Pomposity, Literary Fiction, and Trashy Romance Novels

***This is a revised version of this story***
I wrote this story with the intention for it to be a satire, social commentary on the literacy level of the contemporary college student and the resultant frustration of college professors. To that end I felt that the David character in this story needed to be more sympathetic. So, let me know what you think, is he more sympathetic? Is this an improvement? If not why?









When the vapid young woman came to turn in her story she had entered David’s office cradling the monstrosity lovingly against her ample bosom. David assumed that someone had paid a great deal of money to create that bosom. She leaned forward to place the little bastard on his desk and allowed her blouse to fall open enough to give David a good long look at the grotesque silicone lumps within. She gazed coyly up through her eyelashes to be sure she had his attention before straightening her spine and allowing her blouse to fall back into place. She believed that this action would increase her odds of getting an A. David believed this action was a good indication of how poorly written her story was likely to be. He breathed a disgusted sigh, and thanked her for turning her story in on time. As soon as she had finished swishing and wiggling her way out of his office, David breathed a second sigh, a sigh of relief. This would be the final story his class would workshop this semester.

David perceived himself as being a patient, intelligent, insightful man and believed he was doing the scholarly world a favor by attempting to enlighten his students about how to write respectable literary fiction. When she married him, David’s wife had perceived him as being an intelligent, insightful man, with a sparkling wit and a dry sense of humor. Now David’s wife perceived him as being short tempered, disillusioned, and tired. She had believed that their relationship would be filled with intellectual conversations, and wine tastings. The reality was more along the lines of her listening to David incessantly, bitching about ignorant students and pompous faculty members. When he married her, David had perceived his wife as being an intelligent, vivacious, and kind-hearted woman. He now perceived her to be a money-grubbing, irritable, man-hating hag. He had believed that their relationship would be filled with intellectual conversations, home cooked meals, and sexy nights. The reality was more along the lines of his listening to her incessantly bitching about money, cold take-out, and colder sheets.

Throughout his career as a creative writing professor, David had read more than his fair share of torturously long-winded and poorly constructed stories, each positively filled to overflowing with typos, misspelled words, wrong words, bad grammar, and wholly lacking in actual content, not to mention run-on sentences. He believed he had kept his tongue in check through every workshop for 23 years. His students believed that he had savagely attacked every story in every workshop for 23 years.

This most recent story outraged his senses more than anything he had ever seen in print before. It was 18 and a half pages long and contained not one genuine sentence. David assumed that the vapid young woman had been too lazy or too stupid, or perhaps both, to utilize her spell check. He assumed this because of the inclusion of typos and/or misspelled words that, as nearly as he could tell, approximately equaled the number of words that were spelled and utilized appropriately. Once he had finally waded through the typos, misspellings, and inappropriately used words, David was confronted with the ever present over usage of punctuation. Each page positively groaned under an eminence weight of commas, dashes – semicolons; colons: and exclamation points! As if all of this weren’t enough to enrage the most patient of men, the content of the “story” appeared to have taken a leave of absence. Perhaps a story this atrocious would not have enraged him quite so much if it had been turned in by a student in an introductory class, but this was the Senior Seminar. After 23 years David still couldn’t shake the persistent, though clearly unrealistic, expectation that students taking the Senior Seminar would have a basic grasp of spelling and grammar, be in possession of at least a moderately diverse vocabulary, and have a basic concept of how to put together some semblance of a readable story.

This most recent affront to all things literary was titled “True Love.” It consisted largely of a rather dull recounting of a love affair between a 17 year-old girl and her 19 year-old boyfriend. The story’s alleged conflict consisted of constant begging for sex by the boyfriend and persistent denial of sex by the girl. The resultant atrocity read something like this, “’But baby I loev you! If you loved me back you’d prove it, by makin’ love to me.’ ‘I do love you! But; you know I’m savin’ my virgenity for that special, prefect moment: when out 2 soles con become 1!’” Of course, the whole mess ended with the two starry eyed kids screwing under a full lunar eclipse while a vividly described, albeit horridly misspelled, meteor shower “light up teh skie over they’re writhing naked body’s!”

At the end of his first read through, David had marked out a few misspellings and grammatical nightmares, and was shuddering. By the third read through he had a bottle of scotch sitting next to the monstrosity and a half empty glass in his left hand. His right hand grasped a shaky pen with which he made brief, scribbled notations on the wretched sheets of paper. With each new notation David bit down on his lower lip and forced polite words out the tip of his pen, then took a sip from his glass. The scotch first burned then numbed the raw scrapes on his lip.

David’s notations were things like, “although the imagery here is vivid, it does not illuminate the story,” and, “this word does not fit the apparent meaning of this sentence,” and “there are a lot of similar scenes of dialog here. Perhaps just giving us one scene of the boyfriend begging for sex and your main character turning him down, then telling us that this was a common conversation, would help to move the story along.” The notations he wanted to make were things like, “Are you insane, or merely insipid?” and, “I don’t even know what the fuck this sentence is supposed to mean,” and, “if you can’t spell and don’t know the basic rules of grammar what the hell are you doing in my class, you dimwitted twat?”

On the day of the final workshop, more students than was usual showed up for class. That was odd because this was such a bad story; normally the worst stories brought fewer students to class. David assumed this was because most students didn’t want to seem cruel to the authors of those horrid stories. David, consistently late to the point of anality, arrived five minutes after the last student had tromped into the room, that final student having arrived five minutes late for class himself. David eased himself into his seat, tapped his papers on the table, rocked his chair back on two legs, and smirked around the room.

“Does anyone have any literary news to share with us today?” His left eyebrow twitched in unison with the upward twitch of his sneering lip. “No? Ah well, I suppose I can only hope, to one day, have a class filled with students whose fingers are held dutifully to the pulse of the literary world. Until then I suppose I shall be forced to keep you all abreast of the important ins and outs of the lit. world.”

David had found that a good seven minutes of boring news about musty authors, who practically no one had ever heard of, was a wonderful way to lull his captive audience/victims into a false sense of security. Then he could pounce on their banal attempts at writing and reduce them to abject misery, or as close to abject misery as the department head, Jim, would allow.

He thought Jim was a weasely little man, who students adored. For all his attempts at understanding this phenomenon, David simply could not fathom why students liked Jim so much. For that matter, he was also at a loss as to why Jim’s writing had seen so much more success than his own. In these perceptions David was incorrect. Jim’s writing had seen very little success while David’s had seen quite a bit, and although students didn’t fawn on David, they didn’t hate him whereas they despised Jim. In fact, most of Jim’s students considered him to be a sadistic asshole with a penchant for purposefully asking trick questions, particularly on exams. Jim perceived himself to be a rather nice fellow who simply wanted to stimulate a genuine ability in his students, to think for themselves. David’s wife perceived Jim as being an intelligent, insightful man, with a sparkling wit and a dry sense of humor. Jim had little perception of David, or David’s wife, and felt that he had more important things to do than run about formulating opinions of his fellow faculty members and their spouses.

After David’s seven, tediously dull, minutes of literary news, he glanced around the room. He appraised the glassy-eyed mouth-agape stares of his students, decided it was time, and announced, “So. ‘True Love.’ Who wants to get us started?”

A pompous young man, who was auditing David’s class for the third time, spoke up. David thought this young man needed to spend a bit more time on his hygiene and a good deal more time on his writing. In fact, David believed that the fellow in question was such a bad writer himself that he only continued to audit the class for the joy of shredding the hard work of writers more talented than himself. The pompous young man believed his constant auditing of David’s class was a good way to prepare himself for a life of teaching creative writing.

The pompous young man grinned around the room with gunk encrusted teeth, and launched into a long-winded speech about the conflict of the story. “The most glaring aspect of this story is, of course, the technical errors, but I’ll return to that later. First I want to discuss the conflict. There is a great deal of opportunity for conflict here, but it’s mostly opportunity for internal conflict, which is mirrored in the external conflict of the back and forth begging for sex and denial of sex. Rewriting this story with a specific focus on the girl’s internal struggle to decide whether or not to give up her virginity, which is representative of her girlhood, would create a more vivid and interesting story.” The pompous young fellow went on to read a passage from the fifth page, then read how he had rewritten that passage. He followed that up by saying, “From this, we can see how the conflict is moved forward more rapidly, in what had been a rather stale scene, without losing any of the vividly descriptive language that….”

At this point a rather loud young woman, who sat across the room, interrupted. “I don’t see how your constant rewriting of other people’s stories is helpful to this process. Frankly, you aren’t here for a grade so I think those of us who are would all appreciate it if you would shut up and let the rest of us speak.” She glared at the pompous young man, daring him to continue speaking. The pompous young man made a strangled noise of incoherent anger, which he made a weak and ineffective effort to cover by coughing, but he didn’t speak again, opting instead to stare sullenly at his outlandishly phony alligator skin boots. The boots were a putrid shade of lime green.

The rather loud young woman smiled at the vapid young woman and said, “Aside from the frequent technical errors, I thought this story did quite a good job of expressing the girl’s internal struggle of whether or not to relinquish her virginity. A girl’s virginity, by the way, is representative of her innocence, not her age. I particularly enjoyed the vivid imagery in this story. The descriptions of the settings for each scene, the character’s clothing, and especially the appearance of the girl were quite vivid. However, the best imagery was the depiction of the night sky overhead of the two characters as they made love.”

A sexually ambiguous young man, who always sat in the back corner of the room, and rarely offered anything that David considered to be a valuable insight, spoke up. “I agree that the imagery here is both vivid and enjoyable. I think the settings, that are described in such detail here, are a metaphor for the girl’s self-image.” The sexually ambiguous young man grinned smugly at the pompous young man.

Annoyed by the ignorant comments of his students, David interjected, “I think we can all agree that the imagery in this story is quite vivid. Unfortunately, vivid though it may be, this imagery does not illuminate the story or move it forward. What we have here is an example of a repetitious argument between a teen boy and a teen girl, whose names we are never even given, over whether or not they are going to have sex. This is something of a common theme in teen life and not a particularly interesting premise for a literary short story. Once again we have a story that is plot driven rather than character and conflict driven.” David rushed on before any of his students could inject further ignorant comments into the conversation. “The fact that this story is fraught with technical errors is a good indicator that the author is not paying close attention to her own story and therefore leaves readers uninterested in actually reading her story.” At this David tipped his chair back a bit further, touched the tip of his tongue to his upper lip, raised his eyebrows, and stared first at the furthest right-hand corner of the ceiling, out of the corner of his eyes, and then at the furthest left-hand corner of the ceiling, out of the other corner of his eyes. David believed that this combination of movements and facial expressions communicated both wisdom and deep insight to his students. Most of his students believed that this combination of movements and facial expressions communicated some kind of mental defect.

The rather loud young woman frowned at David. “I disagree with your assessment of this story. I thought that a simple clean up of the technical errors would result in an excellent story and a rather insightful glimpse into the heart and mind of a conflicted young girl on the verge of becoming a woman. Stories like these are important. They help young girls and young women recognize that they aren’t alone in these feelings and they offer young men much needed insight into how young women think and feel. I would consider this to be an important piece of literary fiction.”

The rest of the students, with the exception of the pompous young man who was still staring at his hideous boots, nodded their heads and murmured agreement with this sentiment. David looked around his classroom as his students nodded and congratulated the vapid young woman on a job well done. He watched the vapid young woman’s lips twitch and turn up at the ends, and her eyes crinkle at the corners. His teeth began to grit and grind painfully, his chest constricted, and there was a roaring in his ears.

Air gusted into David’s lungs, and before he could stop himself he slammed all four legs of his chair onto the floor, slapped his desktop and bellowed at the class, “Are you all completely stupid? Can’t any of you see how thoroughly insipid this trite piece of pointless garbage is? What the hell kind of world is it we’re living in if a student who can’t even type a coherent sentence in a word program, which by the way will correct most spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors, can get into college? Never mind for a moment the fact that this ignorant, insipid, silicone injected, brain dead, daddy’s girl, twat was able to get into college, any brat with a wealthy parent can buy themselves a college education, but even brain dead twats can now get into Creative Writing Senior Seminars without having the slightest idea of how to write a coherent sentence. Most of you are destined to work in fast food or writing trashy romance novels filled with words like ‘quivering love mound’ after you graduate, if you even manage to graduate.” David ran out of steam and noticed, with a great deal of satisfaction, that every student in the room looked shocked and horrified and the vapid young woman’s face was streaked black with tears and smeared mascara. Incidentally the words “quivering love mound” had been bouncing around in David’s mind since he was 13, when he had read one of his mother’s trashy romance novels.

That afternoon he submitted failing grades for each of his students. Then he packed up all of his belongings, emptied his checking and savings accounts, cashed in his retirement fund and his life insurance policy, and bought a one-way ticket to Ecuador. He did not inform anyone that he was leaving.

Upon discovering that he was gone, David’s wife assumed that he had run off with some grad student and was livid that he had taken all the money with him. She filed divorce papers and began a romance with Jim, which ultimately led her to believe that he was a pompous windbag who did little more than bitch petulantly about ignorant students. After a few months she moved to San Francisco where she lived out her days hopping from one lesbian fling to another, teaching angry feminist literature to third-world immigrants, and marching in gay pride parades.

David moved to a small village in central Ecuador. He purchased a tiny building, in which he opened a rather seedy bar, and began drinking himself stupid on a daily basis. He started introducing himself as Oscar, and telling those people whom he deemed worthy of speaking to, that he was a retired inventor. He claimed to have made a fortune off, infomercial generated sales, of a magnetic handle for old pots and pans whose original handles had broken off. He further claimed to have lost that fortune to the poorly conceived invention of a new type of electronic vending machine that had a nasty tendency to malfunction and fire candy bars and soda cans out at dangerous velocities. He gave up writing altogether, and eventually drank himself to death.

Terra-Lanie

It was beautiful, how he was with her. They had been married for 63 years. The last 35 of those years MS had slowly, painfully whittled away at her until, finally, she was left paralyzed and bed-bound. He cashed in everything he had to cash in, and sold off everything he could sell off, except the house. He built that house for her. He even named it after her. The sign hanging over the driveway entrance read, “Terra-Lanie.”

In 63 years he had never doubted her, never doubted that he was meant to be with her. When her health got so bad that he couldn’t take care of her anymore, he refused to allow her to go into a nursing home. Everything he’d cashed in and sold off was for her. He used that money to hire nurses and to make her house suitable for her broken body. He bought her a hospital bed and pushed it up next to his bed. At night he held her hand while they slept. Every morning when he woke he kissed her cheeks. Every morning she smiled and whispered her love to him.

In 63 years she had never doubted his love, never doubted her own love for him, but in the last 35 years she had struggled more with guilt than with disease. He deserved better. He gave her so much and worked so hard, just for her, and she couldn’t give him anything. She couldn’t even reach her hand out to him anymore. In the beginning she had argued that he should place her in a nursing home once her health got very bad, but he wouldn’t hear it.

For the last 10 years his heart had been steadily deteriorating. He had to wear patches, take pills, eat a special diet, follow a special exercise program, and see a doctor twice a month. He’d had open-heart surgery, more than once. Every valve in his heart was artificial. Most of the time he had a dull ache deep in his chest, and he didn’t know if it was from his heart condition or from sorrow for his wife’s failed health.

She knew he was only hanging on for her sake. It was plain for any fool to see. She loved him for it and pitied him for it. She wasn’t really in much pain, most of the time. There were a lot of pills, but they did the job well enough. Most of her pain came from seeing him suffer. She heard the nurses talk. She knew that, from a medical stand-point, she was much healthier than he was.

He fought death and clung to life all for her. He wouldn’t die first and let her end her days in a nursing home. She deserved better. He occupied his time reading to her, she liked the heart-warming stories best, stories with a feel-good ending. He laid next to her and they watched the morning news talk shows. He refused to allow the nurses to feed her. That was his job, taking care of her in all the ways he still could. He rarely left her side. His joy, he said, was in her eyes. He only left their bedroom to cook for her, to do laundry, or water her plants.

In her younger days, she had kept a beautiful flower garden. She had planted each flower tenderly, talked to them, sprinkled them with water, and petted their velvety petals. Her flowers flourished and she beamed with pride. She had kept pictures of her garden for the days, she had known were coming, when she wouldn’t be able to tend to them anymore. Now he tended her garden, and brought her pictures. On truly spectacular days he video-taped the garden and the sunset for her. Then, laying side by side, they would watch it, her feeble hand cradled gently in his.

She watched as his health faded and the color passed slowly out of his cheeks. His smiles were always genuine and he was never anything but sweet while he was with her. But she could hear how gruff he was with the nurses, how angry he got with the doctors when they called. The thought of failing him made her heart ache. She loved him so much and all he wanted was for her to be able to live out her life in the home he built for her.

When she made her decision he could see it in her eyes. That morning when she whispered her love to him he heard the finality of her words. He sat, all morning, at her side and when the time came he cradled her in his arms, kissing her cheeks and whispering his love into her hair. It was peaceful, the way she went. There was no jerking or shuddering gasp, no final attempt to cling to life. She smiled up at him until the very end.

Everyone had known that her death had broken his heart so it came as no surprise when, three weeks later, one of the artificial valves in his heart gave out. According to his wishes, he was laid by her side, next to her flower garden.

Monsters

***Warnning***
This story contains information about pedophiles. It is concerned with spending a day in a therapuetic camp that juvinile sex offenders are sentenced to, and contains some descriptions, not detailed, of what these boys did to get sent there. If this will trigger you, please don't read this story!!!

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They were monsters, rapists, and pedophiles. They were vile, unspeakably vile and loathsome. They were only children, just boys, some as young as 11 years old. These boys certainly didn’t look like monsters. They looked young, and stiff with exaggerated bravado. The few who were sent here were lucky though, lucky not to be in prison. That camp was their last chance. Most of them had been convicted of felony sex offenses and had been given deferred sentences. If they could survive the program and the therapy in camp they could return to a life of freedom.

I was offered a job there, working face to face with those boys. Supervising their daily routines and listening to stories of the unthinkable acts they had committed: violations against brothers, sisters, cousins, and classmates. The job paid better than anything I was qualified to do, but I wasn’t sure I could face those boys, and hear their stories. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know how children so young could do such terrible things.

When he offered me the job, the program administrator had said, “Well Karen, if you think you can handle it come back tomorrow and work a 12-hour shift. That way you can see for yourself what the job entails and get a feel for whether or not you can handle it.”

I wasn’t certain, but I needed the money and, although it disturbed me, I was curious to know if I could handle it. “Okay, I’ll give it a shot.”

When I pulled up in front of Cabin D the next morning, the boys were still sleeping and shift change was getting underway. I met the staff members I would be working with, a heavyset woman named Julie, Miss Julie to the boys, and a middle aged man named Tom, Mr. Tom to the boys.

When shift change was done, Miss Julie said, “Tom and I will wake up the boys. You read their charts. When you’re done come join us for breakfast at the fire pit out front.”
Each boy had a chart outlining his background. There were six boys in Cabin D. It took me half an hour to get through those charts. Every single one of those boys had come from an abusive home, some had been beaten, some raped over and over. One boy had been kept in a dog kennel and rented out for whatever torture any sicko who could meet the price felt like dishing out. The hell these boys had lived through was clearly reflected in their convictions. Most of them had been convicted of raping a sister or brother, one or two for raping other relatives, but the one that stood out the most was a boy who had molested a six-year-old girl in a public library.

When I walked out to the fire pit all six boys stared at me, the most intensely appraising stares I’d ever experienced. Every boy was given a buzz cut when he entered the program, and the military donated used boots and fatigues, so that’s what each boy wore. I looked into their faces and tried to see the monsters inside of them. All I saw were boys; any of them could have been one the boys who lived in my neighborhood.

Mr. Tom glared around the pit. “This is Miss Karen. She’ll be here all day. You all know the drill.”

The boys took turns telling me their names. Because the boys were all minors there were a lot of rules about confidentiality, for that reason I will simply refer to them by number. When everyone was finished eating, #5 collected all of the bowls and washed them, along with the pot that had been used to cook the oatmeal, in a large utility sink attached to the side of the cabin. The other boys were given cleanup assignments around the fire pit area while Mr. Tom took #2 inside to make beds and sweep the floor.

During all of this, Miss Julie pointed out the features of the camp. There was a shower house and laundry room on one side of the cabin, which she explained the boys were never allowed to use, unsupervised. On the other side of the cabin was the “latrine,” which was a rickety wooden outhouse. A roll of toilet paper hung from a stick on the side of the fire pit, and Miss Julie told me that the boys were timed while in the latrine. Two minutes was the longest they were permitted, and they were not allowed to take the roll in with them. They had to pull some paper off before going in.

“While a boy is in the latrine,” Miss Julie said, “a staff member must be in sight of the latrine and no other boy is allowed to approach it until the boy inside comes back out. The boys are only allowed to be outside of a staff member’s sight while they are showering or using the latrine. They change clothes in the shower stalls or the latrine.”

“Why only two minutes, and why aren’t they allowed to take the roll in with them?” I couldn’t imagine having only two minutes to use the restroom. That would be enough to make me too nervous to go at all.

“If they’re allowed too much time in the latrine, they masturbate in there. If they take the roll in, they use it to masturbate. As it is, we frequently find used toilet paper being passed around among the boys. It’s a TSOB. They get off on it.”

An image of two boys sniffing each other’s butt’s, like dogs meeting for the first time, formed in my mind. I coughed to suppress a morbid giggle. “What’s a TSOB?”

“Typical Sex Offender Behavior.”

Miss Julie introduced me to the camp dog, “This is Sandy. She’s been with us for a couple of years now.” She squatted down and ruffled the dog’s fur.

I reached forward to scratch her ear and she snapped at my hand and growled. “Isn’t it dangerous to keep a dog with that kind of temperament around? Don’t you worry about the boys getting bitten?”

“She’s actually a very friendly dog. You reached for her from behind. Like I said, she’s been with us for a couple of years now. She doesn’t like it when anyone comes up behind her, she just snaps and growls at anyone who tries.”

After morning cleanup, the boys were separated into two groups for work detail. Mr. Tom took his to work on digging a new hole for the latrine. When one got too full the boys were required to shovel dirt over the old hole and move the outhouse to the new hole. Miss Julie and I took our group to chop down mesquite bushes to clear an area for a ropes course, and each of our boys was issued an axe. I glanced at Miss Julie, acutely aware that she and I were outnumbered by axe-wielding boys, some as old as 17. I couldn’t imagine being alone with these boys, let alone arming them.

Before we set off, Miss Julie had the boys line up and “check intervals.” They had to be at least an arm length away from every other boy at all times. When they were carrying tools their interval extended to the tip of whatever tool they were carrying. We hiked about a mile and a half into the woods before we reached the site of the future ropes course, and the boys set to work hacking down mesquite bushes and digging up the roots. Once a bush was felled, it was dragged to a large pile of other bushes to be burned.

After about two hours of work, #4 and #6 began to argue. Evidently #4 had dragged a bush too close to #6 and jabbed him with a mesquite thorn. Miss Julie shouldered between the two boys and broke up the screaming. She inspected the offending jab, ruled that it wasn’t life threatening and told the two to move further apart and get back to work. As she was turning away, #6 charged #4, brandishing his axe high above his head. One of the other boys yelled a warning, before I could, and Miss Julie did the most amazing thing I’d ever seen anyone do. She stepped directly in front of the charging boy, then neatly side stepped him at the last second and swept his feet out from under him. As he went down, she grabbed the pickaxe and slung it to one side. When the boy hit the ground she immediately yanked both his hands behind his back and placed one knee just below where she was holding his wrists.

The boy kicked and screamed, “Get off me you fat fucking bitch. I’m going to kill that sister-fucker.”

Miss Julie said something firm, but too quiet for me to hear, and the boy stopped kicking, but continued to scream profanities and threats. I realized that none of the other boys were paying much attention to the action. They just continued to work. Even #4 returned to chopping away at a bush. I moved closer to Miss Julie so I could hear what she was saying to the boy she had pinned down.

“I’m not going to let you up as long as you’re screaming. When you stop screaming we can talk about letting you up. Do you understand me?” Her voice was rock steady and very calm. I didn’t think there was any way I could stay that calm while holding down a kicking screaming teenager.

When he calmed down some, Miss Julie said, “Okay, now I want you to take three deep breaths, in very slowly and out very slowly.” Her voice was even quieter now.

“Fuck you, bitch.”

“Alright, just let me know when you’re ready to be compliant and I can let you up.”

“Get off me. I’m fine. You weigh too much. I can’t breath. You ought to lay off the burgers you fat whore.” He kicked again and Miss Julie sat down on his back with her knees on either side of him. She pushed his wrists up higher on his back and held them with one hand. Then she reached back and, grabbing his ankles, crossed them and pulled them up so he couldn’t kick anymore. He looked hogtied. I was impressed and shocked all at once. It looked really painful for the boy. She was pushing his wrists up so high on his back that I was afraid she might break one of his arms.

The boy howled, “Ow. Fuck, you’re hurting me. You can’t do this. Get the fuck off me.”
“Like I said, as soon as you calm down and start following directives I’ll let you up. Just take three deep breaths.”

“How am I supposed to do that with your fat ass on me? I told you I can’t breath.”

“You’re breathing well enough to shout so I’m sure you’ll to find a way to take three deep breathes if you really want my fat ass off your back.” Miss Julie winked at me as she said that. I bit my tongue and held my breath to keep from laughing. I looked a little closer at exactly how Miss Julie was holding the boy and I realized that he wasn’t in any danger of being seriously hurt.

The boy finally settled down and she him let up, but had him sit next to her for almost half an hour before allowing him to return to work duty. I tried to picture myself restraining one of those boys and imagined how it would feel to know that I was capable of being that much in control.

At two o’clock we hiked back to camp for lunch. Mr. Tom and his group of boys had cooked hot dogs and pinto beans. While the boys sat around the fire pit eating, Miss Julie filled out an incident report, detailing the restraint of #6. When she was done she had me read it over. She used a lot of therapeutic language, just as she had during the restraint, words like non-compliant, assaultive, directive, and so on. The report was very detailed and explicit. It looked to me like the truth was somewhat exaggerated and stilted.

“We have to write one of these up for every restraint and every instance of acting-out behavior. The law requires that a boy only be restrained if he is a threat to himself or others, so our language has to make that really clear. These go in their files and copies are sent to the their PO’s Too many of these and their deferment gets revoked and they go to juvenile prison.”

“Is that why the other boys were so calm and ‘compliant’ during the restraint? Fear of prison?”

“Mostly. We don’t actually have too many restraints here. Overt aggression and violence aren’t TSOB’s. Most sex offenders are very manipulative and passive aggressive. Generally the boys only get that out of hand on birthdays, holidays, and after family visits. Sometimes a boy will test things out right after he gets here, tries to prove he can’t be restrained, especially with the female staff. I suspect today was just about showing off for you.”

When lunch was done, the boys got some free time. When a boy broke a program rule he was given “logs.” That meant that he had to split, however many logs he was assigned. Free time was when boys who had logs were able to work those off. The rest of the boys were free to write letters, or work on therapy assignments. #6 had been assigned 12 logs for attempting to assault #4, and he still had a few of logs to work off when free time was over.

After free time, Mr. Tom and I took the boys to the laundry room/showers in groups of two. #1 and #2 each started a load of laundry, then trooped into shower stalls and closed the curtains.

Mr. Tom shouted, “60 seconds.” He explained, “We give the boys ‘Navy Showers.’ They get 60 seconds to strip down, then 30 seconds of running water, then another 60 seconds to soap up, then 45 seconds to rinse, and another 60 seconds to get dressed. If they aren’t out on time they get a log for every 30 seconds it takes them to get out.” The whole thing seemed cruel. After the sweaty work those boys did during the day, a five-minute shower didn’t seem adequate.

“Turn the water back on. I still got soap in my hair Mr. Tom.” It sounded like it came from #2.

“You’ll just have to finish rinsing it out in the dish sink then won’t you?”

I was shocked. “Shouldn’t these boys at least get a decent shower?”

Mr. Tom sighed. “If they get too long in the shower they masturbate. Sometimes they even shit in there and the next boy in plays with it and masturbates. These aren’t your average teenagers. They can have all the long showers they want when they graduate and go home, but I can guarantee you that a prison shower would be a lot less fun than a shower here.”

Once all the boys had showered, #1 and #2 were brought back to move their clothes into the dryers. Mr. Tom explained to me that the next day another set of boys would wash their laundry. That way every boy got his laundry washed once every three days.

During showers, Miss Julie led an informal therapy group. I wasn’t welcome at therapy groups, until it was decided whether or not I would be working there. By the time all of that was done, dinner was ready and we all sat around the fire pit eating fish sticks, pinto beans, and dinner rolls. Then dishes were washed and the fire pit was swept and trash was emptied and removed to a burn-pit.

“Okay, it’s time for official introductions.” Miss Julie looked solemn. “This is the part that usually scares folks off. If you can get through this without having nightmares for the next two weeks you can handle this job. Brace yourself; most of the boys take great delight in trying to shock new staff. They like telling about what they’ve done. It’s a TSOB to relive their offenses by describing them elaborately. They’re going to take turns telling you their names, ages, where they’re from, and how many offenses they’ve committed and what each one was. It’s part of their therapy to self-disclose any offenses they committed but didn’t get caught for, so a lot of what you’re going to hear isn’t in the files you read this morning.” Then she raised her voice loud enough for the whole camp to hear and shouted, “Fire pit, time for introductions.”

The boys scurried to the fire pit. Most of them grinned at me. #1 stood and gave me all of his information. He listed several offenses, all concerning his younger sister. #2 listed one offense, fondling a five-year-old boy he had been babysitting. #3 said he had raped his younger brother, fondled a little girl who lived next door to him, and exposed himself to several children on a school bus. He looked me straight in the eyes and sounded cocky, like he was proud of what he’d done. #4 listed several offenses, all concerning his brother, who had been a toddler at the time. He stared at his feet the entire time and his voice shook slightly. #5 said he had forced his sister to perform oral sex on him.

By the time it was #5 sat down, I was having a such hard time breathing that I couldn’t be sure if the horror was showing on my face or not. Early on I had shoved my hands into my pockets and balled them tightly into fists. When #6 stood up he stared me straight in the eyes and said, “I’m 13 years old, and I’m from Dallas, Texas. I have committed 11 offenses. I raped my four-year-old sister three times, I fondled my mom once while she was sleeping, I forced the six-year-old boy who lived next door to me to perform oral sex on me, I forced a six-year-old girl at the library to perform oral sex on me, I raped a twelve-year-old girl at school, I fondled a three-year-old boy I was babysitting three times.”

I clenched my teeth and decided there was no way I could do this job. Then he said, “And I raped a cat.”

I sucked air in through my nose and bit my tongue so hard that I tasted blood.

Mr. Tom led the boys inside and started getting them into their bunks for the night. Miss Julie sat next to me and put her hand on my shoulder, which was shaking visibly by now.

“It’s okay Karen. Not many people can take this job. Like I said, introductions are what scares most people off. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

I breathed out hard and sucked air back into my lungs in great gulps. Tears sprung up at the corners of my eyes and my whole body was shaking.

“Hey, it’s going to be okay. You’ll go home, and after a few days the shock will wear off and you’ll feel normal again.”

A cartoon image of a boy attempting to violate a cat formed in my mind. The cat’s fur stood straight out on end, and its tail looked like a bottlebrush. Its feet were a blur of claws, and its teeth were three times the size they should have been. The cartoon boy was suddenly scratched and bitten from head to foot and shot straight up in the air to grab a hanging light fixture and hold on for dear life while the cat continued to claw at his ass. I rocked in my seat, gasped, and was finally able to sputter, “I think someone should tell that child that raping a cat isn’t what’s meant by ‘getting a little pussy.’”

Miss Julie stared at me silently for a moment. Then she cracked up too. Several minutes later we were both holding our sides, and fighting to regain our composure.

After 12 hours with them, those boys weren’t any less intimidating. I still wasn’t convinced that I could really handle the job, but I really needed the money, and I wanted to prove to myself that I was tough enough to do it.

The next day I started training. I was required to be CPR and lifeguard certified. I had to take restraint training, and a milieu therapy class. Restraint training was intimidating. The instructor was a man about twice my size, and I had to practice on him. The officially government approved restraint technique was PMAB, Prevention and Management of Aggressive Behavior. The milieu therapy was the interesting stuff. I learned a lot of therapeutic language and a lot about TSOB’s. After a month of training I started working with the boys.

Solitary Confinement

***WARNNING***
This story is dark and describes vividly (I hope) a very black depression in an extremely personal way. If this will trigger you, DO NOT READ THIS one!!!!!



Solitary Confinement





I can’t do it. It’s too much. Every contact, every interaction is just one more burden heaped on top of an enormous load that presses down on me, a weight I stagger under. No matter what I do, no matter how hard I try, eventually I crumple. It’s so easy for other people, those outside of me, to mouth platitudes, “stop being lazy, quit being a baby, suck it up, act your age, toughen up, just push on through, take baby steps, take it one day at a time.” If only it were that simple.

No amount of explaining makes it clear to all those people who live outside my skull. In here, inside, where I’m alone and no one can reach, it all makes sense. Life, everything about it’s too hard. Everything is. I can’t even commit suicide, even that is too hard.

The pain. I can’t describe it clearly. I could say that it builds up from somewhere down in the deepest darkest places of my soul until the pressure is too much and it explodes upwards, out into my body. A deep dull ache that rolls up out of the pit of my stomach and washes over my chest in hot pulsing waves, making me dizzy, until I sob myself sick and wake up hours later wrapped tightly around my own stomach on the cold dark floor of the bathroom. I could say that, but it would only be words, and words can’t ever truly express the reality of it.

The isolation. I’m alone in here. It doesn’t matter how many people surround me, I can never be anything but alone. No one sees into my prison. No one sees into my soul. Standing in a crowd, I look around and see countless faces, one blurring into the next. I hear a cacophony of voices, coughs, snuffles, grunts, gurgling stomachs, stamping feet. I am reminded of a herd of cattle; an acrid reek of manure fills my nostrils and I taste dust in the back of my throat. I scream out in my mind, shrieking to be free of the stifling desolation of the crowd.

I don’t pray. What is there to pray to? Instead I meditate, I picture my connection to everything. I meditate on the connection of all things to all other things by an invisible thread of sameness. My silent chant: All things are one, all things connected, all things made up of the same building blocks. I picture distant galaxies, suns, planets, and moons, all made up, at their very core, of the exact same building blocks that I am made of. I feel the breath pulled deeply into my lungs. It becomes a part of me, and as I exhale it takes a part of me with it out into the world for others to inhale and incorporate into their own being. I envision the food and water that I ingest. I think of where it comes from and how it becomes a part of me. I imagine myself returned to the earth, buried and decomposing, becoming one with it. I think of how this planet will one day return to the Star Dust from which it was formed. Alone inside my own soul, I feel my connection to the rest of the universe, for just a fleeting second and then it’s gone. For that brief moment I’m not alone, the entirety of the universe exists within and around me.

My husband. I’ve tried to explain it to him so many times. He nods, and smiles, and tells me that I’m not alone. He meditates with me and tells me, “all things are connected and one.” He says he understands and he says he “gets it.” He asks me why I’m so sad, how anyone who is so “spiritually aware” can be so sad. He calls me the most spiritual person he has ever known and says that’s the reason he loves me so much. But it doesn’t bother him that he’s locked outside of me, forever unable to reach the core of me, the essence of my being. He doesn’t even know that he is. He is closed to me, a giant iron door. All my efforts to reach him amount to little more than the bashing of my fists against that door. I can’t imagine a fate worse than being forever locked away from the ones that I love, forever unable to reach them.

If only I could imagine that I had never felt that connection. If I could bury it down in the depths of my subconscious mind, that hidden place where most people store such things, then I could face life. I could stand in a crowd and speak aloud. I could be seen and heard. Instead I know that I am not meant to be alone inside my head. I know we are, all of us, meant to be connected to one another and no one was meant to be locked inside their head. Skulls, like prison walls, are molded to precisely squeeze the very essence out of ones being, to compress it and hold it pinioned forever in place. No one was ever meant to have their soul locked inside their chest, an angry bird forever beating its wings, in futility, against bars of flesh and bone. But how do I explain that to anyone? I try, but it’s hopeless. No one hears, no one understands.

Words. Empty, hollow, physical expressions invented to approximate the contact our souls yearn for. How pitiful it is, speaking of the things we feel, a pale wisp of an excuse for communication. I reach out with words and try to touch those around me, to move them, to reach their souls. How sorry an attempt it seems. To wrap my soul around my loved ones and embrace them with it, to mingle our hearts and minds, to truly know one another; that would be truly knowing someone. But it never happens. I know it can be done, I even know how to reach out, how to open myself, but no one else does. They don’t even try.

I don’t know how to carry this burden. I don’t know how to shoulder the weight of this knowledge. Knowing that I am connected to a universe of closed souls, knowing that I am one with a million hearts and minds that I can never reach and never communicate with, this must be what hell is. This is what will kill me, the loneliness.

Every night my husband curls his body up against me and wraps me tightly in his arms. He whispers words of love in my ear, insubstantial half-truths. How can he love me if he doesn’t know who I am? How can he know who I am by only seeing my actions and hearing my words? He has never mixed his soul with mine, never opened his mind to me nor entered mine. He has never fingered through the memories and emotions locked up inside my skull. How can you love someone fully, wholly if you have never done these things? Every night I lay in his arms baring my soul, flinging wide the doors of my mind, inviting him into me. He comes closest to entering me truly when he enters me physically. I can feel it when we make love, the ghostly feather caress of his soul brushing against mine. It never lasts more than an instant. That instant is a tantalizing glimpse. Those fleeting instants of contact are a reminder of how trivial physical contact is.

I’ve never known my mother, or my father. They are there, at the other end of a phone line, or across the table at a Christmas dinner. They smile and speak. They hug and utter pale words of love and concern. They aren’t real to me. They’re two-dimensional, nothing more than paper dolls. Inside my skull and deep within my soul they are insubstantial. I can remember how it was before I knew I was locked inside a prison of meat and bone. They were warm and real. Their words soothed and comforted me. I loved them, or thought I did, before I knew that real love doesn’t exist in a world where no one can ever know another living soul. Now I understand just how far I am from knowing anyone, even the woman of whom I was once a physical part. I was once an extension of her body, a tiny piece of her that she imbued with an ounce of her soul to create. That knowledge is what gives birth to the anguish that fills the depths of my soul and crumples me up on the cold dark bathroom floor, late in the night.

I no longer have “friends.” What’s the point if I can’t know them? I used to have friends, people I had known for years. They were people whose lives I had shared, whose children I had diapered and helped to potty train. Some of them I had known since childhood, some I had shared the joys of marriage and childbirth as well as the anguish of divorce and the loss of death. Now those relationships seem empty, that sharing seems false, shallow. How can I “share” joy or sorrow with someone without reaching into their soul and feeling their joys and sorrows as they feel them? Their physical absence in my life causes me far less pain than their presence did after I realized they were locked away from me.

I won’t see my family again. Seeing them hurts too much. Watching them embrace each other, feeling their touch on my skin as they embrace me, it’s more than my soul can bear. The shadow of love that is all I can ever feel for them now crushes me. They won’t understand. It will hurt them and they will tell me again that they love me and try to offer me the solace of “understanding” and tell me that I am only depressed. My mother will tell me the name of a good therapist and suggest that I try anti-depressants. She’ll probably tell me how much therapy and medicines have helped her. My father will be analytical. He will tell me stories of his younger days, soul-searching and metaphysical experiences. Stories of how acceptance of life as it is leads to inner peace. But these things haven’t opened their minds or their souls to another single living creature. They remain locked forever inside their own skulls and blissfully unaware of their imprisonment.

I am grateful for only one thing, I never had children. To not be able to reach into the mind and soul of a being who I gifted with an ounce of my own soul, who I grew within my own body, who I created out of the very essence of my being, that knowledge would kill me. It would suck the last tendrils of life from my soul and unlock the walls of my skull, flinging my mind out into the cosmos. Maybe that would not be so bad, maybe not having children to kill me isn’t something to be grateful for at all.

Perhaps this knowledge is what has led men to become monks, take vows of silence, and cloister themselves away. Perhaps this is the knowledge that drives women into convents. Being physically alone makes being truly alone a little more bearable. The presence of souls that I cannot touch is like slipping beneath the surface of a calm pool and drowning, the crystal clear water closing over me, my lips quivering, reaching for the cool fresh air that is just out of reach.

I will leave my husband. He won’t understand. He’ll be crushed and confused. Maybe he’ll beg me to stay, or maybe he’ll scream and curse. I will tell him that the faint whisper of love without the substance of contact is killing me slowly. He’ll think I’m saying it to be hurtful, that I’m accusing him of something heinous. He won’t “get it.”

Being alone in this house, surrounded by the city is too painful. I am alone amongst a sea of people: strangers wearing familiar faces and bodies. I am alienated by the closeness of people who think they know me, souls that I have never known and will never know. The nearness of them presses against me, squeezes and compresses me. I feel my skull shrinking, the walls of my cell closing in, strangling the life from me, blotting out what pale color still exists for me.

I left the city. I sold the house. The mountains offer solace, solitude. I bought a house up high, far from people and free from the isolation of their presence. I spend my time meditating. I will achieve a connection, something real, substantial, and more than merely fleeting. I will lose myself within the oneness of the universe, become one with everything that ever was, is, or will be. I will escape my skull and truly know those who I have loved without knowing, and they will never know it. Their lives will go on, without me. They will think I’ve lost my mind, perhaps they will think I have killed myself. Maybe they will even come looking for me.

It’s good here, peaceful. There are no unreachable hearts or minds here to isolate and dishearten me. I will stay, alone in my mountain home. I will spend my days and nights exploring my connection to the universe. I will expand my mind and soul. I will sail along the dips and curves of my soul. I will learn to embrace my own being and perhaps in doing that I will learn to merge myself with the oneness of all existence.

It’s beautiful, the universe. I can feel it best at night. When the world around me sleeps, when the souls of the world loose themselves from their bodies and wander freely in dreams I can feel them, brush up against them and, briefly, know them. The stars pulse in my heart, the wind floats in my soul, the oceans crash and flow in my mind. Cosmic winds tug at me and I soar through them. I have never truly known any living person outside of myself. I can know the universe and I will one day be free of this flesh and bone prison. Maybe that’s enough. I think heaven must exist, I think it’s a spiritual place where all the souls of those who were and all those who will be mingle and are one. I can’t know those souls yet, but one day I will, and for now that’s enough for me.

Work in progress **Black Phoenix**

This is a work in progress, I think I know where it's going but I'm not positive yet. How do you like what I have so far? What do you dislike?

§§§§

I am the Black Phoenix. On wings of black flame I ascend, transcend. I devour all obstacles, transforming anguish into ecstasy. Fiery black talons, like midnight razors, grasp the prey that is my goal. I am eternal flux, forever growing, changing. I am birth and death in one breath. I exist inextricably entwined at once in pleasure and pain.

This is my spiritual mantra. When change finds me again I hold it to my breast and cradle it. I imagine flaming black wings sprouting from my back, I feel myself flex them and I picture myself transformed into a great flaming raven, Black Phoenix. This is the image, the mantra that carries me through each new change that life throws at me.

My name is Anastasia, it means “She who shall rise again.” My mother told me she gave me this name because a phoenix came to her in a vision while I was being born. She taught me to meditate and pray for spiritual guidance in times of trial. When I was fourteen, my father died. That night Raven came to me in a vision. He told me that my life would be in a constant state of flux. He then burst into black flames and gave me my Spirit Name. I am Black Phoenix.

My wife was killed. We were married for seven years, beautiful years. Joan was a doctor, and she believed it was her calling to bring medicine and care to those who most needed it. So we traveled. For seven years we moved from one third-world village to another. Then she was gone. I spent a lot of time praying to Raven after she was killed.

Joan and I came back to the states to visit my family. We were hit by a drunk driver before we ever made it to my mother’s house. I had a nasty gash in my scalp, twelve stitches, a lot of bruising, and one broken rib. Joan died on the site. It took rescue workers three hours to cut her out of the car. She screamed for almost half that time and she died before they were done. The woman who hit us broke her right arm and got scraped up a bit. She was so drunk she couldn’t stand.

Joan’s killer was 24 years-old, her name was Cynthia Richards. It took them six months to bring Cynthia Richards to trial. I prayed to Raven every day for six months. I prayed for vengeance. When they brought her into the court she looked small, her eyes were big. She looked like she might be a kindergarten teacher, or a librarian. She looked sweet; I hated her for her that almost as much as I hated her for ripping my life apart.

When she took the stand she cried. She placed her right hand on the Bible and she began to cry. When the prosecutor asked her if she felt remorse for what she had done she didn’t make any excuses, she said she was “blind drunk” that night. Cynthia Richards looked at the jury members and told them, “I have done a terrible thing, a thing that I can never repay or make right. I can’t imagine a punishment harsh enough to serve justice for what I have done.” The jury was out for less than an hour. They found her guilty of “involuntary manslaughter.” She was sentenced to serve three years in a minimum-security prison. She was released in less than eighteen months.

The day Cynthia Richards was released from prison I prayed to Raven. I felt great flaming black wings rise up from my back. I prayed for guidance. I felt myself engulfed in black flames, mighty talons extending from my toenails, a razor sharp ebony beak replacing my lips. In my mind I soared into a dark sky, trailing lightening in my wake. I begged Raven to come to me, to release me from my rage. When I opened my eyes I sat alone, no guidance was given, no solace found.

The next morning I drove slowly past Cynthia Richards’ home. I saw her hugging a man who looked old enough to be her father. She was smiling, laughing. She looked like she was his little girl, innocent, sweet. Her curly hair and cotton dress, her sweet smile and sparkling eyes brought a bitter acrid taste into my mouth, a sickly sweet smell of rotten meat to my nostrils.

For days all I could do was sit in my living room and pray. The harder I tried to relax my mind and allow Raven’s guidance to reach me the more I saw Joan’s face, her long black hair spilled over her shoulder, blood smeared across her beautiful cheeks, anguish in her eyes. I smelled smoke. I saw pebbles of glass from the shattered windshield and windows. I heard her screams. I saw the light go out of her eyes. Each failed attempt to achieve peace and find guidance brought a new layer of rage to the surface. Each time I closed my eyes and envisioned myself as The Black Phoenix my wings were larger, my talons sharper, the black flames engulfing me darker.

Two weeks after Cynthia Richards returned to her happy life, my phone rang. The voice on the line said, “Is this Anastasia Macey?”

“Yes, who is this?”

“My name is Cynthia Richards.” Her voice was kind, quiet. I don’t know if she said anything else. The room began to shimmer and waiver as if heat were rising in great dark waves from the floor.

A roaring filled my ears and after a moment I realized it was my own voice. I don’t know if I was even speaking words. When the roaring stopped, my throat was burning and raw and there was a sharp ache in the knuckles of the hand that was holding the receiver. When I looked they were bleeding and still clutching the phone. I was slamming it into its cradle over and over.

It's A Boy

“It’s a boy.” Her voice was much too cheery for so early in the morning.

I rubbed my eyes and switched the phone to my other ear. “I’m sorry Mother, it’s five A.M. and I’m just not awake yet. You’ll have to repeat that.”

“Honestly Jewel, anyone would think you haven’t been paying attention. You’re brother’s new baby was born this morning. It’s a boy. His name is Sampson, but I think they’re going to call him Sammy. Isn’t that just the sweetest name? Aren’t you excited? I just can’t wait to meet him. Jewel? Jewel, are you even listening to me? Aren’t you excited?”

I sighed. Of course I wasn’t excited. “I’m sorry Mother, of course I’m excited. It’s just so early and I haven’t had any coffee yet this morning.” I always seem to apologize whenever I talk to her. “I’ll tell you what, why don’t you call me back in a few hours? That’ll give you time to get all the details and me time to get awake.” I harbored a secret hope that she would get so carried away that she wouldn’t call back at all.

As soon as she hung up I climbed into the shower and gave in to a nasty crying jag. That was normal. I cried after most of her calls. She was just so damned selfish. She never could see how obvious it was that she loved Willoughby best and how much it hurt me every time she rubbed my nose in it. Will never much cared. As long as he was her Golden Boy he was happy. He did everything right, even when he fucked up she found a way to turn it into something positive. I, on the other hand, couldn’t do anything right. My accomplishments always paled by comparison, and she never missed an opportunity to point out how much more accomplished Will was.

By the time I was out of the shower, finishing up my first cup of coffee, and just getting my composure back the phone was ringing again. She always had perfect timing.

“Go check your E-mail. Hurry honey, I sent you a picture. He’s just an angel. He’s absolutely perfect.”

That baby couldn’t have been more than three hours old, and she lived almost five hours from Will, and she was already sending out pictures? “I’m sorry Mother, my computer isn’t booted up yet and I was just getting Thomas’s breakfast started. I’ll check it as soon as I get him off to school.”

“Oh, of course dear. You’re not feeding him cereal I hope; you know how important a good breakfast is.” She took every chance she got to remind me that she disapproved of every parenting choice I ever made. “Well anyway, call me when you’ve had a chance to look at that beautiful baby.”

“Are you okay Mom?”

“Yes honey. I’m just having a rough morning. Do you want syrup or honey on these?”

“Honey. Who was on the phone?”

“Your Gran. Will’s new baby was born this morning. She wanted me to check my E-mail. Evidently she’s already sent out pictures.”

“Oh. Is it a boy or a girl?” He drizzled honey strategically. “Can I see the picture?”

“I suppose. After you eat your breakfast.”

The baby’s head looked sort of squished, he didn’t have much of a chin and his face was mottled angry red and pasty white. His eyes were squinched shut and his pale lips were pursed. The topic line read “5 pounds 3 ounces.”

Thomas grinned. “He’s cute.”

“Okay, you’ve seen the picture. You’d better get your shoes on, the bus will be here soon.”

That evening Thomas asked, “What did they name the baby?”

“Sampson, but Gran says they’re going to call him Sammy. She sent some more pictures and promises to send video clips just as soon as she can get up there for a visit, some time next week probably.”

“Sampson? Really? Why did aunt Jenny let him give the baby such an ugly name? I mean it was bad enough that he named the first one Jebediah, but at least that’s a family name.”

“When your uncle Will and I were kids Gran told us that she wanted to start a family tradition of giving all the kids what she called interesting names. I think Will just wants to make her happy.”

He scratched out something on his math homework and squinted at his book for a minute. “I don’t think that’s fair.”

“What don’t you think is fair?”

“Giving kids weird names. Dealing with the stupid crap that other kids do is hard enough, why would anybody want to make life any harder for their kids?” With that he slapped his book and glared at the paper he had been working on.

When I checked my E-mail that night I had three more pictures of Sammy and a sound clip of him crying. The E-mail read, “Isn’t that just the most adorable little cry you ever heard?”

The next day, at work, I told my friend Rebecca about the baby, and the early morning phone call, and all the E-mails. I’ve known Rebecca for twenty years now. Fifteen years ago we made a pact to be allies in the Maternal Wars and to do anything and everything necessary to prevent each other from turning into our mothers. It was our agreement to be Godmothers to each other’s children and, if necessary, to defend each other’s children from ourselves. She knew all of my Maternal War stories and I knew all of hers.

“Okay, don’t work yourself into a lather. You knew this one wouldn’t be any better than the last. You remember what she did last time?” Rebecca handed me a tissue and miniature candy bar.

I crumpled the tissue and glared at her feet, “Yeah. She threw Jenny’s baby shower on my birthday.”

“On your thirtieth birthday. And, she spent the whole day telling everyone how excited she was that she was going to have a grandbaby.”

“Yes, but in all fairness I guess I’ll be pretty excited when Thomas gets married and starts having babies.” I stuffed the candy bar into my mouth and smeared the rumpled tissue with blobs of melted chocolate from my fingers.

“Come on. You know better than that. She already had a grandbaby by then, Thomas.”

I folded the foil wrapper from the candy bar into a little triangle. “I don’t think it would bother me so much anymore if she’d just treat Thomas a little better.”

Mom hadn’t been to visit Thomas at all in the three years since Jebediah had been born, but she had been to visit Jebediah five times. Even that wouldn’t have seemed so bad if it hadn’t been for the fact that we lived two hours closer to her than Will did, and she had drive right by us to get to Will’s. She usually called from her cell phone to say that she was driving through town and thinking about us.

Rebecca reminded me of all those on-the-run phone calls. “Did she ever even consider turning one of those trips of hers into a family get together? Did she ever offer to take Thomas with her so he could spend a little time with her?”

“What, and spoil her baby time?”

“That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Now quit moping around.” She handed me another miniature chocolate bar.

“You’re right. I guess I could actually have the dreaded conversation with her.”

“Be Serious Jewels. You know that won’t do you any good. It’ll just piss her off and you’ll still end up crying in the bathroom.”

I chewed on my bottom lip and gently kicked the base of her chair. “Well something has to change. I’m miserable. Maybe if I piss her off enough she’ll just quit calling.”

“I’ll tell you what, why don’t I take you out for a drink tonight? Thomas can fix himself a sandwich for dinner and we’ll have a girl’s night out. How’s that sound? Flirt with some greasy bar flies, shoot pool, drink ourselves stupid, and toast our mothers funerals. How about it?”

“As much fun as a hangover sounds, and I’m sure it would just be bliss, I think I’ll stay home tonight. I want to spend some time with Thomas.”

Before I got to plan out my evening my cell phone rang.

“Hi Honey. Listen I’m on my way to visit Will and meet my new grandbaby and I was thinking I should stop along the way and pick up a gift for him. Do you know where I can find something cute between there and Will’s? The place I used to stop closed down.”

“You’re coming right through town and you aren’t planning on stopping to spend any time with Thomas but you think I’m the one you should call for toy store advise? What’s wrong with you?” My ears were ringing.

“Do you have your period Jewel? You should talk to a doctor if your PMS symptoms are getting this bad, it’s not healthy to let your hormone levels get too out of whack you know.”

“Mother. This isn’t about my hormones. This is about you totally ignoring Thomas and treating him like he’s a second rate grandson the same way you treat me like I’m a second rate daughter. I might not be Will but I am your daughter and Thomas is a good kid. He deserves to be treated well, why can’t you do that?” I felt like someone had flipped my stomach upside down.

Mom sniffed, “I don’t have any idea what you’re talking about. I’m going to stop while I’m in town and buy you some dinner. You can tell me what’s really bothering you over dinner. How are you dressed, do you need time to go home and clean up before going out? I know how you like to dress casual but I’d like to go someplace decent.”

“I’m busy tonight. Maybe you should actually plan out a visit with us and give me some advance notice.”

“Nonsense. You can always make a little time for your mother. What on earth could you possibly be doing that’s so important? I’m coming by your place. Expect me around seven. I was planning on going to a hotel tonight and visiting Will and the baby tomorrow, but maybe I should just stay with you tonight. Yes, I think that would be best. You sound upset and you could probably use some momma therapy. Besides, by the time you get done explaining to me why your doctor isn’t treating your PMS it’ll be too late for me to get back on the road. I’ll see you this evening dear.” She hung up without giving me a chance to protest.

“Look at this adorable giraffe.” She wasn‘t even in the door yet. “Won’t Sammy just love him? Oh, and you have to see the blankie I got for him. I found the sweetest little store, just wait till you see everything I got.”

“You said you were going to be here at seven. It’s almost nine. I cooked dinner for us but it’ll have to be reheated.”

“Come look at these.” She brandished a bag of baby accessories. “I’ll take you and Thomas out for dinner afterwards.”

“Thomas already ate Mother. It’s a school night. I can just reheat dinner for us.”

As usual the mention of food caused Thomas to appear. “Hi Gran.”

“Hello darling. Be careful; don’t hug so tight. Your mother says she’s going to reheat dinner, don’t you think we ought to go for dinner instead?”

Thomas grinned. “I ate already. But I could eat again.”

“I’m sorry mother but it’s too late for Thomas to be going out tonight. I don’t mind reheating dinner but if you’d rather go out that’s fine too. I’ll still be here when you get back.”

Mother shrugged. “Well if you’re going to be rigid about it I can order us some pizza. Where’s the best place to order from?”

While we waited for pizza Mother showed us three bags worth of baby toys, clothes, bedding, and odds and ends. This process involved a lot of “Isn’t this the cutest –whatever-it-was- you’ve ever seen?” When she ran out of cutest things to show us she insisted on showing us the website Will made for the sole purpose of documenting little Sammy’s life. There we found pictures of everything from the actual birth process, which made Thomas shout and cover his eyes, to pictures of little Sammy’s first poopie diaper. Also available were short video clips of dear little Sammy wailing at top volume, Jenny breast feeding, which also made Thomas shout and cover his eyes, and Will kissing little Sammy’s toes. Mother oohed and ahhed over every picture and video like she’d never seen anything so wonderful in her life.

While we were eating Mom’s phone rang and she stepped out of the room. Thomas pulled a pepperoni off a slice of pizza, stuffed it into his mouth, and said, “Gran sure is excited. Did she get like this when I was born?”

Not even close. “Grandmothers are supposed to get excited about grandbabies. It’s part of the job.” She sent me a packet of adoption agency pamphlets.

“Jewel.” Mother called from the other room. “Could you come in here please?”

Mother was sitting on the sofa. Her cell phone was on the floor by her feet. “What’s wrong?”

“I have to go. That was Will, Sammy’s in the hospital. The doctors don’t know what’s wrong yet. He just stopped breathing. Will needs me.”

“I’ll drive you. Let me tell Thomas to get some shoes on and we’ll go.”

“That’s okay dear. I can drive myself.”

“Seriously Mom, let me drive you.”

“I know you want to be there Jewel but think about what’s best for Will and the baby. They aren’t going to need you and Thomas under foot. I’ll call you and keep you up to speed.”

I got the call the next morning. “The baby didn’t make it. Jenny’s a mess, but you know our Will, he’s holding things together.”

Oh my God. “What can I do Mom? I can be there by this afternoon. I can take Jebediah or I can come there and help take care of him. Whatever Will and Jenny need.”

“No, they don’t need a bunch of people over here. I’ll take care of things. I’ll call you and let you know when the services will be.”

After I got off the phone with Mom I sat Thomas down and explained to him that the baby had died. He was devastated.

“What? How? He was only two days old. I didn’t even get to meet him.” His voice trembled.

I wrapped my arms around him. “I know Honey. I didn’t either, but we can say goodbye to him at the funeral, Gran’s going to call later to let me know when it will be.”

“I wanted to give him my old teddy bear.” He picked at a loose thread in the arm of the sofa.

“You still can. We can take it to the funeral with some flowers.”

“I’d like that.”

The funeral was held three days later. It was a quiet affair. Very few people were invited, only close family members. Thomas’s teddy bear wasn’t the only stuffed animal but it was the only one that wasn’t new. Several people hugged Thomas and Jenny thanked him for the bear.

At the reception Mom hugged me. “He’s a very sweet boy, that son of yours. I’m taking his old bear home with me. Everyone was very touched that he brought it.”

“I haven’t really invited you to spend any time with us lately have I?”

“No dear, you haven’t. But I haven’t really volunteered either, have I?”

“I’d really like it if you could come and spend some time with us. Thomas could use some Gran therapy.”

“That sounds wonderful. I think I could use some Thomas therapy.”

Monologue Mania

I'm really fond of this story, right up to the ending. I hate the ending, but I can't seem to pull it together and come up with anything better. Suggestions on this story and any part of this story are welcome, but I'm especially interested in thoughts on the ending.

Monologue Mania

Karen had always had an inner-monologue. When she was younger it was marvelous. It narrated every detail of her life, each experience in sparkling clarity, even embellishing a bit here and there. Her inner-monologue had managed to make her life sound interesting and exciting. It was responsible for all of her successes as a writer. When something particularly interesting or noteworthy happened, it offered up a vivid, eloquent, and engaging narration that she translated into fiction. Those stories had captivated readers often enough to provide her with a comfortable income.

It had never occurred to her that other people might not have inner-monologues of their own. She just assumed that everybody had one. As for the contributions hers made to her writing career, she just assumed that her inner-monologue was more eloquent than most.

When it started the trouble was only annoying, but after a couple of years it began to really interfere with Karen’s ability to concentrate. It wasn’t like schizophrenia, exactly. One day her inner-monologue just stopped narrating her life to her; it even quit speaking in complete sentences. It started blurting out random words and phrases and singing odd bits of songs at totally unpredictable times.

She knew exactly when it had happened. She was eating breakfast at the time. She had just finished off her first cup of coffee and was polishing off the last bits of muffin when she distinctly heard her inner-monologue comment, “A-hole.” It spoke in the phony Dutch accent of a popular comedic villain. At first she had thought it was just the usual odd bit of pointless jabber that the sub-conscious occasionally dredges up and flings into the forefront of awareness. But as her day wore on she became increasingly aware of the absence of narration. Late that afternoon, at the grocery store, it began to sing particularly irritating snatches of jingles from television commercials then quickly segued into theme songs and show-toons.

By the time Karen got home it had escalated to belting out children’s songs and seemed especially fond of “Ring Around the Rosie.” After several hours of this, Karen felt she couldn’t take it anymore. She tried to reason with it.

“Now see here, this isn’t productive in the least. I have things to do and this incessant singing has got to stop."

But it didn’t stop. Instead it crooned gleefully, “hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to work we go…It’s a beautiful day in the neighborhood, a beautiful day for a neighbor…I love you, you love me, we’re a happy fam-i-ly…I love you, you love me…” Like an old vinyl album the voice began to skip and just repeat that last bit over and over.

Karen got angry. “Stop it. Stop, stop, stop. Just knock it off.”

“This old man, he played one…”

She shouted, “Oh come on.” The voice stopped.

After that Karen began to give serious thought to her inner-monologue. She began to wonder if other people really did have inner-monologues of their own. She thought about seeing a doctor but dismissed the idea as an overreaction.

Good days were quiet days. On those days it didn’t have much to say and didn’t sing at all. On bad days it talked a lot, or worse yet sang. The singing was intolerable. Mercifully, it didn’t do much of that.

For the next two years most days were good days. Those were the days when she wrote, but her writing suffered from the lack of her inner-monologue. For the first time in her life Karen struggled to find her own voice. She moved away from writing dramatic stories about adventurous characters who did interesting things and began writing dark stories with somber characters who struggled with strange afflictions. These new stories weren’t as popular as her older stuff had been and her income began to drop off. During those years, Karen occasionally reconsidered seeing a doctor, but the good days out numbered the bad and she never got around to making an appointment.

Then things began to get gradually worse. The voice started blurting and singing more often. Eventually it reached the point when a good day was a day when her inner-monologue didn’t sing. The days when it didn’t talk at all became a memory.

Writing became harder and her stories took on a psychotic tone. Her characters began to come out as confused and irrational beings whose woes made little sense. One story was about a woman who kept her dead mother’s ashes in a shoe box and jabbered incoherently at her own clocks, another was about a talking dog named Oliveloaf who fell in love with a can of coffee. None of these stories really went anywhere. They all had interesting bits and pieces, but none of them moved in a linear fashion or ever reached any real conclusion.

After her publisher returned “Oliveloaf,” with a nasty note about friends not letting friends drink and write, Karen again considered seeing a doctor. The more she thought about seeing a doctor the more frightened she became of what he might say. After a good deal of consideration she decided against it.

Eventually Karen was forced to take a job at a discount kitchenwares shop just to make ends meet. She had been there three months, answering questions about blenders and microwaves, and helping customers find just the right spoon set when something finally happened to break her resolve.

She had been trying to help a customer pick out a food processor for his wife. The man was already agitated by the time he found her and hadn’t been willing to wait for her answers to any of his questions.

“What’s the difference between these things? Why’s that one cost so much more when this one obviously has a better variety of blades? Are these things dishwasher safe?” After each question, Karen tried to interject an answer, but the man just rushed on with new questions.

Then the voice started. “Hula-hoop,” it yelled in her mind.
“Is there a warranty on this one? Never mind, I don’t like that color anyway.”

“Axel grease.”

Karen sorted out who had said what and responded, “We have a variety of colors in this model, it has a very nice selection of blades, and it comes with a warranty.”

The customer frowned at the box, “No. That one looks too small. She wants something pretty big. What about that one?”

“Toasty-O’s.”

Karen’s voice quavered a bit, “Um, I think…”

“Never mind. Never mind. I like the looks of this one. It’s nice and big, but it doesn’t look like it has many blades. Does it have a grater blade? I know she wants a grater blade. What about a thin slicer? Oh, and she said it needs to be a space saver. No, wait. She wanted a space saver coffee maker. Anyway does this model come in black?”

The voice started singing. “Tomorrow, tomorrow it’s only a day away.”

She wiped her eyes. “I uh, I think so. Yes, here’s a black one.”

“At the Copa, Copacabana…”

The customer scrutinized the box. “I don’t know, I’ve never heard of this brand before. Maybe this isn’t the one I should get. Don’t you have one like this made by G.E.?”

“Rain drops on roses, and whiskers on kittens…”

Karen rubbed the back of her arm, coughed, and tugged at her shirt.

“The hills are alive with the sound of music…”

“Hey, are you even listening to me?”

“Jingle bells, batman smells, robin laid an egg…”

“Hello? I said, does G.E. make one like this?”

“Oh, I wish I was a little bar of soap, bar of soap…”

Karen put her hands against her temples, and leaned against the shelves behind her.

“Look, I just want an answer. Does G.E. make one of these or not?” The man was waving his arms now.

“The wheels on the bus go round and round…”

Karen shook her head violently and howled, “Would you just shut up. Shut up, shut up, shut up. I can’t stand your incessant noise.”

Shocked and offended by Karen’s sudden outburst, the customer stomped away to the front of the store and made a complaint against her. Within fifteen minutes she had been fired. After that, Karen made an appointment to see her doctor.

The doctor eyed her quizzically, “It just sings? It doesn’t tell you to hurt yourself or hurt other people?”

“No, it doesn’t tell me to do things. But it doesn’t just sing, sometimes it blurts out weird stuff.” Karen sighed.

“Wheatgerm.” Her inner-monologue barked.

“Mmm Hmm.” The doctor nodded. “What kinds of things does it say?”

“Spork.”

“Just random stuff. There’s never any telling what it’ll say.”

He made a notation. “Okay, and what does it sing about?”

“Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, even though the sound of it is something quite atrocious…”

Karen groaned. “Mostly show-toons.”

“Uh-huh, uh-huh. Okay, and is it talking or singing right now?”

“Eee de dee dee, de dee, de dee dee, de eee umm mum ooaway…”

She pressed the heel of her hands into her eyes.

“In the jungle, the mighty jungle…”

Karen managed to nod, “It’s singing.”

“A-wimoweh, a-wimoweh a-wimoweh, a-wimoweh…”

She whimpered, “This has to stop. I can’t function anymore. I can’t write, I can’t sleep, I can’t hold an intelligible conversation. It just got me fired for pities sake.”

“Lions, and tigers, and bears, Oh My!”

The doctor patted her shoulder. “I think we need to consider medication. There are a lot of excellent medications out there. I’m going to write you a prescription for an antipsychotic. I want you to take one of these every night at bedtime.”

For six months Karen took the pills faithfully but she couldn’t tell that they made any difference. Her inner-monologue just kept right on singing and blurting. She decided to see the doctor again. He increased her dosage and told her to give it at least three more months. The new dosage seemed to help. Her inner-monologue slowly began to quiet down and Karen started to relax quite a bit. She knew the medication was helping when she started selling stories again.

It took almost a year but her inner-monologue finally stopped singing and blurting. It never narrated her life for her anymore, the medication seemed to silence it completely. She still had bad days but now a bad day was punctuated by oppressive silence rather than sprinkled with random chatter.