Dr. Apopolus

At the moment this is just a short story, but I'm thinking of pushing it to novella as I've bits and pieces coming together. Let me know if I should continue or not. Please give some feedback. Interesting? etc.


I guess this first part would sort of be the prologue, the second is the beginning of Ch1.
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The pollution, the greasy haze, strutting down the main drag I was batting diaper follicles from the air with my eyelids. The traffic, I could sense it, even with the drapes shut and the pillow over my head. The beggars, I could hear them necking at my chamber door. Me - feeling like a porous rock formation, stiff, expressionless, and oh-so cold.

I rarely give anything much thought. I'd be spending a month in Shanghai. I didn't think about it again until I'd arrived and then, still, very little. Loading my luggage into a tacky gold taxi, I coughed and sputtered excited chunks of phlegm onto the back seat. They call it Shanghai heartburn, and it begins the moment your plane hits the tarmac. You can literally feel your hair fraying.

Streaming past bike fiends, trinket bimbos, and diamond back hustlers, I arrived at the decrepit hotel. There was a bar on one side, I wrote home, a sharp exclamation mark on the business side of a postcard. I commenced consumption.

Shanghai has a natural regression, it's a supplement. You take it anally, 3 times a day, otherwise you take it orally in a hotel restroom from a snot nosed hooker you just bargained down from 300.

Later that night, when you're wedged between the cogs of the city, you stub your toe just to get a bairing. Due North? Wherever the crowds are. Due South? Anywhere but the direction your feet are marching.

You look around and you see rainbows. In a trash can - dirty denim, half a stiletto, the contents of a Croatians lower intestine. Don't tell me that's not beautiful.

But when the haze fades, the toxic haze, you awake upright, a medium-rare hangover, a missing pant leg.

What had happened? I vaguely recall a verbal standoff with a brick wall, getting intimate with a pile of rubble, and a moment of zero-grav down a stairwell.

But through this smog, smog you could stand a spoon in, I remember her. God damn, do I remember her.

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A gale tightens, takes me hand, shows me where to tread. The winding streets, bend, there's no way that doesn't involve a lactose less maze. People pass, scuff my boot on a window, I'm getting heckled by a storekeep. Take a wrong turn, four blocks, two intersections, I'm lost. But I'm always lost, keep marching.

My mother used to tell me that good things happen to those who wait. Not anymore, nothing good happens. If you wait you die. You tie your shoelaces? Your competitors use Velcro. You cook your own dinner? Don't, Lean Cuisine, microwave, 3 minutes - High.

Everyone speeds up their life in some little way. In the end, all those saved minutes don't matter. It's the city that poses a hindrance. Getting lost cannot be helped.

And where I'm going, nobody knows.

I was in this city because I needed a vacation, so why did I need to hurry? My work leave had piled up, I'd lucked out, cashed-up and taken off. Here I am.

A Marketplace.

It was cultivated by vermin, bargain bin pultergeists, prodding in pockets, bidding me tidings in exchange for a dime - something to make a days work seem less arduous. I felt for these people, these kretins, whisping around, baiting the crowd. These people could turn a pretty dollar, turn it on its head, replicate it, and at the end of the day blow it all on craps, booze, whatever poison was on sale at the time.

I drifted past a palm reader. He grabbed my hand, assistant calling out price listings. I shot off into the crowd, assistant barking like a cocker spaniel.
I didn't know these gutters, I didn't knew these people, but these people knew the gutters, and these people knew me.

I noticed a juggler, shunned into the corner by the ferocity of the market place, people paying little attention to his struggle. I snaked past an antique jewelry tent right up to him. He had five balls going. I was impressed, I could only manage three.

When he noticed my stare a smile errupted, momentarily covering years of neglect. His face was cracked and disfigured, his lips bounding like two red slinkys down a cobbled stairwell. It broke my heart, I disappeared.

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Happenstance

Shadow Reeves

it is nice. but very hard to read as there is no flow, there are way to many breaks in every part of your story.

i wouldn't call it a short story as there is no complication. your whole story is basically describing shanghai and the people... you begin with a possible love interest, but nothing becomes of it.

it is very powerful, your wording is excellent, nice turn of phrase and imagery powerful. but nothing actually happens...and thus your problem

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why use 1 word when 3 will do the same job? - philosophy of novel writing

Dr. Apopolus

Thanks for taking the time to give some feeback.

Your points are the very reason I think I can turn this into something more substantial. These are notes, with some semblance of a story forming.

I still have Shanghai fresh in my mind. Here's hoping I get to the end.

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Happenstance

thales

Very nicely worded. You conjured vivid emotions and scenes.

There was only one thing I noticied with one pass of this:

When I thought of hooker here, I thought she would be the one taking it orally. What am I missing here?

LolliAdverbs

The wording is so Sam Spade, I love it. The descriptions, in particular, are great. I just wish I knew where the story was going.

Two errors I saw immediately:

Bairing - bearing

Crotians lower intestine -- Crotian's lower intestine.

Dr. Apopolus

I realize this is plagued with errors and I posted this simply to see if the style is adequate. I don't want to commit to 80,000 words and find out it's total bull-shit.

But, yes, in the way of a story, I've plenty brewing.

Actually, I'm deep into the thicket of this tale. If you'd like to take a look, let me know. I assure you it's miles ahead of this little snippet.

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Happenstance

LolliAdverbs

I'd love to look at what else you have. After all, I really enjoyed this snippet. It's a style I long to write in, but fail at miserably.

nacreous

umm, Jack Kerouac is dead, dude. Deal with it. Of course, he was a genius. The style is very close, very similar, and I think you should break away more. The stream of consciousness is a complicated path to follow. Good luck.

Dr. Apopolus

He's not the only one to write like this. It's a style.

Edit - Also, I've never read any Jack Kerouac.

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Happenstance