat with us.  I don’t know what it is she’s working on that she can’t leave her computer.  When I ask, she starts yelling about privacy.  Sometimes when I go in to bring her her dinner, Jamie is banging on the drum-set Dad couldn’t afford to buy.  She wanted to learn percussion, so Dad bought her the whole set – the base, the symbol stand, the snares, and the big vertical one that you strike by stepping on a pedal with your foot.  Sometimes when Jamie is banging on them, I tell her that maybe she should use those things that you put on the ends of drumsticks to make the banging a little quieter.  I am thinking about Ed and Louise downstairs who are old and are always taking naps.  Jamie tells me that she won’t get the full effect with the mufflers and that I don’t understand anything about music, so I should just leave and please shut the door.  She bangs louder as I try to explain about Ed and Louise and I can see that it is no use, so I leave and shut the door.

          We don’t see Jamie very often because she only comes out of her room to make trips to the refrigerator in the kitchen.  The refrigerator is about three feet from her door-handle.  When we moved into the apartment a few years ago, Jamie wanted the master bedroom.  It has a small walk-in closet and a bathroom attached to it, so I guess there is really no reason for her to come out.  Dad’s room is the smallest because he wanted me to have the big window.  He said it would be good if I put my desk by the window so that I can have lots of light when I study.  Studying is important, he says, so I try hard at it when I can.  Dad and I share the bathroom in the hallway.  

          I see Dad in the mornings.  He gets up before we go to school and makes eggs.  He tries to make them a different way every morning so that he can know how we like them.  Sometimes he makes pancakes because he’s heard that all the younger generation like pancakes and will eat them for breakfast.  Dad is always preparing a variety of things for Jamie, but I don’t see why he keeps doing it because she never eats anything he makes.  “Everything you cook is too salty.”  Jamie likes snack bars and the diet bars that some of the girls carry around at school.  “Even your pancakes are salty.” 

          I don’t see Jamie at school very often because she’s two grades below me and we’re usually in different wings.  But I noticed that some days our lunch periods overlap so I’ve started to keep an eye out for her.  Like today, she walks in talking to a girl with a red bandana tied around her neck.  I think Jamie sees me but she says something to the girl and they start walking away, so I shout “Jamie!” and the girl with the red bandana turns around.  I walk over to them, carrying my lunch tray with a glass of milk that I’ve filled too much to the top.  All this time, I’m thinking, I’m going to spill the milk, I’m going to spill the milk.  The girl with the red bandana raises her thin eyebrows at me.  “Nice sweater,” she says.  She catches Jamie’s eye and smiles.  Jamie is looking down.  “Thanks,” I say.  I ask them if they want to have lunch with me, but they say they are having lunch with friends, so I go over by the window with the big oak tree and notice the milk on my sweater as I sit down. 

          After we get home, after dinner, Dad and Jamie are fighting again.  I’m in my room trying to fall asleep when they bump into each other in the kitchen. 

          Bumping into anyone in the kitchen is inevitable because Dad is always making tea which means the kettle is always boiling.  Sometimes it just goes on whistling and shouting because Jamie thinks Dad will get it and Dad thinks I will take care of it but I am in the shower trying to untangle my mess of hair.  So they scramble for it at once, and the confrontation is of course inevitable. 

          And we are all making trips to the kitchen because we are all needing food.  Sometimes when I go into the kitchen I forget what it was I came to get, so I stand there and look at the magnets on the refrigerator.  Most of them, Mom bought when she was alive.  We don’t use them for anything anymore because none of us really makes grocery lists or daily notes or family announcements.  The magnets are just there, stuck to the refrigerator. 

          So Dad and Jamie start fighting again and I curl up under the covers because it’s cold.  Dad is asking Jamie how was her day and I hear the refrigerator door stick as Jamie pulls it and says he forgot to buy her tuna again.  Dad says that well he’s sorry but maybe the world doesn’t revolve around her.  The refrigerator door shuts with a suctioning noise.  “Well maybe if you knew how to be a better parent, you would actually remember for once.”  I search under the covers for Tipsy, the bunny Mom gave me when I was three.  His ears are flopping down as usual.  I can imagine Dad shaking his head and sighing.  His eyes look sad.  Jamie’s door slams.

          Tipsy is looking at me like I should go and do something.  So I get up in my pajamas and walk over to the living room/dining room/Dad’s office and find Dad sitting in his foldable chair with his head in his hands.  I pick up one of the old magazines on the coffee table and sit down on the couch.  It is one of Jamie’s.  I turn over pages while looking at Dad.  It is the first time I notice that his hair is graying.  “I think you’re a good parent.”  Dad lifts his head up out of his hands and sighs.  “You know, Liz.  Sometimes I really just want to give up.”  I set the magazine back on the table.  Dad has his head in his hands again.

          I go into Jamie’s room and she’s looking at some sort of old photo album that she flips shut when I walk in.  I ask Jamie what is she looking at and she tells me it’s none of my business, so I am quiet for awhile.  Then I ask her if she wants to have a midnight meal.  We used to have midnight meals, Jamie and me, when we were little and used to play chef.  We also used to have a house, then, and we would sneak downstairs after lying with our eyes open in the dark for hours to make sure everyone was asleep.  We’d sneak downstairs and start pulling out all the pots and pans we needed for our meal.  Somewhere in the midst of our preparations, our clanging and banging would wake Mom up and she’d come into the kitchen to see what we were up to.  “We’re making a midnight meal!” we’d tell her.  We knew it was too late for her to stop us, so she’d begin clanging and banging with us, and we’d be happy to have someone who knew the ways around the kitchen.  So now when I ask Jamie does she want to have a midnight meal, she lifts her head up off the pillow.  She blinks.  What would we make, she wants to know.  I am thinking about strings.  “Spaghetti,” I say.  Jamie shrugs.  “If you make it I’ll eat it.”

            I go into the kitchen and try to think where to begin.  Pots and pans.  Noodles, long strings of noodles.  Boiling water.  Tomato sauce in a saucepan.  Milk.  I stir and wait and wait and knock on Jamie’s door to tell her I’m done.  I start spooning all the spaghetti onto a plate and mixing it with the sauce I’ve made. 

            Jamie comes out of her room to get a bowl and a fork and watches me finish evening out the sauce in the spaghetti.  I bring the plate over to the dining table and ask Dad would he like to join us for a midnight meal.  Jamie has followed in front of me at this point and is sitting at the table with her bowl.  My palms are sweaty. 

            Dad is at his work again, hiding all the sadness I must have imagined in a look almost of anger.  He has not heard my question so I open my mouth to ask him again if he would like to join us for midnight meal, when Jamie tells me to just serve the spaghetti already.  Dad’s brows furrow as he types faster and faster on his keypad.  Jamie’s fork is rapping impatiently against her ceramic plate and I cringe slightly at its metal scrape.  The lights seem to flicker.  Another metal scrape.

            Another excruciating hair-raising metal scrape.

            The plate flies and I don’t even notice until it hits the wall on the opposite side.  Then I flail my arms out to catch it but it has already landed and the sauce is everywhere, sliding down the wall and seeping into the carpet.  Jamie has stopped rapping her fork against her plate and is looking at Dad, who has looked up from his work. 

            Dad gets up from his foldable chair and comes over to observe the mess for a moment.  He brings a fist up to his eyes to rub them in a tired way.

          “Butterfingers,” he says.  He rubs his eyes again. 

          Jamie takes a minute to make sure she’s heard right, then her laugh is almost immediate.  She has expected him to say something about the stain it will leave in the carpet.  She has expected a mess.  Jamie laughs and Dad’s weak smile boldens.  “Such a butterfingers!”  Jamie is practically shaking from laughter now and I’ve forgotten all about the spilled spaghetti, until Dad comes over to help clean it up, and Jamie bends down to scoop some up with her hands.  I retrieve the plate from where it has flown and hold it out as we reassemble the strings of spaghetti, Jamie on one side and Dad on the other, then Dad on one side, Jamie on the other.    

Bella

It’s been awhile…here’s a piece that I’m not satisfied with at all, but am posting anyway.  I will actually be traveling to Piazza San Marco in a few weeks, so will have a greater sense of place when I write about it.  Here’s to magic, anyway:

Bella

He looked her square in the eye. 

I see, he said, and stepped back.  She stepped to the side.  Then she stepped away, and the hem of her dress swayed as she crossed the plaza not looking back.

I’m sure I’m not mistaken when I say there are two kinds of love in this world.  Look now at our young mercenary wiping the mist off his brow.  Look how he turns on his heel, how he scoffs!  At himself, undoubtedly.  And how forcibly he strides in the opposite direction!  We have here, clearly a case of the former.

The birds flew up as they are always doing.  And Salvatore strode over them and around them, kicked the ones up into the air that did not fly voluntarily out of his way.  In this fashion, he blazed a trail through the gently feeding pigeons and the aged couples amongst them who were also feeding, but on more intact pieces of bread.  Salvatore pushed past these coats and feathers until he made it across St. Mark’s Square. 

The day that had barely begun was done now.  And it did not come back the next morning, nor the next, as Salvatore wandered lonely Venice in – pursuit, shall we say? – no – more like directionless searching for the Bella he had lost.  He thought he saw her departing just there, under the canopy, or turning the corner into more corners, somewhere on the horizon when the sun rose.  But because she was never quite close enough, and because Salvatore was never quite sure enough, his search turned rather into a waited observance, and Salvatore stood always staring after her, his loathly lady.

But he did look for her.  I can’t say he didn’t.  He looked in alleyways, museums, the galleries she’d haunted, in paintings of solitary streets.  He looked under trashcans, over streetlamps.  Overturned gondolas and stopped taxi-cabs.  One day he looked— wooden boats down canals carrying musicians to restaurants, along small arches of doorways, window frames, restless balconies lit by sun and light, with chipped paint revealing brick of earlier diplomacy, new paint bouncing color into shifting waters— and saw grayness settle over a skeleton city.

The night brought closer encounters.

Salvatore worked by the light of his beside lamp.  But he could no longer work, so he admired it now, looking at the lamp as if mesmerized.  It was the figure of a woman, her arms stretched above her head holding the light fixture, her head turned away.  Salvatore ran his finger along one of the breasts.  How sensuous the curves!  How soft the stone appears, as it true flesh.  He quickly retracted his hand and stood up.  He pulled a lampshade out from under his bed and felt the thick material between his fingers.  It dimmed the light so he could sleep.  Thus he put it on now, this night shade, over the indifferent figure and the light bulb, and the room darkened.  And so Salvatore lie in thoughts of Bella, falling to sleep beside his sleeping night shade.

Before daybreak, Salvatore woke twice to relieve himself and once to spit.  When he rose in the morning, he remembered that they’d agreed to see each other again.  So Salvatore drew his black overcoat about his shoulders and made his way to St. Mark’s Square. 

She was standing in front of the café.  He saw her before he’d even fully turned out of the alleyway.  It was an old café.  Still alive, but rundown.  Paint was flaked and fading on the large sign over the door so that the entire first half of the word was not there.  The owners never took the pains to fix it, thinking it added to the vintage style of the place, so people, having lost half the name, simply referred to the café as donna.  Bella stood in front of the faded sign now, and touched a hand to her falling golden hair.

This next part – I’m not sure how it happened, but believe me it did.  In this next part, Bella smoothes the folds in her pink-white dress of chiffon and color seeps into the stonework at her feet.  Pink hues, earthen hues, spring up from under people’s shoes.  The paint on buildings softly brightens pastel.

Passersby seem oblivious to the phenomenon taking place, not noticing even when their coats acquire an inexplicable brilliance, when their pearls regain luster, their diamonds lose the stubborn cover of dust and again sparkle.  They pass by.

But Salvatore saw it all.

Bella turned and he looked into her beautiful round eyes.  Then she was gone.  From the northeast corner, the bells on the clock tower tolled – I number only peaceful hours – and slowly, slowly, the city fell silent of echoes.  

 

 

Fiction Portfolio, Revisited

A circumspect reflection on a unit should focus primarily on what I learned. So I shall revisit my portfolio and give a more complete account…

In fiction, the goal that I tried hardest to achieve was to make characters walk off the page – saunter, in some cases, or crawl or sprint. I did this through careful observation of people going about their daily routines as I went about mine. Small movements, the way people acted or talked, were under the scrutiny of my covetous eye. Writing stranger studies instigated a constant sketching of them in my head. Running commentary and fiction narrative scrolled through my thoughts as I met people, observed them, looked at them from afar. This whole process, which was brought out during the unit and intensified as it progressed, helped make me pay attention to how characters might walk off the page – with a jaunty off-step, or with a slight limp due to a previous injury that the reader does not find out about until the end of the story, or with a wink and a line: “Be good. I’ll come check on you tomorrow.”

But it’s quite difficult, creating a full portrait of a character in such a way that he comes to life for the reader. I feel that many of the characters in my short stories and exercises fall flat. (My extraordinary –> ordinary piece is an example of underdeveloped characters.) I realized the challenge of keeping out of the cliché. At times I felt that the expressions I used were very colloquial and somewhat static. It was difficult to write in a different way, with descriptions that were solely unique to the person, and with a new, fresh perspective. In order to develop my characters, I created their back-stories in my head, so that whether I chose to take anything from them or not, the knowledge of their past and their person would still influence the way I wrote about the character in the story.

One risk I took was the experimentation of inhabiting different characters’ voices. I struggled to break out of my own lyrical, quiet, fairytale-like narrative voice to take on different personas and sound convincing. I tried to do this in both my myth re-appropriation The Boy Who Cried, in which I took on the voice of the “villain” character who is usually not given much thought, and in my first person narrative “Pete’s First Date,” in which I adopted the voice of a character I normally would not write about or from the perspective of. First person was by far the hardest voice to write from, mainly because I wanted to interject as the writer, or simply found it hard to break out of my already established style of writing which I had become rather attached to. Speaking of attachment, I wonder if it dangerous to become too attached to your characters. What degree of distance should the writer maintain? Is the goal to have as little distance as possible? Or will the writer become too involved rather than let the character tell his/her own story?

I think the aspect of writing fiction that I explored most extensively was dialogue. Technique-wise, this is the area that I learned the most in and improved the most in. Before our studies and exercises in dialogue, I was not consciously aware of the different ways of writing dialogue and how each functioned and propelled a story. After learning about the effects of summarized dialogue vs. actual dialogue, I was able to make mindful decisions about how people talk to each other in my stories. I practiced summarized dialogue quite a lot and experimented with how it fit into the narrative voice of the piece and kept the story moving forward rather than slowing it down with actual dialogue. And I learned that actual dialogue, then, in the midst of summarized dialogue, could be extremely effective. It felt, in some ways, earned.

Another important element that I was introduced to in this unit was structure. I learned from the pieces we read, the effectiveness of marrying form and content. For some pieces, certain structures spoke to a particular story more than others. The way that a story is told is just as important as what is being told. Examining writers closely (as I did with my presentation author Thom Jones and my response author Milos Macourek) lent insight into how to employ the best structure possible for a piece. In imitating them, I was able to apply their techniques and learn from putting my observations into practice. The piece that most exhibits my experimentation with form and structure is my imitation piece: Johnny’s Goldfish.

The lessons I learned in writing during this unit are many and I cannot recall them all in this reflection. There may be simple stylistic moments that I picked up unconsciously that I have transferred into my writing – the best way to learn how to write is, after all, reading those who know what they’re doing. And put their instruments into practice, get into the habit of keeping a journal and writing everyday. In all, the most important thing I will take away from fiction, I think, is a heightened awareness of my narrator. With this comes narrative voice, narrative distance, etc., but what is most important is to know who is speaking and whose story it is, be it one person’s, many people’s, an ant’s, or even, perhaps, the color blue’s. I tried my best to bring this awareness of the narrator together with all the other lessons I’ve learned into my final piece: Story of the Stone.

Back to fiction portfolio

Here is an update on my long fiction piece, still unfinished, still disconnected, but slightly more developed than where I left it last: story-of-the-stone

Reflection on Fiction

Fiction was supposed to be the unit in which I would feel at home as a writer, but it in fact proved to be the most difficult so far and will stand, I think, as the most difficult unit for me even after poetry, though we haven’t even stepped into poetry yet.

Perhaps it is because I settled into creative non-fiction too nicely and got too comfortable. I’m not sure. I usually tend to think of myself as a fairly creative person, which is why I have always been drawn to fiction – inhabiting different characters’ voices and actually being someone else has always been fun for me. But somehow, throughout this unit, I felt as though I couldn’t get these creative juices to flow. The only consistent feeling I got when sitting down to write was writer’s block.

But though I feel that this fiction portfolio is not up to the standard at which I know I can write, I have learned many things throughout this unit. For one, I am definitely honing my skills in reading as a writer. The step to perfect is applying them. I have also done a lot of experimentation in our exercises and assignments. It may be that they don’t work as individual pieces, but in writing them I am practicing writing. Perhaps this is more important for me as a writer in the long run.

I should mention discipline. You told me in a conference that to be a writer, one needs talent, passion, and discipline (and luck, if we’re going to go there). This unit made me realize just how much I lack discipline. The reason why many of my stories are still unfinished (and not just unfinished in the sense that no piece is ever really “finished” – I mean really, far from finished, as in the ending is nowhere near well thought-out) is because I tell myself that I can only write when I am truly inspired to write, when I want to write. I put off writing, saying I will do it when I am able to set aside a large chunk of time to just sit and write and organize my thoughts. And it takes a long time to even do just that, when I have set aside time.

But here is my sample from fiction nonetheless:
(It is incomplete. I intend to finish this portfolio fully, but find that I cannot within this time limit. This is very much the fault of my writing habit and I am very sorry – I will get my missing pieces up as soon as possible.)

Writer response: Milos Macourek

Macourek imitation: Johnny’s Goldfish

Stranger Studies: England Strangers

Kafka Re-appropriation: The Boy Who Cried

Extraordinary –> Ordinary: Petrified

Dialogue Exercises: 1st, 2nd, 3rd person narrators

1st person short story: Pete’s First Date

Some exercises from my journal.

My long fiction piece is still unfinished as of yet…I will post it soon to complete my portfolio.

fiction piece in progress

(this is just a rough beginning…I’ll keep updating as I piece things together)

Story of the Stone

I’ll tell you I found it. One day, among some rocks in a riverbed, perhaps. I might tell you, if you point to my neck and ask, almost touching it, that the sun was shining in a cloudless sky that day, and a glint in the water caught my eye.

That is what I tell little kids, sometimes, because they have a fascination with found things, and it sends them scurrying off to riverbeds and trickling streams, squinting into the water despite the glare. Sometimes they find things like smoothed broken glass and that is enough. But that is not what I told Diego, when we first locked eyes two summers ago. It was a swelteringly hot day, even for Mexicans, and when I was forced, at midday, to leave my small but cool hostel room in search of water, no one was in the streets. I walked in the heat for a bit, and that was when we locked eyes. Or rather, when he locked eyes with my necklace.

There is a stone I wear around my neck. It is a bead, really – a stone, that lies horizontally with a hole drilled through it for a string to run through. Its shape is an imperfect cylinder that is slightly longer than the length of my lips and slightly wider than the width of them. It is called a Three-Eye stone because of the pattern. It has three eyes.

His mother clapped her hands together and said Diego, my son Diego, a few times before noticing me. When she finally did, she repeated the episode with increased fervor, replacing my name, which she did not know, with such a beautiful girl. I smiled as she sprinkled me with these soft Spanish words and continued to smile as she leaned in close to examine the stone.

“What is this, anyway?” William traced his hand down my face, gliding his fingers over my neck to get a closer examination of the stone. I cupped my hand over it before he could touch it. He lifted his head up off the pillow and looked at me through the darkness. “You’re not supposed to touch it,” I explained, “It’s bad luck.” And though his face was only a few inches from mine, I had trouble making out his expression. My hand still covered the stone. “Is that what the gypsies told you?” He let his head drop back onto the pillow and I couldn’t tell if it was in exasperation or simply tired disinterest. “I didn’t know you were so superstitious.”

I suppose because the stone is large, it draws attention. And it is unusual; few have seen the likes of it. No one can begin to guess where it might come from. People want to know.

The next day, Diego wanted to introduce me to his family. So he took my hand and took me to his village. His mother was cooking corn tortillas when we arrived in front of her worn, wooden house, thatch-roofed and everything, leaking from the rain and smoking from the cooking. She was expecting the milkman.

The stone is actually from Tibet.

I usually wear it tucked under my shirt, where I can feel it on my skin. Perhaps that is why William didn’t ask me about it until a month into our relationship, because it was wintertime then – a time of warm sweaters and thick coats and a cold that amplified the bell tolls of Big Ben. It was not until he accompanied me back to my flat to politely remove my coat and pull my concealing sweater over my head that his curiosity was piqued. I could tell, during that slow study of my body, that it was my necklace that was the main object of his attention. But he gave my figure its due respect and did not ask me about it until the next morning, when we had become a bit better acquainted.

I told him that a gypsy sold it to me for a good price. He looked amused. “Oh?” “She was a traveling gypsy.” William was not exposed to the world. He had never left the small, proud island that he called home, bowing to the queen, kneeling before the houses of parliament, and I knew he would know nothing of far-away lands. “Of the Ruska Roma.” He did not follow. “The Russian Gypsies.”

In-Class Exercise: Strange Words

5 words:
-slukie
-galiven
-vollow
-slitties
-selukilim

Salt

He’s searching all my cupboards again.

“I told you, I don’t have any.”

“Pepper, ground pepper, cloves…selukilim? You have selukilim and you don’t have salt?”

I smile as he galivenly sniffs the small bottle of selukilim. The kitchen is in a vollow state. Half-chopped onions litter the countertop. Chives, parsley…a whole slukie of vegetables still haven’t been washed.

“What’s this?” He pulls out a half-rotting zucchini from somewhere among the mass of decaying vegetables. He makes a face and tosses it into the slitties.

Dialogue Exercises

3rd person:

“Which is apparently unprecedented, or not unprecedented, but—”

“But very unusual.”

“Largely. Yeah, largely.”

Thomas looked back down at the newspaper and continued to read.

“Historical,” she said.

He nodded. She was looking out the window, staring the sun down. It cut into her eyes and made her squint. Thomas paused in his reading to examine her over the top of his newspaper. He thought her rather pretty.

“Oh, if I could go back now…” The sun threw sparks into her red hair.

“Go back…”

She tore her eyes away from the sun to look at him, and he thought he saw its light still lingering there.

“Home.”

And she was squinting at the sun again.

2nd person:

“I really want more chicken, but there isn’t any more.”

What do you say to that? You might say gee, that’s really too bad or you might say maybe that’s because you ate it all, but you think it best not to say anything, so you continue looking down at your plate of food and continue feeding yourself, pretending you didn’t hear.

“I need more water.”

You’ve been sitting here for an hour now and you wished fifty-four minutes ago that you hadn’t listened to your friend who’d set you up. After her first plate of food you’d already listed twelve other places you’d rather be, and by the time she finished her fourth course, you’d revised it to include twenty-seven others.

She has her mouth full but she manages to talk between chews and swallows.

“The beef’s a little salty but it’s bearable.”

No, you think. It’s not bearable. In fact you find her quite repulsive.

Look, you say. They’re putting the buffet away. The restaurant is closing.

She looks surprised. “Oh!” A bit of meat flies from her mouth and lands two inches away from your fork.

You stand up to excuse yourself and walk quickly towards the restroom.

1st person:

“Cigarette for the winner?”

He passed one to me and I lit it against the wind.

He laughed. “I’m the only fucking sober one here.”

I watched as he swung the beer bottle in the direction of his mouth and missed, sending glugs of beer down the front of his shirt. He cast the empty bottle aside and I watched as it rolled down the pavement, gritting against the cement and making a hollow sound.

He made to stand up but swayed instead. I stood to help him but he pushed me aside, angry now.

“I’m the only damn fucking sober one here.”

Extraordinary –> Ordinary

(untitled as of yet)

They were not cries for help, but rather grunts of physical exertion. Walking along in the woods, enjoying the clear autumn day, Peter heard these noises from somewhere above, in the trees. He looked up and saw a girl stuck there.

Her head was lodged in an owl’s hole in the large oak that stood before him. She had a hand on either side of where her head would be, pushing against the trunk of the tree.

He stood awhile and looked up the fifty or so feet between them. And remembered, vaguely, a distant fear of heights.

Her body protruded perpendicularly from the trunk of the oak and held, horizontally, unsupported. It tightened with every effort of freeing her head. Loosened briefly, tightened again.

He did not consider helping her (the simple effort of thinking this was too much) and so lowered his head, turned down his gaze, and shuffled again through the damp leaves.

When he returned an hour later, following the trail back the way he had come, the low hoot of a common owl made him stop once more under the oak tree.

It was perched on a branch in the figure of a girl, resting on her right calf. Peter looked more closely and thought he saw her knees twist into knots, thought he caught a slow change from the folds in her clothing to the lines of the oak bark.

He stared at the girl, as if petrified, then, suddenly seized by some sense of urgency, hurried off in the direction of home.

The owl swiveled its head towards the hole now sealed by the girl. It raised one wing slightly, then settled it back into place.

Kafka-like re-approriation of folktale

The Boy Who Cried

I don’t target sheep. I target shepherds. The other wolves look for weaklings in the flock – the young, the old, the frail and sick. I look for weaknesses in the shepherd.

This one was a liar. He performed so well, it only took me three days to get the job done. All I had to do the first two days was lay in the grass and watch the clouds go by, waiting, hidden, watching the villagers come running up the hill. And I would laugh with the boy at their angry faces. Then, I laughed alone at his weeping one.