Ad Hoc Fiction

Steam Wand Nostalgia
Sometimes things don't work out.
    The startup fails.
    The solo career flops.
    The coffeehouse closes.
    My favorite part of those early days (before it went to shit) was steaming the milk and wedding it to the fragrant brown espresso. Flooding the cup with lick-your-lips marshmallow foam. Handing the cup over, a little reluctant to let go. Surface tension slick, rosetta bulging.
    You fall in love and you leave your chest cavity wide open for these sorts of things.
    Shady landlords.
    Apathetic customers.
    Lazy employees.
    Truth is, I don't care anymore. I managed to salvage my La Marzocco FB80 and a Mazzer Major grinder. My parent's basement has 220 power. Some days I don't leave the house, unless I run out of coffee.

Funny How the Colors Stick With You
I remember her color: black speckled with serpent's green. Today, when I should be slumping at my desk writing copy for a natural cleaning product made in Salinas, I'm daydreaming about my mother's toes and how my father used to kiss them. 
      I have a date tonight. One of those muscly Crossfit guys. We met near my house on open mic night – he sidled next to me, complimented my blouse (we both knew he liked what was in my blouse, cradled in my faithful pushup bra), and displayed a fair tenor later in the night when he sang his version of The Color of Love. I'm not sure why I mumbled, "Yes", when he asked me out, maybe I was bored. 
      Hours later, spiderwebs crowning me, I find it: a crystal bottle with striations of color, tumbled to the bottom of a crate of her things. 

Danny and Steve have a pint
"Rita said she saw Bob at the Festival Hall. Said 'e had a splint on his nose."
   "'E 'as got a splint on his nose. He got into a fight with Micky McEntee about um… about string theory. Mick took issue with his views on quantum chromodynamics and glassed him."
   "Fackin' 'ell. Typical Mick."
   "Yeah, fackin' typical of Mick. D'you remember when Karl Brady said that Leibniz’s critique of Cartesian dualism was facile, and Mick kneecapped him?"
   "Yeah. Yeah. 'Arsh."
   "That was 'arsh."
   "Karl was out of order tho."
   "'E was. 'E fackin' was. It’s like that time Micky plunged a corkscrew into Dean Makepeace’s chest, pulled out his heart, and then shoved it into Dean’s mouth before he died. Yeah – that was 'arsh. But what was Dean doing calling Piers the Plowman tonally uneven? You make a provocative comment like that…"
   "'S gonna be consequences."
   "'S gonna be consequences."

A sense of timing
Cheerfully, the doctor plunged the needle into her chubby thigh.
   "Don't worry about all that grit in your knee," he said, in a mock-serious tone. "Most of it will wiggle out. The rest will work its way to your heart and kill you when you're ninety."
   Then he laughed.
She carried the scars of that fall all her life - a slip on the wet leaves, an ankle twisted over the kerb and then the perfect glide on face and knees, body arched to save the new patterned anorak she'd worn for the first time, that wet October day.
   She'd been cautious on slippery surfaces ever after, avoiding skating and skiing, distrusting mud. Seventy-eight years of watching her step. No more accidents for her.
   She looks at her scarred knees and wonders about the doctor's comment.
   Tomorrow will be her ninetieth birthday.
   Today, there's no sign of the grit.

Breaking Dad
Through the crackled panel of the door you see him lying at the foot of the stairs; a grisly painting in mosaic. Blue of the pyjamas he's been wearing since Thursday, white of the skin that never sees sunshine, and crimson of something terrible... up near his head. The picture is all joined together like the tiles on an ancient temple's floor. Beautiful but damaged.

Yesterday he had been more difficult than usual. Said that without her he didn't know what to do with himself. Every morning he got out of bed and just wanted to die. You shrugged it off. He has always been melodramatic. Even before the heavy curtain came to lock his memories down.

She is in hospital and your only job was not to break dad while she was gone.

You fumble the key in the door, your heart pounding.

A Private Thing
It’s her across the landing’s turn to clean the close. I have to tell her every time, even though she knows the rota fine well. I make sure they know the drill when they move in, but young ones are that lazy these days.

Not like it used to be. We took pride in the closes when I was a young bride. Just as important as how you kept your ain flat.

Haven’t seen her for a couple of days. The usual shouting and banging, her screaming, weans crying, him stomping off, hasn’t been happening. It’s been quiet for a while. Just the weans crying now and then, but softer.

None of my business, mind. Marriage is a private thing. But it’s her turn to clean the close, so I’ll give her door a chap later. Aye. Later. Or maybe tomorrow. Or maybe I’ll just clean the close myself.

Mudskipper
You came in a rush when the river rose, my waters breaking as the dam burst upstream. Your screams rasped like mewling cats. As we clustered on rooftops you sucked hungrily at the air.

It was only when the waters receded that your colic calmed. We would lay you on a blanket outside while we dripped sweat over the reconstruction, watching the mudskippers flip and flop across their aqueous domain. Each unlikely flight pulled your eyes wide with wonderment.

Today, I read about the mudskippers' gills, and the tiny bubble of air they trap inside, that perfect pocket of survival. Many years have passed since we lost you to the mud. I guess your bubble burst too soon.

Vitruvian Man
Three mirrors hinge in an arc around you. The corners of your eyes catch either side of your face, one in shadow, one in light. Beyond the reflection of your bare shoulder, the sun and moon hang together in a square of sky framed by a veiled window. 

You twist the lip gloss and trace the fine bristles in a smooth arc across the bow of your epithelium. You fold a tissue and smudge a rose of colour onto the white pulp. The shade reminds you of your wife, gloved hands pruning and planting, weeding and watering. 

You slide a cap over your crown, lift the hairpiece from the faceless mannequin, and secure it with a few drops of spirit gum. 

You slip into the silk dress like a second skin. 

You stand with your arms outstretched, legs parted like the Vitruvian Man. 

A perfect square, a perfect circle.

The Writing Process
Draft 1: Steve bought a cup of coffee.
 
Draft 2: Steve bought an extra-tall, triple-shot, non-fat latte.
 
Draft 7: Steve bought a grande latte from the pretty girl behind the counter.
 
Draft 11: Steve bought a latte from the smiling waitress who reminded him of his mother.
 
Draft 24: Steven Blake purchased a foamy latte from the waitress who looked uncannily like his mother.
 
Draft 46: Steven Palmer-Blake pulled out his gold credit card and paid the pretty waitress for his triple-shot, extra-tall, non-fat, extra-foam, mocha-latte with extra sprinkles, all the while thinking how much the waitress looked like his recently deceased mother.
 
Final draft: Steve bought a cup of coffee.