Rejection

A horse lies on its side. It is not dead and no one is beating it. It seems ill, somehow, but you can’t tell just what is wrong with it. Professionals are called in. They tell the horse that it has a hurt leg and they leave. The horse doesn’t know which leg is hurt or what it can do about it, if anything.

So it just keeps lying there.

Zero - Pt. 2

He was sitting in his Government class listening to the teacher drone on about the Judicial Branch as he drew out plans on his notebook for some considerable stock investments in a cell phone company when he saw a greasy little forehead and a botched haircut peek in through the window.

“Zero!” he yelled and jumped from his chair.

The class laughed, the teacher dully told him, “no, Vito, what’s wrong? Take your seat.”

Zero bolted.

Vito burst from the door into the quiet outdoor hallway, “Zero, wait!”

She wound her way around a fence and took off full speed across the baseball field.

Vito groaned, looked back only a moment, and then took off after her.

She scrambled up the fence, chancing a glance back and nearly falling over the other side in surprise.

“Zero! Wait, it’s me Vito!” He flew up the fence.

They ran five long blocks, away from the houses and shops and city. She took a shortcut through a thick copse of trees, the thick branches snapping under her bare feet. She loped up a long, steep hill to the lone house at the top. Vito was losing steam, he couldn’t keep up, but it didn’t matter. He knew the house at the top of this hill and there was nowhere else to go. It was called Hatchet Manor and was said to be haunted, although he didn’t believe it. A family lived there, the oldest son was in some private school, but the younger twins had gone to Vito’s elementary school for a year. They had fine clothes, but their mother dyed their blonde hair black which Vito never really understood. The Manor was nearly five stories tall with a bell tower and a yard full of dying trees, old statues and a family graveyard. He stopped about ten feet from the Iron Gate, unsure if Zero had gone inside or continued running.

He stood catching his breath, when he spotted the pale figure he had been chasing. She climbed over the eaves on the roof of the house. She glanced down at him then flew across the roof with sure footing as though she had done this a thousand times before. She crawled in through a small circular window on the highest level.

Determined, Vito walked around to the back of the house where he found her path: an obvious trail through the garden and clean, polished wood running up the house next to a series of poles next to the patios and balconies.

Vito took a deep breath and jumped the fence.

The windows were all curtained; it seemed like no one was home.

He pulled himself up the five levels, wishing he had spent more time on his physical education. Getting over the hurdle of the roof’s eave was the hardest part. There were no hand or footholds, and it was a very long drop.

He flopped over like a walrus, nothing like the experienced, graceful deer that was Zero.

Finally he pulled himself to the top of the roof. He could see the entire city, the elementary school, the high school, the shops and theaters and hospital and people. He could see the whole town moving and beating as one, and there he was seeing what Zero had seen for years, an outsider filled with wonder. He wondered why she wasn’t a part of it, why she was only able to observe. He slipped around on the slats on his way to the window.

He peeked in.

It was the attic; dusty, old, and covered in grimy, long-forgotten children’s toys, boxes, easels, mannequins, old bedding, deflated soccer balls, moth eaten bags, a bent bicycle with one wheel, a ratty couch missing a cushion, broken shelves, wood planks, metal bedframes, and one Zero.

 She was sitting in the middle of the floor, near a stairwell, picking at wounds and scabs on her bare feet. Vito pushed open the window just a crack, about to get her attention when she jumped up to her feet.

A momentary beam of warm light and a door slammed shut.

“What the hell is going on up here you wretched girl!? If you’ve been out on that roof again I swear I’ll chain you back in that closet!”

Zero backed away shaking her head violently.

A skinny, wretched, angry looking woman climbed into the room. She had dyed black hair, horn rimmed glasses, necklaces and bracelets dripping over her silk shirt and expensive trousers. She carried a long loaf of bread.

“I asked you a question you little bitch, what were you doing?” She raised the bread and thumped her on the head. 

Zero shook her head.

“Don’t you lie to me you useless piece of shit. You were on the roof again, I heard you,” she grabbed the front of Zero’s shirt, the stiches and ties ripped; it looked handmade from the same shirt material she wore when she was little.

“You’re lying to me you filthy disgusting thing,” she threw her to the ground and kicked her once.

“You’re a good for nothing little brat. You always have been. Now get in your bed.”

Zero clambered to her feet.

“I said get in your bed! Hurry up,” she kicked her again as Zero climbed over the rickety wood of a filthy baby crib and curled up inside.

“That’s right you little bitch,” the woman turned to walk back down the stairs.

Zero jumped to her knees and made a noise, “Muh.”

The woman stopped and sneered, “What did you say?”

“Mum…” Zero said holding a tentative hand out.

“I am not your Mother. I have no daughter,” she ripped a quarter of the bread loaf off and tossed it onto the dusty floor, “there’s your three days’ worth, eat well. You get less if I hear you on that roof again.”

Then: creaky footsteps, a hopeless beam of warm light, a door slammed, a lock clicked, and the woman was gone.

Zero jumped from the crib and scrambled to the bread, eating hungrily.

Vito pushed the window open all the way and climbed in, his heart pounded, fiery anger and tears burned behind his eyes.

“Zero.”

She jumped to her feet, tripped and fell backward, she grabbed onto a moldy teddy bear, but didn’t know what to do with it. She shook her head violently, jumped to the couch and fell over behind it.

Scared the woman, her mother, would return Vito held out his hands and whispered, “Zero, please be quiet, it’s me Vito, remember? Your friend. We played on the swings and ate together after school?”

Zero’s greasy hair peeked over the couch.

All that mattered was being friends.

“Zero, it’s time to leave.”

This time she stood and she didn’t run.

Zero - Pt. 1

The first time Vito saw her he was sitting in his elementary school conjugating Spanish verbs with his SAT class. A little forehead and messy blonde hair peeked in through the window. He didn’t think much about it. Once his after-school SAT class let out he wanted to hurry home to his piano instructor, but the fall wind bit angrily and he stopped to pull on his gloves and scarf. That’s when he saw her for a second time. Not far from him, attempting to hide behind a table was the thin, peaky looking girl. Her hair was greasy, and despite the weather she wore only a dirty tank top, soiled shorts and no shoes on her frozen feet. She stared wide-eyed. Vito turned to walk toward her and she bolted, stumbled slightly, and took off at a sprint across the grounds and into the distance.

A few days later, during an advanced quantum SAT class, that Vito was sure was being taught by an undergraduate, he saw her again. She peeked through the window at the board, at the teacher, at the students, and her eyes grew wide when she spotted Vito staring back at her. She ducked out of sight. After his class let out, he walked to the tables where he had last seen her, but she wasn’t there. He strolled to the end of the building and spotted her small bare feet behind a trash can. She saw him coming and jumped up to run again.

“Wait, wait,” he threw up his arms, tossed his bag to the side, “don’t run, it's okay.”

She backed away.

“Please, wait, my name’s Vito, what’s yours?”

She shook her head violently and averted her gaze.

“Please, stop, I just want to say hi...Here, take this,” he pulled off his scarf and held it out.

Her eyes widened as she shook her head again; she made a strange noise and took off at a run to the end of the grounds where she disappeared into the bushes.

It took Vito many tries. He saw her a couple times a week, sometimes during his after-school SAT classes, but also sometimes during school hours at the edge of the playground watching the children play. He always waited for her. He always tried to speak with her. Most times she ran away from him.

It wasn’t until one day in early spring when the clouds threatened rain as Vito sat down at a table with two juice boxes placed upon it that he coaxed her to him. She sat awkwardly at the table, like a deer sitting with a hunter. They drank idly together.

“What’s your name?”

She sipped on her straw.

He sipped on his.

“Zero,” her voice cracked.

“Hi Zero, I’d like to be your friend.”

She leapt from the table; he was certain she was going to run away again, but instead she ran to the swings on the playground and beckoned him.

It was something she saw friends do on the playground: swing. So they swung. Because all that mattered at that time was being friends.

They met after school every now and then. Vito always brought food that she never turned down. She didn’t talk much and Vito didn’t ask many questions, instead they just sat and ate and played.

One day they sat on a set of stairs, watching some doves pecking through the lawn when Vito took off his shoes.

“Here, take these.”

She shook her head, “Mom don’t like it when I come home with shoes.”

Vito slid his shoes back on his warm, clean feet.

She took the cookies he offered and left at a light jog into the bushes beyond.

Vito graduated elementary school and went to his middle school; he learned violin and French, won the district spelling contest, was awarded $500 for winning a state science fair, and, once he got to high school, joined all the Interbaccalaureate classes and three university courses. For a while he returned to the elementary school wondering if he would see Zero again, but soon his visits stopped. His life moved on, but he didn’t forget his friend…

Ransom

Damion McCourt,

I have your daughter.

Bring $1 Million to 5^th and Lane tonight.

Wait at the bus stop for a phone call.

No cops. No marked bills.

This was all fine. The problem was that I didn’t have a daughter.

                       

“Mr. McCourt, we understand the circumstances you’ve been placed in. We’re running missing persons now. Our question is whether or not you are going to be a willing participant for us,” said Agent Golding.

“I don’t think I can help you,” I responded. I had a big house, luxurious clothing, a maid and a butler on my service – the fact that I had money was obvious. I continued to roll the thought around in my mind. It had to be fairly obvious that I didn’t have a daughter, or any child for that matter.

“Mr. McCourt, please consider your action. This girl’s life may be in your hands,” Agent Golding persisted.

“He may not have even kidnapped anyone. He could just be trying to get my money for free. You realize it’s hard to ransom someone if they have nothing to lose, right?”

“Yes, I understand that, Mr. McCourt. We would like to know for sure as well. Your money will never leave your hands. We’ll be with you the entire time. Is your wife home?”

“No, just James. My wife passed away two years ago. Car accident.”

“I'm sorry to hear that. And who is James?”

“My butler.”

“And may we speak with James?”

I reached over and rang a silver bell on a side table.

The slightly stooped yet prideful look of James Beaugartner walked through the sitting room doors as if he had been waiting for the bell.

“James, I’m Detective Golding, will you go with my friend here, we have a few questions for you…yes him, thank you. Mr. McCourt who else is on your staff list?”

“Just Maggie, my maid. She’s off today, but her living quarters are in the back. I’ll take you.”

Maggie wasn’t home. That didn’t surprise me. If I only had one day off a week I doubt I would spend it cooped up in the hen house. I still had the other seven rooms furnished for more maids or butlers, but after Nancy died my thoughts of a large family jumped out the window as did my necessity for a whole cleaning crew. Maggie did just fine. A little dusting, garbage on Wednesdays, and a meal every night – but only because she worries about my cholesterol not because I tell her to cook. She says she likes it. Gives her a reason to cook for herself as well. Doesn’t bother me at all.

“James lives in these quarters?”

“No James lives on Mayberry, he says he prefers to keep business and home separate. All the same to me, really.”

“Mr. McCou - ”

“Stop persisting. I’ll do the damn drop. Let me go change into some evening wear and get the money together.”

They marked all of my bills. It took an hour. I thought it strange, considering they had said the money would never leave my hands.

That night I waited at the bus stop on 5^th and Lane. The bench looked sticky and trash from the can was overflowing onto it. I refused to sit. I could see the darkened cars watching me with baited breath on three different streets, all waiting for their chance. It was 8:03 when a Jack in the Box cup in the trash can began ringing.

“Hello,” I said, disgusted, when I picked the disposable phone up out of the cup.

“Leave the money under the bench and go.”

“Where’s my daughter?” I asked, perhaps too unconcernedly.

“I have her.”

“Good. You realize I don’t have a daughter right?” I sensed Agent Golding grinding his teeth at me.

“Of course you do,” the phone jostled a moment, then

“Daddy?”

“Hi sweetheart, it’s not your Daddy. My name is Damion McCourt and I’m going to help you get home.”

“Daddy! Help me!”

“I will, sweetie, I will, but I’m not your father.”

“Daddy,” she screamed, she sounded like she was only four, the phone jostled again.

“Now, leave the money and go.”

“Bring me the girl.”

“Leave the mon - ” somewhere behind the phone call, two gunshots rang out and the girl screamed. She didn’t stop screaming.

“Hello? What’s going on?”

“Check him! Get his gun!”

“It’s okay little one, we’re here now, we’re here, everything is okay.”

“Hello? Hello?”

The phone jostled again, “who is this?”

“I should ask you the same question,” surely Agent Golding’s teeth were being sawed off at my sarcasm by this point.

“Agent Dunnifer. What business do you have speaking with Jack Gruntle?”

“I got a ransom note from him saying he had my daughter. I’m at a drop right now. Do you have the girl?”

“Yes, is this Mr. Lundy?”

“No, Damion McCourt.”

“The girl I have is Hank Lundy’s daughter. We can search the premises for your daughter.”

“No, I don’t have a daughter.”

The line when quiet for a moment.

“Sir, if you don’t have a daughter…”

“The guy said he took my daughter, but I don’t have one. I was doing the drop to help whoever he did have.”

“I see. Where are you at?”

“Del Mar, California. You?”

“Riverside.”

“That’s a couple hours away. There’s no way that asshole was going to give me the girl or come get this money. What the hell is going on?”

Agent Golding stole the phone away from me. I hadn’t even heard him coming. They spoke for a while. I massaged my briefcase handle imagining a really lucky pickpocket.

“The girl they recovered is Hannah Lundy, she’s the only female on scene,” said Agent Golding, “she was a kidnapping case from two years ago. The girl is insisting that you are her father.”

“I’ll take a blood test. I’m nobody’s family, that’s for damn sure.”

“Alright guys, I have an idea here,” Agent Golding spoke into his walkie talkie, “we’re going to continue with this drop, hold position.”

“What? Why?” I said, following him to the car, my briefcase left naked and alone at the dirty bus stop.

“Jack most likely had a partner. Someone who would actually pick up your money. Let’s see if we can find out who that was.”

Three hours, two cups of coffee, and a full spinal cramp later a cloaked figure came around the corner and passed the bus stop so quickly I hadn’t even noticed my briefcase disappear. The cops were on the figure in moments. I ran out after them. They lifted the hood from the black hair. It was Maggie.

“What are you doing?”

“You asshole. You should have just given me the money when I asked you for it.”

“Maggie? Why? What money? What’s going on? Who is the girl? Who is Jack?”

“Later, McCourt, take her in guys.”

The next morning I went to the station to watch the questioning – a favor by Golding. The little girl was there.

“Daddy!” she wrapped her arms around me.

“Sweetie, I’m not your father.” The angry looking man behind her was presumably Hank Lundy, and the biologic father. “Daddy, why is Mommy in there?”

“What? You mean Maggie?”

She nodded.

“Maggie isn’t…”

“I’m your Mommy sweetie, me, remember?” a woman came over.

I went to listen to Maggie’s questioning.

“I’ve had little Lauren for the last two years. Jack dropped her off on my porch in the back, he said to take care of her. I told her I was her mother and Damion was her father, but he was much too busy to bother with silly girls. That asshole didn’t even notice I had a child. He’s so fucking self-absorbed in his money and misery. And no, Jack never came back. He called me a couple weeks ago and I drove Lauren up there to him, to her Uncle Jack. And we decided to get some money out of it.”

Her plan was incredibly flawed. I rolled my eyes. Money and misery. Better than raising a stolen kid and going to jail for being completely delusional. I shook my head. I’m going to have to find out what my butler has been up to. 

Something

Nothingness is spreading across my room in search of a place to hide, embarrassed at its nakedness. Nothingness regains its courage and begins its course; Nothingness outstretches its long folded arms once again and reaches out from nook to cranny. It seeps across walls leaving patched holes in its place. It crawls across desks and bookcases and mattresses. Nothingness withering away on windowsills. Nothingness escorting out somethingness. Nothingness slithering across the carpets and tiles, mirrors and staircases. Nothing is pushing out everything. Nothing is making way. Nothing is created. Nothing is there.

Nothing

I don’t really believe in the concept of nothing. There’s really no such thing as nothing. If you cleared off a table of the plates and flower pots leaving a clean wood surface and asked me, what now? Is there nothing on this table? I would have to reply that there is still dust and skin particles and molecules of moisture and air and germs upon the surface. What if a man walked into the room wearing nothing, what would I say then? He would still be wearing something – primarily a grin, I’m sure. If you ask me if nothing is there, isn’t it nothing? I would have to reply that by saying nothing is nothing then it has just become something. People say they have nothing, but simply aren’t counting their blessings and paying attention to what they do have. A paraplegic says he can do nothing with his arms and legs, but this too is false, he may not do a lot, but his arms and legs are still lying down or hanging or touching other things. You can’t poke a needle into a numb arm and say “I feel nothing” without being more specific, because you do feel things, just not in that particular spot. Not only is it perspective, but the adjectives used to describe this “nothing” come into play as well. If you are being prodded with said needle you can say “I feel nothing in that particular spot” however you could not say “there is nothing in that particular spot”. Upon saying “I feel nothing in that particular spot” you are using many words to describe the definition of numbness, which is something. If we were to use the example of “say nothing” you are in the act of being quiet and silent and therefore in the act of something. Perhaps nothing is equivalent to nonexistence and therefore dinosaurs and dodo birds are nonexistent. I agree that they are nonexistent as living creatures in today’s time; however they are not nothing because they used to be something. The death of a creature that has reverted to Mother Nature’s soil and been dug up has not left nothing in its hole, there are still something’s, just no trace of the original creature. And still the memory of the creature may exist or photos or illustrations and therefore the creature is something because it was something. I don’t doubt that there are still chemical reactions in the soil proving the existence of some deterioration as well.

The concept of nothing cannot exist, because there is always something to take its place.

A Note on the Weather

The mist fell in great horizontal gusts. The cars had turned into clouds: speeding recklessly, barreling over curbs and trees leaving behind scrap bits of moistness in their wake. They rushed to beat the heavy periods of eventual static and wet diamonds that would fall to the earth, guaranteeing the morphing of these misty cloud cars into asphalt puddles.

The North Pole Starbucks

When I found out they had opened a Starbucks at the North Pole, I absolutely had to go and see for myself. Surely, this would cause some bizarre mecca-like movement for every lover of weird places to visit. Once I finally arrived in the cold tundra I was pleased to see that Starbucks didn’t disappoint – they had made the very tiny, little building into a “snow-mobile drive thru” that looked exactly like a snowy, frosted gingerbread house - incredibly tactful for Santa Clause and the Elves that were surely in the nearby vicinity.

There was one man running the inside, as they didn’t get many customers (wonder why?). He told me they didn’t have anywhere near a normal selection, as shipments were so difficult to receive up there. He had regular coffee, mochas and caramels, one type of milk, and no whip cream or little sprinkled toppings. They were served in pewter jugs for hot or glass tumblers for cold, unless you were on the run (say, in a hurry to get to that next snow bank) then you could get a bio-degradable cup.

As we were talking about how he had no food items, he stopped mid-sentence and waved his arm off toward the distant glacial hills. A tall, shadowing figure loomed nearby. Startled for only a moment, I realized it was just an old dark tree limb, left from the construction of the building. But the worker's face had a touch of worry. He continued to gesture into the distance.

“There’s a nice tornado spout out there, do you see it?”

It was a thin spout that stretched from clouds to ground. I didn’t realize the North Pole got tornadoes, but I supposed the wind could whip things around anywhere. We continued talking, but the wind picked up. Very soon that tornado was close to us.

“May I come inside?” I asked the man, already stepping in and laughing lightly as if it was preposterous for him to reject me. The wind grew powerful and loud; it kicked around snow and debris. He stepped aside and closed the door after me. There was barely room for a third person, I couldn't imagine him working an 8-hour shift in there. Standing inside didn’t make a large difference, the wind roared at the walls and we couldn’t hear each other. Snow crept in to safety through cracks in the molding and windows. A truck catapulted through the air as the wind reached its climax and the world settled.

We closed up shop after that, the man decided to show me where he lived with the other employees in a small town they created.

Not far off was the truly amazing site: a bio-dome. We rode his snow mobile through a set of glass doors into a parking area and walked into a phenomenal world bathed in synthetic warmth and sunshine with a 24-hour sun cycle very unlike the arctic north; there were plants growing happily, dirt trails, small houses, a refreshing lake, people riding bicycles and golf-carts. He introduced me to a group of friends – laid-back, adventuresome, unmotivated types – who obviously enjoyed their paradise in the middle of nowhere with no real responsibilities except running the small stores and that Starbucks. To them, there were smarter people who dealt with the science behind the bio-dome and even the shipping of goods to their little stores. All they had to do was order goods and a month later it arrived. They showed me around their phenomenal town via a well-worn dirt road. Tire swings on trees and playgrounds were rampant, but children were not. Most of the people seemed to be young adults, but their town was growing as more people grew interested in the lifestyle. It was happy there.

They welcomed me openly and during a ceremony that night they dressed in silky blue robes and gemstones and walked me through a beautiful part of the city as we all sang made-up songs about living happily at the North Pole thanks to Starbucks.

One Minute in the Neighborhood

There are 17 houses on my cul-de-sac. It’s a Friday morning, which means it’s quiet. Most everyone is at work I’d imagine…


:59 (House 1) Mandy is late for work due to traffic on Main Street. She was half-listening to a news report about aerial biplane parades in Virginia while texting her co-worker about the traffic. She was planning on peeling out down the next road she found.

:53 (House 2) Brandon is at home working on his car while his four children are at the elementary school: two of them are doodling, one is talking during the PE lesson and his little girl is on the monkey-bars. His wife, Janice, is on the couch watching a Spanish soap opera.

:48 (House 3) Mikaela works at the golf course, but is busy chatting up the cute bartender at the moment. The bartender, Richard, whose shift was nearly over, was deciding whether he wanted to meet his pal Bedford at the mall to “study” for their college English exam or rail Mikaela in the parking lot.

:45 (House 4) Mrs. Hunt is out gardening, picking lemons and oranges from her trees while her son Bedford is going 114 down the Interstate racing a stranger in a Peppermill Company Car next to him while he was on his way to the mall to spend the money he never earned.

:41 (House 5) John is a deputy sheriff, but he has the day off and is out at breakfast with his daughter Trisha, while his wife Melinda is in the bathroom of a coffee shop going down on a man named August that she had been seeing for three months. She plans on running away with him if they’re still at it a month from now.

:37 (House 6) Tommy is up in a plane over the Potomac enjoying the scenery.

:33 (House 7) Nancy is out cleaning her stable while her husband is at work with his partner fixing the electrical wiring at a Party Store, he suspects the wires might be labeled wrong.

:30 (House 8) Maggie is at home wearing her slippers and robe drinking coffee planning out the fun day of wagon rides and sidewalk chalk that lay ahead of her with her two grandchildren.

:26 (House 9) Vasco is sitting in a tree outside the elementary school watching a familiar little girl on the monkey-bars.

:24 (House 10) Ricky is at the firehouse playing cards as a call was coming in about an electrocution at a Party Store, while his fiancé, Rachael, was driving an ambulance to a call 23 blocks away for a car crash on Main and G street. A girl texting and driving, it seemed.

:20 (House 11) Michael is at work at a drugstore, it’s a slow day, in the past hour he had only sold a pack of cigarettes and a pregnancy test to a young couple. His wife, Lucy, is getting a jelly doughnut stain out of her white business shirt before the 11:00 advertisement meeting with Peppermill that could change her life forever.

:16 (House 12) Wendy’s parents are both at counseling for three hours every Friday so she ditched class with her boyfriend, Soot. She was currently in the bathroom crying with pregnancy stick in hand. Soot was raiding a jewelry box he found. Wendy’s mother, Susan, was getting a coffee before the counseling session, wishing the woman in the bathroom wouldn’t take so long, while her father David was telling their psychiatrist that he would be seeing her tomorrow night during Susan’s Pilate class. He wouldn’t miss it for the world.

:14 (House 13) Damian is waiting for his brother to arrive so they could go on a blind double date together. His brother is in a coffee house bathroom with a woman whose name he forgets and that he thinks is a little too fat, but has been getting free head out of it for the last three months, so he doesn’t mind.

:12 (House 14) Hank is twenty feet under the city fixing some leaking pipes with his crew which was causing a huge backup of cars on Main Street. They were all singing The Scorpions “Rock You like a Hurricane” at the top of their lungs. Hank’s wife Mary Ann was at home scrapbooking a picture of Hank and her on their wedding day. Kyle was kicking at her insides, yearning for a tuna sandwich.

:08 (House 15) Rachael (the other Rachael on the street) was ‘Sweating to the 80’s’ in bright pink spandex as if she never got the memo it was a new decade. She was planning on going to Pilate’s with Susan the next night so they could fawn over the weightlifting men on the floor below. Rachael wanted to look her best if she was going to ask out the young man that sold the overpriced water bottles. Meanwhile, that same young man was picking out a tie for a blind lunch date he was about to go on with a man named August who was very busy in a coffeehouse bathroom.

:04 (House 16) Denise and her husband Greg were at the movies wearing 3D glasses, Denise was thinking about her 6:00 English exam and whether or not she should be studying. Greg was waiting for the 3D boobs that his friend told him about yesterday.

:02 (House 17) Well, I guess that’s me. My boyfriend’s at work slaving away creating a 3D movie (sans boobs), my two cats are asleep in their cat tree and my two dogs are barking incessantly at the neighbor picking lemons and oranges outside. Me? Well, I’m not doing much of anything.

A Long Story: Only Six Words

War strips unborn child of mother. 

That Smell!

Where oh where is that smell coming from? Is it you little, smelly old man living inside the garbage can? Have you been feasting on the eggs? The onions? The five day old grunions? Or is it you little cat, rolling around in your dirty litter and scat? Have you hidden a dead mouse for me? Or perhaps a bird? Not that gopher I washed out, that I’m assured. Or perhaps it’s you beefy gym rat with your muscles and taunting limited fat. Have you been working out and sweating till you stank? Your shirts yellowed? Your armpits rank? No, I believe I’ve misjudged the source. My apologies to the men and little kitty, of course. I believe it’s the Mexican food left under the bed, and upon further inspection I fear it has bred...

A Book and His Cover

He was a large and encompassing man, with a woodsy feel to him. He walked with a defiant limp, powerful and determined though he was. His ratted brown beard caught every branch like Velcro. Inside he was sure to find moss, leaves, and a minimum of two honey roasted peanuts from that afternoon’s snack. There was a burlap shirt over his enormous frame and tan cotton pants held up by a tight black rope. His shoes were no more than animal skin tied to his feet – two skunks to be precise, making as near an attempt at fashion as he possibly could. He was a man I imagined to be carrying an axe, walking through the forest, dead squirrel pelts thrown over his shoulder as he meandered home to a small shack in the middle of the woods with a warm fire glowing and hot venison soup simmering on a wrought iron pot slung over a rail inside the fireplace.

And yet, there he was, smack dab in the middle of one of the most pretentious department stores: Nordstrom's. He had a black Armani wool pants suit and Boconi leather messenger bag slung over his shoulder as he thumbed through small cocktail dresses for the skinny, high class woman that wasn’t anywhere near him. All of the skinny, high class women, in fact, had expanded into a 20 foot diameter encircling this man watching him with sidelong glances trying to be nonchalant. The cashiers were all whispering to their managers. Even the pants suit over his shoulder seemed confused and distraught.

Twenty minutes after his merry perusing he ducked into a changing room disregarding any contemptuous looks. Ten minutes later, like men on a plane trip leaving Las Vegas, he exited the room wearing the suit. His hair was clean, brushed, and gelled back into a small pretentious ponytail. He had black Gucci sunglasses that matched a pair of spit-shined Ferragamo Loris Oxfords. He sat down the tags on the checkout counter and was rung up by a flamboyant young man wearing a fake Burberry watch and a petrified smile.

Might as well be Ecstasy

Expressing music through words is technical, jumbled and messy. Expressing art through words is systematic. Expressing, in words, the way someone fights and uses their bodies is wretchedly overt. Expressing feelings is biased. Mechanics of machinery, how a plant looks as it’s growing, the communications of war, or the expansion of space are all so intricate to describe that it makes for only a brilliant manual. Expression in words is impossible. That’s why you must express everything else, everything that’s not there, and everything that makes no sense.

Nude, beautiful females floating through the air, toes pinched, silken ribbons wrapping around their bosoms, hair adrift, their breath all synched as one, as the violins and cellos throb through the cold pulsations around their warm bodies as they dance.

A golden flirtation hinting at painful blues and hopeless yellows warm amongst a cold sky. Topical texture traversing the town. Tiny people unaccustomed to such popularity. Tiny church bells ring through eternity. The world, ever never changing.

Powerhouse of aching muscle, ignored. A leap of faith into an aerial axle until a collision.

Only a gentleman observes the distant gaze of his master as an impassioned solitude.

Pumping steam in hot flashes of light and sweat, an underground of iron, mining and death.

Timid strength, faithful belief and hope are things it knows not; sunlight is good, water glorious.

Speak if you dare.

Touch everything.

Planted

How long have I been here? Sitting: Cross-legged, Indian style; my feet planted on the ground or stretched out next to me. How long have I been sitting? Days, weeks, months? I’ve watched the grass turn dry and brittle, become covered in snow, melt away to sleet and ice, and finally turn back to brittle grass. How long has that been? How long have I been watching TV, movies, video games? How long have I been scrolling through the Internet on my phone, laptop, tablet? How long have I been reading? Doing crosswords? Seriously considering working? I piss, eat, masturbate – but then I’m right back at my seat.

My flesh changes color: brown, black, striped blues and whites. My legs have turned leathery, my skin like flannel, my groping hands prove the wooden textures riding up my buttocks. My limbs are heavy and awkward; they’re numb and plump and strange. I’m filling with cushion, feather, foam. I try to rise from this seat and find it stuck to me. I’m immobile. The frozen distress, the hot uncertainty, the moldy ignored concern is now creeping up my neck. My fingers and toes enlarge to nubs, clubbed feet, elephantine extremities. I can’t rise up, the colors and textures of blankets, pillows, chip crumbs all creep over my throat, my chest, my face. My eyes seize; my sticky hair webs; my lungs stutter to a stop.

And it’s final.

I have become the couch.

An Ode to Betty

We fell in love in that car. Do you remember?

The first memory I have of Betty is leaving the final late night class before the holiday break and running out after you as you walked to her. I had to give you my phone number in hopes that you would call…even though you never did.

But then she began parking next to my car every day at school.

She carried us on our first outing together – back when you still had a girlfriend. We drove all around downtown looking for some protest to join, trying to find a mixed up street name we thought was “Imperialism”. We actually read a real-life map, but never found the protest. Instead we brought lunch to your girlfriend at work where all you two did was sit and argue while looking out at California’s bay. We left her and wandered into the Wyland shop to examine the paintings, but really examine each other’s thoughts. And we sat in Betty and talked for hours, never wanting it to end.

We took hundreds of naps in her, especially when we were exhausted from staying up until dawn doing school projects. We zipped around sharp turns and raced down long hills toward homes that were all separate before we chose to live together. There was even that time you sped over a hill and whipped to the right causing me to fly across the backseat.

Betty saw the end of your relationship and the beginning of ours.

She kept us safe, hidden behind a Chili’s one night as we both sat in the same seat, our faces warm against each other. And that time you drove us to a tall hill to look out over the city lights and I leaned over, grabbing the emergency break…which really wasn’t the emergency break…

We were even sitting in her when I asked the question: “What are we? This relationship? We’re more than friends, but not together.” And we were still sitting in her when we decided we were a couple. Two peas in a Sentra pod.

She moved us into the same apartment together and listened to us talk about our roommates.

She drove us out to our “Narnia”, a little dirt road that led from the busy city to a magical forest of trickling water, tiny frogs, and cascading grapevine.

She’s been pulled over for speeding to Old Town for a late night ghost excursion where you were too nervous and blubbery to form sentences for the officer and I had to do the talking. I’m still convinced that after explaining the situation, asking the officer how he was doing while waiting for your ID, and reminding myself aloud to be quiet that I saw a smirk on his face and that’s why we never got a ticket.

She drove us to graduation, and she left you stranded there - after I accidentally took the keys with me.

She’s seen us up to Los Angeles and even to Northern California a few times for conventions and family. And out to Las Vegas for our personal vacation full of Cirque du Soleil, Body Exhibits, and Asian bartenders telling us “oh! You get fucked up!?” after ordering two monster Sunsets.

Eventually she even moved us into a rental of our own. Squeezing in the desks and TVs we were certain wouldn’t fit, but Betty always stretched. She even carried our new kittens and puppies home from the shelter and eventually would carry them to all their vet appointments and excursions to lakes and beaches and dog parks. And she rolled her eyes every time the dog vomited in the back seat – and the other climbed into the window to get away from it.

She listened to us talk about the mass layoffs from our first job. And your second. Third. Fourth. And fifth. She’s made the commute with you from San Diego to Los Angeles. And helped us move there. She drove you to your interviews and listened to us cry about breaking our lease when that job didn’t hold.

And so with a deep breath, she drove my mother and me, with our dogs in the back and kitty litter at the ready in the trunk, across the country following a monster U-Haul to your new job in Louisiana.

She carried our bikes to our many muddy trails, parks, and levee rides. She drove us three hours to and from the Gulf of Mexico. Then she drove us back when we realized we’d accidentally taken home a hermit crab. She drove us to and from our haunt at Happy’s – whether we were too drunk or not. She always found her way home. And she was grateful to be moved into the carport the night of the hurricane, where an enormous branch fell onto the driveway and went flying toward our house where she usually parked.

Then she drove us to New Orleans where a penguin waited at the Aquarium with a ring around its neck and you asked me to marry you.

She listened to us cry about the Louisiana mass layoff too. And she listened to us cry when your next job would take us to the East Coast. She waited patiently for a month in the driveway for your return. Then she carried me with the dogs and plants and kitty litter, following another monster U-Haul, up the coast to our New Jersey rental.

She’s had her battle wounds too, hasn’t she? The dent in the hood where the bicyclist ran right into her while you stopped at a light. The white moustache my mom gave her when the car jerked forward into an iron bar. The time you pegged her oil pan going over a boulder hidden in the snow before we even knew each other.

And now, at this moment, she sits outside, covered in six inches of snow from a storm the night before, her tire flat and her bumper broken from your icy slide into a ditch. But she got you home safe.

Every time she gets us home safe. Because she’s Betty.

And we continue to love her. Because she’s family.

White from Fear and Aging

Another winter storm approacheth. The grocery store is exploding with quietly panicking masses - most of which are white-haired. Coffee, water, cans of beans: sold out. Impossibly long lines of these wide-eyed, wrinkled, fleshy beings stretch down the aisles so far you'd think they were still shopping. And here I am with my cilantro and cat food trying to hurry home before the sky vomits up a determined eight inches of fluff this evening.

The Bridge

Off in the distance, tunneling through the evening squalls of snow that floured the caked mud and frozen river, was a low whistle. Howling ghostly moans of determination through the darkness, the train’s passengers were likely to be celebrating, champagne chilling in the fridge at the end of the cabin, awaiting a midnight hour.

Beneath me, trudging through the powdered fluff and marbled layers of ice rose a rhythmic clip-clop, clip-clop muffled by my own tartan scarf. The iron beams, old and peeling, that I had crossed over for many years nodded down at me. Respectful and quiet. A strength within them, cradling me above an icy grave of trout, breathless darkness, and silt too distant to find with groping, panicked feet. Every iron bolt held a memory of mine that even I had forgotten. Fishing as a boy. My second kiss with the prettiest girl I’d ever seen. A pair of stolen jeans traded for women’s lacy underwear that I wore home to my brother’s roaring laughter. A sunset with a porcelain doll, a diamond resting firmly on her milky finger. And fishing with my own boy.

In and out, in and out, a long passage of towns on the same grey mare just as trusty and bold as the ironwork we crossed. In and out, in and out, every morn and eve as the train roared in the distance.

The end goal always to find the other side.

The 365: Writing A Day

Welcome to my new project, the 365! 

The 365 is created for people who have a very limited time to read during their day, but would still like to get in a little story or perhaps an interesting, thought-provoking concept or image. It's also my own way to assure that I'm writing something every day and pushing myself to find inspiration for different pieces in my everyday life. 

I will be posting a new story, philosophical thought, or descriptive note every day this year. 

My only set rule revolving around the writing is that I must write for a minimum of 10 minutes and a maximum of 30 minutes. 

I do not guarantee brilliance, but I've come to hope for it. 

Feel free to pop in every now and then or treat it as a devotional. Either way, enjoy! 

Redirection!

I appreciate you checking out my blog!

But I have to admit...you're in the wrong place....

My new website is up and running. It gets updated a lot more and it has all of my work on it. Since it's my first domain (aww how cute) I wanted it to be me - completely and fully me. I'm not catering to anyone in particular. I want to show people who I am and what I do.

Check it out here:
www.trdailey.com

Thanks!

However, if you'd like to hang around and check out the writing-a-day 365 entries, feel free to mosey around! 

Zoo University

Here's the video of Zoo University that I worked on as a Character Animator while interning at DoubleTake Media Solutions (DTMS). I animated a bunch of the walk cycles in the background, which I may post as individual videos later.

This video is a little dirty though, it's for a specific audience, just a pre-warning :)

Enjoy!