Drafts shor t stories
No. 1 / Summer 2013
For E.K. : Thanks for the ideas and the instigation.
Let’s listen to something. J.Wilson It was springtime, night, an old record was on the turntable, sad and nostalgic. He was sitting alone in the basement. The music was pulling memories out from the back of his mind - memories of walking alone in certain places during the fall months of the year, headphones on, mind wandering. Reading a story in the middle of the night, alone in a tent, eyes heavy. The song ended and he realized then that it was storming outside. He wondered about the man he had seen walking along the road earlier, if he had made it to where he was going, or if he was still walking and if so did he find cover from the rain? He had also seen a possum about to cross the street in front of his car but instead froze in the headlights. He wondered if the possum has made it safely across the street or had some other car come crashing down on it? Emily called then, from the top of the stairs. “Cal? Are you down there?” “Yes, I’m here,” he said. He stood up with a groan because his knees were stiff and sore. “Are you ready to go or what?” “I’m coming right now, hold on,” he called back. It had started to really rain and he could barely see anything ahead of the car, just rain drops illuminated by the headlights. “We’re going to be late,” she said, blame in her voice. “We told them we’d be there by nine.” “It’s fine, they’ll wait,” he said, squinting into the dark. “What was the street again?” “Ridgeview or something like that. Ridgeway?” When they pulled up to the house, a dog started barking. He could see it at the front window, its paws up on the windowsill. The rain had let up a bit. The man and his wife came out as they were walking up to the porch. “Hi there. You find it alright?” the man called.
They walked in the drizzling rain around to the back of the house where there was an old red shed. The man fumbled with the latch on the door and then held it open for them. “Well, this is it,” he said. “It works?” Cal asked. “Oh yeah, she works alright,” said the man, nodding emphatically. The jukebox was covered in a layer of dust, but otherwise it looked to be in fair condition. Cal laid a hand on top of it and crouched a little to get a better look through the window at the stacked records and mechanism. “I could plug her in, she works just beautifully,” the man said. “Let’s see, there’s an extension cord around here somewhere. Sue, you know where that cord is?” As the man and his wife were busy looking for the cord, Cal and Emily stood by, studying the details of the jukebox and make small nods with their heads. “What do you think?” Emily asked. Before Cal could say anything the man let out a relieved grunt. “Ah, here it is,” he said, pulling a pile of cord out from behind an old refrigerator. The wife clapped her hands together, startling them. “Let’s listen to something,” she said, cheerfully. Cal looked at her curiously. She had been so quiet until that moment, he hadn’t expected her to say anything. The man succeeded in plugging the jukebox in and it lit up, filling the space with an warm yellow light. “Let’s see here, what should we listen to?” he said, wiping dust off the buttons. Before he could push any buttons, the wife brushed him aside and pressed a button. There were some mechanical sounding noises as the record was selected, then a moment of silence, a hissing noise as the needle dropped onto the record and then the music started. It was an upbeat soul record, one that Cal did not immediately recognize, but that felt familiar. The wife started bouncing her hips and swaying with the rhythm, smiling gleefully. She took the man’s hand and they started to dance together. They danced with such energy that it seemed as though they had forgotten about Cal and Emily. They danced and Cal and Emily watched them and outside it had started to really rain again.
Journey to the End Jim Markus Lake street was quiet except for the fast, heavy footsteps we heard behind us. When we burst into a run, it was already too late. We had been seen. Our bright blue armbands had betrayed us. Their prominent presence on our upper arms screamed that we were different. These bands didn’t just say that we were still blue, they proclaimed our fear and hatred of the reds. They heralded our resistance. Our rebellion. Lewis Carroll said that if you don’t know where you are going, any road will get you there. I guess that’s how we found ourselves in Wicker Park. At six that same evening, we had been average working stiffs, Mike and Josh and me. Mike and I have been friends for years. He’s the guy I celebrate with when I get a promotion and the guy I mourn with after a breakup. Josh was his friend, but he seemed nice and we were getting along fine. The mild rain didn’t bother us much. It was already starting to feel like summer and we didn’t need coats to keep warm. When we got to Wicker Park, a dozen people were already gathered around the fountain. Some had brought bright colored ponchos to help stay dry. Others looked just like us, wet hair matted down already. Nothing can prepare you for the feeling of immense paranoia that kicks in when you are being hunted. They told us that the people after us would be wearing red armbands. We walked south, glancing from right arm to right arm of every person on the street. The sun was still out and it was easy to tell if someone else was involved in our madness. When we saw our first chaser, our stomachs jumped into our chests. Any other night, that chaser would have been just another guy on the street. That night, we spotted him from a block away and bolted before he could make a move. We ran without thinking. We ran without strategy. We ran. And, after six blocks, we were lost. Josh had disappeared, too. He had been caught, surrounded. I’d like to think that he changed immediately when it happened. That he became the kind of monster that all of the chasers must have been.
The officers at the registration desk distributed waivers and arm bands. We were told to stand with the rest of the participants and to wait for further instruction. As the crowd grew larger, a tall man with an oiled handlebar mustache walked out on the rim of the fountain. He was thin as a rail, but everything about him screamed vibrancy. He was wearing a skirt over his tight pants, his black hair was pulled back in a ponytail. He said: This is the Journey to the End of the Night. It is still early. You all have a blue arm band, a red arm band, and a map. Put on the blue arm band now. Out there in the city, there are seven checkpoints waiting to receive you, to sign your maps, and to help you on your way. Reach all of them . . .if you can. While you have blue armbands now, there is an army out there with red armbands. They thirst for you. They are hunting you. They will stop at nothing to find you. If they tag you, give them your blue arm band as a prize, then join their ranks and start chasing the any remaining survivors. There will be a celebration at the end for any who survive with their blue band. There is also a prize for the most capable chaser, the one who claims the most blue armbands as trophies. Remember that this isn’t the playground. Falls break bones. Cars end lives. Good luck. And with that, we were off. There must have been seventy five people with us at the start. Some sprinted away immediately. Some walked, composed, in the opposite direction. Everybody had a strategy. We headed south. Mike and I, we clung to our maps like the treasure they were, even when they were flimsy from the rain. After some lucky breaks, we were able to orient ourselves to the first checkpoint. Two chefs stood in front of something. Maybe an old restaurant. It couldn’t have been open. Aside from the large hatted chefs, the place looked deserted. They held trays of vegan cupcakes and offered them happily to the surviving runners. We accepted without hesitation, thinking about Alice and her trip to wonderland only after we had already swallowed.
The rabbit hole goes deep and it never ends up where you’d expect. We found ourselves talking to enormous cardboard monsters, answering impossible riddles, and discovering hidden diners in the bowels of the city. Each checkpoint was different. Some were magnificent in wonder. The robot, we discovered, would only speak using words that had been written on its sides. Others were troubling. We met outside of a graveyard and discussed what we wanted to do before we died. One was just two lonely people, sitting in a diner and welcoming terrified runners. By the time darkness fell on the city, the rain had stopped, but glaring at people’s arms became more and more difficult. We had run, almost screaming, on more than one occasion. We had found other runners. We built a small alliance. When we were chased, we lost everyone that we called friends. Josh appeared later. He had been captured. Like the rest, he donned a red armbands with pride and sneered when he saw us just hours later. We were on Lake street when he found us. It was quiet except for the fast, heavy footsteps we heard behind us. When we burst into a run, it was already too late. We had been seen. We didn’t survive, but we were lucky. I found that mustache-clad man later. These days, I’m the one standing outside of graveyards, in front of abandoned restaurants, building giant robots. And the runners, I look forward to seeing fear in their eyes. Uncertainty. Hope. I hope they sneak past their first few chasers. I hope they are terrified when someone they trusted comes back to find them. I hope they see that the madness isn’t just in the streets. The lucky ones, they don’t know where they’re going. When you go down the rabbit hole, there’s no telling where you’ll end up.
what color is the color of adventure? J. McAlistair what will happen? she said. i don’t know he said. the earth continued to spin, the clouds continued to sail, the shadows kept on doing their dramatic crescendo and decrescendo march across the landscapes of cities and fields. there’s no time to wait and see he said. we have to keep moving forward bravely she said. will it be bright and hot or cold and mostly dark? he said. maybe both she said. at one time dark and at another time bright she said. will it sound like bells? or more like thunder he said. i hope thunder she said. but bells would be a sight too she said. what if it doesn’t happen he said. something will happen she said. it began over and over again and ended over and over again.
The Sugar Rocks Jim Markus The Sugar Rocks hit gold with their first album, Freedom. The band couldn’t go anywhere without lines of adoring fans celebrating their arrival. Billi, the lead vocalist and part-time drummer, said it was like being the pope. The TV pundits were furious about the comment, but it was true. She used to open her balcony window on Sunday afternoons to deliver public prayers and everything. It started as a joke, but Billi kept it up and, only a year later, a pretty serious group of followers organized a church. She never commented on it publicly, but she kept up the Sunday prayers. I think it she liked the validation. When Billi left the Sugar Rocks to start her solo work, the church ate it up. They bought the record even though it wasn’t as good as Freedom. Lime Green Frogs sold a few hundred thousand albums on release day. It was an inarguable commercial success, but Billi didn’t see it that way. It fell far short of the Sugar Rocks’ album and she expected to surpass her previous fame, not fall short of it. She stopped making her public appearances around that time. After the Frogs release, she came out less and less. Her last public appearance was promoting a single she wrote about a floating bathtub. The church adopted its message into a form of hymn. They say it represents the soul’s journey after death. Maybe the church was right; Billi didn’t live much longer. After the Tubs single dropped, so did Billi. She had been climbing one of her spiral staircases (her house had a dozen of them) when she slipped and fell from the side. It was one of her eccentricities that none of the stairways had been built with railings. She said that she didn’t like having to rely on other people, especially for something as simple as climbing to the second floor. She should have relied on other people more. She might still be releasing those whiny vocal tracks if she had. She might have drummed herself another hit. The church didn’t dissolve after she passed. Instead, the congregation grew. They built hymnals from her song-books and compiled her prayers and statements into
a single tome. The book that resulted was complete absurdity. It became important though. Some of the leaders of the group even split off because of it. The new sect dubbed itself the Authentic. They reenacted important moments from Billi’s life as ritual and burned copies of the book as false idols. The remaining group, about half of its former population, took to calling themselves the Original. While both of these sects shared history, each viewed the other as blasphemers. It shouldn’t be a surprise that their verbal fights escalated into physical ones. It doesn’t matter who threw the first stone. Both ended up lobbing bricks in the end. There were bombings and shootings and kidnappings. Neither side was safe. Neither side was innocent. The Universal Freedomites formed in the midst of that violence. They took the general teachings of Billi and sang her songs, both the Original versions and the Authentic ones. They even said that everyone was welcome in their places of worship. The new church started, but the other two remained. Each of them grew. Billi never wanted a church in the first place.
Delirium J. Wilson The air had become so heavy with the rain that it refused to let go of, It hung over and around us like a wet dog panting its hot wet breath on our necks and cheeks. On the weather channel they kept promising that it would storm and telling us all to watch out because it was going to be a great big loud and windy one. It went on like this for weeks. Everyone sat out on their stoops and sweated and complained and looked up at the clouds and cursed them for being so stubborn. It was in the midst of this long humid stretch of weeks that Wayne came up with his great delirious idea. He came running up to us one afternoon while we sat squinting on the steps. He was melting through his clothes. He looked like he’d been through his own private rainstorm. “I’ve got the best idea. Seriously, it’s the best idea of my whole damn life.” We shrugged, too miserable in our own sweat puddles to entertain Wayne’s ecstatic bantering. “Just listen - a few weeks back I was wandering around down by the docks - over there down by the Dempsey Piers, you know?” “That’s all just a bunch of abandoned buildings where creepers hang out,” I interrupted. “I know - but look - I was checking it out and I found this boat there - like someone’s been stashing it there - it was hidden just out of sight, under the dock….” We stared at him. “So?” “So - it’s probably hidden in the same spot now - we could go over there.” Now he stared at us, waiting. ...
“But, why? Who cares?” He let out a sigh of exasperation and sat down finally, shoulders slumping in defeat. “I just thought… what else is there to do? Sit around and sweat? We could take it down the river or something, I don’t know…. just.. seemed like a good idea.” We sat in silence for a while. The air shimmered and sank around us, wrapping itself around our shoulders like a damp blanket. The air was dulling our senses and creating its own kind of surreality. Without a single conscious thought leading up to it, I stood up and started walking toward the dockyards. “Let’s go, where is it?” Wayne jumped up and took off ahead of me in a jog. The others lifted themselves and followed like zombies. When we caught up with Wayne he was sprawled out on the dock, straining to reach over the edge and down underneath it. “It’s here, but I can’t reach it.” Again, without thinking about it for even a second, I jumped into the water. The coolness of it instantly shook me out of my daze and catapulted me into a sort of excited craze. I swam under the dock to where the boat had been tied to one of the pilings and undid the knot. The boat was this beautiful old wooden motor boat with chipped and peeling white paint. We all got in and started drifting out into the middle of the river. It was only after several futile attempts to start the motor and after the current had caught us and was sweeping us further and further away from land that we realized there was no gas in the engine. The current was moving us faster and faster along and soon we were surrounded by choppy waves and the boat rocked back and forth higher and higher. Before we could start to panic there was a great roar of wind and it began to rain.
J.Wilson is from Michigan. Currently he lives in Brooklyn where he has too many hobbies. Jim Markus writes. He tells stories and sometimes performs at live literature speaking events. He manages the elaborate wealth of free writing prompts and exercises on the More Known site and contributes practically nothing of value to the weekly podcast: Stuff Smart People Like. On occasion, Jim helps organize intricate, public games as part of a motley band of adventurers. His new book, Write with Lions, comes out August 1st, 2013. J. McAlistair is a made-up name.
WILSON & McAlistair’s