A Short Story

She was being argumentative. The entire drive she complained about how I brought the wrong granola bars, and even after I insisted that she should just eat them, there is nothing wrong with these granola bars, she proceeded to cry and wine. After a while she calmed down and eventually forgot about the whole episode.

I got a call from Jazz, and when I saw her name appear in the synthetic light, I rolled down the window and tossed the phone out onto the wet, black concrete.

“Daddy, who was that?”

The raw look of innocence weaved into her face was enough for me to puke on the steering wheel. But I didn't. I vomited something else.

“It was your - mother, Janet.”

“Oh.”

At a gas station I parked and got out and told Janet to lock the doors. She nodded politely and I walked in and paid for thirty dollars of gas. A*s was painted all over the interior of the convenient store and it bled out onto the outside on the windows in skimmy euphemisms inscribed in fluorescence. Magazines, DVD's, books, toys (?), and also they sold ginger ale.

I bought some of the ginger ale for Janet.

After squirting thirty bucks of Arabian gravy into my cars gashole, I tapped on the window and Janet laughed when she did not unlock the f*****g door.

"Okay, Janet, come on., open the door,"

"Nope"

"Janet."

"Whats the password, Daddy?"

"It's screw you, you little s**t."

"Nope."

"JANET!"

"Okay!" After the reluctant click I opened the door and started the car and grabbed Janet like I was going to hurt her, but instead I pianoed my fingers around her body in lithe tickles and she laughed loudly as I said, " you little s**t, you little s**t . . . "

We drove on. Soon Janet asked, "Daddy, I have a question."

"Yes."

"Why did that store where we got gas said that they sold dirty books? Why would they sell dirty books? Why don't they sell clean books?"

"Uhmm, well, Janet, uhmm -- some people like dirty books."

"But why? Who wants to read books with like dirt and boogers and pee and poop on it."

"I don't know, kid, theres some weird people out there."

"Oh."

The road curled down the great mountain, thick with pine and redwood and everything alive with sprouting green colors. A sign materialized behind the prism of fog that hung over the road, and Janet pointed and tried to read it.

“Buh, bluh, boo, blue, k " ”

“It says Blue Kramer, honey.”

“Blue Kramer?”

“That's right. This is where we are going to live for a while. Out in the forest. How does that sound, Janet?”

“Does Santa live up here?”

“I think Santa lives in the next town.”

“I want to go to the other town!”

“No, this place is better, honey, I think Santa might drive through here a few times.”

“I want to live where Santa lives!”

“Janet.”

“Daddy!”

I pulled over to the side of the road and looked at her in the rearview mirror.

"Janet, listen, Santa doesn't live up here. He lives up in Alaska, and we are in Blue Kramer right now."

"SANTA!"

"Janet, Satan is not real, I mean, Santa is not real!"

"Not real?"

"Santa is not a real person. He might have lived a long time ago, and he might have given kids presents, but he doesn't anymore, because he does not exist anymore, hes just dirt right now, decomposing into mud, and poop and pee, and all those times you got scared when I told you Santa was coming into the house to put presents under the tree, well you got scared for nothing, because that was just me putting presents under the tree -- it was me, and, and -- I am Santa Clause."

"You're Santa Clause, Daddy?"

"I am Santa."

She was quiet for a long time after that, and I felt her eyes watch me in wonder as I drove the car.

The house was on the lake, and after twenty five minutes of sifting through the elder trees and the deer, we pulled into the driveway. Janet was the first one out of the car, and she inspected the surroundings thoroughly.

“Daddy, I found a girls underwear.”

She held it up to my face and I recognized the red lace. I took it out of her hands and dropped it.

“Janet, don't pick that up! That's dirty! A girl might have peed in that.”

“Or pooped.” She irked out those words and giggled. “Or she pooped, daddy.”

“Okay, Janet, okay, enough, come help me with the bags.”

“Okay, Daddy.”

Once everything was unpacked and Janet had settled her things into her room, we walked around the back of the house. The sky was swelling with black clouds, and the electricity in the air around us tickled our ears like television static. The thunder roared and Janet screamed in delight.

“Daddy, look a boat!”

Her little white worm of a finger pointed down the rotted deck. I looked at the small row boat tied around the old wood of the deck and the cloud above us seemed to grow ominously. Janet's face burned with excitement, and she ran down the deck.

“God d****t, Janet! Get back here!”

She screamed until she got to the end of the small pier and jumped into the boat. My heart swelled in trepidation and my lungs filled up my throat, imagining her being swallowed by the black waters.

I ran after her and the deck shook with my heavy weight. 

"Daddy, lets go for a ride!"

I balanced myself at the end of the deck and leaned down to look at her, and my face filled with hot blood and I felt the veins swell out in intensity, and I said, "Janet, get out of that boat right now!"

"Daddy! Get in, lets go for a ride!"

"Janet its not safe!"

"DADDY!" Her scream raped my ears and I gave in.

"OKAY, S**T, LETS GO."

I stepped into the boat and sat next to her.

"Whats this place called, Daddy?"

"It's called Blue Kramer. We already established that."

"Blue Kramer. Hmmmm."

"They say its named after the moon and how it shines on the lake, the entire lake turns blue, like a crystal..."

"Like a flower blooming."

I laughed. "Sure, kid. Like a flower."

We ended out in the middle of the lake. The wind was blowing in violent heaps of waves and Janet was still screaming, as happy as could be.

"Okay, Janet, sit down. We need to get back to the house."

"No, Daddy! This is so much fun!"

The clouds commenced to relieve their entire stock, and monochrome droplets of ice splattered upon the surface of Blue Kramer. I grabbed the mounted ours and manually rowed back to the surface. Its a good thing I am 12% Mexican, however it is not. Quite the opposite. It is terrible. But then again, I am pretty good at rowing a motorless boat. Hmmmm. Contradictions. Contradictions. I had to write that word twice. Okay now I am just getting off track. Goddammit, I hate this f*****g computer so much. F**k this piece of s**t. I mean, I have a typewriter, I could write on that and get the same s**t written, but what the f**k, Shirley, its not f*****g the fifties anymore, am I right? They're fun just to type some bullshit, but seriously, how the f**k did people get s**t done back then, on f*****g manual typewriters? What the f**k? Are you kidding me? No wonder Hemingway blew his brains out. How many f*****g times do you backspace when you are writing a paper on your laptop? Say, every fifth letter? So think about that. Every fifth letter, you have to backspace and correct your mistake on the paper that will end up to amount to well over two thousand words. Five pages at the most. Okay, now put yourself fifty years back devoid of the luxury of backspacing, and being a student, or worse, being f*****g Thomas Wolfe, writing these millions of words just to compile his whole life into ink, and to be forced to write it on a f*****g mentally retarded typewriter...

"Daddy, look!"

I followed the trail of her wormy finger to the bloated dead body that floated on the thrashing surface of the black water. I started to row. I didn't want her to smell the lies in the air...

Hello, Ladies and Gentlemen, Random Readers. I want to conclude this terrible piece of writing right now, right now just for your own benefit. I could go on writing this bullshit all day, I am f*****g bored and got nothing to do.  I could write a f*****g book if wanted to, but I don't. Instead I write this crappy cracker jacky poop with stupid little prizes inside. Admit that some of that s**t you read up there had vague hints of being anything good... Anyways. No more of this story, I'll cut the reel. How did you even find yourself reading this? I bet you're like from India or something. So the story ends with some cheap, generic Hollywood ending, something really stupid, with like a crazy f****r in a hat with a machete or something, I don't know. I write s**t, but yet whenever I read my words in the printed form there are always changes. Corrections that should never have been corrected. Alterations that should have never been altered. My story can never be told. There will always be some a*****e out there to censor my voice. You hearing me, Scholastic? Don't you ever think about printing my teen erotica series called, Sex on Maple Street, Rape on the Third Floor, because that s**t is gold.

Author's Note

Nobel worthy

Reviews

[Calliope]

I'm laughing so hard right now, you have no idea. Sorry, I had this mental perception of your previous writing that went a little like, "wow so poetic and meaningful and I bet there's definitely some deeper message beneath it all" and this. Well. The farm animals have officially staged rebellion and taken the farmer hostage. They are running the farm. The farm is highly profitable. Neighbouring farms have noticed the competition and are now seeking new marketing strategies.
I had a point behind that metaphor.
Regardless, I don't think you could ever disguise what this is with a cheap Hollywood ending. Even if you stuck it on a gold plated nickel platter and sprayed it with Chanel No. 5, the underlying sense of wrongness, of inevitable corruption and decay would still peek out and wave a cheery hello.
You've just written entropy. Congratulations.

[Chadvonswan]

Hahaha oh god that's the perfect description for my writing process:entropy.
S**t, I'm sorry you read this entire thing, it's really a pathetic piece of ink.
But I really enjoyed your review, ''twas enlightenin upon itself
Thanks

[Gaston Villanueva]

Arabian gravy lol
A lot of little things stuck with me (like corrections that should never have been corrected) and it's cool how we get to see your thoughts during your writing process
Awesome

[Chadvonswan]

Thanks a lot G-DADDY. Im glad you enjoyed. I just added a new story right now if you wanna check it out!

[Nadia Gerassimenko]

I bet the dude with the machete is Danny Trejo.

Anyways, this was funny as hell. Especially the thoughts of the story writer being typed in invisible parentheses. It was interesting to get into his perverse and frustrated thoughts. I think you can only polish it a bit, as you said, but keep it as is. It is hilarious and unexpected.

[Chadvonswan]

I'm glad you found this humorous. Thanks for reading, Nadia!

[Marie]

Nobel worthy indeed. I am not from India, but I read this piece, because you say interesting things now and then. I am certain that "Sex on Maple Steet, Rape on the Third Floor" will someday be a classic, and requied reading in all literature classes.

[Chadvonswan]

I thoroughly appreciated your review, Marie. I do have hopes, though, to revamp this story and solidify its structure, and take out the sidetracked bullshit. But I think it's funny as is. Idk.