Commit this to memory...

I suppose it's been a while since I've posted anything significant. This is one of the short story's I've written that I'm rather pleased with. I have another one that I feel has much more potential but until it's revised perfectly, I won't be posting it.


Commit this to Memory

“You know if they just legalized murder then there would be a lot less crime in places like this,” Kyle commented while piloting his fictional, video simulated character through the streets of a made up city and brutally slaughtering any pedestrians, drug dealers and gang members foolish enough to get in his way.
“Well yeah, but then people could run around killing anyone they wanted. I think society frowns upon things like that,” I replied.
“Yeah but at least it would solve the ever-rising and often overlooked over-crowded prison problems our country has.”
We both laughed and continued on in our video-simulated shooting rampage. We were both mashing buttons on our controllers in a precise order so as to avoid the wrath of the police officers who could bring an end to our game and simultaneously. This would quickly destroy our dreams of attaining the highly sought after high score achievement. Just then my character (while wielding a flamethrower) was picked off by a sniper, keeled over, and died a horrifically painful and dramatic death.
“Weak sauce.”
“Nice job, Madison.”
“Meh,” I replied while trying to act unfazed that I cost us the high score, even if it was crushing me on the inside. Kyle got up and left for his bedroom.
I didn’t mind rooming with Kyle. I had to admit that I was a bit iffy a few weeks ago when he asked me to move in with him because I didn’t know him very well. I met him through a friend at some party we were really too old to be attending. He mentioned in casual small talk that he needed a new roommate because his previous one had moved out suddenly. I’m not normally one to act out so spontaneously when a situation such as this arises, but given the fact that I’d only just graduated, I thought what the hell?
I finished up with my schooling at the University of Pittsburgh with a degree in writing and a useful minor in history to back it up. Realizing that I might struggle finding work, I leaped at the opportunity to remain in Pittsburgh with a stranger and pursue a fascinating career as a freelance writer. The conversation at the party may as well have gone something like this:

Stranger I’ve never met: “Hey, I’m Kyle and need a roommate. Wanna move in with me even though I could be a potential murderer, rapist, racist, arsonist, axe-wielding maniac, or rude car salesman?”
Gullible Madison: “You bet.”

So here I am two-weeks later rooming with Kyle. I had to admit that the apartment was very nice, although perhaps I was basing this off the fact that my place in college looked like Genghis Khan threw up on it. The living room was always very nice and I tried to make sure I did my best to keep it that way. Keeping this in mind, there were always those nights where one of us had a little too much alcohol and turned the place into a wrestling ring, battleground, or slip-n-slide. Regardless, we always did a good job of keeping things tidy afterwards.
The room was very white. The white leather couch with white pillows sat atop a comfortable coat of white carpet providing a pathway up to our white curtains which were very close to the white end table and white telephone. Everything looked nice so I had no problem with the fact that the room also looked like it was devoid of all life, or like Martha Stewart was let loose in it for fifteen minutes with an armada of cleaning and decorating supplies at her disposal and told to “go nuts.”
I was currently working at an electronics store in the city and disliking my job very much. I soon discovered that new writer’s often struggle finding work that will fully support them when they are fresh out of college. I was able to find a little bit of success writing humor columns for various magazines. My most recent success was an educational article informing readers as to how they could win a fight against a mob of twenty five-year-olds should the need arise. I also wrote an article explaining a list of ten dinosaurs that most readers would be able to take in a fight with relative ease. I was getting by on the money I was making because I was able to get a lot of hours at the electronics store and the freelance writing checks were just sort of an occasional bonus.
Kyle was working at a credit card collection agency and somehow making much more money than me. He had recently received a big bonus for leading his department in collections and instantaneously spent it on an oversized, high-definition television. I didn’t complain.
Kyle emerged from his bedroom wearing only his boxers.
“What are you up to tonight, man?” Kyle asked while making his way to the kitchen.
“Oh, my girlfriend is coming over. Her name’s Samantha, I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned her before. She’s just now getting back from vacation in Florida.”
“Oh yeah, that’s right. You guys just hangin’ around here for the night then?” Kyle asked while reaching into the refrigerator.
“I think so, she just got back tonight and said she’s pretty tired,” I replied, watching Kyle sniff an old carton of milk questionably, and then cough and choke on the noxious fumes that emerged. He then proceeded to place the carton back in the fridge.
“That’s cool, I think I’m just gonna hang around here too. You know, I used to date a girl named Sam, brings back memories,” he shuddered and meandered his scrawny, muscular frame back into his room.
It was 6:00 pm. Samantha wouldn’t be over until 8:00. I figured I could kill some time by sitting down at my laptop and at least trying to spit out a few words for another humor article. I had myself convinced that every written word, no matter how stupid or senseless, brought me one step closer to writing a best-seller. I had been trying to sit down and write a comical argument aimed towards the raison and why he should keep his shriveled ass away from my delicious cookies. My argument was that nature should mind its own damn business and stop ruining my sugar-filled treats with unwanted nutrients. Just as I sat down at my desk, my phone rang. Samantha.
“Ahoy-hoy?”
“Hey dollface, it’s me!”
“Hey hey, what’s up? Did your flight come in yet?” I asked, excited to hear from her.
“Yeah we actually got an earlier flight so I’ll be over shortly. Gotta go, my phone’s about to die. See you soon.”
I ran outside to meet Sam at the curb as the familiar sight of her black Honda Civic approached my building. I hadn’t seen her for a few weeks so we exchanged a seventeen minute long hug and the mandatory exaggerated kiss accompanied by intermittent comments from her explaining how much she missed me. I really liked Sam. Seeing her short, slender body, pretty face and long librarian hair often made me feel better if I was upset. We had only been dating for a few months but things seemed to be going pretty well.
We came back upstairs and situated ourselves in the angelic living room and she started to tell me about her trip. None of this was news to me considering she’d been calling me most days to tell me about everything her and her friends had done. Most of it involved lying on the beach, gradually roasting under the hot sun.
“So what’s been going on around here? What’s your new roommate like?” She asked while picking at a piece of flaking skin on her forearm.
“He’s alright. No complaints thus far. We’ve spent much of our time drinking and playing video games when we aren’t at work so I can’t complain.”
Just then, Kyle emerged from his room yawning. He was fully clothed this time. He wandered to the kitchen seemingly still in a daze from a nap that may or may not have put him in a coma, his eyes staring blankly at the floor. Sam was flipping through a magazine she found laying around.
“Hey Kyle, come over here I want you to meet Samantha,” I hollered into the kitchen. Kyle yawned again and stretched his arms upward as he made his way over. His hair was half-covering his face and his ribs protruded out of his chest as he stretched and approached the living room. Samantha looked up from her magazine and their eyes locked onto each other in astonishment. Both of them looked at each other like a deer facing imminent death from a tractor-trailer.
“Holy shit, it’s you!” Kyle screamed while pointing to Sam. I was shocked and confused. I looked over at Sam and she was sitting with her hands over her face, allowing her eyes to see through a partition in her finger-created mask.
“Stay away from me! Get out of here!” Kyle muttered in a panic, fear enveloping his voice. Sam looked at me with tears in her eyes, threw the magazine to the floor and ran out of the apartment.
“What the fuck is wrong with you? Don’t talk to her that way!” I yelled at Kyle, enraged that he could treat another person, let alone my girlfriend, that way.
“I don’t wanna talk about it” Kyle replied, rushing to his room and slamming the door.
I ran outside after Sam. She was just entering her car when I started dashing down the steps after her.
“Sam wait! I’m sorry, I’ve never seen him act that way before” I called to her while running down the stairs out of breath. She started the car and put it into gear. I caught up to her and stood at the driver’s side window hoping desperately that she’d open the door.
“Open the door Sam and talk to me. I dunno what the hell his problem was.”
“He’s my ex. I don’t wanna talk about it” she cried to me, tears running down her cheek. Her car pulled away before I had a chance to say anything else. I watched her black civic pull away down Tullamore Avenue, watching my tall, pathetic figure reflect off the shiny back window. Furious at what had just transpired, I stormed back inside and started banging on Kyle’s door.
“Come out here and tell me what the fuck just happened!” I barked at him through the thin layer of wood that was his bedroom door. I probably could have snapped it over my knee if I wanted but figured that’d only make things worse. There was no reply. I figured I could bang on his door all night but if he was going to be stubborn then I’d have a very hard time. I walked back to the living room and sat down on the couch, running my hands through my curly brown hair. Before I could even continue thinking about what happened, Kyle’s door opened and he slowly made his way out. I didn’t say anything and watched him come over and sit down next to me on the couch. It took him a few minutes to collect his thoughts and spit out what he wanted to say.
“I was seventeen when I dated Sam. I assume she told you that much if you were able to catch her before she left.”
I nodded. Still confused.
“Met her at a bar near the university. We both had fake ID’s. We were also both young and attending different high schools in the area. It wasn’t one of those corny one-night stand types of interactions, you know? We got along well and talked for a while and then all of a sudden I had her phone number and was calling her the next day. We were together for a long time and didn’t see eye to eye on what would happen to us after high school. I cared about her and even loved her but I just didn’t want to change my life around by trying to go to the same University as her. We saw a lot of each other and never really had any major problems like a lot of other couples do,” he paused and took a breath “that is, until she told me she was pregnant.”
My organs sunk about a foot lower each, effectively stopping each and every one for a moment.
“There were a few times that we didn’t use a condom and she called me while I was at work one day to tell me she was pregnant.”
I wanted to hit him. I wanted to hit him even though I knew everything he was telling me was perfectly understandable. I figured this type of thing happened to a lot of couples who may have been careless once or twice. It’s human nature.
“I was still only eighteen at the time and was ready to somehow change my life around and help her support the child. I decided not to be one of those guys that run out on the girl, leaving her with her grief and a stack of bills. After a few months, I noticed that she wasn’t getting any bigger. I asked her if she had been attending regular doctor visits and she assured me that she had. She told me that the doctor said everything was normal and that some women get bigger more quickly than others. I’m pretty sure that’s a load of horse shit, but I had no idea at the time. When after another month she still wasn’t any bigger, I found out that she was never really pregnant.”
“What? Did she have a miscarriage?” I asked, half confused and half enraged.
“No, she was never pregnant to begin with. She told me that she loved and cared about me so much and didn’t want to leave me after high school. Sounds cliché right? Like a lot of other high school couples go through the same thing? Nope, she faked a pregnancy with hopes I’d change my life around and move in with her at age eighteen.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.
“I promptly cut things off with her in a panic and stopped returning her calls. I was disgusted that someone would try to do something like that to me. She couldn’t take it and would often come to my house and bang on the door claiming she was still carrying my child.



“Wow…” It was all I could think of to say. I was having a very difficult time trying to think about Sam the same way. I had always figured that situations such as these rarely, if ever occurred outside of Jerry Springer re-runs in which multiple lounge chairs are thrown across the room in anger. I got up from the couch and dispatched myself to my room without a word. Kyle didn’t bother coming after me. He retired himself back into the seclusion that was his bedroom.
I plopped myself down on my bed and began staring at the ceiling as I thought about what Kyle had told me. My cell phone was sitting on my bed stand and I didn’t bother picking it up to call Sam just yet. I figured she probably wouldn’t even answer for a little while. I put on my headphones and let the shuffle button on my iPod decide what I should be thinking about as I drifted into sleep.


Over the course of the next couple days I didn’t talk to Sam at all. Neither one of us made the effort to contact the other, likely thinking that we both just needed a little bit of time to let things sink in. Things with Kyle were okay, but only okay. We didn’t talk to each other much, but my feelings of rage had subsided gradually. I couldn’t in good conscience blame him for something that happened before I was with Sam and at that, something she was responsible for. I was avoiding her in all my cowardice like a seven year old kid trying to avoid a girl that had a crush on him.
I spent most of my time outside of work focusing on writing. Even though it was partly my job, I really enjoyed writing. It was one of those things that helped keep me sane in an otherwise boring atmosphere I called my life. I had spent the greater portion of the last few days spitting incoherent jumble into my laptop. Nothing that I had written really made any sense; it was mostly just inarticulate free-writing. I didn’t care. It was helping.
I enjoy writing humor columns for whoever is willing to take the time to read and possibly publish them. I like to think that every day someone is laughing at something I’ve written, or even cursing at the poorly developed themes that I pass off as humorous and slap my name onto. However, when I sat down after speaking with Kyle, I wasn’t really in the mood to continue my rant about the egotistical raison. I sat down and spat out some garbage about why I’m a bad writer.
I don’t read, I don’t note small things that should be written down for later use in writing, I don’t envision anything that I may want to write about, I give poor critiques to others if I’m uninterested and I claim to know more than I do about many topics. I don’t properly proof read anything I write until it is positively reinforced as a “good piece of writing.” I lack the confidence to recognize when a piece of my writing is a valid and well constructed piece of work and I overestimate other pieces of writing simply because I use good diction and a few humorously compiled words. I lack the ability to recognize when I’ve bludgeoned a dead horse, lost the reader or poorly constructed a scene and the fact that I’m not working to correct these problems isn’t helping.
I don’t really consider myself a bad writer, but after seeing some recent flaws in myself and my mindset towards Sam, it was hard for me not to be critical of other things in my life.
I had a very difficult time thinking of Sam after what Kyle had told me. I had never once seen any kind of psychotic behavior from that girl. Hell, we still hadn’t even used the word love around one another, and the thought of it scared me after only two months. She was only ever a good girlfriend to me and I knew she cared about me like I cared about her. I almost wanted to see this other side of her just so I could find out if she was capable of acting in such a manner. However, when I thought about it, I realized that we were twenty-two now and this all happened when Sam was leaving high-school. I convinced myself that everyone is a dumbass in high school and that made me feel a little better – but I still couldn’t shake these new thoughts I was having about her. Was she really as crazy as Kyle thought?
I decided to man-up and head over to her place after work the next day. I didn’t get off until 7:00 so I figured she would definitely be home when she got back from her job as a secretary at some local firm. I got to her apartment complex and rang the buzzer.
“Hello? Who is it?” The familiar sound of her voice.
“It’s me, it’s Madison. Can you let me in?”
…
“Yeah, alright.”
Our fifteen second conversation was very awkward and I feared this would foreshadow the rest of our conversation that night. She slowly opened the door and let me inside. I quickly entered and made my way right for her couch and sat down. I looked up at her. She was wearing a pair of shorty short shorts and a tank top with what looked like a push-up bra. I instantly forgot about why I came here for a few seconds after looking at her. Her long brown hair was curling down over her chest. It was as if she picked the most seductive clothing possible and sat around waiting for me to call. She came and sat down next to me. It didn’t look like her roommate Cassie was home. That was a plus.
“I assume Kyle told you about our past together” she asked slowly.
I nodded.
“Look I was very young and still in high school when we were together. I had never had a serious boyfriend before and panicked when college was going to come around and we would both be going separate ways. I didn’t want to lose him at the time and now I realize that my behavior was totally irrational, immature and straight retarded. I hope you understand why I didn’t tell you about this. It was embarrassing.”
“So everything Kyle said was true? Everything about the pregnancy, and the restraining order?”
Sam was sitting on the couch, looking down at her awkwardly crossed legs. She sighed and heaved a deep breath before responding.
“Yes, it’s true,” she eventually revealed, “I hope you aren’t petrified of me now.”
I hesitated before I could reply which apparently was mistake number one. After a quick breath to think about what I could say in response, I came up with absolutely nothing.
“Madison?” She interjected before I could correct my error and say something.
“I’m sorry. I wouldn’t say I’m scared, but it’s definitely something that’s been on my mind over these past few days. I really didn’t see something like this coming.” Weak at best, but it was all I could come up with. Sure, Sam and I got along pretty well and we liked each other but we’d only been together for a couple months. I really didn’t think our relationship was strong enough to withstand a ship wreck. It was around this point that I realized how much I didn’t want to be at Sam’s place. A lot was racing through my mind and none of it was willing to slow down and let me catch up to myself.
“You’re really thinking seriously about everything Kyle told you, aren’t you? I know we haven’t been together long but I liked to think that by this point we would at least be capable of acting maturely and attempting to figure things out. Yes, I had a bit of a rough adolescence and I understand why this would be a bit of a shock to you but it’s no reason to act like a coward, Madison. Either speak to me about things that bother you, or don’t bother wasting my time. I sat around here these past few days waiting for you to call, and half-hoping that I wouldn’t be home when you did. I’ve been scared shitless of your reaction and I had to wait three days in mental anguish, waiting for you to come talk to me.” I watched as her kill switch engaged, switching her from defensive to aggressive. I couldn’t blame her. She was right about everything. No matter which way I went about this, she was right and I wasn’t able to grow up and accept it. Mistake number two came in the form of another hesitation. It was a few seconds before I could find my tongue and muster up the strength to say anything.
…
“Sam, I-”
“Save it.” She cut me off and motioned towards the door, gesturing that I leave. I chose not to say anything and obeyed her. The fact that I couldn’t even say anything confirmed her accusations that I was a coward. I think most normal people would have tried to defend themselves and at least left with the tattered remains of their dignity. Mine was left on the center cushion of the couch she ejected me from. I looked back over to her as I opened the door to see if the expression on her face had changed. Before I could think of my last words, she once again interjected.
“Don’t let the door hit your ass.”

When I arrived back at home I found Kyle sitting on the couch in his underwear slaughtering police officers and pedophiles with a chain gun. I sat down on the couch next to him and watched him play the game. I finally worked up the courage to say something.
“Sam won’t be coming by here anymore.”
“You wanna talk about it?” He asked while throwing Molotov cocktails at unsuspecting cars.
“No, that’s alright. Maybe later” I replied, thinking of very few other things to talk about. Kyle picked up a controller and handed to me. Within seconds I was wielding my trademark flamethrower, burning innocent victims and watching them suffer. I felt better instantly, smiled, and asked Kyle if he knew where the sniper rifle was.

****
As mentioned several times, I like to write. I often write humor pieces because they seem to be one of the elements I excel in, and sometimes I just write whatever the first thing I think about is. Up until the incident with Sam I had never been very good at articulating my emotional or intellectual thoughts and getting them on the page. I always avoided such things by writing like a smart-ass, making myself laugh and forgetting about any insecurity I might have had to face that day. Everything Sam had scolded me about in that brief interaction was not only true about my personality, but was also reflected in my writing. These limitations seemed totally unwarranted in my writing and there was no reason I couldn’t correct them. I sat down at my computer screen imaging the horrific scowl on Sam’s face as she sent me away and quickly began work on something with a little more meaning. I made sure to commit this to memory.

The beginning of the first chapter...

Chapter 1
Carrie Jacobs found herself dashing around the corner of her living room and sprinting up her winding set of stairs with the force of a small tornado, her two younger siblings attempting eagerly to keep pace with the speed demon.
“Come on, Carrie. Give us the key!”
“Yeah, this isn’t funny. Where did you even get handcuffs anyway?” Unlike her sister who was only a few years younger than Carrie, her brother was able to restrain any unwanted feelings of hatred at least until things escalated to a totally unwanted level. Carrie had found herself bored after school and used a pair of handcuffs to tether her younger siblings together. That slightly younger boy that she was only just friends with had all kinds of useless junk lying around his house that he liked to share with her.
Reaching the top of the stairs first, Carrie was able to successfully seclude herself to her room for a whole seven seconds before her door was hit with such repeated force that she was nervous they might actually kick it in. While she felt no fear from her siblings, the wrath enforced by her parents was a whole other story and the penalty for knocking the door off its hinges would lie strictly on her shoulders as the oldest of the children.
“Okay okay, calm down,” replied Carrie. She had to grab Amanda’s hand out of mid-air to prevent her from finishing off the door. Brent had taken a more reserved approach and merely decided to sit down against the wall while his sister gave Carrie’e door a beating as if it were a punching bag. Carrie took the key out of her pocket and reluctantly freed her siblings. Amanda mumbled a stream of incoherent jumble and walked off in defeat, while Brent merely rubbed his sore wrist, seemingly apathetic towards the idea that he was now free. He followed Carrie back into her room and sat down on her bed while Carrie spun the handcuffs around her finger with a smug sense of satisfaction devouring her already impulsive ego.
“Why’d you handcuff us anyway?” Brent didn’t seem bothered, just inquisitive.
“Sorry. It was more to annoy Amanda than it was you. I know that you can take these things and walk away laughing, or at least with a neutral look about you. Amanda isn’t like that and it makes me smile to see her so frustrated.” She had no reason to lie about it. Amanda was always a bit of a nuisance to her. If she wasn’t helping herself to half of Carrie’s belongings then she was complaining to her parents that she should have the same rights and responsibilities as Carrie when she was clearly not ready for such things. Brent was polishing his glasses on his t-shirt and acting a little too compulsive in the process as he struggled with a particularly stubborn smudge.
“I’ve gotten used to it,” he replied while walking out of her room, “just try not to annoy her to the point that she tries to include me on her violent schemes for revenge.”
“Gotcha.”

For Carrie.Hannah...

Welcome back everyone.

I'm glad to see you've chosen to join me on another installment of the super awesome, fabulous blog full of questionable content to be enjoyed by an audience of a questionable nature.

It's been quite some time. I suppose I'm back into the realm of literature construction known as writing, seeing as how there actually is a writing program at my university this year. I'm fully unsure of how one chooses a university that has his major...but only sometimes. I have become rusty. I have become lazier than normal and I have seemed to become more of a computer nerd as of late. I suppose there is nothing wrong with any of the aforementioned character traits as long as I've chosen to live my writing-free life in an enjoyable manner. I've found myself partaking in activities lately that I could not say I would normally find myself involved with. For example, the other week I took the advice of a friend and mastered every musical instrument known to man, including the elusive old-timey jug with 3 X's written on it. It produces soul-soothing hymns to calm even the most up-tight nerves. I also found myself kicking names and taking ass much more frequently than before. I've been running up vertical hills at unflagging speeds with no traces of fatigue. I'm even capable of playing my hymn-inducing bottle while doing so.

I've enrolled in a few writing classes this semester. One called Advanced Fiction Writing and one called Writing for Children. Because of this, there should be more writing to come. This writing in question may not produce any intelligent thoughts from the reader and may commonly produce my trademark response of "what the fuck?" However, it's writing and if that's what my audience (right now I think it only consists of a few Fauseys and possibly some rogue UPB students) wants then that's what they might get at a time that does not conflict with my earliest convenience.

R Shark

Call me what you will...

I like to call myself a writer and maybe I’m unsure why. Maybe it’s because people tell me I have a knack for wording things in a specific way that caters to a specific audience in a specific manner of my choosing. Maybe it’s because I once wrote a short story that caught the eye of some friends and family and that automatically constitutes my brand image a writer. Maybe it’s because I love to write, even if I’m picky about what I write about and when I write it.

I can’t call myself a writer. I am a writing major with specific successes and even more epic failures that deem the response “what the fuck?” An audience has to call me a writer based on their experiences with writing and what they feel constitutes “writing,” in any of its forms.

I don’t read, I don’t note small things that should be written down for later use in writing, I don’t envision anything that I may want to write about, I give poor critiques to others if I’m uninterested and I claim to know more than I do about certain things. I don’t properly proof read anything I write until it is positively reinforced as a “good piece of writing.” I lack the confidence to recognize when a piece of my writing is a valid and well constructed piece of literature and I overestimate other pieces of writing simply because I use good diction and large words. I lack the ability to recognize when I’ve bludgeoned a dead horse, lost the reader or poorly constructed a scene (although I’m working on that.)

I enjoy being lazy. I enjoy telling myself “I’ll do it this afternoon.” I enjoy getting drunk and accomplishing abso-fucking-lutely nothing and feeling bad that it hasn’t positively impacted my literature the next day.

I write this with full knowledge that very few pieces of my writing will get published and the one’s that do may end up on a coffee table, better suited as a coaster for some middle-aged widow’s three day old cup of coffee that she's never coming back to, except to dispose of when her girlfriends visit next and they share several glasses of wine and several stories of epic disappointment.

These are my flaws. Unlabored flawlessness does not exist and recognizing that it is unachievable is the first step any one person can make in achieving effortless success in anything they do.

What to do while bored in Canada...

(Incomplete)

My shoulder hurt. Alcohol can be such a bitch with inhibiting memory. I remembered stumbling onto the rough pavement during my impromptu fight against a new Canadian friend not much taller than me. Nothing serious, it began with one of those conversations that states “I bet I could kick your ass,” or something along those lines. It was at this point that my other new Canadian friend not much taller than me interjected. “Just fight for 1 minute. No face shots and no ball-tapping.” There you go.

My head hurt. Damn. I don’t usually get hangovers but this time my body was just pissed off with what transpired the night before.

“Come on guys, get up. We have to go back to Emily’s and clean up all the shit we left on her lawn.”

It was 10 a.m. It was also hot and sunny. Combine those two factors with the already throbbing skull on my shoulders and you’ve got one pissed off lush.

“No way, really?” I really didn’t want to get up.

“Yeah, I could hear her mom yelling in the background. She sounded pretty pissed which just plain sucks for me because I have to be over there all the time.”

My stomach hurt, and churned, and growled. The only thing I can compare it to is that it felt like a very small and possibly homicidal man was trying to tear his way out of my stomach and leave no prisoners on the escape. I decided that if I wasn’t very careful about how I spent my morning, I was going to vomit.

“Ross, you’re driving us there, get dressed.”

“Fuck you, I am so hung-over to the point that I’m barely functioning.”

“Either you drive or we’re walking.”

Fuck walking. I got dressed, avoided the anticipated vomit and got ready to proceed to Emily’s house accompanied by all the members of the guilty party, excluding Jeff’s girlfriend who had to leave early. She lucked out.

My broadband sidekick...

Alright well I promised that I would post the longer story that was accepted into Baily's beads due to the fact that it did such an excellent job of being awesome.

Although you could easily figure out what the story is about simply by reading it, I'll be annoying and give a little bit of background. Essentially, I used to live in Canada and this short story gives a summation of a friendship I share with someone who still lives there. Yeah I know it sounds adorable and you're anxious to read. Anywho, I go back and visit sometimes and this story gives a summary of how this friendship progresses through the boundaries of the United States over the course of several years. Eventually we decide to be even cuter and get simply stunning tattoo's as a marker of the friendship. We got the tattoo's on our legs so we made a deal to never wear shorts at the same day to ensure we don't look too cute together. This may be my last post for a little while so do me a solid and enjoy it....even though it's kinda long...

Broadband Sidekick

“…When you say best friends means friends forever.”

- Brand New

“Jeff, how many more levels do we need to beat in Crash Bandicoot before we finish the game?” I was trying to make some simple conversation to take my mind off the fact that a needle was charring my skin. I almost expected him to call me out on being a wimp because of the pain but he was surprisingly understanding about it.

“Well we beat the third world right?”

“Yeah,” I replied as my leg cringed with the first signs of pain.

“Okay well then we just need to beat the boss in that world and then finish the last few levels and we’re done.” That conversation was over much more quickly than I would have liked and I searched frantically for any objects around the room that could act as a simple conversation starter. Failing to find anything out of the ordinary, Jeff and I made small talk with the tattoo artist between intermittent surges of pain.

* * * *

I can’t even describe the number of hours we devoted to James Bond’s Goldeneye video game on Nintendo 64. We could spend hours at a time rampaging through buildings, open fields and military compounds killing anything that crossed our paths.

It was as though it were any other day; Jeff and I perched at the edge of his bed with our eyes cemented on his TV screen. It was the day that I’d been dreading for quite some time and I didn’t think I was ready for what was about to happen. My dad had told me a few months back that we’d be moving to America because he’d been offered a better paying position down there. I almost refused to believe him when he first told me. My mom showed up shortly after my James Bond replica had been pumped full of buckshot. She didn’t say much, just that I should get ready to say goodbye to Jeff and meet her back in our driveway next to was left of our belongings. Jeff and a few of my other neighborhood friends followed me to the foot of the driveway to wave goodbye. I really appreciated the effort on their behalf, but I didn’t know what to do or how to act. When the car was all packed up and ready to go I found myself slowly walking to the back seat where I always left my Gameboy. My friends all stood on the curb waving goodbye, and after I returned a few waves I directed my attention strictly to Mario and his pet dinosaur as the car proceeded out of town, and out of Canada in silence.

I didn’t speak with Jeff at all after the first month of life in America. When I first moved, we would both exchange e-mails on our parents “work only” computers religiously. This all changed when we grew a few years older and were able to get our hands on our own computers. This form of communication never died down as we both found ourselves becoming more and more interested in technology and came to the realization that we were in all likelihood, nerds, geeks and/or Poindexters. Most of the types of conversations we had came off as immature banter to anyone but ourselves. If we both found ourselves bored and online at the same time we would occupy ourselves by writing lists of “things that suck” and filling hundreds of lines:

126. When you pick up the carton of milk in the fridge and instantly put it back down when you realize it’s too light.

127. When the cat falls asleep on your lap when you’re at the computer and you realize that there’s no way to escape without its claws becoming better acquainted with your leg.

128. Rap music

129. When a bottle cap rolls directly under your chair to the point that there’s no way you can reach it without straining.

This list was built over the course of a few years in random spurts of boredom. Typically it would start when I’d come home annoyed one day and find Jeff on the internet to complain to:

Ross says: You know what I hate? I really hate it when you’re walking somewhere in a group and not fully paying attention to the path so you step in a little tiny hole that you can’t see. I hate that; you fall over every single time and look like an ass in front of everyone.

[ J e f f ] says: Add that in as #214

As I watched our friendship mature over the years I quickly realized that although Jeff was never one to turn down a relationship with a girl he truly liked, he seemed to prefer hooking up with a new girl every weekend. I was much different - Jeff had been with several girls by the time I’d found my first.

Jeff saw me through my very first relationship from start to finish. I began dating a girl named Steph in my junior year of high school and when I told Jeff about it he was beyond ecstatic that “my balls had finally dropped.”

I waited in an awkward silence listening to the sound of my lungs nervously pumping out oxygen at a higher than normal rate.

“Hey…are you very busy right now?”

“Actually Ross I am,” my girlfriend said as she answered the phone, “Why? Do you need to talk to me again about something important?”

“I hardly get to talk to you Steph and when I’m away at college, talking is very important if this is going to work. I know that you never have problems calling and talking to your friends, so why can’t you just make time for me?”

“You just don’t understand how busy I am do you, Ross?”

Jeff never seemed to get annoyed that I kept calling him and leaving emotional e-mails complaining about something Stephanie had said or done. Eventually it got to the point that I’d finally had enough and knew that I had to end the relationship for my own well-being.

[ J e f f ] says: Hey sweetie, what’s going on?

Ross says: …I broke up with her today. I actually did it. It feels so good.

[ J e f f ] says: Finally! I told you it’d feel so much better. Add that bitch in as #215.

212. When you try to eat bagel bites but you miss your mouth entirely and it falls all over your shirt.

213. Paris Hilton

214. When you’re walking somewhere in a group and not fully paying attention to the path so you step in a little tiny hole that you can’t see, wrench your leg and fall over in front of everyone.

215. Ross’s ex-girlfriend.

Despite the fact that my relationship with Steph ended on the worst possible terms, there was something good to come from that web of teenage angst. After the girl that Jeff appropriately labeled “she who shall not be named” played me a few songs performed perfectly by the alternative/emo/indie super band, Brand New, we couldn’t stop listening. Memorizing lyrics, listening to songs on repeat, seeing concert after concert, we did it all (even if it was in entirely different countries at entirely different times.) We could never get out of our heads and never got tired of listening to songs like “Sic transit gloria…glory fades.” Its chorus was shouted with such intensity and angst that we found it easy to sing the lyrics to ourselves whenever we wanted:

The fever, the focus.

The reasons that I had to believe you weren’t too hard to sell.

Die young and save yourself!

To further add to our obsession, on frequent occasions I would receive e-mails from Jeff that would read something like:

So keep the blood in your head!

And keep your feet on the ground!

If today’s the day it gets tired,

Today’s the day we drop out!

Oh man Ross, I was listening to The Quiet Things That No One Ever Knows today and got goose bumps when I heard the chorus. I fuckin love Brand New!

p.s. I was eating bagel bites earlier today and just missed my mouth when I tried to eat one and it fell all over my shirt. Straight up, it was like my face had been re-arranged and I was guessing where my mouth should be.

* * * *

I was confused when my dad called and told me to meet him at a nearby shopping center. He was interrupting my steady flow of Nazi killing with a sub-machine gun issued by my favorite computer program. I drove to the meeting place and searched for my father’s red Pontiac Bonneville. Instead I saw him drive around the corner in a small, turquoise-looking family sedan with the words “Cavalier LS” written on the back.

“Sweet, my father is a car thief now!”

“No, no, no you little smartass. I’m test-driving this car for you right now. If you approve then I’ll gladly go place an offer on it for you because I know you’re going to need the car when making the six hour commute to and from college every few months.”

“No way, really?”

This car was nothing special by any means. It was a turquoise-ish, blu-ish, green-ish calamity of colors all morphed into one strange sight for the eyes. The four-door layout of the body was perfect for family road-trips with the kids and the automatic transmission and high-mileage, four-banger engine was sure to pump out boatloads of power for the NASCAR driver hiding in all of us. It was a car. As long as it had wheels and was capable of getting me from one place to another with only a few minor engine fires then I would happily accept.

When my dad drove back with the car to place an offer, I found myself speeding home as fast as my mom’s Malibu with the ever-so effeminate Mickey Mouse antenna ornament could take me. I had to find the nearest telephone or computer in the house to alert Jeff of this new development.

Ross Says: so I was just hanging out today playing video games when my dad calls me up and is like “Yooooooo what uppp? I bought you a car, come test drive this shit!”

[ J e f f ] Says: I’m no stranger to sarcasm Ross

Ross Says: yeah I know sweetie but this time I’m not being sarcastic

[ J e f f ] Says: …you actually have a car now?

Ross Says: damn right

[ J e f f ] Says: yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeah!!!!!! why the hell aren’t you up here yet?

Ross Says: believe me, I’m already planning my trip

Over the course of the next few weeks, we spent our time on the internet collaborating on a list of things that would have to be accomplished upon my arrival:

1. Get drunk upon Ross’s immediate arrival

2. Eat our weight in pizza every night

3. Go to Canada’s Wonderland

4. Find scandalously clad teenage girls at parties

5. Eat more pizza, drink more beer

6. Get a tattoo

We would talk for hours over the next few months collaborating on the design until we had it perfect. Instantly, we agreed that whatever tattoo we chose, it had to involve Brand New in some form or another.

After thinking hard for specific lyrics that we wouldn’t mind having burned into our skin for eternity, we came up with a perfect idea. Jeff informed me that he was going to have the words “The Fever” ink’d on the back of his leg and I would have “The Focus” in the same spot. I was a bit skeptical at first, and then Jeff offered his reasoning. He explained that he knew he was good with women and didn’t feel cocky to admit it. This accounted for the words “The Fever.” He continued to explain that I always ended up picking the maniacal girls who would end up tearing me to pieces and that I focused too hard on fixing things when in reality I should be trying to get out. This accounted for the words “The Focus.” Lastly, these words were taken from the chorus of the song “Sic Transit Gloria…Glory Fades,” and we both agreed that that song is just badass.

After I nagged Jeff relentlessly to place an appointment at a respectable tattoo parlor, he finally pulled through and booked us in for the end of my visit at a place called “Cottage 13.” He explained that this was where his sister had gotten all of her tattoos and that all the artist’s there were highly commendable.

After the excruciating eight-hour drive, I finally arrived back in Waterdown with unnecessarily loud Brand new lyrics being screamed at the highest possible frequency my tiny car speakers could pump. I arrived in Jeff’s driveway right as the song “Seventy Times 7” reached the loudest part of emotional bridge used for constructive emphasis of the singers’ angst.

Jeff quickly rushed out his front door to come give me a hug right as the singer was finishing his rant.

“What the hell took you so long? Come on, I got our 2-4 inside already, we’re going to get drunk!”

Over the course of my week-long visit back to Canada, I became quite good friends with Jeff’s girlfriend, Danielle. Jeff and I assigned Danielle the nickname “TR” to be used only when I am in their company. The name TR was decided upon during one of our late night internet conversations shortly after Jeff started dating Danielle. I told him that since she was awesome, she had to be assigned a nickname out of principle if nothing more. He said that he loved kissing a girl who had a tongue ring and abbreviated it to TR on the spot.

TR was different. Through much of our friendship, I was constantly enlightened about Jeff’s sexual prowess. It wasn’t often that Jeff fell so hard for anyone. Even if Jeff wouldn’t agree, I felt like he was showing signs of vulnerability like the majority of human males. He built up such a powerful defense to protect himself and his masculinity from the hardships we find within the opposite sex and down it came in an instant by a girl who arrived fashionably late to the party that was his life and luckily for him, she arrived stag.

Although we spent just about every night nurturing our inner-alcoholic doppelgangers and fighting off the hangovers that inevitably ensued, we were still able to have a great time during the day. Jeff, TR, TR’s friend Claudia and I spent an entire day at the popular Canadian theme park known as Canada’s Wonderland:

The cart rattled with the intensity provided by the chain-link lift that carried us up the steep slope on the old, wooden rollercoaster. Jeff was next to me as we waited eagerly for the wonders that would follow on the other side of the steep peak. TR and Claudia were in the cart behind us talking about god-knows-what when Jeff nudged me on the shoulder.

“Hey, you know what Jesse Lacey’s middle name is, right?”

“Jeff…he’s the lead singer of our favorite band and neither of us are ashamed to say that we have a man-crush on him. His middle name is Thomas. He’s Jesse Fuckin Thomas Lacey.”

“Okay okay, just checking,” Jeff replied in defense.

“You think TR knows what his middle name is? If she truly loves you Jeff, then she should take a shining interest in everything that you love.”

“Good point, let’s find out. Hey babe, do you know what Jesse Lacey’s middle name is?”

“Fuckin.”

I was jealous myself that I didn’t have a girl so amazing that she actually provided that answer when asked such a ridiculous question.

It wasn’t until shortly after midnight at Jeff’s house that we realized our tattoo appointment was the next day and we still hadn’t fully decided exactly how we wanted the tattoo to look. We had been fiddling around with the design over the course of the several month long period ever since we came to the final decision to have the words The Fever and The Focus painted on our bodies. We were quite happy with the font we chose and the idea to have the words written down the back of our calves, but something was still missing. Knowing full well that Brand New was known for toying around with lyrics without the use of vowels, we decided to put this idea to use. Although it would not be possible to sing without vowels, Brand New frequently released website updates containing lyrics with no vowels.

Fght ff yr dmns

Wrt sngs n yr slp

Sng n yr slp

Fghtffyrdmns, yr dmns!

Putting this concept to good use, Jeff suggested adding a sort of subscript text to each of our tattoos in the bottom corner. This subscript would be different for each of us, contain no vowels and still link to the other’s tattoo. Seeing how my tattoo would read “The Focus,” I would add the letters fvr to the corner and Jeff’s would read fcs. Although we were aware that this could possibly add too much to the design, we loved the idea so much that we couldn’t pass it up. It was simply another way to combine our friendship with our love of Brand New.

We arrived at Cottage 13 about fifteen minutes before our appointment was scheduled to take place. I was hoping to be able to meet our artist first so we could discuss every detail of the tattoo. If I was getting something ink’d on my body forever, then I was damn-well going to make sure it looked the way I wanted. The artist introduced himself as Os and explained that he could make our design look however we wanted it to, but that if he strayed too far from the design we printed out for him, then he wouldn’t really be drawing our tattoo; it would be his own. We agreed with him on this and told him to follow our design as best he could.

I got to take a look around the small office in the lobby of this tattoo parlor while Os printed up the stencil he would attach to the back of my leg. It was a very clean establishment, with each artists’ credentials hung proudly on the wall next to several pieces of their artwork, most of which consisted of some sort of elaborate dragon or skull design so they could flaunt their best masterpieces. I commended Jeff on his choice of artist.

After Os had the dark stencil set firmly on my leg for him to trace, he was all ready to begin the procedure. He could sense my nervousness and said that after the count of three, he would be pressing the sharp needle to my flesh, indicating that there was no turning back.

“1…2…3…”

* * * *

“Man Jeff, my leg is still really sore.”

“Yeah you’re a pretty big wimp; it’ll take another few weeks to fully heal,” Jeff replied in his usual, sarcastic tone.

“Yeah whatever, I’ll have to tough it out for a few weeks. You know, Os told me that if I came back to Canada within a year, then he’ll touch up my tattoo for free.”

“Yeah, he told me that too.”

“It gives me an excuse to see my sweetie again next year…although when I come back next year we have to make sure that we don’t wear shorts at the same time in public. Our friendship is already borderline questionable as it is.”

“Yeah, we need some time apart,” replied Jeff with his eyes still locked on to the back of his leg in fascination.

I tried extremely hard to fight the urge to reply with something witty and sarcastic that would in all likelihood question his sexuality. I restrained myself when I realized that as soon as I got home I would probably open an instant message window on my computer, greet him with a cute pet name, and add something to the list that might read “312. Leaving my sweetie after a week full of booze, pizza and tattoos.”

Keeping all of this in mind, all I could come up with to say was, “Agreed.”

The one where I listed some meaningful quotes...

Alright I have a few more stories to post on here and maybe some other forms of writing I'd like to share to gain feedback from anyone who may actually find themselves reading my work. The point of this section is to list some things I've heard (many from songs) that have in some way spoken to me. I'd appreciate any comments about things you've heard that have meant something to you. I'm not the only writer here you know...

1. "Always up or down, never down and out." - The Academy Is...
2. "I have burned the bush that covered my light, and know I'm scared I won't burn that bright." - Brand New
3. "Once you start rationalizing, you've already lost." - Shane Phillips' Father
4. "Let's get wrecked on pop tarts and sex and see the Taj Mahal." - Motion City Soundtrack
5. "I don't want to be one of those people who screams into a microphone just because they have one, I just like giving my thoughts a voice." - Shelley Jack (no I'm not sucking up, I really liked that quote)