Mattrick's Written Works

[Mattrick]

Rabid Euphoria

Rabid Euphoria May 23, 2006

Rabid Euphoria Pages 8-11

Rabid Euphoria Pages 11-17

Rabid Euphoria Pages 17-22

The Catacombs (Short Story)

first few pages of a script

Nova Cane

Many Ports In A Storm

Novel re-write help

Novel re-write continued

Novel re-write Prologue

Novel re-write Prologue & Act One





Rabid Euphoria


Part One - Three Musketeers

Chapter One - Car Accident


There was a chill in the air outside but Lloyd doubted highly it was provided from the dampness that engulfed the city after this morning’s rainstorm. Regardless a shiver surged through his body and his hands pulled into his sleeves like a turtle shell. He could faintly see his breath in the flaming atmosphere as what remained of the sun was about to retire over the horizon for the night. I’m glad I've got my trusty toque. It’s fuckin’ frigid, he thought to himself and pulled a cigarette from his pocket through his protective sleeves. A puff of smoke escaped the flash of cinder and he discarded the match as well as the empty pack of smokes on the sidewalk.


Several cars raced by him clearly exploding through the speed limit. It could have very well been his imagination but he could have worn that one of the vehicles was being driven by a screaming teenager but he wasn’t screaming as many teenagers screamed to music or simply for the sake of being loud. He looked terrified. He dismissed it as the buzz he gained from the six pack he leveled before leaving fifteen minutes ago and continued walking.

Often he thought about his friends being as they were the only two people in his life anymore; Andy and Darren. It’s amazing a group of guys so different yet so alike could co-exist in this crazy world. Andy, of course was a smack head and Darren did every kind of drug under the horizon as long as long made him forget. Lloyd on the other hand was partial to the sauce and he sauced it up every night. One of the reasons his wife left him and took the kids. Of course, the abuse he put her through several drunken nights certainly didn’t help in that department. Every night he wished he could turn back the hands of time and retract all his past mistakes and love his family the way they were entitled to be but they called them wishes for a reason. Wishes were never granted. Not many people like him could find solace with people like Andy and Darren but nothing could feel more right. Or was it just plain easy? He wasn’t sure.


Lloyd tried to see his children sleeping. Frannie being four and Michael being seven before the divorce, he found it impossible. All he was able to depict was blackness. He considered this for a moment and drew from his cigarette. Jess had taken the kids five years ago and since the only glances he’d been allowed were the illegal ones at a distance from his car. The sentence was carried out by the Honourable ‘Judge Grudge’. Never in his life had he wanted to strangle somebody with a more psychotic rage. A man he hardly knew (nor cared for) took his kids away from him, leaving him with nothing but two hours every two weeks for visitation rights. During these periods Fran and Michael were in Prague and only spoke up if they needed something out of their reach and when they got what they wanted they thanked him with a sneer of such contempt you’d never think it was a little child giving it. These visits only lasted for five months as during the eleventh visit his emotions took control and he got very drunk. When Jess came for the kids and seen his state she called Child Services and they assessed him unfit to care for children solo and during visitation periods he would be in a state facility under supervision. Lloyd knew this would piss the kids off even more so he declined and said he’d be better off alone. Those hours alone with his darlings were more agonizing than the entire break-up.


For years Lloyd would lie in bed, the ceiling spinning, vomiting into a little red bucket at the bedside cursing Jess’ name in drunken slurs for everything she had done to him. One night in the haze of toxins he realized that perhaps he’d done it all to himself. Perhaps he had. When around Andy and Darren he’d often wonder what choices they made to end up where they were and if they had deserved it. Did Lloyd feel he deserved everything that has happened to him? He did until he wandered further down the path stopping at all the dives and slums getting so plastered at times he couldn’t even remember whose names he was cursing.


He tossed his cigarette on the sidewalk and when he stomped it out there was a loud crash from behind. Every instinct told him to run but the human mind was ever curious and in these days such sounds pumped the adrenaline and the thought of seeing disaster excited him. The line he ran was surprisingly straight and there was only one step where he almost keeled over. It was difficult to tell what the commotion was all about with the growing crowd around the scene but he could see a rising cloud of smoke and blue metal; a car crash.

T
he blue car was on its roof with the rear tires still spinning frantic to grip the pavement. Fluids leaked from the front end which had been smashed beyond all recognition. On the other side was a black SUV with a crumpled front end and the driver of it was leaning on the hood of the car, blood streaming from his nose but looked otherwise fine. Obviously the little mid-size car was no match for it. Exhaust still smoked from the muffler like a metallic cigarette which made him crave one. There was incoherent screaming pouring from the wreck but he could pick out there being two voices; a male a female. Sparks flew out from the under carriage and a puff of a flame appeared. The female voice let out an ear piercing scream and several people from the crowd covered their ears and then it fell silent, save for the snapping of flames.


It wasn’t until he was closer that he realized he recognized the car from somewhere in the back of his mind. Maybe it was Jess’ car and the kids were in the back seat and every part of his sorrow would be gone. A sick thought but many people are prone to them. Even sickening was the toothy and drunken grin which crossed his face.


“Somebody call an ambulance!” a woman screamed through the crowd and Lloyd saw dozens of people with their cell phones primed to the number already.


Someone ran from a clothing store with a fire extinguisher and vanquished the fire. If the gas tank had of blown not only would the people inside have been killed but some the onlookers as well. Thank goodness for small favours. Lloyd supposed the entire world wasn’t shit and seeing the way all these strangers worked together brought up a brief twinge of hope. He moved to the left around the crowd to catch a better glimpse of the car and it was when he found himself behind a rotund gentleman he could recognize the driver. It was the car with screaming teenager in it. The driver had to be no older than seventeen and was probably driving illegally. Blood covered half his face in a crimson mask and a large chunk of skin was missing from his right shoulder. His bloodied hand reach out of the wreck and someone from the crowd went to grab it.


“Don’t touch him!” the rotund gentleman in front of Lloyd yelled and ran up to the young man. The young man looked at him with startled surprise and anger.

“Man, if we don’t help this kid fast he could end up as dead everyone else in the car!”

“Don’t do anything or you might kill this boy. If you pull the wrong way you could paralyze him if he’s got a broken back, sever a nerve or kill him. Do you really want that on your conscience? That your impatience caused this boy who could very well have been saved by professionals to die?”


The young man backed off and the rotund gentleman bent down and said something too low for Lloyd to hear to the bloodied boy. The young man scratched his head in a gesture that seemed too comical for the dire situation. Someone from the crowd roared that an ambulance and fire and crews were on their way. There was a murmur of applause from the gathering of strangers.


When the rotund man turned towards Lloyd again his face was pallid and his eyes empty as if someone had told him the gravest news. Lloyd couldn’t help but ask what the boy had said if he’d said anything at all. “He told me it was the man eaters that did this. They stormed his house in the outskirts of the city and attacked his family.” Lloyd swallowed and reached into his pants pocket for his smokes and remembered being fresh out. He asked the rotund man if he smoked and the rotund man offered him one and even lit it to boot.

“Is that all he said?” Lloyd asked after skirting around the question as he enjoyed the first drags of smoke.

The rotund man was mute for a moment before commenting. “No, he said something else. He said that it didn’t stop there. What do you suppose he was trying to say?”


Lloyd simply shook his head and continued to stare and the bleeding boy and listened as the bellowing screams turned from jumbled words to incoherent moaning. He couldn’t take anymore, thanked the man for the cigarette and bid him good evening. The man returned the thanks with a nod but never took his eyes off the accident. Several minutes later when he was blocks away he could hear the ambulance arrive. He wondered if the boy would survive and how he would take knowing that his family is most likely dead. How would he - could he - go on living after this? He knew what it was like to have a ‘dead’ family.

It made Lloyd want to drink but then again, almost everything did.

[Steve]

RE: Rabid Euphoria

Man, I love the work you've done over on .net, and I urge you to keep it up. Maybe design a book cover or something.

[Mattrick]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

I'm nearly finished...have about thirty pages to go in first draft.

[Mattrick]

I had a school assignment to write a short story. This story is meant to be my second novel but with me still working on the first it was difficult for my to concentrate on my old novel with this one invading my thoughts. There is a limit and I could only include the bare bare essentials and it is pretty compacted.

Looking for critique on techniques, style and voice. Just making sure it doesn't vary. It felt pretty constant to me when I read it a few days after I wrote it.



The Catacombs


He sat in the house. It was empty, unforgiving. At least it was free. Only the study, kitchen and bedroom contained furniture and that wouldn’t change. Nothing will change. Six months his lethargic apathy had paralyzed him. Then again, this house was a change of scenery; his penthouse apartment was corrupted with love. Claire’s aunt had left the house to her a week after he’d died. Naturally, it was signed over to him through a marriage license. The house – half a mansion – was not without its creeps; dim-lit hallways, dank basement and a half rotting, antique bathtub. Many of the floorboards creaked, the doors loud.

For months he’d tried to convince her to quit her networking job since he’d published several books, acquiring a convenient cash flow. An argument about it was their last experience. Claire and him came from a small town and she was afraid of losing face with wealth. She insisted on taking the train even, to grasp normalcy. She boarded the 8:25 to Dundas and never arrived. It derailed, ninety-six people died including his wife.

When she jumped the tracks so did he. Writing has become impossible. Sometimes he’ll sit for hours writing a mere sentence before deleting it. Everything he wrote was pure crap. Sleep was impossible. That is why he drinks. Lately he’d gotten into the painkillers left over from Claire’s surgery last year – an axis ally. Late nights spent in large beds were torture.

Last night he’d dreamed, of a crawlspace filled with cobwebs and spiders. An abominable force was there. She was also there. A terrible force was keeping her from me. Unseen. Malignant. Noxious. For a moment he thought he could smell her perfume before awaking. He stroked the bottle, sitting in a fold-up chair surveying the basement door. The realtor mentioned a crawlspace yet hadn’t showed him it. He wanted to go, just wanted to be sure. It wasn’t even arachnophobia that worried him.

It was that thing.

Assuring himself it was a mere dream wasn’t a possibility. Rational thought grew faint, translucent in vision. When he drank the whiskey he didn’t taste it, he was already hammered. That dream dug deep. It was the closest he’d been to her in six months. No soul or task remained. In life, he was two things; husband and writer. Both duties wisped away.

Enough.

The crawlspace summoned. Already he could feel the tingles of hundreds of prickly legs on his skin. When he opened the door it groaned. Each step creaked and clunked under the pressure of his weight. An overhead light contributed little to his vision. It was an old basement; the walls constructed of large, grey stones and red brick above that. A rusted woodstove and wood stack to his left. Around the back of the stairs was the crawlspace. Several boxes sat in front of the door.

When he opened the door, his heart skipped, taking notice of the frigid draft. A small spider crawled from the crack of the waist-high door. It was enough to stop his movement. A stale cobweb slung from the door frame spoke to him. Not literal words but an off perception. He was told to retreat, that death and madness awaited him – stale.

A queer draft blew back his hair, exhaled from sordid lungs. The breath of the beast failed to deter him. Claire and his will were held hostage. He needed it. Death was a reasonable payment.

The doorknob grew colder against his palm. Insanity was awful. Automatism could be another world for it. Involuntary functions of the mind. No part of him wanted to believe the crawlspace contained hellions yet he believed it. Poking his head into the darkness beyond the door he fathomed comfortable lunacy.

Cobwebs caressed his face as he crawled. Much of it was empty save for dust balls shaped like boxes. Grits of cement scraped his palms. From his pocket he removed a small flashlight. Ahead were more cobwebs and he though he spotted guising spiders. Then legs crawled across his hand. He yelped, rather girlish from the fright. It was the respect he gave spiders that terrified him; nature’s perfect predator. He truly believed if they banded together they could overtake the world.

Ahead there was a green square, fashioned with vertical golden etching. The reflection was blinding. It was a door, eerie in its freshness. Not a single cobweb, absent of dust and the colours were vibrant. The door was decorated with a ruby, an emerald and a pearl stacked vertical. Without words he understood it; Claire. Red hair, green eyed; precious.

Boundless, torrential atrocities prepared. Gnawing mandibles and clawing talons and stinking abominations. How he knew this he could not say. A stray omnipotence propelled him through the doorway with no breeze, only stale.

Claire’s door closed, a phantom hatch winched shut.

For twenty minutes he crawled through grubby roots hanging from the dirt tunnel. His elbows drove his body, his mind drove his elbows and his vacancy drove his mind. He pushed, relentless. When he came to the end he climbed onto his palms and toppled, drunk.

It was a passageway; ancient by impression. Torches illuminated the passage way, a staircase swooped down and right. The architecture was remarkable, unlike any he’d ever seen. The ceiling resembled a steeple. Though, it couldn’t be higher than fifteen feet. Sandstone blocks were designed for the wall to appear to flow like a river. There was no choice, he had to move. Something was tearing for him.

Bearing a torch he descended further into lunacy.

At the bottom of the stairs happened upon a door constructed of cast iron. Its weight was tremendous. All of him opened the door, its deep whine echoing through the next chamber. This chamber was much smaller, homely. Ten feet ahead was another door, small (like Claire’s door) but plain. He opened it and looked inside. The crawlspace was only two or three times his length and he could see a light as well as a table leg.

No hesitation existed, only an aching destitution. The fit was tight but he was able to pass through it without much effort. An old wooden table was in front of him. There were three places set with clean, white china. It was a kitchen, he could smell roast. It didn’t make any sense. The room was dilapidated with luxury dinnerware.

There was a door and it opened to a hallway. Upon further investigation he found two doors in the ‘L’ shaped hall. Inside the first was a bedroom. Though rundown, it was far from dirty. A single candle was lit beside the bed, a pair of glasses beside them. They were hers, he knew it. He picked them up and smelled them – lavender, definitely hers.

He called her but received no acknowledgement; alone and asunder. Comprehension throbbed in his head. Ignorance was bliss.. This proves he wasn’t crazy, that this was all real and she needed him. But this place, it defies logic.

The glasses turned to ash in his hand, leaving it’s remnants on his palm. Onward he would have to go. Pieces of her weren’t enough.

When he opened the door to the second bedroom his heart stopped. The walls were draped in dark red sheets. There were three beds beside each other, white sheets draped over bodies. It was their featureless faces – the noses – he noticed first. Two candles were lit and they blew out; a tendril of dense black faded in their stead.

A coarse pressure expanded around him. His hair went numb, his eyes stung. Something was coming. He didn’t know what it was and he didn’t want to know. There was no sound, no notification. He just felt it.

Knew it.

As he ran he knew it was getting closer and it was fast, ripping apart whole worlds just for him. It was years faster than him. He threw open the door into the kitchen. Faces, boneless, were laid on the fine china. A man was eating a woman’s face, cutting with a knife, a mild stream of blood. All he noticed was the stranger’s plain report before lunging into the crawlspace.

As fast as his elbows could pull he pushed. A wall imploded, he could taste the dust. The pressure was so intense he waited for an eyeball to burst from its socket and his ears to hemorrhage. A sulphorous odour emanated from the fiend. He pushed open the door and felt the brief touch of alien before slamming it shut behind him.

It screamed and pounded on the door then outright vanished. Embodiment of terror, pure evil is what he felt tearing towards him. In the dense silence he heaved and wiped the sweat from his brow. A peculiar thought entered his head; it was tearing through this place yet this flimsy door halted it. He decided it was best not to question good graces.

A new door had materialized. It was a deep, crimson red and decorated with strange wood cuts. One showed a sailboat going off a waterfall and another while another presented a woman in a rocking chair. Each individual picture represented something subtle, too subtle. What was its purpose? Who made it? They were questions lacking answers and voices without words. When he touched the knob, it was ice cold. A bad omen, perhaps, but Claire was beyond this door.

They were both green and ambitious, only sampling life. A cosmic force killed them. How was he supposed to start over when he’d barely learned to start? Thirty days of insomnia, drinking, writer’s block and grief. Last week his brother, after weeks of irritation coerced him to lunch. It was a listless affair, the dialogue faded from his memory. No two conversations have lacked exhausting empathy and feeble endorphins. The love he felt for his brother was authentic. However, he’d banished love in all forms.

When he awoke this morning he’d the platonic presence of death. He dreamt of a crawlspace, but what of this place? What fiendish force induced this? A faint murmur begged for reconsideration. It was too late.

Inside the door was a cavern. Jagged spikes of earth rutted the landscape. It was quite expansive in height but narrow, like a coffin standing up. A folded note, donned by a lone torch was placed beside him. The writing was feminine, scrawled in scarlet ink.

S’ Bye Dear

Lavender, it reeked of it. He inhaled its narcotic nurture. Tears welled to near escape but he convalesced. When the paper ignited in his hands it floated away. Another piece burned away. There was no fighting, he cried with the utmost shame. He hated crying. Being a wounded fawn watching the wolf lick its gums. Avoidance allowed it to brood. He grabbed the torch and continued into the damp passage.

Several bats flew overhead. Smutty supplies of disease. As he walked he heard the bats vision, from the left then overhead. Not creatures particularly to his liking but tolerable. Fluttering by his face, he dodged one. There was the matter of rabies. He swung around the torch to warn them, before continuing forward. Minutes later the bats were behind him and the cavern began to narrow. It was a hydro minefield. Reflection of the fire made it difficult to discern distance.

What was that noise echoing forth? Did it exist? He listened, the fire roaring beside his head. It was so faint…

Cold filtered the air. A chill climbed his spine before sinking into his head. What was up there and why was he so afraid? He’d sensed the abomination but what of it?

Pressing forward he avoided the water. Visibility wasn’t more than fifteen feet. Some thing could be perched, tensed. The sound of water spelunking echoed but there was something subtle looming beyond it.

There was something off to the side, an old typewriter. It was hefty, made of dense metal. Claire’s birthday gift to him, he’d meant to write his next novel on it but he can’t even recall if he’d packed it. It had rusted from dripping water. Why was this here? He didn’t touch, didn’t want to lose it to dust.

A whisper distracted him. It was her voice but it was unintelligible.

Then it was coming. The noise had grown louder, faster.

Above him the ceiling was dome shaped, constructed of limestone tablets. The light reflected effortless, a wider field of view. The cavern was dead and a beast was coming. It felt different; less barbaric, and covert. A deathly skitter, audible barely above the torch. His mind painted wretched portraits and he shoved them aside.

First they were tiny, insect sucking things. They’d all stopped in a circle, covering the entire tunnel. Tiny legs crawling all over each other and millions of eyes watched. It was a candid sensation of anxiety. The beings behind those eyes meant to suck him dry. Not long after, the meaty ones arrived. Cannibalistic, calculating, predators lined in front of him.

Swinging the torch did little. It was as if they were hive, together for a universal objective. The fire projected a wave reflected from their ravenous eyes. Then something peculiar happened. They all crawled over each other, creating a dense mass. All species combined to create a massive spider. Its skin rippled and flowed as they trampled. The scale was massive making him an insect in seconds. The entire cavern was engulfed by this force.

What could be done to defeat it? It’s long, slender leg reached forward and pushed him down. Several spiders broke away and crawled over his skin. He flicked a black widow from his shoulder and daddy long legs from his leg.

It moved with quiet grace. He swung at the leg and broke it. An assortment of spiders exploded from it, many burning before they were replaced. To his right was the type writer. An urge to write on the keyboard was impossible to resist. Words channeled out of him, he didn’t focus on what he was typing just the fact that he was. It was sheer ecstasy. A simple joy he’d been without for half a year. Hearing the click clack of the keys was relief.

As the spider reared up and darted towards him his mind drifted toward Claire; their wedding and honeymoon, fights and agreements – bittersweet.

He looked above at the formidable force looming. Its liquid skin swarmed around him, scratchy and slithering. Random breeds dropped from the host. At first he sensed the legs inside his jeans, prickling his calves. Then he felt the pincers. He’d been bit. Death was imminent. A stream of them poured over him, a faucet flowing arachnids.

Through it all his hand continued typing, even when it was covered in spiders. Click. Miniscule, grating laughs horded around him. Millions of fangs pierced him. Clack. He screamed out in pain. A large spider lay on his face, felt the bite into his brain. Through the paralysis he knew they were all wrapping him up.

As he began to swoon, a hint of lavender broke through the sordid stench.

Then he coughed. Something in his mouth tasted horrible. He turned his head and was sick. All he could taste was ash. All the spiders were gone. He was surrounded by ash. It was odd but he didn’t question it. The typewriter, too, was blanketed in ash. He wiped away the paper, a thick cloud of smoke billowing.

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust. Everything that lives, dies. The spiders dematerialized around him leaving him sheathed in clotty ash. He coughed and turned his head to vomit.

He continued reading, intense and discombobulated.

When he read the words on the type writer he couldn’t believe his eyes. Surely, it was all a mistake. He’d gone insane, it was the only answer. He continued reading until he reached the bottom of the page. This is where the catacombs would erode.

His eyes widened as he read the words. They became vacant, redundant. He began to rise.

When his knees lifted from the gritty floor a panic surged through him. An abnormal weightlessness that, if he could feel it, would’ve started to thrash. He clutched the type writer, desperate to know what happened next. No man’s grip could break its bindings. As he rose higher the words passed out of focus, then the type writer then the circle of grey.

All was black, dense, except for a pinprick of light off in the distance. He wanted to float to it but he couldn’t control his movements. There was a voice that echoed. The only word he could decipher was ‘movement’. No idea what it had meant. He closed his eyes or thought he closed his eyes.

When he opened them a bright light was facing him. Someone was touching his right arm, a murmur. He tried to speak but no words came out.

He wanted to know where he was, wanted to know where she was.

How much time passed he couldn’t determine. A woman told him his parents were on the way, they would be ecstatic to see him moving. He tried to ask her why they were coming and where was he moving? He smells something, lavender. A vase of flowers invaded his thoughts with white sheets and a blue gown.

“Oh hunny. Are you alright?” A woman asked and far away someone kissed him on the cheek.

“Claire?” he choked out. It might have come out as hair, or dare. Hope that the message was received was all he had.

“Who? Who is Claire?” Was the reply.

Time slipped.

He was alone. The flowers were gone. A tray of food lay to his right. Much of the blur had faded from vision. Blinking hurt his head, thinking hurt more. Images were received but not processed. The white walls cramped him. He wanted to thrash because there were spiders on him. If his legs and arms were moving he couldn’t feel it.

Someone walked in the door, daylight poured in through the window.

Did he fall asleep?

A shadow loomed over him and he tasted chicken, felt his jaw move. “My wife, where is my wife?” he asked, each syllable a marathon. There was no reply, only another sampling of chicken. There was no protesting.

When he was alone again, he was embraced by a coarse pressure. He attempted to scream. No sound. He couldn’t even run. The wolf was licking his gums.

A hand grabbed him and he was shaking. Another hand grabbed his shoulder and pushed him down. A man told him he was dreaming and they were there for him. A raspy laugh drilled into his skull.

“It’s your mother.” She said. Her face was lucid, wrinkles deeper than his memory recorded. Memory felt foreign. “There was an accident, on a train.”

“I know. I remember. Claire is dead.” The words were a reaction.

“The nurses have said you’ve mentioned her, said she’s your wife. You’ve never married. Never dated anyone name Claire.”

Could that be genuine? The love of his life, figmented then fragmented? It wasn’t a probability! It was preposterous above and beyond! He protested and screamed and they tried to remain calm. His mother broke down into tears and his sister had to leave the room. Did he just lose her all over again? His father calmed him and he was left alone.

Ten minutes later he watched the images deteriorate. Shards remained but it was hard to piece together. There was a crawlspace, spiders and…that force. An image of bodies covered in white sheets bogged his mind and he cringed. The terror was all too real; the insane knowledge of evil approaching. It faded. He heard a door shut and there was a doctor.

He was briefed on the accident. A passenger train had derailed. They found him under three bodies, impaled through the shoulder by a pole. Severe trauma had cracked his skull, gave him a concussion and sent him into a comatose state.

The next few days were a blur but a week later he was discharged and returned home.

Claire had died. She was a fellow passenger on the train. Still, he cannot recall the slightest second of that train ride. He made sure to visit her grave. There be broke down, it was impossible not to. His parents watched with hurtful eyes. They thought he’d gone crazy. He sprayed lavender on her grave and left her a yellow tulip, her favourite. They may never have spoken, perhaps overheard her name in conversation yet he grieved her, longed for her.

When he got home he there was a present waiting on his desk; an old fashioned type writer. A note attached proclaiming he’d slept through his birthday. A piece of paper was already ready. A quixotic desire surged through him. He began typing. Click. Clack.

A great idea just came to him, ‘The Catacombs’ he would call it.

The dedication read: To Claire, thanks for nothing.

[Steve]

Re: The Catacombs

I liked it. Pretty quirky at times, but otherwise pretty good. I give it a B+.

[Storyslinger]

Re: The Catacombs

I thought it was good

[Mattrick]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

Hello, fellow horror lovers! I'm announcing the reposting of my novel, in serial form. A new post every day.



Ill post this is manageable parts. essentially, when I have a space in the writing - signifying change in setting or time, will be a post. I've always gotten complaints they are so long. So, keep in mind, some will be short (half a page to a page but I think I've got one that's ten pages. Some will have to be split in two.

I've gone through the effort of creating chapters (I had just parts, but with two at seventy plus pages and the rest under 30 I figured I may as well make it all chapters, in the parts. I've also done some editing (not rewriting, though) to the initial pages and will replace the post above. It's been reordered so above isn't the exact beginning, either.

I need to write my ending but it's not even a block I have (I know, essentially, how to end it) but I guess I've got the same syndrome King had with Carrie. I wonder if I've wasted my time and I suppose I just need some reassurance that after working it and tweaking it that I can use it as a stepping stone. No one has read my later pages, probably only the first few chapters.

Does anyone wish to help me along this journey? A new post each day? While it's not perfect yet, I do think you will enjoy the experience. And, hopefully, get a nightmare or two








May 23, 2006

“What have I become?
My sweetest friend?”

I heard Johnny Cash’s version of the song on a special of him the other night. Personally, I know what I’ve become so that question answers itself; nothing. Whoever reads this would probably be thinking that I’m some twenty-something know-it-all who thinks he has it bad. Anyone who would think that obviously has no clue what I really think. I’ve never had it bad. In fact, my parents told me when I was eighteen to leave home and never come back, find an apartment and just live my life. On the first of every month there is two thousand dollars transferred into my personal banking account from my comforting creators. Since they are pretty well off it’s not obscene for them to grant their only son such money to live. Both of them know I’m not able to work due to my problems and essentially they’ve given up on me. However, the love they feel for me has faded to a dull moan and albeit all hope being abandoned I have not. They’d rather never speak to me again than know I might have frozen to death on the unforgiving curb of the train station.

I’ve thought about calling, of course. Thanking them for their courtesy yet realizing the truth has halted me. There would be pleasantries to no end, nods in the appropriate places and silence filled with inane chatter. We’d all skirt around the real issues and in the end the connection would not only be absolutely redundant, it would be depressing. In a sense it would be like conversing with yourself in a past life as that life no longer holds any meaning for you. The comfortable life I took for granted during youth is now as real as Hobbiton. Now, I’m simply Andy, needle freak and ailing junkie.

My entire life has been cast aside like an empty pack of cigarettes and replaced with this thin existence. I’m not living or dead…I’m simply waiting to see what team decides to pick me and I’ve always been the last one picked. What I now have instead of a life is euphoria in its purest form. Life was good but this is nothing short of spectacular. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise because those are the ones who are really afraid to live.

Reality is not everyone is apt to agree with me (my well off parents included). Plenty of the do-gooders out there that consider me absolute scum – a sponge of the everyman. Not that it’s wrong to have an opinion but until you’ve seen the world through my eyes you’ve no right to label me as the shit on the bottom of your shoe. Deep down I’m no different from you and I think that’s what makes you all so revolted by me. We’re not the same but we’re no different. We’ve all got our quirks and jerks, things that turn our chins a different way and we’re all keeping skeletons in our closets. Whether it’s your taste for hookers or alcohol or even those idiotic toy trains some people find so fascinating. We all have our escapes and methods of ventilation. Perhaps my means aren’t the cleanest or the most dignified but it’s mine all the same.

You’ve no right to take it away from me.



All thought drifted away from him; a feather in the winds of consciousness. The echoes of thoughts long passed faded to an inaudible drone in the winds and he was free of the prison that was his mind. Alcatraz must’ve been easier to escape. What he called ‘The Climax’ was on it’s way, he could tell by the way the light reflected of the pane window before him and the thin ripples that passed through his skin like shockwaves; the hairs on his arms stood at attention. Sleep washed over him in a dank blanket of space. Stars whirled around his face in a psychotic display. Their gravity tugged his arms towards the swirling emptiness taking form beyond comprehension. As his arms were gently pulled into the nothingness of space a faded silver mist spiralled around the tips of his fingers exciting the follicles of the tiny hairs growing on them, towards his knuckles and swathed his entire body with tainted metallic aura.

To be enclosed by nothing - alone in the vastness of existence is truly insatiable. Being truly alone is a gift the meek are not awarded and the strong have forever possessed. For a brief second a silky weight pressed against the colour of his eye yet he did not blink nor could he blink for he wasn’t sure he was even seeing with his own eyes any longer. Maybe this time his wish would be granted and he would never return to his shell and forever he would wander the universe as a specter, marveling perpetually at the silent beauty of absence.

Surrounding him was a remote melody that sounded so eerily familiar yet he was unable to place a finger on what it was which, was often the case. An image of a thousand angels stuffed into a tiny cathedral and forced to bellow out the most serene piece of music passed before his eyes and suddenly he could make out the words but not understand them. And the band played on.

The melody dulled and the serenity of the voice became a low moaning which seemed to envelop his body in an uncomforting numbness. There was a foreign undertone which he found unfeasible to touch. Now that too was fading and he was left in silent obscurity. The tiny follicles of hair on his fingers repeated their queer actions as the silver mist retreated quicker than it arrived.


In the real world the worn syringe had snuck its way from his indolent grasp and now lay nestled in the spine of the journal he’d been writing in over half an hour ago. A year or so ago (though to Andy it felt as if eons had passed since he came into possession of the object of his wayward affections) his life altered. During his cooked wanderings downtown (as was the thing to do after his parents discarded him) he came across a stationary story whose name escapes him even to this day. Gaining possession of the journal even seems to be a dream because as capricious as he isn’t, an unapparent hand plucked the book from a shelf and casually slipped it into his coat pocket. He browsed for several more moments before exiting the shop oblivious to the fact he’d just committed a felony. An hour later when he’d placed the keys to his new apartment on the kitchen counter (beside the toaster, not the microwave) was when he’d discovered it. Nothing about it seemed unordinary to him – it held about three hundred pages and the cover of the book was being protected by a smooth leather casing (he decreed was a nice touch) and was bound together by a gold plate of metal which was fastened with magnets. When he opened it he discovered a new world or a way of life, so to speak. Before his eyes lay hundreds of pages of empty space (which happened to be his favourite place in the entire universe) that was simply begging—jonesing to be filled with its drug of choice; ink. He cast his glance away from the open book and left to sleep; the day had tired him and his new possession would have to wait until a later day. It’s time would eventually come. And come it had. For the seven months following his first entry (psychotic rambling about how all the traffic lights in the world should always stay green and how the cat across the hall had it out for him) the pages became more and more filled. Initially it started off he would only write in it when he felt the need to get some things off his chest but as the entries piled up he felt more of a [i]need]i] to fill up those empty pages until it became something that was done at least once a day, even if he only jotted down a few scribbled slurs. These blank pages would not be denied their birthright.

Nor would he.


The next post will finish this part with Andy. To those that have read this already I apologize, after this next post it will be new. Though, I think Steve has read about the first 30, unedited pages on .net.

[Mattrick]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

A sucking sound overtook Andy’s world. Much like the slimming stack of blank pages his mind had begun to wear thin and the malady began. In his world universes began to spin around his face and the stars that were dancing their psychotic jig were too miniscule to see. It was nauseating but after so many trips even the worst tumbles seem elementary. For a moment he caught a glimpse of the face of his father in the dissipating light and he recalled back to a lesson his father had taught him one winter day when his wish for a snow day was denied (it had only snowed an inch when half a foot had been forecasted). No sense in worrying about the negatives all the time, Andy. For you should always remain focused on the positive things in life. If all you think about is negative then it’s all you will see. It is mind over matter son, mind over matter. His Dad had said that on several occasions but this was the time he’ll forever remember. It was the day he realized life without optimism would be impossible and happiness unobtainable. Knowledge is power and with the divine knowledge that at the end of the day when all the chores are done and the doors are locked, you’re nothing more than a star in an infinite sky. To many, the mere thought of unimportance is disheartening yet to Andy it was even more of a reason to go on. When nothing you do matters…what does it matter?


Miles away a slim line of a smile cut across his face.


Boring into his head the carnivorous resonance grew to a sickening level before silencing. A momentary wash of tepid air wrapped around his body and it was in this moment he knew that once again it was all over. “Sorry kid, better luck next time” he could almost hear the voices saying. Maybe he would have better luck next time and be stranded (hardly the word considering he wants to be stranded) in the extraneous. Retraction was never an easy thing to cope with and when the ear piercing wind chimes erupted he bit, no chomped, down on his bottom lip spilling blood onto his chin. Comparing the scintillating sensation that engulfs his being to the re-awakening to reality is like comparing black and white. Awakening was in such a deep contract to his momentary feeling of bliss that at times he’d simply break down with his hands in his face and pour out. No dubitably the afterglow was satisfying but compared to the climax it’s as thrilling as Donald Trump finding a dollar. The afterglow will fade until the know-it-all voice in his head told him he needed another fix.

There was a love/hate relationship with that voice.

Nothing shifted to everything (words) revealing the pathos of his forsaken apartment. The blurred syringe blockaded his entire frame of sight. Peering over the rough contours of the paper he could see the digital clock stating it was ten to seven. Lloyd would be over soon for sure but he wasn’t sure what was going on with Darren as in recent weeks he’s been much more isolated than usual, in fact, Andy doubted if he’d even talked to him in the few days. Surrounded by silence he wiped the viscous drool that pooled around the corners of his mouth. From the nestling of the book’s spine he removed the worn syringe with his left hand, negating to realize his right still grasped his blue ball point with stern determination. Getting to his feet with shaking legs wasn’t the easiest task he’d done all day but he managed just fine.


Feverish, he sat down on the old plaid sofa his parents had bought him for his sixteenth birthday – now three years overdue for its appointment at the dump and his considerable ass groove was now pasted with duct tape – with ball point in hand and let out the deep groan of an old cynic. He squished his ass around on the gummy tape until he found his point of comfort and thought maybe it was time for a new couch. “Whatever works, works.” He slurred and kicked his tingling legs on to the creaky coffee table.


On most nights the malady of the apartment failed to bother him and on more than a few occasions felt even the luxury of his parent’s model home in the suburbs couldn’t provide more comfort yet, on this night, there was a distractive pull in the air around him. Maybe it was the way the white-turned dingy yellow (nicotine) paint was beginning to peel off the walls that did it. Three years he’d laid holed up in this box never being sober enough to look twice at it (not that he was sober now by any stretch) but up until now it had been acceptable. In the back of his mind he placed a Post-It where he figured he’d see it with a note ‘find new apartment’ scrawled on it.


After a few seconds his thoughts drifted back towards his euphoria and the serene singing. Mere thought of the tune broke his skin into gooseflesh simultaneously exciting the blood. Later he would spend hours trying to recreate the same sensation in a time of need and would come up short. To him it was like a message that there is beauty in the world if you look hard enough for it. In essence, all his years of searching for that perfect place in the world might have finally come to its end. Whilst floating through the vision of the angelic choir a sensation arose he couldn’t resist; his niche. He’d finally found his niche. It was queer and awful.


Reflection on his experience was beginning to drone into incomprehensible sentences and he knew soon he would fall victim to sleep. All in all his experience was completely unlike anything he’d previously experienced on the needle. Everything including space and time was available to him. Every instinct in his ailing body commanded anything and all was at his disposal and he was god of it all – although, what everything and all were was the variable.

Thoughts and images began to bounce around in his head like a pong machine on mescaline. One of his arms twitched involuntarily in a comical fashion that, if his buddies had been in attendance, surely would cause them to shit their pants laughing as they often said as, it actually happened once.

Peering through glazed eyes that were tearing profusely his feet began to imitate a spinning record. His head reeled flinging a glittering swatch of saliva through the innards of the dingy apartment.

That was when the side of his head cracked off the coffee table and his body landed in a heap.

[Mattrick]

Rabid Euphoria

Lloyd took the stairs up to third floor of the apartment building that his friend Andy lived in as he always did. Andy asked him one day why he was so intent on taking the stairs when he said the elevator would be quicker and easier, Lloyd lent him a smile and said ‘ever been to the movies kid? The elevators always fall’. And Andy had laughed just as he always had. It was probably most of the reason that him and Andy had become such good friends since that fateful evening two years ago. Andy made him remember that not everyone in the world was shit regardless of the image they projected and you could find solace in the strangest places.


He opened the door on the third floor and stepped out into the hallway. The apartment building was the Hollywood stereotype for where a junkie would live; the walls were a dull and faded green which lent the impression of grime covering the walls, the navy blue carpet was worn and missing fabric in patches and it was dimly lit with flickering lights. There was always a lingering smell throughout the building, one of cooking beef in a greasy frying pan that made him want to gag but luckily Andy wasn’t cheap in the incense department and much like the fire extinguishers at the scene of the accident, thank goodness for small favours.


Andy’s Apartment was number 316 and, if the numbers were stolen (not entire uncommon considering the neighbourhood) you could always still recognize it by the bottle cap sized hole about waist high from the time he’d one drunken night tripped on his untied shoelaces and cracked his elbow through the door. Lloyd paused in front of the door for a moment and raised his hand to knock but paused for a moment and looked back over his shoulder. He could’ve sworn something was looking at him but he shrugged it off. He knocked once and waited a moment.

No answer.

Andy was a smack head so not answering the door immediately wasn’t surprising but after the third knock a sweat broke on his brow. He placed his ear firmly against the wooden door and even stilled his breathing to help ear any sort of noise. But there was nothing. He tried to the knob and when it didn’t turn he assumed Andy had left to go somewhere but when he tried the knob again the door popped open.

Slowly the door swung open revealing a bit of the apartment at a time. First it was the wall on the left of the door, then it reveal the short hallways leading towards the bedroom and bathroom, the small but perfectly fine kitchen and finally the living area to the right of the door. Nothing seemed out of place and he sure didn’t see Andy anywhere.

“Andy?” he asked and waited for answer but all the replied was the stillness of the room.

Outside a dog parked furiously at something and he took a few steps forward. “Andy? You here?” he said louder this time. Yet, still there was nothing. Andy was especially picky about security and keeping his door locked because he usually always had some stuff in this place.


When he stepped forward he could see the outstretched hand sticking out from behind the couch with its palm towards the ceiling as if waiting for a high five. Lloyd ran towards him shouting his name but Andy hadn’t stirred. There was blood on the carpet but it looked as though whatever happened was just a step above painful but quite a ways from damaging. From what he can gather he was standing or possibly sitting on the couch and he fainted and cracked his head off the corner of the coffee table. He grimaced when he imagined what the pain must’ve felt like. Fortunately for Andy it was a good chance if he was baked the pain would be minimal at most. With the swiftness of a sober man he dropped to his knees and turned him over. The right side of Andy’s brow was splattered with cadmium and he could see the cut just underneath the hair line. It wasn’t very deep but it was about an inch long and would probably require stitches to heal properly. He shook his shoulders and slapped his face a few times before Andy’s eyes managed to peel open. Lloyd was greeted with a distant look that reminded him so much of the way his children would look at him during those days and he wanted to pulverize Andy.


“L-Lloyd man…how the fuck did you get in this place?” he said and his lips formed a sliver of a smile but it was a painful smile then he continue talking, not even waiting for an answer. “What the hell happened? It feels like someone clocked me over the head with a pipe or something.”

“Just don’t try and sit up right away. From what I can tell you took yourself a little tumble and smashed your forehead off the coffee table. Looks like you got off lucky my friend.”

Andy touched a finger to the location of the numbing pain and brought the fingers over his eyes – blood. “You call this lucky asshole?” There was no anger in his voice.

“You’re damn right. I’m going to grab you some ice from the freezer and myself a beer. That is if there is any”

“There might be some at the bottom. Darren probably left a couple here when he stopped by here the other night on the worst bender I’ve ever seen him on. I didn’t want him to leave at all.” He paused and winced in pain. “I was afraid he might do something completely stupid like get himself killed or worse, kill himself.”

Lloyd laughed a hoarse laugh and found himself coughing by the end of it. He walked into the kitchen. “A bender eh? What was it all about this time? Get stuck in some traffic for a few minutes or stub his toe? That guy always finds something to bitch about and makes it seem so horrible.”

“Amy dumped him.” There was an audible click in his throat.


The freezer door stood open while Lloyd rushed back into the living room to look at his buddy face to face. “You gotta be joking with me right? Tell me you’re joking!” But Andy simply looked at him and said nothing. The look said what words hadn’t. Lloyd looked down at his feet and said, “Shit. Do you know why?”

Andy shook his head. Lloyd opened his mouth to say something but felt it would be better if he hadn’t. Afterall, it was a hot reply itching to escape his throat. There were far too many times where he felt Darren could use a good slap in the face for his bitching and the things he says but he’d always refrained for Andy’s sake. There were times where he liked being around Darren but there weren’t many. He turned back into the kitchen and grabbed three ice cubes from the tray, two remaining buds from the back of the fridge and the only clean rag from the drawer wrapped it around them.

“Why do you think Amy dumped him, Lloyd? They seemed perfectly happy to me most of the time. A great couple actually.”

Lloyd shook his head and stepped back out into the living room. Should he give Andy a version of what he’d just choked back? Or should he simply toss out a little white lie and go on with their peachy little lives? He stood there looking at Andy for a moment, beers in one hand and the rag in the other. No, not right yet. He lobbed the rag to him. “Here you go, put it on your head. It’ll keep the swelling down.”


Without a hitch he did as bid and winced when the ice cubes connected with the hot wound. Fortunately he hadn’t repeated his question and simply sat silent, dabbing at the gash on his head. Some blood spilled on the rag but the bleeding had stopped.

There was a pishhh followed by a plink and the beer cap was on the creaky coffee table and the first swallows went down with pride. As always the first sip led to the second and eventually to the bottom of the bottle. The empty bottle was placed on the coffee table.

“You know, I think I read somewhere, in Newsweek or Time or one of those big publications that drinking too much too fast can rupture the kidneys causing internal hemorrhaging.”

Lloyd looked at him with intense fascination that in Andy’s state – battered and baked – that he was even able to put together such an intricate sentence.

“I think it’s definitely something to think about every time you crack open a new case, ol’ buddy.”

“You don’t even read magazines.”

“I know.”

“Look Andy, you can call you me your buddy, you can call me an asshole or a prick or a pole-sucking mother fucker or, if you so feel the need to do, you can call me your daddy but that’s only on Tuesday when I’m feeling generous.” Lloyd winked at Andy and he returned the gesture with warm-hearted laughter. “But, if there is one thing I’m not, it’s old.”

Andy reached his free hand up and Lloyd took it and hoisted him up to his feet so they were standing face to face. “Sure man, whatever you want. If you don’t want to be old I’ll hold myself back when the urge comes.”

“Glad we’re in agreement.”

“I just want to be clear with one thing,” Andy said and place his hand on Lloyd’s shoulder. “You have to make me a promise and it’s a promise that is bound on everything you’ve ever lived for. Strong as oak, ya know?”

Lloyd nodded and waited. When Andy hadn’t spoken back up he took it upon himself to get the train rolling. “And…that promise would be?”

“That if I ever feel the need to call you daddy you put a fucking bullet in my head.”


Both of them erupted in a roar of laughter which would no doubt irritate the neighbours if they were normal neighbours. Lloyd slapped his knee and Andy fell back bottom down on the floor holding his ribs with tears streaming down his face.

“I think we’ve got a deal on that one.” He choked back through a fit of giggles. The booze was definitely starting to work into his system now. There was an audible crack in his back as he once again helped his friend to his feet and he let out a droning groan. Andy looked up at him with cunning eyes that seemed to glisten in the soft light. Immediately it was obvious what the expression intended but what happened was unstoppable. Andy grabbed the worn green toque from his head with cat-like swiftness and flung it across the room. It landed in the shoddy blue recliner he picked up from a junk pile several months ago.


“You might not be over the hill yet ol’ buddy but you’re sure going pretty damn bald!”

Lloyd’s palms had immediately covered the ever-growing pallid circle of flesh on the top of his heads as if trying to protect it. Blind surprise was written all over his face. Andy giggled and inside Lloyd screamed out in frustration and shock. Andy and Darren could never understand how it feels to start losing the hair you loved so much at such a tender age, years shy of when most people get their first grays. Behind his thick rimmed glasses his eyes watered and he caressed what was left of his black hair. Lately it had become a habit to do this with a hope it might come back. “Asshole.”

It never hit Andy how vain he might have been about his losing his hair but him and Darren couldn’t help but rag on him about it because it was just so easy. They don’t mean to hurt his feelings because it’s all just for shits and giggles. Just the kind of things guys do to each other to pass the time. He watched him plod towards the shoddy recliner muttering what were probably curses under his breath and pluck the toque from the armrest with the foam sticking out the front. “I try Lloyd my man. Boy do I try.”

“Well, maybe you shouldn’t.”

“Look, if I hit a nerve I sure didn’t mean it. All I was doing was fucking around man, you know me.”

“Yeah, not a serious bone in your body, I know. Life’s all a big joke to you.”

Andy said nothing.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it.”

“No, don’t worry about it.” He replied and sniffled. “I suppose I did deserve it. After all, I started it.”

“Don’t beat yourself up over it is all.”

There they sat in silence for several minutes. Neither of them said anything yet attempted to break the uncomfortable silence. All the phrases rush up their throat were held safely behind their teeth. Lloyd finished half of the second beer and sat staring down at his army green toque which he’d neglected to put back on. Outside the wind was beginning to pick up and with the sun fully set it was impossible to see the approaching storm clouds preparing to unleash their cargo. Horns honked furiously and sirens rushed past the apartments windows casting a flashing atmosphere of crimson and indigo around them. Silence was something not easily broken, especially for those short on words. But it would have to eventually be broken.

“How was Darren doing?”

“Hold on a second. You look like a man who could sure use a cigarette.” He held out a cigarette to Lloyd and he accepted it and popped it into the corner of his mouth.

“That and a blowjob from a five hundred dollar hooker but I guess beggars can’t be choosers.”

Andy lit his smoke and offered his lighter. Lloyd shook it off and used his Zippo. “Thanks.”

“Anytime O…sorry, buddy. I almost forgot about the whole ‘you can call me daddy’ bit.. Any who, as you can imagine Darren was completely out of his head. Hammered out of his tree, spending half the time he was over mumbling phrases I couldn’t make out. I kept asking him what was wrong and he would just reply with that mumbling. It seemed he was doing everything under the moon that night. He told me he spent the evening smoking rock with a few other friends of his and spent the rest of the night getting booted from bar after bar after he kept trying to pick fights with people and I mean bad people. It was as if he was trying his damnedest to get himself killed. It wasn’t until before he left around three in the morning he told me that Aimee dumped him and he wasn’t sure if he could handle it. I haven’t heard from him since. I tried calling him all day yesterday and couldn’t even get his machine.” He took a pull from his smoke and exhaled it slowly with a contemplative look on his face. “I managed to talk to Amy though.”

“What’d she have to say?”

“She told me she couldn’t deal with his woe is me bullshit anymore. In the beginning she said it was magic but the past couple of months it was if the man she fell in love with just up and vanished. Poof.” He flipped opened his closed fist to emphasize. “We both know she wasn’t an innocent girl and lived on the wild side but she said it was Darren who managed to get her feet to touch ground. Then it all turned to shit. He started sneaking out of their place, not calling when he was being late, coming home out of his head. It didn’t stop there though. She said that when she approached him about his recent tendencies to vanish he hit her several times in a drunken stupor. He told her that if she tried to leave him whatever happened after was on her head.”


“Jesus Christ! He fucking hit her? That mother fucker!” Lloyd screamed and pounded both of his fists down on the coffee table. “Son of a bitch! I’m gonna beat the-"

“No you won’t. We won’t do nothing except try and keep him as calm as possible right now. If he shows up tonight which I have a feeling he just might we’ll try and take his mind off things. In other words, we’ll be his friends.”

Lloyd didn’t like the idea of simply letting this guy sit in this apartment tonight fucked out of his tree babbling about how fucked up his life got when he was the one who fucked it all out of control. For starters you never, ever hit a woman no matter what they’ve done to you. If anyone in their group has ever had a right to hit a woman it was him for what Jessie has done to him over the past few years, stripping his former life away from him piece by piece and even that was no excuse. Could he keep his cool tonight around Darren if he showed? No, he didn’t think he could but he would try for Andy’s sake. Always for Andy.

“Fine.” He butted out his smoke. “I’m outta smokes and I need some beer. You need anything while I’m gone? A chocolate bar or a soda?”

Andy waved him on.

A gunshot rang out in the distance followed by a several more dogs joining in the furious barking.

Lloyd left the apartment in an extremely foul mood hoping to god that Darren wouldn’t show up tonight or he’d have to bite his tongue so hard it bleeds.

[Mattrick]

Rabid Euphoria

Not sure if anyone is reading this or not but I'm going to keep posting, every day.




This city, like most cities was teeming with people who didn’t know each others names, the people who owned the shops around their houses or the name of the man in blue behind the wheel of a cruiser. People went place to place driving their cars and chatting away on their cells phones as they walked the streets appearing to have interesting and exciting lives filled with interesting characters but the problem is that none of them do. All of them wake up in similar fashion and go to bed in similar fashion. Nothing separates them from each other except for the thoughts in their heads. On a street that ran along downtown there was a man who’s thoughts focused mainly around all the people walking around him as he hung up the phone. The whites of their eyes wide when they seen him and he knew the look better than his own face. It was the look of being lost and looking for someone to blame and he was sick of being that someone. No longer will they fuck with his life. Now, he will do the fucking. [/SIZE]

Casually he strolled – well, staggered is more apropos – along the darkening streets of downtown equipped with stainless steel flask and the switch blade he’d always carried with him because you never know. Vision transcended from a blurred reality to a thin darkness and with each spot of sight he’d be further up the street than the last. A swoon was cast over him and the nearby bus shelter was as good a spot as any for a drunk ponder silly questions and forget serious situations. From inside his coat he removed the flask and knocked back a strong swig. It bit the back of throat in a way most would wave off a second but he took his with zeal.


Every attempt to mull his thoughts away on silly questions was futile. Every attempt to mull his thoughts away on anything remotely pleasant was slapped away with images of Amy and her tenderness. It made him want to die. She was gone and it was the only thing he could really think off. To every thought there was an inaudible thought below it infected with the love that abandoned him. No longer was Amy with him to put her frail arms around him and plant soft kisses on his neck as she often did. Darren’s free hand began to run through his long brown hair stroking the scalp delicately. For an instant he could smell her perfume and feel her breath on his skin and when he moved in closer, the cold glass of the bus shelter to much to bear. A shocked yelp escaped his lungs and pounded repeatedly on the glass, pushing his moist face against the clear surface. Warm tears streaked down the cold glass behind chocked cries. He staggered out of the bus shelter not sure of what to do or where to go.


Strangers walked around him unbeknownst of the pain and torment that was surging through his veins and in that moment he hated them all for being so heartless. Why couldn’t there ever be anyone for him to count on in this cruel and inarticulate world? Why did everything have to be out of his grasp when he needed them the most? Piss on you. He thought through a tangled smile. A man in a baseball cap looked him and it was a look he knew very well. He’d seen it every day as far back as he could remember and it always made him feel as if he should be behind a glass case. Darren returned a grimace and the man the baseball cap quickly turned his head and looked away. Yeah, you’d better hurry away you piece of shit. I’ll piss on you and your entire family, until their hair is yellow. A moaning chuckle escaped his mouth.

Another swig of the flask might relax his nerves a bit. Yes, it just might. Again the bittersweet concoction inside the flask bit his throat in a pleasant way and warmed him inside in a way that not even Amy had been able to accomplish. Alcohol was mankind’s cure for everything and he loved it.

Above him the traffic light changed from green to yellow to red. On a drunken whim he decided to sprint across the street instead of waiting for the next green light. Fortunately for Darren traffic wasn’t congested and he tripped on his untied shoelace. He tried his hardest to remain balanced but gravity overcame him. Had traffic been busier he’d most likely have been run down a driver in the outside lane. The cement scraped above his left eye and a trickle of blood ran down his face. Various people around him laughed heartily at his misfortune and someone from across the street made sure to scream how much of an idiot he was. Typical people who simply don’t understand what it’s like and the more typicals he came across the more he loathed them. However, he managed to pick himself up and crossed the intersection as the light turned green.

Not a spectacular way to start the night. Darren thought. He turned and looked back the way he’d come wiping blood on the sleeve of his jacket. At the back of his mind he hoped that he wouldn’t run into a cop who’d throw him in the drunk tank for the night. No, I couldn’t have that. It would destroy my night. Over time acting sober had become easier than being sober and the only white flag about him was the sordid stench of alcohol wafting from him. Cars sped through his vision in a blur that caused the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and the corners of his mouth to go numb.

Darren put his hand in front of his mouth and exhaled into it and sniffed it. Good, my breath absolutely reeks of whiskey. It’s far better than the smell of that skank.

On his right he passed the store Lloyd happened to be in buying smokes. Coming out from the store was a young couple walking arm and arm, both displaying white grins. Grief washed over him like a waterfall and he desperately needed a drink. The girl even looked a bit like Amy and with the wind was able to deduce she even wore a similar scent. He compensated with another swig from his flask which was nearly as light as it would get. Sad but true.

A police car sped up the street beside him with sirens blaring and lights flashing. Up ahead there appeared to be some kind of accident and the crowd seemed unusually small. However the cop drove right past and turned a hard right on the following block. There was an ambulance parked along the side of the street with an EMT leaning against the side having a cigarette. In front of him lay three body bags and trails of blood leading towards them. Several onlookers apparently either refused to leave until all the commotion concluded or they were new to the scene. One of them was a rather rotund man wearing a black sweater and blue jeans. A cigarette was in the corner of his mouth and he stepped around the body bags and began to chat with the EMT. A middle-aged woman had dropped her shopping bags at the site of the accident and appeared to be enthralled by the destruction. An older gentleman was looking at the damage done to his Cadillac while he was yelling at someone on the phone.


The accident looked pretty fresh to him. As he got closer he a police officer stepped around the far side of the ambulance and he could see there was a cruiser there all along. It was time for him to put up or shut up with his acting abilities and not allow the cop to catch a whiff of him. There was a good bet he wouldn’t care with everything that was on his plate but he decided to keep a good distance all the same.

Catching sight of the man in uniform the guy who owned the Cadillac raced over to where the rotund man and the EMT were talking before the officer could. “What the fuck is going to happen with my car? This stupid punk of a kid came barreling through that intersection and drove straight towards me!” From the phone a voice crackled and he put it back to his ear. “Yeah, I know. I’m talking to a cop right now. Yeah, I’ll make sure to ask him that as well. Of course I’ve got my proof of insurance with me! Ow, my fucking neck!” Cadillac lowered the phone again and told the cop to hurry up and write this report down because or else he would sue.

“Hey buddy. If you want something to be done about your precious car and your valuable time then shove that goddamn phone up your ass.” The rotund man quipped. “You see what’s behind me? Three goddamn body bags and a nearly dead teenager that was just taken away in an ambulance.”

“You don’t think I know that? That damn kid smashed my car!” he said, holding he neck with his free hand.

“Go wait by your car sir.” The officer instructed. “We’ll need to resolve any disputes in an orderly manner but your smashed car is the last thing I’m worried about. As this gentleman just said we’ve got body bags and going form what this man has told us it was a homicide of some kind.”

“But my car!”

“Fuck your car.” The rotund man said behind a minute smile.

Displeased with the results Cadillac went back to his car kicking at the ground like a kid whose mother called to come in for the night.

Darren could hear everything clearly and for the time being wasn’t just sober, he actually felt sober. There was a set of stairs leading to an apartment building he sat on and listening to the unfolding situation with ardor.

“Can you tell me again what the boy said to you?”

“It was a bit difficult to make out but I’m almost definite he said that man eaters stormed the house and attacked his family and he said he lived on the outskirts. Actually, even through all the trauma and shock he tried to apologize to me for causing the accident before he passed out cold from the pain.”

“Is that all he said to you? Nothing else?”

The rotund man considered this for a moment before replying. “I do believe he said that ‘it didn’t stop there.’ I had no clue what he was talking about so I dismissed as just jargon.”

The police officer nodded and jotted down a few notes on a small pad of paper and then placed the pad into the breast pocket of his uniform. His glance found Cadillac still flipping on the telephone and shook his head. “If only everyone I had to talk to was as co-operative as you.”

“Don’t we all.” The rotund man mused and offered the officer a cigarette from his pack.

“Thanks but I’m trying to quit. Using the patch but I tell ya, it’s hell.”

“So I’ve heard. But I figured why bother? We’re all going to die anyways so I may as well keep on smoking like a chimney.”

“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.”

“Officer, before you go I was wondering, what would you say was the cause of death?”

“We won’t know until we get back from the coroner which probably won’t be until the wee hours of the morning. Why?”

“Oh, the bodies looked rather tattered so I was just curious.”

“Thanks for your help, it could help to catch the fuckers who did this. We’ve got officers en route to their home.”

After the officer left to deal with Cadillac there was a window of oppourtunity to walk past the scene without receiving too much attention from the officer of the law. He snuck away past the ever diminishing group of people. Around a blind corner he drew the last suckle of booze from his flask and wiped his lips with the back of his hand. The accident had shook him out from the destructive trance and at last he was able to think easier. What he set out tonight to do still needed to be done. A malicious smirk appeared on his face.

“Amy, you’ll always be mine. Whether you want to be or not.”

While the officer dealt with Cadillac and the EMT waited for the coroner to remove the bodies Darren wandered in search for blood.

[Jean]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

keep posting

it is being read

the chances of it being commented on will increase if you comment on someone else's writings, too

(personally, I would read it much more productively if the font was larger...)

[Mattrick]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

I changed one of them...size 3 looked no different and size 4 might be too big...?

[Jean]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

both (the part that starts May 23, 2006 and Pages 11 - 17 - 22) look ok to me. A lot more readable than those other parts.

[ATG]

Re: Rabid Euphoria

Nice.

[Mattrick]

Now, I posted a story on here sometime ago called Rabid Euphoria. I wrote about 230 pages of it. Problem was, due to the large gap in time between the first 70 pages and the last 160, there was a large lack in continuity from start to finish. My ideas changed and even the characters did. So I had to rewrite it all and I still had finished the ending. So, after getting a copy of Final Draft, a screenplay writing program, I decided to adapt my own work into a script. Seeing as I am planning to get into a really good film program, part of my portfolio should included scripts that I have written.

I won't be posting the whole thing, obvious. Maybe a few snippets here and there. Not sure if many people have read/wrote scripts but I just want to be sure it's presented as best as possible. Now, the full presentation and layout will not transfer to this site, so I'll try to make it as how it looks on my screen as possible.

EXT. STREETSIDE - NIGHT

LLOYD is walking. He is wearing a dark green toque and rounded glasses. He walks with his head down, as if he’s waiting to see his own feet come from underneath him. This is because he’s already began drinking.
He lights a cigarette. He watches the traffic pass by.

He continues walking, deep in thought. He is thinking about his kids, whom he had not seen in years.

A loud bang interrupts his thoughts and he turns to survey it. A car crash had happen merely a block or so behind him. Instictly he begins to run towards it.

CUT TO:

EXT. CRASH SCENE - NIGHT

Lloyd finds himself to be among the first few onlookers, along with a rotund gentleman with a jovial spirit and a small handlebar moustache.
Screaming from inside the blue car which, was on its roof. The tires spum frantically. It had hit a black SUV, whose front end had been smashed to pieces.

LLOYD
What happened?

ROTUND MAN
I’m not entirely sure, I wasn’t looking. Judging from the wreck, the blue car veered off suddenly, hit that SUV.
A door opens and shuts an a very clean and well dressed man steps out of the SUV, holding the back of his neck. Blood trickles from his nose.

LLOYD
Well, he looks to be fine.
(Motions towards SUV Driver)

ROTUND MAN
Then let’s forget about him. They’re still screaming in there. One definitely sounds like a woman.

A blood curdling female scream comes from the car. Then silence.

LLOYD
Jesus! What the fuck was that?

ROTUND MAN
I’m don’t want to know.

The driver’s door opens. A teenager, about 15, crawls onto the pavement. He is covered in blood and visible wounds.

ROTUND MAN
He’s just a kid! Where the is the ambulance?

Rotund Man takes steps forward and kneels down beside the boy, who had now rolled on to his back.

ROTUND MAN
Help is on the way. Stay calm, okay?

TEENAGE DRIVER
They came...they came out of forest.
(coughs, blood comes out)
My dad heard noise at the back door, so he opened it...

Lloyd stepped behind the man who was attending to the kid. He surveyed the inside of the wrecked car. There was a body in the passenger side. An older woman, the kids mother.

ROTUND MAN
Don’t talk, son. Just rest, help will be here soon.

TEENAGE DRIVER
They...they attacked him. Thrashed him. I heard it and then I saw it. They were not people. They were animals!

SUV DRIVER (O.S.)
...Yeah that’s right, Martin. It’s totally destroyed. Twenty Minutes? Well, the blasted cops will take more than that to get. Sounds good.

LLOYD
What’s the kid saying?

ROTUND MAN
I think he’s delirious. He’s probably in shock. How does the inside of the car look?

LLOYD
Not good.

SUV DRIVER
Alright, you better have insurance there buddy!

Lloyd and the rotund man turn to look at the driver, who still held his phone. He was approaching them as he talked.

SUV DRIVER
My premiums aren’t going up because of some little shit having a joyride!

ROTUND MAN
I’d advise you wait until the police get here to sort out your insurance concerns.

The SUV Driver looks down at the boy’s bloody body and is taken back.

SUV DRIVER
Damn kid! He turned right into me! I will not stand for this! I think my damn nose is broken.

ROTUND MAN
Go wait by your car. You can explain your side to the police when they arrive.

SUV DRIVER
You can count on that.
The driver pulled out his cell phone, dialed and turned and started walking away.

TEENAGE DRIVER
My dad...they, killed him. They hurt my mom...I was the only person who could get her away from them. And then she...
(cough)
Mom, I’m so sorry!

As the boy screamed blood came out of his mouth and then he died. A significant crowd had gathered around the scene, chattering to each other. When the boy died, they fell silent.

LLOYD
Shit...oh man, shit.

Lloyd pulled out a cigarette and offered one to the rotund man, he took it.
ROTUND MAN
I haven’t smoked in over ten years. But if there was ever a time to start again, this is it.
(Lloyd lights his cigarette)
What a tragedy.
LLOYD
Amen.

CUT TO:

INT - ANDY’S APARTMENT - NIGHT

Andy sits at his writing table. Andy looks to be in his twenties. Slovenly yet dignified all at once. The dignified half comes from his late parents, who were well off. The other half comes from apathy.

In front of him is a journal, he can’t remember where he got it. In it were the skewed scrawls of an addict. It had become routine to write entries before fixing. We find him find making his latest entry.

ANDY (V.O.)
The comfortable life I took for granted during youth is dead, that kid is dead. Now, I'm simply Andy - needle freak and ailing junkie. My entire life has been cast aside and replaced with this tenuous existence. I'm neither living or dead. I'm simply waiting to see which side I end up on. What I now have instead life is euphoria in its purest form. Life was good but this is nothing short of spectacular. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise because those are the ones who are really afraid to live.

Andy begins to scratch at his neck as he writes.

ANDY (V.O.)
Reality is not everyone is apt to agree with me. Plenty of the do-gooders out there consider me absolute scum; a sponge of the everyman. Not that it's wrong to have an opinion but until you've seen the world through my eyes you've no right to label me as the shit on the bottom of your shoe. Deep down I'm no different from you and I think that's what makes you all so revolted by me. We're not the same but we're no different. We've all got our quirks and jerks, things that turn our chins a different way and we're all keeping skeletons in our closets. Whether it's your taste for hookers or alcohol or weed or cigarettes. We all have our escapes and methods of ventilation. Perhaps my means aren't the cleanest or the most dignified but it's mine all the same. You've no right to take it away from me.

Andy places the pen on the table and opens the drawer beside him. He removes a wooden jewelery box. Inside are his tools; spoon, lighter, syringe etc. He opens a baggie with brown powder and places it on a spoon. Adds a few drops of water and takes a lighter to it.

ANDY
Come on...come on.
(mutting to himself)
Cook damn it.

As the brown powder turned to a liquid on the spoon, he salivated. Sweat appears on his brow. He draws the drug into the syringe and sets it down. He wraps the rubber band and preps his vein.

ANDY
Euphoria; my best friend. My one true love.
Andy inserts the needle and pushes the plunger.

CUT TO:

[Sandalwood79]

RE: first few pages of a script

Mattrick,

I too have Final Draft. I went to film school for two years and am currently raising funds to direct and produce a short film I've been dreaming of making for years now, but aside from that, I have produced/directed/written and worked various positions in real film crews, and have at least a rudimentary idea of screenwriting, and am thrilled to see someone has thought to post a script (or at least, a segment of one) here on the forum! Kudos!

If you really want help, I would be more than happy to give you general feedback on your piece, but after reading it I can see that you already have the basic principles of screenwriting down. Most of your action lines are short, there appears to be a lot of space there (which is a good thing), and you're clearly passionate about the project. These are all good qualities when working on a screenplay.

Of course, to give you any helpful feedback, it would help to know exactly what you're purpose is for this script you're writing. For instance, if you were going to submit this to an agent in Hollywood and propose this to studios, you would have to make appropriate tweaks in you're structe and formatting, as well as knowingly gear the subject matter so that it's business-friendly (they are, after all, only in it for the all-powerful-dollar, regrettably).

However, if you are planning on making this yourself with your own financing, or finances you raise from investors, and would be interested in making this an independant production, I would give you differing feedback still.

However, old advice is sometimes the best advice, and there are fundamental screenwriting techniques (very subtle techniques, but they work wonders) that will instantly improve the quality and urgency of your screenplay without changing a single word of dialogue, or augmenting the plot or story at all!

And it all starts with your action lines.

One thing you want to keep in mind is that movies always take place in the moment. Moment-to-moment. It's all present-tense. Even in flashbacks, the images are "painted" with words onto the page using active descriptions that keeps the reader focused in what it literally happening to the characters. This means that by simply eliminating all "ing" words will instantly add urgency and suspense to your story. Also, it serves a second, and more aethstetic purpose, by cleaning up your sentences and making them look neat, trim and short. It also lends a certain authority to the writer that triggers a sense of confidence with the reader that makes their brains say: "this story is going places, and I want to read more", even without them knowing it.

For instance:

JEREMY, a stout and grim man in his 40's, is walking into a bar with dim lighting. He starts digging into his deep overcoat pocket, snarling impatiently, and starts pulling out a heavy wad of sweaty bills.

JEREMY, a stout and grim man in his 40's, walks into a dimly lit bar. He digs into his deep overcoat pocket with an impatient snarl and releases a heavy wad of sweaty bills.

Granted, neither of these is an amazing action line. The use of "heavy" to describe the bills suggests a narrative touch that would be more fitting in a novel, or short story. All "prettying up" of words should be kept to an absolute minimum when writing a screenplay.

Think of a screenplay as a blue-print for making a movie. The director is looking at the script to decipher information as to how the scene should be shot. Adding details is instrumental to this process, but it is important to ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS omit any and all useless words that don't directly contribute the whole. "Heavy", in this case, is supporting "wad", which calls to mind roughly the same image; therefore rendering "heavy" as a description that isn't altogether necessary, even if it is interesting.

That is not to say that you couldn't add these words of flair every once and again, to help maintain the reader's imagination; but I believe firmly that this is only to be used sparingly, and only for good reason. A director will know these words when he sees them. As a matter of fact, there's a rumor that Christpher Walken goes through the screenplays he is going to star in, and omits all his character's punctuation marks; periods, commas, exclamation points, everything. He does this because he knows that punctuation doesn't build character, and it doesn't make a movie. Likewise, fluff words don't make a movie: they are fluff.

It's like a jenga tower. Take out any and all blocks that aren't essential to the foundation of your story. But don't take out too much that the whole thing collapses. The trick to writing a good screenplay is making every single word so absolutly essential that without any one word, the whole thing would collapse. Every screenplay I have ever written, or read, would benefit from this drastically.

I'm sure I may have written more than you bargained for, perhaps; and I certainly hope it helps! I'm really happy to see someone else on here who is interested in writing screenplays, and would really like to see where this (and other) work goes for you.

And of course, if you would be interested in feedback concerning the subject material or content of your script, I would be more than happy to do so


-ksZ

[Mattrick]

RE: first few pages of a script

This was more an experiment, really. I thought it would be easier to familiarize myself with the process by adapting something I'd already previous written. So I could focus more on learning the program than actually creating it.

Now that I have the gist of the program and can use it more efficiently, I've started working on something I started writing but only got about ten pages in before my laptop and pc both died on me. It's a story that has been bugging me for sometime and it's definitely much easier to write in a script format.

I wrote 8 pages of this work tonight. It's actually more freeing to write this story as a screenplay. Funny enough, I always envisioned my main character to be a male and the shrink to be female but I think it works better the opposite way. It also allowed me to give the a character a very interesting name, as well as the title I couldn't find for the work.

I realized above the narrative aspects were too detailed. That's what happens when you copy from a novel you wrote, more things feel necessary then they really are.

One thing I like about final draft is the voices. Makes it a little easier to see how the dialogue flows in words rather than text. It does mess up sometimes...it pronounced passed 'pass-ehd' and middle-aged as 'middle-aye-jed' but can't really complain.

I'll look to your post for advice if I get stuck. I do plan on going to film school myself and one day make movies. But I would deal with being a screenwriter as long as I get to write what I want. Ideally, I would love to like a Shyamalan, P.T. Anderson or Wes Anderson where I write my own movies as well as direct them.

[Mattrick]

Nova Cane






INT. DR. GREYS OFFICE - DAY

DR. THOMAS GREY sits at his desk. He is middle-aged. He takes his wedding ring off while he works. His hair is greying but thick for his age. He’s expecting a new patient today. In his line of work, he often sees many new patients. Though, due to the circumstances which often brings them, he doesn’t see them very long. He checks his watch and goes to the door to let in his new patient.

DR. GREY
Hello, you must be Nova. Please, come in.

NOVA enters. She sits down on the couch and places her coat on her lap, her purse beside her. She is in her mid-twenties, beautiful but not particularly striking. She carries a void in her eyes but a smile on her face. This void is even more expressed by the thick makeup around her eyes.

DR. GREY (CONT'D)
Would you like me to take your coat?
NOVA
No, thank you. I’m quite fine holding onto it.

Dr. Grey nods and smiles and sits in his chair.

DR. GREY
Hello, Nova. That’s a pretty name by the way.
(she nods)
My name is Doctor Thomas Grey, but I’m sure you already know that. First off, I’m going to ask you if you understand how this process works.

NOVA
I saw someone like you when I was younger. I was a much different person, then. Now, the reasons are much different.

DR. GREY
So then, that brings me to my next question. What exactly brings you here?

NOVA
I think you’ve got a fair idea. When the doctor handed me your card, it came from a large stack of them. Are they all yours or are you simply a member of some legion of super shrinks?

DR. GREY
I suppose my reputation preceeds me.

NOVA
Well, your card did.

DR. GREY
I suppose that does as well.

A moment of silenced passed.

NOVA
Aren’t you curious?

Dr. Grey smiles.

DR. GREY
Curious about what?

NOVA
What I’m dying of.

DR. GREY
Do you want to know what I’m curious about?
(she nods)
I am curious about your super shrink comment. Is that what you expect of me?

NOVA
For you to be a super shrink?

DR. GREY
Yes.

NOVA
Doc, in the first place, I was hesitant to even show up to this appointment. Opening up has never been my area of expertise. But it IS yours. So I figured, what the hell? Give it a shot. Secondly, I thought, who else do I have to talk to?

DR. GREY
No one? Not a family member or a friend?
(she shakes her head)
What about your parents? Siblings?

NOVA
I was an only child. My mother died when I was eleven. She was the only person who ever actually cared about me. My father...he could never come to grips with me.

DR. GREY
In what way?

NOVA
Pardon?

DR. GREY
In what way couldn’t your father come to grips with you?

NOVA
Sorry Doc, but I’m not going there yet. You’re going to have to work for that answer.

DR. GREY
A woman of mystery, I see. That’s quite an admirable quality. Especially in today’s age of self voyeurism. That’s fine, we’ll get to it. What would you like to talk about, then?

Nova reacha into her purse and removes cigarettes and places one in her mouth. Dr. Grey shoots her a queer stare.

NOVA
Oh, I’m sorry.
(laughing)
Is it okay if I smoke?

DR. GREY
Actually, I’d prefer it if you didn’t.

NOVA
Fine.

She places the cigarettes back in her purse. She pulls out gum instead and puts it in her mouth. She closes her eyes as if to savour the taste.

NOVA (CONT'D)
So this ailment, well, disease I have. It’s pancreatic cancer. I looked up the statistics on the internet and I did the math. I’ve got a one in ten chance of surviving this.

DR. GREY
When did you first discover you had this, pancreatic cancer?

NOVA
I went to the hospital a few weeks ago, told them I was coughing up blood. After a few appointments, tests and a biopsy, I got the results in last week and went to see the oncologist. He told me I was in advanced stages and I mean advanced stages. Current diagnoses is extremely bad. I’ve got seven tumours in my pancreas; 4 malignant, 3 benign.

DR. GREY
What else did they say?

NOVA
Mhmm?

DR. GREY
What else did they say? About your condition?

NOVA
That I’ll die before my 25th birthday. Which is just less than two months away.
(coughing)
Just my luck.

DR. GREY
Now, I’m not overly familiar with pancreatic cancer, but I do know it’s extremely painful. Are you feeling any pain right now?

Nova looks down at her feet as they shuffled. She then looks at him but doesn't speak.

DR. GREY (CONT'D)
What is it?

NOVA
Dammit. I didn’t want this to come up so fast.
(sighs)
Well, here we go. I haven’t told anyone this, ever, that didn’t already know it. I’m considered somewhat of a medical miracle.

DR. GREY
A medical miracle? In what sense?

NOVA
Get this, when I was born. I was completely paralyzed. My mom told me before she died, that they thought I was a stillborn. But I had a pulse and my lungs were working, but just barely. I was in an incubator for weeks she told me. I was undersized and malnourished but that was temporary. They couldn’t understand why I wasn’t moving.

DR. GREY
So how did they fix you?

Nova reaches into her purse, pulls out a cigarette and lights it.

DR. GREY (CONT'D)
I thought we already discussed the smoking rule.

NOVA
I’m showing you how they fixed me.

She extinguishes it on the underside of her arm. Her expression doesn't change. Dr. Grey winced and withdrew.

DR. GREY
Why would you do that?

NOVA
To show you.

DR. GREY
Show me what?

NOVA
That they didn’t fix me. I’m still paralyzed.

I've had this idea for sometime. I know somewhere there is a condition actually like this. Think a girl went on Oprah with it or something and I would love to know the name but I really don't. I just thought of the possibilities to write with someone who cannot feel, physically. How it would affect their lives, how they would have to work to do the littlest things like knowing when to use the washroom or understanding when to eat to avoid starving. The favourite part I wrote when I tried to novelize it, was how human memory is often linked to bodily harm or sensations. There is always a story to go with a scar. But what if someone couldn't feel the pain that made the scar, would they remember how they got it?

Also, the name. Considering my main character cannot feel anything, I thought calling her Nova Cane (after the drug dentists use to numb an area) would be clever. That will also be the title.

[Mattrick]

Any port in a storm; it’s a saying resounded through time and generations, passed down as a pearl of wisdom. It tells that no matter how daunting the world becomes we can find refuge in the most unlikely of places – in not so many words – buck up, things will improve, be blessed for that which you have. This definition is a far-gone fallacy – a talisman to bear through the darkness, lighting the way for those in simple denial of their own situations. The phrase echoes no such sentiment to me as I prepare my vessel for deportation. The storm was here but I could no longer stay in this port, it no longer provides me what I need and its lighthouse blinds me upon each slice through the violent sky. The saying is one that kept me here for much longer than I needed to reside. It was a port at first glance seemed so elegant in all its simplicity. When I initially arrived I was overcome with loquacity despite my emotional stupor. Yet, something struck me as indignant about it, some intrinsic quality I cannot yet see. As I shove off the dock in my small yet sturdy vessel I understand it.

Some weeks before a light appeared in the night, its first appearance brief yet enticing. It was a few days before I witnessed it again; its white light seemed to beckon to me. It wanted me to come to it, I knew this, and I could feel it. Without words it spoke entire volumes of longing and exasperation. It wasn’t until a week I ago on a crystal clear, moonless night I comprehended that it was a lighthouse itself. I questioned on whether or not what felt to be a beacon was merely poor translation. I doubted its need for me or perhaps I merely doubted my own need for it. It wasn’t until I received an S.O.S. two nights before I finally learned the truth. My inklings proved to not be an erroneous belief but an absolute certainty. What the message said is not critical but my response holds great weight upon my being as I cast off shore.

The storm that the horizon wore as a hat for days had finally arrived. This was, without a sliver of doubt, the most asinine time to venture out into the murk but no other option resided in my thoughts. All I knew was that I had to leave and I had to get to that light. But in order to get there I must push through familiar territory. The vast ocean was prepared to throw everything it had at me. On the odd instance the moon managed to shimmer through the opaque sky it seemed to be screaming at the chaos surrounding me. My shoulders already ached from paddling through the bellowing wake, its white caps spilling solemnly over the sides. A morbid thought crossed my mind that this storm was designed with me in mind. That or my own crisis had built it up and now as I strive for a new life the torment of my past life is determined to sink me en route.

I bellow laughter from my stomach. I laughed at the ocean as well as myself, it was an act of pure and utter madness and untimely selfishness yet it contained a notion of heroism. To leave a life behind at the promise of something that might be better is both foolish and valiant. I felt like a general, leading my platoon into battle with a saber in hand, screaming CHARGE until my voice gives out. I relished the frigid water on my face and the taste of salt on my tongue. Its amazing how alive I feel! This was a place I used to call reluctantly call home, I was adrift without a paddle, enveloped only by the harsh extremities of the world for comfort. I recall the elation when I saw a lighthouse in the dim, concluding that my errant drifting nomadic ways were coming to an end. I recall this because through the sleet and the rain I see the other lighthouse – faint but unmistakable.

I paddle faster and faster. The swell of the ocean means to push me off course but I refute its influence. Its shoves pressure of the frame of my boat. I feel the wood groan beneath me. Lightning breaks through the sky and its brilliant light blinds me and my destination is lost momentarily. I panic during this temporary blindness, a gripping anxiety that when my vision returns there will be no light, that I will have gone off course, never to return. I continue to struggle against the ocean yet it feels more difficult than it should. I look around the frame of the boat and I see something glisten in a flash of lightning – an iron chain. Feverishly I begin to pull on the chain, my muscles threatening to burst through my skin with the act. After much tribulation I haul it inboard and notice it is an anchor. There is another one opposite this one but I’m too sapped of strength to pull it in.

It was no surprise on how this had come to be. I must have given off some discernible signals that I was planning on leaving. In my rush to fulfill my own needs I neglected on how it would be for those who accommodated my stay in that port, how I was welcomed with open arms and provided shelter from the storm. My leaving obviously inflicted a wound and now I’ve been sabotaged in revenge. Part of me felt if I was more cautious about my intent to leave, handled it with more tact this journey would be easier. I had no choice but to make the best out of what I had to work with so I dug in and paddled once again.

Visions of the promise that awaited me flooded my vision. During this time I forgot about the maelstrom slapping against my face; I see the bright colours, the beautiful sunset, the new things to feel and experience and discover for myself. Before lay a destination of eternal potential, it’s a truth that permeates my soul much as the rain has my coat. Still I see the lighthouse through the sleet and the rain.

Then it is gone.

I paddle, my frantic eyes pooling with destitution and overflowing with despair. I had to get there I just had to, there was nothing else out there for me, I know, I’ve drifted through the ocean for decades and only found one port. This is the only chance I have at laying true foundations. Days seem to wisp by in each icy and cutting gust of wind. Still I could not see the light. I turned the boat around over and over again, feeling like a dog chasing its own tail. Still I could not see it anywhere. I was surrounded by vehement darkness. Millions of questions on a nightmare loop played through my mind; was it all a lark? Miscommunication? Fear? Denial? Why oh why did the light disappear? Did I go off course? Did the saboteur accomplish their task? Did the world simply seek to chastise me? Was the light extinguished or can I merely not glimpse it?

I was alone in the murk again, an unwilling solitude I was again entrusted to bare, my own talisman. There is no future before me and my past trails everlasting behind me. I find myself once again adrift, an all too familiar place; a place where I once established incorrigible peace, yet one thought does not escape me during this hour of distress – that I do not want to go back to that place, to be that person once again. I reflect upon myself as I shoved off into the storm and the epiphany that came with it. Any port in a storm is a feeble mantra. To throw yourself at the mercy of the first port you come across is act of embarrassing desperation. I’ve arrived at realization that not one port out there exists. No, any port in a storm will not do, not at all. I now understand there are many ports in a storm.

I plunge my oar into the water, slicing through a perfect reflection of the raging storm above and press on.

[woodpryan]

Re: Many Ports In A Storm

In the forum I posted for my story, "Embers and Ashes" you asked for a critique of this story. Here goes.
The first thing I noticed about this story is it's tone, which is very distinctive and different. The question I have, though, is why? I have no sense of when this story takes place, but the language feels archaic, leading me to believe that the story is supposed to have taken place in the late 1700s or early 1800s. I would recommend two things dealing with tone. Explicitly tell us at some point where the story takes place and when the story takes place. If it does not take place at a time that matches this archaic sort of language, it needs a tone overhaul, bringing it up to date.
The second thing I notice is that we have a few tense problems. Does this story take place in the present tense or the past tense? I would recommend that you make this a past tense story for two reasons. It is easier to write a story in the past tense, making it less likely for you to slip up and have a tense issue, and it is easier to read a story written in the past tense.
Next, I notice that we don't have much conflict in this story. What is the real driving force of the story? We have a man who is in the ocean during a storm who sees a light and is trying to get to it. What is special about this light? Why is it imperative that he reach it? What put him in the ocean in the first place? We need a stronger conflict. We need more tension here.
Next, I realize that we know nothing about our main character. Why should we care if he reaches the light if we don't know who he is, what he is doing there, who he cares about, what he cares about, how old he is, if he is even a he, if he is married, has kids, has parents who are still alive. We know virtually nothing about this character. On this point, I have not just a suggestion, but a requirement. I will not read a further draft of your story without you having written a detailed character sketch. Before you come back to this story to re-write, you need to know everything about this character. You are his mother, father, best friend, closest confidant, therapist. You know more about this character than this character knows about himself. You know what time he wakes up, goes to bed, how many times a day he brushes his teeth, the year, date, hour of his birth, how many girlfriends he has ever had and why those relationships failed, how many kids he has, all of their names and how he feels about each of them. I mean everything! You know everything about him. Make a character sketch that is 3,000 words long. I'm not kidding. Then, come back to the story with all that knowledge in your head. Not everything in the sketch will come out in your story, but you will have enough information about him as a character that he will be lifelike, realistic. A walking, talking, 3D character.
I notice that you do not tend to use adverbs very often in your story. For that, you are to be commended. Good job on not throwing useless crap at me.
I also notice, however, that there is a bit of a lack of description here. How does it smell out there? How cold is it (show me, don't tell me)? What time is it (show me)? What is the season(show me)? What color is the water? Blue, grey, black? It is raining. How hard? Is there lightning? Wind? Give me some more descriptions.
I commend you on your verbs. You use some excellent verbs here, and your vocabulary is enormous. But, here is the question. Are you doing this to show off your vocabulary or is it for the overall tone of the story?
I get the sense that this is the first draft of this story due to numerous awkwardly phrased passages and mistakes that would have been caught by a re-read. Make sure you catch these in revision.
Finally, I get the sense that this story was written with a moral in mind, or some sort of lesson to be taught. I highly recommend against that. Your purpose as a writer is not to import upon me some sort of moral, value, or lesson. Your purpose as a writer is to tell me a story. If I get a lesson out of your story, that's great, but don't write the story with the lesson in mind. Write the story with the story in mind.
I hope I have been helpful. Keep writing, my friend. Practice makes perfect as Mr. King said in, "On Writing." Good luck.

Ryan Wood

[Mattrick]

Re: Many Ports In A Storm

I'm not an overly descriptive writer, I tend to only describe what I feel needs to be described. For me the emotion and themes of the story are more important to present. I like to allow my audience to create the scene in their own minds. This short story is actually an abstract short story and it's more of about symbolism than anything. Someone described it to me in my group as they envisioned a painting while I read it aloud which is what I was going for. As for what the story means, what you see in it is what you get really. It's not about a moral or a lesson, but about it's protaganist have an epiphany, one which require great loss and pain to realize. My goal essentially was to hide it's meaning in imagery and allusions so hopefully each reader sees it in a different light. We had to write a story about change and it's a pretty personal story.

I agree with backstory and such and that's very important in a narrative. The novel I am writing, I suppose you could say, is nothing but backstory lol. And I assure you there is great conflict in this story. It contains man vs. nature, man vs. himself and man vs man. Some of the things you mentioned are in there and some were unnecessary. There is backstory there, you just have to look for it, as was my intent.

And as for the character sketch, the person in the boat is me so...no need for that. I've all the information I need on the character. I consider specifics in a character to be arbitrary. What good is the date of a characters birthday or age if it holds no significance. I just read of Mice and Men and it mentioned neither, nor really any back story on the individual charactes, merely backstory on their relationship with each other. It really all depends what you need in your story and what you don't.

Thanks for your thoughts and much appreciated. I was very proud of this piece of work as I thought I articulated what I wanted to say very precisely. It's actually given me confidence to write more, as I'd not written in sometime, nothing of any value at least. I'll do a write up of your story tomorrow...maybe tonight if I feel up to it. I'll make it pretty in depth and I hope I can help.

[Mattrick]

Re: Many Ports In A Storm

Also thanks for going a little above and beyond. I only wanted you to read it

[Mattrick]

Currently I'm rewriting a novel I wrote some years back. The original draft was basically a failure as I wasn't a fantastic writer when I initially took on the project and I had far too much fun with it, which eradicated the realistic and gritty atmosphere I originally intended on, nor did I manage to properly work in the themes that originally drew me to conceive the story. If anyone remembers it (I only posted I think about 30 rough pages of the 260 I wrote), it was called Rabid Euphoria. Basically this thread is more about help with my prose as it's something I've really focuses on improving. I'll be posting paragraphs from it that I've had trouble or I feel that could do more or maybe do too much or that I'm having trouble make flow properly, or maybe I'm mis-expressing (is that a word lol) things. If anyone can lend me a hand (Jean, I'm looking at you for some help here) it would be much appreciated.



This is the opening paragraph. In it I'm trying to illustrate the backdrop of this tale, as I feel the settings are a character entirely of itself. Yet I don't feel it packs quite enough and it could definitely use more. I want the reader to truly understand how destitute the city really is.


----

The city in which this tale takes place, is a decaying city; in most respects it is a cesspool, a blight on humanity and all it’s strived to achieve . . . the infrastructure is failing, poverty runs rampant, there are pregnant children, broken families, and drugs course through this particular city’s veins, and as the city crumbles it personifies the conditions of it’s inhabitants. If this city were to go up in a flash, many residents would not be missed for they are shattered people, many who’ve severed all ties with loved ones and they now exist merely for their vices. The most profitable businesses in this city are prostitution, illegal gambling, bars and drug trafficking and that is not even mentioning the far less sordid practices of fraudulent welfare and disability claims, many of which are supported by the far more sordid practices. It’s the kind of place where people walk with their heads down, so as to not mistakenly anger a drunk or a smack addict in dire need of a fix, where if you thought you heard someone beckon after you, your gaze remains fixed for you don’t turn; sure you may know this person, but it would not stop them from mugging you for your last dollar in hopes of making a score.


- - -

As I continue with the rewrite I'll post more parts of it for some help and any help from anyone is extremelyappreciated.

[Jean]

Re: Novel re-write

I'll be greatly interesting in reading/revising it with you. Don't use the italics, ok? for the sake of readability

[Mattrick]

Novel Re-write continued

It must have done that because I used the quote feature...I'll refrain from using it lol I'll edit it.


This next part is the introduction to one of the main characters in the first chapter. I think it's the strongest writing I've done in the re-write so far yet something about it strikes me as odd. I'm thinking all these paragraphs could really be one paragraph is all kind of ties in togther. Wondering if it does an effective job of making the reader understand the character's situation.


----


Andy lay slumped on his couch, stoned, practically drooling, his gaze vacant with a cigarette draping a snake of black ash in one hand. The couch is quixotic in correlation with the rest of the two bedroom apartment; the paint was tinted yellow from tobacco smoke and a perpetual smell of mustiness permeated the apartment. . . . it was a sordid dwelling, perfectly fit for a self-actualizing junkie who gave no second thoughts to appearances. It was an unclean, dimly lit place. The living area was scarcely furnished; a television, a tattered chair, a leather couch and wobbly coffee table and over in the corner was his contemplation spot, an old, coffee ring stained desk, and on it rested his journal and his heroin lockbox. The windows were grimy, dirty dishes littered the counters and the trash container overflowed several days ago and no one had bothered to clean it up and now, flies congregated around a rotting slice of pizza on the floor. Yes, it was the ideal domicile for a self-actualized junkie. It is ideal for the mere fact it is cheap. It is no more than a habitable drug den. Andy was content with it.

The amusing part of it all is that Andy could afford to live somewhere more accommodating, yet he chose to thrust himself into poverty. He is from a suburb of this once thriving city – his father was employed as a manger in a manufacturing company and his mother was an English teacher at a high school in town. He lived comfortably in a modestly appraised home; a pool in the backyard, a two car garage, four bedroom, three bathrooms and a finished basement, with a white picket fence a large Beech tree in the front yard. It was in a picturesque neighborhood where luxury vehicles were no stranger to its driveways. In Andy’s eyes it was artificial and mundane and its inhabitants mere slaves to the redundant superficialities of society; caring more about the aesthetic value of their lawns than of anything with substance. How he loathed being surrounded by sycophantic socialites! They would exchange congenial greetings to your face and gossip when you turned around. This place vexed him irrefutably and he wanted out.

One fateful night, he received a phone call from the police not long after scraping through high school. . . . there had been an accident; a drunk driver T-boned his father’s Lincoln in an intersection and killed him on impact, and his mother was in critical condition at the hospital. The police sent an outfit over to pick him up. He was high at the time. When he’d arrived his mother had already slipped into a coma. All night he spent in the hospital, utterly inconsolable, shaking, scratching, craving. . . .needing. As the sun rose he was told by a doctor they didn’t know the extent of his mother’s injuries, if she’d ever awaken from the coma or the long term repercussions of the incident. Before Andy even pondered the possibility of being an orphan it became an unrelenting reality – at noon his mother succumbed to her injuries. The week following was an incoherent blur of nameless condolences and gripping embraces from relatives he hardly knew. He shot up before the funeral and stumbled and sweated through his prepared eulogy, those in attendance chalked his composure to grief. After the funeral he was contacted by an their family attorney, to come in for a meeting. The will stated that their estate and all their assets, including half a million in life insurance, was left to him. Andy was stupefied at his situation. For sometime he attempted to co-exist with his fallaciously considerate neighbours, as they brought him food to eat and helped him out around the property, smiling counterfeit smiles and uttering proverbs of inane wisdom and consolation. However, the plaguing of family memories wore on him like a ball and chain and he had to make his escape. Promptly he sold the house for a smooth three hundred thousand. The only way he could escape was to find a place that in no way reflected the idyllic home he once had. All his families belongings were either given or sold away, save for the couch he is now slumped over on.

Andy no longer had a family, nor had a loving home and in their stead he substituted something far superior. . . .he had euphoria in its purest form. Its caress equaled that of his mother’s touch, no, in fact, it eclipsed it, pervading his entire being, from his skin to his very essence but more than anything it made him whole, it validated his existence.