MentosandCoke
08-03-2010, 02:18 PM
Hey guys, I'm new to the forum but I have to say that I've been impressed with the level of writing I've seen here. Here's something I threw together a couple of nights ago. It's a little long to be flash fiction, but it has the same overall structure.
Ain’t it the Truth, Babe?
She liked him because he made her feel like she had a choice, like she wasn’t a victim of her own pathology. He was intelligent, cultured and deceptively handsome, an expatriate of Russia or one of its former satellite states.
She had noticed Alec sitting across from her in the lecture hall. He was slightly older than the other students and seemingly untouched by the California sun. Not really her type perhaps, but then again her type usually revealed themselves to be cheaters, mooches, douchebags and every other degenerate male stereotype. She willed herself to talk to him the same way she willed herself into a diet or workout regimen, but soon found that it was more pleasurable than she expected.
Now, sitting with him at a beach-side diner, she immersed herself in his stories of world travel. His English was a little too formal, but polished enough that his accent barely clung to the tips of his syllables.
The long winters of his childhood had endowed him with a dry, witty insight into the seemingly mundane. She found that she could go toe to toe with him; cracking him up or provoking a reflective pause. For the first time she felt the understated thrill and romantic tension of this kind of banter.
The feeling turned sour when she saw Dylan walk through the door. There he was: tall, slightly chubby and dressed in his white, upper-middle class imitation of hip hop. Definitely the most memorable of her exes. He never paid much attention to the restraining order, his father being the prominent attorney he was. She would always be the one who had to avoid him.
“Wow you move fast Addie, he must be number…I don’t know twenty or something,” he said looming over their table. He cocked his head and looked Alec over.
“dude I’m sorry but…” he said, stifling a derisive chuckle, “You look like faggot just straight up” now bursting into laughter, “I’m sorry but it had to be said. I mean, I knew that you were desperate but this dude?”
She stared out the window, denying him eye contact or any acknowledgement at all.
“Okay I see how it is, you weren’t always this cold. Ha, you used to jerk me off under tables like this.”
Still no response.
“I know you’ll come around sooner or later, and tell your little boyfriend that he can find me outside”
He hesitated and then threw her root beer into Alec’s face before leaving. This brought him to his feet but he stopped himself from pursuing. She immediately apologized, railing against Dylan hysterically, pleading with him to just to let it go. He sat down and slowly composed himself.
“I understand. It’s a difficult situation for you.” He said, forcing a smile. “I find that it’s better to ignore such things. Focusing on topics of pleasure and intrigue is always best.”
They resumed their conversation, grouching about their coursework, trading clever jabs about the moody professor and the kid in the back row who never showered.
“Hold on” he said, laughing as he rubbed his eye. “Some of the root beer got under my contact lense. The solution’s out in my car, I’ll only be a moment.”
“Be careful.” She said softly.
Looking in the rearview mirror he noticed that the soda had corroded the makeup on his cheek, revealing the edges of a tattoo that read молоток, roughly translating to “hammer.”
To be impulsive is to lower yourself to the beast’s level, his uncle had told him as they wandered through the tundra with their rifles, to hunt a predator we must act for the future not the present. You’ll find corpses out here of men slain by their impulses.
Alec opened the car door in time to face the approaching figure, his hand dipping beneath his seat as he stepped out into the moonlight.
“Well well, I guess it’s time to teach you about messing with what's mine.”
Dylan quickened his pace while massaging the knuckles of his right hand. Inviting the conflict and brimming with testosterone, not noticing what Alec was holding against the back of his leg, not until the last second. The baton extended when he swung it, adding an extra 11 inches to his arm. The internal springs whipped the steel segments directly into Dylan’s orbital bone. As many as it takes, don’t turn your back until it stops moving his uncle had said as they stood over the bear heaving in the snow. It was hardwired now.
He rotated his shoulder. His arm would be stiff in the morning. It was now just a matter of booking the flight online later that night. The credit cards could be charged and maxed out overseas where they’d be harder to track. As he walked briskly toward the diner’s front door, he wondered if she’d vacation with him in the Crimean.
Ain’t it the Truth, Babe?
She liked him because he made her feel like she had a choice, like she wasn’t a victim of her own pathology. He was intelligent, cultured and deceptively handsome, an expatriate of Russia or one of its former satellite states.
She had noticed Alec sitting across from her in the lecture hall. He was slightly older than the other students and seemingly untouched by the California sun. Not really her type perhaps, but then again her type usually revealed themselves to be cheaters, mooches, douchebags and every other degenerate male stereotype. She willed herself to talk to him the same way she willed herself into a diet or workout regimen, but soon found that it was more pleasurable than she expected.
Now, sitting with him at a beach-side diner, she immersed herself in his stories of world travel. His English was a little too formal, but polished enough that his accent barely clung to the tips of his syllables.
The long winters of his childhood had endowed him with a dry, witty insight into the seemingly mundane. She found that she could go toe to toe with him; cracking him up or provoking a reflective pause. For the first time she felt the understated thrill and romantic tension of this kind of banter.
The feeling turned sour when she saw Dylan walk through the door. There he was: tall, slightly chubby and dressed in his white, upper-middle class imitation of hip hop. Definitely the most memorable of her exes. He never paid much attention to the restraining order, his father being the prominent attorney he was. She would always be the one who had to avoid him.
“Wow you move fast Addie, he must be number…I don’t know twenty or something,” he said looming over their table. He cocked his head and looked Alec over.
“dude I’m sorry but…” he said, stifling a derisive chuckle, “You look like faggot just straight up” now bursting into laughter, “I’m sorry but it had to be said. I mean, I knew that you were desperate but this dude?”
She stared out the window, denying him eye contact or any acknowledgement at all.
“Okay I see how it is, you weren’t always this cold. Ha, you used to jerk me off under tables like this.”
Still no response.
“I know you’ll come around sooner or later, and tell your little boyfriend that he can find me outside”
He hesitated and then threw her root beer into Alec’s face before leaving. This brought him to his feet but he stopped himself from pursuing. She immediately apologized, railing against Dylan hysterically, pleading with him to just to let it go. He sat down and slowly composed himself.
“I understand. It’s a difficult situation for you.” He said, forcing a smile. “I find that it’s better to ignore such things. Focusing on topics of pleasure and intrigue is always best.”
They resumed their conversation, grouching about their coursework, trading clever jabs about the moody professor and the kid in the back row who never showered.
“Hold on” he said, laughing as he rubbed his eye. “Some of the root beer got under my contact lense. The solution’s out in my car, I’ll only be a moment.”
“Be careful.” She said softly.
Looking in the rearview mirror he noticed that the soda had corroded the makeup on his cheek, revealing the edges of a tattoo that read молоток, roughly translating to “hammer.”
To be impulsive is to lower yourself to the beast’s level, his uncle had told him as they wandered through the tundra with their rifles, to hunt a predator we must act for the future not the present. You’ll find corpses out here of men slain by their impulses.
Alec opened the car door in time to face the approaching figure, his hand dipping beneath his seat as he stepped out into the moonlight.
“Well well, I guess it’s time to teach you about messing with what's mine.”
Dylan quickened his pace while massaging the knuckles of his right hand. Inviting the conflict and brimming with testosterone, not noticing what Alec was holding against the back of his leg, not until the last second. The baton extended when he swung it, adding an extra 11 inches to his arm. The internal springs whipped the steel segments directly into Dylan’s orbital bone. As many as it takes, don’t turn your back until it stops moving his uncle had said as they stood over the bear heaving in the snow. It was hardwired now.
He rotated his shoulder. His arm would be stiff in the morning. It was now just a matter of booking the flight online later that night. The credit cards could be charged and maxed out overseas where they’d be harder to track. As he walked briskly toward the diner’s front door, he wondered if she’d vacation with him in the Crimean.