exercise: self prompt

Business Card

I hear the phone ringing. I see it on the table with its rapidly flashing light. Yet I don't pick it up. I wait. It rings again. And again. On the fourth ring I reach for it but not so fast as to actually answer it.

It's not that I don't want to talk to her. It's that I don't want to talk to anybody. Not anymore today.

The message light comes on. And I retrieve her voice, her digitally synthesized but still beautiful voice. The one that goes with that blue skirt and the white blouse. So perfectly arranged. Maybe I don't want to talk to her but I can listen.

She says, "Mr. Boyd, this is Sara Mays. You interviewed me today for the position. I'm sorry that you got called away from your desk. I left my business card for you, should you need to call me back. It was a pleasure meeting you and I hope to hear more from you soon."

Hear more from me. She wants to hear more from me. Such sweet words.

When I feel like talking again I'll call. For now, I put the phone back on the table and stare at it.

Basking Ridge

Reb and me rode our bikes up to Basking Ridge. Well, not really Reb and me. Just me. Reb wanted to do it and we started out all cheerful and it was a nice day. But when we got near Princeton he called out "Jake!" and his voice sounded farther behind me than it should have been.

I saw him down at the base of the hill and figured he must've got a flat so I went all the way back down there and both his tires looked fine but he didn't. "I can't do this," he said and pulled out all the money he brought with him. It was nickels and quarters mostly but a few dimes too. "I'm not going to make it all the way there and back."

I hadn't thought about back.

I said I didn't need anything and maybe it came out sounding a little mad.

"Take the money," he said. "Please. I'll see you in school Monday and you can give me whatever you don't spend."

After that I watched him ride off for a minute.

My bike was a green ten speed. I had a plastic garbage bag tied to the frame with my lunch in it, an airpump, and a spare tire tube. And I rode the rest of the forty miles by myself. I made it to Somerville alright where I ate lunch and then sat on the grass looking at the bike. At that moment I knew how Reb must've felt. The last thing I wanted to do was get back on that bike.

It was another fifteen miles to Basking Ridge. There was a girl there I wanted to see, her name was Ellen and we met at the beach earlier in the summer. When I got there she wasn't home. Her mother suggested that it might have been wise to call ahead of time but I liked surprising people. She let me call around at Ellen's friend's house and then drove me over there without my bike. So I did get to see her after all.

When we got back to her house, Ellen's mom had repacked my bag with some food and handed me a ten dollar bill. She had loaded the bike into her trunk and pulled it partway closed with some bungee cord.

"I can take you as far as Somerville but you'll have to call your mom and dad from there." She said it like it was an order.

At a gas station with Ellen and her mom watching from the car, I called Reb and pretended he was mom.

"What the hell are you talking about? Are you alright?" He never did get it and I had to explain it to him at school on Monday.

Just outside of Princeton my right leg folded up and I couldn't straighten it out. One second I was pedaling and the next my heel was buried in the back of my thigh. It hurt bad. I coasted into a grocery store parking lot and waited five mintes for the cramp to pass. Then I limped up and down the aisles of the store asking people for a ride. One guy told me he couldn't help but thought I should drink some fruit juice and eat a banana. It did help some, or maybe it was just that I got a break from pedaling.

I made it home in stretches of forty minutes; riding for thirty and resting for ten. It was still light out when I got back to the house. Mom and Dad never knew where I had been.

On Monday I gave Reb back all his money, four dollars and eighty-five cents. He said it looked like I was limping a little bit and I hauled off and punched him hard in the arm.

Back to School

I've let this thing languish long enough. For a while there I was up to my eyeballs in putting words on paper and delivering other people's words. I may have some time here in the next few months, so let's start the writing practice again.

To the one person who actually linked to this blog, thanks ever so much. It was very nice of you. I'm sorry I didn't keep up with it and that my lapse roughly coincided with the exact minute that you included it in your blogroll. And I can't promise less spottiness in the future either, just yo you know.

Okay... time to write.

intrusion by the author

If you're wondering why not much is appearing here these days, it's because other writing demands have crowded in. One of them is here.

This blog is not on hiatus, I will still post here as time permits. It may simply not permit that often.

who forgot to put the screen back in?

leaves come in
through the window
on the wind
and light on
top of the piano
and are gone
skating away as
if on ice
in their passing
to the floor.

exercise: after the chase

She sat on the curb, black hand stroking blacker hair. Swift strokes beginning at her forehead. Eyes wide and bloodshot. A man was talking to her in calm, measured tones. He wore a uniform and pointed up the road, finger poking at the air.

He was the officer who pulled up alongside her at the close of the chase and forced her to the curb. She had responded by slamming her car against his cruiser. The cruiser won the fight.

It was panic that put the thought in her head. When she came over that hill, there were all those flashing lights. A hundred blue fireflies all coming for her. She froze, taking her foot off the gas for a moment. It was more than enough. Officer Friendly was alongside her pointing that finger at her before she had remembered to breathe.

Or maybe it was anger. She half remembered a voice. "That son of a bitch pointing at me?" it had said. Did she speak those words or think them or had they come from the radio? It was still playing in the car about five feet from where she sat. She made a move to go turn it off and the officer shouted, "SIT DOWN" in a new and not so friendly tone. His hand dropped to his side, hovering briefly over the protruding gun handle.

Her leg was bleeding and it hurt. She hadn't noticed that before. Now she could feel the anger rising again, what with him speaking harshly to her and that finger jabbing the air like that.

work in progress: phil

His band was three songs into it first set of a long night when Phil felt the pressure below his waist. He knew not to drink coffee after 7 pm. He knew further that to have a beer following the coffee was sheer lunacy. But, he did both. The coffee he bought at Starbucks on the way to the roadhouse, a grande Verona, and the beer had been a Sierra Nevada Porter, alcohol content 5.6% which was not incredibly high but not exactly low either. It was poor choosing, pure and simple.

Maybe I can make it through the first set, he thought while at the same time noting the involuntary sidestepping motion of his legs.

"Dammit, I'm doin' the pee pee dance!" he mumbled, repeating the phrase in the same sing-song voice his wife used when their daughter had to go.

No one in the crowd or on the stage could hear Phil over the rumble of the drums, the guitars, and his bass. He hoped that no one would be able to name the dance he was doing either, though he was certain that any moms out there in the blue light would recognize it instantly.

As the song slammed shut, he edged over to the lead vocalist, who sported but did not play a guitar, and said, "Do something that doesn't need bass, I have to pee." The singer, Alan, made it plain that he could manage for one song. He did this without seeming even to acknowledge that Phil was almost kissing his ear; all the while he held his last note and never broke eye contact with the audience, the mostly young, white, female audience.

Phil was in the bathroom before Alan sang the first line of the Green Day song he decided on. He stepped in front of a urinal to relieve himself and looked up at the ceiling at the single sprial flourescent tube fixture that reminded him of the kitchen in his childhood home. He sang along with Alan's attempt at mimicry, "I hope you had the ti-i-i-me of your life."

I might have time to get another Sierra Nevada before the next song, he thought. The bartender had smiled at him earlier. It was just that kind of smile.

"Yes, I'll get that second beer," he said out loud to the condom machine hanging not six inches from his face.

"You're back," said the bartender. "You're good up there."

"Thanks."

"So what'll it be this time?"

"Sierra Nevada, the sequel," he said and then chuckled at himself.

She walked off and a woman next to him turned on her stool and hit him in the arm, "You're in the band!"

"Yes," answered Phil, turning toward her. She held a beer in her other hand, the one she hadn't used to hit Phil. That elbow rested on the bar and was propping up its forearm and the beer. She had what looked to Phil like a three beer grin.

Phil heard the knock of bottle on wood. "Here ya go," said the bartender.

"Oh, sorry," he said reaching for his wallet.

"This one's on me," said the bartender.

"Hey! I was gonna buy him that beer! The next one's on me!" said the grinning woman. "You come back here when you're done, honey."

"Okay."

Phil smiled at the bartender, "Thanks ma'am."

"It's Wendy," she said.

"Thanks Wendy."

Alan was crooning an old Dan Fogelberg song, so Phil figured he must be getting desperate. Sure enough, instead of eyeing the women at the foot of the stage, Alan was staring straight at him. It was an unmistakable cue.

exercise

self prompt: cupcake

Before I begin, a word about the origin of this self prompt. My housemate Will returned home a minute ago. I thought, "the first word or phrase he speaks when he comes in the room will be my prompt."

This is true. There was a guy, I forget his name, this was back in my days in advertising; we called him cupcake. It started when one of the creatives noticed the shape of his hair, the set of it, with waves around all sides his head and mussed at the top. The mussing was part of the effect, it was intentional and had to be achieved through liberal application of extra strength hair gel.

But it was also because of his personality. "I don't know," she said, "He's just a cupcake. You know?" I didn't but I nodded anyway.

The agency employed at least three hundred people. Cupcake worked in traffic, which meant he saw to it that creatives and account people could interface successfully and that the projects would stick to something like a schedule. The poor guy interacted with almost everybody in the company at one point or another, and we all knew his nickname. It spread fast.

There came the day, it was inevitable really, when some poor sot said, "Hey cupcak... I mean..." This humiliated the account exec with the loose lips, but Cupcake himself never knew. I'm sure he doesn't even to this day.

exercise

self prompt: skull cap

He's behind me, now moving closer, now farther away. He's saying something at me through his windshield at seventy three miles per hour. I can't hear it. The sentence includes the phrase "come on!" among others.

His ass is in the driver's seat but his head hovers above the center of the dashboard. What I see is a windshield, a hand on the steering wheel and his hovering, skull capped head with its open mouth. He's making up a rap about me perhaps.

I gently apply the brakes.

He has another hand after all, I see it now. It's got at least one finger, maybe more.

The road ahead is clear and empty as the sky.

exercise

prompt from my wife: there was three to six inches of snow in the forecast and...

...not a chance that those newspaper people had gotten it right. Last winter the school board morons closed down the whole district a day in advance because of a storm that never came. Next day was picture postcard perfect and the kids stayed home and I had to stay home with them. This meant I had to take the day off from work... again. A lot depends on the weather.

And a lot depends on the forecast being at least reasonably accurate. I mean it's one thing when I know not to believe those bastards, but most other people are not as smart as me. As soon as they hear that a flake or two might fall, why it's off to the supermarket to stock up on a bunch of crap they already have too much of. Idiots.

My life depends on the actions and beliefs of other people. Far too much, most of the time. Far too much, cause most people don't have much in the way of intelligence.

I'm thankful that the good Lord made me smarter than the average human being.

exercise

self prompt: wakened by sirens

At the kitchen sink I pour a glass of water and gulp it and place the glass upside down on the counter. There are knife marks all in the formica. Charles insists on using the countertop as a cutting board even though we have three perfectly good wooden ones sitting not three feet away. I run my fingers back and forth over the ridges.

The sirens sound further off now. Three of them, or four maybe. They must have left the firehouse, that was the one that woke me. Then I heard another approaching, sounding like it was from east of here, followed by another. Trouble somewhere, big trouble for somebody. I picture a family standing in the street watching everything burn. Mom and her two kids. Dad out of town on business. She's on the cell phone but he's not answering even though it's the middle of the night. Something like that.

When I wake up in the night I'm always cotton mouthed. It's like I haven't had a drink in days. Throat like sandpaper, tongue feeling swollen and a kind of pain at the sides where it rests against the molars. Most of the time I go to the bathroom and stick my mouth right under that faucet. But tonight the sirens put my heart in my throat. I probably won't get back to sleep and it's only two in the morning. I hear the sirens winding down. In the end, a second before they stop completely, it sounds almost like purring. Like a kitty.

post, the first

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peace.