Ok, so I almost never post here... but I am gonna make an exception.
A friend of mine is putting together a collection of creative works by friends of his. He wants to actually spend the money to either publish it or make an interactive CD out of it.
So this is what I was thinking of submiting to him, but I know it needs some cleaning up. I wrote it like 2 years ago....
Anyways, the point is, I am interested in hearing some honest feedback. I don't want the "wow! That is sooooo good!!" type responses from people who think they are supposed to be nice. If you don't like it, or some part of it, tell me WHAT and WHY so I can work on improving it.
Make sense?
AverageI’ve got a story to tell you”. James stood from his desk and walked across the room to the chair where another figure was seated. “You always said I never opened up to you.”, he began walking slow steady circles around the chair, “That I was too withdrawn.” James, paused, looked back at the figure and half-smiled. “Well, we’ve got a few minutes right now, so here it is. My chance to open up to you, Jenna”. “Maybe it’s too late now… but I believe in fixing my mistakes. They always say, better late than never”. James turned his back to Jenna and, in his mind, counted out the 5 steps back to his desk. His shoes clicked on the hardwood floors. One, for the first day we met. Two, for our first date. Three, for the first time we made love. Four, one for each year we were together. Five, for the five months we didn’t talk to each other. At each step, James would look at back at Jenna, start to speak but then stop and pace again. He stood motionless for several minutes looking out the window at the tall building in the distance. Slowly, he removed his suit jacket, the letters “Armani” emblazoned across the cuff, and hung it in the corner. Both figures remained motionless for several moments. Jenna desperately wanted to say something to James, to break the silence with anything, but instead sat there quietly. Finally, James turned back to his desk, poured himself a glass of bourbon form the cabinet of red-wax covered bottles and settled down into his tall brown-leather office chair.
As James looked down at Jenna he could feel the first few swallows of whiskey dripping their way into his stomach and down into his veins. James’ thick padded leather chair sat easily three inches above the small wooden office chair James chose for Jenna. James was very specific in how he arranged his office. The desk and chair were arranged so that the picture window behind him would let in just enough sun to make anyone sitting across from him a little uncomfortable. Of course the sun had long since gone down this evening. After a few moments he spoke again “I’m sorry, maybe this…”. James looked up from his glass of whiskey and into the eyes of his visitor and then he remembered why they were there. Why she was there. She needed to hear this and he needed to hear what she had to say. He didn’t want to do this. He had to do this. Besides, it was too late to turn back now. In one quick swallow James downed the remaining liquor and placed the crystal glass to the side by the cabinet.
“Growing up, I was never the smartest kid. I was never the most athletic kid. I was never the most popular or the best looking. I was one of those kids who always managed to disappear in the crowd. Lost in the obscurity of the American school system. I spent most of my childhood content to be”, James paused, “average.” He smiled slightly. “When we played basketball, I was never picked first, but I was never picked last either”. “No one ever called on me to make plans, but I always had a long list of people I could count on to include me in their plans if I took the initiative and called them”. “The first girl I asked to a dance rarely said yes, but I always had a date by the time I asked the third girl on my list”, James shrugged.
“I still remember my first real girlfriend. I was in junior high. 8th Grade. My last year before I became a full fledged high school student.” James settled back into his chair and placed his feet up on his otherwise spotless mahogany desk. “There was a whole group of girls some friends of mine always hung out with. As the weeks went by we all kind of paired off with the girls. I guess we had finally realized girls didn’t have cooties and maybe they had something we were interested in after all.”
James’ eyes searched the ceiling, “Her name was Lesley. Lesley…well, I can’t remember her last name anymore. I guess it doesn’t matter really.” His eyes returned back to his guest. “She had shoulder length brown hair, hazel eyes, and more than anything in the world, she just wanted people to like her. Lesley would do anything to feel special. It was easy for a young boy to use that to his advantage.”
“It didn’t last very long though. Just long enough for me to get a taste of the opposite sex. She eventually moved to the next county and I never really saw her again. Of course I would see her out at the mall, or at parties… but I never really talked to her. I guess I knew she was replaceable. And she was.”
“The next one came just a few months later. Sarah. Sarah Coleman. You remember Sarah? She went to college with us” James turned his head slightly “you don’t remember Sarah Coleman? Well, she graduated the same year we did. She was around at a lot of the same parties you that we went to. In fact she was there when… well. I’ll get to the part in a minute” James frowned.
“Then, in High School, there was”, James counted each name off on his fingers, “Kate, Kristin, Erin, Kelly, Catherine and Ashley.” James brought his feet back down to the floor under his desk and leaned forward to get a better look at Jenna. “They were all pretty girls. They all had their good sides and their bad sides. Sarah was really a looker from a distance, but she had one eye that would wander from time to time. Kate would constantly fluctuate between being too skinny and too chubby. Catherine had her terrible mood swings and Kelly was in and out of counseling so much I felt like she was spending more time with her psychiatrist than she was with me.”
“I don’t know if any of those relationships really made me happy, but each of those girls made me feel safe. Comfortable. Sometimes feeling comfortable can be just as good as being happy.” James rose from his desk again and knelt next to Jenna. James raised a hand to brush the hair back from Jenna’s eyes, and Jenna flinched away from his hand. A dark cloud passed across James’ face, “But that was what was wrong with you, wasn’t it?” James stood and began to pace back and forth in front of Jenna. “Nothing was ever comfortable was it? God forbid anything ever be that easy.”
James stopped his pacing and circled around behind Jenna and whispered into her ear, “but I’m getting ahead of myself aren’t I?” James found a seat on the front edge of his desk and lowered his eyes down to his three hundred dollar loafers. “So skip ahead a few years. It’s the summer before college. I had already settled on State because I knew they would accept me and because that’s where all of my friends were going.” James reached up and loosened his tie. “I didn’t know what I was going to major in, but what freshmen does?”.
“Then, the most amazing thing happened to me”. James looked up at Jenna. “I met this girl. She wasn’t like any of the other girls I had dated. She was perfect. She had perfect hair, perfect eyes, perfect lips…”. Jenna let her eyes lock with James’ for an instant than looked away immediately. “You were at State because it was all your parents could afford. You and I both knew you belonged at a big name school. Hell, you were granted admission to most of them. But the scholarship board saw fit to only give you enough for a state school. So you went and you didn’t complain”.
“But you worked your charm. Everyone at school loved you. By far the most popular girl in our freshmen class. Way out of my league naturally. But every time I’d see you at a party you’d make eye contact with me. Then, when I didn’t have the courage, you approached me!” James raised his voice in mock ire. “Didn’t you know that I’m not good enough for you?” James managed to force a smile. “I was a B and C student! You had straight A’s your whole life. You dated the college football star! I was thrilled when a cheerleader smiled at me once! But something about the way you laughed at my bad jokes, and stood close to me when we talked…” James’ voice trailed off.
“I could recount our years together. Tell you about all of the memorable dates. The long weekend in the mountains. The week in Italy. The hundreds of nights spent sitting in the dorms just being together. But you were there. You remember.”
“But do you really remember what you did to me during that time?”, the anger in James’ voice rose. “You started to reshape me. You told me that business degree would help me get a good job so we could be happy together. You told me how much better I look in dress khaki’s than blue jeans. You suggested that I would be great for student council. You told me that being an officer in the business frat would look good on my resume. You helped run my campaign for class president and helped me write my acceptance speech. You helped me get my first job, hell, you practically got the job for me. You were with me when I got my first raise and landed my first big sale. And I did it all…” James paused and closed his eyes. “I did it all because I just wanted to make you happy”.
James paused, as if he was expecting Jenna to speak, and when she didn’t he continued on, “but you know how the story ends. Eventually the girl gets tired of her play toy. Once she’s reshaped him in whatever image she sees fit, she moves on to the next one. Isn’t that how the game works? Or was it because I couldn’t live up to the expectations you had set for me? Was that why I saw you with HIM downtown last weekend? And if you expected me to believe that ‘he’s just a friend’ bullshit…” James could see tears starting to trickle down Jenna’s cheeks as she shook her head from side to side. She’d denied it since the first time James confronted her. He didn’t expect any less now. James slowly circled around behind Jenna and lowered his mouth down to whisper in her ear.
“So now is the moment of truth, the real reason we’re both here.” James licked his dry lips, “Why did you do it? Why did you take me away from my life and force me to be an ideal I could never live up to? Why did you abandon me when I needed you the most?”
James reached up and removed the bandana from Jenna’s mouth so she could speak. Jenna sobbed uncontrollably, unable to speak through her tears for several minutes. But James was patient. He had been waiting a week for this, he could wait a few more minutes. Jenna’s eyes focused on the now empty red plastic can in the corner of the room and the overwhelming fumes that filled the room. When she was finally able to speak she looked up at James, “I only wanted you to live up to your potential. I just wanted us to be happy.”
“I think I was happy once Jenna. Before things got so … perfect.” James quickly placed the gag back over Jenna’s mouth and, ignoring her muffled sobs, walked down to the garage to look for his matches.
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