not that any of you will read this old entry, but . . .
. . . if you're bored and stumble across it, I've deleted what used to be here and posted the version of the story I submitted to class. enjoy.
Object Lesson
Or, “Stanley’s Casual Casualty”
Stanley decided to take time to listen to the ground, as long as he was down there. No buffalo or white men coming. The furnace, though, sounded far more regal than expected. It murmured like a symphony for whales, playing the floorboards at frequencies Stanley could feel more than hear. The furnace had always frightened him as a child; it had had a bad habit of clicking on with an ominous rumble right at the quietest moments of nights when only he was awake.
The furnace had never realized how ominous it sounded, and rather had considered itself to have damn good comic timing. It tried to explain this to Stanley, but Stanley wasn’t listening that closely. He was stalling, not having a revelation.
***
Stanley had always been the type that enjoyed hearing about men with names like “Sartre” or “Kierkegaard” or “Nietzsche,” but had never been the type that enjoyed reading thick tomes of philosophy. He was enamored of the romantic notion that, at some point, foreign men with intimidating beards and hard-to-pronounce names had thought really deep thoughts and figured out the answers to all the really hard questions.
It didn’t particularly matter to Stanley that the answers these men produced often contradicted each other. Just so long as he knew someone else had the answers, he could enjoy his morning coffee or late night talk show without being bothered by existential quandaries.
***
1436 Whitehall Lane; Apartment 7B, 1436 Whitehall Lane; Apartment 7B, 1436 White-
The hitman would always recite the addresses rhythmically to help him remember them. He had the bad luck to discover the success of this device at the ripe old age of 27. He kept telling Ron-at-the-gas-station that he would have aced high school history if he had known to put a beat to the Gettysburg Address. Ron-at-the-gas-station thought the hitman could make some real money by applying this skill and doing a musical children’s show. Anytime Ron-at-the-gas-station would say so, the hitman would picture himself in a purple dinosaur suit, tell Ron-at-the-gas-station to quit being a fag, and leave without paying for his beef jerky.
Once home, though, the hitman would always give the idea some thought. He secretly longed to be in a profession that allowed him to have a paper trail. But if it hadn’t been for the “no paper trail” rule, he never would’ve gotten so good with his beats. Que sera.
This particular address was giving the hitman some problems. The beat for the address had come almost instantly, that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that the beat was too good, it drew all the attention, reducing "1436 Whitehall Lane" to a senseless jumble of words. What Smells Like Teen Spirit was to guitar riffs, Whitehall Lane was to beats, which meant that it was just as hard to remember if “36” came before “14” as it was to remember if “albino” came before “mosquito.”
***
The TV was whining loudly about not being turned on for its eleven o’clock talk. It had been good and quiet all day, and not pulled its cable at all, but dammit, it was eleven fifteen, and it needed to pull info desperately. A pull from channel five sounded refreshing, but it was willing to settle for a fuzzy pull from channel fifteen at this point. Was this any way to treat man’s best friend? The TV was sure Stanley knew better than to sleep before letting the TV talk so it could pull.
The bed knew something was wrong too. At this time of night, Stanley was supposed to be pressed warmly against it, cozied up to the corners where its ruffles used to be. (Stanley had thought the ruffles too feminine, and had cut them off. It took a while for the bed to forgive Stanley for that.) At this time of night, Stanley definitely was not supposed to be sprawled on the floor. Except when . . .
The TV and bed glared at the refrigerator. The refrigerator whirred out a shrug. Its wine cooler was still fully stocked.
***
Stanley was having a number of revelations, such as why he never got a dog, and what the source of that high-pitched whine he occasionally heard was. He was also coming to the realization that the men with hard-to-pronounce names and intimidating beards may have put their time to better use getting a good shave than thinking their deep thoughts. They may have learned something from listening to their razors.
***
The door looked annoyingly well kept. The hitman smiled at this. He now had an excuse. Too often, the hitman would find himself knocking at doors that looked like they could have been described, in some glorious past life, as "decrepit." The hitman always felt bad knocking at such doors, knowing they shielded tenants with very good reasons for not paying. But not Mr. Whitehall Lane. Mr. Whitehall Lane would be easy. The hitman let him know this by rapping out the beat that had led him there a bit more sharply than necessary:
White*knock*hall*knock* Lane*KNOCK*
“Alright, I got it, you don’t have to be so loud-” Stanley opened his door.
“Fifteen hundred”
“. . . what?”
The hitman sighed. Why did they always act oblivious?
“Look, just give me the fifteen hundred.”
“Dollars?”
“Yeah, of course friggin’ dollars. And you should be thankful that it’s fifteen hundred, instead of pullin’ this-”
“What? Do I know you? Whatever it is you’re selling, I’m not interested, sorry -”
Stanley attempted to shut the door. Stanley failed.
Stanley had never been pummeled rhythmically before.
For that matter, the hitman had never pummeled anyone rhythmically before, but he just couldn’t get Whitehall Lane out of his head.
White*bam*hall*bam* Lane*BAM* Apartment*ba-BAM bam* 7B*tha-thunk BAM*
And then came the hitman’s favorite part: the techno breakdown, when the beat collapsed back on itself . . .
Fo-Fo-Four-*record scratch*Fourteen . . .
And the beat just kept looping, thumping away in stroke with the hitman’s fists. And it thumped far too loud for the hitman to hear Stanley’s cries. And it thumped far too loud for the hitman to hear the advice the boss gave him: “never beat too hard - dead men can’t pay.” And Jim usually always heard the advice, because it rang over everything, chained to his ears as a reminder of where he’d sunk to, but now there was just the thumping, a gigantic bass backbeat to the thwack of his fists, and the hitman was too immersed in it to notice the feeble hits Stanley would dish back, they were just reverb, just an echo of Whitehall Lane, amplifying the beat like it should be amplified, because it was a perfect beat, it really was, and now it could fill a stadium, it had a stadium echo . . . but then Stanley’s hits stopped. And the echo shut off.
And for a little bit, the hitman hit harder to compensate. Because if he hit hard enough, he could fill a stadium all by himself, he was convinced.
But soon, it became clear. Without the echo, it just wasn’t enough.
***
Stanley was stalling. He figured that even a man gone as mad as this one clearly was would stop hitting a man limp on the ground before long. And while he was limp on the ground, he could recuperate, and then hit back properly. He’d listen to the furnace’s symphony for a just a little while longer (why ever hadn’t he noticed that before?). And then he’d . . . he’d . . . what was it he was going to do again? It suddenly seemed unimportant.
***
The hitman was smart. He used only his hands, and he wore gloves every time. He knew how important it was to be inconspicuous after a job, and would drive away from a scene slowly. Every time. Which was why he didn’t speed the hell out of that parking lot like he wanted to. Which was why he was driving slowly enough to read clearly the number on the mailbox.
41436 Whitehall Lane.
Damn techno breakdown. The hitman swore and reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a crumpled sheet of paper.
2515 Grand Avenue.
He would keep this one simple. He needed to keep it simple this time. Maybe a punk beat . . .
***
Stanley was having another revelation: he could hear the lifeless so well because he was no longer able to hear the living.
Having made this realization, Stanley did not worry much over the fact that he was now, by most definitions, dead. He did not wonder why he wasn’t in heaven, or hell, or reincarnated. He didn’t wonder what came next, or how much longer he had before next came. After all, Stanley did not have an intimidating beard, and his name was Stanley, so he figured that such thoughts were none of his business. Instead, these were his thoughts:
That TV really is annoyingly loud. How did I not notice that before? I wonder if it can hear me, now that I can hear it? I’m going to try a field test: Hey! Hey, you! . . . TV! Shut up!!
The TV began to sulk.
Object Lesson
Or, “Stanley’s Casual Casualty”
Stanley decided to take time to listen to the ground, as long as he was down there. No buffalo or white men coming. The furnace, though, sounded far more regal than expected. It murmured like a symphony for whales, playing the floorboards at frequencies Stanley could feel more than hear. The furnace had always frightened him as a child; it had had a bad habit of clicking on with an ominous rumble right at the quietest moments of nights when only he was awake.
The furnace had never realized how ominous it sounded, and rather had considered itself to have damn good comic timing. It tried to explain this to Stanley, but Stanley wasn’t listening that closely. He was stalling, not having a revelation.
***
Stanley had always been the type that enjoyed hearing about men with names like “Sartre” or “Kierkegaard” or “Nietzsche,” but had never been the type that enjoyed reading thick tomes of philosophy. He was enamored of the romantic notion that, at some point, foreign men with intimidating beards and hard-to-pronounce names had thought really deep thoughts and figured out the answers to all the really hard questions.
It didn’t particularly matter to Stanley that the answers these men produced often contradicted each other. Just so long as he knew someone else had the answers, he could enjoy his morning coffee or late night talk show without being bothered by existential quandaries.
***
1436 Whitehall Lane; Apartment 7B, 1436 Whitehall Lane; Apartment 7B, 1436 White-
The hitman would always recite the addresses rhythmically to help him remember them. He had the bad luck to discover the success of this device at the ripe old age of 27. He kept telling Ron-at-the-gas-station that he would have aced high school history if he had known to put a beat to the Gettysburg Address. Ron-at-the-gas-station thought the hitman could make some real money by applying this skill and doing a musical children’s show. Anytime Ron-at-the-gas-station would say so, the hitman would picture himself in a purple dinosaur suit, tell Ron-at-the-gas-station to quit being a fag, and leave without paying for his beef jerky.
Once home, though, the hitman would always give the idea some thought. He secretly longed to be in a profession that allowed him to have a paper trail. But if it hadn’t been for the “no paper trail” rule, he never would’ve gotten so good with his beats. Que sera.
This particular address was giving the hitman some problems. The beat for the address had come almost instantly, that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that the beat was too good, it drew all the attention, reducing "1436 Whitehall Lane" to a senseless jumble of words. What Smells Like Teen Spirit was to guitar riffs, Whitehall Lane was to beats, which meant that it was just as hard to remember if “36” came before “14” as it was to remember if “albino” came before “mosquito.”
***
The TV was whining loudly about not being turned on for its eleven o’clock talk. It had been good and quiet all day, and not pulled its cable at all, but dammit, it was eleven fifteen, and it needed to pull info desperately. A pull from channel five sounded refreshing, but it was willing to settle for a fuzzy pull from channel fifteen at this point. Was this any way to treat man’s best friend? The TV was sure Stanley knew better than to sleep before letting the TV talk so it could pull.
The bed knew something was wrong too. At this time of night, Stanley was supposed to be pressed warmly against it, cozied up to the corners where its ruffles used to be. (Stanley had thought the ruffles too feminine, and had cut them off. It took a while for the bed to forgive Stanley for that.) At this time of night, Stanley definitely was not supposed to be sprawled on the floor. Except when . . .
The TV and bed glared at the refrigerator. The refrigerator whirred out a shrug. Its wine cooler was still fully stocked.
***
Stanley was having a number of revelations, such as why he never got a dog, and what the source of that high-pitched whine he occasionally heard was. He was also coming to the realization that the men with hard-to-pronounce names and intimidating beards may have put their time to better use getting a good shave than thinking their deep thoughts. They may have learned something from listening to their razors.
***
The door looked annoyingly well kept. The hitman smiled at this. He now had an excuse. Too often, the hitman would find himself knocking at doors that looked like they could have been described, in some glorious past life, as "decrepit." The hitman always felt bad knocking at such doors, knowing they shielded tenants with very good reasons for not paying. But not Mr. Whitehall Lane. Mr. Whitehall Lane would be easy. The hitman let him know this by rapping out the beat that had led him there a bit more sharply than necessary:
White*knock*hall*knock* Lane*KNOCK*
“Alright, I got it, you don’t have to be so loud-” Stanley opened his door.
“Fifteen hundred”
“. . . what?”
The hitman sighed. Why did they always act oblivious?
“Look, just give me the fifteen hundred.”
“Dollars?”
“Yeah, of course friggin’ dollars. And you should be thankful that it’s fifteen hundred, instead of pullin’ this-”
“What? Do I know you? Whatever it is you’re selling, I’m not interested, sorry -”
Stanley attempted to shut the door. Stanley failed.
Stanley had never been pummeled rhythmically before.
For that matter, the hitman had never pummeled anyone rhythmically before, but he just couldn’t get Whitehall Lane out of his head.
White*bam*hall*bam* Lane*BAM* Apartment*ba-BAM bam* 7B*tha-thunk BAM*
And then came the hitman’s favorite part: the techno breakdown, when the beat collapsed back on itself . . .
Fo-Fo-Four-*record scratch*Fourteen . . .
And the beat just kept looping, thumping away in stroke with the hitman’s fists. And it thumped far too loud for the hitman to hear Stanley’s cries. And it thumped far too loud for the hitman to hear the advice the boss gave him: “never beat too hard - dead men can’t pay.” And Jim usually always heard the advice, because it rang over everything, chained to his ears as a reminder of where he’d sunk to, but now there was just the thumping, a gigantic bass backbeat to the thwack of his fists, and the hitman was too immersed in it to notice the feeble hits Stanley would dish back, they were just reverb, just an echo of Whitehall Lane, amplifying the beat like it should be amplified, because it was a perfect beat, it really was, and now it could fill a stadium, it had a stadium echo . . . but then Stanley’s hits stopped. And the echo shut off.
And for a little bit, the hitman hit harder to compensate. Because if he hit hard enough, he could fill a stadium all by himself, he was convinced.
But soon, it became clear. Without the echo, it just wasn’t enough.
***
Stanley was stalling. He figured that even a man gone as mad as this one clearly was would stop hitting a man limp on the ground before long. And while he was limp on the ground, he could recuperate, and then hit back properly. He’d listen to the furnace’s symphony for a just a little while longer (why ever hadn’t he noticed that before?). And then he’d . . . he’d . . . what was it he was going to do again? It suddenly seemed unimportant.
***
The hitman was smart. He used only his hands, and he wore gloves every time. He knew how important it was to be inconspicuous after a job, and would drive away from a scene slowly. Every time. Which was why he didn’t speed the hell out of that parking lot like he wanted to. Which was why he was driving slowly enough to read clearly the number on the mailbox.
41436 Whitehall Lane.
Damn techno breakdown. The hitman swore and reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a crumpled sheet of paper.
2515 Grand Avenue.
He would keep this one simple. He needed to keep it simple this time. Maybe a punk beat . . .
***
Stanley was having another revelation: he could hear the lifeless so well because he was no longer able to hear the living.
Having made this realization, Stanley did not worry much over the fact that he was now, by most definitions, dead. He did not wonder why he wasn’t in heaven, or hell, or reincarnated. He didn’t wonder what came next, or how much longer he had before next came. After all, Stanley did not have an intimidating beard, and his name was Stanley, so he figured that such thoughts were none of his business. Instead, these were his thoughts:
That TV really is annoyingly loud. How did I not notice that before? I wonder if it can hear me, now that I can hear it? I’m going to try a field test: Hey! Hey, you! . . . TV! Shut up!!
The TV began to sulk.