Everyone in the room exchanged glances except for one woman in her late seventies. "I always thought that book was overhyped."
"Susan," another woman gasped. "How could you say that? I'm not a huge Kerouac fan, but I can appreciate its merits."
Susan shifted in her seat and gazed deep into the other woman's face. A hush consumed the room. "The book goes nowhere," she said. "You can sum the whole story up with 'man travels across country, gets bored, then travels back, then does it again'."
The man who leant Vernon "On the Road" exhaled deeply, falling back into his chair and slapping the tops of his thighs. "Read it again, Vernon. If you can't see what makes the book special by then, you're a lost cause."
"I read it four times," Vernon said with a tone of desperation. "It just makes me feel more depressed each time I read it."
"Four times," said the man. "Four times and you can't see what makes it brilliant?" His left eyebrow arched.
Vernon's face flushed crimson. "It felt like Sal never grew, just got increasingly restless and never found any satisfaction."
The man's arch stretched higher and a smirk peeled across his face. All but one of the others leaned forward in their seats. "Didn't he, though?" he said. "Think about it for a bit, Vern. What were his last thoughts? What epiphany did his travels elucidate?"
Vernon shrugged and said, "You mean all Sal's rambling about Dean Moriarty as though he were father to us, or should be?"
The man shook his head. "Nobody knows what’s going to happen to anybody besides the forlorn rags of growing old." His eyes were as wide as someone with Graves disease. The brawny woman beside him rolled his eyes and said, "Can we move on now?"
"Honestly, you two." The prim woman who typically moderated the critique period of the group scowled and crossed her arms. "This is a writers' group. Unless either of you can relate this to our own writings, please, let's discontinue this discussion."
The man smirked and ignored the others, handing Vernon the book. "Read it again. You'll understand in a few more readings." Begrudgingly, Vernon took the soon-to-be battered copy of "On the Road" and shoved it back in his bag.
"Vernon?" The prim woman asked. "Did you bring us something new to read for next time?"
* * *
"Nobody knows what’s going to happen to anybody." The line reran through Vernon's mind like some tired old sitcom as he walked home.
The wind tore through his bones. He felt much older than his years, more forlorn than a man his age should feel. People scurried past him, their gazes cast forward with a determination that implied a clear destination. Vernon dragged one foot in front of the other, turning his head often to look around for something to inspire him, to give him hope.
As he eventually wandered back to his aunt's place, he threw his satchel on the coffee table and flopped down into the cozy couch pillows. He stared at the white of the spackled ceiling, its shadows stirring his imagination with intangible twinges of lament. A heavy sigh preceded the drooping of his eyes, which turned to slits that let in only enough light to blur the spackle to a gray mass.
"I could have written that book," he thought. "I should. I should write about my life. Yeah, right. Like anyone would read it."
A sudden thump followed by a flicking of sheets of papers jerked him upright. Vernon saw his manuscript scattered across the floor and groaned. He sighed again, bending over the disheveled pages. So many exotic words like hyperdrive, Pangalactic Confederation, and Xuluranctinik.
Showing posts with label Story Tweets. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Story Tweets. Show all posts
06 October 2010
04 September 2010
Vernon Story Tweets — July & August 2010
Vernon's hand twitched, reminding him of the crumpled piece of paper the man had dropped during their collision on the street.
The man at the desk set his pen down, his eyes widening with a spark of fear. His entire posture shifted to one of defense. He lurched back and nearly fell out of his chair as Vernon propelled the fist clenching the paper toward him.
"You dropped this," said Vernon.
The man reached over his desk and cautiously pulled the crumbled sheet of paper from his hand. He stretched out the paper and ran it up and down along the edge of his desk, keeping his eye on Vernon all the while.
Sensing the man's discomfort, Vernon took some deep breaths and let his shoulders sag and his chest cave.
The man looked down at the words typed upon the sheet. The ink had begun to run from Vernon's sweating palms, but the man recognized the piece immediately and smiled with relief. "I can't even begin to express how glad I am that you returned this. Allen thanks you, too. I think this might be his only copy." The man's eyes drifted back to "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by \ madness, starving hysterical naked,"
Vernon's hand moved to his jacket pocket, his thumb and forefinger gripped his beat-up copy of "On the Road." "Ever publish fiction?"
The man looked puzzled at how Vernon knew he was going to start publishing out of his bookstore. "How do you know that I publish at all? This is a bookstore, brother." The man straightened the papers before him.
Vernon's eyes darted to the stack of papers near the man and raised his eyebrows. "Looks like an edit in process to me."
"That's quite an assumption," said the man as he slid the stack onto his lap and out of Vernon's sight. The man's chest puffed slightly.
Vernon backed up and started to turn toward the nearest exit, then paused. He slowly pivoted back around to face the man who was now standing. "It's just -" He thumbed the book in his pocket, searching for the right words.
The man hovered on the edge of his seat, silent for a moment then asking, "Out with it, man! I haven't all day to watch you yammer."
Vernon's mouth opened and closed, his eyes bugged out from his skull. He glimpsed himself in the window and felt like an idiot.
"Fool," said the man. "Hit the road already." He shooed Vernon out as far as the door, eventually reaching around to turn the knob.
Vernon slammed the door closed and spun around to face the man, who jumped back with fists raised and ready to scrap. "Please," said Vernon. "I don't mean you any harm. It's just that I have a book that I'm pretty sure you’ll want to publish."
The man dropped his fist and said, "Why didn't you say so in the first place? You stoned, or something?"
"No," stammered Vernon. "Just nervous. I've already received so many rejections, and I've never spoken directly with a publisher."
The man chortled and said, "I'm barely a publisher as it is, and definitely not a publisher of note to date." He thrust his hand out to Vernon and said, "Lawrence Ferlinghetti, pleased to meet you Mr....?"
Vernon stammered once again, finally composing himself to say, "You can just call me Vernon. The pleasure's all mine."
"Well, Vernon, tell me about this great new novel of yours. Let me guess, it's the next great American novel, right?"
Vernon blushed and thought, ‘Would this be considered dramatic irony? Play it with humility, Vern.’ He cleared his throat and shook his hands before saying, "This book will come to define the next generation."
"Ho ho!" The man sounded almost Victorian British. "That's a bold assertion, Mr. Vernon. I'll be the judge of that. "Let's see that book of yours." Lawrence thrust out his hand again, this time waiting for Vernon's fictional manuscript.
Vernon started to reach for his beat-up copy of "On the Road," then caught himself. He slyly converted his reach into a chin stroke. "I don't have it with me," Vernon said. "I have to retrieve it from... from my parents' home in Delaware."
Lawrence guffawed. "How long you think it'll take for you to retrieve the manuscript? You going to have it mailed to you?"
Vernon panicked inside, a bead of sweat forming below his hairline. "Then you're interested in the book?"
"Yes, boy!" Lawrence snapped back so intensely that Vernon lurched toward the nearest exit. "Can you fetch it or not?"
"One week," Vernon told the man. "It should take me one week to travel back and forth between coasts. Is that okay?"
Lawrence smirked with contempt and said, "Take all the time you need." He then sat back at his desk and resumed his work. Vernon stared at the man for a moment, leaving only after Lawrence shot him an irritated look from below his brows.
* * *
About an hour had passed. The sun sat higher in the sky as he exited the bookstore, yet the gusty air chilled him more deeply. Vernon put his hand back in his jacket pocket and thumbed his well-worn, dog-eared copy of "On the Road."
'What did you just do, Vern?' He bit his lower lip to stop it from trembling. 'What did you do?' He sighed and eyed the street. "Guess I need to find a typewriter," he muttered. "Or at least, a ream of paper to transcribe this book onto."
CHAPTER 4
"Science fiction, Vern?" The rest of the writers group shot their own looks of disdain at Vernon, who blushed crimson.
"It's what I like to write," Vernon squeaked. "It's what I know."
"What?" A robust woman in her forties shook her head. "Sci-fi, fantasy...? It's all so contrived. Nobody 'knows' those worlds."
Vernon hung his head and twisted his left foot. His gut tumbled as all eyes glared at him in demand for an explanation. Hours and hours of shows like Stargate, Star Trek, heck, anything with "Star" in its title swirled through his head. 'It is what I know,' Vernon thought. 'It is what I know.'
"Vernon," said a man with long, twisted goatee. "Don't sweat it. You just need to read a wider variety of books." The man reached in his satchel, pulled out a thin, worn book and tossed it at Vernon, who failed to catch it. The book title beamed at him: "On the Road." The man said, "Now Jack Kerouac, there's a man who knew how to write what he knew."
Vernon picked up the beat paperback and shoved it in his bag without another look. "I've heard of it," he told the man who gave it to him.
The man squinched at him and said, "Don't borrow it if you don't plan to read it."
Vernon assured him that he'd start tonight.
Later that night, Vernon found it tough to move past the first few chapters of "On the Road" but managed to finish it before dawn. That was the first time he uttered the phrase that would come to define his cynical outlook on publishing: "I could have written that."
He read "On the Road" three more times before his writing group next met. "I just don't see why it's considered 'great'." Vernon used air quotation marks to emphasis the word great, and everyone in the group rolled their eyes at him.
"Vern," the guy who leant him Kerouac's seminal work leaned forward. "Can't you see how simple the style is? ‘On the Road' defined an entire generation, gave it a voice that it lacked, signaled an end to Bourgeois writing."
Vernon sighed and sagged. "Frankly, I found the story depressing. It didn't inspire me at all."
The man at the desk set his pen down, his eyes widening with a spark of fear. His entire posture shifted to one of defense. He lurched back and nearly fell out of his chair as Vernon propelled the fist clenching the paper toward him.
"You dropped this," said Vernon.
The man reached over his desk and cautiously pulled the crumbled sheet of paper from his hand. He stretched out the paper and ran it up and down along the edge of his desk, keeping his eye on Vernon all the while.
Sensing the man's discomfort, Vernon took some deep breaths and let his shoulders sag and his chest cave.
The man looked down at the words typed upon the sheet. The ink had begun to run from Vernon's sweating palms, but the man recognized the piece immediately and smiled with relief. "I can't even begin to express how glad I am that you returned this. Allen thanks you, too. I think this might be his only copy." The man's eyes drifted back to "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by \ madness, starving hysterical naked,"
Vernon's hand moved to his jacket pocket, his thumb and forefinger gripped his beat-up copy of "On the Road." "Ever publish fiction?"
The man looked puzzled at how Vernon knew he was going to start publishing out of his bookstore. "How do you know that I publish at all? This is a bookstore, brother." The man straightened the papers before him.
Vernon's eyes darted to the stack of papers near the man and raised his eyebrows. "Looks like an edit in process to me."
"That's quite an assumption," said the man as he slid the stack onto his lap and out of Vernon's sight. The man's chest puffed slightly.
Vernon backed up and started to turn toward the nearest exit, then paused. He slowly pivoted back around to face the man who was now standing. "It's just -" He thumbed the book in his pocket, searching for the right words.
The man hovered on the edge of his seat, silent for a moment then asking, "Out with it, man! I haven't all day to watch you yammer."
Vernon's mouth opened and closed, his eyes bugged out from his skull. He glimpsed himself in the window and felt like an idiot.
"Fool," said the man. "Hit the road already." He shooed Vernon out as far as the door, eventually reaching around to turn the knob.
Vernon slammed the door closed and spun around to face the man, who jumped back with fists raised and ready to scrap. "Please," said Vernon. "I don't mean you any harm. It's just that I have a book that I'm pretty sure you’ll want to publish."
The man dropped his fist and said, "Why didn't you say so in the first place? You stoned, or something?"
"No," stammered Vernon. "Just nervous. I've already received so many rejections, and I've never spoken directly with a publisher."
The man chortled and said, "I'm barely a publisher as it is, and definitely not a publisher of note to date." He thrust his hand out to Vernon and said, "Lawrence Ferlinghetti, pleased to meet you Mr....?"
Vernon stammered once again, finally composing himself to say, "You can just call me Vernon. The pleasure's all mine."
"Well, Vernon, tell me about this great new novel of yours. Let me guess, it's the next great American novel, right?"
Vernon blushed and thought, ‘Would this be considered dramatic irony? Play it with humility, Vern.’ He cleared his throat and shook his hands before saying, "This book will come to define the next generation."
"Ho ho!" The man sounded almost Victorian British. "That's a bold assertion, Mr. Vernon. I'll be the judge of that. "Let's see that book of yours." Lawrence thrust out his hand again, this time waiting for Vernon's fictional manuscript.
Vernon started to reach for his beat-up copy of "On the Road," then caught himself. He slyly converted his reach into a chin stroke. "I don't have it with me," Vernon said. "I have to retrieve it from... from my parents' home in Delaware."
Lawrence guffawed. "How long you think it'll take for you to retrieve the manuscript? You going to have it mailed to you?"
Vernon panicked inside, a bead of sweat forming below his hairline. "Then you're interested in the book?"
"Yes, boy!" Lawrence snapped back so intensely that Vernon lurched toward the nearest exit. "Can you fetch it or not?"
"One week," Vernon told the man. "It should take me one week to travel back and forth between coasts. Is that okay?"
Lawrence smirked with contempt and said, "Take all the time you need." He then sat back at his desk and resumed his work. Vernon stared at the man for a moment, leaving only after Lawrence shot him an irritated look from below his brows.
* * *
About an hour had passed. The sun sat higher in the sky as he exited the bookstore, yet the gusty air chilled him more deeply. Vernon put his hand back in his jacket pocket and thumbed his well-worn, dog-eared copy of "On the Road."
'What did you just do, Vern?' He bit his lower lip to stop it from trembling. 'What did you do?' He sighed and eyed the street. "Guess I need to find a typewriter," he muttered. "Or at least, a ream of paper to transcribe this book onto."
CHAPTER 4
"Science fiction, Vern?" The rest of the writers group shot their own looks of disdain at Vernon, who blushed crimson.
"It's what I like to write," Vernon squeaked. "It's what I know."
"What?" A robust woman in her forties shook her head. "Sci-fi, fantasy...? It's all so contrived. Nobody 'knows' those worlds."
Vernon hung his head and twisted his left foot. His gut tumbled as all eyes glared at him in demand for an explanation. Hours and hours of shows like Stargate, Star Trek, heck, anything with "Star" in its title swirled through his head. 'It is what I know,' Vernon thought. 'It is what I know.'
"Vernon," said a man with long, twisted goatee. "Don't sweat it. You just need to read a wider variety of books." The man reached in his satchel, pulled out a thin, worn book and tossed it at Vernon, who failed to catch it. The book title beamed at him: "On the Road." The man said, "Now Jack Kerouac, there's a man who knew how to write what he knew."
Vernon picked up the beat paperback and shoved it in his bag without another look. "I've heard of it," he told the man who gave it to him.
The man squinched at him and said, "Don't borrow it if you don't plan to read it."
Vernon assured him that he'd start tonight.
Later that night, Vernon found it tough to move past the first few chapters of "On the Road" but managed to finish it before dawn. That was the first time he uttered the phrase that would come to define his cynical outlook on publishing: "I could have written that."
He read "On the Road" three more times before his writing group next met. "I just don't see why it's considered 'great'." Vernon used air quotation marks to emphasis the word great, and everyone in the group rolled their eyes at him.
"Vern," the guy who leant him Kerouac's seminal work leaned forward. "Can't you see how simple the style is? ‘On the Road' defined an entire generation, gave it a voice that it lacked, signaled an end to Bourgeois writing."
Vernon sighed and sagged. "Frankly, I found the story depressing. It didn't inspire me at all."
01 July 2010
Vernon Story Tweets - May & June 2010
Looks like I totally spaced May's Vernon Tweets, so here's a two-fer:
Vernon had spent a total of six months living on his own in the past couple decades since graduating high school. His mom had kicked him out shortly after he graduated college, when it was apparent that Vernon wasn't looking for work. That's when his aunt invited him to stay with her. She thought he should pursue a career as a not-so-starving artist.
"I'm not sure I want to even try to write," Vernon told his aunt. "It's too competitive. Everything's been written already."
"See," my aunt said. "You're already writing. You're terrific at making excuses. Get 'em down on paper, nephew."
Vernon balked. "Aunt Joanie, nobody writes on paper anymore. This is the end of the twentieth century. Get with the times."
"Get with the times?" she said. "If you mean sponging off your relatives while you play around on the computer all day, no thanks."
Shortly after, his Aunt Joanie started to leave the classifieds and a pen lying around in strategic locations.
* * *
"Why do you want to work for Ubermarket, Vernon?"
He fumbled with his fingers. Only his aunt's face appeared as a possible answer. "It definitely has to be the opportunity to set daily goals and accomplish them," said Vernon.
The interviewer's face lit up. "What experience do you have with telemarketing?"
Vernon replied, "Only when they call my house."
"Excellent!" The interviewer made an exaggerated check mark on his interview sheet. Vernon did his best to hide his confusion. "So," the man said as he jutted out his jaw. "When do you want to start?"
Vernon's gut twirled and he sighed, "Tomorrow?"
The interviewer launched his hand out to Vernon and said, "You start at 8:00. Don't be late."
* * *
His aunt slept as he stepped out to the street, the lunch she had made him the night before clutched in his palm.
Orientation wasn't supposed to take all that long. That's what the interviewer told him. A guy near the office had chuckled. The door to the orientation room was exactly six steps from the entrance to the office space. A permanent sign diffused his confidence.
Three hours later, Vernon felt more tired than when he started. As he emerged from the room, the guy near the office chuckled louder. The whole orientation could have lasted 15, maybe 30 minutes tops. 'How long does it take to learn how to use a headset and program?' Aside from the technical aspects, his job responsibilities were best summed up as, "Make the call. Follow the script. Make the sale."
'Oh well,' thought Vernon. 'At least it was three hours of pay.' He followed his new boss to the cubicle he'd grow to detest.
With his tie slightly loosened and cocked to the right, his boss said, "I'd sanitize the handset before you use it."
As Vernon took a seat at his cubicle, he sighed. The other agents droned into their headsets, vacant stares in all their eyes. 'It's going to be okay, Vern.' For the next few minutes, he sat and glared at the monitor with his fingers poised to type.
"Woohoo!"
Vernon jumped at the sound of the guy two stalls down declaring a sale before running down the aisle for high fives. Within 15 minutes, someone else sounded off their success. Vernon had yet to make a single call, let alone make a sale.
An hour passed before Vernon managed to get an actual person on the line, only to have the recipient slam the phone down on him. The next time he got through, a lonely and presumably old woman started to sob on about how much she missed her sons.
After consoling the woman for a solid twenty minutes, Vernon sensed someone looming behind him. He turned to find his boss scowling and arms crossed. The man pointed to the sign and used his finger to underline "Follow the script." The squat man in the loud tie continued to hover over Vernon. His fingers shook as he reached to make the next call.
"Good evening sir. I'm calling tonight to share an exciting offer from Vitoptimum with you."
The man stood firm behind him.
Click.
Vernon turned to his boss, who smiled. "Sorry. They hung up on me."
His boss smiled in an unexpectedly warm way, then patted Vernon's back. "No worries. Just keep trying. You'll make a sale." The man jerked round and sauntered down the aisle eavesdropping in on the other agents, occasionally stopping to provide direction.
From that point on, Vernon always stuck to the script. It didn't seem to help though; it took a week before he made his first sale. After awhile, Vernon grew numb to the constant rejection. Most of the time, it took him nearly a 100 dials before he spoke to anyone. He was called all manner of obscenities. If most had it right, Vernon and his entire ilk were the worst of the worst.
* * *
"How was work today?" asked Vernon's aunt when he collapsed into the couch. He stared back with glazed eyes and shallow breath. "That good, huh? Well, you got to make a living somehow, right?" Vernon rolled his eyes toward his computer and sighed.
'Something has to happen,' Vernon thought, 'Something exciting, or this whole story that is my life is going nowhere.'
CHAPTER 3
Beneath the slim smear of grime, a glow emanated from the City Lights Bookstore door window. The wind picked up and rattled the door.
Vernon looked up and down the street again. 'Nope,' he thought. 'Nothing's different. They all still look like they're stuck in 1950.' He rubbed his eyes, gave his surrounding one last look, took a deep breath, then turned the door knob to the infamous bookstore.
All around were books, some ramshackled others sparkling new, lining the simple wooden shelves. It took Vernon by surprise. The smell of fresh ink and musty pages mingled in his nostrils with the smell of over-boiled coffee grounds.
Someone shuffled pages from behind one of the racks, rose to their feet and cleared their throat before rounding the end of the shelves. It was the man he ran into on the street. He had combed his hair down, cleaned his glasses and tucked in his button down shirt. He also wore the uniform of those in the literati: a tweed jacket with patches on the elbows. His coffee mug steamed with weak coffee and copious amounts of dry creamer. He cleared his throat and began to speak. "Have any questions? Speak up if you do. I'm working back here." He turned and rounded the shelves. The sound of scribbling ensued.
Vernon rose his hand slightly and began to gape like a fish out of water. He tried to speak, but nothing would come. He rubbed his eyes, took a gander around and found that nothing changed. 'Should I pinch myself, or would that be too cliché?'
"Too cliché," he muttered.
The scratch of writing ceased and the man in the back said, "What's that?"
"Um..." Vernon searched for the right words but found none. "Nothing." He walked toward where the man sat, and then loomed there.
The man at the desk tapped his pen, staring at Vernon and waiting for him to say something, anything at all.
Vernon Story Tweets - May & June 2010
Looks like I totally spaced May's Vernon Tweets, so here's a two-fer:
Vernon had spent a total of six months living on his own in the past couple decades since graduating high school. His mom had kicked him out shortly after he graduated college, when it was apparent that Vernon wasn't looking for work. That's when his aunt invited him to stay with her. She thought he should pursue a career as a not-so-starving artist.
"I'm not sure I want to even try to write," Vernon told his aunt. "It's too competitive. Everything's been written already."
"See," my aunt said. "You're already writing. You're terrific at making excuses. Get 'em down on paper, nephew."
Vernon balked. "Aunt Joanie, nobody writes on paper anymore. This is the end of the twentieth century. Get with the times."
"Get with the times?" she said. "If you mean sponging off your relatives while you play around on the computer all day, no thanks."
Shortly after, his Aunt Joanie started to leave the classifieds and a pen lying around in strategic locations.
* * *
"Why do you want to work for Ubermarket, Vernon?"
He fumbled with his fingers. Only his aunt's face appeared as a possible answer. "It definitely has to be the opportunity to set daily goals and accomplish them," said Vernon.
The interviewer's face lit up. "What experience do you have with telemarketing?"
Vernon replied, "Only when they call my house."
"Excellent!" The interviewer made an exaggerated check mark on his interview sheet. Vernon did his best to hide his confusion. "So," the man said as he jutted out his jaw. "When do you want to start?"
Vernon's gut twirled and he sighed, "Tomorrow?"
The interviewer launched his hand out to Vernon and said, "You start at 8:00. Don't be late."
* * *
His aunt slept as he stepped out to the street, the lunch she had made him the night before clutched in his palm.
Orientation wasn't supposed to take all that long. That's what the interviewer told him. A guy near the office had chuckled. The door to the orientation room was exactly six steps from the entrance to the office space. A permanent sign diffused his confidence.
Three hours later, Vernon felt more tired than when he started. As he emerged from the room, the guy near the office chuckled louder. The whole orientation could have lasted 15, maybe 30 minutes tops. 'How long does it take to learn how to use a headset and program?' Aside from the technical aspects, his job responsibilities were best summed up as, "Make the call. Follow the script. Make the sale."
'Oh well,' thought Vernon. 'At least it was three hours of pay.' He followed his new boss to the cubicle he'd grow to detest.
With his tie slightly loosened and cocked to the right, his boss said, "I'd sanitize the handset before you use it."
As Vernon took a seat at his cubicle, he sighed. The other agents droned into their headsets, vacant stares in all their eyes. 'It's going to be okay, Vern.' For the next few minutes, he sat and glared at the monitor with his fingers poised to type.
"Woohoo!"
Vernon jumped at the sound of the guy two stalls down declaring a sale before running down the aisle for high fives. Within 15 minutes, someone else sounded off their success. Vernon had yet to make a single call, let alone make a sale.
An hour passed before Vernon managed to get an actual person on the line, only to have the recipient slam the phone down on him. The next time he got through, a lonely and presumably old woman started to sob on about how much she missed her sons.
After consoling the woman for a solid twenty minutes, Vernon sensed someone looming behind him. He turned to find his boss scowling and arms crossed. The man pointed to the sign and used his finger to underline "Follow the script." The squat man in the loud tie continued to hover over Vernon. His fingers shook as he reached to make the next call.
"Good evening sir. I'm calling tonight to share an exciting offer from Vitoptimum with you."
The man stood firm behind him.
Click.
Vernon turned to his boss, who smiled. "Sorry. They hung up on me."
His boss smiled in an unexpectedly warm way, then patted Vernon's back. "No worries. Just keep trying. You'll make a sale." The man jerked round and sauntered down the aisle eavesdropping in on the other agents, occasionally stopping to provide direction.
From that point on, Vernon always stuck to the script. It didn't seem to help though; it took a week before he made his first sale. After awhile, Vernon grew numb to the constant rejection. Most of the time, it took him nearly a 100 dials before he spoke to anyone. He was called all manner of obscenities. If most had it right, Vernon and his entire ilk were the worst of the worst.
* * *
"How was work today?" asked Vernon's aunt when he collapsed into the couch. He stared back with glazed eyes and shallow breath. "That good, huh? Well, you got to make a living somehow, right?" Vernon rolled his eyes toward his computer and sighed.
'Something has to happen,' Vernon thought, 'Something exciting, or this whole story that is my life is going nowhere.'
CHAPTER 3
Beneath the slim smear of grime, a glow emanated from the City Lights Bookstore door window. The wind picked up and rattled the door.
Vernon looked up and down the street again. 'Nope,' he thought. 'Nothing's different. They all still look like they're stuck in 1950.' He rubbed his eyes, gave his surrounding one last look, took a deep breath, then turned the door knob to the infamous bookstore.
All around were books, some ramshackled others sparkling new, lining the simple wooden shelves. It took Vernon by surprise. The smell of fresh ink and musty pages mingled in his nostrils with the smell of over-boiled coffee grounds.
Someone shuffled pages from behind one of the racks, rose to their feet and cleared their throat before rounding the end of the shelves. It was the man he ran into on the street. He had combed his hair down, cleaned his glasses and tucked in his button down shirt. He also wore the uniform of those in the literati: a tweed jacket with patches on the elbows. His coffee mug steamed with weak coffee and copious amounts of dry creamer. He cleared his throat and began to speak. "Have any questions? Speak up if you do. I'm working back here." He turned and rounded the shelves. The sound of scribbling ensued.
Vernon rose his hand slightly and began to gape like a fish out of water. He tried to speak, but nothing would come. He rubbed his eyes, took a gander around and found that nothing changed. 'Should I pinch myself, or would that be too cliché?'
"Too cliché," he muttered.
The scratch of writing ceased and the man in the back said, "What's that?"
"Um..." Vernon searched for the right words but found none. "Nothing." He walked toward where the man sat, and then loomed there.
The man at the desk tapped his pen, staring at Vernon and waiting for him to say something, anything at all.
Vernon had spent a total of six months living on his own in the past couple decades since graduating high school. His mom had kicked him out shortly after he graduated college, when it was apparent that Vernon wasn't looking for work. That's when his aunt invited him to stay with her. She thought he should pursue a career as a not-so-starving artist.
"I'm not sure I want to even try to write," Vernon told his aunt. "It's too competitive. Everything's been written already."
"See," my aunt said. "You're already writing. You're terrific at making excuses. Get 'em down on paper, nephew."
Vernon balked. "Aunt Joanie, nobody writes on paper anymore. This is the end of the twentieth century. Get with the times."
"Get with the times?" she said. "If you mean sponging off your relatives while you play around on the computer all day, no thanks."
Shortly after, his Aunt Joanie started to leave the classifieds and a pen lying around in strategic locations.
* * *
"Why do you want to work for Ubermarket, Vernon?"
He fumbled with his fingers. Only his aunt's face appeared as a possible answer. "It definitely has to be the opportunity to set daily goals and accomplish them," said Vernon.
The interviewer's face lit up. "What experience do you have with telemarketing?"
Vernon replied, "Only when they call my house."
"Excellent!" The interviewer made an exaggerated check mark on his interview sheet. Vernon did his best to hide his confusion. "So," the man said as he jutted out his jaw. "When do you want to start?"
Vernon's gut twirled and he sighed, "Tomorrow?"
The interviewer launched his hand out to Vernon and said, "You start at 8:00. Don't be late."
* * *
His aunt slept as he stepped out to the street, the lunch she had made him the night before clutched in his palm.
Orientation wasn't supposed to take all that long. That's what the interviewer told him. A guy near the office had chuckled. The door to the orientation room was exactly six steps from the entrance to the office space. A permanent sign diffused his confidence.
Three hours later, Vernon felt more tired than when he started. As he emerged from the room, the guy near the office chuckled louder. The whole orientation could have lasted 15, maybe 30 minutes tops. 'How long does it take to learn how to use a headset and program?' Aside from the technical aspects, his job responsibilities were best summed up as, "Make the call. Follow the script. Make the sale."
'Oh well,' thought Vernon. 'At least it was three hours of pay.' He followed his new boss to the cubicle he'd grow to detest.
With his tie slightly loosened and cocked to the right, his boss said, "I'd sanitize the handset before you use it."
As Vernon took a seat at his cubicle, he sighed. The other agents droned into their headsets, vacant stares in all their eyes. 'It's going to be okay, Vern.' For the next few minutes, he sat and glared at the monitor with his fingers poised to type.
"Woohoo!"
Vernon jumped at the sound of the guy two stalls down declaring a sale before running down the aisle for high fives. Within 15 minutes, someone else sounded off their success. Vernon had yet to make a single call, let alone make a sale.
An hour passed before Vernon managed to get an actual person on the line, only to have the recipient slam the phone down on him. The next time he got through, a lonely and presumably old woman started to sob on about how much she missed her sons.
After consoling the woman for a solid twenty minutes, Vernon sensed someone looming behind him. He turned to find his boss scowling and arms crossed. The man pointed to the sign and used his finger to underline "Follow the script." The squat man in the loud tie continued to hover over Vernon. His fingers shook as he reached to make the next call.
"Good evening sir. I'm calling tonight to share an exciting offer from Vitoptimum with you."
The man stood firm behind him.
Click.
Vernon turned to his boss, who smiled. "Sorry. They hung up on me."
His boss smiled in an unexpectedly warm way, then patted Vernon's back. "No worries. Just keep trying. You'll make a sale." The man jerked round and sauntered down the aisle eavesdropping in on the other agents, occasionally stopping to provide direction.
From that point on, Vernon always stuck to the script. It didn't seem to help though; it took a week before he made his first sale. After awhile, Vernon grew numb to the constant rejection. Most of the time, it took him nearly a 100 dials before he spoke to anyone. He was called all manner of obscenities. If most had it right, Vernon and his entire ilk were the worst of the worst.
* * *
"How was work today?" asked Vernon's aunt when he collapsed into the couch. He stared back with glazed eyes and shallow breath. "That good, huh? Well, you got to make a living somehow, right?" Vernon rolled his eyes toward his computer and sighed.
'Something has to happen,' Vernon thought, 'Something exciting, or this whole story that is my life is going nowhere.'
CHAPTER 3
Beneath the slim smear of grime, a glow emanated from the City Lights Bookstore door window. The wind picked up and rattled the door.
Vernon looked up and down the street again. 'Nope,' he thought. 'Nothing's different. They all still look like they're stuck in 1950.' He rubbed his eyes, gave his surrounding one last look, took a deep breath, then turned the door knob to the infamous bookstore.
All around were books, some ramshackled others sparkling new, lining the simple wooden shelves. It took Vernon by surprise. The smell of fresh ink and musty pages mingled in his nostrils with the smell of over-boiled coffee grounds.
Someone shuffled pages from behind one of the racks, rose to their feet and cleared their throat before rounding the end of the shelves. It was the man he ran into on the street. He had combed his hair down, cleaned his glasses and tucked in his button down shirt. He also wore the uniform of those in the literati: a tweed jacket with patches on the elbows. His coffee mug steamed with weak coffee and copious amounts of dry creamer. He cleared his throat and began to speak. "Have any questions? Speak up if you do. I'm working back here." He turned and rounded the shelves. The sound of scribbling ensued.
Vernon rose his hand slightly and began to gape like a fish out of water. He tried to speak, but nothing would come. He rubbed his eyes, took a gander around and found that nothing changed. 'Should I pinch myself, or would that be too cliché?'
"Too cliché," he muttered.
The scratch of writing ceased and the man in the back said, "What's that?"
"Um..." Vernon searched for the right words but found none. "Nothing." He walked toward where the man sat, and then loomed there.
The man at the desk tapped his pen, staring at Vernon and waiting for him to say something, anything at all.
Vernon Story Tweets - May & June 2010
Looks like I totally spaced May's Vernon Tweets, so here's a two-fer:
Vernon had spent a total of six months living on his own in the past couple decades since graduating high school. His mom had kicked him out shortly after he graduated college, when it was apparent that Vernon wasn't looking for work. That's when his aunt invited him to stay with her. She thought he should pursue a career as a not-so-starving artist.
"I'm not sure I want to even try to write," Vernon told his aunt. "It's too competitive. Everything's been written already."
"See," my aunt said. "You're already writing. You're terrific at making excuses. Get 'em down on paper, nephew."
Vernon balked. "Aunt Joanie, nobody writes on paper anymore. This is the end of the twentieth century. Get with the times."
"Get with the times?" she said. "If you mean sponging off your relatives while you play around on the computer all day, no thanks."
Shortly after, his Aunt Joanie started to leave the classifieds and a pen lying around in strategic locations.
* * *
"Why do you want to work for Ubermarket, Vernon?"
He fumbled with his fingers. Only his aunt's face appeared as a possible answer. "It definitely has to be the opportunity to set daily goals and accomplish them," said Vernon.
The interviewer's face lit up. "What experience do you have with telemarketing?"
Vernon replied, "Only when they call my house."
"Excellent!" The interviewer made an exaggerated check mark on his interview sheet. Vernon did his best to hide his confusion. "So," the man said as he jutted out his jaw. "When do you want to start?"
Vernon's gut twirled and he sighed, "Tomorrow?"
The interviewer launched his hand out to Vernon and said, "You start at 8:00. Don't be late."
* * *
His aunt slept as he stepped out to the street, the lunch she had made him the night before clutched in his palm.
Orientation wasn't supposed to take all that long. That's what the interviewer told him. A guy near the office had chuckled. The door to the orientation room was exactly six steps from the entrance to the office space. A permanent sign diffused his confidence.
Three hours later, Vernon felt more tired than when he started. As he emerged from the room, the guy near the office chuckled louder. The whole orientation could have lasted 15, maybe 30 minutes tops. 'How long does it take to learn how to use a headset and program?' Aside from the technical aspects, his job responsibilities were best summed up as, "Make the call. Follow the script. Make the sale."
'Oh well,' thought Vernon. 'At least it was three hours of pay.' He followed his new boss to the cubicle he'd grow to detest.
With his tie slightly loosened and cocked to the right, his boss said, "I'd sanitize the handset before you use it."
As Vernon took a seat at his cubicle, he sighed. The other agents droned into their headsets, vacant stares in all their eyes. 'It's going to be okay, Vern.' For the next few minutes, he sat and glared at the monitor with his fingers poised to type.
"Woohoo!"
Vernon jumped at the sound of the guy two stalls down declaring a sale before running down the aisle for high fives. Within 15 minutes, someone else sounded off their success. Vernon had yet to make a single call, let alone make a sale.
An hour passed before Vernon managed to get an actual person on the line, only to have the recipient slam the phone down on him. The next time he got through, a lonely and presumably old woman started to sob on about how much she missed her sons.
After consoling the woman for a solid twenty minutes, Vernon sensed someone looming behind him. He turned to find his boss scowling and arms crossed. The man pointed to the sign and used his finger to underline "Follow the script." The squat man in the loud tie continued to hover over Vernon. His fingers shook as he reached to make the next call.
"Good evening sir. I'm calling tonight to share an exciting offer from Vitoptimum with you."
The man stood firm behind him.
Click.
Vernon turned to his boss, who smiled. "Sorry. They hung up on me."
His boss smiled in an unexpectedly warm way, then patted Vernon's back. "No worries. Just keep trying. You'll make a sale." The man jerked round and sauntered down the aisle eavesdropping in on the other agents, occasionally stopping to provide direction.
From that point on, Vernon always stuck to the script. It didn't seem to help though; it took a week before he made his first sale. After awhile, Vernon grew numb to the constant rejection. Most of the time, it took him nearly a 100 dials before he spoke to anyone. He was called all manner of obscenities. If most had it right, Vernon and his entire ilk were the worst of the worst.
* * *
"How was work today?" asked Vernon's aunt when he collapsed into the couch. He stared back with glazed eyes and shallow breath. "That good, huh? Well, you got to make a living somehow, right?" Vernon rolled his eyes toward his computer and sighed.
'Something has to happen,' Vernon thought, 'Something exciting, or this whole story that is my life is going nowhere.'
CHAPTER 3
Beneath the slim smear of grime, a glow emanated from the City Lights Bookstore door window. The wind picked up and rattled the door.
Vernon looked up and down the street again. 'Nope,' he thought. 'Nothing's different. They all still look like they're stuck in 1950.' He rubbed his eyes, gave his surrounding one last look, took a deep breath, then turned the door knob to the infamous bookstore.
All around were books, some ramshackled others sparkling new, lining the simple wooden shelves. It took Vernon by surprise. The smell of fresh ink and musty pages mingled in his nostrils with the smell of over-boiled coffee grounds.
Someone shuffled pages from behind one of the racks, rose to their feet and cleared their throat before rounding the end of the shelves. It was the man he ran into on the street. He had combed his hair down, cleaned his glasses and tucked in his button down shirt. He also wore the uniform of those in the literati: a tweed jacket with patches on the elbows. His coffee mug steamed with weak coffee and copious amounts of dry creamer. He cleared his throat and began to speak. "Have any questions? Speak up if you do. I'm working back here." He turned and rounded the shelves. The sound of scribbling ensued.
Vernon rose his hand slightly and began to gape like a fish out of water. He tried to speak, but nothing would come. He rubbed his eyes, took a gander around and found that nothing changed. 'Should I pinch myself, or would that be too cliché?'
"Too cliché," he muttered.
The scratch of writing ceased and the man in the back said, "What's that?"
"Um..." Vernon searched for the right words but found none. "Nothing." He walked toward where the man sat, and then loomed there.
The man at the desk tapped his pen, staring at Vernon and waiting for him to say something, anything at all.
15 May 2010
Vernon Story Tweets - April 2010
Despite advice found in every issue of "Writers Digest," Vernon had come to recognize no one gets published without connections. New York was too big, his neighborhood too buried, for him to garner any meaningful connections with publishers. Besides, New York publishers didn't really appreciate his experimental form of prose. Heck, no one really cared for it.
That wasn't exactly true. An agent from San Fransisco had fawned over Vernon's submission during a recent author conference.
* * *
"It's about time someone had some guts," said the agent from the writers' conference. "And it's even readable." The man gritted his teeth as he read through Vernon's brief manuscript. At best, it was a novella. The man's legged twitched. "Yes, yes, yes!" The people in line at the Harper-Collins table lurched in sync as the small press agent burst out with approval. "Let me take this back to my boss," the agent said. "It's exactly the kind of experimentation he loves."
Vernon bit his bottom lip and wished he had spent the money to print up a copy of his manuscript. "But that's my only copy."
"Well," said the hirsute agent. "When you're ready to get serious about publishing give me a call." He handed Vernon his card with the manuscript. The paper was bare, except for the man's name, phone number, and email.
"Where are you located?" The agent didn't hear him at first; he was too busy shaking his head at the authors in the Haper-Collins line. "Excuse me," Vernon spoke a little louder.
The agent turned and said, "Made a copy of your manuscript already?"
Vernon blushed and stammered over the restatement of his request.
"San Fran, baby!" The agent swiped his finger across his nose.
Vernon thanked him and wandered down the aisle, winding his way around lines of would-be authors queued up at the major houses.
* * *
The subway all but emptied after the first stop. Vernon had found a paper clip and attached the agent's card to his manuscript. 'Experimental?' He stared at the ream of paper awhile, then let an all-too audible groan. 'I wasn't going for experimental. Come on, vern. Put this in perspective. He liked it. He really liked it. No one's told you they liked your writing before.'
He looked up, scanning the remaining people in the car. One woman fiddled incessantly with her iPhone while a vagrant watched her. Two seats down, a man read a paperback novel that looked as though it once resided in some back alley gutter. Vernon returned his gaze to the business card on his manuscript. 'How different could San Fran be from the Big Apple?'
The subway screeched to a stop with more urgency than normal. The woman dropped her iPhone, but the vagrant caught it before it hit the floor. The woman looked terrified, unsure if she should reach out for her gadget or write it off as lost. The bum extended the phone back out to her.
The guy two seats down watched the whole scene go down, his brows furrowed mostly at the woman now cuddling her phone.
Vernon went back to the card and his work. "How different, indeed," he mumbled making the woman squirm even more than before.
* * *
Standing at the threshold of his mom's abandoned apartment, Vernon scanned for anything he might have left behind. His pillow and blanket lay crumpled in soft rolling hills beside the deep indents where the couch used to rest. The pillow was new, full, plump. His aunt gave it to him for Christmas. His mom scowled at the gift.
His Aunt Joanie had kicked him out a couple years back and enjoyed not-so-subtly razzing her sister for taking in Vernon.
That wasn't exactly true. An agent from San Fransisco had fawned over Vernon's submission during a recent author conference.
* * *
"It's about time someone had some guts," said the agent from the writers' conference. "And it's even readable." The man gritted his teeth as he read through Vernon's brief manuscript. At best, it was a novella. The man's legged twitched. "Yes, yes, yes!" The people in line at the Harper-Collins table lurched in sync as the small press agent burst out with approval. "Let me take this back to my boss," the agent said. "It's exactly the kind of experimentation he loves."
Vernon bit his bottom lip and wished he had spent the money to print up a copy of his manuscript. "But that's my only copy."
"Well," said the hirsute agent. "When you're ready to get serious about publishing give me a call." He handed Vernon his card with the manuscript. The paper was bare, except for the man's name, phone number, and email.
"Where are you located?" The agent didn't hear him at first; he was too busy shaking his head at the authors in the Haper-Collins line. "Excuse me," Vernon spoke a little louder.
The agent turned and said, "Made a copy of your manuscript already?"
Vernon blushed and stammered over the restatement of his request.
"San Fran, baby!" The agent swiped his finger across his nose.
Vernon thanked him and wandered down the aisle, winding his way around lines of would-be authors queued up at the major houses.
* * *
The subway all but emptied after the first stop. Vernon had found a paper clip and attached the agent's card to his manuscript. 'Experimental?' He stared at the ream of paper awhile, then let an all-too audible groan. 'I wasn't going for experimental. Come on, vern. Put this in perspective. He liked it. He really liked it. No one's told you they liked your writing before.'
He looked up, scanning the remaining people in the car. One woman fiddled incessantly with her iPhone while a vagrant watched her. Two seats down, a man read a paperback novel that looked as though it once resided in some back alley gutter. Vernon returned his gaze to the business card on his manuscript. 'How different could San Fran be from the Big Apple?'
The subway screeched to a stop with more urgency than normal. The woman dropped her iPhone, but the vagrant caught it before it hit the floor. The woman looked terrified, unsure if she should reach out for her gadget or write it off as lost. The bum extended the phone back out to her.
The guy two seats down watched the whole scene go down, his brows furrowed mostly at the woman now cuddling her phone.
Vernon went back to the card and his work. "How different, indeed," he mumbled making the woman squirm even more than before.
* * *
Standing at the threshold of his mom's abandoned apartment, Vernon scanned for anything he might have left behind. His pillow and blanket lay crumpled in soft rolling hills beside the deep indents where the couch used to rest. The pillow was new, full, plump. His aunt gave it to him for Christmas. His mom scowled at the gift.
His Aunt Joanie had kicked him out a couple years back and enjoyed not-so-subtly razzing her sister for taking in Vernon.
31 March 2010
Vernon Story Tweets - March 2010
He rolled his eyes, sighed, leaned back and grabbed the hair near his temples. "I won't publish anytime soon if you keep hounding me." Vernon looked to the clock, dropped his hands, slammed his laptop shut and dashed for the door. Editing awaited.
"Vernon!" His mother yelled after him as he dashed out the door. "Vernon, remember today's the day."
* * *
The wind whipped his cheeks even harder as the city bus flew past him. Again, he'd missed the bus and would have to run to work. 'So much for a raise,' Vernon thought as droplets of sweat rolled down the nape of his neck and chilled his back.
He slipped through the warehouse doors, up through the stairwell past the smoking warehouse supervisor and into his chilled chair. His monitor crackled to life as he flicked the mouse. His eyes probed over the cubicle. John, his manager, was nowhere in sight. "All clear." Vernon sighed as he relaxed back into his chair.
"What's all clear?" The sound of his boss behind him made him lurch. "Got something for you, Vern." The smirk on the clean-shaven, slick-haired man with the steaming coffee cup made him squirm.
Vernon's chair squeaked as he turned to face his boss. He wondered if his boss noticed his legs quaking with anticipation and trepidation.
The man with the mug reached inside his shirt pocket and pulled out an official looking envelope and placed it in Vernon's shaking hands. "Congratulations," said his boss before walking back to his corner office. Vernon watched the man's chuckling back walk away.
Vernon held the envelope, too afraid his raise request was rejected. But his boss had congratulated him, hadn't he? He fumbled to open the envelope, finally ripping one end open. The meat of the document within was torn and pink.
* * *
The letter said he had until the end of the day to vacate his cubicle, but he didn't need that much time to pack up his meager items. He had plenty of time to catch the bus back to his mom's house but opted to walk instead. 'Delaying the inevitable,' he thought.
As he passed the welfare office, he had to step into the street to get around the crowd of people clustered around the block. A cab squealed up beside Vernon and rolled down his window. "Need a ride buddy?" With a whopping $3 in his wallet, Vernon declined.
Five steps from his mom's front door, thunder rolled and the sudden deluge of rain soaked him to the bone before he entered the house. Vernon turned his eyes to the sky and thought, 'Why must my entire life be such a cliche?' He turned the knob only to find it locked.
Even with the deafening patter of rain, passers-by were startled by his deep groan. Some kid asked his mom, "Is he right in the head?"
He sighed and lifted the sopping wet doormat, searching for the spare key. It was gone, but a soaked envelope awaited him. The heavy pen lines had started to run, but Vernon could make out the message well enough: "The back door's unlocked." There really was no back door at his mom's place. What she meant was that the window around back was unlocked.
Vernon managed to climb the fire escape to the apartment's window that overlooked the grimy alley. As promised, it opened. As he stumbled through the window, he noticed that the apartment was virtually empty. Within a few short hours, his mom had moved out. His room was untouched and a few kitchen and bathroom items littered the rest of the apartment. Another letter waited for him.
"Vernon!" His mother yelled after him as he dashed out the door. "Vernon, remember today's the day."
* * *
The wind whipped his cheeks even harder as the city bus flew past him. Again, he'd missed the bus and would have to run to work. 'So much for a raise,' Vernon thought as droplets of sweat rolled down the nape of his neck and chilled his back.
He slipped through the warehouse doors, up through the stairwell past the smoking warehouse supervisor and into his chilled chair. His monitor crackled to life as he flicked the mouse. His eyes probed over the cubicle. John, his manager, was nowhere in sight. "All clear." Vernon sighed as he relaxed back into his chair.
"What's all clear?" The sound of his boss behind him made him lurch. "Got something for you, Vern." The smirk on the clean-shaven, slick-haired man with the steaming coffee cup made him squirm.
Vernon's chair squeaked as he turned to face his boss. He wondered if his boss noticed his legs quaking with anticipation and trepidation.
The man with the mug reached inside his shirt pocket and pulled out an official looking envelope and placed it in Vernon's shaking hands. "Congratulations," said his boss before walking back to his corner office. Vernon watched the man's chuckling back walk away.
Vernon held the envelope, too afraid his raise request was rejected. But his boss had congratulated him, hadn't he? He fumbled to open the envelope, finally ripping one end open. The meat of the document within was torn and pink.
* * *
The letter said he had until the end of the day to vacate his cubicle, but he didn't need that much time to pack up his meager items. He had plenty of time to catch the bus back to his mom's house but opted to walk instead. 'Delaying the inevitable,' he thought.
As he passed the welfare office, he had to step into the street to get around the crowd of people clustered around the block. A cab squealed up beside Vernon and rolled down his window. "Need a ride buddy?" With a whopping $3 in his wallet, Vernon declined.
Five steps from his mom's front door, thunder rolled and the sudden deluge of rain soaked him to the bone before he entered the house. Vernon turned his eyes to the sky and thought, 'Why must my entire life be such a cliche?' He turned the knob only to find it locked.
Even with the deafening patter of rain, passers-by were startled by his deep groan. Some kid asked his mom, "Is he right in the head?"
He sighed and lifted the sopping wet doormat, searching for the spare key. It was gone, but a soaked envelope awaited him. The heavy pen lines had started to run, but Vernon could make out the message well enough: "The back door's unlocked." There really was no back door at his mom's place. What she meant was that the window around back was unlocked.
Vernon managed to climb the fire escape to the apartment's window that overlooked the grimy alley. As promised, it opened. As he stumbled through the window, he noticed that the apartment was virtually empty. Within a few short hours, his mom had moved out. His room was untouched and a few kitchen and bathroom items littered the rest of the apartment. Another letter waited for him.
Dear Vern,New York was no place to try and make it on your own. Now that his mom had moved out, the landlord was sure to raise the rent. People in the Midwest bought mansions with mortgages that compared to this roach-infested two-bedroom flat. How could he afford it? 'Besides,' thought Vernon, 'How much chance do I really stand in New York? I need to switch coasts, need to get out West."
I'm sick of harping on you and hoping you will get your life in order. I'm tired of you relying on me to take care of you. It's time for my little boy to grow up. You can keep this place if you can afford the rent, but let's face it, you can't.
When you get your shit together and find a permanent place to live, let your Aunt Joanie know and I'll be in touch.
Love,
Mom
08 February 2010
Vernon Story Tweets – January 2010
"I could've written that," Vernon thought as he closed Kerouac's "On the Road" and laid it on the side table. "Born in the wrong era." That's what he thought whenever he read anything written by the Beat writers.
For more than two decades, Vernon submitted short stories and novellas to publishers. He had the stack of rejection letters to prove it. It's not that he didn't enjoy the Beat writers. It's just that what they wrote was so simple, so direct, so fun.
Vernon sneered at his dog-eared copy of "On The Road." "Kerouac. He couldn't write his way out of a paper bag." He picked up the book in one hand and bowed it in the middle. "I was born in the wrong era."
A knock at the door startled Vernon. The pages of the book shuffled like a deck of cards before falling to the floor. He looked at the door as though it were a loaded gun pointed at his head. No one he knew ever visited him at his 12x12 studio. In San Francisco, you could never use enough caution when it came to answering your door. "Where's a peephole when you need one?"
The knock came again, a little louder this time. Vernon recoiled slightly, a sense of dread creeping up from his gut. "Who is it?" He heard no response and called out a little louder. Whoever stood on the other side of the door rapped harder and with more urgency.
Vernon moved to the door and pressed his ear against the flimsy wood. Cartoon noises resonated from someone's TV down the hall. The loudest knock yet boomed into his ear drum. He jumped back. His heart leapt. Stars ushered in a blinding whiteness. As the whiteness consumed him, Vernon saw his door burst open and a dark figure step through, reaching out for him.
* * *
"Ding ding. Ding ding." Vernon's eyes fluttered open. His apartment floorboards vibrated a little less as the trolley passed outside. Bright morning light filtered through his window, splashing across his eyes and obscuring his view. "How long have I been out?"
The lighting hinted at a morning hour. He blinked until his ceiling came into focus. Gone were the peeling flecks of paint. The slide-whistle call of someone slipping on a banana peel blasted through the wall, the same cartoon that was playing before his fall. The animated funnies now came from next door, the sounds of the program so clear Vernon felt like a blind man watching TV.
"What the hell you doing in here, boy?" The voice, a rich blend deep south and inner city Chicago, lunged at Vernon. A dark fist clutched his shirt and lifted him from the ground. A sweet burning scent danced over the hulking man's shoulders. "Don't make ax you again." The menace of the man's voice shook Vernon to his core.
Vernon stammered and looked around the room. His vision started to clear and all around him came into focus. The stranger pinned him against the wall by his throat. Vernon couldn't explain his presence even if knew.
The man's nostrils flared and his eyes opened wide. He released his grip on Vernon's neck and dashed for the black cloud of burned grits. Vernon grabbed the door handle, jerking the door open to make his great escape. He hadn't counted on the slide chain lock. Before he could slide the chain free, the angry man slammed him against the wall and stuck a blade in his face.
Then the angry contortions of the man's face twisted into that of confusion. He slowly turned his head toward, then back again. He squared his face with Vernon's, one eyebrow obtusely raised. They both turned their gaze back to the firmly locked slide chain.
The boi-oi-oing of someone stepping on a rake and getting smacked in the face came from the television next door. The man lowered the blade ever-so-slowly and loosened his grip on Vernon.
This is a monthly compilation of tweets posted throughout the month of January 2010. Want to read along? Follow me on Twitter @kylestich.
For more than two decades, Vernon submitted short stories and novellas to publishers. He had the stack of rejection letters to prove it. It's not that he didn't enjoy the Beat writers. It's just that what they wrote was so simple, so direct, so fun.
Vernon sneered at his dog-eared copy of "On The Road." "Kerouac. He couldn't write his way out of a paper bag." He picked up the book in one hand and bowed it in the middle. "I was born in the wrong era."
A knock at the door startled Vernon. The pages of the book shuffled like a deck of cards before falling to the floor. He looked at the door as though it were a loaded gun pointed at his head. No one he knew ever visited him at his 12x12 studio. In San Francisco, you could never use enough caution when it came to answering your door. "Where's a peephole when you need one?"
The knock came again, a little louder this time. Vernon recoiled slightly, a sense of dread creeping up from his gut. "Who is it?" He heard no response and called out a little louder. Whoever stood on the other side of the door rapped harder and with more urgency.
Vernon moved to the door and pressed his ear against the flimsy wood. Cartoon noises resonated from someone's TV down the hall. The loudest knock yet boomed into his ear drum. He jumped back. His heart leapt. Stars ushered in a blinding whiteness. As the whiteness consumed him, Vernon saw his door burst open and a dark figure step through, reaching out for him.
* * *
"Ding ding. Ding ding." Vernon's eyes fluttered open. His apartment floorboards vibrated a little less as the trolley passed outside. Bright morning light filtered through his window, splashing across his eyes and obscuring his view. "How long have I been out?"
The lighting hinted at a morning hour. He blinked until his ceiling came into focus. Gone were the peeling flecks of paint. The slide-whistle call of someone slipping on a banana peel blasted through the wall, the same cartoon that was playing before his fall. The animated funnies now came from next door, the sounds of the program so clear Vernon felt like a blind man watching TV.
"What the hell you doing in here, boy?" The voice, a rich blend deep south and inner city Chicago, lunged at Vernon. A dark fist clutched his shirt and lifted him from the ground. A sweet burning scent danced over the hulking man's shoulders. "Don't make ax you again." The menace of the man's voice shook Vernon to his core.
Vernon stammered and looked around the room. His vision started to clear and all around him came into focus. The stranger pinned him against the wall by his throat. Vernon couldn't explain his presence even if knew.
The man's nostrils flared and his eyes opened wide. He released his grip on Vernon's neck and dashed for the black cloud of burned grits. Vernon grabbed the door handle, jerking the door open to make his great escape. He hadn't counted on the slide chain lock. Before he could slide the chain free, the angry man slammed him against the wall and stuck a blade in his face.
Then the angry contortions of the man's face twisted into that of confusion. He slowly turned his head toward, then back again. He squared his face with Vernon's, one eyebrow obtusely raised. They both turned their gaze back to the firmly locked slide chain.
The boi-oi-oing of someone stepping on a rake and getting smacked in the face came from the television next door. The man lowered the blade ever-so-slowly and loosened his grip on Vernon.
This is a monthly compilation of tweets posted throughout the month of January 2010. Want to read along? Follow me on Twitter @kylestich.
Introducing My Story Tweets
On 1 January 2010, I began a new writing project via my Twitter account. Each day, I tweet one sentence, sometimes more depending on the length of the preceding sentence. Each sentence serves as the next line in an overall story.
My goal is to tweet once a day, every day for one year. In the end, I should end up with a complete story that is 40,000 - 50,000 words in length.
I've milled around this story for awhile. It is somewhat reminiscent of Kurt Vonnegut, in that there are sci-fi elements. Here's the basic storyline:
I have a four-part strategy to crafting and publishing this story:
I encourage each of you aspiring writers to follow suit and start tweeting out a story. If you've always wanted to write a novel, but never seem to find the time, Twitter is the answer. You merely need to type up to 140 characters a day, including spaces and punctuation.
Not a writer but want to read along? Follow me on Twitter @kylestich.
My goal is to tweet once a day, every day for one year. In the end, I should end up with a complete story that is 40,000 - 50,000 words in length.
I've milled around this story for awhile. It is somewhat reminiscent of Kurt Vonnegut, in that there are sci-fi elements. Here's the basic storyline:
Feeling as though he were born fifty years too late, a desperate writer unwittingly travels back to the Beat Generation in an attempt to beat Jack Kerouac to the punch.
I have a four-part strategy to crafting and publishing this story:
- Phase 1 - Tweet one sentence (or more if space affords it) per day.
- Phase 2 - Compile and blog all my story-related tweets on my blog at the end of each month.
- Phase 3 - Create a WebRing exclusive to the chapters of this story.
- Phase 4 - Revise and then self-publish my tweets at the start of 2011.
I encourage each of you aspiring writers to follow suit and start tweeting out a story. If you've always wanted to write a novel, but never seem to find the time, Twitter is the answer. You merely need to type up to 140 characters a day, including spaces and punctuation.
Not a writer but want to read along? Follow me on Twitter @kylestich.
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