| And that’s when I ran out of shit to write about. I can’t think of anything. And honestly, who the fuck can blame me? It’s not like I haven’t been doing this for half a decade now… I’ve even kept busy on my breaks. I have to write creative bullshit every day as part of my job, and every week for this shit as my hobby… I could mail it in and coast, but I’m aiming for legend status here, and you don’t get that just writing any old shit that pops into your head!! You have to have a plan! A gimmick! When all else fails, you have to write something completely irreverent, and hope that you confuse your audience enough that they can only assume that you had some kind of masterful design, some kind of triple-layered metaphor that they just aren’t bright enough to grasp, and you pull a total “Emperor’s New Clothes” on them, where they pretend they get it, just so they can be hip like all the other clueless intellectuals! But who wants to win like that? Or through politics and bullshit? I suppose I could call all of you right now, and start begging you to back out of the contest, cause Ol’ Sharp’s on his last legs, and I’ve worked so hard for so long, and I’m not even trying to be a naked emperor, I just want to be the king… Doesn’t that just reach out and tug on your heartstrings? If that didn’t work, I could always remind you that I’m bigger than you, and that I study martial arts. Scared yet? No? What if I also brought up that I was writing all of this on my laptop, racking my brain for ideas, in full uniform, whilst taking a shit? Pants around the ankles, pretty as you please, laptop ON the lap. Still nothing? What if I told you it was an old school typewriter, instead of a laptop? Nerves of steel, you fuckers have. But come ON!! Give a guy a break… This is my big chance, the one I never got in all these years… I don’t even know what to write about, because I’ve always been fired or fell victim to political maneuvering at this stage!! The brass ring has always been snatched away from my grasp by those without the brass balls to get in my way on the way to it… I have no point of reference, I’m off the edge of the map!! What do you write about that hasn’t already been done? What’s the norm for this sort of thing? Do I take classic literature, and satire it? Do I suddenly become Alice falling down the rabbit hole, or King Arthur drawing his sword? Maybe a soldier finally reaching the enemy stronghold? It’s all been done!! All is lost!! THERE IS NO ORIGINALITY LEFT IN THIS BUSINESS!!! Where do we go from here? How do we answer the questions we have when we no longer have our handy-dandy set of accepted laws and metaphysical givens? Who sets the precedence for unprecedented events? “Why, even if you haven’t had carrots in days,” Sharp began to mutter drunkenly from the edge of my tub, watching the bile drip from his lips onto the (previously) virgin white surface. “Does it always look like there’s carrots in your stomach before you’re done puking?” I leaned over as much as was safe for my modesty, and spied into the tub from my seat on the commode. He was right… It looked like he’d puked up the entire contents of his stomach, and somehow produced a handsome portion of shaved carrot as a garnish. “It’s stomach lining, my friend!” I answered quite cheerfully, glad to see he’d regained some of his faculties. Not all of them, obviously, as he should have been fully aware of the origin of the ‘carrots’, since I myself was. Not to mention, I’m almost certain he’d referenced it before himself, back during one of those dreadfully depressing drug promos. This was most distressing… He’d lost the XCW years… We didn’t have much time left now, did we old friend? He looked up at me with the sweetest smile. Only his creator could really appreciate it, caked with mucus and Shepherds Pie as it was… but that being me, I was heartbroken at the brilliance in the simplicity of his design. Hold on… there. One of those ‘pushers’… Like giving birth, those! He didn’t have much left to push, but by god, he was giving it one hell of an effort!! “And why are you on my toilet again, rosy cheeked guy?” he asked at the conclusion of this latest bit of excitement, as my face beamed with pride, no doubt, at this sign of the return of his ocular acuity. It’s true, my cheeks were ruddier than a White Chapel whore’s… Likely all the more so for the straining, and I was never happier for that fact. “Well, dear friend,” I began to explain. “You seemed as though you were going to die alone in your bathroom, and I’d simply spent entirely too much free time and bottomless reserves of energy getting you to where you are now, we couldn’t have you Hendrix in the latrine now, could we?” He stared at me and my enormous grin like I was quite bat-shit, and he was damn right to do so. Unfortunately, he only had that fire for a moment or two before he lapsed back into a sort of doldrums, staring over the side of the tub once more. “We all die alone.” “Oh, now don’t go spouting movie lines! We’re quite a few steps above that, aren’t we? I mean, sure, we’re already taxing the split personality cliché to its outer limits, but I dare say we’re doing it better than anyone else… But trying to cram in extra brilliance via pop cinema and fiction is hardly our forte. Let’s leave that garbage to the other legend’s handlers…” I swear I didn’t spit the word. Really, no offense meant. “So,” he started again, and actually made the effort to push himself up to a seated position against the wall across from me. This was good not only because it showed he had taken grasp of his motor functions once more, but because he was not in the least bit daunted by being eye level with my wedding tackle. “So,” he said again, realizing that the readers had likely forgotten he had the first time, what with my babbling. “We’re not going for cheap intellectualism here… then why do you talk like a fuckin’ Limey?” Have I been? I’ll have to proof read my dialogue before I submit this. Not the effect I was going for. “Maybe a little too much Douglas Adams?” I offered, weakly, somewhat disarmed by being called on such a thing by a fictional concept with multiple head traumas. “Maybe. Maybe a little too much Alan Moore.” “No more subculture references, please… we’re trying to keep this pure!” “Says you.” says him, with a humorless guffaw. “Pure? I’m pretty sure I was puking up three different types of pills while you wrote a novel on my shitter... I dunno how you avoided a lap full of dinner, but I know I’m not taking the heat when Suzy sees this tub in the morning.” “Well, you should be a sight more grateful, then, that she’d not finding your dead, bloated remains on the toilet.” “I can’t ref pop culture, but you try and tell me I nearly Elvised? Not more than two pages after bringing up Hendrix?” “Lest we forget, I’m the writer! I just don’t want to overdo it. Now, have you thought of anything particularly clever for me to get us through this between last time I asked, and your last bout of projectile vomit?” I ask, hopeful beyond hope. “I still can’t think of anything.” He answers, and then looks off at nothing unparticular. That’s some kind of humor there, but we won’t get into it, simply for brevity’s sake. “But let me just go over this again, to try and get the gears turnin’…” “Go ahead…” “You, apparently… or, obviously I should say… don’t belong here.” “Correct.” “Yeah, shush… that wasn’t a question.” “Duly noted.” “Anyway, you’re not… from here. And you’re not like a normal person… You’re some kind of writer, who spends all his free time writing about… me?” he trails off for a moment, and to avoid his train of thought becoming completely derailed, I keep my answer brief. “The majority of the time, yes.” “Okay, so… More like, I’m not like a normal person. I don’t exist, for real. I’m a character in a series of stories, stories you write. In some form of bizarre ‘Creative Writing Battle Royale’, your little stories about me combine and compete with those of dozens of losers around the planet, who have nothing better to do than sit, fat and happy in their panties, and also go on perpetrating this fictional world.” “Uh huh, and our stories shape your lives.” I interject quite unnecessarily, and probably quite a bit more enthusiastically than the situation calls for. “I’m sort of like god, I guess… If it would make you happy, I could answer some grand questions about the secrets of the universe for you.” “No, that’s okay… you pretty much sorted me out on the carrots thing. Wouldn’t want to overdo it.” His egotism cut like a knife… Faced with the divine force in his existence laying cable before him and offering the answers to life, the universe, and everything, he verbally bitch slaps the shitting deity, secure that he is still the master of his own destiny as he wipes spoiled milk from his chin with a face cloth. He was amazing. “Anyway, blabbermouth… You’ve got some kind of big deadline coming up, and your ideas for it amount to sweet fuck all. So, when I hit the wall, health wise, about two hours ago, you Scotty-beam-me-downed onto my toilet, and watched over me to keep me from keeling over while you continued writing.” Dig that crazy exposition. “Yes, yes, that’s exactly right… And now that you’re not dying anymore, I thought maybe together, you and I could come up with something truly innovative and brilliant to wow the judges, and cinch us a big win! Heh, I think just the fact that we’re giving up sleeping with our gorgeous wives to do this right now should do the deed for us on effort alone, but likely most would state that since we’re the only ones in this contest capable of getting laid, our refusal to do so would be seen in a more negative light.” He pursed his lips at that and nodded for a few minutes before he began pushing himself up the wall. He was nearly standing now, and seemed to be in deep thought. “And you say this is the first time we’ve really gotten an opportunity like this, because in the past we’ve always gotten diddly-fucked at the last minute?” “Yes,” I answer, while internally hoping that he meant diddly-fuck in the same way that I would. “We’re not terribly popular, due to our attitudes, you and I.” “Can’t argue there…” He wandered back to the sink, and looked himself in the mirror again. Both eyes open, no stupid grin… nasty dark bruise forming on his jaw line, but it’s likely not broken at least. He fingers at the bruise lightly, pensively, then seems overly pleased by its existence, smiling slightly. “Heh,” he coughs, still looking himself over in the mirror. “So, there really is no free will. We’re just a series of ridiculous stories on some computers. Just the product of a bunch of bored kids sitting around trying to be something.” “Well, some of you… but you’ve taken on a life of your own in many ways! You’ve become quite the icon, transcended the flotsam and jetsam of the common rabble.” “And yet now, I’m apparently coming up on the finish line of my run, and you’re looking for one last good hook for the story… am I right?” “Well, for all intents and purposes… yes. I’m sort of shooting for immortality before other things pull me away from this project.” “What other things? I thought it was your job to plot out my life for me?” He growls, venom dripping from every syllable. “Well, actually, no… You sort of sprang to life out of a hobby.” “A hobby? I’m your hobby? So what’s your real job?” “I write… military fiction.” The anger was doing a great deal to rouse him from the final bits of stupor that clung to him. It was also tightening his jaw as blood pumped faster to the wounded area. “And where the fuck do I go when you go back to that?” “Where do dreams go when you wake up?” I answer in the most brutally honest way I can muster. He deserved to hear it, really, after all I’d put him through. I mean, honestly, we torture these poor people for each other’s amusement… the least we can do when presented with a situation like this is not to formulate bold faced lies to feed them on top of it all. He was letting the thought mull over in his brain, really bouncing the concept off his synapses. By the looks of him, he didn’t like the feel of it. “What if…” he begins, still looking deep in thought. “What if you’re just the result of Post-Concussion Syndrome?” “What?” “People who have been involved in motor vehicle accidents, falls, or other injuries involving a blow to the head sometimes develop post-concussion syndrome.” He began, wagging his finger a bit while smiling at himself in the mirror. “A syndrome is a medical term used when a person is experiencing symptoms in a variety of areas. Post-concussion syndrome occurs when a patient is experiencing physical injuries, emotional distress, and thinking difficulties following a concussion or physically traumatic event.” I am at a loss, completely struck dumb by this sudden outburst of medical knowledge. I didn’t write that, what the fuck was he talking about? Where was this coming from?! “A concussion can cause your thinking to be temporarily altered.” He continued, becoming slightly more animated as though picking up momentum while leaving me hopelessly behind. “If you begin to pay more attention to this alteration in your thinking, that may lead to increased worry about your health and your future… I’ve got this crazy vicious cycle of physical injuries causing emotional stress and resulting in psychological apparitions… My dead friends, dead father… Now a guy that looks vaguely like me that is solely responsible for everything that happens in my life, the good and the bad.” “Wh-what… what if that’s just like, the Deus ex Machina…” I stammer, attempting to regain control over this altercation, and finding it increasingly malfortunate that I chose to begin it while seated on the toilet, allowing myself to quite literally be caught with my pants down… “Shut your damn MOUTH, and stop typing while I’m talking to you, Kaufman!!” “Wh-who?” “You came here to help me sort out my head, right? Well congratulations, I’m not dead, and I’m feeling quite well now. I’ve been having difficulties focusing lately, but rather than really taking the time to deal with that, I’ve gone and drugged myself up and bounced my head off of the floor to complicate matters more. While I appreciate your attempting to take the blame-slash-credit for the state I’m in, I don’t think I needed some half naked 'Fictionaught' from the ‘real world’ to come tell me I’m short on time to make my mark and get out of the game before that decision is taken away from me.” Oh, good… first the creative wellspring runs dry, and now I’ve lost control of my main character. “Oh, fine, type your little heart out, Jessica Fletcher… You may find this entertaining, but I’ve got more important shit to do than waste all my time trying to shit out a story for you!” And with that, he spun about and walked out of the room. This simply had to be catalogued. This was wholly unprecedented… not only had I encountered the physical manifestation of a fictional abstract I created, but it exercised independent thought and memory recall in my presence… I… Just then, Sharp returns to the room, pointing at the writer. “Two more things… If you wanna beat these little dorks, go to their houses and beat their ass. When I fight Logan, Pericolo, and Collins next week, I’m not gonna do it with words… I’m gonna do it with FOOT ON ASS… You’re a decent sized kid, the only thing you should be using the internet for is to find porn! TWO… If you’re responsible for writing everything about me, I’m likely some kind of fantasy extension of what you wish you could be... so why the fuck all the drama and misfortune?"” “Well, Mr. Sharp…” the writer begins hesitantly. “That’s the type of thing these folks want to read… only a complete tool would turn around and write themselves up as some invincible hero, some genius possessed of a dizzying intellect that they couldn’t even properly represent on paper… I mean, how does one even put genius into words? Or give ones self the perfect life without seeming cheesy? I realize we could be having more sex, but I don’t write your wife’s character. Other than that, I just write what I know.” Sharp stares at him for a moment, some of the tension leaving his muscles. “So, my father?” he asks, clenching and releasing his hands at his sides. “Completely based on mine.” The writer answers, and Sharp nods solemnly, then rolls his neck. He turns to walk away… …but then turns back, smashing his fist across the writers face and knocking him off the toilet and into the vomit-lined wash basin. The writer immediately vanishes from sight without a sound. “Then you should have fucking known better.” He says with little to no emotion, staring at the empty toilet… and the unfortunately far from empty tub. |
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