The ghost of Meryl Streep is chasing folks around this house. Secluded out in the woods, over-looking a lake (with mountains in the distance), the house has to rhyme or reason to its arrangement or structure; its corridors go any which way. Myself and a woman acquaintance race around the halls in the middle of […]
Hopping like ninjas from roof to car roof at the drive-in movie theater. Underworld has set up on the stage as a live accompaniment to the film; it’s like an Olde Turn of the Century production. The show is slow to start and everyone is eager. Rumors of seductions abound as the band begins their […]
I wait in line all day and into the night. For some World of Warcraft sequel? I had no idea; I play along. A co-worker admits that he played games as a kid so that he would understand the computers when he got a job and now he has a job to pay for the […]
Hole up in the apartment. Close the doors. Lock them. Bar them. Push the tables and chairs up against them. Patrol the windows. Get all the knives out of the drawers and butcher’s blocks. Where are the guns? The city is half on fire. The rooftops that are not ablaze are covered with the militants […]
It seems as though I am bound for more inviting harbors. This sea-side town has had enough of me and me of it. My meager wages and scores have not turned over enough cash to re-outfit my ships with the new sails that they require. Instead, I have jury-rigged my own, stitched together from flags […]
The house feels very early-80s Rust Belt. A package has arrived in the mail for me; it is some kind of thick quiz. There are dozens of pages of line items, each a paragraph or two long; some of the exam questions even have diagrams. The test seems to be about copyright and fair use. […]
I need to get out of here. I’ve been working too long hours, farmed out to a satellite office (Chicago? Schaumburg?) for work that isn’t mine. It’s maddening, frustrating but there’s a little extra money involved and I don’t want to let anyone down. But it is time to leave, the last train will be […]
They’re breaking in downstairs, little by little. (No. Wait. Back-up.) The funeral was short and grisly. (No. Wait. Back-up.) Didn’t this start with fishing? A party at someone’s house. A camp or cottage on the lake and a fishing pier. I haven’t fished since I was a little kid. Turn your back and people drop […]
A banquet, a gathering. All manner of co-workers (former and current) and friends and family. All together in one place, seated around ten-foot round tables in a courtyard with high brick walls. There is a stage with nothing on it. I know everyone here and they’re all trying to talk to me. I am embarrassed, […]
The whole operation has been moved down to the beach. The computers and phones, the snake plants and half-gallon aquariums, the desks and file-holders — it’s all set up in these tents and lean-tos. (I shudder at the quaint cliche of it all. How Survivor… How Lost…) We have turned the lamps into torches and […]