LJ Idol Week 6 - untitled snippet from a work in progress
With his right hand, Alan Rhodes tipped the tablet back to stare at the two lines on the screen, stirring sugar into his coffee with the other. He repeated them silently, lips moving, wondering why he couldn’t think of a way to finish the little poem:
We know your lives together
Will be joyous long after the wedding kiss …
Bliss? Miss? Hiss? Alan paused, then withdrew the spoon, tapping it against the rim of the cup. “Hiss?” he repeated softly, scrunching his face. “Too early to start thinking of him as a snake in the grass?” He shook his head and put the spoon aside. If he stared at the screen long enough, the letters might leap up and rearrange themselves. The second line was too long; too many syllables. He needed to figure out a way to drop some. “We know your lives together … hold joy long … hold joy after …” He trailed off, willing blood vessels not to explode with the pain of completing the stanza.
Instead, his brain conjured:
This card writer moved to Nantucket
Where he told his publisher “Just fuck it
“I’ve got more things to do
“Than satisfy you
“You can take your pap and go suck it.”
Momentarily pleased with himself, Alan took a quick drink of coffee and chuckled as he set the cup down, keeping his eyes on the tablet. He felt marginally better about the crap on the screen, and himself - it was low-grade second-grade poetry, but that mental limerick hadn’t exactly been a Drama Desk candidate, either. “This can’t be this difficult,” he mumbled, picking up the small metal stylus and hitting the Back button, blowing air out between his teeth until the screen was a blank gray-white again.
A gust of chilly air blew past his table, and he looked up to see the reason for leaving his little writing desk at home today. He didn’t say anything as Michael Connor shrugged off his coat and dropped it haphazardly folded over the other chair, nodding at Alan. He crossed to the counter, and Alan overheard him ordering a latte, something with chocolate and whip. He tried not to think about the upcoming conversation, by focusing instead on the wedding card he was supposed to be authoring.
The artwork (not his!) was two cutely goofy dogs dressed like people, in a tuxedo and wedding gown, noses together in a chaste doggy smooch on the cover. Inside were to be two gem-studded dog collars linked to look like wedding rings. Alan had tossed off a couple of canine-themed poems to his publisher, just off the top of his head, but they were turned down. “No goofiness,” Carter told him. “Just regular, old-fashioned straight sentiment, Rhodes.”
That’s the dumbest thing ever, he’d thought two hours ago when Carter handed it to him, but he’d said nothing. “That’s the dumbest thing ever,” he echoed now, out loud.
“What’s dumb?” Michael took the seat across from him.
“If you’re going to draw dogs getting married on a wedding card, why wouldn’t you want to make canine references in the poem on it?”
“Why would they have dogs getting married?” Michael cocked his head as he carefully peeled the plastic lid from the top of his waxy cup, then licked the chocolate and foam from inside it. “What’d you do, come up with some ‘doggy-style’ limerick, or something?”
Alan watched him start sucking the whipped cream and chocolate sauce off the top of the drink, feeling superior for his simpler, more grown-up beverage. “It was a little classier than that,” he answered, stiffly. “More to do with how cuddly dogs are.”
Michael nodded, ignoring his disapproval or simply not noticing. “So how’s the musical coming?”
“Same as ever.” He wanted that to cut off the friendly patter portion of their afternoon. “Why did you need to meet me? What’s wrong?”
“Right to it, no ‘how you doing’ and straight to ‘kiss my ass,’ hmm?” Michael put the lid back on his cup and licked his lips. “All right.” He studied Alan with nearly-black eyes and tapped his fingers on the table as he seemed to be searching for words. Alan didn’t know why he was so hesitant; it wasn’t like he’d been called on the carpet as often as Alan was. “You know what I’m going to say,” he finally said.
“If I knew what you were going to say,” Alan answered carefully, trying not to sound like the absolute jackass he felt like being, “why did I need to get out and spend three dollars on a cup of coffee, and hear you say it?”
“Come on - not just a little bit easy, here?”
“It’s not my job to make this easy for you,” Alan retorted.
“No, your job is to make it easy for others. For people who don’t know any better, who already feel traumatized.”
“I’m pleasant enough,” Alan said, defensive. “Once in a while, they’re in a big rushing hurry, and I’ve got to speed the explanation along; I stomp on a few cracks along the way, okay? You know I had to lock one in my bedroom so she wouldn’t go screaming out, and the only way I could get through to her was to yell through the door?”
“And you think this is good? Normal?”
“NORMAL?” Alan caught himself as a couple of baristas stopped work to look over. He leaned over the table toward Michael, dropping his voice. “What about any of this is normal? There’s no way to make someone feel normal when they think they’ve just lost everything they had the day before.”
Michael pointed at Alan. “That’s where you come in. It’s your appointed task to make these people feel like things are normal, or at least not any worse than they were.” He flattened his palm to the table again. “Look, you’ve been doing this enough years, you ought to know enough by now. When’s the last time you went to a training?”
“I have to work. Not all of us can trade off and take off whenever we want, Captain Connor.”
Michael rolled his eyes. “Come off it. I’m a commercial pilot, not an international playboy. I work, too. But I make time to learn how to be a decent Anchor; you can do it.”
“So now I’m not even decent.” Alan locked the stylus back into the tablet case cover, shaking his head. “I’ve helped a lot of people; a LOT, damn you. And I’ve been at this longer than that-”
Michael’s hand came down on his tablet cover, flat, to stop him packing up. “Alan, she tried to jump off a bridge, okay? She was that scared. She thought it was all wrong, that she’d never see her kids or her boyfriend again.”
“She wasn’t going to!” Alan blurted on reflex. “Not the ones she knew; you know that, I know that. All I did was try to explain it to her too!” Michael’s expression was oddly calm, but Alan sensed it wasn’t from patience. Too late, he thought to ask, “Is she okay?”
“Do you care that much?”
“You being an asshole isn’t the big help you think it is,” Alan snapped, trying to keep his voice down. A blind stranger could tell they were arguing, but he tried not to look it so much.
“And you being an insensitive prick doesn’t actually toughen anyone up for shifting.” Michael sat straighter, crossing his arms. “I don’t know if you’ve got any compassion in you, but you need to learn to fake it better if you don’t. This isn’t a lifetime appointment; you can be kicked off.”
He tried not to show how that smarted. “Look, just give me the warning and leave, all right?”
“Can’t.” Michael gave a small shake of his head. “I’ve got to get you to commit to a training. Pick a couple of days this month.”
“There’s less than ten days left in the month.”
“Then you’d better start scheduling.” He sighed and uncrossed his arms, less hostile. “If you don’t do it, they’ll say you’re off. Automatic.”
“And you would just hate that.”
“Fine, it’d make my job easier,” Michael admitted. “Babysitting you isn’t the high point of my Anchoring. But you’ve been doing this several years, and I’m told you weren’t always quite this bad at it.”
Alan rubbed his eyes and muttered, “Do it long as I have and see how you deal with the repeated crazies.” Michael was three years younger than him. “I don’t have my calendar. I’ll have to check it when I’m back in the office tomorrow.”
“You do that.” Michael took a drink, watching him. “Alan, I don’t hate being your Seer like you act like I must. But you’ve steadily been getting worse, and it’s not making things any easier for me. You sink the boat, I’m tied to it too.”
“Oh, I’m fairly certain you’d find a one-man raft before the sharks sniffed us out.” Alan nearly cringed at how whiny he sounded, especially considering Michael had made excuses to the council for him more than once, and so he tried a weak save. “Just call me tomorrow with the training stuff. Not until after nine, I won’t be by my calendar.”
There was a long silence as Michael messed uncomfortably with the cuffs of his sweater and made noises like he was about to speak. “Do you want to talk?” he finally asked.
“No.” Alan pointedly turned his attention back to the tablet. “No - thanks, no.” He hated forced concern. What was he going to say? I can’t write; I can’t hear any music in my head for a while now. Can you fix it?
Another ten or twenty seconds, and the other man pushed back his chair. “All right. You’ve got my number. You don’t hear from me by noon, try to remember to leave me a voicemail with your dates; I’ll call back when I land.” Alan nodded and attempted a small smile as Michael pulled on his coat. “Maybe you shouldn’t think about it so hard. The musical.” Alan flicked his eyes up. “Or the card. Watch some TV or something for an hour.” He caught the man’s skeptical expression. “I’m going, I’m leaving. Just don’t burst a vessel.” Michael picked up his cup, waved at the barista as she called at him to have a good evening, and left the shop.
(Written for therealljidol's Week 6 prompt "step on a crack" as referenced here - not the voting link, I'll post that later.)
We know your lives together
Will be joyous long after the wedding kiss …
Bliss? Miss? Hiss? Alan paused, then withdrew the spoon, tapping it against the rim of the cup. “Hiss?” he repeated softly, scrunching his face. “Too early to start thinking of him as a snake in the grass?” He shook his head and put the spoon aside. If he stared at the screen long enough, the letters might leap up and rearrange themselves. The second line was too long; too many syllables. He needed to figure out a way to drop some. “We know your lives together … hold joy long … hold joy after …” He trailed off, willing blood vessels not to explode with the pain of completing the stanza.
Instead, his brain conjured:
This card writer moved to Nantucket
Where he told his publisher “Just fuck it
“I’ve got more things to do
“Than satisfy you
“You can take your pap and go suck it.”
Momentarily pleased with himself, Alan took a quick drink of coffee and chuckled as he set the cup down, keeping his eyes on the tablet. He felt marginally better about the crap on the screen, and himself - it was low-grade second-grade poetry, but that mental limerick hadn’t exactly been a Drama Desk candidate, either. “This can’t be this difficult,” he mumbled, picking up the small metal stylus and hitting the Back button, blowing air out between his teeth until the screen was a blank gray-white again.
A gust of chilly air blew past his table, and he looked up to see the reason for leaving his little writing desk at home today. He didn’t say anything as Michael Connor shrugged off his coat and dropped it haphazardly folded over the other chair, nodding at Alan. He crossed to the counter, and Alan overheard him ordering a latte, something with chocolate and whip. He tried not to think about the upcoming conversation, by focusing instead on the wedding card he was supposed to be authoring.
The artwork (not his!) was two cutely goofy dogs dressed like people, in a tuxedo and wedding gown, noses together in a chaste doggy smooch on the cover. Inside were to be two gem-studded dog collars linked to look like wedding rings. Alan had tossed off a couple of canine-themed poems to his publisher, just off the top of his head, but they were turned down. “No goofiness,” Carter told him. “Just regular, old-fashioned straight sentiment, Rhodes.”
That’s the dumbest thing ever, he’d thought two hours ago when Carter handed it to him, but he’d said nothing. “That’s the dumbest thing ever,” he echoed now, out loud.
“What’s dumb?” Michael took the seat across from him.
“If you’re going to draw dogs getting married on a wedding card, why wouldn’t you want to make canine references in the poem on it?”
“Why would they have dogs getting married?” Michael cocked his head as he carefully peeled the plastic lid from the top of his waxy cup, then licked the chocolate and foam from inside it. “What’d you do, come up with some ‘doggy-style’ limerick, or something?”
Alan watched him start sucking the whipped cream and chocolate sauce off the top of the drink, feeling superior for his simpler, more grown-up beverage. “It was a little classier than that,” he answered, stiffly. “More to do with how cuddly dogs are.”
Michael nodded, ignoring his disapproval or simply not noticing. “So how’s the musical coming?”
“Same as ever.” He wanted that to cut off the friendly patter portion of their afternoon. “Why did you need to meet me? What’s wrong?”
“Right to it, no ‘how you doing’ and straight to ‘kiss my ass,’ hmm?” Michael put the lid back on his cup and licked his lips. “All right.” He studied Alan with nearly-black eyes and tapped his fingers on the table as he seemed to be searching for words. Alan didn’t know why he was so hesitant; it wasn’t like he’d been called on the carpet as often as Alan was. “You know what I’m going to say,” he finally said.
“If I knew what you were going to say,” Alan answered carefully, trying not to sound like the absolute jackass he felt like being, “why did I need to get out and spend three dollars on a cup of coffee, and hear you say it?”
“Come on - not just a little bit easy, here?”
“It’s not my job to make this easy for you,” Alan retorted.
“No, your job is to make it easy for others. For people who don’t know any better, who already feel traumatized.”
“I’m pleasant enough,” Alan said, defensive. “Once in a while, they’re in a big rushing hurry, and I’ve got to speed the explanation along; I stomp on a few cracks along the way, okay? You know I had to lock one in my bedroom so she wouldn’t go screaming out, and the only way I could get through to her was to yell through the door?”
“And you think this is good? Normal?”
“NORMAL?” Alan caught himself as a couple of baristas stopped work to look over. He leaned over the table toward Michael, dropping his voice. “What about any of this is normal? There’s no way to make someone feel normal when they think they’ve just lost everything they had the day before.”
Michael pointed at Alan. “That’s where you come in. It’s your appointed task to make these people feel like things are normal, or at least not any worse than they were.” He flattened his palm to the table again. “Look, you’ve been doing this enough years, you ought to know enough by now. When’s the last time you went to a training?”
“I have to work. Not all of us can trade off and take off whenever we want, Captain Connor.”
Michael rolled his eyes. “Come off it. I’m a commercial pilot, not an international playboy. I work, too. But I make time to learn how to be a decent Anchor; you can do it.”
“So now I’m not even decent.” Alan locked the stylus back into the tablet case cover, shaking his head. “I’ve helped a lot of people; a LOT, damn you. And I’ve been at this longer than that-”
Michael’s hand came down on his tablet cover, flat, to stop him packing up. “Alan, she tried to jump off a bridge, okay? She was that scared. She thought it was all wrong, that she’d never see her kids or her boyfriend again.”
“She wasn’t going to!” Alan blurted on reflex. “Not the ones she knew; you know that, I know that. All I did was try to explain it to her too!” Michael’s expression was oddly calm, but Alan sensed it wasn’t from patience. Too late, he thought to ask, “Is she okay?”
“Do you care that much?”
“You being an asshole isn’t the big help you think it is,” Alan snapped, trying to keep his voice down. A blind stranger could tell they were arguing, but he tried not to look it so much.
“And you being an insensitive prick doesn’t actually toughen anyone up for shifting.” Michael sat straighter, crossing his arms. “I don’t know if you’ve got any compassion in you, but you need to learn to fake it better if you don’t. This isn’t a lifetime appointment; you can be kicked off.”
He tried not to show how that smarted. “Look, just give me the warning and leave, all right?”
“Can’t.” Michael gave a small shake of his head. “I’ve got to get you to commit to a training. Pick a couple of days this month.”
“There’s less than ten days left in the month.”
“Then you’d better start scheduling.” He sighed and uncrossed his arms, less hostile. “If you don’t do it, they’ll say you’re off. Automatic.”
“And you would just hate that.”
“Fine, it’d make my job easier,” Michael admitted. “Babysitting you isn’t the high point of my Anchoring. But you’ve been doing this several years, and I’m told you weren’t always quite this bad at it.”
Alan rubbed his eyes and muttered, “Do it long as I have and see how you deal with the repeated crazies.” Michael was three years younger than him. “I don’t have my calendar. I’ll have to check it when I’m back in the office tomorrow.”
“You do that.” Michael took a drink, watching him. “Alan, I don’t hate being your Seer like you act like I must. But you’ve steadily been getting worse, and it’s not making things any easier for me. You sink the boat, I’m tied to it too.”
“Oh, I’m fairly certain you’d find a one-man raft before the sharks sniffed us out.” Alan nearly cringed at how whiny he sounded, especially considering Michael had made excuses to the council for him more than once, and so he tried a weak save. “Just call me tomorrow with the training stuff. Not until after nine, I won’t be by my calendar.”
There was a long silence as Michael messed uncomfortably with the cuffs of his sweater and made noises like he was about to speak. “Do you want to talk?” he finally asked.
“No.” Alan pointedly turned his attention back to the tablet. “No - thanks, no.” He hated forced concern. What was he going to say? I can’t write; I can’t hear any music in my head for a while now. Can you fix it?
Another ten or twenty seconds, and the other man pushed back his chair. “All right. You’ve got my number. You don’t hear from me by noon, try to remember to leave me a voicemail with your dates; I’ll call back when I land.” Alan nodded and attempted a small smile as Michael pulled on his coat. “Maybe you shouldn’t think about it so hard. The musical.” Alan flicked his eyes up. “Or the card. Watch some TV or something for an hour.” He caught the man’s skeptical expression. “I’m going, I’m leaving. Just don’t burst a vessel.” Michael picked up his cup, waved at the barista as she called at him to have a good evening, and left the shop.
(Written for therealljidol's Week 6 prompt "step on a crack" as referenced here - not the voting link, I'll post that later.)