can't think of a title. something about anarchy and christmas. - Writers Forum

cellardoor · 12-29-2005, 02:33 PM

Bing… bing… bing… bing… bing… bing…bing… bing… bing… bing… bing…

The enormous clock tower in the center of town tolled the hour, then softly began to play Christmas songs.

Fucking Christmas songs. They’d been playing constantly today, echoing throughout the entire town, pissing me off wherever I went. There was no escape from the songs, and I couldn’t muster the energy to ignore them.

And of course here, on the tracks, the bells echoed, creating a storm of sound that threatened to wash away my sanity. I normally wouldn’t mind that much, but today everything I hated seemed enhanced.

I wished I smoked. Then I would have something to do besides walk down these tracks, listening to the fucking bells. I imagined how cool it would look, a dark form walking down the tracks in light snow, surrounded by bells, with a glowing red dot in front of his mouth and smoke following him.

I sighed and mumbled a bit from “The Soft Parade”.

“Can you give me sanctuary… I must find a place to hide… a place for me to hide…”

The echoes of the bells melded with my voice, and it actually sounded all right. I had stolen the noise from those fucking bells and made it my own.

I kept walking, smiling a little, a tiny spring in my step. I came to a gap in the scrub and trees that shielded the tracks from the road and looked out, and saw my friend’s apartment.

He had gone to California for break. He was supposed to leave a bag of fireworks outside his apartment for me, but apparently he had forgotten, because he never called to say he had done it. That bastard.

I noticed all the houses around my friend’s apartment, glowing with little rainbow-colored dots, pissing off all the nightwalkers. The night was supposed to be secret, with occasional flashes of insight under streetlights. These fucking Christmas lights bathed everything in a lie. Christmas was no longer sacred. It was all about who had the brightest lights, the biggest gifts, the warmest smile. Everyone everywhere knew that Christmas was just a sham, but they refused to believe it. Deep down they knew, though. I could see it in their eyes, and their commercials. And now, those assholes were trying to take the night away from us. I knew, had always known, that they hated free thought. And the night inspired that. The silent nights let you think, they let you focus. Everything in the day was a distraction.

I jumped over the tiny, rancid creek between the road and the tracks, and trotted through the gap between the trees. Checked the street for cars, walked across, got on the sidewalk, walked to my friend’s apartment. There was a plastic bag by the trashcans near his backdoor, just like we agreed on. My heart leapt as I checked the street for people, found it blank, and ran over to the bag.

It was heavy. Filled with all the stuff we worked on, the mega-rockets, the M-80s, the volcano on steroids. Everything was in there.

I knew my teeth were flashing in the night, my grin was enormous. My friend came through. That bastard did it. I was wild, I was ready to do anything with these babies.

I couldn’t help but snicker as hundreds of ideas ran through my head. Launch a plastic Santa into the sky? Go reindeer hunting?

No.

These fucking lights, these goddamn blinding Christmas lights. They’re going down.

I stole back across the street, leapt over the creek, got on the tracks and started walking back towards the center of town, towards the power controller thing. I’ve never known what to call it, it certainly isn’t a power plant. I think it just controls the flow of electricity for my town.

I’m going to fuck it up.

I kept walking, till I saw my destination through the trees. I skipped off the tracks, fought my way through the trees, and burst out onto the sidewalk. I walked down the sidewalk, grinning. Out of nowhere, an enormous flatbed trucks pulled up to me. The driver yelled “Hey!”

Aw fuck. What the hell?

I froze and hid the bag behind my back. What the fuck is going on? He can’t possibly know what I’m going to do. Impossible.

“Yeah?” I called out, voice cracking.

“Do you know where Reidel is? The street?”

“Uh, yeah, just.. well, you have to go back up that street right there, take the second left, then the first right, then left again.” My finger is jittering as I try to point out where he should go. I suck at directions. I have no idea where I’m sending this poor guy.

“Oh, thanksalot buddy.”

“Sure.”

He backed up and took off down the street I had pointed out. I sighed with relief, then started thinking. His truck had said “Weidelman’s Repair” or something. Why was he out here at (I checked my cellphone) 10:20 at night? He couldn’t be making a house call. It’s way too late to do something with an enormous truck like that, especially on Christmas.

What the hell.. why was he out here at all? It’s Christmas! Nobody works on Christmas!

Did I just help someone who was about to commit a crime? Steal a bunch of shit from some vacationer’s house?

Well, if he was up to no good, then I did a good thing by giving him shitty directions. Unless my directions were accidentally correct.

Fuck. I had to forget all this. I had a mission.

My destination was across the street, at the top of a hill, totally fenced in. I trotted across the street and laid low. I clambered up the hill, sliding on the shallow snow and long dead grass. I managed to get up, and snuck around the fence to the gate. I looked up. Barbed wire. I looked at the gate. Locked.

Of course, six feet away from the gate, the bottom of the fence was bent up. Easy.

I slid under, onto the large rocks that surrounded the metal components. I stood up and ran over to a shed-sized gray metal box. I opened my cellphone to make it glow, and I found the lock. I used part of the bag as string and tied six M-80s to it. Then I climbed up onto the top of the box and looked around, at my peaceful town. Everything was glowing, pinks and greens, yellows, white reds blues, everything was glowing. One house had an inflatable Yeti. I laughed at those poor bastards. Everything was about to go crazy.

I checked the time. 10:29. The clock tower was about to chime the half hour. I jumped down and held my lighter by the M-80s.

The bells started. I flicked my lighter. Bing bong bing bong.. bong bang bing BOOM! Bong bing bong..

I check the lock. Gone. I swung open the tiny door, to find a bunch of switches. Should I turn them all off? No. I picked up a rock. The bells continued tolling. Bong bang bing BANG BANG BANG BANG bong bing BANG BANG BAM! Bing…. The bells stopped. Sparks popped out of the control board I had just destroyed. I jetted, sending up gravel behind me.

I flew across the street, slipped through the trees, and got back on my tracks. I cackled. I watched, through the trees, as houses went dark. Streetlights went dark. Everything went dark. I doubled over, sniggering and giggling. It hurt to feel this good.

I started walking again, skipping every few steps. One foot came down with a crunch.

I pulled out my cellphone for light and looked at what I had stepped on. A carton of cigarettes. There were two left. I pulled one out, lit up, laid on the tracks and stared at the moon.

cellardoor · 12-29-2005, 04:54 PM

i'm thinking of adding the part where i see the flatbed truck again

cellardoor · 01-01-2006, 11:39 PM

why won't anyone freakin comment this? it's only 1316 words.

Sigg · 01-02-2006, 05:34 AM

It was an interesting read, you did a good job of capturing that feeling of walking in the cold night by yourself just being pissed at everything. The only real problem I had with the story was there really was no plot, no conflict. But otherwise your main character came off as very organic and believable.

ross · 01-02-2006, 05:53 AM

Ok, let me have a shufty... I'm always up for reading your stuff anyway.

I sighed and mumbled a bit from “The Soft Parade”.
“Can you give me sanctuary… I must find a place to hide… a place for me to hide…”
I'm not sure what that adds.

I noticed all the houses around my friend’s apartment, glowing with little rainbow-colored dots, pissing off all the nightwalkers. The night was supposed to be secret, with occasional flashes of insight under streetlights. These fucking Christmas lights bathed everything in a lie. Christmas was no longer sacred.
Nice, liked that paragraph.

inflatable Yeti.
Really? Fantastic!

I particularly liked the idea of the ending, but would have preferred to have had him actually become the "dark form walking down the tracks in light snow, surrounded by bells, with a glowing red dot in front of his mouth and smoke following him" at the end. It would kind of complete the circle for me.
Again I enjoyed it - it did seem to a pretty mindless act in some ways, but people do stuff like that. Maybe there could have been more of a motive.
On the whole - pretty good.
Keep them coming mate!

Raging_Hopeful · 01-02-2006, 05:14 PM

Well another fine example of your grasp of the human condition. It actually reminded me of the crap I pulled when I was 15 and 16. I was the pissed off youth, walking around in the dark looking for stuff to destroy. And goddamn, I hated the music too!!

Maybe it was because I could personally relate, but I really liked this piece. It was nostalgic, with solid, engaging imagery and emotion. Brava and keep writing!

gohn67 · 01-02-2006, 08:25 PM

Hey CellarDoor,
I didn't read it because of the title. And that's because I lately I've been annoyed by some of the titles in these posts. So I've been boycotting them.

As for the story the voice you use for your stories is good and engaging to read as always. Maybe you use variations of "fuck" too much, but I guess it does work because that is your character. You write well in first person. I agree that this story kind of meandered, but what I can I say, I'm guilty of doing that a lot also.

I think you got a good draft though. You got a good skeleton for a story and some good ideas and character. Some of the sentences felt a bit convulted, usually your sentences flow pretty well. So this is definitely something you can work with to make a balance story with character, plot and story telling. It's all a matter of getting yourself to do it. Lot easier said than done.

Anarkos · 01-03-2006, 06:47 AM

Not a bad piece overall. Some clunky sentences, but mostly it was technically okay. The big problem I had, however, was the lack of conflict. Sure, there's the good old-fashioned protagonist-versus-the-world, but, as it is, it's underdeveloped and shallow. The narrator sounds like a ranting child. If you want us to identify with him, then we need more than this. We need to see more than one facet of his personality.

There is, I think, too much internal monologue and too little description and/or action. Show, don't tell. Instead of saying "I wish I smoked", for example, have the narrator look enviously at a smoker. Then flip from that to why he doesn't smoke; a father with lung cancer, for example. Show us levels of his personality. Allow us too sympathise.

I did like the irony of him worrying about helping another possibly commit a crime while preparing to commit one himself...