A Short Story of Mine...
Part One of A Very Short Story of No Real Importance but a Lot of Great Inspiration.
Carry On
“My day sucked ass, all right?” I said furiously at the congregation of attendees before me. The man next to me- I call him man for although he looks completely like an adolescent boy, he has a beard- flinched and said, “You are insane.”
I turn to him, even more infuriated then before, and scream, “I am not insane! I am mad. I am enraged and insane, which makes me completely crazy!”
“Oh, I’ll say,” the man sputtered out, looking as though he had intended to maintain that comment behind his teeth; he really should have.
“Oh, you’ll say, will you?” I stated in a calmer tone. The anger was still there, but my voice was softer and more curiously contemplating, rather than raging barmy. The calm in the eye of the storm soon passed, however, and the wind came back into my sails at a full gale. “You’ll say? Why, thank you, sir! Thank you for pointing out the finer details of my person! As though everyone here didn’t already know that; as if everyone in existent didn’t already know that!” I fumed, my eyes growing wild and my hair seeming to stand on end, as though I were raising my haunches in order to seem as large and scary as I sounded; and as I really was.
“Why, you should not be named Jovi!” I sneered, my face twisting to show my straight teeth and red gums to the assemblage- and the stunned man. “Jovi; like Bon Jovi?” I mimicked him, mocking the adolescent look about him by raising my voice a pitch and speaking in a nasally tone. “You should be called Captain Obvious! You are so very good at stating such things; I don’t see why you shouldn’t get a title!” I screeched once more, before falling back and putting a hand to my aching head.
For some reason, though I cannot be quite sure which, I started growling. Each time someone moved; I’d growl. Each deep breath, each shift of a cheek upon a chair, each idle or nervous scratch at a nose, and I would growl.
Suddenly, I stood; looming much taller then I had just moments before. I seethed, breathing deeply and quickly through my flaring nostrils, my teeth still bared, my haunches raised, and my eyes more wild then ever before. I grabbed the edge of the desk in front of me, looking like- and I know this because people were bellowing it out like there was no tomorrow, and really I can’t blame them- I was about to puke. Instead- of course, instead- I lugged the table into the air and, using my newfound superhuman strength tossed it into the far wall.
There was a crash, a deafening crash of the nasty collision, and then silence for a whole three seconds as the dust settled. Then, everyone accumulated at the Creative Writing workshop screamed and screeched and ran for their lives, save two solitary people.
The man, the adolescent boy, Captain Obvious, and Jovi, looked at me and said, “You are insane.”
And I collapsed in an infuriated heap upon the floor.
Part Two of A Very Short Story of No Real Importance but a Lot of Great Inspiration.
The Real Thing
A few minutes later, as soon as the assemblage returned to the room to see that I had been sedated, Captain Jovi Obvious was idly twiddling his thumbs, and that the table had been removed from the wall and the room set to rights.
“Well,” the teacher said, her happy face all shaken and a little false, though she was trying terribly hard, I’ll give her that, “Would you like to read your story?” she asked me, holding the fright in mind our of her voice.
I grumbled, and almost moaned, as I moved sluggishly toward my satchel and story, drab though I thought it was; especially in comparison to tonight’s events. The papers were at the bottom, as they always seem to be, and I had to shuffle through my bag in order to find them, and then I spent a moment to flatten them out and straighten the pile into a neat stack. And then I took another moment to take the single sheet of unfinished story from the pile of other unfinished stories.
“Those unfinished stories must be so lonely and pathetic,” I thought in my mad head as I stared solemnly at the sheets of prose, “Never being complete. Maybe they will never be complete until I, too, am complete. For, how can I complete something if I do not even know how to complete myself?” I shook my head- my very mad head- about and stacked the papers once more before shoving them back into my satchel.
My throat was clear, or so I thought, but my voice came out garbled, so I cleared it twice just for good measure and told the teacher, Lisa, though I know not why we are not to call her by her last name, “This story is not complete.” She waved her head in a nonchalant way, saying wordlessly for me to continue anyway, and so I did.
“I blame my mother and my aunt for starting this conspiracy and, of course, the first insane person who said it,” I recited from my story, glancing around to see what they all thought, waiting to see if they would guess the story before the next line. They did not, so I continued, “My name is Jovi. Now, the second I said that, each and every one of you thought, “Jovi? Like Bon Jovi?” After the first sixteen years of my life- sixteen years of introducing myself and always getting the same exact reply- it gets old, very old.” They all laughed or giggled or snorted, or if they were Jovi they rolled there eyes, at that silly part. Audiences can be so predictable.
“It’s like everyone is simply a flock of sheep! My aunt wants me named Jovi, like Bon Jovi, and my mom follows her advice, not stopping to think of any consequences that may occur. One guy says, when we are first introduced, “Jovi? Like Bon Jovi?” and every person after him says the same exact thing,” I continued on, seeing what their reactions might be now that I had said something a little more cruel. Reactions were the same, for the most part, so again I continued, “So, one would think that telling the tale of my name would also get rather old, seeing as how I rant and rave about the name itself. It is not to be so, for I always tell the tale when meeting new people. Each one reacts differently to the story, even though their thoughts on the name are all the same.”
I looked at Captain Jovi Obvious, and at his strange face of adolescences and maturity all mixed into one, and scowled. He was about to rise his eyebrows, but I beat him to it, and he simply turned his head away.
With the feeling of victory in my heart and pumping through my veins, I said the last bit I had written, “Ah, the story, you say? Well, basically: my aunt was into Bon Jovi when I was born, and somehow convinced my mom to name me Jovi. Of course, there were other things to complicate the matter, like the tradition in the family of naming every first born son Charles. Everyone in my family hates the name Charles, except for my grandfather... And, that’s it.”
I looked up at the class; the workshop assemblage; the people who all fled in terror from me just minutes ago, and smiled. “What do you think?”
Carry On
“My day sucked ass, all right?” I said furiously at the congregation of attendees before me. The man next to me- I call him man for although he looks completely like an adolescent boy, he has a beard- flinched and said, “You are insane.”
I turn to him, even more infuriated then before, and scream, “I am not insane! I am mad. I am enraged and insane, which makes me completely crazy!”
“Oh, I’ll say,” the man sputtered out, looking as though he had intended to maintain that comment behind his teeth; he really should have.
“Oh, you’ll say, will you?” I stated in a calmer tone. The anger was still there, but my voice was softer and more curiously contemplating, rather than raging barmy. The calm in the eye of the storm soon passed, however, and the wind came back into my sails at a full gale. “You’ll say? Why, thank you, sir! Thank you for pointing out the finer details of my person! As though everyone here didn’t already know that; as if everyone in existent didn’t already know that!” I fumed, my eyes growing wild and my hair seeming to stand on end, as though I were raising my haunches in order to seem as large and scary as I sounded; and as I really was.
“Why, you should not be named Jovi!” I sneered, my face twisting to show my straight teeth and red gums to the assemblage- and the stunned man. “Jovi; like Bon Jovi?” I mimicked him, mocking the adolescent look about him by raising my voice a pitch and speaking in a nasally tone. “You should be called Captain Obvious! You are so very good at stating such things; I don’t see why you shouldn’t get a title!” I screeched once more, before falling back and putting a hand to my aching head.
For some reason, though I cannot be quite sure which, I started growling. Each time someone moved; I’d growl. Each deep breath, each shift of a cheek upon a chair, each idle or nervous scratch at a nose, and I would growl.
Suddenly, I stood; looming much taller then I had just moments before. I seethed, breathing deeply and quickly through my flaring nostrils, my teeth still bared, my haunches raised, and my eyes more wild then ever before. I grabbed the edge of the desk in front of me, looking like- and I know this because people were bellowing it out like there was no tomorrow, and really I can’t blame them- I was about to puke. Instead- of course, instead- I lugged the table into the air and, using my newfound superhuman strength tossed it into the far wall.
There was a crash, a deafening crash of the nasty collision, and then silence for a whole three seconds as the dust settled. Then, everyone accumulated at the Creative Writing workshop screamed and screeched and ran for their lives, save two solitary people.
The man, the adolescent boy, Captain Obvious, and Jovi, looked at me and said, “You are insane.”
And I collapsed in an infuriated heap upon the floor.
Part Two of A Very Short Story of No Real Importance but a Lot of Great Inspiration.
The Real Thing
A few minutes later, as soon as the assemblage returned to the room to see that I had been sedated, Captain Jovi Obvious was idly twiddling his thumbs, and that the table had been removed from the wall and the room set to rights.
“Well,” the teacher said, her happy face all shaken and a little false, though she was trying terribly hard, I’ll give her that, “Would you like to read your story?” she asked me, holding the fright in mind our of her voice.
I grumbled, and almost moaned, as I moved sluggishly toward my satchel and story, drab though I thought it was; especially in comparison to tonight’s events. The papers were at the bottom, as they always seem to be, and I had to shuffle through my bag in order to find them, and then I spent a moment to flatten them out and straighten the pile into a neat stack. And then I took another moment to take the single sheet of unfinished story from the pile of other unfinished stories.
“Those unfinished stories must be so lonely and pathetic,” I thought in my mad head as I stared solemnly at the sheets of prose, “Never being complete. Maybe they will never be complete until I, too, am complete. For, how can I complete something if I do not even know how to complete myself?” I shook my head- my very mad head- about and stacked the papers once more before shoving them back into my satchel.
My throat was clear, or so I thought, but my voice came out garbled, so I cleared it twice just for good measure and told the teacher, Lisa, though I know not why we are not to call her by her last name, “This story is not complete.” She waved her head in a nonchalant way, saying wordlessly for me to continue anyway, and so I did.
“I blame my mother and my aunt for starting this conspiracy and, of course, the first insane person who said it,” I recited from my story, glancing around to see what they all thought, waiting to see if they would guess the story before the next line. They did not, so I continued, “My name is Jovi. Now, the second I said that, each and every one of you thought, “Jovi? Like Bon Jovi?” After the first sixteen years of my life- sixteen years of introducing myself and always getting the same exact reply- it gets old, very old.” They all laughed or giggled or snorted, or if they were Jovi they rolled there eyes, at that silly part. Audiences can be so predictable.
“It’s like everyone is simply a flock of sheep! My aunt wants me named Jovi, like Bon Jovi, and my mom follows her advice, not stopping to think of any consequences that may occur. One guy says, when we are first introduced, “Jovi? Like Bon Jovi?” and every person after him says the same exact thing,” I continued on, seeing what their reactions might be now that I had said something a little more cruel. Reactions were the same, for the most part, so again I continued, “So, one would think that telling the tale of my name would also get rather old, seeing as how I rant and rave about the name itself. It is not to be so, for I always tell the tale when meeting new people. Each one reacts differently to the story, even though their thoughts on the name are all the same.”
I looked at Captain Jovi Obvious, and at his strange face of adolescences and maturity all mixed into one, and scowled. He was about to rise his eyebrows, but I beat him to it, and he simply turned his head away.
With the feeling of victory in my heart and pumping through my veins, I said the last bit I had written, “Ah, the story, you say? Well, basically: my aunt was into Bon Jovi when I was born, and somehow convinced my mom to name me Jovi. Of course, there were other things to complicate the matter, like the tradition in the family of naming every first born son Charles. Everyone in my family hates the name Charles, except for my grandfather... And, that’s it.”
I looked up at the class; the workshop assemblage; the people who all fled in terror from me just minutes ago, and smiled. “What do you think?”