semtecks

Spike pushes the door open and is greeted by the usual smell of piss and shit and stale, exotic farts. This is his duty, to clean up after the world.

The rest of the airport is spotless and Spike usually feels more at ease when he pushes this door open and wheels in his cleaning trolley behind him—he’s usually glad to be away from the heaving, sweating crowds of a thousand countries. But something is wrong.

The door swings closed and Spike brings the trolley to rest in front of the urinals. The smell of cleaning fluids over piss, shit, and farts grown alien by unknown herbs and spices.

Is there another smell in here?

Yes, something faint and sickly sweet.

Has he smelled it before?

Spikes memory machine coughs and kicks into life. Six years ago a Dutch man came in here, fresh from Amsterdam. The diamonds he’d swallowed had cut him up inside; he’d died on the toilet (like Elvis), the diamonds in the bowl had picked up the light of the harsh overheads and glittered in the blood, and shit, and pink flesh of a Dutchman’s bowels. Spike hadn’t taken the diamonds.

The smell is the same.

The smell is fresh death.

He starts pushing the cubicles open, one by one they swing inwards . . . except for the last one. It’s occupied.

“You okay in there, buddy?”

No answer.

“You need help?”

Still none.

“If you don’t say something I’m coming in.”

Silence. Dead men tell no tales, Spike thinks.

Spike raises his foot and kicks.

The door shakes.

He kicks again.

The simple lock breaks and the door hits the inside wall with a bang.

The smell hits him like a neutron bomb. Spike, veteran of bad smells, manages to keep his Mac-and-Cheese in his stomach.

The man has been dead for at least eight hours. He lies cramped between the toilet bowl and the cubicle wall. His eyes are open and staring, he holds a mobile phone in his left hand.

Spike places him as South American—maybe Brazilian. The Dutch man had fallen off the seat, his bloody, torn ass upraised. At least the Brazilian has more dignity.

Spike looks into the toilet bowl. No blood, no shit, no diamonds . . . something else. He’s seen enough movies to know what.

Cocaine.

The Brazilian stares blankly at him.

Spike carefully takes each bag out of the bowl, noticing an empty one that must have burst in the Brazilian’s stomach.

He puts the bags in the small bin under his trolley and closes the lid. He’s wasted six years in this shitty job and he isn’t going to waste another six.

He gives the Brazilian some of his dignity back by closing his eyes and pulling his pants up. And then he leaves the airport a rich man.

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DirtySyko

It's a decent story, but it is definitely needing some more length to it. Besides the problem with how short the story is, I also found a couple other problems with the plot.

I'm not sure if this is correct, but after 8 hours I don't think a corpse would start smelling all that bad. It would take a corpse, especially one that is just sitting on a toilet, over a week to develop a stinch that strong. If the body was laying out in the hot sun it would probably start smelling like that within a day, but 8 hours seems pretty fast. Also considering that the guy didn't actually use the bathroom, he just died from an overdose.

Also, the ending said he "left as a rich man." He took the cocaine from the dead guy, but does this janitor know anything about the drug business? How does he figure he can go out and sell cocaine if he is oblivious to drug prices, where to sell, and what quality the stuff is? Plus you never said the amount he found... It's hard to believe a guy is walking around with pounds of cocaine on him, and this janitor isn't going to get rich on a couple grams of coke. He would have had to found POUNDS. The diamonds in the other dead body probably would have been worth more than the cocaine he found and decided to take.

Besides that, I liked the idea of the story. A guy with a shitty job (literally) who has seen some crazy things during his life. You could definitely render this story, make it longer, edit some things, and it would be very interesting.

eggo

Nice vingete Semtecks,

Very good opening scene to whatever you have planned. Athought a bit short it brings right into the story with concise, no frills typr of writing that I like.

very good, the double kick adds to the tension.

Very cool

.

another six seconds? seconds to years.

I would lose the "And" here. It weakens the final sentence. I disagree with Dirty Syko here. He believes he is rich and that good enough for me.


Thanks for the read

DirtySyko

Actually it isn't good enough. The author blatently said "And then he leaves the airport a rich man." He stated the guy left a rich man, he never said he just "believes" he is a rich man. So the point is, the guy actually isn't rich, and the story says he is at the end. That's an error in the plot that takes away from the realism.

gohn67

I liked this story. Very nicely done. You created good tension.

At first, I thought along the lines of dirtysyko, but after reading Eggo's comment, I agree with him more. So yea, the ending works for me also.

Only one that thing that really stuck out to me.

THose two lines are too repetitive. It uses the same wording basically. Too close together also. Maybe find a better way to word it.

Spikes = Spike's?

The name choice was really interesting to me becuase it reminds me of a dog's name more than a humans. Not sure if you did that on purpose but I thought that was a good idea.

I like this simile. Most have been very expolsive.

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EDIT

Well, if he is writing it in the POV of this character, I feel like that works. Using a sort of untrustworthy narrator, that only sees it how Spike sees it.

But I see your point. I'm not sure what Semteck's intentions were though.

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DirtySyko

Well once again there is still a problem. He wrote this story in Limited Third Person, which means the narrator is unknown, but the narrator knows everything about a certain person. His thoughts, his actions, his past. In this story the narrator knows everything about Spike... But Spike isn't the one telling the story, so at the end when it says he leaves a rich man, the narrator claims that Spike IS a rich man. Since the narrator knows everything about Spike, then it's a fact, but realistically Spike isn't going to end up being rich.

If he wrote it in the POV of the character, the narrator would have said something along the lines of:

"Spike left with an overwhelming feeling of being a rich man."

By saying Spike had an overwheelming feeling of being rich states that Spike is the one who feels rich. So the narrator isn't pointing out any facts, he is pointing out what the protagonist, Spike, feels.

So it's still an error in realism of the plot, that can't be denied. I'm just saying a small amount of editing, and a little lengthier, would make this story more interesting.

EDIT:

"Using a sort of untrustworthy narrator, that only sees it how Spike sees it. "

I somehow missed that statement. Even still, if the narrator is untrustworthy, the story didn't give us any clues to know that except for the end. That isn't enough action to show us the narrator is untrustworthy. We would need to see him make more mistakes along the way in the story to realieze what he says can't be trusted.

So I still stick by to what I've said

eggo

The point is he may or may not be rich, it’s a short short or a vignette. Just a short sketch or a scene, an as yet unknown plot. For all we know his brother is the biggest drug dealer in the city or the police are offering a one million dollar reward for the most Brazilian coke collected that night.

Third person narration used in this manner, is of course telling us what he believes, just as we know what’s going on inside his head in all the other text just as Gohn said.

He was very happy. He walked away the luckiest man on earth. That was when the cement truck hit him.

Here, was the narrator lying? Or are we seeing the mans inner thoughts? Grammatically should we should say;

He walked away feeling as if he was the luckiest man on earth.

Perhaps, but the first quote is used as a device. Using your trust for the narrator as twist to be comedic. It can be used as a tell or a foreshadowing. Perhaps him being rich has nothing whatever to do with the money or coke or maybe he's a coke head. I don’t know if that’s what he was shooting for, but I repeat,

He believes he is rich and that good enough for me.

You have already said it isn’t good enough for you, don’t presume to say what’s good enough for me.

Btw. Welcome to the forum, it's always nice to have a freindly debate.

gohn67

Agreed, this is interesting.

quote]Well once again there is still a problem. He wrote this story in Limited Third Person, which means the narrator is unknown, but the narrator knows everything about a certain person. [/quote]
But this is written in present tense also, so the future hasn't happned yet.

But I agree that the last line is sort of jarring. It did throw me off a bit. And wouldn't have thought of that if Eggo had not pointed it out.

I would like to see a longer version of this also.

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semtecks

Thanks guys, for commenting,

I think this story does need some work, Gohn, Eggo, Glad you guys like it.

Dirtypsyko, thanks for pointing out where the story fell flat on it's face.

I'll need to go into research to find out about mules, prices, etc. I've tried google and yahoo and ask but all they give me is a loud of waffle and no straight facts.

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gohn67

Oh man I forgot to say that this reminded me of the movie, Maria Full of Grace.

Just the whole heroin capsules up the ass thing. I can't remember the price they were paid for those. But if you rent the movie or google search the movie you may get a good answer. Obviously your guy had coke capsules instead though. But it may help.

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Chris Miller

Hi semtecks,

I won't enter the debate spawned by this basiclly very well written and imaginative piece. But I would like to make a couple suggestions. Watch Maria Full of Grace. Read the effects of a cocaine overdose. I wonder if it would be possible to die from eating diamonds. Still, this scene is well portrayed.

I feel the "shit... piss... fart" spiel at the beginning is the weakest prose. I am as vulgar as a marine when I'm frustrated or pissed off. Vulgarity is not offensive to me, but it is very inarticulate. Generally you will lose more than you win with it in your writing. Also, this is not a childish piece, and this wording almost makes it seem so initially. If you are going to describe a rank washroom, then try to put some real descriptive "stank" on it. Don't cop out.

That said, this was an enjoyable read. It had no trouble keeping me going. The ending felt a tad abrupt, maybe beacuse I kind of hated to see it end. Perhaps uou could let your character wrestle with the alternatives (and thus address come of the other critiques) before winding it up.

Chris

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judysaidso

Great story and excellent use of words! I've never seen anyone use "exotic farts." I loved that the story was simple, and really short. You managed to pack a lot in there for its length. I loved that you didnt follow the regular short story format, very well done. A lot of the best writers are doing that. The ending makes sense, who could he sell diamonds to, without coming off as suspicious. Cocain, anyone looking for that wont ask questions. Good story dude! Loved the language.

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Wyndstar

Aside the repetition of yuck words and the fact that it seems a bit unrealistic (to me) that a body can sit in a stall unnoticed for eight hours, ignoring the debate, I enjoyed the story for its length and its ending. They were very consistant given the description of how long he'd been doing that job, and his attitude. After years of cleaning up, it isn't likely I'd have much of an inner debate about putting an end to it either. That is what I think I like about it the most. A dirty story with a neat, clean ending. Nicely written semtecks...

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semtecks

Thanks guys,

just started a new job and my time is short, so thanks for all the feedback, i need a lot of encouragement just to put pen to paper right now.

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