The Bone Brigade (part 1)

The couch was the kind of couch that the skinny girl hated. The cushions were firm, perfectly square, and too short. If you didn’t keep both feet firmly planted on the shit colored carpet and your spine erect, the shape of the couch informed you that you were doing sitting wrong and made you as uncomfortable as possible. Loo wanted couches to feel safe; oversized, sunken in, deep enough that if a freak tsunami swept through the 5th story window of the office in which she now sat it would provide a sturdy life raft from which to ride the cresting wave.

She lost herself for a moment, disappeared into the tsunami-surfing couch reality, imagined drawing midnight blue whorls with muddy brown swirls, peering over a fat armrest at a collection of pissed off cats spinning past on a torn off roof. She felt cool droplets of water explode against her cheeks as she trailed fingers over and down and through her wake, stinging a little. What would the rush feel like, she wondered, the anxiety of watching such an awesome encroaching force of nature, the adrenaline, the swooping drop of the belly as you’re swept away and out to the newly created sea.

The doctor in whose office the unfortunate couch sat was silent during this reverie. He had been Loo’s therapist since she was 10, going on seventeen years now. When her mother had brought her in at the onset of the initial neuroses, he had tried to recommend she see someone a little more specialized.

Little Loo had looked up at him with her waifishly huge green eyes and simply said a quiet no.

So the years had passed, and even though Doc Brown was a child’s therapist, Loo refused to even contemplate talking to someone else.

‘It’s you,’ she said. ‘You’re the one I talk to.’

He watched her now; watched the way her eyes went to some faraway land in her head, watched her fingers curl and uncurl, and idly wondered where she was. Sometimes she told him. Other times she shrugged…nowhere, really, she would say, and on those occasions she wouldn’t meet his eyes.

Dr. Brown knew that there was something different about Lucy Blair. He wondered if she knew there was something different about him.

‘Loo,’ he said sharply. If he was quiet or gentle, she’d happily stay in her lalaland for an extra hour. ‘Loo, your time’s done for today.’

Her head snapped up, and her face, all angles and plains and cheekbones, almost startled him with it’s sudden intensity. Then she dialed it back, shrugged, and gathered her things to leave.

‘Thanks for letting me go,’ she said. ‘It was a good place this time.’ A mega watt smile, and she was out the door.

Admittedly, Quentin was happy the hour was up. He had some things to see to, and Loo didn’t seem like she was in any immediate need of counseling. As he straightened his papers and put files and pencils away, he thought about oncoming events, and whether or not there would ever come a moment when they shared their differences with each other. He kind of figured that sooner or later there would be no option.

Dr. Quentin Brown was the sole occupant of the dingy building where his offices were. He pretended that people were put off by the institutional look of the place, or the fact that it was so far off the beaten path that you couldn’t easily get there from any highway exit. Truth be told, he owned the building and didn’t want any company. Walking down the back stairs towards the little attached parking lot, he was grateful that he had had the foresight to eliminate sightseers. Loosening his tie with one hand, Quentin stepped out into the cold clear winter air and flew.

* * *

MASTER CLASS, TWO PROMPTS IN A ROW! DOLLA DOLLA BILL, YA’LL! Ahem…

The Master Class prompt this week was chosen by yours truly, as Prof Sam decided that my nonsense was worthy 🙂 Our assignment was to use the last line of our book of choice ( The Magicians, by Lev Grossman ) as the last line in our story.
Please go check out other entries at http://www.frommywriteside.wordpress.com, and even better, join in. There are guidelines, but there’s a lot of freedom to this particular challenge, which seems to bring out some really interesting writing.

I’ve got some ideas on continuing this story that I’m actually pretty excited about 🙂

Grateful…

This morning queued up to be annoying. I was ‘accidentally’ woken up at 6:47 on a frickin Sunday. Funny how every time I’m ‘accidentally’ woken up waaay too early, after the apology for not realizing the tv was turned up too loud while watching a shoot ’em up, I’m then informed that I did something awful in my sleep.

Apparently I do awful things in my sleep a lot. One time I rolled over, put my hand lovingly on Dude’s face, then smilingly said ‘I hate you.’
I throw elbows, steal covers, laugh cry scream, get up and talk to invisible people.
I don’t remember any of these things, don’t remember dreams most of the time, although I do know I snore since a recording was provided to assuage my initial disbelief of how badly. For someone who’s not very familiar with the feeling, that recording was acutely embarrassing for some reason.

So, yeah…I’m apparently not the ideal bedmate. Hey, my waking qualities make up for it, obviously, or I wouldn’t still be sharing my bed.

ANYWAY.

Grateful.

Right now, I’m grateful that my kid spent the night at his buddy’s house and is going to play Whirliball today, because we weren’t able to do much this Spring Break. For the uninitiated, Whirliball is one of the greatest games ever invented. It’s set up on a half basketball court, but there’s no nets, just backboards. You drive around in this strange little bumpercar, with a stick for steering, and a little scooper dooper whatnot (like a mini plastic lacrosse doodad). You have to scoop up a little plastic ball and whang it to hit the backboard while the opposing team smashes into you in their cars.

I’m grateful that I can eat chicken nuggets and French fries for breakfast because I’m a motherfuckin adult and I DO WHAT I WANT.

Lastly, I’m grateful that this is what I see when I look out my window right now:

The Council

When the renegades caved, sent the transmission requesting aid, the Council seemed receptive in an immediate reply beaming erratically through the broken bricks of the building where they holed up.

Holly, or Holy as they called her in grinning whispers, claimed that the Council was displaying the Divine Grace of Forgiveness, both for the renegades insubordination in refusing to leave the planet in the first place, and for their appropriation of the technology that was left behind.

When tentacles began slithering from the opening hatches of the so-called relief ships hovering over their hideout, she was the first to run.

* * *

So this guy Chris over at Chris White Writes ( http://chriswhitewrites.com/2014/03/28/scifriday-2/ ) started a really cool game called SciFriday – he posts a sweet picture and you write ~100 word sci fi tale and link it up. It seemed like too much fun not to play…

* UPDATE: I just realized that I forgot the picture DERP *

*UPDATE 2: I also forgot to mention that I first found his blog from a series of Monsters A-Z stories that he wrote about lesser known legendary and mythological monsters that were really great.

The Next

As the quill drips its ink
upon a new page,
an ending is beginning.

Authors pack up their wares,
Close up shop,
and find another fireside for yarn spinning.

Their words cannot quit.

****

A 33 word free write for Trifecta this week. I am incredibly grateful for all of the writers whose work I have come to read and follow and love through Trifecta.

Cleansing Fire

Atmosphere

I had just come to expect that my life would be ordinary when extraordinary things began to happen.

The day was overcast, but more gilded than washed out, a huge cloud cover with a visible ending that allowed a tiny yellow yoke drop of the sun to peek out from underneath it. That there is enough heat and solar flair in such a small sliver of sun, the size of the bottom of a child’s version of a cartoon boat, makes the fundamental into the fantastic.

There was static in the air, a tingly dance that sent my arm hairs to attention and made the back of my neck itch like the phantom of a former love was breathing heavily beside my ear. I turned the radio up and tried to funnel the energy into my lungs instead of my fingers because they were shaking as I tried to hit my cigarette and it was weird to watch and I worried I would shake out of my skin. I sang along to every damn song that played, I belted and bellowed and wiggled my ass against the seat, musically inclined primal scream therapy. It helped a little bit, except that it made my vocal volume control knobs a little wonky for the rest of the morning and I had to watch or I’d holler instead of talk and bark in lieu of laughter.

I found myself in a Wonderland of humanity as I walked through the garishly lit aisles of the supreme superstore, harsh fluorescent lighting that usually makes everyone seem like a sallow-skin covered rattly skeleton jerking along on broken strings, somehow illuminated them instead. From the inside out burst this shocking white glare that should’ve had me covering my eyes and ducking from the mushroom cloud, but instead I was basking in the brilliance and smiling into strangers faces.

The mundane had transformed into the miraculous, enlivened enlightened invigorated and energized. Follicles became individuals and the individuals a whole.

***

This is my free flow re-entry into the Master Class prompt. I was reading a favorite passage in On the Road and figured I would pull an amateurish Kerouac- write till I had to think about it, then I, this, was done. So it’s done 🙂

Hop over and join the Master Class, and/or go read the other entries linked up. It’s quality writing by quality people, and it’s always interesting. This week’s challenge was to use the line chosen by last week’s winner as the first line of your story.
http://www.frommywriteside.wordpress.com

A funny thing happened at work today

I have this weird thing with my ears. And my brain. Or possibly the communication between the two. However the error occurs, I will sometimes hear words that are completely different than what a person actually says. The words are clearly spoken, but are so ridiculous I know for a fact that it isn’t what was said.

Before today, my favorite incident went thusly:
I was sitting at the foot of the bed, flipping through the DVR’d options for something to watch before I went to sleep. Some random show was playing in the background and Josh says, Hey, that guy looks like he bangs like a spider.
Okay, obviously I knew it wasn’t right, but it was what I heard.
(what he really said was Hey, haven’t we seen that guy in a movie before?)

This morning I was just settling in at work, and I heard footsteps coming down the stairway behind me. I turned around to say good morning, figuring it was this guy John that works upstairs. He smiled back and said, clear as day, Stinky buttfuck.
It took about five minutes for me to be able to stop laughing long enough to ask him what the hell he really said. I give him credit, he waited patiently all while he had to have been wondering why I was acting a fool.

Timothy Olyphant. There’s a picture of him on my desktop. He said Timothy Olyphant.

Stinky Buttfuck. Timothy Olyphant.

I am such an idiot that I am still laughing as I type this.

(Stupid stupid italics, I don’t know why this keeps happening!!)

Weekend Media Warrior Mash UP

It’s not often that I have a significant amount of time to myself on the weekends (or ever), and it’s amazing how many hours there are to fill with whatever the hell you want, whenever the hell you want. Not only did I get out of the house (being as it was over 1 degree out and most of the snow had melted) and have some interesting conversations with people that I don’t actually live with, I also…

Watched:

Fairy Tale
This is an anime series I found on Netflix, the creator of which claims Tolkien as an influence. Shock that this was why I watched the first episode. I haven’t watched anime in a long ass time, honestly because I haven’t been in the mood to read subtitles. I laughed my ass off at this show, because it was so ridiculous and wonderful that I remembered why I love the broad spectrum of what the genre encompasses. The basic premise is that the cast of characters live in a world where magic is common, if not commonplace. You can actually go to shops and buy little magical doohickeys, but if you want to join one of the real wizard guilds you have to be able to perform without trinkets. Most of it was just silly, but there was a scene where a Celestial Wizard conjures an Aquarian water spirit that turns out to just be a straight snotty bitch that was really great.

Adventure Time
I’ve seen so many gif-sets of this show that made me laugh that I finally broke down and watched the first episode. Um…it’s bizarre, and sweet and funny, and the voices of the characters that I heard in my head in no way, shape or form resemble the actual voices on the show. That actually threw me to such a degree that I kept missing bits of the super important story line and had to rewind to figure out why Princess Bubblegum’s De-Corpsifier (don’t even know how to go about spellchecking that one) didn’t work as she had planned.

Tai Chi Man
I hadn’t heard of this movie before, but I’m always interested in martial arts movies and figured I’d give it a shot. The cool thing about tai-chi is that, once you master the sequences, if you speed them up you’ve got a hell of a time distinguishing it from the more martial of the arts. Anyway, this is a movie about that 😉 Keanu Reeves directed it, and while he’s in it, he’s not the star. It’s enjoyable to see him as a bad guy, though, as he’s usually the affable idiot. The movie is a straight forward take on the student / master relationship, going down the wrong path and then finding your way home. I enjoyed it, but I’m not sure I know anyone I would recommend it to.

The Matrix
So, after watching Keanu fighting in an all black outfit in the previous movie, I had a hankering to have a marathon of all three Matrix in a row. That was before I remembered they were almost as long as the LOTR movies. So I settled for buying it on Amazon for $7.99, making the bargain with myself that I would pack my lunch every day this week because budgets aint a joke, son. I loved it as much as I always have, and it’s awesome that in all this time the movie hasn’t dimmed for me in the slightest. The soundtrack is fantastic, Trinity & Neo are still young and hot, and Morpheus still makes me feel like there’s a ghost in the machine.

Read:

Mockingjay – Suzanne Collins
This one was a re-read, and just served to remind me of why I dislike the movies so much. They’re shallow and clean, nowhere near gritty enough. There’s no powerful emotional punch, you don’t get the time to grow to give a shit about the characters. Too slapdash, too pointedly marking out the parts where you’re supposed to care. The books are no nonsense, sharp quick words with a sharp quick point. The movies are all rounded edges. Of course, to make the movies they way that I think they should be made would alienate a large portion of the younger audience, but I still believe they could have done much better.

Looking for Alaska – John Green
So, I’m not sure how to describe John Green’s writing, other than to say that I don’t think there’s many people who feel middle of the road about him. I would think that people either think he can’t put a word out of place or that he’s writing just to sound pretty. Personally, I love his beautifully worded beats upon the breast of humanity. This one hit a personal chord on a couple different levels, but the narrator’s voice also had just a whisper of Holden Caulfield in it, which for me is a lovely whisper.

Blahblahblah, so there. A weekend was had by all, and now it’s Monday, and I think this is my way of trying to remember how lovely the days off felt 🙂

** I don’t know what in the hell is going on with the bold / italic whatnot, but I can’t fix it, ha **

The Tree of Me

There are mistakes that I have made.

Like a giant and ever growing tree,
whose roots are my roots,
whose trunk is my me,
whose outstretched forked branches show me
where I went wrong in the outcomes of ‘coulds’ and ‘dids’

Some of the branches are gnarled and barren, and I fear
they would not take my weight;
they end in skeletal fingertips that tsk an Ah-ah-ahhhh! at the past;
This was a did that should not have been done.

Some of the branches end in an escapade of colors, an ebullience
of effervescence that says You have chosen….wisely.
That was a could that I did when I should.

Gurus & geishas & grapplers have all offered advice about your past:
dissolve it, embrace it, let it go, ignore it, forget it…
Me? Me, I want to pluck some of those brilliantly hued leaves off
and make some fucking tea, read the story in the leaves,
and figure out how I got some of these things so very right,
and some of these things oh, so very wrong.

There are mistakes that I have made.

I want to lie in the fork of a wrong turning and mourn,
weep over what could have been, and wallow in the hurt that was.

Then, when I climb upwards and reach for the next limb,
I will know to go right instead of left, and I will understand why.

There are mistakes that I have made, that I do not intend to make again.

Shenanigans

grain by atom by sub-atomic particle,
a slow flood became an avalanche once spotted;
wormed an unconscious declaration, didn’t you,
as love overcame annoyance, at your feet,
on my side of the bed

**********************************************

This, Week 113 at the esteemed http://www.trifectawritingchallenge.com, we found ourselves asked for 33 words exactly that included the word
Worm, using it’s third definition: 3 : to obtain or extract by artful or insidious questioning or by pleading, asking, or persuading —usually used with out of

So, here’s 33 words about when I realized that I really was gone daddy gone over my guy 🙂