The House

There's nothing more to say, he thinks.  It's simply time to go. I think we need to go some place else, he mutters, turning to face her, but she's gone. He blinks stupidly for a second, trying to remember what happened, but as far as he can recall, she should be standing next to him.

He sighs, running his hand along the stubble on his chin. He turns and looks out over the field, the black earth studded with the torn stalks of corn and rutted with the tracks on the combines trails as they had sliced through the field weeks ago. Turkeys mingle along the timberline near the creek in the distance, eyeing him warily before disappearing into the brush.

He stumbles as he walks along the dirt track next to the field, patting his shirt pocket until he finds the pack of cigarettes. Shaking one out, he puts it between his lips as he digs in his pants pockets for his lighter. The sky is an even slate grey, darker at the horizon. Is there a storm coming. The air is cold, and bites into his lungs as he lights the cigarette and takes the smoke deep into his lungs.

What was he going to tell her? He looks down at his brown boots as he stumbles along the road. She should be here. Why is it so hard to remember what happened to her? She should be here. There are few other places that she could be.

The house should be around the corner, around the bend in the trees. How does he know this. He can see it, how it should look, small white frame house, rambling front porch, small shed out back. A single farm light should sit above the gravel track that leads up into the trees. A battered blue Ford pickup rests against the pole holding the light, but it never moves. It always remains.

He pauses, looking over the house, trying to remember the last time he was here. Why does it look so familiar? At one point there was a girl who lived here, simple and pure of spirit, and maybe he had done something wrong to her. He scratches his chin. That's entirely possible that something like that happened. The cigarette burns his fingers and he flicks it away into the wet brush. Rage rose through him and his body reacted before his mind could really think through what he was doing. Whisky was involved, wasn't it.

He stares at the front door of the house and starts shivering. Why was he here? What brought him back? He looks over his shoulder, back down the dirt track towards the field, but there is no one there. Where is she? She was right next to him just a moment ago. He looks down the gravel track as it disappears into the dark forest, but he can see no movement.

The air is getting dimmer. The sun must be setting, somewhere behind the clouds. The wind rustles around his feet, nuzzling against his ankles. This thin jacket won't keep him too warm once it gets dark. He looks at the front door of the house, and swallowing deeply, steps forward towards it.

The knob of the door turns easily, and door creaks as it opens. He steps in, letting his eyes adjust to the darkness. The house is quiet and still. He calls out, but no one answers. He reaches over and flips the switch next to the front door, but nothing happens. He pauses, listening, and the house has the quiet feel of something dead and sleeping. The wind rattles the glass in the windows, but the house remains silent.

The boards in the floor creak under his feet as he makes his way into the dark house. The living room is around the corner, he thinks, and there should be a large blue hutch, and in the drawer of the hutch should be some candles and some matches. The stove in the kitchen was wood-fired. Hopefully there is still wood in the bin.

The furniture in the living room is draped in sheets, lumpy ghosts huddled around a ghost coffee table, facing a ghost television set. He pulls the sheet off the hutch and tosses it to the floor. He pulls open the drawer and fumbles around until he finds a candle. He rattles around in the drawer some more but cannot find any matches. He pulls his lighter from his pocket and lights the candle.

The warm glow of the candle light fills the room, and suddenly the house feels more alive. The candle casts herky jerky shadows as he makes his way from the living room into dining room. The large long table is shrouded in sheets as well. The chairs are leaning against it. The large armoir in the corner stands uncovered, threatening in its presence

The Sun

The sun cracks the horizon, causing the old man to frown around his pipe. He hitches up the collar of his coat, and keeps walking along the hedges. Over the gray smoke curling over the edge of the pipe, he looks out over the meadow, an empty expanse of green shimmering with dew.

The air is heavy with promise and anticipation. His leg cramps up, and he stops to rub his calf. Looking around to be sure that no one is around, he pushes open a gap in the hedge and slips into the meadow. Moving faster now, he crosses the short grass, the brown leather of his boots glistening.

In the center of the meadow sits a small pile white stones, jumbled like a pile of bones.

Don't get meta

Petra pulled down the shade on the bedroom window, shutting out the street below, lit by the plaintive street lamp. She turned and walked across the room to the bed and sat on the edge, fretting the edge of her shirt with her fingers. Her eyes glanced nervously at the clock, but it hadn't changed since the last time she'd checked it.

"Time and time again," she muttered, cracking her knuckles. Her stomach growled. She sighed.

Getting up from the bed, she crossed the room and opened the door. She went down the dark hallway to the kitchen, and flicked on the light. The old cat put its ears back but didn't even bother to open his eyes to look up at her. She opened the refrigerator, and after rummaging for a while, pulled out a package of ham, a jar of mustard, and a jar of mayonnaise.

She set these things on the counter next to the refrigerator. She found herself humming to herself as she reached over to get the loaf of bread from were it sat next to the toaster. Setting the bread down, she reached up and pushed the 8-track tape into the player sitting on top of the refrigerator. With a squawk, 70s funk filled the tiny kitchen.

The old cat opened his eyes at the music, looked up at her balefully as she began assembling her sandwich. His whiskers twitched when she opened the package of ham, and he stood. He stretched out long, yawning, his tongue curling up in his mouth, then crossed the room to rub his back against her bare legs.

"You had your chance," she growls at him, "You chose to be your own cat tonight, remember?"

He continues to rub against her legs, purring loudly as she spreads mayonnaise and mustard on the bread and then layer the slices of ham. She replaces the lids on the jars, reseals the ham, and then pushing him out of the way with her foot, opens the refrigerator to return the sandwich fixings.

The cat meowls up her, but she just frowns and shakes her head. "No, I know I shifted tenses. I didn't mean to, it just happened, ok?"

The cat sighs. "Could we have just one scene that doesn't get meta?"

She takes a bite of the sandwich. "Hey, this is hard enough. Don't get surly."

"At least you get ham."

"At least you get to speak."

"Only until he decides to rein this in."

She takes the sandwich on a plate into the living room, shutting off the light in the kitchen behind her. She sits on the couch, curling her long legs underneath her, taking another bite of the sandwich. She doesn't bother to turn on the light, but sits there in the near dark, looking out the window at the trees lining the street outside, and the plaintive streetlight that flickers as the wind blows the branches, shaking the leaves and causing the light to shimmer and dance. She hasn't heard from him since that night he decided he needed to drive out and save her. She glances over at the clock on the VCR.

Still no time has passed.

Work

"Come on," she said. "Let's go for a walk. It'll clear your head."

"I guess I need help getting my bearings."

"You need a lot of help, buster." She smiled. "That's what I'm here for."

She stood outside in the cold sunshine, her hands in the pockets of her coat as she waited for him to lock the door to his house. He joined her on the sidewalk.

"Where to?" he asked.

"See," she grinned. "That's your problem. It doesn't matter. Look at where you're standing." She gestured up and down the sidewalk. "You can either go right or left. Pick a direction, and start walking."

He smiled slightly. "It's just that simple?"

She poked him in the shoulder. "Pick a direction."

He turned to the right and started walking. She fell into step on his right hand side, and the two of them walked down to the corner.

"Now," she said, as they waited for the traffic to clear before they crossed the street, "I think the problem is that you're starting too generally."

"Really," he muttered, his hands in his pockets as they crossed the street.

"Yes, really." She looked over a squirrel running up a tree. "You have a man and a woman, maybe. It's hard to tell from what you've put down so far. They don't even have names. It's hard to tell what their relationship is." She looked up at him. "I think you need to give them names, and you need to make them as real as possible."

"But I don't know them."

She shakes her head. "That doesn't matter. You will know them, because you are creating them. Just make them, put them on the page, and then let them figure out where they need to go, and what they need to do. The sooner you put them down and let them run, the sooner you'll be out of this morass that's captured you."

He sighs. His shoe catches on a crack in the sidewalk and he stumbles. "I don't think it has anything to do with the writing." He looks up at her, frowning. "I wish it did. I think it's just happening again, the way that it always does."

She nods. "It always does. And you always get better." She reaches out to take his hand. She gives it a slight squeeze. "It will get better. Just ride it out."

Daddy

He came to with a kid poking him with a stick.
"You ok, mister?"
"Stop it."
He pushed himself up on his elbows, blinking at the sunlight. "What's going on?"
The kid turned and pointed. "That your car?"
He followed the kid's arm, wincing at the pain as he turned his neck. "Yeah, that's my car."
"You crashed. You crashed hard." The kid's eyes narrowed. "You crashed into Daddy's fence. Daddy's not going to like that."

Flush it Out

"No, no, no," his editor shakes her head. "There's not even a smidgen of narrative in this. What are you doing, vomiting on the page?"
"There's the scene in the bar."
"Don't even start. It's just weak. Come on, you can do better than this."
He nods, "Normally. I think I'm getting a little depressed right now."
"Well, snap out of it. Start writing. Don't you think that'll free you up a bit?"
"Free me up?"
"Yeah, break your writer's block. Just start writing, just get words down on the page."
"What do think I have been doing? What did you think you were just reading?"
"I think I just read you flushing out your brain. Now that you're clear, get to work."


P e t e r B i r k

$600 Mistake

It just gets harder every year to keep it together. I don't know if I can keep going. It's harder and harder and my brain feels like mush and keep reaching into a deep dark pit and pulling at the morass that surrounds me and I wish I could just keep the words on the page and out of my heart and I don't know why this is so hard this time, but I really don't think this one counts.
Maybe I should just start over. Sometimes I wish I could just pull the paper out of the typewriter crumple it up and throw it in the corner, but I write on an iPhone now and I don't want to make a $600 mistake because I can't get my head in the game.