Summertime!

It's become seemingly customary to open my postings with an apology about how I haven't been on recently; I do apologize about not being able to keep up, but now school's over. Despite a couple of nail-biting weeks and several exams, I'm still here, and on the road to recovery!

I've finished my post-apocalyptic and Flannery O'Connor classes. Both went well enough, and the last book we read for Comparative Lit was Life and Times of Michael K. I can't say I found it particularly post-apocalyptic, but it stuck to the themes of humanity in the face of overwhelming obstacles, which was more or less the point of the class.

But enough about school. Summer's here and with it comes plenty of time for new reading and writing! I picked up a few great books for my summer reading list, and grabbed a couple others as a spur-of-the-moment decision. That said, the following books are on my list thus far:

Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Collected Fiction by Jorge Luis Borges
Memories of the Future by Sigizmund Krzhizhanovsky

If you can pronounce that last author's name, it's about as difficult as his reading gets, which isn't a bad thing at all. I started Infinite Jest a couple weeks ago, but I need something a bit lighter to wind down from all my school reading. So I'm trying Memories of the Future, which is a collection of surrealist short stories written in 1920s Russia. I've only read one of the handful of short stories and novellas thus far, but Krzhizhanovsky's writing style is absolutely engrossing, even in translation. He reflects a lot of what I enjoy of the little Borges and Kafka I've read, though Krzhizhanovsky wrote well before Borges and only read Kafka at the end of his own literary career. Give it a look if you come across it; it's worth it.

As far as writing, I'm still wandering around with that pile of ideas in my head. Now that school's out I hope to dedicate a lot more time to getting some writing done. I'm toying with a sci-fi piece that is a bit difficult to describe as it isn't quite put together yet.

I'm heading to a wedding in California next week, but if all goes as I hope it does I'll be around a lot more often between now and September. Then I start a fifteen credit semester. Hoo boy.

Anyway, hope your summer goes well, and keep an ear to the ground!

Spring Cleaning

So I was rummaging through my old stories on my computer. Really, they're more like fragments that I just write as they come to me. One day they may be cohesive pieces that belnd together, but right now they've got a real Magnolia meets Waking Life kind of feel in that they're just snippets of life from different people. Anyway, I came across a piece I wrote back in January that I honestly more or less forgot about. So here it is.

She came in from the cold, her jacket seemingly alive with the scent of new fallen snow. All at once he was reminded of a time when he used to sit in front of his old television. Just as he turned on the tube there would be a characteristic clicking noise and a subtle crackling as the dust on the tube became polarized by the static electricity. He would run the back of his hand across the screen, less than an inch away from the glass. When he pulled back his hand it was saturated with the oddest scent; so fresh and yet musty. The smell invaded his nostrils, rejuvenating his senses. There was little in the world that compared to this scent, but there was snow.

So her jacket gave off tufts of this static smell, gently wafting off her with every minute turn of the shoulders or shivering sigh. He watched her and smiled at how truly beautiful she seemed, cheeks flushed with color against the chilly air outside. Her glasses fogged up slightly and she crinkled her nose in that cute way she usually feigned frustration, her eyes beading together as her eyebrows furrowed, the hint of a smile evident on her face. He chuckled slightly, getting up from the couch to take her coat.

"Work was hell today. Absolutely unbelievable. God, I wan--"

She stopped her sentence short. They both knew what she was going to say and, though she knew it was better for her, she still cast accusatory glances his way whenever she came home from a particularly stressful day, knowing how he would react to the faint scent of nicotine sloughing off her short black hair. She loved him, really. From time to time she just missed the woman she used to be.

"So work was tough, then?" he asked after a brief silence during which resentment and forbidding emotions hung in the air.

"Yeah." For a moment she stood in the doorway, not wanting to make eye contact with him. It was a childish tactic, but it got the job done. Starting back to life, she held her arms and rubbed them, shivering. With measured detachment, sure to strike just the right nerve of guilt, she said "I'm going to take a bath." She then disappeared into the bedroom, flakes of melting snow falling imperceptibly from her clothes, patterning the carpet like tears.

So there's that. But I'm not here to rest on the laurels of stuff I wrote a long time ago. That short piece I promised in my last post is here. It's post-apocalyptic, and it came from a writing prompt that I enjoyed. So here's this, too. I tried to write a Flannery O'Connor-esque ending to the piece, but it seems forced. I'm going to have to start polishing pieces before I post them.

They hadn't seen light in days. They traveled the flooded catacombs in darkness, eyes straining for the slightest sign of movement. Rats swam past like greasy fish, claws occasionally scratching against the boat. The scratches were amplified by the otherwise impenetrable silence, bounding and increasing in intensity until becoming a dull roar hidden far beyond them, a great beast lurking just out of sight, waiting.

Eric had been quiet since The Flare-Up. He had been at choir practice. Claire was watching him, smiling at the angelic voice she could discern from the wave of singers in a way only siblings can. The slow, melodic piece was building to its crescendo, and in the top corner of the bleachers Eric was preparing to be led into his solo. Claire remembered feeling pride as Eric smiled, squaring his shoulders and raising his songbook. Then the church burst into flames.

There was no lingering smoke, no candle left conspicuously close to any of the ancient yellowing drapes. The flames just appeared, as if a switch had been flipped. The immense Gothic pipe organ behind the choir burned, air whistling through the pipes in unholy wails which intermingled with those of the panicked choir. Robes spontaneously combusted, engulfing the singers in flames as they blindly stumbled for an exit. Eric stood mortified as his world was quickly turning to ash. Claire moved to grab him.

"Come ON, Eric! We need to get out!"

The flames licked the tears from Eric's unblinking face, leaving salty trails down his cheeks as Claire half-dragged him through the rapidly deteriorating church, the wails of their fellow churchgoers echoing behind them.

Claire and Eric staggered to the exit, coughing ash from their lungs. They checked that the other was okay, then looked out on the city. Eric gasped.

The entire city was ablaze. Every building was engulfed in hellish fire, every car a rolling fireball. People were running through the streets with their burning clothes falling away from them like insect skins, only to find their very flesh on fire. From Eric and Claire's perspectives, they almost seemed like ants. Their collective wails of torment, with the subsequent collapse of the church behind them, sent Eric into a catatonic state from which he had yet to recover.

Claire knew Eric had taken a break when the rowing got substantially more difficult. She didn't want him to know just how scared she was that they were stuck down here, no real way of finding their way back to the surface (and no real reason to, either). Every trace of civilization was charred away. Not a house, not a building, not a single mailbox was now anything more than a handful of ash waiting to be tossed upon the wind.

Nature had not been harmed, though. Despite the raging inferno all around it, there wasn't a singed blade of grass or browned leaf in the city. Perhaps this had been judgement, Claire thought to herself. Perhaps we're not alone. Maybe only the pure were saved, and God kept the world as a new Eden. After all, He only promised never again to purge the world with a flood.

A small rectangle of light directly ahead snapped Claire from this reverie. They had made their way back to land. Claire smiled. "See Eric," she said, "I told you we'd be fine."

She turned to smile at him, but as soon as she did she gasped, stifling a scream in her throat. Suddenly it was clear why Eric stopped rowing with such noise, dropping the oar against the canoe with what Claire mistook as frustration. She understood why she hadn't heard him move in hours.

A fat wet rat glared at Claire through one of Eric's pale white eye sockets, its pink tail curling out of his lipless mouth. Eric's face had been completely eaten away.

Claire screamed, a peal of terror that echoed back into the catacombs, doubling and tripling on itself, snowballing away into the distance, then striking a wall and returning, not one scream now but dozens, barreling back up the watery corridors like cerberi, their barks endless and maniacal laughter.

So that's where I am right now. I'll be getting more posted in the weeks to come. I bought a collection of essays by Flannery O'Connor, so I'll be employing more of the Southern Gothic style into my pieces, to be sure. Stick around!

...

It's been a month. Sorry for not being around at all; school's kicking into high gear and the blog's fallen on the back burner. I'm still writing. My penance will be to post my newest attempt at a short short story I wrote for a prompt I found online. It's post-apocalyptic (of course) but I think it's also got some real influence from Flannery O'Connor, at least in the last few sentences. I'm drawing on her writing style a lot--in case you've forgotten I'm taking a class that studies her works exclusively--and when I start reading her collected nonfiction in the coming weeks I'm sure I'll be employing advice she dispenses.

My novel's still in brainstorming, though I've gotten a few more blurbs written down (including a nice piece about a woman screaming in the distance, with her scream dissipating away into nothing). I'm interested in a new short story idea I'm working on, with a young couple in an apartment fire. Bits of the imagery I have for that story appear in what I'm posting later this week.

Again, sincere apologies for not being on more often. This should cease being an issue when summer rolls around and I've got more time to dedicate to writing.

Stay tuned!

Those Rough Pieces I Promised

So I just noticed that I never actually put up those ultra-rough drafts I promised. My apologies. I've rummaged around my notebooks and found a couple that I'll just put up exactly as they are in my notebook (so don't be surprised if they're disjointed or end kind of abruptly). These are works I may have scribbled down while at the bus stop or at home with a few extra minutes. In any case, here you are.

The first piece is the one I alluded to a while ago, the dystopic fiction I was trying to flesh out into a tangible idea.

Elias still marveled, as people unabashedly buffaloed their way past him and into the shelter, at how damn efficient the whole thing was. Not five minutes earlier he had been sitting quietly at his kitchen table, paying his bills while the Animals gently crooned about how their father had been a tailor. Steam was lazily wafting from his mug of coffee, spiralling away in long curling tendrils of heat before dissipating into the kitchen air.
Then he heard the unmistakable static crack-pop of a loudspeaker turning on, followed by the rising wail of the air raid siren, urgent yet detached, almost uninterested. It wasn't until he looked out his window and saw entire buildings flooding people into the street that he knew this was no drill.
The crowd was silent. They had run this scenario so many times it had lost any novelty or urgency; it had become a matter of routine. Innumerable rows of shoulders slouched forward. Countless dull eyes, soft and lamblike, watched countless worn feet tramp across the asphalt. There almost seemed to be a resignation, perhaps even a grateful thought or two that the damn thing was finally decided.
Elias straightened up, stretching his back with a groan. Exhaling deeply he let his arms fall to his sides as he looked around the apartment he'd called home for nearly a decade. Almost lazily he conjured an image of the entire place engulfed in flames. He watched red-orange fingers as they scrambled up his aged parlor drapes, growling and snarling across the shag carpet, hissing through his heating ducts.
A low rumble was beginning to gather itself to the north, a single guttural noise slowly snowballing into a great swath of fearsome droning moving closer and closer.

Not too shabby. In my opinion, anyway. But I'm biased.

This other piece didn't really stand for anything larger; it was just a sort of snapshot I sketched out while at the doctor's office a while ago. A nice little moment with some imagery I really like.

"Did I ever tell you about the man I once saw in the laundromat? Of course I did. I did! He came into the laundromat and without a word stripped down buck naked and threw his clothes in the washer. Poor guy just stood there in front of the machine shivering. Scrawny little guy. He got arrested, of course. A mother came in with her daughter, took one look at him, and turned around so fast you'd think she'd been slapped across the face.
"But only one set of clothes, can you imagine? Isn't that something?"
Mitch had no response. Snow continued to fall in great thick heaps, like feathers pouring from a goosedown pillow. The sky was slipping into a blue-black, chasing away the last red hues of the sunset like air rushing out from under a falling blanket. The interstate was thick with cars returning from the airport, families briefly united as they gabbed incessantly to kill the time.
The long black scaly leech of traffic lurched forward in segments. Mitch briefly thought of longitudinal waves along a slinky, drew the connection back to school, and immediately abandoned his train of thought.
Joan was growing increasingly uncomfortable. Mitch's forehead hadn't left the window since they left the airport, and he just carried an aura, an ennui she couldn't seem to penetrate.

Thanks to Juliana's mother for the anecdote that not only led off this story, but was also responsible for what there currently is of it.

So that's that. Incredibly brief and rough works that hopefully satiate you for a while. I'll be putting up more as it gets written, but that novel's becoming pretty promising. I can't escape it, especially considering I'm in a class that deals specifically with the Apocalypse and humanity's response thereto. Hopefully the novel will have an outline within a couple weeks, soon as I figure out how I want the characters to be. I'll also need to do some research for factual accuracy. I'm so excited!

Take care, and come back!

I'm Planning a Novel!

Dismissing the usual apologies regarding my inability to keep this thing updated more than twice a month, I've got some news...I'm going to write a novel!

Perhaps I should make an elaboration here; I'm planning on writing a novel. I was at work a week ago or so and an idea just sort of walked into my head. Nothing revolutionary as far as plot goes but definitely something that explores the ideas of humanity and compassion in dire circumstance.

Without giving too much away (not that I don't trust you, but this is the Internet) it's going to be a post-apocalyptic story following two families as they attempt to survive a nuclear winter. I can already tell there's going to be a great amount of Cormac McCarthy's The Road present in this piece, hopefully just as a sort of mood establishment. I'll be updating sporadically throughout the process so that you can see where I am in the novel-writing thing. Who knows, maybe you'll even be inspired!

Well, I'm off to class. I had a couple minutes and got out what I want to say. Take it easy!

I Haven't Forgotten About You

It's been almost 2 weeks since I posted last. Sorry about that. I'm just throwing this up really quick before class, but as a form of penitence I will be posting some VERY rough drafts of some stuff that's just been sitting in my various notebooks. A couple of them could be rather nice stories, but I just haven't had the time to expand them at all (working 24-28 hours a week on top of being a full-time student is surprisingly taxing).

But anyway, as I said I'll be tossing up a couple new pieces shortly, just because I like you guys so much. They should be up this afternoon. Happy belated Valentines Day!

Down to the Nitty-Gritty

Well, I'm finally starting to really sink my teeth into this semester. I'm becoming more and more impressed with my classes, but especially English 215. It's a rudimentary class that, as I've said before, is essential to English majors but I just love the method of discourse in our class. We all arrange the tables in a circle and just discuss the reading we had due for that day. It hearkens back many fond memories of the Philosophy and Ethics course I took in high school, and honestly I think it's my favorite style of classroom participation. Not to mention the fact that in Week 2 we've already read essays on Aristotle and Marxist literary interpretation (and next week we cover Deleuze and Guattari, two VERY famous post-modern literary scholars).

We're currently reading The Brief and Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao bu Junot Diaz. It's one of those books that, prior to this class, I had been perpetually intending to purchase but never did. I'm only about 70 pages in thus far, but it's a great ride. The voice is so genuine and funny, but also deeply personal and intimate. You feel like Diaz wrote the book specifically for you, which is intriguing because as a writer I am aware of the difficulties of engaging your audience early on. It's nice to see examples of novels that have the ability to hook you and keep you on the line, to use a fishing metaphor.

I also came across a wonderful book at the Golda Meir Library a little while ago that attempts to interpret the works of Kurt Vonnegut through the lens of Postmodern analysis as well as chaos theory. Seeing as I'm a math and physics geek at heart, as well as a fan of Vonnegut, this book just seemed interesting. I've only read the introduction but it looks like it will be quite the treat!

I'm coming down with a rather unwelcome bout of writer's apathy (which is really just apathy) and haven't written recently. I'm going to take some time this evening to try finding potential writing prompts that'll kick-start my creative side. I haven't forgotten the point of this blog!

Off to read for my Philosophy of Art class. Until later!

Catching Up

Hey everyone! Sorry I haven't been around lately. School was a bit of a headache for a while, getting into classes and so on, but I'm back. I'll be updating on a weekly basis or so and just letting you know what's new on this end.

So I'm taking two English courses this year, English 245 and English 215. The latter is a mandatory course for English majors, but looks promising with some of the books we'll be reading, including excerpts from Aristotle, Freud, and Foucault. The former is an in-depth analysis of a prominent literary figure, and in this case it's the Southern writer Flannery O'Connor. I'll admit I hadn't heard of her before this class, and didn't know what to expect in taking such a class but I've been reading her short stories and have to say I'm quite impressed! It's fascinating to think her first short story, "The Geranium" was published when she was just 22 years old. I can't help but think that she was only three years older than me and she was already published. I guess that's just more motivation for me!

The class I'm most interested in, however, would have to be my Comparative Literature class, Comp Lit 135. It's an exploration into apocalyptic literature and how it relates to society through the ages. For those who have read my bio, there's little in the literary world I find more enjoyable than the post-apocalyptic genre and this class, which analyzes the strengths of the human condition in post-apocalyptic settings, is guaranteed to be entertaining and thought-provoking. If that's not enough, the book list for the class includes Kurt Vonnegut, Alan Moore, and Jose Saramago! Needless to say, a very exciting class.

I'll be starting work on another short story soon; I've got a great little idea I'm trying to flesh out into something tangible. It's a dystopic piece, which is a new genre for me, but it should be a rather rewarding experience. Stay tuned!

Part 3 of 3

January 25

It’s night again. I spent all of yesterday making sure everything is found just as I want it to be. I don’t know exactly what will happen to me after this, but I can’t leave Alice out there. I made a vow to her and to God that I would stay by her side in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, in good times and in bad, forever.

My dear wife Alice used to say I didn’t know how to follow through with resolutions because I didn’t like the idea of changing myself. I can only smile as I remember how she’d stare at me over her half-moon glasses and chuckle as I made my resolutions, wishing me the best but knowing I’d never finish any of them. But that was before. Now I truly see just how much I meant to Alice, and I want her to know that I will love her forever, regardless of how she looks. I’m committed to showing her my dedication, to prove to her she’s not fighting alone against whatever dark abyss she’s gazed into. I want to be there holding her hand as we fight together.

I’ve already set about making myself appropriate for the next time I see her. The straight razor has made quick work of my left hand. It’s almost eerie to watch the muscles twitch and strain as I flex my hand. I’ve done away with my legs, stomach, and chest too. I remember getting a manual as we landed in Korea, showing pictures of the human body as a muscle-enveloped skeleton with vital organs circled under bright red ink. As I looked into the bathroom mirror beneath a forehead gleaming white in the harsh fluorescent light, my lips dangling from my crazily-grinning mouth I could only imagine myself as some great leering caricature of what I’d seen fifty years ago.

I’ve saved my right hand for last, because I want to be sure the world knows why I’ve done what I’ve done. Any minute now I’ll go back into the bathroom and add a final pound of flesh to the bloody mess on the linoleum floor.

I want the world to know that I loved Alice. I still love her. I don’t know what will happen when I descend the attic stairs, trailing blood behind me like some macabre wedding train, but I know I’ll be with her.

That’s all I really want.

Part 2 of 3 (Long Section)

January 16

I’ve stared at this picture throughout the night. Every part of me knows it can’t be true, but the more I look at that haze of yellow light the more I can see her face. Her high cheekbones and soft chin hiding behind a radiant cascade of soft hair, her fair skinned arms holding her hands just like they did the night of our honeymoon, nervous but excited as we stood on the tarmac waiting for our plane to Hawaii. Her eyes, though. I keep coming back to her eyes. They seem different somehow, like they’re holding some kind of secret. There’s a soft smile behind them, but more a look of understanding. I don’t know where Alice went after she passed away. I guess I just assumed she moved on to a better place. But I’ve gone through every one of these pictures and she’s in each of them. Maybe Heaven was lonely. Maybe she could sense how much pain I was still in. I don’t know. All I know is she’s back now. Maybe things will get better.

January 18

I’m turning into the barmy old coot I never wanted to be. I’m completely changing my lifestyle for a blur in a picture that vaguely resembles my wife. There’s a small voice in the back of my head saying it’s all just a trick of the light or a funky blur, and the entire rational side of my brain is screaming at me for being so deluded. But at the same time, the camera doesn’t lie. Does it? All it does is show what’s there. So maybe there is something to this whole thing. I’ve certainly acted like there was this past few days. I’m back to my old ways of courting.

I’ve saved everything Alice used to like. I set her place at the kitchen table when I sit down to eat, laid out in her best china and crystal wine glasses. We used to love sharing a bottle of wine together. Tonight I’m treating her to a candlelight dinner, just like the one we had in Paris the night of our twentieth anniversary. The light glinted and seemed to dance, playing against the darkness of her eyes. I feel so much more life within me having seen Alice in those pictures. I need to take more.

January 20

I saw her today. Not in the pictures this time, I’ve seen her there dozens of times. I saw her in real life, before my eyes. Well, out of the corner of them maybe. I was in the den reading my evening paper and suddenly a glint of light sprang into the corner of my eye. I cocked my head almost instinctually, expecting perhaps light bouncing off the hood of a passing car, but I saw her. The yellow haze of light and dust was moving slowly, like a passing car’s reflection crawls across your ceiling. She seemed to be moving without any real speed, but if you’re no longer among the living I suppose you don’t really need to set an agenda. The light had an almost human form but still drifted like a patch of smoke, dreamily, toward her old sewing room. I feel so stupid, not remembering the hours she’s spend in that room making shirts and quilts and goodness knows what else. It’s only natural she want to stay where she’s comfortable.

She looks so much different when she’s right in front of you, rather than looking at you from a picture. Her features were softer, not so horribly contrasted by whatever barbarous acts the photo developers use. Her face was blurred, so much so that it almost seemed fake. Like a piece of rubber pulled over her skull. Maybe all the crazy stuff she’s going through means it’s just going to take some time to fully rearrange herself. Even without the eyes, nose and lips I’d stared at for so many decades, without the cheekbones that held her smile so beautifully, the forehead that always relaxed into a smooth dome when she laughed, I think she’s happy. She’s seen how I’ve kept everything just as she left it, and you need that. It’s like returning home from a long trip in a distant land, finding everything exactly as you left it and sliding into that sense of comfort in knowing you’re home at last.

January 21

Alice hasn’t come out at all today. I haven’t seen her around the rest of the house, anyway, so I’m pretty sure she’s still there. A soft golden glow keeps pouring out from under the door, moving around like a firefly who can’t find its off button. Maybe she’s just settling in again. Hopefully I’ll see her tomorrow.

January 22

Still nothing from Alice. I stood in the hallway outside her sewing room for about half an hour today, knocking on the door and waiting for a response. All I felt was a cold silence. The light under the door’s dimmed a little. I hope I haven’t done anything wrong. I don’t want her to be angry with me. I told her I wanted her to feel comfortable, and I’d do whatever it took to make her feel that way. Maybe she’ll come out tomorrow.

January 23

She’s started crying. I didn’t hear it at first, except as a low sort of whimpering. It sounded like air rattling through the heating vents; this old house makes more noise in the winter than I do. Anyway, it started out really weakly, a couple of sniffles and some whimpers. Now it’s gotten a bit louder, and I’m concerned. It’s the crying you hear when someone learns of the death of someone they knew well, but weren’t particularly close to. The death of some kind of ideal image of that person. Maybe I’ve done something wrong.

Later

The crying’s gotten louder. It’s become full-fledged weeping now, flowing out from under her sewing room door like tar, heavy and solemn. I can’t seem to get her to stop, no matter what I say. It’s almost as though she can’t even hear me.

January 24

She hasn’t stopped. It’s two in the morning and her weeping has turned into wailing. Heart-rending shrieks of pain are coming from the other side of the door, and I can’t get her to stop. She never cried like this when she was alive; it’s a kind of screaming I haven’t heard since Korea. It’s the frantic, terrified scream of the men who limped back into the trenches with their stomachs torn open, holding their guts in their arms, eyes darting everywhere in hope of some kind of relief but secretly knowing all they could do was wait to die.

I just wish I knew what was wrong. I don’t know what else to do. I need to confront her and see what happened.

Later

My heart won’t stop pounding. God in Heaven, what’s happened to my wife?

I put down this journal and tried steadying myself, though her constant screams had quite deeply unnerved me. I slowly walked down the stairs, and as I did I felt an odd pulling sensation, as though part of me was trying to stay away from the source of the noise. I’d felt as though I tapped into the unrivalled fear of our ancestors who lived in the trees, huddling together as they heard dark shadows rustling in the foliage below. I reached the bottom of the stairs and started slowly moving down the hallway to her sewing room. I could see a weak reddish light coming from below the door, though I knew it to be the sun rising on the horizon. There was no other light.

I need to stop for a minute. My hands won’t stop shaking.

Later

The sun’s been up for a couple hours, and I think that’s helped to calm me a bit. I can still hear her; she hasn’t stopped screaming. She’s wandering around the house now, shrieking like a banshee, but her screams have lost their sorrowful tones. They’re now completely filled with horror.

To continue my story, I approached Alice’s door, my breath escaping my chest only in the slightest of constricted gasps. I could feel beads of sweat slowly forming on my brow, cool in the early morning air. I prepared to knock on the door, thinking as I did that there was no way she could have heard me over her own frenzied screeching, but the second my knuckles rapped the dense wood the door flung open, and I saw Alice.

Her body was no longer a shaft of light and dust. She was an honest-to-God human, though I don’t believe God would have claimed her. Her skin had gone a mottled gray and green, large patches falling off her face and arms, exposing black muscle and pearly bone covered in writhing maggots. Her hair was a scraggly black mess, sparsely covering her skull in the places where her skin still clung stubbornly. Her forehead was white bone, a huge flap of skin dangling over her cheek. Her nose had been eaten away, leaving a gaping hole in the center of her face. Most of all I remember her mouth. Her lips had gone a purple-green, shriveled to the point where her remaining yellow and black teeth leered at me in a grim rictus. Her tongue was hugely swollen, writhing behind her teeth like a purple slug, half eaten by whatever godless creature had done this.

She stopped screaming when she saw me. There was no love left in the empty sockets of her eyes, but her eyebrows wrinkled in an expression of absolute helplessness. She stumbled toward me on rotting legs, her fungus-eaten bones on the verge of collapse. Her wildly-flailing arms reached for me, shaking off dirt and maggots as she moved. I tried to back away, but her rotted stump of a hand, finger bones and ligaments wasted away, managed to grab my shoulder. Her rotten sockets stared into my eyes, her sour breath like compost against my face. She took a few shuddering breaths and with monumental effort succeeded in hissing a single word:

“Empty.”

Then her head fell back, as if she were struck with some divine inspiration. For the briefest of moments it rolled aimlessly over her shoulders, across her chest, and along her back as though she were trying to remove a kink in her neck. Her arm fell lamely to her side as she stumbled backward slightly. I began to back away from what had once been the woman I loved, the woman I swore to be with until the end of time, tears falling from my unblinking eyes. She seemed to sense my departure, and lunged toward me with a shriek that froze my heart. I turned around and ran, tears streaming from my face and in that last moment before I slammed the attic door behind me I could hear our screams mingling in the stale air of the morning.

Later

Since I left Alice downstairs she hasn’t stopped screaming. I can hear her downstairs, tearing the house apart. I must have left the door open behind me when I ran out on her. She’s still shrieking, but now it’s almost sorrowful. I think she’s looking for me. I know I didn’t see any love in what used to be her eyes, but I can feel her sadness. After all, she must be scared. Who knows what thoughts have been running through her mind these past days as she’s had to watch her body slowly decompose, then see nothing at all. Imagine sitting in your favorite chair, feeling every sensation as your skin decomposes and insects gnaw away at your flesh, the only person you’ve ever loved in the living room mere feet away from you. Imagine the utter helplessness of feeling your own body decompose.

I have done wrong by her. My God, I’ve forsaken the only woman I ever loved, and she’s going to walk the earth searching for me until the end of time, if she has to. Every now and then I hear a shattering come from below me, and I know she’s searching for me now. I’ve seen her as she is, and she thinks I’ve left her. There’s no way I can imagine the fear she must be enduring, and yet here I am, hiding away from her as she tries so desperately to make sense of what’s happened to herself.

I can’t do this anymore. I can’t leave her like this.

It's Here! (Part 1 of 3)

So here it is! Criticism is welcome; post it as a comment after any of the acts (I've broken it into 3 parts, roughly where the acts meet). The piece is untitled, but suggestions are welcome!

January 1

So here we are, the first day of a new year! I’ve made several resolutions this year and I intend to keep them! My dear wife Alice used to say I didn’t know how to follow through with resolutions because I didn’t like the idea of changing myself. She used to look at me from behind her half-moon glasses with a sweet little smile on her face as I’d go on about how I was going to be more active, maybe join her at bingo a few nights a month or just get gussied up for no real reason. She’d laugh and say “Jim you old curmudgeon, the day you follow through with all these promises is the day I start watching for the Second Coming!” We’d laugh together.

I miss her.

Anyway, I finally made a list of resolutions, and this time I intend to stick with them! I’ll do right by Alice and show her I actually can keep promises. First on the list, I’m finally joining the twenty-first century by buying a camera. Alice used to complain that we didn’t have any pictures of ourselves and I hated paying someone else to do the job I knew I could do. I kept telling her I was saving for a camera, putting away a little from each check. Pretty soon, I’d tell her, we’d get the camera and I’d take so many pictures she’d be sick of it! Every time I’d tell her that and every time I could see she didn’t believe a word of it. Well that all changes. First thing tomorrow I’m buying a camera.

January 2

Just got back from the store. Guess who’s the proud new owner of a digital camera? I told the young man at the store I wanted nothing but the top of the line and he brought me over to a rack of Japanese cameras with names I couldn’t even dream of pronouncing. He must have known I wasn’t much of a technological guy when I asked him where the film went. He told me there isn’t film in cameras anymore; everything’s saved on little plastic cards inside the camera and I can just print off pictures whenever I want. So I bought the one he said was the best they had (most expensive one too, I might add) and now I just need to read the instruction manual, as soon as I find my glasses.

Later

After a few mishaps and a lot of frustration I’ve got the camera working! The buttons on the thing are so damn small it’s almost impossible to use and the screen’s one of those touch-screen jobs that my beefy fingers aren’t used to using. You need Japanese fingers to use this thing! Anyway, I managed to get it going and I took a few pictures of my house, just to see how it works. I photographed my den, with my corduroy recliner and newspaper rack, I took a picture of the kitchen, with its yellow walls from years of Alice’s smoking while she cooked. So many times I told her those cigarettes were going to be the end of her, and she just laughed it off. I can’t blame her though. We both grew up in a time when smoking was everywhere; all the big movie stars were doing it and they seemed to be getting along just fine.

She didn’t take it seriously until that day in the oncologist’s office when they told her about the tumor sitting on her right lung, the size of a golf ball and getting bigger. By then her raspy voice had become second-nature to her. I hardly even noticed it anymore. But there was still something incredibly sad about listening to her cry in that cold sterile room, her chest hitching as she tried to gasp for one deep breath but knowing it would never come.

Now I’ve stained the pages. I’ve spent the last hour remembering how she spent her final days, just staring vacantly out the kitchen window with a look of resignation on her face. She tried so hard to take solace in the fact that pretty soon her pain would cease, but you could tell in her eyes the last remnant of spirituality, which had been such a strong characteristic in her in years past, had left. It just coiled away like heat rising from the road on a hot day. It left her as a shell, her eyes dark and dull.

I don’t think I want to write anymore today.

January 5

I haven’t been keeping up on this, but these last few days have been pretty hard. I’ve been crying mostly, lying in bed and trying to recall her face in happier times. Before the cancer ravaged her system and rotted her from the inside out. It’s getting so much harder to remember.

January 6

I went to Walgreens to get the pictures developed today. It seems if you need a camera you need a printer, and if you have a printer you need a computer and so on and so on. This is why I don’t like technology. It used to be my rant I gave to Alice every time she would bring up how we needed a television or a computer. One thing always leads to another, I would say, and pretty soon we’re spending thousands of dollars on things that we don’t even need. I raised hell the day we brought a phone into the house, and to this day I hate using it. It just seems so invasive, coming right into my home and talking to me less than an inch from my ear.

Anyway, I got to Walgreens and they told me they’d have the pictures done in an hour. Rush, rush, rush, everything needs to get done so fast! I told the lady behind the counter (who had more colors in her hair than the rainbow) I’d be back later this week and she could take her time. It felt good to get out of the house for a while. I just can’t seem to get over losing Alice. Everything in that house reminds me of her and I hurt more and more when I try to remember her face, knowing that it’s fading more and more with each passing day. You spend forty years looking into someone’s eyes every day, and within six months you can’t even remember what color they were.

This isn’t at all how I wanted this journal to be.

January 8

I think the man at the camera store took me for a fool. I picked up the pictures from Walgreens today and they turned out pretty well. The images were pretty clear and the quality of the camera is pretty good, as far as I can tell. But every single picture has some weird blur in them. There’s a wisp of yellow light that looks like maybe a smudge on the camera lens or some weird reflection of light off a mirror in the den or countertop in the kitchen. I think it’s a problem with the camera, though. I’m going back to the store tonight.

Later

Well that was pointless. The man at the store told me there was nothing wrong with the camera. I showed him the pictures and he told me it looked like a lighting problem. We got in a huge argument about how the camera was supposed to have some sort of light balancing technology and all sorts of bells and whistles. Pretty soon I was yelling and security had to escort me from the store. After all the money I spent on the camera I think I deserve to have something that actually works properly. I’m going to give the camera another try but if that smudge is still there I’m sending it back.

January 12

It’s not a smudge on the camera. I took another batch of pictures a few days ago and got them developed. The odd cloud of light is still in the pictures, but there’s something different about it now. It seems to be taking some kind of form. I’m getting a bit concerned, but the pictures are so small I can’t make out what it might be. I’ll be heading to the library to see if there’s anything I can do to make these pictures bigger. I don’t want to give Walgreens any more of my money than I have to, and I don’t think the camera store will even let me in the door, so I’m going to see what I can do on my own.

January 13

I found something that I think could help me. I was going through a mountain of books at the library last night when I found a chapter on something called a camera obscura. Basically if I can find a way to convert my digital images into film I should be able to set up a sort of projection system that makes the picture much bigger. I can set up the machine to project the picture onto one of the walls in my home. It should help me figure out what the heck this thing that keeps showing up in my pictures is. I suppose now I need to consult the yellow pages and find someone who can help. It’ll be expensive, I’m sure.

January 15

I found a specialty camera store that converted all my pictures to film. They even gerry-rigged a camera obscura machine for me, for a nominal fee. Photography’s becoming a very expensive hobby. I’ve asked one of the neighborhood kids to help me set up the equipment. I’ve become quite obsessed with figuring out what it is I’m seeing in this patch of dusty yellow light. It seems so familiar. Anyway, as soon as it gets dark I should be able to set up the projection and finally see what it is that’s wormed its way into all of my pictures.

Later

Oh my God. It’s Alice.

Some Shameless Self-Promotion

For those of you interested, a majority of the body of my work can be found on the website www.thepoetsanctuary.net. Just throwing that out there. My username is madamimadam, and you can run a search through the site after registering. It's a fantastic website, and their critiquing section greatly honed my self-editorial skills.

Speaking of which, the story will be coming up soon! A couple more tweaks, and we'll be good to go! I already have my next story brewing, more of an idea than a plot or story. It's futuristic and dystopic, which is a bit of a stretch for me but we'll see.

Stay tuned!

Huzzah!

So my first written work of the year is finally done! Well, the rough draft is done, anyway. I decided to try writing in journal entry form, mostly as a way of seeing just how much of my ability to create a distinct voice remained. It's a bit choppy, some of the language is lowbrow even for the layman I'm trying to create.

Anyway, the story's a short horror piece (commonly called "creepypasta" on the internet, for being a scary story that's often copied and pasted elsewhere by people who found it enjoyable), and it explores some pretty interesting aspects of loneliness and the desire for companionship. I think it could have been a lot worse, considering it's the first short story I've written in more than 2 years.

It'll be up here soon; I want to get one good edit in before submitting it for your reading pleasure. Criticism will be welcome!

With a New Year Comes New Writing...Soon

So the new year kind of caught me off guard with a family emergency and problems at work. Suffice it to say, I haven't been around as often as I'd like. This year I intend to devote at least two hours a week to writing and if I feel I've written something worthy of online publication (so to speak) I'll toss it up here for you. My first piece should be pretty intriguing; it's tentatively called "Perelesnytsia" so stay sharp! Hopefully it'll be up within a week or so; I'm toying with different formats right now so there's some heavy revision.

Naturally as followers you will also get to be in on the critiquing process; writing is rewriting, it is often said, and I'm not deluded enough to think I'll get it right the first time. If, after I post something, you feel it needs another revision, add a comment and I'll treat each criticism as that of the utmost importance.

Anyway, I'm off to my volunteer job for a couple hours of tea and writing. Until we meet again!